The Marie Antoinette Syndrome
Posted by Heading Out on October 11, 2007 - 10:00am
A short while ago I wrote about my concerns that, with a growing drum roll of articles decrying the use of coal, we might find ourselves short of power, at a time when we have a real need. The tone of articles written about the mining industry are virtually all negative, with very few counter-arguments being made to demur at the emotive tone of the language used in writing about this subject. The thought returned today as I read the article in the Guardian that Leanan had highlighted in Wednesday’s Drumbeat. The piece, by George Monbiot, bemoans the creation of a new surface mine in Wales.
As I watched the machine scraping away the first buckets of soil, one thought kept clanging through my head: "If this is allowed to happen, we might as well give up now." It didn't look like much: just a yellow digger and a couple of trucks taking the earth away. But in a secure compound behind me were the heaviest beasts I have ever seen - 1,300 horsepower or more - lined up and ready to start digging one of the largest opencast coal mines in Europe. In Romania perhaps? The Czech Republic? No, on a hilltop in south Wales.
I am thinking of calling this the Marie Antoinette Syndrome – she of the “let them eat cake,” quotation. Because there is a reality to life that seems to be beyond the comprehension of writers of this ilk. George Monbiot refers to the opening of the mine as being a sign of a “re-entry into the coal age,” but we never left it. Coal has been, and is, used extensively around the world as a fuel source, and in the United States produces more than half the electricity consumed. It is one of the cheapest (in straight dollars per kWh) sources of power for a utility. Solar is currently about five times as expensive as coal power. Further the coal in place in the UK, even if not at the moment a reserve, still totals more than 45 billion tons .
We are very rapidly approaching the point where world oil production will likely peak and then start to decline. The quantities of fuel that will have to be found to replace this gap are not likely to be found in the occasional wind farm, dotted over the landscape, nor in solar panels on the roofs of very profitable corporations. The alternatives to letting the populace “freeze in the dark” are starkly limited. A significant amount of that power will likely have to come from coal, for a number of different reasons.
Partially it is because it is a technology already in place and functioning, one that is not that difficult to scale up to meet increased need (China being an illustrative example). Partially it is because there is little else on the horizon that has a chance of meeting the need, at an affordable cost.
Oops, there I go touching hot buttons again. But consider this, politicians do not get elected because they voted to double your electric bill. There is great concern when bills rise by 10-20%, consider if this was multiplied by a factor of ten to change the mix to more solar, for example. (The cake analogy). It is not a practical reality. Yet politicians with a degree of social responsibility recognize that they must do something. I have no mandate to defend the British Government, nor any great wish to, but it does seem fair to note that they have been working to find future supplies of energy from a variety of sources to meet anticipated future needs. In this context they cannot just wear rosy glasses but must recognize certain fundamental truths. One of these is that coal is a part of the energy future.
So now we come to the second part of the discussion – why surface mine the coal? The new surface mine is near Merthyr Tydfil, in the South Wales coal field, where there was, for many years a large underground mining tradition. Part of the new mine will, in the process, apparently clean up some of the mess left (waste heaps etc) from some of that era. The answer also addresses part of the question as to why mountain top mining is allowed in the United States. The first part of the answer is that we need the coal (see above). The second part of the answer is that surface mining is a lot cheaper (in terms of safety as well as dollar cost) than underground mining. Now there is an interim cost, in that while the mine is in operation it looks pretty ugly (you can for example watch the video that accompanied a recent Washington Post article here. What that video did not show, nor did any of the others I ran quickly through (Google searching “Mountain top mining You tube”) was the condition of the land after the mining company has finished land reclamation. Comments about “moonscape” relate to what it looks like during mining, it turns out to be quite hard to find photos of reclaimed land in a quick search, but there are some here that suggest that it doesn’t end up in the same shape as it is in while mining is going on, but can be more useful and (since it also includes golf courses) not wholly unattractive.
Now it could be that the coal could be mined in a less obtrusive way – underground mining is less obvious, and was the traditional way of mining in much of West Virginia and Wales. But the waste has still to be stored somewhere, and the process is more costly than surface mining in a number of ways. And so, you might say, why don’t we develop new technology to help solve these issues.
Well here’s the rub, there are now only 13 universities in the United States that teach mining, and in total, as a recent article (ppt file) showed, there are 69 faculty of whom 29 are anticipated to being going to retire in the near future. There is one (1) faculty member under the age of 30. As demand for students rise (and enrollments are increasing) the amount of time for research declines (not that there was ever much money to fund it in the first place). So where are these new methods of mining going to come from? The last time this happened the Government gave one of the leading engineering/university groups in the US a large chunk of money to find the answer (they were not a mining school). they reckoned, I suppose, that if you could work out how to put a man on the moon, that mining coal would be a piece of cake. It turned out about the way you might have expected, right Dave?
Finding new technologies has not been an imperative for about 25 years or so, and so there is not a whole lot of innovation going around. And there is still the cost issue – how much extra is the general public going to be willing to pay on their electric bill (since that is where it ends up) to develop new methods and then pay for their use. The historic answer, which has driven the steps to find the cheapest way to produce coal, is not much!
There is also another worry which I thought I might mention, since as Aniya has noted, my reading gets a bit broader about the time I go to Energy Conferences. (And we have one coming up next week). There was an article on ABC News this week about the growing concerns for Atlanta as it faces the fourth year of a drought. There are an increasing number of problems that the metropolis faces and it is approaching a point where there will not be enough water, period, without a long and continuous period of major rain. So, being of that frame of mind, I looked to see what the weather was like back in the Medieval Warming Period and while it was apparently still warmer then up in Newfoundland than it is now, the prospects for further south are not promising. For example in the Hudson Valley the drought lasted about 500 years.
Aside from views of cattails and blackbirds, the marshes in the lower Hudson Valley near New York City offer an amazingly detailed history of the area's climate. Sediment layers from a tidal marsh in the Hudson River Estuary have preserved pollen from plants, seeds, and other materials. These past remnants allowed researchers from Columbia University, New York, N.Y. and NASA to see evidence of a 500 year drought from 800 A.D. to 1300 A.D., the passing of the Little Ice Age and the impacts of European settlers. . . . . . From the pollen record found in sediments in Piermont Marsh of the lower Hudson Valley, a Medieval Warm period was evident from 800 to 1300 A.D. Researchers know this from the striking increases in both charcoal, a sign of dry vegetation and fires, and pollen from pine and hickory trees. Prior to this warming spell, there were more oaks, which prefer a wetter climate.
So if we are heading back into that cycle then perhaps water issues may well become evident within the next few years at about the same time as we are looking at finding alternatives to oil, which could make life extremely interesting, as they say.
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There are a multitude of renewable energy sources; you have only addressed solar photovoltaic. Let's examine a few of the rest;
- Solar thermal power generation (towers and troughs)
- Solar hot water systems
Having a wide variety frees us from depending on any one particular source, and reduces variability associated with individual sources.
You mentioned costs, though completely left out external costs for coal burning such as air pollution (smog, soot, acid rain, global warming, and toxic air emissions), wastes generated (Ash, sludge, toxic chemicals, and waste heat), and the effects on the land where mining occurs (mountaintop destruction, water pollution [including heavy metals], and the use of invasive species to 'restore' the environment).
Because there is a reality to life that seems to be beyond the comprehension of writers of this ilk.
We can do much to reduce our usage of electricty; there is no 'reality' that says we much continue to waste energy for largely whimsical purposes. For example, I have a well-insulated passive solar house powered primarily by net-metered PV with efficient appliances; my worst electric bill has been $57 during a long stretch of 100F days in August (we employ a conservation mindset).
The days of endless dirty cheap power are numbered, and it is pointless to argue for it's continuation, especially in light of its impacts.
I looked to see what the weather was like back in the Medieval Warming Period and while it was apparently still warmer then up in Newfoundland than it is now
Your source being a Wikipedia entry of an anecdotal quote from 6 centuries ago? I would suggest that we refer to more scientific investigations in the future, such as the National Research Council's study of this topic.
Arguing to expand the use of coal while bemoaning the droughts brought on by climate change presents us with an argument that is utterly and completely self-defeating. You may want to stick to oil resource forecasting in the future.
The point of the article is well made though. Its easy to say people should do X, or shouldn't do Y. However people will take what appears to be the best option they are presented with at any particular time. In practical reality, if its a choice between freezing during a winter, and burning coal - they WILL burn coal. Long term climate effects are very unlikely to impact intense short term needs decision making.
As such, getting the take up for any of the options you list relies on it being the best option at the moment of need.
Are they ready to roll?
Are they able to scale?
Are they cheap to implement?
Will they deliver what's needed?
Will they deliver what's wanted?
Its no good telling people they would be better off with fancy little cakes they cannot afford, next week. You need to provide them with the bread they can afford right now, baked in large quantities.
Are the alternative options you list capable of being bread rather than cake?
If you hadn't already been made aware, Denmark currently produces 20% of its power from wind energy alone.
Solar hot water heaters are on hundreds of thousands of roofs around the world.
Hydropower is well established in dozens of countries.
You seem to suggest that we ignore improving home insulation levels, and seek only the most convenient, regardless of the overall consequences. Hardly the sentiments of the citizens of the developed countries. The vested interests do have their supporters, of course, who decry any change from the status quo, unless it is to use even more of their 'services'.
You need to provide them with the bread they can afford right now, baked in large quantities.
In other words, "feed and grow the addiction"? This sounds much like the words of a drug pusher...
I think you're missing the point. Yes these technologies CAN work, but they only get taken up if they are the best option at the time.
Wind turbines are an obvious way of saying 'green', so while resources are relatively available they are taken up as a response to climate change. Same is true of the Prius on a personal scale.
However general uptake is constrained since most people are trying to get through the week, with any other attention being take by who's doing whom on the latest reality show.
In a world where oil has peaked, you can't drive your car because there is rationing and extreme prices, and food is getting more expensive as well - you will take a solution that fixes your problems here and now.
Its no good wishing it were otherwise; that's like wishing people would all think differently. You have no control over that.
No I don't think we should 'ignore' anything. However its not a case of what should or should not happen, its a case of what will or will not. You want better insulation. Great. Find a way, a politically acceptable way, in which that is the easiest and best solution and it will happen. Same goes for driving cars. You want less journeys, answer the key question.
If I sound like a drug pusher to you, you sound like someone who says "addicts should just stop themselves wanting drugs, they just need a little backbone" to me. Reality is much more to do with making them not want or need the drugs than stating rational viewpoints of desire.
though its early, this post and its predecessor, i nominate for 'post of day'
(which is another way of saying I strongly agree with you...;)
Cheers Nate !
Sometimes it can feel like throwing out messages in a bottle and getting no reply. Its nice to get a positive response!
And in the vein of solutions rather than just pointing up problems, I'll mention one idea about how a more sustainable lifestyle can be made to look 'better' than the current lifestyle - to the average person.
Many people are saying the route to a solution is for people to accept a lower energy lifestyle, to do less with cars, flying, McMansions etc.
That's great, but that is very much a lifestyle choice. Much of the time the implicit words behind it are "do less of the things you enjoy because its good for the earth", often with a distinctly hippy subtone. We know that doesn't work, we know its not something people will buy or accept - not since the last tie-die shirt was burnt in the 1970s.
Instead I'd suggest losing the green tinge and not mentioning peak oil. Rather its a 'plan', similar to the F-Plan diet for making yourself happier, decluttering your life, removing the hustle and bussle and relaxing, eating organically, not giving a **** what the neighbour's think; and giving yourself a lifestyle where you are relaxed, happy, andwhere you only work 10 months of the year with more time off to enjoy yourself and family.
Sell it as a method, sell it as a plan, sell it with a celeb, sell the sizzle of things people want and as a way to get rid of things they don't. That way people are more likely to give up on the McMansions, the pointless gadgets, the driving everywhere, etc. and take up a lifestyle that is less energy intensive.
If you don't like that idea, fine. However something like it is probably the only way the majority of people will take a blind bit of notice, so you'd better dream up something equally enticing.
that was one of my messages at ASPO - we have to make changes for selfish/tribal reasons due to our inherent drive to compete for resources. to tell someone to turn the lights off will only work if they buy into the plan that it improves their own life and well being - otherwise they will agonize over that energy being used to build 5 more feet of cement in China - tragedy of the commons meets jevons paradox.
From an electricity standpoint, the reference to Chinese cement does not apply. From a petroleum standpoint, spending less money on whimsical energy use always makes sense. National goals such as having the nation less addicted to oil makes as much sense as other national security goals.
People have been changing out incandescent bulbs for CFLs, though doing so doesn't necessary proportionally improve their life.
I live at a latitude where I need heat and light at the same time - the cheapest way (and simplest by far) to do this is with an incandescent lamp.
Compact Fluorescent Lamps (CFLs) aren't always a good idea, it depends how you currently provide heat and electricity.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Compact_fluorescent_lamp
Xeroid.
From your link...
"If incandescent lamps are replaced by CFLs and all other factors are kept constant then the temperature inside any building will reduce. At times when the building requires both heating and lighting, the occupiers might then increase the space heating in order to bring the temperature back to a desired level. Depending on the source of this alternative heat compared to the local source of electricity, this may result in either a small increase or a small decrease in the total cost and environmental impact of changing to CFLs."
So what makes your particular housing situation so unique?
Spending winters at the North Pole and summers at the South?
Even if you use direct electrical heating you will in practice use less electricity for heating and lighting combined with CFL's. The waste heat from incandescent bulbs emitted near the ceiling and largely staying there is much less efficient at heating the inhabitants, the only thing that really matters, than heat from electrical heaters lower down.
Even in theory, you could only finish up using the same amount of electricity at times when you need both heating and lighting and there can be very few places that do not need lighting without heating at some time. If you are heating your house with a source that is more expensive or polluting that direct electricity, allowing for for all the losses in generation and transmission of electricity, then you should change to electrical heating.
If you require cooling and lighting at the same time then the advantages are multiplied as with incandescents you are using electricity to produce waste heat end then more electricity to get rid of it.
The longer life of CFL's means the overall cost will always be cheaper unless you are foolish enough to heat your house with some means more expensive than electricity when you have this available to use.
As for 'simplest by far' what is complex about changing a light bulb?
Okay, let's say I'm in Vermont, with most of the power from Hydro Quebec (flooding First Nations land which incidentally releases a lot of mercury as it's flooded), a substantial chunk from the Vermont Yankee nuclear plant (terrible record on basic safety measures), and a small dose of more local hydro and even wind - no coal in the mix. I should heat with "clean" electricity - even through my light bulbs? For minor space heating, sure, but like most people around here I notice that it's still only half the cost to burn oil, which a typical boiler does fairly efficiently. Like many here, I significantly supplement with wood. But Northern New England's likely to stay on oil until the last drop, or radical new tech, whichever comes first. However, at least one neighbor is considering putting a coal stove in his basement.
It is fashionable on this board to deride J6P.
Maybe J6P isn't anywhere as dumb as people here seem to think.
We are caught in a vise with the banking and political elites cheating us on one side and the minority welfare activists demanding ever more entitlements on the other.
Looking at it from J6P's point of view, tactically it makes the most sense to run the whole system into the concrete wall full speed ahead, because we are the ones that have the most useful skills to make something off the wreckage, and because there is no viable solution at the ballot box.
Think about it.
Comparing smaller advanced societies like Denmark, Sweden or Norway with their much more homogeneous demographics to the US is a exercise in futility. The conditions on the ground are what they are and there is no way around them.
Rather, we are caught in a vise with the economic system cheating many at the same time the majority contented class demands ever more entitlements.
The obstacle to a decline protocol is the existing contented class: the greatest generation, the haves, the wealthy. They run the show, not the hordes of welfare queens driving pink Cadillacs. We already have the political solution the dominant class prefers: business as usual.
Activists are next to powerless against the economic machine - at least if they try to work within the system.
cfm in Gray, ME
Yeah! Those damned entitlement parasites.
Why don't they just stay at home and die?
Whoops. They do. In Japan: the model of efficiency.
First of all PO is a liquid fuel crisis, not an electric one, so additional coal use is not an emergency necessity. Second, your argument depends on how ones define 'best options.' Options that continues this motoring madness at the expense of our children's future can hardly be described as 'best.' Fossil fuels left not poured into the automobile maw can still power the construction of an alternative electrical energy grid. That would honor the earth's fossil fuel bounty.
As long as Britain is fighting a war for petroleum in the Middle East than its 'national scale' has been skewed. It is a matter of priorities. Do we as a people chose habitual waste and consumption or do we choose to reallocate our taxes and wealth to a sustainable future.
There are veiled implication of 'elistim' in your comments as if the 'regular folk' need indulging. This is paternalism. If not hidden from the truth, these hardworking stiffs might surprise us with their willingness to change. If only they had a willing leader ready to stop propagandizing for the status quo.
This feels like fatalism. To help an addicts not want drugs you offer alternative behaviors and views. Maybe if a creative politician ran a real vision in exchange for sacrifice instead of the status quo folks would rise to the occasion.
I'll say again, YOU don't get the opportunity to define 'best', the public at large do that. If they think Coal-to-liquids is 'best' then that's what will happen.
You want to change that? Make your alternative 'best' in their eyes. If you can't then they will not take any notice.
That's a distinct lack of paternalism, and a bounty of realism...
I'll say again, YOU don't get the opportunity to define 'best', the public at large do that. If they think Coal-to-liquids is 'best' then that's what will happen.
You can repeat things until you are blue in the face, but that does not make what you say any more rational. In reality, only some of the public gets to chose their power source these days; the power companies wield signficant political clout, and they lobby (grease palms) to ensure their choices are government-approved. Indeed, in my state, Dominion power has successfully prevented green power companies from gaining a foothold, and have convinced the state legislature, to whom they have contributed almost almost $3.8 million in campaign contributions over the last 10 years, along with lavishing them with gifts, to accept Dominion Power's own drafted bill to reregulate electricity in the state.
Want to see what such political power allows them to get away with? See the mix of renewables in their power generation.
The net-metering law Dominion Power allowed to be passed restricts renewable power sources 0.01% of the generation.
Go to their website and look for any "green" power options; you'll find none you can purchase. There are talk of 'plans' and 'projections', but this has been the case for over 20 years.
So people won't pick Coal-to-liquids, the coal and oil companies will. I'm surprised you would think that readers of this forum would be so gullible. The elitism mentioned earlier is still evident in this thread.
You're misunderstanding the rules of the game. It not rationality that in charge, its realism. Its no good bemoaning big business or the public doing other than you would wish, the only way to win is to the play the game with the rules that exist, rational or not.
Realism? One particular truth (that our democracy has been hijacked by the wealthy) should not be conflated with other pertinent truths (modest lifestyle change will obviate need for coal plants) (a Marshal-plan for renewables) (etc.)
This is exactly how a lobbyist would respond.
I pity you, for you cannot distinguish between realism and fatalism.
You are doomed to die.
(hey aren't we all?)
I think missionary revolutionaries are much more dangerous than vested interest reactionaries. The second at least know they are being hypocritical and counter common good - under certain circumstances they can be shown the common good is their good too. Revolutionaries don't know that - they are just too busy saving the world to give their ideas second thoughts.
If you want to change the system - first learn the system. Everything has a reason and you should know the reason before suggest smashing it all to the ground and recreating it your way. Without addressing the reasons, you will end up with a system much worse than the first one. Happens all the time. I lived within such an experiment, and my home country which I love, still suffers from the result.
No, thanks, no more revolutions.
You're the one missing the point. The only reasons why coal is so cheap is:
1 - It's an old industry that has all the processes very matured and understood - read Let's stick to what we know bkay?
2 - They have tremendous tax benefits;
3 - The network is built around these kind of resources, and not exactly around renewables;
4 - Coal price is not accounted for in its environmental prejudice, as is:
a) topsoil destruction;
b) pollution;
c) carbon dioxide proliferation.
5 - An entire powerful lobby industry that fights everyday to mantain its status quo and fights against renewables.
Even still, renewables are the most rising energy industry. Amazing.
Renewables not only have to fight against status quo, but also higher taxes (yes, that is right), and lack of lobbyists. If even TOD people are arguing for and not against Coal, what would we expect? These people, completely disregarding our real potential and capabilities, opt for the least wrong possibility (ex: destroy the f*in world) than to destroy the economy, missing out entirely the power of renewables.
We should be crying out loud RENEWABLES! RENEWABLES! and totally disregarding any FUD whatsoever. I don't CARE if wind's EROEI is only half of that of coal. For Coal is "cheap", if by cheap we mean dispense with the check our grandchildren will have to pay. It's the same problem as with the entire mortgage problem. People don't care about the future, as long as today they have the money. It turns out though, that future really comes along sometime, and that means pain in the ass to all of those who opt for unsustainable solutions.
So, NO, coal is not the answer and should NEVER be. I don't agree with the article at ALL. This article is simply a cowardly excuse to continue BAU with these shitty resources, and thus excusing every politician and "pundit" that lobbies with these destructive industries, while dismissing real solutions, or at least attempts at so. For example, people argue that we should wait even further for future wind power generators, or sun power generators. NO. The time IS NOW. We don't have much time LEFT. We are burning the earth and the scientists are scared shit out of what is happening in the arctic. We should too. We are already scared shit of PO. So, we should bandwagon this NOW.
For if the Iraq's war is about oil, it is surely not about energy. The amount of energy anyone will get out of this country will never pay off the war. The money used (a trillion dollars) could boost by so much the renewables it would make manhattan project like an insect.
Yet people talk as if we are out of options. And thus you leave your politicians out of criticism. You choose a small-talk of "less evils" in a time when we should opt for WIN WIN solutions. You even opt to sustain reasonably these kinds of choices when it is so clear that it is so wrong.
You're wrong. And our grandchildren will account for everyone of us by the wrong choices we are making now. I know my son will. Remember that!
Please, consider!
We have only one future!
Let's fight for it!
EROEI is another of those undefined variables.
EROEI of coal apparently only includes the cost of getting it out of the ground. It does not include the real energy IN (sunlight) plus the time value of the energy (worked on for millions of years by geological processes).
Not correct to compare with EROEI for solar or wind power where direct sunlight conversion to electric power is being measured.
1) The time to create the coal does not impact EROI nor should it. for human use purposes we care about the energy WE input in order to get an energy output - in this sense the millions of years to us are 'free'. If we were an infinite lived alien species, then your point would be valid. But when comparing high energy gain fossil fuels (which allow us to do immense amounts of work to flows of sunlight, which are great but allow us to do less work is the issue.
2)But you are on the right track - EROI comparisons of coal and solar do not (normally) include externality costs parsed into energy terms - if we assign a real energy cost to the GHG and pollution impacts of coal the EROI would plummet - so in the end we have 2 goals at odds - energy and the environment. neither the market nor EROI can presently solve this puzzle.
OK Nate Hagens.
You are free to set the boundary conditions. Defined your way, coal is like a one-time feeding of the fish tank. Human beings are not infinitely long lived as individuals, but we flatter ourselves that the species might survive a long time.
From a physical point of view, it takes an awful lot of sunlight and geological heat, over a very long time, to produce coal. The energy in must be many, many times the energy out. So coal is more like a storage battery -- on a geological time scale.
Yup - as are oil and natural gas....
I see your point, and it is certainly applicable to some people/countries. However, it would seem that the following examples don't necessarily fit this:
- Large European wind/solar investment costs born as increased tax burden by all citizens.
- Apparent variations in acceptability of different environmental regulations/costs.
- Generational differences in lifestyle choices in US.
?
I've often wondered whether anyone here would bring up this point...cultural differences seem to translate into rather significant actions (or, inaction)in this context.
In other words, your vision of the future is ever-deepening poverty, people living in caves, while you sit around making smug pronouncements disconnected from all political, social, and even physical reality? If Denmark had to live off that wind power tomorrow or anytime soon, it would collapse, as wind supplies only 20% of only a part of even their documented overall consumption. And lets not mention what they consume indirectly, via imports of goods and services other than fossil fuels.
Sentiments are too cheap to meter and are thus unworthy of attention. When they get their self-righteous dander up, "citizens" will do anything, even engage in self-hurt, to avenge themselves upon the so-called "vested interests" who deliver the bad news that they have to get up in the morning and go to work, and that even then, they still can't have everything they say they want. No one wants to hear that, least of all "citizens" puffed up with gangrenously swollen 'self-esteem'.
One of their most impossible wants seems to be a planet with seven billion people that is identical in every respect to a planet with zero people. But they don't mean it, it's just a way to express their NIMBYism, economic jealousy, obstructionist desire for revenge, and general frustration with their own irremediable, gaping, wide-mouthed incomprehension of the world. After all, when electric rates or gasoline prices
go through the roofgo up even a few percent, then instantly they howl to a different tune. In the end, no possible way exists to please either them or you, and there's no use even trying.HO, by injecting a note of reality, I think you just started what is going to be one of TOD's worst-ever doomfests.
You're the one doomfestating this thread.
And your vision of the future is one that is already scripted by yourself to doom, where anything you do is meaningless as the conondrum is already moving towards the inevitable. You act not like a passive observant, but as a coward, for the difference being in that you don't find in this view of coal boom anything wrong, just what "is possible" without creating "poverty" all around.
You are stuck in the past. You are stuck with the lack of vision. The problems with renewables aren't its potentials. It's problems are political and lobbyistical.
And you are just helping the crooks.
So mind not if I'm not very polite towards these kinds of manifestos. I despise them, not because they are "realistic", for surely they "are", but because they view "reality" as something inevitably towards "coal", to conclude that
"it ain' that bad ya know, 'cause a lil' warmin, what's wrong in tha'?"
Its wrong. Put the glasses. You're not seeing past your own nose.
And is that feasible? I mean, is it sustainable? Just because there is no country in the world sustainable yet, should we stop endorsing it?
What would your grandparents think of you, the ones that abolished slavery, death penalty (oh wait!), and fought for human rights and universal suffrage? What would you say to them if you were one of their own? My guess:
Oh but there is no country that survives without slavery! You're being pathetic!
Great hallmark there, mister. One that will fit well in history, no doubt about that.
But you misunderstand politics, mister. A politician should never try to please its population, but to LEAD them. Yeah, I know, these kinds of people are rare, but if we just abandon our hopes and rely on what "we have", we are doomed. We must fight for more! We should demand MORE of leaders.
Your entire view is narrowed to death. We should aspire to go to the galaxy and give a big finger to Fermi's paradox. We should aspire to go further and never backwards. What are you afraid of? What have you to lose? Why, oh old man, you're so stuck to yourself like a rotten fruit?
If you are to rant me back, nevermind it, go rather sulk in your bedroom. I haven't that time to waste.
BY THE WAY, Marie Antoinette was BEHEADED, which renders the entire thread MOOT.
Not moot, but it does speak to the ultimate end of proceeding as the article suggests.
In some ways, bread becomes literal rather than metaphoric, as food production is extremely energy intensive. Every calorie of food we eat it the result of burning ten calories of fossil fuels, for nitrogen fertilizer production, deisel tractors, shipping, etc. There is no possible way renewables will ever be able to meet our entire energy needs. Just supplying New York city alone with electricity would require a solar panel the size of Conneticuit. And that isn't even counting distribution costs, ways of capturing or storing the energy for days with less sun, making the solar panels, keeping them free of dirt and debris, powering future electric cars or heaters, food producton, industry, etc. Most energy consumption isn't even electric. It's difficult to imagine even mining materials from the earth and industrial manufacture of turbines or photovoltaics without fossil fuel energy.
So the point of the article is that as we run out of oil, we may be forced to open up this pandora's box of coal.
"Every calorie of food we eat it the result of burning ten calories of fossil fuels, for nitrogen fertilizer production, deisel tractors, shipping, etc."
Actually, that 10x ratio is for the whole food system, including the processing of twinkies, etc. It's much lower for making relatively unprocessed food, like bread.
"There is no possible way renewables will ever be able to meet our entire energy needs. "
Sure, they can. Rooftops provide enough space for PV, should we want to go to the extreme of using just one power source (not really optimal).
" It's difficult to imagine even mining materials from the earth and industrial manufacture of turbines or photovoltaics without fossil fuel energy."
Not really. Actually, a lot of mining is electric, and PV manufacturing is almost entirely electric.
You must have a vested interest.
PV manufacturing...CRAP, assembly you should say. Where do the raw materials come from........thin air....what about delivery, installation and labour.
You make off the cuff statements with no backup.
What "LOT" of mining is electric?
Rooftops for PV to power New York.... what a load of crap.
You make outlandish claims and expect everyone to believe it will happen. Come on tell me you think it WILL happen but when you do, tell us how and when, including who by and how much it will cost just to make sure it IS viable.
"it is much lower for a loaf of bread" I'd like to see your energy ratio for a loaf of bread sitting on my sideboard (don't leave anything out} then I'll compare for myself, without just having to take your word for it.
I'd like to see you compare the solar flux on NYC times its area versus the electric consumption (which is key to deciding if PV would be adequate to run the city), but you don't seem to be the kind of person to let mere facts get in the way of an ideological rant.
As opposed to the copious quantities of solid evidence you provide to back up your statements.
Oh, wait...
There is no future energy other than coal, yada, yada, yada, we need fossil fuel to produce our food, yada, yada, yada, this can get old real fast.
By coincidence as I was reading this post I noticed this quote in the margin:
“For a successful technology, reality must take precedence over public relations, for Nature cannot be fooled.”
—Richard Feynman
I really admire Richard Feynman and while I basically agree with this statement of his, the necessity of public relations can never be underestimated. How else could you make good money off of Worm poop as a commercial fertilizer?
http://www.terracycle.net/revolution_5.htm
"One answer lies in worm poop! Worm poop has a market price that is close to $0.50 per pound or $1,000 per ton. That's over 3,000% higher than the value of compost!"
The problem with the folks who are stuck in the past is that they really are completely unable to think outside the proverbial six sided cardboard box. So how the heck can you expect them to think outside of a box that is a glass icosahedron. They can't even visualize the box.
F Magyar
That cardboard box makes excellent feed for the worms and is therefore a worm poop precursor. The main thing about worm castings, though, is that they work. Their public relations is any good compost heap or a healthy soil in a garden, a folk wisdom gained from experience and relying on traditional gardening methods. And that's thinking inside the box and recycling the box too and all without the benefit of a moronic cliche' like "think outside the box". Bob Ebersole
Bob, I have to assume from your comment that you didn't bother to even look at the link I posted. Had you done so you might have been aware that the results of traditional composting, while certainly not a bad thing by itself, doesn't provide much bang for the buck, so to speak. It was only by not trafficking in the usual tired old cliches but rather engaging in some rather non traditional approaches that worm poop becomes profitable. Anyways, that you are even talking about worm poop and composting just underscores the fact that you have missed my point completely. Which was, to put it a bit more succintly, one person's worm shit is another's expensive fertilizer and that it takes some non traditional thinking to to see profit in worm shit. I'll bet the moronic owner of that idea is laughing all the way to the bank.
Your Denmark has 20% wind. And your Denmark has 60% coal.
It's per capita CO2 emissions are among the highest in Europe, higher than Germany and nearly twice those in France. And they have been rising recently.
Think about it.
Denmark used to burn coal for over 95% of their electricity needs. By utilizing increasingly higher amounts of wind generation, they are moving in the right direction (and coal use is now down under 55%).
reference
The problem is that it is not "increasingly" and in fact Denmark is moving to nowhere. They stopped adding new wind 2 years ago due to physical infrastructure constraints. Their experiment ended - and looking at their emissions the results are poor.
Their wind capacity in fact provides for only 5% of the domestic consumption. Due to wind variation the rest is dumped to the Norway / Sweden grid, where it displaces... clean hydro.
Consequently their emissions have everything but stalled, and in recent years have actually increased. And they still remain among the highest in Europe. I can provide you the numbers if you like.
I'm not against wind but it has quite a few limitations. In other places it may perform better; Denmark is not even the best place for it.
I would indeed like to see where all of your figures came from above. I hope you are not confusing electricity production with all forms of energy consumption (i.e., cars, heating, etc). And the U.S.s CO2 emissions are twice those of Denmark's. See, I can bold too...
- Denmark produced 45 per cent more energy than it consumed itself in 2006.
http://www.ens.dk/sw47770.asp
- Fox News: Twenty percent of Denmark's energy needs are now met by electricity generated by wind turbines, and the proportion is steadily increasing.
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,203293,00.html
- Since 1990 adjusted CO2 emissions have dropped by 13.7 per cent.
http://www.ens.dk/sw47770.asp
- Denmark plans to increase wind energy production to 50%
http://www.renewableenergyaccess.com/rea/news/story?id=46749
What is your point comparing Demark with US? US is a CO2 spewing monster, you'd better compare it to its neighbouring Scandinavian countries. Here is some comparative data:
Carbon emissions per capita, tonnes of carbon (2000-2004):
Denmark: 2.37 2.45 2.42 2.81 2.68
Sweden: 1.43 1.45 1.66 1.44 1.61
France: 1.64 1.71 1.68 1.68 1.64
Source: http://cdiac.ornl.gov/trends/emis/em_cont.htm
Denmark produced 45 per cent more energy than it consumed itself in 2006
Denmark is a significant oil and NG exporter.
Natural gas exports (net) - 4.964 billion cu m (2006 est.)
Oil exports (net) - 156,000 bbl/day (2006)
Source: https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/geos/da.html
Denmark plans to increase wind energy production to 50%
Better start now. Here is a table for you:
For these 10 years renewable generation has increased from 1.7 to 8.0 Gwh, but thermal generation (mostly coal) has also increased - from 30.2 to 35.3 GWh. Wind has not been able to decrease coal usage and emissions.
In the light of these numbers Denmark does not seem to be such a green tiger after all.
For these 10 years renewable generation has increased from 1.7 to 8.0 Gwh, but thermal generation (mostly coal) has also increased - from 30.2 to 35.3 GWh. Wind has not been able to decrease coal usage and emissions.
Sources please.
You took a look at the table didn't you? The original source is there - DOE/EIA. I borrowed the table from the blog post here:
http://peakoildebunked.blogspot.com/2006/01/213-something-fishy-in-denma...
Feel free to cross check the numbers if you doubt the data.
First, Norway does not produce all of it's electricty, so it imports it;
Electricity - production: 108.9 billion kWh (2004)
Electricity - consumption: 112.8 billion kWh (2004)
Electricity - exports: 3.8 billion kWh (2004)
Electricity - imports: 15.3 billion kWh (2004)
https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/geos/no.html
So 'displacing clean hydro' is simply your blogger's misguided spin.
Secondly, the figures you cited do not match up with Denmark's own numbers. One can only wonder where EIA obtained their information, or whether the blogger made some errors entering the table data. Note the values for coal drop 53% from 1994 to 2005. The thermal generation you had assumed was coal turns out to include natural gas, waste, biomass, biogas, all of which have increased significantly in that timeframe. So take care when using aggregated data in the future.
I'm sorry I'm already tired of this and I've had this discussion maybe a dozen times.
1) Whether Norway is importing or exporting electricity is irrelevant. What is relevant is that it uses primary hydro - and the wind imported from Denmark is displacing its own hydro resources. The reason is technical - hydro electricity may be ramped up and down very quickly and this is so far the only way to handle wind variations. Coal can not be ramped up and down quickly.
My point was that wind is not displacing coal in Denmark. And never will.
2) The table I showed was correct. You are comparing apples to oranges with your table - it is showing energy content of fuels, my table is for electricity production.
3) You are right - my assumption that the thermal generation in Denmark in 2003 was the same as structure as in 1993 was wrong. From your own table you can see that natural gas rose and coal dropped. But overall thermal generation stayed the same and even rose. They effectively replaced their coal with natural gas. UK did the same thing in the 90s and that's how they lowered their emissions, because NG is cleaner. Obviously Denmark followed suit - which is good for them, but no big deal.
Since now North Sea is depleted UK is going back to coal (read the original post). Denmark will soon follow. They don't have other choice - they need a secure source for baseload electricity.
If you study a little bit about how the electricity grid works you would find why wind is not an alternative to neither coal nor nuclear and can not replace them. They have different roles and provide different services. Wind has its place but don't expect too much of it.
During this period Swedish and Danish "greens" got the Swedish Barsebäck nuclear powerplant closed. One 600 MW BWR were closed in 1999 and the other 600 MW BWR in 2005. They were mostly replaced with old Danish coal power. Happy Danish "greens" and happy Danish coal power owners. *katching*
The sister reactor Oskarshamn 2 is due to be uprated to 840 MW. Barsebäck 1 and 2 are not torn down but it wold take years to refurbish them.
I'm sorry I'm already tired of this and I've had this discussion maybe a dozen times.
Perhaps you might set aside some of your opinions when they are confronted by facts that negate them.
1) Whether Norway is importing or exporting electricity is irrelevant. What is relevant is that it uses primary hydro - and the wind imported from Denmark is displacing its own hydro resources.
I find this statement incredulous, to say the least. Hydro is imminently dispatchable, and is a perfect complement to wind power. When the wind doesn't blow, use hydro. When wind is blowing, save up the hydro for other times.
"Displacement of hydro" is a non-sensical statement. The hydro is not 'wasted' in any stretch of the imagination, especially when the hydro does not completely fulfill the demand.
My point was that wind is not displacing coal in Denmark. And never will.
Such desperate pronouncements have been already proven false by the information provided above; why do you persist in this falsehood?
Coal generation fell by over 50% (-55k TJ). Yes, it was displaced in part by gas generation (+23k TJ), but in larger part by renewable energy sources (+30k TJ) of which wind was +20k TJ.
So unless you can provide reliable information to refute Denmark's own statistics, you may want to stand back and reflect on why you cling to the positions espoused in the blogs you referenced.
I need to ask you to stop for a second and take a look again what you just wrote.
Your post shows lack of basic understanding about electricity production. I'll remember this one as one of the biggest masterpieces I've seen on this site:
You are obviously unaware that the water that flows from a river and is kept behind a dam is a limited resource. Do you imagine it replenishes itself magically and the dam is always full? What is this? Abiotic water?!? I bet you are also unaware that some of it is used also for irrigation.
If you don't believe me take a look what happens in Climate Change ridden Australia:
Water is, in fact, aboitic. I comes from clouds.
Wind and hydro supplement each other and together displace coal. This is a pretty basic concept. Perhaps what is holding you up is the idea that base load is fundemental. It is not. It is a kluge that is outliving its usefulness.
Chris
Please don't try to cover up his foolish statement.
I feel awakard I need to explain that the "abiotic water" was a joke, allusion with the self-replenishing "abiotic oil".
I'm happy to understand that baseload is already an obsolate concept. The best news since the Congress recalled the second law of thermodynamics. Now if those pesky electrical engineers could get that too.
Perhaps this is another conceptual difficulty. Rain does replenish itself.
You should understand that naming portions of the electric supply is not physics, it is simply a set of lables that have been useful in the past. Things are changing so new labels will likely be more useful in the future. To me, base load is coming to mean lacking sufficient flexibility.
Chris
Actually "base load" means continuous stable supply. This concept will never be abandoned simply because some sources will always have more expensive variable costs and low fixed cost (peaking load) and some sources will be vice versa (baseload). It makes economic sense to use the baseload ones at their maximum while the peaking to follow demand. Theoretically you could build the whole grid with "baseload sources" - you just need to overbuild above peak demand and disconnect them when they are not needed. But it would be twice as expensive.
What may change in future is how we can achieve baseload, not the concept itseld - that is how we can achieve a stable stream of cheap electricity. Wind plus hydro may provide for this - but you have to match peak wind with peak hydro because the wind can stop any time. Some additional hydro or natural gas may be used for demand following. The problem with wind is that the options to balance it are limited - most places in the world do not have enough hydro resources and NG is expensive. We need cheap efficient storage.
Storage is a more useful concept for the future than base load I think.
Hope you are right. I mean it.
But the truth is that if the concept "storage" existed, all of the following concepts: base load, peak load, grid regulation, spinning reserve will automatically disappear.
The job of grid operators is how to make ends meet without storage and they go through a hell of a trouble because they don't have it. Me and 10 million electrical engineers are holding our thumbs, but personally I'm not buying that champaign bottle yet.
There will be time for champaign when the job is done. The first thing now is to grow installed renewable capacity at an enourmous rate while anticipating the need for storage.
Chris
- Let's say storage costs go down to as low as $0.02/kwth (hurray)
- Wind power costs $0.06-0.08/kwth onshore - not likely to go down much further, actually with depletion of good sites it should get more expensive
- A kwth stored in a battery (ignoring degradation) will return 0.86kwth based on 86% efficiency - so the total cost of the battery kwth will be:
(0.06 - 0.08)/0.86 + 0.02 = $0.09 - 0.11
Looking at bloomberg:
http://www.bloomberg.com/markets/commodities/energyprices.html
The peaking power in West Coast costs 65$/MWh = $0.065/kwth, about twice less than wind + storage.
If you are wondering why they are building wind at all if it costs more than peaking power - if you substract the 1.8c subsidy wind becomes exactly competitive to peaking power (which it supplements, in practice saving NG, it can't compete with baseload, which is about half the peaking price).
California has mandates for renewable energy and PG&E is smart to lock those batteries and get them by the cheap - they know they will need them. They don't have any choice - they are not allowed to build neither coal nor nuclear. The results you'll see in your bill - it will be slowly growing as wind and storage grow too. Solar has yet to deliver acceptable costs and the only reason they are putting it at this point are the heavy subsidies (check your bill again).
I suspect such policies are feasible in times of prosperity and in places like California. Not likely to sell them to China or India.
Wind has another factor of 2 to fall I think. We are beginning to see scales for wind that can approach this. It is worth remembering that the storage premium is not applied to all of wind since much can be used as it is generated. Up to about 20% of generating capacity there should be little need for storage. But you have a point that it is what we might once have thought of as base load that will make use of storage. What is interesting to me is that synergy with transportation can make storage so cheap tight at the start, before scale. Now, transportation may come up with batteries that work perfectly until they fail completely and this won't happen, but it is and interesting thing now, just at the beginning.
The bulk of solar that gets installed in the next 20 years will be cheaper than coal. This is just the way exponential growth works. Parity is expected in 2015. Parity with retail electricity is happening now.
China seems to be in a similar situation though because they have less in the way of local initiative, they are doing less to lead in bringing scale to solar. Their manufacturing for export is growing though. The California, New Jersey and a few other US markets together with Spain should take over from Germany in providing the impetus for scale. The sign ups we've had so far (23,000 in a year) show there is a market for our 100,000 system per year manufacturing plant. These are offered for rent at the same rate for power as the utilities charge. Since these do not take advantage of state rebates, this is getting close to no subsidy, though there is a federal solar investment tax incentive and for depreciation these are considered 5-year properties. A few more cost reductions and solar will match utility rates even in coal country without subsidy. In areas like the Northeast, federal subsidies boost profits for us but owing to high utility rates, I think we'd be pretty close profitable without them. Current subsidies are hastening the day when electric rates begin to fall owing to substitution of lower cost solar for coal.
Chris
Your post shows lack of basic understanding about electricity production... You are obviously unaware that the water that flows from a river and is kept behind a dam is a limited resource. Do you imagine it replenishes itself magically and the dam is always full?
Err, rainfall is the source of riverwater behind dams. No, the dam isn't always full, that's why wind power is helpful to conserve the stored energy in hydropower for times that the wind isn't blowing.
If Australia was dependent on hydro, it would benefit them greatly to boost their wind power to offset their reduced water resources.
I'm an electro-mechanical engineer whose degree had a special focus on power generation, so please don't act condescending.
What is this? Abiotic water?!?
?? Of course! Rain comes from clouds which are formed over warmer parts of the ocean. Will the climate change, resulting in perhaps less rainfall for areas dependent on hydropower, so yes, we should be burning less and less coal every year. How to answer the baseload problem? Instituting demand side management (in its many forms) in all control areas would seriously reduce the level of baseload power required to maintain grid stability.
Mentioned a couple of times over the last two days, in 2005, U.S. electricity providers reported total peak-load reductions of 25,710 megawatts resulting from demand-side management (DSM) programs, a 9.3 percent increase from the amount reported in 2004. See a DoE initiative at http://gridwise.pnl.gov/
If you truly are an electrical engineer, I'd be happy to see you refute the above numbers with substantive discussion. You seem to have forgotten all about Denmark's displacement of coal burning with wind, so I will assume you concur with the findings of my previous post.
No, the dam isn't always full, that's why wind power is helpful to conserve the stored energy in hydropower for times that the wind isn't blowing
OR in another words wind is displacing some hydro power and saving some water resource for later. Which is a good thing - but it only supports my initial point that wind did not reduce the need for coal in Denmark. "Abiotic water" of course was a joke. Now, what you need is the following graph (from your links):
Large scale capacity (mostly coal and NG) remains the same. Wind has not helped Denmark retire any of its thermal plants.
Now Denmark is a small country and its year by year production vary widely - due to varying imports and exports. Looking at the graph of electricity production:
shows how total electricity varies year by year - and the drivers for that are largely coal and NG. Looking at years 2000-2003 there is a growth of both total electricity and total FF production (watch up to the yellow line) and the next two years it goes down to about 2000 level.
Again for such a small country year over year production variations are big and a bit misleading. For example FF production in 2003 is higher than 1994-95 - and wind has gone on top of it. What matters is the first graph - if CPPs and NG plants are not retired they will be eventually used (when demand grows). Putting more wind is problematic - they can't do it in their own grid and have to rely on their neighbors to balance it. But don't expect it to reduce their own fossil fuel usage by much.
I did not know that we were arguing about DSM. I am 100% behind DSM and I know it is effective. In Bulgaria we have day/night tier pricing and I have seen graphs how it changes the total load. And I'm not an engineer, I don't know how you got this idea.
The depth of your willful blindness is proven by your own graph: it proves the exact opposite of what you have been asserting.
Look at the generation totals for 1994 and 2004. They were approximately the same, but the total for fossil (coal, oil and natural gas) fell from about 140 (units unspecified) in 1994 to about 110 in 2004. The difference was made up largely by wind (which looks to be about 4-5x as large, by eyeball) and a considerable increase (double or so) of "other". The increase in wind is much greater, both relatively and in absolute numbers, than the increase in "other".
It's obvious that you are not an engineer. An engineer wouldn't be able to ignore crucial facts for long and still have a job.
Over the years fossil fuel production remains fairly constant. Compare 1994-1995 with 2000-2003
It is impossible to perform an analysis based on this graph only. The amount of imports and exports is distorting the picture. What matters in this case is that wind was able to displace just 5% of domestic electricity - the rest is exported and is displacing foreign hydro. In a closed grid without much hydro or NG wind won't be able to scale at all.
" The amount of imports and exports is distorting the picture."
There's no question that wind is most effective as part of a very large grid, and that Denmark is too small to operate independently. This isn't a criticism of wind, really.
"the rest is exported and is displacing foreign hydro. "
But doesn't the displaced hydro eventually get used to displace coal and other Fossil Fuels?
But doesn't the displaced hydro eventually get used to displace coal and other Fossil Fuels?
Hydro is largely used to meet peak demand. It's alternative is NG, so at best wind would displace some NG. In reality some of the spared water resources will be diverted for irrigation and some of them will be used to meet growing demand rather than reducing FFs. In the larger Nordic grid wind contribution is in the single digits - which can be easily overwhelmed by the growing demand.
"Hydro is largely used to meet peak demand."
Currently that's the case, because hydro is limited. If you have more available, then you can start using it for mid-level demand.
"It's alternative is NG, so at best wind would displace some NG. In reality some of the spared water resources will be diverted for irrigation and some of them will be used to meet growing demand rather than reducing FFs."
This makes sense, and yet your emphasis seems just slightly off. There is the implication that somehow the displaced hydro doesn't get used in some valuable way. If more hydro is available, it can be used in a number of ways, but they're all valuable. If the Utility System Operator wants to reduce NG, what the heck. Perhaps they'll start moving down into coal territory, or use it for irrigation, or use it for new demand. All of these things are valuable.
" In the larger Nordic grid wind contribution is in the single digits - which can be easily overwhelmed by the growing demand."
Again, how is this low value?
I never said that wind has "low value". I only said that it has certain limits and its potential to replace fossil fuels or traditional generation is well... limited. They are additionally limited by the problems it faces trying to displace coal in coal-dominated grids.
How much limited is a matter of discussion. With enough investment wind can be "pushed" to certain percentage of course, but how long can it go is debatable. How long is it feasible to go is even more debatable.
I'm still to see a large scale solution going beyond 20%... and I think there are certain reasons for that. At 20% of the kwth-s produced and 25% load factor this means peak wind MWs would need to be 90% of the average demand, or something like half of peak and above "baseload" generation. Thus wind gusts at periods of low demand would need to be dumped to neighboring areas or simply rejected. Obviously you can't dump electricity around if all of your neighbors are trying to do that too... thus wind in Denmark reaches 20% only because it's neighbors are good enough not to overbuild wind too. Within the local grids wind can reach high penetration, but not very likely within a larger grid - and in Europe it is still somewhere around 4%.
"At 20% of the kwth-s produced and 25% load factor this means peak wind MWs would need to be 90% of the average demand, or something like half of peak and above "baseload" generation. Thus wind gusts at periods of low demand would need to be dumped to neighboring areas or simply rejected. "
I agree, night time demand is wind's biggest problem. Nuclear has the same problem - the French do the same as the Danes: they export to countries with hydro at night, and import back during the day.
The easiest and cheapest solution is moving demand to the night. Fortunately, a very large night-time demand is on the horizon: PHEV/EV's. Converting just 50% of US light vehicle miles to electricity would create an average of 150GW of demand during an 8 hour night time window, which is about 1/3 of average demand. That's enough to raise your practical market share for wind from 20% to at least 30%.
Of course, that's being conservative: conversion will go above the 50% assumption, and some charging will happen at all times of the day, and can be made sensitive to supply, so that peaks at anytime of the day get absorbed by increased PHEV charging. Exactly how much over 30% market share you could reach would require a detailed analysis of wind variance...
AFAIK in France they are rotationally disconnecting some of the nukes at night for maintainance. They are exporting to Switzerland mostly because they can and it is more economical than the maintainance alternative.
Exporting constant stream of power has the advantage of properly utilising the transmission infrastructure. Denmark position is largely unique as it features strong interconnections with the neighboring grids of Germany, Sweden and Norway. Originally these were built not to maintain wind, but to export power from Sweden and Norway to Germany. It is apparent that if it didn't have those it would not be able to reach 20% penetration.
You are underestimating wind's variance, wind output depends on the cube of the wind speed and the result looks pretty much as follows:
Some good readings about the experience of Denmark with wind:
http://www.countryguardian.net/vmason.htm
http://www.windaction.org/documents/8775
Overall Denmark is very bad example for wind generation. It's wind campaign has a clear marketing component of its own industry, and the cost of subsidies is affecting them very badly - its electricity rates are the highest in Europe.
This topic has also been discussed at TOD too:
http://www.theoildrum.com/story/2006/8/31/194053/962
I would not put too much chips on big infrastructure projects to support more wind - especially with deregulation utilities are too cautious for those and there must be a considerable premium to be worth the investment.
I understand your desire for wind to provide more than it currently can, but there is too little in past experience or what we have as realistic options to support this. The studies you linked are in line with this: 20% of peak demand, translating to 12% of generation is a pretty realistic estimate IMO.
I don't have time to say much, but I don't see anything in your last comment which really contradicts what I said. For instance, the chart covers 2 weeks, and the change over time isn't especially different from day/night cycles.
The countryguardian site really isn't credible. I haven't looked at the other.
Might you have the coal data I was asking about?
What do you think of what I said about PHEV/EV's
I had to quote this, because that one dose of irony could eliminate anemia in some small nations.
No, we are all quite aware of this. It is you who fails to realize that, by holding the water behind the dam when the wind is blowing, there is more water there to generate power when the wind is not blowing. If you can shut off the dam's generators 30% of the time because the wind is blowing, you can produce hydropower at an average of (100%/0.7) = 143% of the previous average generation when the wind stops blowing.
This will likely not convince you or end your rants, but I had to put it out as a factual refutation of your position.
It is you who fails to realize that, by holding the water behind the dam when the wind is blowing, there is more water there to generate power when the wind is not blowing
No, it is you who thinks that I don't understand that.
My point from the very beginning was that wind is primarily displacing (or reducing the need for) hydro, not coal - which is exactly what you are telling me and I have been telling too. Hydro as you are aware is primarily used for peaking power, so the baseload requirements remains pretty much the same.
E.ON Netz puts the capacity factor of wind to 7%, dropping to 4% with larger penetration. This is the amount of coal capacity that could be retired each MW of wind installed; yes a certain amount of baseload is preserved because of increased spinning reserve requirements, but this is not very good news both from emission and economical point of view.
Overall I hold on to my point - wind does not reduce the need for baseload coal or nuclear, at least not by a significant amount.
"E.ON Netz puts the capacity factor of wind to 7%, dropping to 4% with larger penetration. This is the amount of coal capacity that could be retired each MW of wind installed"
You mean the capacity credit. The capacity factor for E.on Netz's area is 18%, which means that wind's effective capacity credit is 7/18, or 39% of average output. That's not so bad.
" wind does not reduce the need for baseload coal or nuclear, at least not by a significant amount."
You're confusing fuel consumption with capacity needs: wind is directly displacing coal consumption KWH for KWH. It's also reducing the need for capacity with it's 39% capacity credit, which isn't 100% to be sure, but it's something.
This is not how the grid works; at periods of low demand when the baseload is high, wind indeed is displacing some coal kWhs. The first problem is the quality of this displacement: Coal (or nuclear) working as a spinning reserve which has to be activated frequently is a terribly inefficient way of producing electricity. The thermal losses from ramping it up and down are huge, figure some 50% of the fuel consumption of coal operating at full speed.
During times of peak demand wind works relatively well, because it usually works together with hydro or NG, which can be ramped up and down quickly. It is where the bulk of its displacement goes, and explains why the recent wind boom in US goes hand in hand with high NG prices.
The overall effect though is that wind does not scale well in grids without significant NG and hydro resource - and most of the grids worldwide are like that, including US (except some regional markets). This is also forcing countries that depend on coal or their NG depletes to be cautious about wind - like UK for example.
People don't understand these issues and they think a kwth of wind replaces a kwth of coal which is not exactly so.
There are also many other technical issues which are generally externalized to grid operators or other forms of generation - including grid losses or how to provide reactive power to distant wind locations. Overall it remains quite expensive technology, which works well in some locations and energy mixes, but is far from appropriate everywhere. Replacing the role of coal with wind? At this point this is largely theoretical. One of the PDF-s you gave was talking about that in therms of "it would require a paradigm shift". But it also specified the only realistic way to accomplish this paradigm shift at the moment - more Natural Gas. Whether this is realistic or desirable to do in the near future I leave up to you to decide.
I'm also happy we are getting closer to an agreement and I thank you for the polite and constructive level of discussion.
“wind works relatively well ... with ... NG, which... explains why the recent wind boom in US goes hand in hand with high NG prices.”
The recent wind boom was caused by public policy, and started before NG prices spiked, though the spike certainly helped greatly.
“Coal (or nuclear) working as a spinning reserve which has to be activated frequently is a terribly inefficient way of producing electricity. The thermal losses from ramping it up and down are huge, figure some 50% of the fuel consumption of coal operating at full speed.”
I can imagine that would be the case during the warmup and cool-down phases, but that assumes cycles of going from zero to peak production for each coal plant, which would be done as a last resort. Instead, a utility system operator would use demand management, export/import to other regions, etc. I wouldn’t expect 0-peak cycles to happen very often - even in France, where they’ve seriously overbuilt nuclear relative to domestic consumption, this doesn’t happen (instead, AFAIK they maintain all of the plants higher on the temperature curve). Have you seen this? Do you have links to discussions? I’d be very curious.
“This is also forcing countries that depend on coal or their NG depletes to be cautions about wind - take UK for example.”
I’d be curious to see your info on this, as I’ve not seen this raised as an important problem for UK wind. The research I’ve seen says that the overall variance of the UK wind resource (for the UK as a whole) isn’t nearly as large as that would suggest. Let’s see...I’ll have to look for the whole UK study. I’ve got at hand the following info: The NGC have stated that 25000MW of capacity would displace the need for 5000MW of other plant:
http://www.sd-commission.org.uk/publications/downloads/Wind_Energy-NovRe...
Certainly, wind works nicely with NG & hydro, and I don’t think it makes much sense to try to push wind much past 30%, but I think you’re overestimating the overall variance of wind, and the ability of demand management to cope with it, expecially as we start to see (in the US) up to 200GW of schedulable charging demand from PHEV/EV’s.
Let me stress the problem of overestimating the overall variance of wind, especially at continental scale. Random variance in any system, where the variables are non-correlated, becomes less important as the system becomes larger: the ratio of variance to average demand goes down quickly. Further, wind farms at continental scale are actually inversely correlated, because wind is a heat transfer from the equator to the poles that is a continual process - locally it looks variable, but it must always continue somewhere.
Now, low night time demand is actually the greatest problem for wind, especially because in most regions wind tends to be a little stronger at night. The 20% of peak demand that is used as a rule of thumb? That comes from the typical ratio of night time to daytime peak demand. Nightime is where you run into insufficient “baseload” demand, which would mean that as wind capacity rose, in effect electricity would start to be wasted, and average KWH costs would rise. In a neat synergy, night time is where PHEV/EV’s will mostly charge.
“I'm also happy we are getting closer to an agreement and I thank you for the polite and constructive level of discussion”
Thanks. I agree.
But upthread, you were talking about wind "displacing" hydro, which is an extremely efficient type of spinning reserve.
You cannot even keep your logic straight. You are either a deranged person or an anti-wind attack dog (perhaps a paid one).
EP, it is again you who can not understand my logic which is very simple:
It is obvious that in a closed system wind will always displace something. My whole point, from the very beginning, was that since wind and coal don't work together well, wind tends to reduce the share of cleaner hydro, rather than that of coal. Existing coal capacity is not retired and the additions of wind eventually go to meeting the overall growth of demand.
If a system lacks hydro or NG introducing wind is hardly an option at all - it would be very inefficient to do so. Denmark uses only 5% of its wind domestically and this is the degree its wind saves it's local FFs. The rest is exported to Norway at dumping prices - and if Norway did not have hydro Denmark's wind would not scale at all.
The bottom line is:
1) In a closed, efficiently operating system wind is limited to the amount of hydro that can back it up and to the amount of infrastructure that supports it.
2) More wind tends to save hydro resources which can be used alternatively, but does not save much on existing FFs and emissions. Therefore wind is not effective as means of reducing GHG emissions (but it can reduce their growth by releasing some hydro, which at least partially would have been otherwise covered by FFs)
3) Saved hydro resources from 2) are most likely to be used to meet growth of demand or for other alternative purposes like irrigation.
Overall there is some credit to wind on FF and GHG reduction front, but it is very far from what they are praising it for.
I won't comment on the adhominem attack (again). It speaks more for you than for me.
“ wind and coal don't work together well”
Could you provide more info on this? I’ve heard it stated before, and yet as I posted before, it doesn’t make sense to me. Heck, coal is used to handle day-night variations of 4:1. For instance, I’m sure that lower boiler temps lower efficiency, but the level of generation during that time would be much lower, so that the reduced efficiency affects many fewer KWH’s, so it isn’t that important.
“In a closed, efficiently operating system wind is limited to the amount of hydro that can back it up and to the amount of infrastructure that supports it.”
This doesn’t make sense to me, for a number of reasons, probably too many to efficiently discuss here. To take one important one, you’re clear that wind does provide some capacity credit, right?
"wind and coal don't work together well"
I have been explaining this all along: wind forces coal to work as spinning reserve, thus wasting fuel both when idling and when ramping up. After the CPP ramps up it is even harder to ramp it down because of thermal inertia so wind gusts end up dumped to neighboring grids. The other option is to reject them altogether.
This is the main reason Alan thinks wind can go to 30% in New Zealand - New Zealand has mostly hydro. But I'm still sceptical, 30% of generation with 25% load factor means wind capacity is 120% of average demand. A can only contemplate how often wind will go over the total demand per day; and absent much pumped storage and where to dump the electricity on these isolated islands I would expect it will simply be rejected. Which is a waste of energy and the 25% load factor would end up looking like 15%.
"I have been explaining this all along: wind forces coal to work as spinning reserve, thus wasting fuel both when idling and when ramping up. After the CPP ramps up it is even harder to ramp it down because of thermal inertia so wind gusts end up dumped to neighboring grids. The other option is to reject them altogether."
Oh, I understand the idea, I just don't see why the problem is that bad. Again, coal is routinely used to handle day-night variations of 4:1, with rates of change comparable to those of wind farm output. I’m sure that lower boiler temps lower efficiency, but for most of the temp curve the effect wouldn’t be great, and the level of generation during periods well down on the temp curve would be much lower, so that the reduced efficiency affects many fewer KWH’s, reducing it's importance.
Do you have any quantitative data on this?
" 30% of generation with 25% load factor means wind capacity is 120% of average demand. "
That overestimates wind variance. For instance, a single turbine will occasionally go to 100% of capacity, but even a moderately large windfarm will very rarely go above 85%, due to the moderating effect of many different turbines under even slightly different wind conditions. Even a relatively small country like NZ will be able to reduce wind variance through geographical diversity (the North & South islands are connected, and I believe there is a decent interconnection with Australia, as well) - I would expect that the maximum production would be more like 70% of nameplate. Also, a 25% load factor is too low for many locations, and much too low for off-shore.
Here’s an interesting effort towards modelling the effects of interconnections on renewables’ utilization:
http://www.geni.org/globalenergy/library/geni/simulation/the-GENI-model....
You need to think a little harder about this. Renewable energy is only wasted if it is not displacing fuel based energy that it might otherwise displace. If your grid is 100% renewable, and you don't use all the generation there is no waste, you just have a comfortable margin. It is a bit like catch-and-release fishing. You are not wasting fish when you do this.
Chris
You would never get financing with catch and release infrastructure development...
"Denmark is not even the best place for it."
Yeah. It's tiny, and it's wind resource is poor. The remarkable thing is that the Danes are so determined to make use of it.
Germany has the same situation. Conversely, the US has an extremely good wind resource, and I think the UK has a pretty good resource as well.
IIRC, Denmark has not been trying to reduce CO2, instead their national goal has been reduction of oil consumption.
Regarding renewables, garyP boldly asks:
Does oil scale (exponentially)?
Does coal scale (exponentially)?
Can population scale (exponentially)?
"Cheap" is a frame game by the irresponsible and the don't-hold-me-accountable. (Now I'm starting to sound like Jay Hanson.) Economics is all about stealthfully figuring out how the elites (Mary Antoinette et al) can be made to seem unaccountable (not liable) for the damage and pillage they leave behind.
Cheap in deed.
So yes. Let's climb and raze every mountain.
Yes, let's ford and damn every stream.
Let's bio-foolerize every meadow.
Till we find our nightmare dream!!
One question "how long between the peak of oil/gas and petrol being rationed or power cuts on the grid?"
If you can't scale to a size that can make a visible difference in that time, then you really don't have a viable solution unless you can find a way to start way before people realise there is a problem.
Nuclear is carving out the start early route, but they will still probably be late.
Its no good saying coal has a head start - you're climbing the mountain you're on, not the smaller hill next door. Now after me, "Doe a deer a ....."
In December 2002, when we had an ice storm that coated everything in our area with 3/4-1 inch of ice (and extremely low temperatures at night after the ice storm), the choice was essentially migrating somewhere else (temporarily) or freezing in the dark. Some 2 million people in NC and SC shared this experience.
We had lots of broken trees (and wooden power poles) to burn, but they didn't necessarily keep the house (or the room to which we confined ourself) very warm. While keeping warm in cold conditions is something that I've practiced any number of times out in the high altitude of any number of mountains, it doesn't work so well for my wife.
Solar would not have helped (at least for several days) and thankfully the wind was minimal or we would have had even more trees down (at the height of the storm we had no wind. About half the damage occurred when a slight breeze of 1-3 mph did in weighted and top heavy trees.
It was bad enough with a week without power, but a whole winter of it would not be my choice.
Where is this strawman of doing without power at all coming from?? I don't see anyone suggesting this.
You might want to go back and read the magazine stories from the '70s about what happened in the United States when Saudi Arabia turned off the oil tap. This is not a straw man this is history, and "those not willing to learn the lessons of history are doomed to repeat them!"
I sat in gas lines in the 70s, so no reading about it necessary.
My comment was about the strawman of people having to do without power all winter (or even frequently). Where does this come from? Certainly not from any of the posters today. I understand baseload power, and see the need for power stations that can provide it, but I also see the benefit from a myriad of demand side management techniques.
Mentioned a couple of times over the last two days, in 2005, U.S. electricity providers reported total peak-load reductions of 25,710 megawatts resulting from demand-side management (DSM) programs, a 9.3 percent increase from the amount reported in 2004. See a DoE initiative at http://gridwise.pnl.gov/
And in one of the courses I teach we discuss the need to define plant power load in terms of that which is critical and that which is sheddable when necessary - and in the class were those who, as interns last summer, actually saw this occurring.
Garyp,
I agree with your statement, "However people will take what appears to be the best option they are presented with at any particular time." In the context of preparing for peak oil or climate change I think this summarizes our most basic problem and opportunity. It also is where government could help if we had leaders instead of politicians.
Tax policy could guide people to choose the best option that is best in the macro sense. IMHO we need to tax the He** out of fossil fuels and use the proceeds to subsidize wind and solar.
I don't understand why many people keep on harping on the need for "better leadership." Ain't gonna happen. If the populace is not conscious of what kind of society it wants to construct, then leaders will take advantage of that to steer it to their own ends. What we need is for all "ordinary folks" to be informed on these issues and consciously looking for ways to remedy them, and then striving at that. Waiting for a Moses figure to lead us to the promised land will only bring us perpetual misery.
Who's gonna be our Energy Moses?
Nominations?
I wanted to make my position clear on this:
Not just no, but HELL, NO!
We should not try to drive people to any particular solution. If insulation would cut e.g. natural gas use more cheaply than solar, but solar is subsidized and insulation is not, we would just waste money. We already tax the hell out of people; let's shift those taxes to fossil fuel and away from e.g. working, and let people spend their money on what works best for them.
Of course, we also need to fix things like building codes, leases which put tenants on the spot for energy requirements without the ability to improve buildings, and other flaws of the so-called free market.
On thing that affect the free market is past subsidies, and on going subsidies of things other than wind and solar. I agree with you that production subsidies would be better ended, but that means ending all of them, including Price-Anderson and sweetheart royalty deals. And, shifting taxes to fossil fuels could be regressive, better to ration so that prices and consumption both fall.
Chris
"shifting taxes to fossil fuels could be regressive, better to ration so that prices and consumption both fall."
I'd go for a per-capita rebate of a carbon tax, instead. Maybe even a special check mailed out quarterly, to make it visible.
I wouldn't. Any such tax would have to amount to hundreds (minimum) per quarter - heck, per month - to change behavior up at the middle-class level. Making the poor wait months to get their rebate would mean lots of pain, not to mention defaults on many of the remaining mortgages.
Make it a zero-bracket part of employment taxes and you're talking.
I've talked this over with some legislative staffers and this will likely not fly. Replacing FICA with a carbon tax would leave social security unfunded if the tax actually worked.
That's trivial to fix, and I've been talking about the solution since I first mentioned it: lower the zero-bracket amount as collections go down. That way it's revenue-neutral and Social Security collections are unchanged.
It is a politcal issue. There are still some people who can't stand that man in the whitehouse and hate it that old people can't be driven into the workhouse to drive down wages. They are allied with people who feel that their oportunities to bask in gratitude for their charitable work while they prostyletize have been limited by a governmental drive to assure freedom from want (they don't like freedom of worship much either). Thus, any tampering with social security is viewed with extreme suspicion because it is assumed to be part of this ideological conflict.
" Making the poor wait months to get their rebate would mean lots of pain"
Well, that would also be easy to fix, just by advancing some of the money. As mdsolar says, I think that would be a heck of a lot less controversial - people get very, very nervous when you start tinkering with FICA.
Plus, a rebate payment would be more visible: I think that's really important, because a fuel tax is also visible, and most people just won't trust that they're getting all of their money back.
Denying the archaeological record doesn't make it go away.
I'm interested in knowing what you are claiming; are you saying that the Medieval Warm Period extended beyond sections of the North Atlantic? Even if it did, what point would you be trying to make? The drought in the Southeast (and Western) US is indeed extreme in many places, and 'only' severe in others. Desertification of these areas is certainly plausible, so the viability of agriculture and even livability of these areas is threatened by continued climate change; arguing for more coal burning takes us from the frying pan into the fire.
I was responding to the comment that the data from L'Anse aux Meadows is anecdotal. It is a World Heritage site and increasingly well documented. The point about what the weather was like in the US back in the last warming period can perhaps be taken as an indicator of what it might be like this one. And since the record shows some sustained drought conditions it might indicate that those in Atlanta/(pick your city) who hope that their current drought would ameliorate soon might be in for a long wait.
The point about what the weather was like in the US back in the last warming period can perhaps be taken as an indicator of what it might be like this one.
I must point out that partial data taken from the Hudson river valley shouldn't be extrapolated to be representative of the U.S. Atlanta might have very different responses to AGW than the Hudson Valley. But your concern about current and future drought is certainly a valid one.
Tidal energy is not renewable. Ok, there is a lot of it, but we can still spend it all, there used to be a lot of oil too. Except that spending all tidal energy would be much more catastrophic...
And I didn't see Heading Out arguing for expanded use of coal. He just said it will happen, not that is should happen.
What, you're claiming that tides will run out?!?
WTF?!?
The tides slow the Earth's rotation. Increasing the friction of tidal action by drawing off some of the energy will increase the rate at which the Earth slows.
Will a small amount tidal energy sucked off to create electricity be a problem. I wouldn't think so.
Would massive global investment in tidal energy be a problem? I don't know off the top of my head, but until we answer that question, we can't count on tidal energy on a global scale.
Ive never thought of this nor heard of it - do you have any references? Has anyone empirically looked at the possibility that the earths rotation might be impacted by something we could do?
I'm pretty sure that the earth's rotation has been effected by the creation of artificial lakes/ponds.
But the probably of rotation being influenced by tidal energy harvesting is remote. Think of the length of the California coast line. Now think of the places where tidal energy would be harvested - San Francisco Bay, Morrow Bay, San Diego Bay, etc. Only a very small percentage of the coast line.
And the tidal flow would not be stopped. Only minimally slowed. We wouldn't build dams and prevent flow, just stick turbines under the surface (deep enough to allow ship traffic).
You forgot to mention Humboldt Bay. You must be new here?
I left out LA, Newport, and Mission Bay as well. I think people got my drift.
(Couple of decades. Just a newby....)
and
Who are you, and what have you done with Nate?
LOL
and I already voted for post of day....;)
I have considered this before. Ocean currents would flow regardless, even if the earth stopped rotating. The temp difference in sunlight/shadows would give you convection.
That should be the funniest thing I've read :) We are worried about 0.6 degrees rise in global temperatures but stopping the Earth from spinning is OK because thermal convection will do the job :)
I suspect even 1% longer day-night cycle would cause disasters which now we can't even imagine... it is a good idea for science fiction story though.
not bloody likely, in the scheme of things.
lets see... ok, here's an interesting link...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tidal_acceleration
The mass of the moon is about 7.3e22 kg orbiting at a distance of 3.8e8 meters. Neglecting the increases orbital distance for slowing it enough to increase the length of the month by one day we would have a change of velocity of 1/28*6*pi*3.8e8 meters/(28 days*24*3600)=106 meters/second. This would be a change in kinetic energy of 2e28 joules. So, at 1.2 TW power consumption, this would last 2e16 seconds or about 600 million years. The moon is expected to increase its orbital period to 47 days in 2 billion years. It is not clear that we can really cause this to hasten much by tapping the tides. Tides count as renewable energy.
Chris
good answer
What if we use the moon to gravity assist our metal bearing asteroids into earth orbit. That will speed up the moon (because we are slowing down the asteroid) replenishing the moon's gravity for more tide farms.
Wave energy is solar powered and will continue even if the tides fail.
RobertInTucson
I haven't escaped from reality. I have a daypass.
I am with you on the slowing down the earth issue but tidal energy is not without costs. Here on San Francisco Bay they are looking into tapping the very fast tides that go in and out of San Francisco's Golden Gate. The problem is that is you slow down the tides, you disrupt the Bay's whole circulation. The tidal marshes do not get flushed as they do now. This would degrade them. The whole Bay system would be endangered. And the amount of power you could get out of it (I think it was about 45 megawatts) was not all that big anyway.
Sorry, you are flat wrong on this one. We do rely quite heavily on coal now for electrical generation. The issue is, as we roll past the peak will electricity become a transportation fuel, and if it does, will this mean a significant increase in the burning of coal with a concomitant increase in carbon emissions. If that is the case, we are well and truly fucked. We had better find a way out of that scenerio. Now is the time to make the necessary investments to be sure that this doesn't happen. Right now, we waste huge amounts of electricity so that is an obvious place to start before we start burning a lot more coal. Efficiency is the great unused energy source of the 21st century. Then renewables, then nuclear, then seqestered coal. We have solutions, we lack the political will.
SW
Australia has just announced that they will ban the import of energy inefficient plasma and LCD TVs. That's going to put pressure on manufactures to create more efficient models.
A bit of political will has just been exercised.
Not quite. An energy report commissioned by the Federal Government has recommended tougher energy ratings that could limit plasma TV by 2008 and LCD TV by 2011 if they remain so power-hungry. The government hasn't responded so far. I will believe a government banning these popular products when I see it. Can't upset the punters.
I agree - coal companies and their users are not charged the costs of their externalities.
There are a number of alternatives that seem puny now, but will become the backbone of our power systems. As global warming becomes more alarming governments are going to mandatorily close down coal fired power stations. My guess is that electicity will become intermittent in the US, Europe and elsewhere, just like it is in Africa today.
"We can do much to reduce our usage of electricty; there is no 'reality' that says we much continue to waste energy for largely whimsical purposes. For example, I have a well-insulated passive solar house powered primarily by net-metered PV with efficient appliances; my worst electric bill has been $57 during a long stretch of 100F days in August (we employ a conservation mindset)."
How nice. And how about all the rest of us that don't have a solar house and have already replaced all the lightbulbs, use natural light from windows as much as possible, have insulated everything in triplicate, and don't use the HVAC unless the temp is near 90 or 40? Out here in reality land, the "conservation mindset" you suggest only works to significantly reduce electric usage in your rarified universe - the vast majority of people live in homes and flats with very little in the way of leeway for "conservation." Shall we hike to the nearest creek and do laundry? Burn firewood to cook? (as if that would be an improvement!) Go to bed at 4:30pm in the winter? Just what else is it you think people who don't live in passive solar buildings can do? Let them eat cake, eh?
http://science.reddit.com/info/2z1f1/comments
if you are so inclined...
No, I'm not so inclined.
"We are very rapidly approaching the point where world oil production will likely peak and then start to decline. The quantities of fuel that will have to be found to replace this gap are not likely to be found in the occasional wind farm, dotted over the landscape, nor in solar panels on the roofs of very profitable corporations. The alternatives to letting the populace “freeze in the dark” are starkly limited."
This is sadly unimaginative thinking.
In the US, for example, there are about 1500 calories per day in overconsumption of foodstuffs per person, which might well once redistributed maintain the lights and heat for a while longer. Then there is the multiple of the total amount of these calories which is consumed in bringing them to people's mouths. This should permit an additional few nights of warmth and light, though we might ask, why the hell do we need the light.
There are perhaps a few other changes to our living arrangement available which might affect the rate at which we 'need' to extract the remainder of the fossil energy endowment.
Right on.
We don't need to freeze and starve in the dark -- but we could put on a sweater and turn down the lights. And we we all be a lot healthier with less to eat.
China is the current great living experiment -- virtually no obesity (in the rural areas, at least) and minimal chronic disease (admittedly, lifespans may have been shorter) up until about 10 years ago. Now an epidemic of obesity, soon to be followed by an epidemic of chronic illness (diabetes, heart disease, arthritis, cancer) caused by calorie overconsumption. At the same time they are suffocating in coal smoke (and sharing that with us here on the west coast.)
So true. And as long as HeadingOut is going to drag us down the rabbit hole of arguing about how coal is the only sure recourse to stave off freezing in the dark, with references to Marie Antionette no less, I am thinking it's time to bring in the Queen of Hearts.
Off With His Head!
;-)
"In the US, for example, there are about 1500 calories per day in overconsumption of foodstuffs"
1500 calories is equivalent to about 7 ounces of fat. If Americans overconsumed by this amount daily either (a) a 30-year old American would weigh over 4,000 pounds, (b) body temperatures would be dramatically higher and skin would be drenched in sweat, or (c) people would be bouncing off the walls like a Jack Russell Terrier on crack, played at double fast forward.
The energy has to go somewhere. I suppose it could be going down America's toilets. If that's true, then perhaps the world can be powered by hooking into America's septic system. Otherwise, a 40-year-old person who is 100 pounds overweight gets that way by storing about 32 calories per day as fat.
Perhaps most of the energy stays in the food. Overconsumption tends to promote inefficient digestion.
"You can never solve a problem on the level on which it was created."
Albert Einstein
Toilforoil:
There is a significant amount of data (and my own personal experience) that shows that it takes about 20-years (order of magnitude) for new ideas to make significant market impact. Believe me or not, there are a few folks out there (me included) we are working on possible answers (though Dave Cohen will tell you he is a bit cynical about one of the things we are looking at - maybe rightly, but maybe not, that's why its called research). But looking for, and finding answers is a long-term solution - we have an immediate term problem, that will be met with a large percentage of the current politicians in place. It must be met with what is available and economic and politically acceptable. Making people pay lots more for power does not necessarily meet all those constraints and wishing won't make it so.
Making people pay lots more for power does not necessarily meet all those constraints and wishing won't make it so.
Making people pay more for carbon-intensive power (i.e., carbon taxes) while reducing their income taxes can meet those constraints.
I agree the 20 year timeframe is a reasonable and doable one. Here is a cut down version of a presentation I gave to my local urban & rural merged government of my county back in January of this year. (I originally posted this version on planetizen, btw.) The presentation was part of the comprehensive plan updating process. The final draft of the comp. plan is now ready - and they completely ignored everything I and others said about peak oil and climate change. So while I agree that it CAN be done, I don't believe for one minute that it WILL be done. People will not act until they are forced to - and at that point the economy will not be able to support the needed changes. Anyway, here's what I said, the short version.
********************
I think it is time for us to realize that one way or another, the issues of peak oil and climate change are going to rise up and bite us in the our exalted posteriors. To take a middle of the road estimate, we only have about 20 years to re-configure planning and development as we know it, both for already developed areas and for those now being developed, and most certainly for all future developments. I would like to therefore throw out a list of things that we need to adopt immediately, whether we like it or not, to try and combat the effects that peak oil and climate change will have on our society.
I don’t have any illusions about anyone actually liking or adopting these proposals. I’m a realist, not an optimist. But after having considered the situation carefully, I have come to the conclusion that these things could be done, if anyone was willing. So in 20 years, if nothing else, I’ll at least be able to say “I told you so,” when everyone looks back and says, “Why didn’t we…”
1. Electric trolley/streetcar systems need to be installed to service every last neighborhood in our urban area. These neighborhood electric systems need to be served in turn by an electric collector system of express streetcars, subways, or light rail. If that means taking up road lanes, so be it. Gasoline powered buses must be replaced with electric ones, starting immediately.
2. A moratorium needs to be placed on “big box” and “mega-shopping” centers. We have enough of these already. The existing ones need to be tied into the electric mass transit system. If that means taking up road lanes, so be it.
3. Every new neighborhood must be absolutely required to have three things:
a) grocery, pharmacy, and hardware retail shopping centers within ¼-½ mile of every home built – in other words, within a reasonable walking distance.
b) A children’s playground, adjacent to at least two acres of open field space. This open space can be used for air-dropping emergency rations, medicine, or supplies, and can be a staging area for a “tent city” of government, medical or military operations during a natural or man-made disaster. These should be no greater than 1-¾ mile walking distance from every home in the development.
c) A “community center” building, with classroom space and assembly space, hopefully adjacent to the open field, must be provided for each neighborhood.
4. All existing neighborhoods need to be retrofitted to meet the above requirements. (“Retrofitted” is a nice, polite way of saying that the division of planning needs to select a block or two in each existing neighborhood that more or less meets the walkability requirements and raze it to the ground in order to put in a-c above.)
5. All new development (both residential and commercial) must, starting immediately, be required to have solar panels or solar shingles to supplement the building’s electrical needs. In order to put the electric mass transit in place in an already near capacity electric grid, we are going to have to get serious about this now.
6. Existing development must be retrofitted with solar panels or solar shingles, and the government is going to have to systematically do this in each neighborhood and provide substantial subsidies for owners of buildings to do so. This is not optional. It is not enough to reduce the electric usage of just the new developments. Old neighborhoods MUST be brought “up-to-speed” with solar power. We have a 20 year timeframe to do this. There is no reason that it cannot be done in that amount of time.
7. The driving age needs to raised immediately to at least 18.
8. The government now offers tax help for those who buy hybrid or electric cars, but this is not enough. Starting immediately, a tax must be placed on all households or businesses starting at the 3rd registered standard gasoline vehicle. No exceptions. In five years, that needs to fall back to starting with the 2nd standard gasoline vehicle. No exceptions. In ten years, every standard gasoline vehicle must be subject to the tax. No exceptions. In addition, a substantial sales tax in addition to the regular state sales tax must be placed on the sale of standard gasoline powered vehicles. No exceptions.
9. Toll roads must charge higher tolls for standard gasoline powered vehicles. Ditto for parking permits, etc. You get the idea.
10. Rail freight must be encouraged and provided for both with land for standard rail yards and tie-ins to the local electric mass transit system for special electric “freight trolleys” which can deliver rail freight to local businesses. Alleys behind and between existing and new businesses can have spur rails for these trolleys to unload so they don’t block passenger service. Underground or basement unloading is also an option.
11. Free or heavily subsidized wireless internet must be made available throughout the urban area. Government must also encourage full or partial telecommuting with tax breaks for businesses – for each employee who telecommutes at least half-time.
12. All government employees should be given free passes for mass transit. Government should encourage businesses to do the same, using incentives of some sort. All students should receive a free mass transit pass from their schools, both k-12 and college (with expiration dates clearly marked).
13. Unlucky 13 I’ll add as my personal wish: All new development must be required by law to be at least 10% “affordable housing” – “affordable” being defined by something like affordable to someone with about 50% of the area’s median income. There are several ways of calculating “affordable,” and most of you already have some way of doing this, so I won’t belabor the point.
14. “Zoning” needs to be changed to allow non-industrial home businesses in all areas, and “homeowner association” rules against home-based non-industrial type businesses needs to be made illegal effective immediately. Density restrictions need to be eliminated to allow granny-flats and other urban infill uses in both urban and sub-urban areas.
15. Conservation of electricity and resources needs to be given a top priority. For example, the government must make it illegal for homeowner’s associations to prohibit clotheslines (and other electricity-use-reducing old fashioned items), home vegetable gardens, home greenhouses, and other eco-friendly practices. Needless to say, prohibiting solar panels (either on or off of the buildings), mini wind turbines, and other renewable methods of generating home electricity must also be made illegal effective immediately.
So here they are – 15 things you can do or start doing right now that will greatly help the city deal with climate change and peak oil. There are surely other things, such as bike routes and the new “walkable schools” initiative, but they are just a drop in the bucket. The two biggest problems we will face are lack of gasoline and hence lack of transportation, and addressing those will need to go hand-in -hand with electric conservation and alternative electric generation, and eventually the acknowledgment that it is morally wrong – a crime against humanity, even – to let electricity (and water, and local phone service) be for-profit privately owned ventures that can deny people basic necessary-for-life services due to inability to pay. – but that’s another post.
Nor am I so inclined.
The premise was okay, but there are two arguments you could have made:
1. The argument that, in all likelihood, coal is going to stay with us for a while, especially because there will be a tendency to lean on it a bit more in the case of a liquid fuels crisis from oil depletion. Since coal use is likely to have this tremendous societal inertia, we need to make EVEN GREATER EFFORTS to gradually supplant it with other energy resources and other ways of living. Yes, many people might be stubborn about higher electricity prices. They might want to stubbornly stick to coal--which is why we must make even greater efforts to create disincentives against coal use (such as internalizing its environmental costs via a carbon tax--that would be a very simple way to start) and develop renewables to the level of cost competitiveness and scale.
2. The argument that, in all likelihood, coal is going to stay with us for a while, especially due to peak oil, so we SHOULD just say fuck it and accomodate ourselves to the thought of "Burn baby, burn!"
Sadly, you went for something like the latter argument rather than the former, which is what I expected from a theoildrum article. You see, the main problem is that you are ignoring the distinction between descriptive and normative arguments. You have described the situation we face accurately enough, but your proposal about how we SHOULD (in a normative sense) approach the situation is very dangerous to the well-being of our society within my lifetime. That's another point that needs making, too. Some people talk about anything beyond 20 years from now as "long term" and therefore of little interest to them. Huh? 20 years from now, I'll only be 39 years old, right in what should be the "prime" of my life--and if life expectancies hold, I could expect living with the consequences of the next 20 years for another 40 years! Maybe you don't care if New York City or Shanghai get submerged under 3 meters of ocean in 40 years, but I do!!!
I have always thought that submerged cities will be the least to worry about. And we could build levees to fix that - it's not that hard.
Food security will be the killer. Now in Sudan, soon to come to your country.
So, the argument goes, much like the keep the cars at any cost argument, we use electricity: therefore, we must keep using electricity.
We are raping the seven year old; therefore, we must keep raping the seven year old.
We are pouring acid on the kittens; therefore, we must keep pouring acid on the kittens.
There is no other way. If we want to keep being the bloated earth-destroying lazy-butt creatures in easy one-button comfort, we have to keep using the coal.
We have to do it. We cannot change. Look at the past. We used coal in the past.
Just imagine what Julius Caesar's life would have been like without coal-fired electricity!!! Oh my God!!
Wait, this just in---seems I've gotten my facts a bit scrambled. Turns out they didn't have electricity back then. I didn't realize the Romans were cavemen! Wow. Go figure.
So, just imagine what Queen Elizabeth's life would have been like without coal-fired electricity!!! Oh my God!!
Wait, again, the reality host interrupts---WHAT? That can't be right. I know for certain Queen Elizabeth was not a cavewoman. How could she have not had electricity?
This is getting ridiculous!
Okay! One more time. SO, just imagine what Abraham Lincoln's life would have been like without coal-fired electricity!!! HEY! REALITY HOST!! Don't you come over here!! Don't you tell me that Lincoln was a caveman, because that was practically yesterday. There is no way. NO WAY!!!
Dang. Seems you don't have to be a caveman to live without electricity.
Maybe we could do without coal. Oh for shame. How can we give up coal? It's so pretty and clean and healthy for all god's chillrun.
Texas says Arkansas must not build the Fulton Coal Fired Plant.
Now that's crazy.
BTW-the SWEPCO plant will destroy a (privately owned) national park and
increase Arkansas coal (car equivalent?) emissions by 50%.
Now that's progress, eh?
And Heinburg quotes two German reports saying the US/China coal reserves aren't there.
How much do we sacrifice before we decide our civilization is committing suicide.
Arkansaw of Samuel L Clemens
No, the Romans didn't have electricity -- they may have burned a little coal in some places. They did use phenomenal amounts of wood for heating their baths, pottery kilns, smelting and of course ship construction. One of the sources of "collapse" of the Roman Empire was the destruction of their forests. And they didn't have diesel powered trucks to get wood from further afield.
Agreed.
HO is talking about the UK which was the furthest and coldest/dampest outpost of the roman empire, and they had some favourable climate decades then, and there was loads of wood in the UK [OK, you mentioned that]. They only occupied 1/2 of it anyway. I dont remember Ab Lincoln in the UK. I'm sure he would have enjoyed a coal fire in winter.
HO is not suggesting a manifesto - he is trying to suggest what will happen in reality in the UK.
I agree, HO has posited a likely scenario.
To my mind, it may well happen that unless we can kick start Nukes, then the obvious alternative is coal. Renewables will have there place. The Severn Barrier is a good start, and Scotland has other likely candidates as well.
Coal and carbon sequestration might be the only bridging technology available in ready form to compensate for our ageing nuke fleet wich will come off line before 2020. And the aging coal fired power stations that fail EC Emissions.
If we want to keep the lights on and have any kind of civilisation, then we will need a mix of all sources and a serious attempt at conservation.
This country has a big problem. We have 60 million people in this country. We have some of the highest population densities in the world. Whatever people think, this Island was not designed to hold 60 million people. We are not capable of feeding ourselves. The scary question is: Do we have anything of worth to trade for food and dwindling hydrocarbons? Well not if we dont even manage to keep the lights on.
We will struggle with multiple coincident, catastrophes, one of which will be electricity generation.
Like it or not, we will take the fast route to the easy solution. It may be unpalatable, but it is inevitable and it will be overlapped by nukes later. But only if we act now.
So there will be coal, nukes,some lingering gas, wind, tidal, - all of it. And massive, forced conservation.
There is no alternative. Except the effective death of the UK.
Your attempt as sarcasm is, let's say, less than effective.
News flash: the romans did in fact have central heat - they were called hypocaust (aka gravity) systems and they used clay ductwork to let wood-burning furnaces heat buildings using the simple principal of physics that cold air falls and hot air, less dense rises. The 1928 arts and crafts bungalo I used to own had the exact same type of system: it had originally burned coal but a former owner had converted it to natural gas. In an emergency, though, we could have still thrown wood (or even the furniture) into it and burned them for heat - just like the romans did.
But the whole point of this conversation is that natural gas and heating oil are not going to be available, and you don't want coal burned. Are you suggesting, then, that the entire population of American should denude the countryside and all burn wood? Why do you suppose most of the world's non-modernized poor live in tropical reasons, genius? [Hint: easter island.]
So is that the best you can do? Instead of trying unsuccessfully to be smart, how about suggesting an actual viable solution?
A. Blinkin was a destroyer of trees -- he lived in a log cabin, remember?
:-)
| The problem will solve itself.
| But not in a nice way.
Heading Out,
You need to read Monbiot's book. You are proposing a strawman. Monbiot supports wind for the UK not solar and he has pointed out that it gets less expensive as you go further offshore. His numbers seem fairly sound.
You are also mistaken that strip mining is safer. It just spreads its destruction more widely.
Chris
Heading Out, I strongly support your efforts to put the discussion on reality-based grounds, but I can not accept you continuously omitting the so-called "externalities" coal causes.
An apology for coal without mentioning climate change is like an ad for the weight-loss effects of smoking without mentioning cancer. And forgetting to mention "nuclear" in your post is akin to forgetting there are effective weight-loss pills as a replacement to smoking (yes, yes with certain side effects and potential risks, but it is proven they work well).
The core of the problem comes out here:
The core of the problem seems to be that we have a spoiled society and a dysfunctional democracy, which is preselecting people in charge committed to only "feel good" policis. We don't have neither the societal nor the political will to change. This must be put to an end, right now! What if Churchill or FDR were feel good politics? Wouldn't we all be Nazi now?
If bills have to rise 10-20%, so be it. The public will have to learn to accept it. If we have to build nukes and wind-mills near towns, so be it. The so-called public will have to live with it. Public good and future generation's good trumps local idiots - and this has to be enforced if needed, with appropriate policy and leadership. I loathe this public which is hardly interested in anything but its property values and the views from its windows.
But coal is not an option.
The "Let them eat cake." attitude is pervasive at the TOD. Most comments are big on bitching about the evils of consumption but are small on practical solutions that can be used and afforded by average people. Maybe those who use the Internet and comment are so disconnected from reality that they believe "Let eat cake" will succeed. Marie Antoinette was beheaded if I'm not mistaken.
I disagree. Most of the commentators on TOD seem to be pretty moderate in their habits -- at least, they claim to be.
If people used 1/3 less energy in their daily life (an easily achievable goal) they would save money and not degrade their "lifestyles." And the advantage to the world would be tremendous (other than people losing their jobs because they wouldn't be producing useless things.)
And that doesn't mean buying expensive Pious cars, and the like -- it doesn't cost anything to eat a little less high on the hog, walk a little more, turn the heat and air conditioning down, and the like.
Interviewer: "...and we are here to interview Mrs Wanda Smith"
Wanda: "why aren't they doing anything about my electric?"
Interviewer: "the government has suggested that everyone eats less, walks more and wears sweaters in the house"
Wanda: "those lying, two-faced politicians can kiss my ...."
Interviewer: "err, quite. What do you see as the solution to your needs?
Wanda: "I NEED those lazy, smug little ***** to get my power back on. If they had to live in my circumstances the power would be on here. My little baby girl needs her 'Sponge Bob' at 4:00"
Interviewer: "The government says that this is likely to continue into ..."
Wanda: "Those crooked little ****! They get the power on or they get their asses out. I know where they live."
Interviewer: "So you don't see it as your responsibility to ..."
Wanda: "Its the governments RESPONSIBILITY to get a move on and get the power working properly. What do we pay them for"
Interviewer: "And if they don't"
Wanda: "we'll get those that will".
Repeat to fade.
You're assuming that Wanda represents the majority.
Pay attention to how global warming has entered the public consciousness.
Peak oil is becoming a more commonly recognized issue.
Those bitter old "Wanda's" seem to have lost control of the (American) government. We've seen where their attitudes get us.
I'm sorry, but you are hopelessly delusional. Wanda does represent the majority. The overwhelming majority.
The "consciousness" and "awareness" you are talking about is a feel-good PR game. Another reality show which will turn into an ugly charade if/when the lights really go out.
LONDON, Sept. 25 (UPI) -- A British Broadcasting Corp. poll finds 79 percent of people in 21 nations believe human activity causes global warming.
The BBC's World Service poll indicates nine of 10 say action is needed to address global warming, with 65 percent choosing the strongest position, saying, "It is necessary to take major steps starting very soon."
http://www.upi.com/NewsTrack/Science/2007/09/25/bbc_survey_humans_cause_...
Wanda is part of the 21% who have their heads in the sand.
And part of the 35% who think we don't need to get really busy. Right now.
(Notice how over half of the 21% believe that we need to address global warming even if humans aren't causing it?)
They're being softened up to accept carbon taxes and trading, which is the last funny-money game now the property bubble has blown.
After that it won't matter. The rubes will have nothing of value and will be ready for work for food.
From the article
Not get their communities to cut their own energy use by 80% in five years. They want the growth paradigm to sort things out through shiny new technology for a happy ending. The fact there *is* no technology that is going to allow continued economic growth, continued forecasted increases in energy use and a reduction in overall CO2 levels will have escaped the majority of the respondents.
Exactly.
Let's see them redo that poll with the question:
"What are you personally willing to give up right now to fight global warming? Or did you all assume someone else besides you was going to have to 'do without' to fight climate change?"
Wanda is part of the 79% that expect someone else will have to deal with the problem, and Wanda and the rest of the 79% expect that their lifestyles will not be adversely affected.
Because 79% think that "human activity" is causing global warming, but from our continued actions, what we really mean is "80% of human activity is responsible for global warming, and my activity belongs to the remaining 20%".
Hell, I want someone else to take care of the problem. I don't want to change my lifestyle.
But I recognize that my lifestyle will change. Transportation costs will increase (at least in the near term), so I'll either cut back on my driving or cut back somewhere else.
And the cost of goods and food will increase. I'll end up buying a bit less and gardening more.
I'll probably put up a windmill when the price of diesel climbs enough to make the payback time reasonable. (It was about 15 years when diesel was under $2 per gallon.)
Others will adapt in their own ways. For some it will mean some serious hardships. Some will be hungry more often. Some will have to move to higher ground. For others, a few less five-star dinners.
But almost all of us will realize that we caused the problem, that we've used up cheap oil and coal, and that there are better ways of doing than the ways we've used in the past.
(The discussion was about awareness. Not what people want for Christmas.)
The people who inhabit these types of forums are aware, and if we aren't all currently willing to make changes, we all at least accept that changes will have to eventually be made.
We compose less than one thousandth of one percent of the people on the planet.
The rest of the planet, including the responders to the survey, will literally fight to the death to first maintain their lifestyles, then fight against declining conditions, then fight for food and water.
We are all too different, and we fail to get along very well even in prosperous times. Humans of differing views only unite in response to a common, and obvious, and immediate threat.
Any actionable awareness and realization from the rest of the planet regarding climate change alone will come far, far too late. To say nothing of pandemic, peak oil, fresh water shortages, or topsoil depletion.
Are you not aware that the rest of the world *is* talking about climate change?
Are you not aware that much of the rest of the world is starting to work on the problem?
Are you not aware of just how much bigger the problem is than simply climate change?
Are you not aware of how much faster climate change is progressing than the models predicted?
Droughts, floods, declining soil fertility, deforestation, desertification, the death of the world's oceans, declining grain stocks, dropping aquifers, melting ice caps and glaciers, pervasive chemical pollution, rising CO2 production, economic instability and to cap it all off the imminent fall in global net oil exports:
Here's a realistic look at primary energy production over the next century:
And that leads to this:
The problem is a whole lot bigger than just peak oil or a bit of global warming.
If you'd like to read the entire paper these graphs came from in order to get a feel for the assumptions in the model behind them, it's at: http://www.paulchefurka.ca/WEAP_page.html
A British Broadcasting Corp. poll finds 79 percent of people in 21 nations believe human activity causes global warming.
Which could easily include our friend Wanda. The 79 percent think it's all the fault of those other people. Not us. It's those other people with their coal mines, their civilian Hummers, their slash-and-burn agriculture, their belching bogs of thawing permafrost (pick your favorite 'other').
Wasn't our fault.
| The problem will solve itself.
| But not in a nice way.
Wanda does exemplify the majority of the political class. That's entirely different from the population as a whole - at least here in US. What most of the population - the majority - thinks doesn't matter. The implication that Wanda is undereducated polloi is wrong; Wanda is the corporate elite, the wealthy, those that profit from existing system - she probably makes more than $100k/year. Those are the people in the way.
cfm in Gray, ME
Exactly the perception Enron was striving for with Deathstar and Fatboy. Funny how some continue to push those perceptions...
Usually the proposed practical solutions revolve around renewables - despite the overwhelming evidence they can not serve as a viable alternative. Not at this point of time, not likely in the near future too. For electricity they simply don't fit in what we have as grid; for biofuels I will not even comment - this "solution" may turn an enviromental nightmare of its own.
I am accenting on nuclear plus niche renewables. Look at France - they have been presenting a working, alive demonstration for 30 years! Nuclear + hydro + wind, only 3% coal. CO2 emissions per capita - half of Germany, quarter of USA. Practically all emissions coming from transportation. But we know we have electric mass transit (which they are expanding as fast as possible), and plug-in hybrids are demonstrated working technology. So, what are the rest of us waiting for? Armageddon?
The undefined variable here is "alternative."
The alternative to 3000 sq.ft. homes heated to 75 in the winter and cooled to 65 in the summer, reached by a 3-ton SUV on a 6-lane freeway and powered by gasoline is ..... what?
No combination of "renewables" will allow that, of course. So the alternative is less, or none. Choose now, or be forced to accept.
I'm constantly amazed at how people stare at huge houses and SUVs as though if they go the world will be saved.
OK, in US we will move to smaller houses, people will drive smaller cars... How much of the world energy consumption will be saved, realistically? US is consuming 1/4 of world energy... if it makes the heroic effort to cut it by half it will save 12.5% of the world total. Europeans, Japanese etc. already live efficiently... if they do some more miracles maybe we could shave off a total of 20% of world energy consumption by conservation. How long will it take? Maybe 30-40 years - just to replace the automobile and housing stock.
In 30-40 years we should have:
1) Population which will be more than 20% above current, just from current demographic trends.
2) A total of 3 billion people in India or China hoping to live by Western standards.
3) (My WAGs) Oil down maybe 30-40%, NG down maybe 10-20%, coal probably stagnant...
It simply does not add. The 20% we could shave off by conservation is a lot. But something will have to replace the other 80%, or we will simply kill ourselves in the resource wars that follow.
"The U.S. Department of Transportation reports that the average life span of a vehicle is just over 13 years, with a final mileage of 145,000 miles. Half of all registered vehicles are at least 8 years old, a third of them 10 years old or older."
Lumping cars and houses together and claiming a "30-40 year" replacement time line is, well, intellectually dishonest.
And most of the housing stock doesn't need replacement. It needs upgrading. More insulation, better windows, that sort of stuff.
Most of the housing stock in US needs to be compressed and brought into energy-efficient urban environment. Whatever technologies are introduced it would take a lot of energy to get from here to there in a reasonable time, if for example your job is 20 miles away. And suburbs tend to grow with time, becoming less and less energy efficient. No amount of insulation will compensate that.
If you insist then let it be 10-20 years for vehicles and 30-40 years for houses. Does not make a lot of difference - it is still too much time.
Half of today's new cars will be gone in eight years. The remaining won't be worth a lot and what they eat up in gas (at eight-year-from-now gas prices) will speed their progress toward the crusher.
Were you not around during the fuel problems of the 1970s? If so, do you not remember how people junked their older 'monsters'?
And we don't need to compress your housing stock. People just need to highly insulate a portion of their houses and live in those smaller areas during the temperature extremes. Why heat/AC the guest room when there's no guest?
So take the average living room, replace the windows with dual-paned low-e, pump the walls full of insulation, weather strip the doors. Now we've spent a few thousand per house, not $200k - $400k. And we can do the work in a few days.
Suburbs may continue to grow, if transportation is provided at a reasonable cost. That can be done with well designed public transportation and/or highly efficient "commuter" vehicles.
If not, then more low/medium income people will head back to urban areas in order to reduce their transportation costs and fewer suburban houses will be built.
Yeah half of the cars will be gone in 8 years but will the new cars be much better than the current ones? I doubt it, it will take time for manufacturers to reequip and adjust, scale up new models etc.
In US vehicle average mileage is somewhere around 21mpg, while in Europe it is closer to 40mpg. If we catch up with them in the next 10-20 years we will save 5mln.bpd. - 1/4 of our oil. Then what? Doubling it again (with plug-ins?) will save additionally just 1/8 of the oil we consume. It is a subject of diminishing returns.
We would have to reduce miles traveled, build mass transit and move trucking and medium length passenger trips to rail - and this will require structural adjustments. Which will take very long time - more then simple fleet replacement.
Six years.
The important number is six: 50% of vehicle miles travelled are by vehicles less than 6 years old.
Plug-in's will reduce oil consumption by 75-99%, depending on your driving pattern, and choices.
Hybrids are 2% of new cars, and doubling every 18 months, which could get us to more than 50% of new vehicles in 8 years, if we choose to sustain that rate.
Hybrids are likely to seamlessly turn into plug-ins.
All of this is much easier and faster than building rail, though I support rail, and think long-haul trucking will inevitably go to intermodal transport.
Hybrids are 2% of new cars, and doubling every 18 months, which could get us to more than 50% of new vehicles in 8 years, if we choose to sustain that rate.
We don't "choose" to sustain exponential growth, like we don't "choose" to forever grow our oil supply. There will always be practical limitations:
1st HEVs and PHEVs are more expensive and will remain like that in the foreseeble future. This will limit their market share to those that can afford and are willing to pay the premium.
2nt there are critical components - like the batteries, which will probably not be able to keep up with the pace you assert. 6 years is a very short-term in terms of planning for new production etc.
3rd - in the longer run plug-ins will face grid constraints.
I think you should tone down the enthusiasm a little bit, this will not happen as fast as we would like to. Chevy Volt is due in 3 years, and this is already halfway though the six years you cite. A recession/financial crisis will probably delay the process with quite a few years - which may be good from PO perspective but quite bad from GW POV, as all low-carbon technologies die due to a lack of funding.
"We don't "choose" to sustain exponential growth, like we don't "choose" to forever grow our oil supply. There will always be practical limitations."
It's a matter of choices. At the level of public policy (CAFE, carbon taxes, carbon trading) and personal choices.
"1st HEVs and PHEVs are more expensive"
Why do you say that? The Prius is less costly than the average light vehicle's price of $27K. The Volt is planned for well below $30K, which makes it substantially less expensive than the average vehicle, considering fuel savings.
"2nt there are critical components - like the batteries, which will probably not be able to keep up with the pace you assert. 6 years is a very short-term in terms of planning for new production etc. "
It's a matter of investment. My observation from various industries is that a doubling rate of manufacturing growth of 24 months is sustainable in the longterm, and we could do better if we were willing to accelerate things, at some modest cost of inefficiency (parallel development, etc).
"3rd - in the longer run plug-ins will face grid constraints."
Have you done the calculations? Night time charging could accomodate more than a 75% conversion to electricity, with no additional capacity.
" this will not happen as fast as we would like to."
I agree. I'm not suggesting that we're facing a cakewalk, just that we should be clear on what the problems are, and what they're not. What do I think is key? Education and public policy. The engineering & technical problems are not, in the broader view, all that large.
"A recession/financial crisis will probably delay the process with quite a few years "
Probably not that much - as oil prices rise, investment will still flow to renewables and PHEV's. We'd be much better off with better public policy, of course - that's the key. The sooner the better.
The Prius is less costly than the average light vehicle's price of $27K
I could go and get a 40MPG Toyota Yaris for 13K right now. The Prius is more like 23K and the 10K difference will require something like $20/gallon to ever pay. The average price is hiding the fact that Americans are spending a lot on luxury, not utility - spacious SUVs, etc.etc. And you are going around the obvious fact - Hybrids always will be at a premium because of the extra equipment cost - a Honda Civic EX is something like 18K, and the hybrid is 23K. This was one of the reasons I did not buy I hybrid - the other - I need to see a longer record of their performance and maintenance costs.
It's a matter of investment. My observation from various industries is that a doubling rate of manufacturing growth of 24 months is sustainable in the longterm
Please go ahead and share your observations, along with a definition of "long term". As you can see here, the oil industry roughly doubled each 10 years from 1930 to 1973. So by 2017 we would have 170mln.bpd, right? "It's a matter" of investment is not always the case.
Probably not that much - as oil prices rise, investment will still flow to renewables and PHEV's
I expect in a recession oil prices to fall on people losing their jobs and demand slipping much faster than supply. It will be a slaughterhouse for every alternative energy investment.
We'd be much better off with better public policy, of course - that's the key
Absolutely. We need a long-term policy for getting off oil. This will make the difference between us getting out off this relatively easy and inflicting a lot of economic pain and likely getting into nasty oil wars.
We need proper incentatives like a carbon tax and maybe a price floor guarantee to protect investments from economy cycles. But we must not pick winners! This is what you are suggesting way too often. You may "like" renewable or I may "like" nuclear. Just price in carbon, remove the uncertainties about future demand and let them compete fairly. Other easy to implement policies like loan guarantees will also be beneficial for both.
"I could go and get a 40MPG Toyota Yaris for 13K right now. The Prius is more like 23K "
Sure, but the Prius is much larger.
"The average price is hiding the fact that Americans are spending a lot on luxury, not utility - spacious SUVs, etc.etc. "
Sure, but the point is that low-oil transportation is perfectly affordable.
"Hybrids always will be at a premium because of the extra equipment cost"
Yes, and no. The difference currently includes a scarcity premium - Toyotat says that they are cutting the cost differential to perhaps $2K. OTOH, a parallel hybrid is inherently more complex than a serial hybrid. A serial hybrid should be no more expensive than an ICE, and have much lower operating costs.
"the oil industry roughly doubled each 10 years from 1930 to 1973. So by 2017 we would have 170mln.bpd, right? "It's a matter" of investment is not always the case."
Sure, but that's a commodity problem, limited by geology, and wind, solar and PHEV's are manufacturing problems, with no important limiting inputs.
"I expect in a recession oil prices to fall on people losing their jobs and demand slipping much faster than supply. It will be a slaughterhouse for every alternative energy investment."
It's possible that oil prices will fall sharply, but I don't think recession would do it. A much deeper economic depression would be needed, I think, given that OPEC has become addicted to high prices, and will try hard to put a floor under them. Further, current public policy will be enough to ensure that wind & solar will continue to grow reasonably quickly, regardless of oil prices. Serial PHEV's like the Volt will be cost-effective with almost any gas price.
"This is what you are suggesting way too often. "
Hmmm. I'm not sure what gave you that impression. I'd be delighted with elimination of all subsidies (including loan guarantees, liability caps like Price-Anderson, etc), to be replaced with a good, stiff carbon tax.
OTOH, some regulation is essential, as the market isn't perfect. For instance, efficiency (i.e., vehicles, small transformers, appliances and I/C & residential construction) simply can't be enforced by the market - regulations like CAFE, SEER and energy codes are needed.
Also, I would note that neither ethanol nor fuel cells were examples of picking an alternative energy "winner". Ethanol was a farm subsidy (and still is), and fuel cells were a red herring to prevent a higher CAFE.
The only real choice we face currently is whether to strongly push for nuclear. Unfortunately, due to the scale of nuclear, and the lack of willingness of the free market to insure it, this is inherently a political decision, not something that can be left to the market. I'm not so enthusiastic about nuclear, as wind/solar are easily transplanted to very poor countries, and if the US proves that they are "baseload", other countries (like Egypt, and other future "Iran"'s) might go that way. Nuclear will never be faster or cheaper than coal (without internalizing external costs like CO2, etc, something most countries, and especially poor countries are not likely to do enough of), but if we push wind/solar enough they might get there, and we might just get a solution to 3rd world CO2 emissions, not to mention energy poverty and weapons proliferation.
Wind and solar will never reach parity with nuclear unless a viable storage solution is found. The reason? Currently available storage technologies are themselves on par with nuclear. A 1000MW, 10GWh battery bank or pumped storage would cost about the same as a nuclear unit that can provide the same 1000MW for 50 years, not 10 hours.
Currently costs associated with wind and solar variability are low due to their low penetration (less than 1% in US!) and are absorbed by grid operators (strengthening the grid) and traditional generators that serve as a backup. V2G if we ever see it, will be a poor source of storage. And I strongly doubt you would be able to sell a technology like it to India for example. Do they even have parking places there?
Overall we'd better stop this hand waving discussion. Downthread I suggested US govt spends some billions to try to build what you think would work - a medium scale, renewable powered grid. Thus showing the way to the third world. And, of course, showing them the bill. Isn't this what you are also suggesting?
I hope we could reach a positive agreement from this discussion on based on this suggestion. If I could vote I would write my senator right now.
"A 1000MW, 10GWh battery bank or pumped storage would cost about the same as a nuclear unit that can provide the same 1000MW for 50 years, not 10 hours."
What makes you think that? 1st, Ludington was built precisely to be paired with nuclear plants: it didn't double their cost. Think about it: Pumped storage is much, much simpler than a nuclear plant: 1 (like Ludington) or 2 water reservoirs and the generators. It costs much less than nuclear, or wind per MW of capacity - Alan Drake indicates about .6 cents per KWH. I'm searching for other sources, but this was said on another TOD thread:
"Pumped storage can add as little as 1 mill (.1 cents) to the cost of a kWh. But because we are asking for more storage capacity (per KW of generating capability) than usually demanded of pumped storage, the price would probably range from 2 mills for a three-hour buffer to around 7 mills for a ten-hour buffer. Currently, we have enough pumped storage to store about 19.5 gigawatt hours -- around what the U.S. consumes every 25 minutes."
If you can find sources for your costs, that also might help us make progress in this discussion on this particular point.
2nd, you need to realize that storage doesn't have to be built to handle 100% of generating capacity, because much of the output will be used as it is generated. Another way to say this is that wind (and solar to a greater extent) actually do accrue capacity credits: capacity credits vary greatly from utility to utility, around the country, and world. The National Grid Co. (the UK grid company also owns Niagara Mohawk) applies a 25% Capacity Value (Capacity Credit) to wind. For every 1000MW of wind, it needs 250MW less of capacity from other stations. When you keep in mind that average production (capacity factor) is about 30%, that's 83% of average. ERCOT's value for capacity credit is at the low end, at about 10% of average production (capacity factor), while Minnesota's is at 90%.
Why wasn't this used before? Because natural gas was so cheap, and worked so well for handling intermittent/peak loads. Nat gas has only been recognized as expensive and limited for a very, very short time.
"V2G if we ever see it, will be a poor source of storage."
We're not making progress. You're not hearing me: V2G is not important. It's not needed anytime soon. What's valuable is G2V: managed charging of PHEV/EV's. Demand management like this is practical, and done today by every large utility in the US. It's here, proven and highly cost-effective.
Anyway, here is some real data. From the IEA:
http://www.iea.org/textbase/papers/2005/variability.pdf
From an actual electrical engineering journal (requires registration):
http://www.spectrum.ieee.org/may06/3544/3
a serious study in Ireland:
http://www.sei.ie/index.asp?locID=330&docID=-1
and from a technical working group of actual power engineers:
http://www.uwig.org/IntegrationStateoftheArt.htm
None of this is speculation, or hand waving.
This is already another discussion, thanks for the links, useful info and my opinion is in line with most of their conclusions. Now, from the third link:
we don't see any fundamental technical barriers at the present time to wind penetrations of up to 20 percent of system peak demand, which is far beyond where we are today
US peak demand is ~800GW, so according to them wind could go up to 160GW or 12 times current capacity of 13GW. Since wind is producing <1% of US electricity today, they see a maximum wind penetration of 12%.
12% is 12%. You were talking about 100% renewable grid didn't you? This is what I was challenging you for. You can not build pumped storage everywhere or rely on unproven or yet to-be delivered technologies like DSM or V2G without proper engineering justification. Nobody is denying that wind is useful and can go to 10-15-20%, or who knows, maybe even more. It is depending on hundreds of factors and even your studies did not provide definite numbers - most often it is claimed that 20% is an upper practical limit, sometimes less, maybe more (not yet demonstrated).
The issue here is that so far nobody has challenged the concept of baseload power and shown a grid which could do without it. Baseload is both producing the bulk of the electricity - 60-70% and more, and is or can be serving as a reliable back-up to variable wind and solar. For baseload we realistically have 2 options - coal or nuclear; hydro is limited (and is better used as spinning reserve and/or to balance renewables) and NG is expensive. This was the technical basis of the original point of Heading Out - without baseload you don't have a grid. If we don't accept nuclear this means we choose coal. It is as simple as that, and Danish and German experience proves it - their baseload coal is alive and intact, except some displacement with NG which is likely to go back.
When pressed with this so called "greens" quickly start listing real or imaginatory technologies like V2G, HVDC, pumped storage etc. without presenting any technical or economical justification for them or showing how much each will help. Simply put they don't know what they are talking about, but they talk it every time and preferably - to the clueless public. And this is pissing me off - and I guess everyone in the electricity business is pissed off too from being taught how to do their job by politically motivated greenheads.
I have a personal request - please read my answer carefully before posting. If you don't address the issue of lack an alternative for baseload power in a technical manner and just start listing technologies like before I'll be forced to ignore you.
The limits of roughly 10-20% aren't maxima. They're minima: levels to which these analysts believe wind can go, without major modification to our current grid. They simply haven't analyzed higher levels, because it seemed too far in the future, and wasn't necessary.
"You can not build pumped storage everywhere or rely on unproven or yet to-be delivered technologies like V2G without proper engineering justification. "
Sure. That's a major project, though. At minimum it would require a great deal of data for simulations.
" so far nobody has challenged the concept of baseload power "
Sure, they have. I have. Alan Drake has. Have we done the sophisticated modelling necessary? No. I don't know if someone has begun to attempt it, but most people think it's not necesssary, because it's pretty far away. We're at about 1% wind today: when we get to 5 - 10% wind, people will start thinking about it seriously.
It would be nice to start people thinking about it, so that such an analysis happens.
"This was the technical basis of the original point of Heading Out - without baseload you don't have a grid. If we don't accept nuclear this means we choose coal."
1st, we don't know that. Heading Out out asserted that coal was necessary, and there's no basis for that.
I asserted the opposite, and at the least I think we have to agree that a non-coal scenario is possible. Is such a scenario thoroughly tested, or modelled? Not as far as I know, but you certainly can't say that it's impossible.
2nd, Heading Out didn't even admit to the possibility of nuclear replacing coal. I think it's worthwhile considering the possibility that nuclear isn't necessary, but that's a side discussion. Wouldn't you agree that coal could be replaced with nuclear, together with renewables??
Finally, on the side question of nuclear: there's no question that wind can displace a fair amount of FF. Can it displace it all? Well, I wouldn't suggest that. What I would see is a roughly 1/3 wind, 1/3 solar, 10% hydro, 12% other, 12% biomass.
I could talk at length about the various levels of variance (diurnal, weekly, seasonal), and how to handle them - to do so quantitatively would be desirable, but that's time consuming. I will try to get back and add more....
You are funny. You are a smart guy but you don't seem to be able to see such a glaring flaw of your own logic. How can you say in two adjacent paragraphs:
Sure, they have. I have. Alan Drake has. Have we done the sophisticated modelling necessary? No. I don't know if someone has begun to attempt it, but most people think it's not necesssary, because it's pretty far away.
And then:
1st, we don't know that. Heading Out out asserted that coal was necessary, and there's no basis for that.
Alan Drake and you are obviously not electrical engineers. This is not a problem for you to say:
"Guys we have grid for you that we think will work. This grid is only from wind and solar and has no (or much less) traditional baseload power. Yeah it is true that noone has either shown how it could work, nor even attempted to do such thing but, who cares - build wind! Keep the course!"
And then:
"But you know you should not build coal, it is not necessary, we have an alternative for that!".
What is your alternative guys? That same grid that you have no idea whether it would work? Which noone has ever made or is planning to make?? You just solved an existing problem with unexisting solution. Congratulations.
There is a one simple, quite obvious fact of life. While we are arguing here the population is growing, the economy is growing too, probably some converted Priuses get plugged in at night (paving the way for the future) etc.
What this means is that the demand for secure, continuous electricity - which in the grid stands for BASELOAD ELECTRICITY is slowly but certainly growing. While you are dreaming without a real technical basis, some coal power plants are ramping up and new ones are quietly deployed, far for sight far from mind. Until the frog gets boiled.
Within our infrastructure wind is not displacing coal. Neither nuclear. These are players in two different teams. Which planet do you live on? What is your infrastructure there?
And given HO's background I didn't expect him to utter "nuclear". It'd be like Coca Cola advertising Pepsi.
"You are a smart guy"
Thanks.
"you don't seem to be able to see such a glaring flaw of your own logic"
No, I'm just being intellectually honest. Too much of the time, in the heat of the debate, we try to exaggerate our position, instead of trying to get to some kind of truth of the matter.
"Alan Drake and you are obviously not electrical engineers"
In the heat of the moment, you're starting to get a little ad hominem...
"what is your alternative guys? That same grid that you have no idea whether it would work? Which noone has ever made or is planning to make?? You just solved an existing problem with unexisting solution."
That's not what I said. What I said is that there hasn't been a large, expensive analysis, the kind which might satisfy you. OTOH, it seems clear to me, if not to you, that there is no mystery here: the technical characterics of the various kinds of generation are well known, and the statistical analysis is straightforward. My preliminary, rough analysis suggests that integration of wind, solar, and the various methods of variance reduction that I've itemized would work just fine.
Keep in mind that no form of generation, except perhaps gas turbines (almost), are perfectly reliable. They all go out, sometimes unexpectedly, and require backup. The methods for handling this are well known,and perfectly scalable.
" wind is not displacing coal. Neither nuclear. These are players in two different teams. "
I'm not clear what you mean here. Actually, wind in the US is displacing 3-4GW of coal and natural gas that would have been used otherwise.
"given HO's background I didn't expect him to utter "nuclear". "
Well, let's leave HO out of the discussion, for the moment: what do you think? Do you believe coal is necessary, assuming we use nuclear, wind, solar, etc? That's the main question.
Now, on the side question of nuclear, perhaps this statement would capture your perspective (if not mine): "Use of intermittent renewables to provide 100% of grid power is speculative at this point, and the safe approach is to include nuclear."
Does that capture your perspective?
Rather than both of us rediscovering the wheel I would refer you to the E.ON Netz Wind Report (PDF!)
The bottom line of the report is the following: traditional baseload generation remains essential in the grid no matter how much wind is installed. Ant its importance grows with increasing the wind percentage. Traditional generation provides for the following:
1) A reliable stream of cheap baseload electricity
2) A backup (a spinning reserve) for the time wind does not blow.
E.ON Netz puts wind capacity factor to 7%, which drops to 4% in larger penetration - this is the amount of baseload capacity that can be disconnected for each MW of wind installed. The rest is required either as usual or as spinning reserve. Maintaining coal for spinning reserve only is not a good thing - both from emission and economical perspective.
It is true that the grid is planned for outages, and the usual rule of thumb is that you must have a spinning reserve in case the largest unit on the grid fails. But introduction of massive wind capacity is equivalent to introducing a massive unit which fails regularly several times a day! The amount of engineering challenge this brings can not be overstated.
Please review the report, it very well explains why wind is not significantly displacing baseload (coal and nuclear) capacity and production.
Overall I agree with the conclusion from one of your links - the amount of renewable penetration will ultimately depend on economical and political factors. Read - how much extra taxpayers and consumers money will need to be spend on that. I would suggest though, that beyond 20% the costs will become unbearable - Denmark and Germany already have among the highest electricity rates in Europe.
And yes, you got my perspective right; my best of all worlds grid would be something like 60% nuclear for baseload, 15% solar, 15% wind, 10% hydro + storage covering some 10% of the demand. I expect the synergetic effect of wind and solar could bring them further than the 20% I mentioned.
E.on Netz has been putting out this misinformation for quite a while.
Their problem is that they apparently have a poor wind resource (18% capacity factor, vs 30% in the US); a relatively small geographical area; and very poor long distance transmission to enable the kind of balancing done in Denmark, combined with a German public that insists on growing wind.
It's very misleading for them to talk about a 7% capacity credit, and suggest that wind requires a 93% backup. In fact, given the capacity factor of 18%, wind's effective capacity credit is currently 7/18, or 39% of average output.
"Maintaining coal for spinning reserve only is not a good thing - both from emission and economical perspective."
It's best to find something better, of course, but it's a lot better than running the coal plant at full steam.
Well. I suppose the bottom line is that we're agreed that in the short term we should grow renewables ASAP (while you would put more emphasis on nuclear than I would), and that in the long term coal won't be essential.
Heck, I think nuclear will work reasonably well in the OECD. It's outside that area that I'm concerned about, especially places like Africa. Any thoughts about those areas?
And neither are you, by your own admission.
But this isn't a job which requires a degree in EE. This is a job which requires a huge amount of data (some of it is probably proprietary) and the skills, time and tools to analyze it. No EE-type math is required (no multivariate calculus), but a solid grounding in statistics (because of the stochastic nature of the various sources, especially during various seasons, is crucial) would be a necessary qualification.
I are an engunear (joke), but I am not qualified for this job.
You are not addressing his basic point of the architecture of the system. Right now the foundation of the architecture is baseload generation. If you are not going to use that, what are you proposing, a Bagdad model (power 5 hours a day)? If that is what you favor to avoid the evils of nuclear, please say so.
If your architecture includes baseload, how do you supply it? Wind and solar are out due to intermittency. Hydro cannot be scaled up unless you want a huge die-off to match supply and demand. Gas will not be available. Bio-mass, which is mainly recycled oil and gas will not have enough supply. If you disagreed, show how generation gets to 5 to 10 times the current level in 50 years using it.
Coal and Nuclear are the only options for baseload that can carry the current demand and scale possibly 5-10 fold in 50 years. And coal will definately go into decline before the end of that timeframe.
"You are not addressing his basic point of the architecture of the system."
Actually, I did, it just doesn't make sense to you yet.
" Right now the foundation of the architecture is baseload generation."
Calling coal & nuclear "baseload", and wind/solar not baseload, is arbitrary. My impression is that it is a distinction made most by nuclear advocates.
The fact is that that no form of generation, except perhaps gas turbines (almost), are perfectly reliable. They all go out, sometimes unexpectedly, and require backup. The methods for handling this are well known,and perfectly scalable. It's just that gas peakers have been the primary solution, because gas has been so very cheap.
"Wind and solar are out due to intermittency."
No, not at all. As I noted, all sources have variance, and I think you're overestimating the variance of wind/solar. In fact, solar in much of the US Southwest has very, very little variance, and much, much better correlation with consumption than any source besides gas turbines. - much better than nuclear or wind, or even coal. Nuclear (at least lately, in the US) doesn't have that much unplanned downtime, but when nuclear plants trip, they do it very suddenly, and in very large increments. For that reason, for instance, Ireland has ruled out nuclear, despite it looking very attractive to their utility engineers.
"Bio-mass, which is mainly recycled oil and gas will not have enough supply."
As for biomass ,don't be distracted by the current controversies about biomass for liquid fuels. Biomass for electrical generation is much, much more efficient than biomass for liquid fuels, and doesn't have significant oil or gas inputs. Biomass couldn't supply more than perhaps very roughly 20% for liquid fuels, and that would be a strain, but 15%+ of electrical generation would be no big deal: it quietly supplies about 1% right now.
"
Coal and Nuclear are the only options for baseload that can carry the current demand and scale possibly 5-10 fold in 50 years."
Not at all - wind & solar can certainly scale: there's 72TW (average output) of wind resource, and 100,000TW of solar. I can re-find the references for wind, if you like, and provide the calculations for solar.
I like your mix but I think that just as now, there will be strong regional variation. Your inclusion of biomass won't fit so well in some of Arizona, though the forests around Flagstaff are thinned and burned in place presently. Hansen and collaborators have called for electrical generation using biomass as a method of carbon sequestration from the atmosphere.
One thing that could even things up is high voltage DC transmission. High voltage is used to reduce line losses owing to ohmic resistance but the voltage is limited by the corona discharge limit. However, a coast-to-coast transmission line would be expected to carry 10s of GW rather than the few GW carried by the Pacific Intertie. In which case, the conductor will have a larger radius of curvature and can be operated at higher voltage since it is the field gradient that sets the discharge limit and reduced curvature reduced the field gradient. At a higher voltage, the line loss, coast-to-coast becomes negligible. One may also be able to get reduced resistance via the increased cross-sectional area depending on the geometry of the conductor. Keeping line loss to under 1% makes the sharing of power sources much more feasable and we can then look at regional specialties rather than trying to find a mix for each region.
Chris
http://www.ferret.com.au/articles/z1/view.asp?id=74786
http://www.abb.com/cawp/seitp202/82b4ae72c448bdab4825704200020779.aspx
I'll take up your baseload challenge. It fits neatly with my photovoltaic empire. Make the baseload solar electricity. Run an HVDC cable across the Atlantic and Pacific ocean and sign a net metering agreement with somebody eight time zones ahead and behind you.
HVDC really does exist unlike the other stuff you lumped it in with. I can post links until I'm blue in the face.
I can run an economic justification if anybody cares. Solar electricity is in the same boat as nuclear and coal. Which is to say nobody knows what a 1000MW solar thermal plant will cost. Nobody knows what 1000MW nuclear plant will cost today including regulatory and litigation cost and decommisioning. I realize you can get a quote on uranium and concrete. Nobody knows what clean coal with carbon sequation costs. For that matter, wind is variable but it isn't random. We have historical weather data and from there it is just cranking through probabilities. You can post numbers until you are blue in the face but nobody really knows.
Instead of forming a circular firing squad, how about we call a truce and all support building all the wind, solar, nuclear, clean coal, tidal, hydroelectric, vortex towers, wave machines we can for the next 10-20 years. Then when we have some hard (or harder anyways) data, we can decide where to go from there.
RobertInTucson
I haven't escaped from reality. I have a daypass.
I join your suggestion. A firing squad is not necessary, and like I have always pointed - I am all for wind and solar! I just don't expect them to make it all, maybe they will surprise me if viable storage is found, but most likely not.
I see the end result of your suggestion something like 60% nuclear for baseload, 15% solar, 15% wind, 10% hydro + pumped storage to balance the wind + solar variability.
Keep it up. You are making great sense.
Thank you, I hope it is worthed.
It certainly is worth it for people who care about this issue. Too often people who try to make the reasonable case that you have get shouted down. I am really impressed with the patient way that you have taken on all the arguments that have been thrown at you in this thread. I think we are really making progress in having thoughtful discussions on the real potential long term solutions.
Nah..
SUV's and McMansions are icons. No serious person would think that getting rid of them would solve the energy crisis, any more than cutting CEO's bloated compensation in half would solve the economic crisis about to engulf us.
It's just a shortcut for a far more comprehensive discussion -- which does go on, but not in these little posts -- of building a better future for us all
Agreed. Let's cut bloated CEO
compensation by 99% and terminate
the one dollar one vote system of
PR
Then we can have a more reasoned
discussion.
I thought in another thread that you were conceding that renewables could do the job? In the US, renewables will certainly bring on more new generation faster than nuclear so nuclear looks much more like a big oportunity cost.
I think it makes more sense to get the job done with renewables, and then, if nuclear has demonstrated by that time that it has cleaned up the waste it has already generated, and has come up with plant designs safe enough to be able to get private insurance, we could look to see if there are any economic benefits to building a reactor or two. The nuclear industry has had many years to come up with a solution for the waste they generate, and many years to attempt to get to the point where they operate safely, but we are still waiting. Let's not waste more resources on nuclear power now, especially since a nuclear accident now could make the federal government insolvant. Avoiding armageddon is best done by avoiding nuclear power for now at any rate.
Chris
Well, they have not over the last decade or so. During that period, nuclear has added a lot more capacity through upgrades and higher operation rates than renewables have, even though they have had no new plants. Bush is trying to get thirty some nuclear plants started in the US in the time before he leaves office. There is a nuclear boom now building all around the world.
It's pure fantasy to think that is possible. Even if it were, it would still be better to diversify. We should build nuclear, wind and solar as fast as possible. That, of course, means the lion's share will be nuclear.
"Well, they have not over the last decade or so. During that period, nuclear has added a lot more capacity through upgrades and higher operation rates than renewables have,"
Well, sure. There wasn't much push for renewables, and nuclear was perfecting the operation of older plants.
There's a quote floating around about people not understanding the dynamics of exponential growth. Well, this is a perfect example: exponential growth always looks unimpressive in the first phases of growth. Now, though, wind/solar are really picking up. Wind was 20% of new US generation in 2006, and that could be 100% in 5-7 years, well before new nuclear plants arrive.
"It's pure fantasy to think that is possible. "
Not at all - it's a matter of public policy choices.
"Even if it were, it would still be better to diversify. "
Probably so.
"We should build nuclear, wind and solar as fast as possible. That, of course, means the lion's share will be nuclear."
Probably not. 30 plants have been proposed, but many of those proposals are place-holders, and are very contingent. IIRC, only 6 will get the PTC subsidies.
IIRC, only 6 will get the PTC subsidies.
Which is a bit unfair isn't it? All wind farms are getting the same 1.8c/kwth subsidy.
And I'm sorry to spoil the party but even if only 6 new reactors are built, only these new units will provide twice as much as the electricity wind contributes now (based on 6 reactors x 1400MWt (standard new size) x 90% capacity / 30% wind capacity == 25,200 MW wind equivalent; latest US installed wind (from wikipedia) - 12,634MW).
"Which is a bit unfair isn't it? All wind farms are getting the same 1.8c/kwth subsidy."
Yeah, I'm not sure what to think about that. I guess the argument is that wind is much, much newer, and that government kick-started nuclear some decades ago, and it should be ready to stand on its feet. Another, perhaps, is that Price-Anderson constitutes a large subsidy - I'm not sure what to think of that argument, but I have to say that I've never heard a good justification for PA.
Undoubtedly the best solution is a carbon tax, which would benefit both wind/solar and nuclear.
"even if only 6 new reactors are built, only these new units will provide twice as much as the electricity wind contributes now "
Yes, but wind installations are doubling every 2 years (2.5GW last year, 3.5 this year). Nuclear will take 10 years for the next wave of plants.
Price-Anderson is not a subsidy. You can't call a subsidy something which has costed nothing to taxpayers.
I would call it a prudent policy. Imagine we had a legislation that forbids moving structures taller than 100m, say for the airplane or birds of pray safety. This would effectively kill wind industry overnight. Nukes are required insurance but insurers are unable to give them insurance - they simply are unable to quantify a risk event which has never happened. Yet theoretically it may be very high - enough to bring them to bankruptcy, so they refuse to insure. If you want a way out of this Catch 22 you have to have a proper legislation.
It is a subsidy because, as you say, the costs may be very high. It may be good public policy but it is clearly a subsidy of unknown costs. Accidents have happened and will happen again and at some point there will be costs.
There are two simple methods to put an end to Price-Anderson. The first is to get a plant design which is safe enough that risk can be handled by private insurance. This would be best and then all we need is a legislative requirement for adequate insurance and a rapid sunset for Price-Anderson. The nuclear industry is not calling for this, so they don't seem to have a plant design that is safe yet.
The second method is to acknowedge that 1) there are no safe plant designs, and 2) the aftermath of what would be a Price-Anderson payout would end the use of nuclear power. The thing to do in this case is to have the nuclear industry post a bond that would cover one full disaster at say, Indian Point. The bond would cost about 4 to 10 cents per kWh over 40 years depending on the casualty payout. This issue is becoming fairly urgent because a Price-Anderson payout of that size could very easily make the federal government insolvent. This has more to do with our debt than conditions when Price-Anderson was enacted, but something has to give and we don't seem to be willing to stop spending money we don't have on current account costs. Since we are likely to have a Price-Anderson scale accident in the next 40 years, getting our Price-Anderson libility reduced quickly should be a priority so that financing the bond based on the utilities' total assets would likely be the way to go. With adequate carbon rationing, nuclear power may still turn out to be financially sensible even with a 7 cent per kWh risk premium and the permium would be diluted with new nuclear capacity together with siting decisions that reduce risk to life and property. But, it does not make a whole lot of sense to complain about startup subsidies for renewables that are much lower than the subsidy that a mature industry is getting. Start up subsidies tend to zero with time but the on going large subsidy for nuclear power does not.
Chris
Insurers can not insure "theoretical" incidents. Theoretically a chemical plant in Galveston may release a chlorine cloud killing off thousands of people, like it happened in Bhopal, India (20,000 there). If every lawsuit settles for $10mln. in US the bill would be $200 bln. + material damage + healthcare costs and compensations for injured, maybe $500bln. Probably more than the value of all chemical and oil industry combined. Looking in retrospective - didn't the FED gov need to insure its citizens for an event like Katrina or 9/11? It is simply the world's practice - for disasters the government is an insurer of last resort.
You can not prove that a plant or anything is absolutely safe. Your car manufacturer can not prove your gas tank can not explode - there is static electricity for example and who knows how many other things that could go wrong.
I would support your second suggestion though - if a disaster happens it must be covered jointly by the nuclear industry by a premium on its electricity. I would go further - it must be covered jointly by the WORLD nuclear industry. This will make them think twice. I don't think they need the government to cover for them.
"a chemical plant in Galveston may release a chlorine cloud killing off thousands of people, like it happened in Bhopal, India (20,000 there)."
Don't chemical plants have to buy insurance to cover all liabilities, at least in the US?
"I would support your second suggestion though - if a disaster happens it must be covered jointly by the nuclear industry by a premium on its electricity. I would go further - it must be covered jointly by the WORLD nuclear industry. This will make them think twice. I don't think they need the government to cover for them."
Interesting. So you would support ending PA? If so, at what level would you estimate the cost per KWH?
At whatever level is necessary to cover the costs after the incident occurs. I have enough information to know that especially in US, potential incidents are grossly overstated.
PWRs and BWRs are inherently safe and realistically they can't blow up the way Chernobyl did. TMI suffered a partial meltdown due to a loss of coolant - but except of the reactor nothing else was affected. Given the long record of exploiting over 200 nuclear reactors in US, having no incidents in which the public is affected is enough of reassurance to me.
Interestingly people do not worry about their gas boilers which cause many deaths on regular basis, but worry about nukes which have caused none so far. I am talking about US here, I won't comment on the safety record of ex-USSR.
" I have enough information to know that especially in US, potential incidents are grossly overstated."
I'm not so concerned about public perceptions of risk. What interests me is the insurance industry, which would seem to be the authority on risk estimation, and which apparently considers nuclear too risky to insure.
OTOH, I would be a little concerned about self-insurance by the nuclear industry, as any incident which exceeded current PA liability levels would be likely to create a public backlash which would shut down many plants, endangering cash-flow and making large payments for damages very difficult.
I think you make a mistake here. A Price-Anderson scale event will end the use of nuclear power. Thus, there will be no revenue or assets. TMI was a much closer call than you seem to realize. It ended growth of nuclear power pretty dramatically because of this. To end Price-Anderson, a 4 to 10 cent per kWh surcharge would be needed over 40 years. Price-Anderson is a very large subsidy.
Chris
"a 4 to 10 cent per kWh surcharge would be needed over 40 years.
I'm curious, how did you calculate that?
$400k homes on half acre lots within a 20 mile radius. $100k to $400k casualty pay outs. Got into an interesting discussion with Chuck DeVore, California Assembly Minority Leader I think.
Chris
"New generation"
In 1998 the US generated 628 billion kilowatt hours with nuclear. In 2005 the figure was 880 billion kilowatt hours. That's an increase of 252 billion kilowatt hours. You know what the figures are for that period for wind and solar? 81 in 1998 and 100 in 2005 for a gain of 19 billion kilowatt hours. 252 kind of beats 19, doesn't it? (Of course these figure also include geothermal, wood and waste in the wind and solar figures.)
World Net Nuclear Electric Power Generation, 1980-2005 (IEA)
World Net Geothermal, Solar, Wind, and Wood and Waste Electric Power Generation, 1980-2005 (IEA)
"Of course these figure also include geothermal, wood and waste in the wind and solar figures."
Then the data isn't useful.
Geothermal and wood are very significant sources of generation, and including them makes the data completely useless for analyzing the growth rate of wind: specifically, both wind and wood are each now about 1% of US generation. Even now, the 100B KWH's for 2005 are about 2.6% of US generation, so wind is less than 40% of this figure, and of course, as a fast growing source, it was even less in 1998. Just not useful data.
Here's useful data: At the end of 1998 wind was about 2.5GW (nameplate). At the end of 2005 it was about 11.8GW, for expansion of 370%. In the same period nuclear grew 40%.
Here are the useful figures: 1997 - 2005 nuclear added 153 billion kilowatt hours (without new plants), wind added 15 billion kilowatt hours [edit: fixed wrong numbers]
It does not impress me that a technology with such a low penetration as wind can have a high growth rate. That is not surprising or remarkable.
Wind's penetration isn't so low: 20% of new US generation in 2006.
More importantly, the growth rate is accelerating, and there are no significant limits to it's growth. Unlike nuclear, it's almost entirely an off-site manufacturing operation, which is easy to scale up.
It could easily be providing 100% of needed new capacity in 5-7 years, well before new nuclear plants can be in operation. This points to one of nuclear's basic problems: it requires very large scale (1.4GW, lately), and so each unit takes a long time to build.
You need this link:
http://www.eia.doe.gov/cneaf/electricity/epm/table1_1_a.html
Wind 1998: 3 GWh
Wind 2005: 18 GWh
The increase is 15GWh, which is about the output of 2x1000MW nukes. I hate it when they are citing rates of growth from a insignificant base and extrapolate them to +infinity.
Isn't a billion kilowatt hours a terawatt hour (TWh)?
Yeap, sorry it's TWh
Oops, copied the numbers down wrong. For nuclear, should be 629 in 1997 and 782 in 2005 for an addition of 153 billion kilowatt hours 1997-2005. Serious screwup. Sorry.
153 still beats 19 for geothermal, solar, wind wood and waste or 15 for just wind.
The alternatives to letting the populace “freeze in the dark” are starkly limited
But, Looking at it from Mother Nature's perspective(while she watches her polar bears go extinct), looking at the 6.x Billion people, the best course she sees IS LETTING People freeze in the Dark.
Mother Nature bats last
Not an easy comment for you to make or for us to take. But if something is not done soon for the polar bears then we humans will find ourself stranded looking wistfully out at our own melting receding iceflow -- this healthy human-friendly planet -- as it drifts out of sight.
Polar bears survived the Medieval and Roman warming periods, I suspect that they will survive this one too.
I wasn't aware the there existed a catastrophic methane/permafrost positive feedback loop during the Medieval and Roman warming periods but such a occurrence is possible now if I am not mistaken.
Heading out,
you keep going on about the Medieval warm periods.
1) All the scientific evidence is that this effect was localised and the global average is warmer now than at any time in the last couple of millennia and the habitat of Polar bears is largely not one of the local areas that was warmer
2) It is largely irrelevant as we are not worried about what the climate is now but what it will be in the decades to come. There is massive evidence that the warming will continue at a rate far higher than has been seen on a global average for the last couple of millennia to a point where it will be far warmer nearly everywhere than has been seen over this time.
Nick,
At the risk of sounding contrarian I think you should perhaps study some of the archaeological evidence about the changing patterns of the lifestyles of those living in the Canadian High Arctic and the Northernmost parts of North America some 800 years ago (when it started to get colder at the end of the MWP) before you make absolute statements of this kind. One of the native tribes of the time is referred to in the literature as the Thule.
As I noted above, denying the existence of this information does not mean that it does not exist.
If you could present the peer-reviewed findings about the specifics you mention above, we can examine them to assess your statements.
You will find several articles in various journals, though without a subscription you have to pay for the individual articles. So let me just quote from a summary comment that seems pervasive to the current thought
, which comes from here
Vicious, Man-Eating Carnivores On Decline In Arctic
(picture of polar bear)
[the onion, america's finest news source]
Ther's a polar bear in the Tucson zoo. They might be more adaptable than the global warming cassandras give them credit for.
RobertInTucson
I haven't escaped from reality. I have a daypass.
it's the polar on the ice flow. Not the polar bear in the garbage dump.
The new reality is that there are more garbage dumps than ice flows. Only the adaptable survive.
RobertInTucson
I haven't escaped from reality. I have a daypass.
Cherenkov said it better than I can. I'm just chiming in to support the reality point of view. Our easy livin' fossil fuel dependent lifestyle has caused us to conflate wants with needs. We do not need to heat and cool 3000 sq ft homes. We do not need to cruise around alone in 3000 lb metal boxes. We do not need to eat food grown 3000 miles away. Or 2000, or 1000... Put on a sweater. Bike to work (or better yet, don't work!) Grow your own food. This is the tip of the iceberg (how long 'till that metaphor ceases to have meaning as the ice melts?) of what we will need to do to survive - perhaps thrive - the energy descent. We will once again learn the difference between needs and wants. But I do agree that we are unlikely to learn that before we burn everything in sight in an effort to continue BAU until we plunge off the cliff.
This is the tip of the iceberg (how long 'till that metaphor ceases to have meaning as the ice melts?) of what we will need to do to survive - perhaps thrive - the energy descent.
How long? 2013
The Arctic sea ice is disintegrating "100 years ahead of schedule", having dropped 22% this year below the previous minimum low, and it may completely disappear as early as the northern summer of 2013. This is far beyond the predictions of the International Panel on Climate Change and is an example of global warming impacts happening at lower temperature increases and more quickly than projected. What are the lessons from the Arctic summer of 2007?
Released 8 October 2007
Long-term climate sensitivity (including "slow" feedbacks such as carbon cycle feedbacks which are starting to operate) may be double the IPCC standard.
• A doubling of climate sensitivity would mean we passed the widely accepted 2°C threshold of "dangerous anthropogenic interference" with the climate four decades ago, and would require us to find the means to engineer a rapid drawdown of current atmospheric greenhouse gas.
Someone knew this 4 decades ago. Someone decided a police state would be necessary 4 decades ago.
And us Dirty Hippies, who've been right since 4 decades ago,
have been vilified.
Arkansaw of Samuel L Clemens
What Monbiot is protesting about is not (mainly) the extraction of the coal as such, though the worries of local residents have been ignored. It is the fact that the coal will almost certainly be burnt for the whole 15 years of the extraction programme, without the use of carbon capture technology. At present, there is not one coal-fired station anywhere in the world that is even on the drawing board, using this technology.
In UK, our existing nuclear stations are coming to the end of their lives and even if plans for replacements are given the go-ahead, it will be close to 2020 before the first comes on line. In the meantime we have a fleet of gas-fired generating stations and more still being built, while our own gas production is falling and supplies from elsewhere are likely to vary from unreliable to non-existent.
The government refuses to consider anything in the way of demand management, let alone any of the steps Monbiot proposes in his book "Heat". The real question is, is it more important to prevent a global climate change catastrophe than discourage people from living in poorly-insulated houses and using inefficient appliances? What is being done smacks of the "burn everything" appraoch feared by James Hansen.
The melting of arctic ice last summer shocked the whole environmental community. What will be next? I would not be surprised sometime toward the end of the next decade, to hear a group of climate scientists solemnly declare that the Greenland and West Antarctic ice sheets have started an exponential and irreversible meltdown, and we can expect 5m of sea level rise this century. What then - the Russian Roulette of geoengineering?
Thank you.
With this latest report we must now take CO2
OUT of the atmosphere plus shutting down
emissions completely.
The US Navy has known about this for at least 3 decades,
I'm sure. By extrapolating their Polaris/Arctic Ice Thickness Studies.
The Navy thinks we can survive this in some sort of survival of the fittest program.
We're in some kind of Island Fortress Program now.
Nothing else makes sense.
Greenland is accelerating.
At least 2 billion will be off the human rolls
in less than 2 decades.
Arkansaw of Samuel L Clemens
There is a moral dilemma here. What you say may be true for UK, USA, Western Europe etc.
But AFAIK 70% of the world population does not live like that. 70% of the humans probably don't know what is hot water, have to sleep in the dark or be cold in the winter. It is hard to tell a Chinese farmer to forget having these absolutely basic utilities because you see we are fighting climate change. It won't happen and we'll turn them into enemies at a time we need to cooperate.
For this to happen we need a truly global approach where rich countries show the way and actively help poorer countries to get off fossil fuels. But we have not even approached this moral level yet - we obviously are unable to even tackle our own fat, let alone help others.
"For this to happen we need a truly global approach where rich countries show the way and actively help poorer countries to get off fossil fuels. But we have not even approached this moral level yet - we obviously are unable to even tackle our own fat, let alone help others."
Efficiency would be really good, but I think the key thing is accelerated development of renewable electricity and electric transportation & HVAC, to the point of being cheaper than FF's. Then we'll have something to offer poorer countries.
Less that 25% of the world's population lives without electricity and that number is dropping rapidly. I spend part of most years in Asia and I can say that solar is moving quickly into areas that aren't served by the grid. And micro-hydro is moving rapidly into the Himalayas.
And few people AFAIK are cold in the winter. There are a lot of people heating with wood, farm waste, dung, etc. They might not have a gas line run to their house or a heat pump, but they've figured out how to be warm.
One of the more ingenious systems that I've encountered was in Kashmir. Folks sit around on cold days in heavy woolen clokes. Underneath the cloke is a clay pot containing hot coals.
And, like what happened with the cell phone, those people who aren't oil-dependent will largely jump the oil-dependent stage that we've gone through. They will go directly to more efficient production methods as they will be the most affordable.
I spend part of most years in Asia and I can say that solar is moving quickly into areas that aren't served by the grid.
I have noticed that on a lot of the alternative energy forums, many many of the windturbines and Microhydro instalations and questions come from 3rd world countries.
They are doing a great job of taking small easy to build low tech things and making them work.
And, like what happened with the cell phone, those people who aren't oil-dependent will largely jump the oil-dependent stage that we've gone through. They will go directly to more efficient production methods as they will be the most affordable.
Exactly as your example says with the cell phones.
Great stuff.
When I lived in China they did not heat buildings at all. It is normal to see your breath in the living room during the winter when the weather inside the house is below -10 C. You just wear lots of sweaters and carry around a glass of hot water in your hands all day. That is normal and nobody bitches. You get used to it (although I can't say I ever truly was). It is obviously a foreign concept here in the West, but living like that doesn't mean you are a cave man. I think nowadays more and more people in China, especially the richer areas, demand heated buildings, but that is a new concept.
Less that 25% of the world's population lives without electricity and that number is dropping rapidly.
Yeah, you know in Kenya they have electricity too? I read an article that was showing how some people were selling it to others from batteries on the street, to recharge people's cell phones. It turned out that the electricity they are selling was amounting to half an average wage per charge and was in fact the most expensive electricity in the world. But who cares - it is important Kenyans are not within your 25%.
My, my, my,... What a sweet push-back against the "we've got to finish destroying the Earth on our way to oblivion" attitude so often seen on this site.
It's encouraging to see that there are a lot of people on this site who are problem solvers and it's not just a gathering places for the terminally pessimistic.
There are plenty of people at this site who make a distinction between the possibility of destroying civilization (Peak Oil) and the possibility of destroying the human race (Global Warming).
Nonsense. It is pessimism, fatalism and elitism to argue the busy masses are too clueless or selfish to change. Maybe a real leader instead of a corporate puppet could show them the way. True democracy might work.
Yesterday's Drumbeat had a sub-thread of comments about the physics of water moving into and out of the frozen state. Specifically, the folks were talking about latent heat.
If transforming ice to water takes 80 times the energy that
it takes to otherwise heat water... and if our Arctic is melting at furious levels... is it fair to say we've reached a major tipping point? Was this correctly modeled?
If the polar ice has absorbed all the latent energy that it can and is changing state, have we lost our climate ballast? Will the subsequent effects be much more rapid and more profound?
Do you think proposing BAU is wise? Marie Antoinette died advocating brioche for the masses.
ah - but there is an opportunity - if there is that much latent heat in ice - perhaps we can use ice turning to water as an energy source? not by baliwick but when you mentioned those figures - it seems we could be pretty inefficient and still produce flow-energy
HO:
Your gentle cough paper puts world reserves of coal at ~11_billion_billion tons. If the 'civilized world' were to mine and burn 90% of that within a few centuries, what would be the resulting rise in atmospheric CO2 concentration? Do you, or anyone else reading this, know a conversion factor, tons of coal to ppm of atmospheric CO2?
I'm inclined to believe some really bad things would happen before that coal were 90% burned - bad enough to actually stop the process, but without knowing the outter limit its hard to speculate.
Edit: slight error in reserves - it should be ~11_million-million tons!
Heading Out,
Thanks for a thoughtful piece on our attitudes towards coal. It appears the more i study the energy situation that we suffer more from mental rigidity in our views of energy than we do from shortages of energy or possibilities for meaningful change. And a person's friends define their responses to peak oil as much as any other reason for reaching conclusions about the proper response.
At the ned of Stoneleigh's energy and the Environment Roundup key post last night are a bunch of links with data showing that the Antartic is going through a cooling cycle while modern data shows global warming in the Artic. The plain conclusion is that we don't have enough data over long enough periods to understand or predict climate change accurately. In other words, the global warming deniers are right that there aren't enough facts and oberservations to come to conclusions about greenhouse gases that are accurate.
I personally was so mistrustful of the global warming denial bunch because of their subversion of our republic through "political contributions" and support for the worst type of propoganda that I really had not gone through much of the evidence. And, I suspect there are many others that view the site that are in the same mental state. I see it every time the discussion gets to any extreme position.
Yet the fact remains that we cannot afford the time to study, experiment and come to reasoned conclusions if the climate is truly off an Oldavai cliff due to CO2 and overpopulation. We have a handful of silver BB's to begin the switch yet lack the political will to begin, and even have a consensus as to some of the best methods.
We need Alan Drake's Electrification of Rail as quickly as possible.
Bob Ebersole
"Yet the fact remains that we cannot afford the time to study, experiment and come to reasoned conclusions if the climate is truly off an Oldavai cliff due to CO2 and overpopulation."
And even if we are wrong about greenhouse gases causing climate change we won't have done ourselves a disservice.
We are facing declining oil. Starting a few years ago, later today, sometime in the next couple of decades....
We are suffering from pollution from our use of fossil fuels. We are paying an enormous price via heath problems and environmental degradation.
So we clean up our act and it turns out that global warming is caused by some previously unknown natural phenomenon, what have we lost?
Not much. We would live in a more healthy world and cease having our strings jerked by foreign oil suppliers.
I can't see moving to "green" being anything other than a winning hand.
HO, the word conservation does not appear in your article. So are we to have our current style of living at all costs? What sort of syndrome should that attitude be called?
And as to your dig into Monbiot, "beyond the comprehension of writers of his ilk," I laugh. Your posting has welded together a cry for continued or expanded use of coal with a rather fuzzy bit of concern over climate change. What possible coherent thinking is going on here? I suggest the better title would be "Some contradictory thoughts on coal and climate".
R
We are not going to build the energy infrastructure of the future without a functioning power grid. For now, that means burning coal.
I for one do not want to be a mushroom growing in the dark of some cold, dank cave.
In fact, to replace fossil fuels liquids, we need to expand that power grid.
There are three strategies. First, build out the solar, wind, etc. to whatever extent possible, either through subsidies or raising the price of electricity from gas & coal. Second, conservation and efficiency. Third, nuclear.
I am happy to get that LNG from Snohvit, but in the longer run natural gas in North America is a losing game.
Once you've built out the power grid with renewables and nuclear, start phasing out coal or sequester the carbon. There's not much choice here.
The long term prognosis is not good any way you look at it, but I'd rather go down fighting.
Many on The Oil Drum want their cake and to eat it too, just as HO says. Don't do this. Don't do that. But when you're sitting there in the dark freezing your ass off and the TV doesn't work, what the hell are you going to say then?
See you in Houston, HO.
As I'll be snug as a bug in my arctic rated parka with gloves, long undies, and extra insulated socks on I'll be "LMAO"
I don't have a TV so not a problem. Will log on to TOD via my laptop hooked up to my solar generator. (Assumming the net is still up)
How's it going, Matt?
You can't get close to another warm body with all that gear on, know what I mean?
Actually the parka is big enough two people can fit in it, providing I lose 15 pounds and the gal is on the slim side.
If the lights go out and people are freezing in the dark, I imagine the organic french fries I like to pick up at Whole Foods will no longer be available. So the problem will solve itself.
smiley would go here if I knew how to insert one
I expect you will impress said slim gal by bagging a squirrel with one of your stashed slingshots...
Actually I do have a slingshot and beeds, purchased from http://www.majorsurplusnsurvival.com.
As far as squirrels: who needs them when you are heading into the apocalypase with a print out of how to cook "long pig" courtesy of The Oil Drum.
(can't find the link but many of you will remember what I'm talking about)
The view that Coal HAS to be part of the energy mix is not correct.
Nuclear, renewables and gas could make up and expand our capacity while causing far less damage to the planet.
Nuclear as a response to energy supply disaster scares me a lot more than coal - after all the ingredients of coal were all once part of the biosphere, not so for nuclear.
Nuclear and coal. Two nasty solutions that we should minimize.
Nuclear has the potential for working best for us in the short term. It takes care of the pollution/global warming part. It destroys less of the landscape.
But it leaves a terrible mess for those who follow us.
I'd rather we were more forward thinking and heavily invest in "green" and conservation.
Heck, sell some bonds, use the money for new solar/wind/wave/storage and housing/appliance upgrades and pay the money back from down the road health costs.
''Nuclear and coal. Two nasty solutions that we should minimize.''
So....
How do you keep the lights on? In New York, London, Moscow, Shanghai, LA?
Or are you a just a lucky little hobbit hunkered down in some lucky little shire?.
Nuclear waste is a simple engineering problem. It is political cowardice when faced by NIMBY Greens that is
the problem.
The Greens are against Nukes, they are against coal and carbon capture, they are against The Severn Barrage.
Come on hobbits and elves: tell us what keeps the Terrawatts flowing?
In London, mainly with wind.
In LA, mainly with solar.
Haven't given much thought to the best systems for those other places you mentioned.
Now....
If nuclear waste is "a simple engineering problem" what's the solution?
Storing it under your bed?
NIMBY is something that raises it's "ugly" head whenever any of our favorite places are in danger of being trashed.
It's so, so easy to find a solution when it doesn't involve your own personal back yard.
There are plenty of tectonically stable , hard rock , basement areas of Scotland that would easily act as underground storage sites.
If done properly they would pose no greater risk to life than the granite architecture and buildings of NE Scotland and the background radiation emitted in this part of the world.
And yes, I would not mind living on top of or next to a storage facility.
And neither will you after you survive your first winter without heat or light.
So Scotland is lining up to take the world's nuclear waste?
We'd be glad to ship ours over there. Just give us the address.
What one might do and what will be done are two entirely different things.
The nuclear industry has largely lost its credibility. There have been just too many "oops, it was just a little leak" and "well the security guards caught sleeping on the job didn't really work for us" type stuff. Essentially no one wants nasty, dangerous stuff parked in their neighborhoods for the next 100,000+ years.
We've watched things not "If done properly" far too many times. Nuclear pushers need to come to grip with the fact that the industry has pissed in its own soup. It's allowed the "doofus factor" to crop up too many times to maintain credibility.
Now, I happen to think that nuclear has lots going for it. It doesn't release greenhouse gases and it doesn't spoil vast areas of the landscape. And new designs take care of most of the plant danger problems. (At least the big meltdown problems.) But I see no realistic solution for the waste. Come up with working storage, not a "well we could..." and you'll find more people siding with you.
Until the storage issue is solved there's going to be a lot of pushback against nuclear. Just like there will be a lot of pushback against new coal. People aren't happy with the "we'll fix that problem later" type of thinking any more.
Planning for millenia is unwise and unnecissary. We don't do this with chemical waste and that will remain toxic forever.
Storing nuclear waste above ground onsite is an easy, obvious solution that works for hundreds of years. After that either civilization has collapsed and theres larger existensial concerns or we readdress the problem with reprocessing or resealing the storage casks. You can bury it in a really deep hole, but its a giant effort without reason. Its simply waste, not pure concentrated evil.
This is pure nuclear exceptionalism. You never hear about such incidents in fossil fuel or renewable accidents. You only occasionally hear about them when the death toll climbs into the tens or hundreds thousands, as in Bhopal or Banqiao.
Nuclear energy has an unsurpassed safety record among the major electricity-generating sources. For instance, there have been 0.006 fatalities per GWe.year of nuclear electricity produced compared to 15 times as many fatalities per GWe.year for natural gas; and 1000 times as many fatalities per GWe.year for coal, oil and hydropower.
http://gabe.web.psi.ch/research/ra/
Perhaps if you listened to both sides, you might have more success with this. "Essentially no one wants nasty, dangerous stuff parked in their neighborhoods for the next 100,000+ years." If you had paid attention, for example, you would know that we now know how to burn up all the long lived waste, leaving stuff that is only radioactive for a few hundred years. I won't go through the rest of it here since I know you are not listening.
Sorry I am late back to this.
We dont want your nuke waste: try taking care of yours yourself. You have enough suitable geology to bury it for all time.
The problems can be over come. Read this about coal:
Just in. And also posted on Sundays Drumbeat.
If you have not seen this already,
Heading out may care to look at it... The hobbits and the elves will recoil in horror...
Though I want coal until we can ramp up nukes (about 43 should do it..)
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/science/article2631117.ece
From The Sunday Times. By Richard Girling
October 14, 2007
Black to the future
Forget about wind farms and nuclear power stations. The answer to Britain’s looming energy crisis could be cheap, plentiful and planet-friendly coal
At 16 minutes after midday on October 17, 1956, at Calder Hall in Cumberland, the Queen pulled a lever and declared open the world’s first nuclear power station. In a high wind that crackled the pages of her script, she spoke of the “limitless opportunities which providence has given us”, and predicted that the peaceful application of nuclear power would be “among the greatest of our contributions to human welfare”. When the cheering died down, men with watch chains spoke of “epoch-making” events, and “energy too cheap to meter”.
Fifty-nine years later, in 2015, someone in the UK will flick a switch and nothing will happen. Eight years from now, the country will have only a fraction of the power it needs. Towns and cities blank out as the National Grid fizzles and dies. Pensioners die of cold, then putrefy in unchilled mortuaries. The only light comes from families burning their furniture. Streets after dark belong to armed gangs operating black markets in everything from clean water to butchered pets. Shop staff flee as customers brawl in the aisles over torch batteries and out-of-date Pot Noodles. The prime minister declares a national state of emergency but nobody hears him.
''In London, mainly with wind''
Do you really think the London and Home Counties Conurbation could be wind powered?
If you do, then you need to get out more.
London Array: up to 341 wind turbines in the Thames Estuary
Cost: £1.5bn Power: 1000MW (when the wind is blowing)
New Grain Power Station: gas fired, also in the Thames Estuary
Cost: £350m Power: 1200MW (when the gas is available)
Given the huge size of this wind farm, its likely that no matter how strong you went on wind power, you could never reliably power the gigawatt requirements of London from wind alone, or even as a substantial part. You would also have to expect to pay a minimum of 5 times more for it.
Interesting that you assume the the price of gas is zero in your estimate.
Chris
You don't know what you are talking about. Check the numbers, before posting BS.
Does that include the 15 tons of Uranium that each coal plant burns every years?
And to risk being a spoilsport, Marie Antoinette never said anything of the kind. :)
http://ask.yahoo.com/20021122.html
you're right AFAIK. Marie Antoinette lived in a world full of cognitive dissonance but she was a bit more intelligent than commonly admitted. But she didn't speak french very well and had some difficulty to make her point.
Another story comes to mind with HO's piece : that of the frog and the scorpion who both had to cross the river to find their energy supply. The scorpion asked the frog to carry him but the frog refused, beeing afraid the scorpion would kill him. The scorpion sweared he wouldn't do so and the frog finally accepted to play taxi. In the middle of the river the scorpion stung the frog causing both to drown. Before dying, the frog asked "why did you do this" ? The scorpion answered :"because that is my nature".
Over the last month all my suppliers have sent out multiple notices stating that due to low crop yelds, energy costs, climate change, etc. the price of flour, sugar, dairy will be experiencing dramatic increases for the forseeable future.
Sorry no cake
Excellent, excellent responses to the "coal-now" approach to peak mitigation.
We've asked the question before, in other contexts: How do we teach (and re-learn) delayed gratification and social responsibility to the extent necessary to accept and even embrace higher bills for less service? And by "we," I mean the US, because the duty is ours and ours alone to lead the way back to rational views of consumption and entitlement.
I'm not sanguine about our chances of stimulating a grassroots effort that can shout down the massive marketing campaign which drives the economy. Making more - including solar panels - is still just making more, and won't change a thing until we figure out how to change the way money works.
Maybe the greenback's imminent boom & bust will be the catalyst for a localized, barter- and trust-based exchange relationship, but if it happens, it will only come after our Federal Kakistocracy implodes.
LOL, kakistocracy, as in "rule of the worst"? Sounds like a decent expression, but this classicist has to point out that 'cheiristocracy' or possibly 'chiristocracy' would surely be considered more elegant (meaning exactly the same thing). But admittedly I have no recollection of coming across this term in an ancient text.
"How do we teach (and re-learn) delayed gratification and social responsibility to the extent necessary to accept and even embrace higher bills for less service?"
Gradually.
Fred goes to the store and notices that mangoes from Mexico are pretty expensive compared to a year ago, but more locally grown apples are reasonable, so he buys apples.
Margie takes a look at her gas bill, realizes that it's eating up a lot of her income and decides to walk/bike/bus/carpool to work. At least part of the time.
Donald gets hit with a large bill for filling up his heating oil tank and decides that it's time to change out those single pane windows.
The Freds, Margies, and Donalds will come around.
(As for your monetary paranoia, well, can't help you there. I'm retired from practice. ;o)
The WSJ reported in July that proposals for new coal generation plants are struggling nationwide:
The WSJ points to the causes as being environmental concerns and uncertainty over CO2 regulation. However, rising costs were also identified as a major obstacle.
In fact, coal is cheap only because it is burned in dirty plants, plants that were built before the Clean Air Act and subsequently were grandfathered in. Plants that are compliant with the Clean Air Act are substantially more expensive. As Sean Casten wrote on the Gristmill blog:
And what are the implications of those expensive new plants for ratepayers?
So barring any great technological leap in clean coal technology that will dramatically reduce costs, it appears that coal is not and will not be the low-cost option it is billed as. Of course, the U.S. could always revoke the Clean Air Act and return to 19th century levels of coal pollution, the kind of pollution that's choking Chinese cities today. Or we could roll out cleaner, cheaper energy technologies that will continue to be sustainable for centuries to come. What a choice, eh?
Here, on the northwest corner of California, we have a lot of wind potential. (And a lot of wave potential, once the technology matures.) But we have a puny wire to the outside world so we can't share and borrow from the greater grid as much as we would like.
We're setting up wind farms on the ridges facing the ocean and converting our LNG generators to "quick react" turbines. LNG is seen as a stopgap on our way to greener solutions.
With a bit of storage we could get off the fossil teat. We had to scale back the underway wind farm as we couldn't use/export as much power as it would produce.
(Any movement to building a DC transmission system in the US?)
With a bit of storage we could get off the fossil teat
This reminds me of the polemic between the economist, engineer and physicist that got into isolated island, about how to open a tin can. I don't remember the other two, but the economist said:
Assuming we have a can opener, we could...
I had a long discussion about V2G the other day. It turns out even this nice idea will not be able to store large amounts of electric energy. Simply the batteries we have are too expensive and short-lived for that. V2G will be primarily used to stabilize the grid, which is a useful thing but not addressing the problem. Of course future developments may deliver cheaper and better batteries but... how much should we bet on that?
"I had a long discussion about V2G the other day. It turns out even this nice idea will not be able to store large amounts of electric energy. Simply the batteries we have are too expensive and short-lived for that."
Actually, no, that wasn't what anyone else was saying. Let me say it again:
1) The battery cost you used was from Tesla. Their batteries are far more expensive than other chemistries, because Tesla wanted the maximum energy density, which the older, conventional li-ion's provide. Firefly or A123systems batteries would be far, far cheaper than the $1/KWH that you're using, more on the order of 10 cents per KWH.
2) The most important thing is not V2G, which is energy flowing from the car. The most important thing is utility managed charging, which will buffer wind & solar. That will suffice for at least 10 years. By that point the infrastructure for utility managed charging will have been in place for years - the utilities (PG&E, etc), car companies (Tesla, GM) and software companies are already planning for this to be in place when the cars are sold. That infrastructure will seamlessly handle V2G.
3) A123systems batteries, which appear likely to win the Volt contract, have sufficiently long cycle life that effectively there is no degradation cost to the car owner to reselling energy back to the utility.
4) vehicle owners will pay for batteries for their transportation utility, and utilities won't have to pay the full cost of the battery.
By the time V2G is needed, if it ever is, the batteries & infrastructure will be ready.
OTOH, V2G may not be needed. Geographical diversity, long distance transmission, PHEV dynamic charging, pumped storage, flow batteries, Firefly lead-acid in utility scale installations....all of these may do the job. I suspect it will have an important role at least for the small-scale services that have been discussed, but we'll see.
Their batteries are far more expensive than other chemistries, because Tesla wanted the maximum energy density, which the older, conventional li-ion's provide
Here is the inherent contradiction between V2G and utility scale batteries. I suspect in the end it would be much more feasible to install the batteries on utility scale - possibly adjacent to wind/solar farms. The utility won't be able to avoid the capital cost but economies of scale should compensate.
I suggest not to bring this discussion here, the thread has a much more important topic.
"I suggest not to bring this discussion here, the thread has a much more important topic."
I disagree. There's a key question here: can renewables replace coal?
It seems clear to me that they can, and are starting to do so (albeit, not as quickly as would be desirable). You suggested that they can't, because of storage problems. I tried to address your concerns about storage.
"Here is the inherent contradiction between V2G and utility scale batteries. "
Not really. The Tesla is a 1st generation vehicle, intended to jump-start the company. It needed to use easily available, energy dense batteries that would provide 200+ mile range in a small sportscar.
OTOH, GM is going to use slightly less energy-dense batteries that will be better in every other way, including substantially less expensive over their lifecycle.
But, the more important point is that while V2G is indeed feasible, it doesn't matter! G2V is much more important: just dynamically scheduling the charging of these vehicles will allow the grid to absorb an enormous amount of variable renewable power.
The question of viability of V2G is largely a distraction. PHEV dynamic charging, geographical diversity, long distance transmission, pumped storage, flow batteries, Firefly lead-acid in utility scale installations....all of these will be part of the solution, and would be sufficient if V2G never panned out.
These comments being brought to you via lead acid battery stored power....
My batteries, not state of the art but old-tech, do a good job of storing power. They last for 5-8 years (got 7 out of the last two sets) and cost me less than $20 per month to replace.
I wouldn't need as many if I had multiple sources of green but I've only got PV at the moment. A unified grid would offer multiple inputs and be less variable.
If we really, really needed to switch off the coal plants we could. People would have to cut back some - CFLs, replace inefficient refers, etc. - but it could be done.
(There are already much better battery systems. Just not usable at my scale.)
Above thread it is argued that it does not matter what we could. It really matters what we will.
If solar + wind + storage turns out much more expensive than coal, just forget it to ever happen. You may do it in your backyard, but the billions of people on social programmes or living on $100/month in China won't do it. My prediction: even with a price of carbon put on it, coal will be cheaper than this combination for many years to come.
If solar goes down in price and storage goes down in price then we may have a renewable economy. And still it will be "depending" - some places don't have good winds or solar insulation and will have to use traditional technologies. Wind is pretty much mature technology and I don't expect much more from it.
Until those two preconditions happen I am skeptical. I'm keeping my fingers crossed, but until then I'm sticking with the technologies I know will work.
Put the "price of carbon" on coal and it's more expensive than wind. Right now. And thin-film solar is right in there.
And get up to speed on what is happening in China. The Chinese are not stupid. They understand what pollution is doing to them and are moving in the direction of cleaner energy.
"Perhaps the most successful program to combat IAP (indoor air pollution) from cookstoves took place in China. This program catalyzed the design and commercialization of millions of efficient, cleaner-burning cookstoves. Chinese manufacturers have pioneered new biomass stove technologies such as gasifier stoves which convert solid fuel into a gaseous fuel for cleaner and more efficient combustion."
http://bigideas.berkeley.edu/node/43
Wind is cheaper only in in certain locations in US which is blessed with lots of it. It also heavily depends on the cost of capital - and some poorer countries don't have an easy and cheap access to capital.
You are also forgetting the storage problem. It ain't cheap and this is exactly why China and others are mostly building CPPs, not wind mills. They are not stupid, but they are not technological magicians either.
"You are also forgetting the storage problem. It ain't cheap "
Again, not so. PHEV dynamic charging, geographical diversity, long distance transmission, pumped storage, flow batteries, Firefly lead-acid in utility scale installations. There are many viable and cost-effective solutions - if you're concerned about the risk of some of them not proving out, remember that just some of them have to work.
You are hand waving again.
What you are suggesting, including all those to-be-delivered technologies need to be tested on a reasonably large scale. Figure some city of say 100,000 residents, with peak load maybe of 200MWt powered only with renewables.
Personally I will vote the government to spend several billions to do it. Could they make it work? I think they would be, despite the enoromous difficulties. The question as always will be cost, plus one more rarely addressed one - reliability.
Even if the results (as I expect) are poor, these billions would be well spend. At least you guys will stop inventing imaginatory grids.
"What you are suggesting, including all those to-be-delivered technologies need to be tested on a reasonably large scale."
It would be nice. OTOH, to say it's necessary before we can plan on using them is just FUD.
All of these things are simple, straightforward engineering applications. Engineeers develop large solutions all of the time, based on standard engineering principles, with very good confidence that they'll work.
Further, most of these things exist in large scale. Take a look at the pumped storage at Ludington, MI. It's been there for 30 years, cost-effectively storing a GW of power during the night for use in the daytime. Demand management, like that I suggested with PHEV charging, is very widely, successfully and cost-effectively in use.
You are hand waving again and I'm starting to wonder is this all you can do.
Just because it was viable to build a pumped storage here and a wind turbine there does not mean you can build a whole large-scale solution based on scattered, local-specific resources and apply it to every smaller and larger grid across the country. Present me a project, present me your numbers. Cost, scale, reliability. Which components will provide for regulation, spinning reserve, peaking power? How much will they cost? How much additional infrastructure and maintainance this would need? How much will it cost?
Clearly you need a concrete large-scale engineering project with a price tag on it. Then compare it with the grid we have now. If you can get the cost down to acceptable levels then you can lobby for going for it and I'll join you. What? You don't have one? Anybody ever created one? No? Why?
Take a look at my most recent post - I've provided some concrete data. If you'd like to provide some specific data, it might help this along.
Yes, but we have a little natural gas and a lot of wood, waves, and wind for our own use. Plus we are blessed with a benign climate and innovative people willing to lead and follow a greener path.
I looked at the Bear River plan and the turbines seem to follow the entire ridge. I didn't know the plan was hobbled from the beginning?
quite likely people will start to move to where the energy is, rather than take the energy to where the people are. It's the natural way. Northwest CA may become unbearably crowded
there are only two roads in, 101 and 299, and they are imminently defensible. or removable.
Well, if you don't count 36, 199, the Pacific Ocean and airspace.
And the rest of your comment.
Pathetic.
Which do you consider more pathetic--my simple math or my regional paternalism. I wouldn't consider 36 a route north. It no more than a tiny double lane country road for the most part. As for 199? Well it goes to Del Norte, the other side of the that bridge
As for my regional paternalism, I moved up here to make a difference and contribute to a walkable conscious community. I believe I succeeded. What have you done to prevent this beautiful place from looking like the rest of Kalifornia?
Pathetic? The idea that we would build a barrier to keep out people.
While I have no desire to see the local population increase I'm not going to man the barricades so that the masses will perish. We're likely to see an increase in our population density as other parts of the world become less inhabitable.
Most likely the world's population is going to shift more towards the poles. At least away from of the places with less water and not "too much" water.
Highway 36? Well, I live a few miles off it. It connects to Highway 5 and that's about as "north" a road as one gets in California. A couple of hours west and you've slipped through the Redwood Curtain.
Highway 199? Drove it south from Oregon last week. One might have to take Hwy 5 a bit further north before hooking back.
What have I done personally? Built and lived in a (largely) responsible and sustainable manner. Certainly haven't supported the parties who want to make Humboldt into a strip mall.
Have I done as much as I could? Nope. Expect that I'll do more when I finish building my house.
Why would yo move to such a remote corner of California if you weren't a bit antisocial? Our personal avoidance strategies can take different forms.
While I have eagerly invited all sorts of conscious strangers to move here, I am not looking forward to chaotic mass migrations that will ensue when the herds shift. Are you? If so perhaps when you are done building your new home you open it to the refugees? Perhaps an extra room (a shop, a garage, a study, or the grow room?) to convert to low-income housing.
I do not believe it is 'pathetic' to help create and defend a corner of paradise. I am fortunate that I am in such a position and I will act accordingly if called upon.
A bit antisocial, but not in the ordinary way. I greatly enjoy the company of people that I enjoy. I like living away from neighbors that I might not enjoy.
And I enjoy being able to pee in my own driveway without having to wonder if anyone is watching.
I have given thought to opening up some of my land for others. I can envision a time at which I might have to share.
Not that I want to share, but I'm not willing to kill other people just to keep my privacy.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pacific_DC_Intertie
The pacific intertie runs through your backyard.
RobertInTucson
I haven't escaped from reality. I have a daypass.
Thanks for the link.
Close, but no cigar.
My backyard? See that hump that sticks out farther than anything else on the California portion of the map? That's my backyard.
The Pacific Intertie is way over yonder. Some nasty mountains in the way.
We've got a lot of power (potential) that we could ship out. Massive amounts of reliable wind off the "Lost Coast", lots of wave and tide.
Just need a big extension cord....
If methane hydrates start evaporating because of CO2's inexorable march to 500-600 ppm, you will not ever have to worry about anyone ever freezing again.
Fun doomer book by John Barnes, "Mother of Storms". Someone nukes a clathrate bed; methane is released causing temperature increases that change hurricane dynamics, and havoc ensues.
I suspect that some of the "science" is suspect, but it's a fun read, related to souper390's comment.
In the article Heading Out mentions, I wish Monbiot had talked more of the drivers behind this project – one of which I expect is energy security. He suggests the various levels of Government have conspired to push this though (Government supporting big industry to make a quick buck). That is an easy position to object to however maybe the main driver is that Government recognise the challenge faced by gas depletion, nuclear decommission and slow renewable growth.
Monbiot does paint a damning picture though and hopefully the article will increase the awareness of this project. This project will have a far greater global climate impact than airport expansion – as this is "new carbon" whereas airport expansion is just reallocation of carbon (oil) that would have been produced and burnt anyway.
Monbiot does make a very good point when he says:
This is critical – responses to climate change that don’t result in fossil fuels being left in the ground where otherwise they would be extracted are virtually worthless. Due to the fungible nature of oil and wide price spread between production cost and market price, demand efforts focusing on oil are not very effective at leaving it in the ground.
Monbiot talks of 10.8 million tonnes of coal extracted, to add some perspective it’s worth adding that this is the total recovery, over a relatively short lived mining operation of some 15 years, that will see annual production of around 750,000 to 1 million tonnes. Compare that to total UK annual production of ~25 million tonnes and falling.
Here’s the developers website: www.ffos-y-fran.co.uk
The first point in their FAQ is that this isn’t the largest opencast site in Europe, or even the UK. They claim the confusion has arisen as the area of land that is derelict is the largest of its type to be reclaimed in Western Europe.
"Supply destruction?" Interesting thought, in the context of the results of US policies toward Iraq, Iran, and Venezuela.
What is wrong with energy efficiency? Why do families need 2 or 3 refrigerators and 4 TVs? I know people who keep their houses so cold in the summer they need to wear sweaters, but also like to wear shorts in the winter. I also now people who keep space heaters under their desks at work to keep warm in the summer when the AC is going full blast. At least 3/4 of electricity in the USA is plain wasted and contributes NOTHING to anyones standard of living--ZERO.
COAL IS A CRIME!!!!!
Need a solution? How about $1/kwh tax on non-industrial electricity. Will it happen? No, we will burn all the coal just like we are burning all the oil. Why turn off the lights when you can trash the planet instead?
I prefer a sliding scale. First 500 KwH = X, 2nd = 2X, 3rd = 3X. Let the wastrels pay for the solar plants. You sed:
Need a solution? How about $1/kwh tax on non-industrial electricity.
Why is the postage for junk mail lower than first class? Why do industrial users get lower electric rates? That's bogus, bub.
Our electric future isn't with coal, it with Fast-Breeding Nuclear reactors, which could meet our energy needs for millions of years, co2 free.
Can you recount for us the successes realized by breeders in the US, Japan, and France? After that, we can talk about their significant problems.
They have successfully demonstrated that when the economics are right, like when Uranium becomes more expensive, we will have a proven way to get more energy out of the spent nuclear fuel we are now collecting.
How expensive would power be from these devices?
Would they be able to compete with wind (price still going to drop a bit), PV solar (price likely to drop significantly), wave/tidal (competitive), thermal solar (already nicely priced), etc.?
Is it not likely that by the time nuclear fuel has become expensive enough to justify fast breeders enough "green" power will be installed that we will not go down that road?
As I showed up thread, we added 13 times as much generation in the US between 1998 and 2005 with nuclear as with geothermal, wind, solar, wood and waste combined, and that's without building any new plants. If we would stop using these nuclear plants, at the current rate it would take decades building green sources to just make up for the loss of today's nuclear.
You guys seem to be forgetting that we will probably need to replace nearly all transportation fuels and all coal and NG generation with new generation in the next 50 years. The only way to do that is to build nuclear, wind and solar as fast as we can. If we actually start building new nuclear plants again, that will mean that nuclear will almost certainly continue to have its 13 to 1 advantage to renewables during this process.
"As I showed up thread, we added 13 times as much generation in the US between 1998 and 2005 with nuclear as with geothermal, wind, solar, wood and waste combined, and that's without building any new plants. "
And as better data shows, the real growth rate for wind was 370%, vs 40% for nuclear. Solar has a comparable growth rate, while geothermal & wood are stagnant.
"at the current rate it would take decades building green sources to just make up for the loss of today's nuclear."
No, although I don't think anyone's suggesting the loss of today's nuclear. We may well need everything we can muster, though I think the major challenge is going to be electrifying transportation & HVAC, not providing the electricity (even low CO2 electricity).
Not buying the growth rate argument. Just because it can grow quickly when it is .01% or .1% of supply does not mean it can at 5-10%. With wind and solar you run out of sites, run into materials bottlenecks, political opposition or a market for your over supplied intermittent service. It would be like electing Dennis Kucinich president. Might sound good when it does not matter but it would be crazy to bet the ranch on it.
Baloney!
"Just because it can grow quickly when it is .01% or .1% of supply does not mean it can at 5-10%. "
Well, it's 1%, not .1%.
" With wind and solar you run out of sites"
Not for wind in the US, and not for solar anywhere not covered (temporarily) in permafrost.
"run into materials bottlenecks"
Not for wind, and not for most forms of solar. There may or may not be problems with a few forms of thinfilm, but it's not that important, because there are so many diverse solar options, so if one or two fail others will replace them.
"No, although I don't think anyone's suggesting the loss of today's nuclear. - Baloney!"
Well, not me, and not many in the mainstream in the US. In Europe there are certainly many who would, I think because they have a much intimate knowledge of warfare than we do (remember neutron bombs in Germany?), and are acutely aware of the link between nuclear electricity & weapons.
With Marie Anntionette in the title I thought the article was about mountaintop decapitation. I have noticed a sort of 'let them eat cake" attitude in many comments. A very large portion of our housing stock needs to be retrofitted with insulation and new, more efficient furnaces/ground loop heat pumps. The overwhelming majority of homeowners cannot afford these investments. Most renters are stuck with the double whammy of paying the utility bills but not allowed to make any changes to the building. No one in the world builds a fuel sipping car which the majority of Americans can afford to buy new(under $5000). We are stuck with the gas guzzlers that were built 10+ years ago. Buying a new efficient refrigerator is also out of the question. Even if people can afford some of these investments they can run afoul of local ordinances like Al Gore did. Solar panels are considered 'too ugly' for some neighborhoods and don't even think about your own wind turbine if you own less than a hundred acres. I know a man who wasn't allowed to put a woodburning furnance outside his house. Any national energy policy that doesn't address these issues is worthless.
The overwhelming majority of homeowners buy all sorts of crap. The average American family spends about $800/year for lottery tickets. Can't afford it is just a lazy excuse. And I can guarantee there are no ordinances preventing anyone from insulating nor are there any landlords keeping anyone from using fluorescents or drying their laundry over the tub.
People waste energy because they can afford to waste energy, not because they they can't afford not to.
Energy efficient refrigerators are available starting a bit above $400. Calculate the payback time and cost in "bottles of designer water".
http://www.treehugger.com/files/2005/09/top_rated_energ.php
And just who is stuck with 10+ year old gas guzzlers? There were (somewhat) efficient cars produced ten years ago. Even people with limited incomes have some options.
If you're spending tons of money to keep your mega-pickup on the road look around for something that will pay for itself in a few years via fuel cost savings.
After my daughter totaled the Kia it took me five months to find a car I could both afford and got comparable fuel mileage. There were plenty of big SUVs and pickups I could have chosen for the same price.
I understand your point (I think), but I think you also misunderstood Monbiot (or used him as an example in a wrong way).
Mobiot advocates 90% cut in greenhouse gas emissions: including almost complete powerdown of air travel (as in tourism and air-work-travel), ramp up of mass style mass-transit, almost complete elimination of personal cars, locally produced seasonal food (that makes energy sens to grow where it's eaten), etc.
If you read his book 'Heat' you will find out that he has not only read a lot of the literature, but understands that the alternatives do not scale to meet demand and even if they did, their GHG emissions would be so bad as to make the whole effort completely bonkers (CSS or not). He goes through sector by sector, looks at the energy usage mix and gives new targets for energy usage cuts and emission cuts. Actual numbers, even if projected into the future, but still based on research data.
Sure, it is possible to _disagree_ with him and say 'I don't want to give up that stuff, I want to burn coal to keep things going on the roughly same level as BAU', but that is a choice of values - a personal preference.
To use him as an example of a person who is against coal, but puts no alternatives on the table, is, I think very misleading.
He just puts forward alternatives that most people do not like.
Of course, this is not to say there aren't people with the Antoinette syndrome. I just fail to see how Monbiot could be classified as one.
Personally I think that burning coal is just stupid, but we are going to do it anyway, on mass scale. Climate and environment be damned. What I think _should_ be the alternative doesn't really matter, because that path will not be pursued. Coal it is going to be along with all the biofuel + GTL + nuclear power that the world can build.
Why? Because non-biophysical economists are running the show along with politicians with no leadership skills, and they're all still running on the fumes of late Julian Simon. They are not even trying to calculate these things in into their decisions. It is not a recipe for long term environmental sustainability success, imho.
There is no doubt that peak is/will lead to a regression to reliance on coal. And it is true that there is really no choice if one insists on retaining our present lifestyle and population for as long as possible. But the end result will only be to stretch out the decline by some few decades.
The other result will be that when we are ultimately forced to address the issue comprehensively, i.e. humanity living in a sustainable way, i.e. with aboveground and renewable resources, the conditions for doing so will be far worse, far more adverse. Coal is not only accelerating GW, it is destroying water tables, streams, and much else that will be of great importance to achieving sustainability.
What are the chances that a few gentle words will convince a deeply addicted crack addict to repent and return to rationality? Zero. Coal is already a disaster -- and it will only grow. But it more closely resembles eating the bark off the trees than anything to do with Marie Antoinette.
On the downslope from peak, there is no resource, no technology, that can get as much bang for the buck in terms of energy, as conservation, localization, change in way of life, and population reduction.
There is no doubt that peak is/will lead to a regression to reliance on coal.
Lead to a regression ??
Coal is already +50% for US power production ..
Of course we're going to continue to use coal; the questions are ..
1) Can we use it in a more environmentally friendly way ??
2) Are there scalable/acceptable/reliable alternatives that
can mitigate future 'growth' in coal use ??
3) Are we willing/able to make the necessary investments ??
Triff ..
There is no doubt that peak is/will lead to a regression to reliance on coal.
A lot of folks talk about climate change here, myself included. The primary fear seems to be focused on sea level. That is not my fear. My fear is that the Arctic ice melts and the jet stream goes flukey. If that happens our Dakota/Montana wheat and a lot of our mid-west corn is in deep sh*t. And then... so are we.
Coal is dangerous.
"There is no doubt that peak is/will lead to a regression to reliance on coal."
Not in the US. Coal plants are being cancelled right and left. Wind & eventually solar & nuclear can easily handle all new demand, and start replacing current demand.
" there is really no choice if one insists on retaining our present lifestyle and population for as long as possible."
Not at all: there's plenty of non-CO2 power - though the transition won't be easy or painless.
"there is no resource, no technology, that can get as much bang for the buck in terms of energy, as conservation, localization, change in way of life, and population reduction."
Well, efficiency and some forms of conservation are surely the cheapest method, but "localization, change in way of life, and population reduction." are much, much more expensive than just going to renewably generated electricity.
ADDITIONAL FUEL FOR THE FIRE:
75,000 new trucks a year on the USA highway system. Just what we need! Do you think PO will KO this?
http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/2007-07-21-trucktraffic_N.htm
Your basic assumptions are incorrect:
" Solar is currently about five times as expensive as coal power. "
Wind is only slightly more expensive ($.04 - $.08, vs $.04 for coal). CSP is competitive (assuming Ausra's costs are realistic, which appears very likely), at about $.10 for peak power. PV prices are high because demand is so far ahead of supply, but costs are coming down very quickly.
" The quantities of fuel that will have to be found to replace this gap are not likely to be found in the occasional wind farm, dotted over the landscape, nor in solar panels on the roofs of very profitable corporations. "
Where did you get this? It's just not true, at least for the US. Wind provided 20% of new US generation in 2006 (adjusted for capacity factor), and it could provide 100% in 5 years with very little additional effort.
New capacity is only needed for peak consumption, and that could be avoided with smart-metering.
I agree that replacements for coal can't be dramatically more expensive than coal, and that coal will be needed if necessary, but it really isn't necessary: wind, and eventually solar and nuclear, are quite adequate and cost-competitive.
It's always good to see Nick's comments. He seems to be one of the few who truly realize where wind power is heading in near-term and solar very likely in slightly longer term.
The cost of wind is not much above what we except from conventional sources and when you add climate and fuel cost risks to the equation, it's no surprise that wind is getting lot of attention in the investment world. Only thing keeping it back has been the fact that the speed of growth is limited.
However, now it's on the verge of being a major new source of power and people don't usually realize this. In Europe wind is almost on par with natural gas when it comes to new power generation - other sources are way behind. However, ramping up production in US will still take couple of years. I think it's going to be bit more than five, but less than ten years before wind is the biggest source of new electricity. However, it will depend a lot on how the investments in natural gas will go.
There are going to be new coal plants as well, but not that much due to GHG induced uncertainty. Nuclear won't arrive in large quantities before people have realized that renewables can deliver and after that nuclear will make only limited sense. A grid with lot of variable production will need power plants that have low capital costs and nuclear is not of them.
Dream on...
You do understand, that "Dream on..." is not a very good argument and may cast you in an unfavorable light? :)
Happy dreams can be a great comfort.
Unfortunately, I have these scary dreams where the world ends because people delude themselves about what we will need to do about our energy problems and we do not take the steps we need to in time. Like thinking we can rely solely on what them think are very benign energy sources, which do not really have the potential to scale adequately in time. Or thinking the situation is not so serious that we do not need to do everything we can. Like we can walk away from nuclear.
"It's always good to see Nick's comments. "
Thanks.
"He seems to be one of the few who truly realize where wind power is heading in near-term and solar very likely in slightly longer term."
Yeah, I'm often surprised by wind skeptics who aren't familiar with how large the industry is, and how fast it's growing.
Nick. Another thanks from me. I am sitting here getting more and more depressed as I read this stuff, thinking of all the things that should be said and aren't, but you are doing a good job saying a lot of them so I thank you. Here is another one.
I pay about 25$/month on electricity. I am very comfortable winter and summer. I live about 40 north. I am NOT freezing in the dark. Would I care if I had to pay twice that for the same amount? No, in fact I would be delighted to do so if it got me electricity without ruining the world for my 4 grandkids.
And would I be willing to pay twice the price for all the energy that goes into everything i buy? Yes! Fact is, I would do just like anyone would- cut down on the buying. I could cut way down and STILL be comfortable.
I grew up in the '30's. I was comfortable then too. People are adaptable.
Total US electricity generation 2005 = 4,055 billion kilowatt hours
Wind US electricity generation 2005 = 18 billion kilowatt hours
Wind US market share 2005 = 18/4,055 = .44%
Germany is at about 6% wind market share and growing quickly. Spain is at 7%, up from near zero 10 years ago. Everyone knows about Denmark. I think the US has developed a fairly strong can-not-do attitude in the past couple of decades.
In Germany, Geothermal, Solar, Wind, Wood and Waste (GSWWW) were 43 billion kilowatt hours in 2005 of a total of 579 for 7%. In the US in 2005 the GSWWW category in 2005 was 100 of which wind was 18 for 18%. If wind were the same percentage of the GSWWW in Germany as in the US it would have a 2005 market share of 43 x .18 = 7.74/579 = 1.3%
EIA International Generation Data
Germany does not have the same share of wind of GSWWW as US. In 2006 wind power produced 30.6 TWh (billion kWh), which covered 5.7% of German electricity consumption. 2006 was a low wind year. There's also more capacity now, so the expected share of wind in normal wind year at current capacity is around 7-8% and the capacity keeps going up.
Terrific!
According to German gov. numbers, the total renewables contribution to total electricity consumption was ~13% in 2006, about half from wind. Most of the rest is hydro and biomass. Wind in Germany is growing at ~25%/year, so the number increases quickly.
The average of 2005 is two years out of date, and you should note that most capacity is added in the 2nd half of each year, so it's about 1% now.
Nick:
We are not talking just about meeting the increased energy demand but in replacing that fraction that will disappear as oil production declines. I am, admittedly, more pessimistic than most about the absolute decline rate post peak, but, even if I were not, I do not see renewables, at this stage in their production, being able to come close to closing the gap that will develop.
"We are not talking just about meeting the increased energy demand but in replacing that fraction that will disappear as oil production declines... I do not see renewables, at this stage in their production, being able to come close to closing the gap that will develop."
It might help to quantify your concerns. Once you see how much more efficient electricity is, you might be somewhat more reassured.
We could replace all of our light vehicles, which account for about 45% of our oil consumption, by increasing our average electrical production only about 100GW, or 22% (assumptions: 210K vehicles, 12k miles/year/car, .35 KWH/mile).
That could be done with wind, easily, while providing for consumption growth in other sectors. Just install 400GW of wind capacity, which would not be a stretch, at all. Utility controlled dynamic charging of PHEV/EV's would allow the grid to absorb this new, variable production quite easily. The systems to allow such dynamic charging are already under development by the utilities (PG&E, etc), car companies (Tesla, GM) and software companies, to ensure that this will be in place when the cars are sold. See http://blog.seattlepi.nwsource.com/venture/archives/123044.asp .
Apres moi, le deluge.
How about the Marquise de Pompadour's attitude...she was a good friend of Marie's father-in-law, Louis XV:
Apres moi le deluge. (After me, the flood).
That seems to be the general attitude of this age except for a few earnest Cassandra's at places like this website.
And the French Revolution was a deluge. We can have a literal one. And 'freezing in the dark' is a little melodramatic...although that may come for the 600,000 survivors on the Artic beaches if we don't pay attention and mend our ways.
We are only a generation in time away from Peak Coal. Even if AGW was not true it's a tough call on today's children to recreate the easy lifestyles of their parents and grandparents. I think the present generation owes it to the future to take big steps along the low carbon path.
Best hopes for reality-based solutions.
Go, bird flu!
duplicate removed. this space for rent.
Heading Out, Thanks for an interesting article. I don't think the situation is that black and white, though. In Florida we have had the Governor get two proposed power plants canceled due to environmental impact, and utility companies have canceled many here because of their increasing cost and the uncertainty of carbon taxes. It has not really dawned on us yet that we will need to generate power from something, but we seem to be moving in the right direction. Twenty percent of Florida's power is used to heat water. As we are called the Sunshine State, we could get the utilities to make money off the installation of solar water heaters in their customer base. This would seem easier than continuing to go down the coal road. Hopefully Florida will modify its laws and allow utilities to make money off this type of non-power-generating work.
It's true that when push comes to shove many would be happy to burn the picket fences in their neighborhood. But with enough time we can manage a better transition.
solar1,
Do you have a reference for that number? I am working with a local agency (NW FL area) on a state grant re: renewables. There's a part of the grant that that info would fit very nicely into.
Mind if I email you at your registered account?
Ed
If ordinary folks are genuinely resigned to sticking with coal in a serious way, then they are practically saying to hundreds of millions of coastal dwellers and billions of poor farmers around the world, "Let them eat cake. So what if the ocean rises 3 meters in the next 40 years, creating hundreds of millions of refugees, and so what if climates shift dramatically, leading to millions of deaths by famine and resource wars? I've got to heat my McMansion!"
If peak oil people are guilty of taking an elitist view of things (I don't buy this argument, but assuming...), then these McMansion dwellers to whom we are supposedly condescending are being just as elitist, in turn, towards the world's poor and vulnerable. And the world's poor and vulnerable will not go quietly into the night if their societies are being ripped apart by climate change thanks to Western extravagance. Terrorism? Pffft. You ain't seen nothin' yet. And the awful truth is, the SUV-ridin' McMansioners will have deserved it.
The continued use of fossil fuels is the path to mass extinction. We have something like 380 ppm of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere now. The last two super greenhouse periods occurred at 1000 ppm. There was no ice at either of the poles and temperatures were in the vicinity of an Australian summer. It lead to something called an oceanic anoxic event that basically killed 90% of everything alive. The scientists working with the UN think we´ll be ¨okay¨ if we stay below 450 ppm. That´s about 400 billion tons of additional carbon. They are a rather conservative bunch. So I have my doubts that we will be ¨okay¨ at 450 ppm. Other less conservative folks think we will be in a world of hurt if we top 400. Geologists seem to think we have 700 billion tons in available oil left, about 500 billion tons in natural gas (not including permafrost thawing just the stuff we can use as an energy source). And then there is over 3500 billion tons left in coal. We either stop using all of them and suffer those consequences or we continue to use them cook the planet and suffer that way. In either case there will be massive death and suffering. It´s just that with one some of us get to survive.
Climate change is looking more and more like it is past mitigation. It is affecting us now, next year, and the following year. We are seeing graphs like this:
from here. We are seeing articles saying that the November IPCC report will say we are already past the climate change tipping point. Regarding Greenland we see Ice Caps Melting Fast: Say Goodbye to the Big Apple?
I am afraid that we are quickly getting to the point where people will feel that it is futile to do anything about climate change -- we will lose the aquifers along the coasts in a few years (or maybe 10 or 20), regardless, making some of the world's big cities uninhabitable. Deserts will start spreading across Australia and Southwestern US. With these problems to contend with, the idea of reducing global warming gasses to try to help future generations will seem outdated.
The concern is likely to be taking care of ourselves today. If coal is available, I expect that is what will be burned.
Gail,
This is incorrect. There appears to be sufficient inertia in the climate system so that a brief excursion above too high GHG concentrations can be dealt with. Rapid reductions in emissions now, followed, possibly, by moderate sequestration from the atmosphere can avert the worst (and permanent) effects. Since awareness of this problem is growing, rapid and sufficient action on this issue can occur.
Chris
There is sufficient inertia in the climate system that the trends we have seen unfolding in the last few decades will continue the melting of the Greenland Ice Sheet.
We have been pouring increasing amounts of CO2, methane, and other heat-trapping particulate matter into the atmosphere for decades. We aren't going to slow down in a few years the century-long warming course that billions of people, billions of barrels of oil, and billions of tons of coal have contributed to.
If we end emissions now, what do you suppose will happen? Do we lose the ice sheet or not? Remember that the inertia is a lag and the concentration of GHGs will decline once emissions cease at about the same rate they have increased for a number of years. That would not be the case past some tipping points.
Chris
If humans died out completely within the next 24 hours, and all our industrial emissions ceased, the Greenland Ice Sheet would still completely melt, it would just take longer than the current 7 to 15 years.
The ice sheet is being swiss-cheesed, melting from the outside in, and accelerating from the inside out. We've already passed the tipping point.
Plans need to be made now for the certainty that within the next two decades, hundreds of millions of people will, at the very least, need to be relocated away from the coasts. Dozens to hundreds of port cities will need to be rebuilt. Infrastructures will need to be redesigned.
And this is just considering a nonlinear melting, a dumping of water into the ocean. If massive parts of the ice sheet break apart and suddenly slide off the land into the ocean, we can expect a series of destructive tidal waves, punctuating sudden large rises in sea level, likely killing millions worldwide, leaving tens of millions suddenly homeless and jobless, leaving businesses large and small in ruin, possibly bankrupting the insurance industry or crushing the economy.
And this is just the melt of the Greenland Ice Sheet affecting sea levels. There's still the melting of the Antarctic Ice Sheet.
And how rising ocean levels will have an effect on land masses, changing volcano and earthquake patterns worldwide.
And how all that fresh water dumped into the ocean will disrupt the thermohaline conveyor and local climates worldwide will radically shift, exacerbating the ongoing Holocene extinction.
And we haven't mentioned the increasing release of methane from melting natural permafrost.
And we highly likely passed the all time peak in oil production two years ago.
If a path to the better there be, it begins with a full understanding of the worst. It's not doom unless we just give up. It is likely to be doom if we just pick up any old weapon without investigating the enemy.
If the situation seems hopeless, it is. All situations are hopeless to begin with. Hope only comes into existence when accompanied both by thought and by action. Without both thinking about where we are, where to go, and how to get there, and without taking action on those plans, there is no hope.
Best thoughts and actions for mitigating disaster.
Ice sheet motion is accelerating, but it is not at all clear that major portions would move into the sea within near term decades. Massive movements on decade timescales may come later. The thing is, we are not locked into those (or all of those) and it may be possible to limit sea level rise to tens of centimeters and draw it back down as we reduce the concetration of GHGs through deliberate sequestration. We are, and will continue to be impacted by global warming, but it is possible to limit those impacts and return to the pre-industrial GHG concentration.
Chris
Let's wait till the November IPCC release and related other studies.
If we are already way beyond the 455ppm mark, as suggested by Flannery, then positive feedback loops could be starting to kick in, for all we know.
The situation is like this: we may still be in the drivers seat, but environmental conditions (sic) may be taking over and we have very little visibility beyond what we see in the rear-view mirror.
Does this situation remind you another process unfolding right now?
I don't think there is a need to wait. The IPCC, who just won the Nobel Peace Prize along with Al Gore, does need some goosing because some observations (sea ice melt, as Gail points out, and sea level rise) fall outside of their adopted parameters. Hansen has discussed the interesting concept of scientific reticence and this may be helpful going forward. But, the direction of trends are correctly predicted so the IPCC is providing foresight. Feedbacks can be halted even with a brief excursion over the concentration threshold because temperture, the feedback driver, lags. I feel that it is important to understand that deliberate sequestration from the atmosphere may be needed, and more of it the longer it takes us to cut emissions, but to use your driving analogy, even if we have misjudged our stopping distance, we still have a breakdown lane to swerve into. Not graceful driving, but a collision may still be avoided.
Chris
I should add that the Flannery statement apparently contains conceptual errors. While the definition of the dangerous climate change threshhold is being revised downward somewhat, at least by Hansen, we are still some ways a way from it.
Chris
Gail,
You note that:
"we will lose the aquifers along the coasts in a few years(or maybe 10 or 20)"
Could you please explain what you're getting at here? All continental coasts? Saltwater intrusion? Unsustainable withdrawals?
Thanks
Of course the other interpretation is that the current models are pretty pathetic at prediction but one probably shouldn't make that suggestion!
Of course one should say it, esp. if one has data or a simulation run to prove it.
Otherwise it's pretty much useless as science goes, other than being acutely aware of the possibility and trying to prove it constantly (e.g. falsify the current theory, as science should).
However, to just say "the models must/can/should/may be incorrect" is not even wrong as a statement. It is not testable.
I think any climatologist worth her salt understands that the models may be wrong A LOT. Nobody just _knows_ into what direction, by how much and at what time span. Everybody hopes for the better, but there is no way to know. One must measure, correlate, check causalities and see how things are developing.
And currently the data from the field (for the past 2+ years) has been tracking the upper range of the worst case IPCC scenario. So the data is indeed indicating that the models might be wrong, but in a direction that is not very favorable to us.
Gail - that graph is dubious. Using a 4th order polynomial is not a smart way to smooth the data - unless you already have reason to believe the data has that structure. Do the authors show why 4th is suitable rather than 3rd or 5th? No.
In this case it has had the misleading result of masking the late '90s peak (all time peak in the satellite data) in Sept. ice whilst maintaining this year's minimum.
The primary reason why coal should not be burned is that it releases higher amounts of health-damaging pollutants - including gases, particulate matter and mercury - than fuel oil (and much higher amounts than natural gas).
This reason does not take into account CO2, which is not a pollutant, and therefore holds true even if global warming is viewed as a positive development, in that it is the only way to prevent the Earth from plunging into a new ice age within the next 15,000 years.
According to http://www.cleartheair.org, for the US:
"Nationally, 50 percent of electricity comes from coal, but coal-fired power plants are responsible for the lion's share of dangerous pollution from the electric power industry. Within the electric power industry, these plants generate:
- 97 percent of deadly fine particle soot and sulfur dioxide emissions;
- 92 percent of smog-forming nitrogen oxide emissions; and
- almost 100 percent of toxic mercury emissions.
Moreover, power plants are responsible for more than 68 percent of the total annual emissions of sulfur dioxide, the primary ingredient of deadly fine particle pollution, from all sources, including cars and trucks."
And the picture from China is frightening:
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/06/11/business/worldbusiness/11chinacoal.htm...
Who, I wonder, who will get the epataph "Let them burn coal"? The justice department finally forced some coal plants in Ohio to clean up some of their pollution, but this is getting to be like the attempted financial reforms in the 1870's in France. The actions were delayed as long as possible and then gudgingly and ineffectively attempted. All the while Japan and Germany are busy building up their production capacity for solar power, making the sustainable substance of energy rather than the cake-like confection of fossil fuels with their wars and other devastations. Antoinette was initially buried in an unmarked grave. Perhaps no such epataph will be given.
Chris
Is that so unusual, though?
I went and checked UPenn's Mech Eng department - the first similar department that came to mind - and the first 10 names I clicked on had an average age of about 49, which is almost certainly not statistically different from the 52.1 years of mining profs.