Comments Michael Hoexter has made

  • Sweden and US have different renewable resources

    Jonas,
    For some reason I disagree with almost every comment you make here, in this case because you seem to treat renewable energy as independent from both its own supply and demand for energy.  

    Sweden is more sparsely populated than the US, and happens to have, relative to its rather small population and power demand a HUGE hydropower resource, especially if you include with that cross border energy trade with Norway's even bigger hydro resource.  Hydropower happens to be the most mature renewable technology out there and one of the most grid-friendly with adequate reservoir space.  

    Re: biomass.  Sweden also has historically had no water shortages so all of its territory is productive of biomass while in the US, large portions of the West are water constrained, so biomass is not as uniformly available.

    Finally Sweden has a recent and not so recent history of public investment in infrastructure that far exceeds that of the US.  

    The US, on the other hand, has relative to energy demand here, a much smaller hydropower resource and furthermore there is much controversy here about tapping into those remaining un-dammed rivers with adequate head to generate power.  We, on the other hand, have relative to Sweden, a spectacular solar resource that with solar thermal power plants with storage could supply a vast majority of the baseload power we need.  At current prices this would cost somewhere around $.15/kWh, which is more expensive than coal and existing hydro but we can afford it.  This price will go down with economies of scale and is by no stretch of the imagination "super-expensive".  

    So, I am mystified by your bad-mouthing solar, especially CSP/solar thermal.  Perhaps out of ignorance?On Alliance for Climate Protection ramps up calls for renewable-energy plan posted 1 year ago 17 Responses

  • Sean, you presuppose knowing the endpoint

    I'm not going to take on the big ethical/ political/economic issues of profit vs. non-profit/public good.  

    Sean,
    Way back when at the beginning of this string of comments you were suggesting that renewables were not NECESSARILY a cost effective means of reducing CO2 emissions, therefore a feed in tariff system is not necessarily the quickest route to carbon emission reductions.  

    Most commentators agree that the quickest and most cost effective route to reducing carbon emissions short of rapid economic contraction is aggressive energy efficiency.  I would add that an aggressive program of feed in tariffs (more aggressive than existing systems which do not effect power costs much), that includes some of the more expensive energy sources, if it contributes substantially to energy costs will spur energy efficiency investment.  The higher power costs get, the more investment you will see in energy efficiency both incentivized and without incentives.

    Also, in your comment, you overlook that the more advanced tariff systems are meant to reduce the tariff amount in successive generations of plants and spur the renewable industry to become more efficient.  This is occuring now in Germany with some protest from the PV industry but will favor those panel manufacturers that have lower costs.

    So, while someone of your orientation would favor a carbon tax or cap and trade system, I believe those systems are not, alone, capable of getting us to a mostly renewable or carbon-emissions free energy system.  At some point, people will be choosing a technology or set of technologies for a number of different reasons that are not based purely on the calculus you or others have proposed as being the most important.  

    Right now, as I have outlined earlier in this series, we are faced with "choosing horses" with regard to how we generate electricity or supply energy.  That choice involves a number of factors that are based on assumptions and not a single dollars/tons CO2 avoided figure.   Infrastructure investment takes such a long time to actually arrive at that figure that it must be based on surmises about future price trajectories, forecasts about the availability of primary energy and also notions of the public good.  This is why engineering firms consult with utilities and with regulators to make sure that contracts to build these massive pieces of equipment are priced within reason.On Renewable energy promotion policies: transparent posted 1 year, 2 months ago 32 Responses

  • Good work Gar

    Gar,
    Much appreciate the explanation and support for a renewable supergrid.  

    DrX,
    The smartness of the grid will not make up entirely for variations and shortfalls in the primary energy that may occur locally or regionally.  A smarter grid is going to be a necessity but I believe you put too much faith in the smart-grid as a kind of "holy water" where we are talking about a basic First Law problem of not being able to create energy out of nothing. Removing coal and natural gas from use by the grid is going to use a big hole in that primary energy.  Linking supply and demand, which the transmission grid as described by Gar will do, will enable us to fill in that gap, and/or use the scalable energy storage capacity of thermal energy from CSP.

    As EGS comes online over the next few decades, we may be able to pare down the density of grid interconnections we will need, as EGS may allow local renewable baseload power generation almost anywhere.On A purely local approach would double or triple costs posted 1 year, 2 months ago 23 Responses

  • Being committed half-way is more dangerous

    The US has not fully committed to rail transit, so in most areas, freight and passenger rail share the same tracks.  If we were able to segregate freight and passenger traffic, this type of accident would be far less likely.

    Barring the expense of building a dedicated passenger rail system, improved signaling would go a long way to preventing this type of accident. On L.A. train collision dismays new riders posted 1 year, 2 months ago 12 Responses

  • If you insist on cheap, not much happens

    Sean,
    Your approach to this is a recipe for nothing significant happening in this area.  The full piece of which this is a serialization is a argument for investing more and paying more for energy to build a clean energy infrastructure.  I don't want to repeat the whole argument here but in a nutshell, the market-biases that you find here in the US and in Britain, which insist that demand will dictate to supply what a good should cost, don't work in the area of energy, and in particular, the new clean energy infrastructure that we need.  

    The reason, especially in the are of renewable energy, is that one needs a lot of "stuff", raw materials to capture the relatively diffuse renewable energy flow.  Also electric generators are supposed to last 20 to 50 years, so have to have a build quality that costs money.  We will achieve SOME efficiencies with lowered finance costs and economies of scale as well as technical innovation but with not nearly the speed that we as consumers have become used in the area of other "miniaturizable" technologies like electronics and biotechnology.  

    Those countries that follow your philosophy, Sean, like the US and Britain, lag in the area of building new infrastructure and in particular in the area of renewable energy.  

    I've written a critique of Google's RE<C in which I suggest that they (and you) are "making the perfect the enemy of the good".On Renewable energy promotion policies: transparent posted 1 year, 2 months ago 32 Responses

  • I'm surprised

    As a frequent anonymous poster, here, biodiversivist, I'm surprised you don't know about feed in tariffs or Renewable Energy Payments.  They stimulate PV deployment without net metering and are much more effective as a standalone incentive policy.  You will learn more in the next installment.  It is true that rooftop PV is still relatively expensive compared to other Renewable Energy Payments but if we want to prioritize and stimulate the building of small distributed generation it does cost more money.

    Net metering is only tenable as a niche policy and a supplement to other stimulative policies at the moment for PV.  On Renewable energy promotion policies: non-transparent or hidden posted 1 year, 2 months ago 12 Responses

  • Petrofree Ag

    Agriculture that relies on petroleum inputs, including most organic ag, is ultimately unsustainable.  I've floated the concept of the Electric Farm on my blog to show how renewable energy can be harnessed to sustainably increase yields in mechanized agriculture:

    http://terraverde.wordpress.com/2008/04/07/exchange-with- ...

    I believe it's possible to learn the benefits of older methods of cultivation while applying more sophisticated farm implements strategically. On New data show that 2008 organic food sales will reach $32.9 billion posted 1 year, 2 months ago 7 Responses

  • Thermal Storage

    Thermal storage is currently the cheapest scalable storage option we have.  Other energy storage options may approach or exceed the scalability and low cost of thermal storage but they are still in the future.  

    That being said, Earl is right to point out the efficiencies involved in using thermal storage with solar thermal.  You can use a smaller, less expensive steam turbine but use it at a much higher capacity.  Or as Earl suggests, you could have two turbines, one that operates at peak capacity most of the time and one that scales up and down depending on the amount of stored heat or incident solar radiation (with solar thermal there is wide variation between the energy available at the winter and summer solstices).

    From reliable sources, the figures I have cited for the first generation LCOE for solar thermal with storage are valid.  I think it would be worth it to enter into this path even if it costed more money.  The Spanish are paying $.35/kWh for solar thermal currently and Spain is not a wealthier country than our own.

    Vakibs,
    It appears you are giving the thorium folk a free ride while focusing all your skepticism on renewables.  Thorium or other breeder reactors are still massive science and technology projects a decade or so in the future.  I'm for exploring this option but they are no means as quickly and, I believe easily deployed as solar thermal electric with storage which are much simpler technologies.  The very complexity of the nuclear fuel cycle has risks associated with it that are underestimated by the more vociferous advocates of thorium and U238 breeder reactors.  

    Furthermore these folk, at least as represented by the commenters to some of my previous posts, see a new generation of nuclear reactor as "Either/Or"  with renewables like solar thermal with storage.  They seem to want to squash interest in renewables, which I find to be a highly irresponsible position and move on their part if they are at all concerned about global warming.  It doesn't have to be Either/Or.On So how much do renewables cost anyway? posted 1 year, 2 months ago 30 Responses

  • Areas of the Desert required

    Vakibs,
    I am using the following data from NREL to make my assertions about the US.  In the US we may have more desert area per capita than some nations but a lot less than other nations, particularly in Africa and Australia.  "Desert" in the world of CSP is not just the areas that we cordon off in our mind as desert but anywhere with the appropriate "direct normal" insolation for solar thermal plants.  In California, where I live, we call certain areas desert but there is much larger semi-arid area that could be used for solar thermal though the power would cost more.

    NREL says that there are

    1.  212,000 square miles of the US southwest that have more than 6 kWh/m2/day insolation and ground slope of less than 3%.  This by no means the entire 6.5 state area but are the prime areas for solar thermal development
    2. NREL assumes a power density of 130MW/sq mile.  This is a number that is somewhere between the low estimate of 100MW and higher estimates for more compact plant designs (150 MW/sq mile).  With innovation this number should go up.
    3. I assume a capacity factor of .25 in these prime areas, particularly in those areas with over 7 kWh/m2/day.
    4. This yields 285 million kWh/year.
    5. In the electricity sector, the US consumes, inefficiently, 4.1 trillion kWh/year
    6. I'm getting therefore, an area of 14385 square miles or less than 100 by 150 miles.
    7. This is less than 2% of the area of the Southwest (starting in West Texas)
    8. If we, unrealistically, converted all transport inefficiently to electricity and used the same amount of energy we do now (which won't happen with electric motors anyway), we would need an area 45,000 of the 212,000 square miles pointed out by NREL as being suitable (from an environmental standpoint as well) for CSP with storage.
    9. As plug-in and V2G advocates know, battery electric vehicles will be able to piggy back onto the 4.1 trillion kWh/year figure to some degree, leaving the amount of land required to fuel transport at much less than the estimate in "8".
    10. Furthermore, combination renewable power plants, EGS, hydro, wind, solar PV will realistically cover a lot of power usage.
    11. Energy efficiency can cut power usage by over half, so the number I use is 21,000 square miles for all energy use in the US.

    I'm not saying that we should plan on building ALL of this capacity.  Only that we should start building some of it, get on a technology development curve, etc to start displacing NOW the 50% of electricity generated by coal as well as block the development of new coal plants.On A choice of primary energies: renewable electrons win the gold posted 1 year, 3 months ago 58 Responses

  • Trying to be open-minded and look what I get

    It's surprising to me, after a rather fair treatment of nuclear energy in the last post, that so much bile is being spilled here against me and a proposed solution that is blindingly obvious. It makes me question my rather positive treatment of the future of nuclear power.  If the advocates of nuclear power are prone to slander their opponents and competing technologies, we will have a rough road ahead in a future DOE.  The tactics used here to further the nuclear agenda here makes me wonder whether people who gravitate to nuclear advocacy are sick in the head in a particularly obnoxious way.  I actually think nuclear power itself may, in the future, be worthier than the advocates it has currently.

    Yes, I stand corrected re: 2% vs. 1% of the world's deserts.  I make the assumption that we will reduce our (per capita) energy usage (i.e. get radically more efficient) before we ever get to using a substantial portion of the deserts to power society.  So I don't see us using 2% of the deserts for power generation...it might happen but I think we will be using a much more diversified portfolio of generators several decades into the future.  On the other hand, we have the best chance of shutting down coal plants by rapidly scaling up solar thermal with storage in the next few years while pursuing an aggressive energy efficiency program.  These solar plants can be built more quickly than nukes, especially the experimental variety in which, Mr Barton, for instance, puts so much faith.  

    Dr X,
    You have your pet technologies, which you feel are the most important.  If I emphasize technologies that are not your favorites I don't know if that exactly "endangers" my plan.  My main concern is linking the strongest primary energy flows with power demand.  Biomass and biogas are important but need to be used carefully because they are, relatively scarce, dispatchable renewable resources.  The concept of a combination renewable power plant encompasses any and all renewable technologies and coordinates them; within the context of such a plant we would get the maximum utility out of biomass derived energy.  So, I don't feel that I have omitted renewable technologies though my emphases are different than yours.  
    On A choice of primary energies: renewable electrons win the gold posted 1 year, 3 months ago 58 Responses

  • Curious hole in understanding of biomass

    Jonas,
    You have a curious hole in your understanding of how biomass arrives at a biomass power plant:  it grows in the ground and is watered by precipitation from the sky.   These factors limit the amount of biomass that can be extracted and burned from ecosystems.  Soils suffer if too much organic matter is extracted from them or we lean too heavily on the water system for woody or other biomass.  In your blind advocacy for biomass, you seem to have left that out.

    I am not against using biomass, biochar, biomass with CCS, etc.  Only that those uses need to be assessed carefully as to their impact on the biosphere.  A society with our level of power needs has never used biomass exclusively to power electric devices, etc.  Blind advocacy is not the way forward in guiding us to appropriate and valuable uses of biomass in the power industry.On A choice of primary energies: renewable electrons win the gold posted 1 year, 3 months ago 58 Responses

  • Chernobyl and nuclear engineering

    KenG,
    I stand corrected about Chernobyl.  I made the analogy to Chernobyl because current nuclear designs do have a potential for catastrophic failure, however slight the chances under the management of plant operators in advanced industrial countries.  No one is going to design reactors according to the Chernobyl design again; on the other hand, could the failures of the Chernobyl design be entirely foreseen by the nuclear science of the time?  That is probably a long argument within the nuclear engineering community which is not so relevant to the current discussion. On A choice of primary energies: nuclear power takes the silver posted 1 year, 3 months ago 23 Responses

  • Except when attached to some carbon fixing process

    Then again, maybe using nukes to fix carbon, in some power using carbon fixing process, might be a good application for them, if we are really serious about reducing carbon dioxide concentrations in the atmosphere.  If we have a serious carbon trading scheme, they might make more money that way than by producing electricity for domestic or industrial consumption.  Or maybe, as this is not such a time sensitive application, using wind power to do the same would be quicker and easier.On A choice of primary energies: nuclear power takes the silver posted 1 year, 3 months ago 23 Responses

  • Cut and paste lets me down.

    I'm sorry... the bullet point that says "carbon negative" was cut and paste from the next installment.  Commenters are absolutely right that nuclear power cannot be carbon negative.  The editing mistake is all mine.On A choice of primary energies: nuclear power takes the silver posted 1 year, 3 months ago 23 Responses

  • The world comes in shades of gray

    IDS,
    Phasing out coal is going to cause pain, there's no getting around that.  It's worth it to transition away from coal but that doesn't mean that it won't cause disruption to communities and people who have made their livings from coal, including coal miners, who unlike some Americans, have been able to raise families on their wages.

    So, the world is not lining up neatly into black and white....sorry!

    Jabailo,
    I don't know if it is worth responding to you as you seem to unthinkingly post as if producing hydrogen were an end in itself.  You need to update your reading list...naive pro-hydrogen boosterism can hardly be found even at companies that have sunk millions of dollars into hydrogen fuel cell vehicles.  Many of those companies are now putting more money into hybrid, battery electric and plug-in hybrid vehicle research and development.On A choice of primary energies: clean coal takes the bronze posted 1 year, 3 months ago 24 Responses

  • Serialization of a Longer piece

    David A,
    This is a serialization of a longer piece.  I've classified the electron economies into three broad categories related to their primary energies:  Coal CSS, Nuclear and Renewable.  It's not my list of "favorite technologies".  I classify the favorites you list as "Renewable"

    Jabailo,
    The question is why would you want to extract the hydrogen from the ethanol?  Hydrogen is more difficult to store...you lower your energy yield... You are showing signs of the unfortunate hydrogen obsession that is becoming less and less fashionable all the time.  In the context of a solid oxide fuel cell you could generate electricity from the ethanol in which hydrogen was extracted as a brief intermediate product before being emitted as water (and C02).  But in that (efficient) usage there would be no use of hydrogen as an energy carrier or storage medium.  It just doesn't pencil out as an alternative despite all the hype that you've heard.On A choice of primary energies: clean coal takes the bronze posted 1 year, 3 months ago 24 Responses

  • Hydrogen is parasitic on the electron economies

    Jabailo is expressing a very naive view of what hydrogen is in discussions of energy.  Hydrogen as an energy carrier, at least in its clean and supposedly promising forms, needs renewably generated electricity.  But it will yield 2/3rds less usable energy than using electricity directly or storing electricity in a battery.  So if we used a lot of hydrogen we would have much more of a need for wind turbines, solar panels and the services of electric utilities.  We would need 2.5 to 3 times as much clean generation capacity to power the same amount of transport than if we used electricity as the energy carrier.  

    I'm surprised that there are people still out there (posting on this blog) with this lack of understanding of how hydrogen works.  

    The hydrogen that is available now is mostly a byproduct of the oil refining process and is such not very "clean".On Why electricity is the energy carrier of choice posted 1 year, 3 months ago 7 Responses

  • Battery Development Curve/Grid Electricity

    Jon,
    I am trying to say here that the improvement of batteries or other small-scale electrical energy storage could vary independently from the strengthening of the electrical grid and on-grid transport infrastructure.  So, if batteries get the cheaper and better fast, you will have people being able to exercise more choice about how densely they want to live with others.  If they don't improve so rapidly, you might see more concentrated settlement patterns as on-grid energy systems will predominate over grid-optional energy systems.  

    This has been the case in the era of cheap oil, when  fossil energy was supercheap, people tended to spread out.  We could reproduce those settlement patterns with cheap, ultra-high energy density, quick charge batteries, if we wanted to.

    Some people say that these settlement patterns are in themselves undesirable, that people require more contact with a broader community than suburbia and exurbia allow.  Technological development may or may not dictate to us the answer to this question.  On More ideas for a post-oil society posted 1 year, 3 months ago 9 Responses

  • Energy is not the only limiting variable

    In addition to energy efficiency we may also be facing shortages and rising costs for metals and other materials used to make vehicles or electric rights of way.  We may end up choosing alternatives based on a combination of what is most affordable in terms of energy consumption, end-use utility (getting you, your family and your stuff from here to there) and net material costs. On A three-pronged approach to getting off oil for transportation posted 1 year, 3 months ago 36 Responses

  • Roadways

    Yes "electric roadways" does sound mysterious...I explain in the latter part that I am largely referring to overhead wires, which are the most mature form of electrifying a roadway.

    However, I think technologists might apply themselves to find a variety of new solutions for electric rights of way.  As a minimum, pantographs and trolley poles could be designed to be more capable of high speed attachment and detachment; more minds could apply themselves to technologies that were abandoned as out-moded in an era of cheap oil but that are now of crucial importance.  

    I am agnostic about what mode or means to travel is ultimately the most resource efficient and sustainable.  Personal electric vehicles, especially ones that are not oversized, will be a very efficient means to getting around.  Public transit has many benefits and many Americans do not realize how much of their "bandwidth" is occupied by driving rather than focusing on other activities.  Bikes are great too, though have their limitations as well.  On A three-pronged approach to getting off oil for transportation posted 1 year, 3 months ago 36 Responses

  • Biomass With CCS

    I'm quite sure a biomass plant could be designed to capture carbon and be carbon negative but it would make more sense if it were a larger plant to cost justify the additional hardware and oversight required to sequester the carbon underground.  Massive amounts of concentrated carbon dioxide are a safety concern and can kill people and wildlife if accidently released.On The five transport energy solutions and one imperative posted 1 year, 3 months ago 34 Responses

  • The Biophilic Imagination vs. Reality

    Richard,
    Guessing and surmising is not going to get us to a sustainable energy economy.  Your comments about solar thermal are way off base; you need to educate yourself about the alternatives rather than spouting off out of ignorance.  Imagining without research is not going to get us where we need to go.

    On a thousand acres of desert, an area with a lower density of living things than a forest, you could have over 200 MW of solar thermal collectors, so your efficiency is about 200x that of biomass production.  Furthermore, I don't know if you have figured into your numbers the energy it takes to transport that massive biomass to the biomass plant, grinding it, drying it, maybe gasifying it.  With the solar thermal plant, most of the energy expenditure is up front and current figures show that we get around 45x the energy in as we would put into building and maintaining it.  

    So I care enough about forests not to put them in the cross-hairs of our energy needs.

    I'm afraid people have bought into the "local and small is necessarily better" ideology and are trying to tailor the world to suit that view.  I like local food production and local energy production but I don't want us to exhaust and distort our local ecosystems because of our demand for mechanical and electric energy.  

    Biomass energy plants are valuable and important parts of what I call the renewable electron economy but, as I have said in the other comment, in the context of an ensemble of renewable generators.  We don't want to lean too heavily on them.
    On The five transport energy solutions and one imperative posted 1 year, 3 months ago 34 Responses

  • The biophilic fallacy

    Richard,
    Burning forests and other cellulosic products in biomass power plants en masse will still put pressure on ecosystems that is unprecedented.  I am not against it, but it needs to part of what are called "combination" power plants, where the storage capacity of biomass is used wisely to balance more unpredictable renewable resources.

    Again, you are showing a touching faith in pronouncements of companies about their concern about sustainability.  You seem to want to straddle biomass and biofuels in your latest post...make up your mind!  These companies need to form a sustainable biofuel alliance and lay out what they mean by sustainable so it is publicly available for scrutiny and accountability.  

    Also, you are falling prey to what might be called  the biophilic fallacy: that somehow if a solution involves green growing things that it is of necessity more ecological than using a mineral or mechanical product.  You like the idea of wandering in groves of trees...but you will need far larger plantations of industrial biomass to equal the energy output of a single solar thermal power plant with thermal storage.  McDonough makes an interesting distinction between "technical nutrients" and "biological nutrients" which may be applicable here.  On The five transport energy solutions and one imperative posted 1 year, 3 months ago 34 Responses

  • Why

    Mr. Miller,
    Whatever your role in FSC, you seem to have left your critical faculties at the door when it comes to biofuels.  I don't hear any of the investors or main biofuel companies getting together to take action on limiting water use,  and conserving the soil.  As yet there is no voluntary biofuel equivalent of FSC or government sponsored eco-certification program.

    You seem to be enchanted by the prospect of all that investment in cellulosic biofuels but are not putting the same faith in certification that you have with wood products.  Policy and voluntary industry standards can help shape technology in ways that you seem not to be putting much effort into (so far).

    My listing of the uses of biofuels is not complete but I am not out there trying to "sell" biofuels to the American public...there are plenty of people out there doing that...maybe you too.  People who do the "selling" of biofuels do so in a way that is largely ignorant of the limits and effects of biofuels and the extreme danger they present to our biosphere and food system if not very well regulated.  

    I believe the internal combustion engine whether driven by fossil fuels or by biofuels should have a much more limited scope in the future.  Electric drive is the way to go.  I can explain if you don't understand why.

    I also don't have a problem with biomass power plants (more energy available than with biofuels) but their biomass fuels will also need to be regulated as well as we come to rely on them more, as we can overplant and become overreliant on using the soil and water system as a conduit for our exosomatic energy demands.  As I said, you should really read "Collapse" by Jared Diamond.  On The five transport energy solutions and one imperative posted 1 year, 3 months ago 34 Responses

  • Who's living in a dreamworld?

    Without a rigorous eco-certification program and or direct government regulation, biofuel production will interfere with:

    1. food production
    2. the water cycle
    3. soil regeneration and organic content

    Claiming that technological innovations such as the use of algae or cellulose will solve these problems by their very nature is naive, to the say the least.  Innovations will probably help but they might, for instance involve larger amounts of water or deplete the organic content of soils more rapidly. Without oversight, these negative outcomes are more likely.

    I'm not against biofuels, I'm against unregulated or uncertified biofuels.  

    It's simple economics...the laws of supply and demand as they interact with the necessarily bounded resources of the planet.  Naive biofuel advocates like Mr. Miller have a myopic focus on producing a liquid fuel from biomass and believe that this produces a desired result of a sustainable carbon neutral fuel.  They have just edited out the laws of economics (not just the economics of the optimistic investment prospectus) out of the picture.  For people who are depending on the soil and biological organisms to produce fuel their are curiously ignorant about the history of human civilizations and the natural environment.  Read "Collapse" by Jared Diamond.On The five transport energy solutions and one imperative posted 1 year, 3 months ago 34 Responses

  • Responsible CTL?

    Some could sequester the carbon from the synthesis of the liquid fuel and REDUCE emissions of fossil carbon but this doesn't eliminate carbon emissions from the actual combustion of the synfuel in an internal combustion engine.   Using coal as a feedstock for synfuels is also is NEVER sustainable.  Period.

    You also are by using the category "synfuels" blurring the distinction between renewable and sustainable synfuels and unsustainable ones.  If you want to represent "responsible" synfuel manufacturers, oppose the use of coal in synfuels and work towards a moratorium on CTL synfuel plants.On The five transport energy solutions and one imperative posted 1 year, 3 months ago 34 Responses

  • Downplaying existing and emerging technologies

    The problem with Pielke et al.'s argument is that it minimizes the potential role of existing and emerging technologies in mitigating carbon emissions.  I've put together a list of about 24 existing and emerging technologies (www.greenthoughts.us) that will get us most of the way there.  

    Government R&D spending is not the highest probability strategy in getting these technologies into the ground nor to create the economies of scale required to bring down their cost.  A combination of government involvement and smart market design through incentives is key, with the carbon price playing a part but with much more specific incentives to build what I believe to be the most probable energy solution, an electricity-based energy system powered by renewables.

    Bill Hannahan's comment above belies biases against existing and emerging technologies that are typical of Pielke et al.  He calls them "expensive and impractical".  Because of the Dane's and Europeans willingness to start working with what we have, we now have wind turbines that are highly efficient though unfortunately because of the nature of their resource (wind) they cannot substitute for coal.

    We on the other hand in the US have the natural resources (solar and some geothermal) that can substitute for coal but because of our unwillingness to start with what we have (looking for the technological silver bullet) we are not pushing down the price of these technologies fast enough by deploying them en masse.  I am for well-designed feed-in tariffs that get people to put their money where their ideals are.

    Talk is cheap, clean energy and the infrastructure it requires is not(yet).  On Government-financed construction plus carbon pricing is the key posted 1 year, 7 months ago 23 Responses

  • Consumers and Workers

    Adam,
    I applaud your willingness to get out of the environmentalist ghetto and take on some of the big problems and big institutions.  I believe many of the commenters here are not sufficiently appreciative of the effort that requires.

    I do have some thoughts about "Blue"

    1)I think one of the things you are focusing on is how to present ordinary Americans with gratifying experiences related to sustainability; experiences that in some way fit into their current lifestyles.  The role that you have chosen is in part that of a teacher but you want to be a good teacher who makes learning fun.  There are dangers in trying to make learning "too fun" so nothing gets learned or being "too serious" and the students start to tune you out.  With "blue" you are trying to dissociate some of the unfun things about environmentalism associated with "green" while trying to maintain some of its essence.

    1. why can't the PSP be also about being a worker who can contribute to increasing the sustainability of their work environment?  The focus on consumption is  partial and meshes unfortunately with the predominant systems of thought that got us to where we are today.  If you haven't already seen Adam Curtis's two documentaries "Century of the Self" and "The Trap", I recommend them because they are focused on some of the cultural problems that arise in consumer society.

    2. I'm thinking that the accusations of greenwashing (or bluewashing) that come your way might in part be addressed by pairing the messages that you are sending out with an equal focus on verifying the "green"-ness or "blue"ness of your and your clients' actions.  Eco-certification is an important tool to back up claims of being better with actually being better.  The semi-greening of WalMart is part an emphasis on energy efficiency but also in part the expansion of greener products on the shelves, many of which depend on an eco-certification for their green credentials (the Organic standard primarily).
    On Adam Werbach calls for a new movement of a billion consumers posted 1 year, 7 months ago 73 Responses

  • "Revolution in Power Engineering"

    I have written a think piece on my blog about where power engineering might need to go to fully embrace renewables which I called "Revolution in Power Engineering":

    www.greenthoughts.us

    My focus was on the production side but you are right to emphasize that the low hanging fruit for many utilities is the demand side given the example of California's state laws/regulatory culture.  Most states and regions of the world have not yet developed a similar system and they should, as Peter Darbee has pointed out.
    On A plead for utility leadership on climate change posted 1 year, 11 months ago 14 Responses

  • Public education

    Industrial illiteracy might be one way to describe it, though I think the target audience for efforts in this area is first educated people with either basic technical or political understanding.  This is not at first a "from the ground up" program of education from year 0.

    I believe using the concept of "infrastructure" or "energy infrastructure" as "type" in the philosophical sense, we can help people make connections between past efforts in this area that are recognizable (Interstate system, Western hydroelectric dams, Bureau of Reclamation, Apollo program) and efforts to get renewable energy measures passed.  I don't think the supporters of renewable energy emphasize enough that what we are talking about is a change in infrastructure or new infrastructure.  On Dems can't overcome filibuster threats to get decent legislation -- so what should they do? posted 1 year, 11 months ago 31 Responses

  • Public education

    As naive as this sounds, the way to get these things through Congress is a concerted campaign of public education that explains the necessity of this form of public support for what is really a large change in our country's infrastructure.  Right now people on the ground do not understand how energy infrastructure and production is funded. To just send out information because a particular bill is under discussion is really already too late.  We can no longer afford to just hope that somehow people will understand, because often the bills themselves are difficult to understand.

    The government has subsidized or massively supported the building of railroads, roads, electrical infrastructure throughout our history.  If people want this type of new, clean energy infrastructure, and most people do, it needs a boost to happen in an accelerated timeframe.  As is, the oil industry continues to receive this kind of help well into its mature years.  To deny this type of help to renewables undermines the public's wishes for this type of change.  

    If enough people in both Red and Blue states are aware of these filibusters, they won't happen or it may be possible to actually get constituents to force their Senators to stop.
    On Dems can't overcome filibuster threats to get decent legislation -- so what should they do? posted 1 year, 11 months ago 31 Responses