There is a climate splash in Nature this week, including a cover showing a tera-tonne weight, presumably meant to be made of carbon (could it be graphite?), dangling by a thread over the planet, and containing two new articles (Allen et al and Meinshausen et al), a “News & Views” piece written by two of us, and a couple commentaries urging us to “prepare to adapt to at least 4° C” and to think about what the worst case scenario (at 1000 ppm CO2) might look like.
At the heart of it are the two papers which calculate the odds of exceeding a predefined threshold of 2°C as a function of CO2 emissions. Both find that the most directly relevant quantity is the total amount of CO2 ultimately released, rather than a target atmospheric CO2 concentration or emission rate. This is an extremely useful result, giving us a clear statement of how our policy goals should be framed. We have a total emission quota; if we keep going now, we will have to cut back more quickly later.
There is uncertainty in the climate sensitivity of the Earth and in the response of the carbon cycle, and the papers are extremely useful in the way that they propagate these uncertainties to the probabilities of different amounts of warming. Just looking at the median model results, many people conclude that a moderately optimistic but not terribly aggressive scenario such as IPCC B1 would avoid 2°C warming relative to pre-industrial. But when you take into account the uncertainty, you find that there is a disturbingly high likelihood (roughly even odds) that it won’t.
Both papers come to the same broad conclusion, summarized in our figure, that unless humankind puts on the brakes very quickly and aggressively (i.e. global reductions of 80% by 2050), we face a high probability of driving climate beyond a 2°C threshold taken by both studies as a “danger limit”. Comparing the two papers is obscured by the different units; mass of carbon versus mass of CO2 (moles, anyone? Is there a chemist in the house?). But chugging through the math, we find the papers to be broadly consistent. Both papers conclude that humankind is already about half-way toward releasing enough carbon to probably reach 2°C, and that most of the fossil fuel carbon (the coal, in particular) will have to remain in the ground.
We feel compelled to note that even a “moderate” warming of 2°C stands a strong chance of provoking drought and storm responses that could challenge civilized society, leading potentially to the conflict and suffering that go with failed states and mass migrations. Global warming of 2°C would leave the Earth warmer than it has been in millions of years, a disruption of climate conditions that have been stable for longer than the history of human agriculture. Given the drought that already afflicts Australia, the crumbling of the sea ice in the Arctic, and the increasing storm damage after only 0.8°C of warming so far, calling 2°C a danger limit seems to us pretty cavalier.
Also, there are dangers to CO2 emission other than the peak, such as the long tail of the CO2 perturbation which will dominate the ultimate sea level response, and the acidification of the ocean. A building may be safe from earthquakes but if it is susceptible to fires it is still considered unsafe.
The sorts of emission cuts that are required are technologically feasible, if we were to build wind farms instead of coal plants, an integrated regional or global electrical power grid, and undertake a crash program in energy efficiency. But getting everybody to agree to this is the discouraging part. The commentary by Parry et al advises us to prepare to adapt to climate changes of at least 4°C, even though they recognize that it may not be possible to buy our way out of most of the damage (to natural systems, for example, including the irreversible loss of many plant and animal species). Anyway, how does one “adapt” to a train wreck? There is also the fairness issue, in that the beneficiaries of fossil energy (rich countries today) are not the ones who pay the costs (less-rich countries decades from now). We wonder why we were not advised to prepare to adapt to crash curtailing CO2 emissions, which sounds to us considerably less frightening.
p.s. For our German-speaking readers: Stefan’s commentary on the KlimaLounge blog.
Good points, Ray, but I’m not sure about this: “Personally, I don’t think we will be able to make it without resorting to nuclear power, geoengineering and serious reductions in consumption.”
Well, nuclear power is also a strictly limited resource, related to the amount of uranium ore, which is really not that limited over the next 50 years, any more than fossil fuels are, overall. Assuming a need for nuclear is also something of an argument against civilization, as is assuming a need for any limited resource. I don’t think too many people are proposing closing down nuclear power plants – the argument is rather than resources should go into wind and solar until they each equal nuclear’s current production (20% of total electric demand in the U.S. goes to nuclear).
Regardless, plants have survived on the surface of the earth for hundreds of millions of years. How did plants and animals solve the resource limitation issue?
Wind and solar and water energy. Solar for raw energy, and wind and water for the transport of raw materials and wastes (and seeds).
With combinations of wind and solar coupled to advanced energy storage, plus agricultural biofuels produced without fossil fuels, you have truly independent energy systems with zero resource limitation issues. That’s the basis of zero carbon cities, fed by fossil fuel free agriculture – a very plausible concept.
Also, geoengineering is an awfully vague term – haven’t we been doing geoengineering for the past 150 years by altering the atmospheric composition? What kind of geoengineering are you proposing?
#199 EL:
Was this some sort of trial balloon from the PR folks? If so it’s badly underinflated.
The underprivileged and disadvantaged are going to be most affected by negative effects of climate change. Thus it is incumbent on we who are more fortunate to take the lead in fixing the problem. Why would we add to their burden of suffering if we have a choice?
Amen, Ray Ladbury #231. The challenge should bring out the best in us. We’re tired of the worst, and sustainability is becoming the new fashion. Waste, greed, and obstinate stupidity have had their 8 years, and now it’s time for thrift and prudence and the sincere intelligence of those who truly believe that “yes, we can.”
#217 pete best:
Sorry Pete but simply not true. Wind turbines are huge structures, true, as are hydro or solar or nuclear installations, but they pay back the cost in CO2 of their own construction already very early in their useful life. As this is a common misconception, here is a link:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carbon_footprint
and follow esp. the Vattenfall link (3) within, page 24.
#185 “co2isnotevil”:
Want to try again with that? The latter part of your post was completely incomprehensible. I think if you look carefully you’ll see that the wooden rifle you were handed before you were sent into the line of battle is too poorly carved to frighten any of us, brave-but-gullible volunteer.
Also, let’s see the exact quote in Obama’s words (not a paraphrase) of the “Obama wants to bankrupt the coal industry” lie you swallowed and then vomited back up on this site. Care to produce it?
Ray Ladbury says: “We will face unpalatable choices down the line. Personally, I don’t think we will be able to make it without resorting to nuclear power, geoengineering and serious reductions in consumption.”
I’ve lost my knee-jerk response to nuclear power in our context, but geoengineering schemes usually strike me as reflecting an attitude insufficiently humble in the face of our evident incompetence at anything resembling this kind of engineering. Look at Biosphere, look at Greenland.
But perhaps I misread your use of the term. Certainly humankind will need brilliant engineers to devise more sustainable systems in the infrastructure of the human/earth interface. Coping with perpetually unstable coastlines in a responsible way, for instance, will be an enormous challenge for that kind of geoengineer.
David MaKay, why not snipe at someone who snipes themselves in the title of their book.
“Without hot air” implies that you uniquely are not just a windbag and that “the others” are.
Charles Munger said it is nearly demented to adopt cap and trade policies during this ecoinomic crisis.
Along with many other experts.
The underprivileged and disadvantaged are going to be most affected by negative effects of cap and trade. Thus it is incumbent on we who are more fortunate to take the lead in stopping this policy. Why would we add to their burden of suffering if we have a choice?
Barton Paul Levinson #222 et al.
Pull that switch.
Ok, but maybe its ok to ask what things will really cost. There is that sticky conservative (lower case c, no religious overtones) in me that likes to keep tabs on things. I realize this is out of fashion; conservatives of my sort might have, and should have, asked some hard questions as we headed into financial collapse as a result of deceitful practices in the financial world.
So I think it is important to know how much things really cost. By that I mean something a little more definitive than “8 cents” etc.
Concentrated solar truly sounds great, but there seems to be something missing. No one seems willing to answer why the big California desert CSP plant was shut down, even though it had already been built. So sorry, before building, I think a few questions are fair.
The main question is whether any and all of the renewables in our dreams will actually displace coal as the marginal responding energy source to each incremental load. When the answer to that question is a knowledgeable yes, plug-in cars could transition from harmful deceptions to important solutions.
To be specific, plug-in cars that use power from coal are generally worse for CO2 emissions than like sized hybrids. Don’t fall for the deceptive statement, “but plug-ins are better than conventional cars.” There is a reasonable accomplishment where conventional cars are well engineered as hybrids, but stop there until the coal is no longer the fuel involved.
>No. Just carbon emissions. You can have as big a solar-powered house as you want.
Just looking at the comments in this thread, we can see part of the agenda people have in mind. An 80% reduction in emissions is very substantial, basically remaking society at high cost. It’s not just a matter of switching to more expensive energy sources, which itself is a huge loss of comfort. I’ve seen estimates that 20% comes from livestock production. You say that the fact of an 80% reduction going back to the level of 1900 is irrelevant, but it is relevant since that’s the amount of reduction you want.
Jim Bullis,
30 April 2009 at 1:30 PM
I understand your point, but did not make the common mistake as you suggest. I am perfectly aware of the conversion efficiencies of wind turbines, solar cells and power plants.
I was trying to point out a flaw in the assumption made by prof MacKay, by suggesting that throwing 1 kWh of electric energy into an electric car would get you just as far as throwing 1 kWh of chemical energy into a petrol car.
Renewable energy sources are usually measured in electric energy, which is a net value, with previous conversion losses already factored in. This electric energy can thus not be compared on a 1:1 basis with the chemical energy in fossil fuels without taking into account the conversion efficiency of both forms of energy into a useful form (kinetic energy in this case).
Jim Bullis,
30 April 2009 at 1:38 PM
I think it is $0.08 including market expectations. According to the page I linked to, that is the total price these companies receive.
What I would like to point out is that this is no final price, it is the current price. Offshore wind is relatively new and will benefit a lot from future development of larger wind turbines. Currently 3 MW is the norm, 15 MW turbines are already on the drawing board. Expect that price to drop.
Re: #175
Ray,
It looks like you concur with me that realism and rationality have been sorely missing from the discussion. Nature Mag’s full frontal assault on the current belief structure puts the lie to the idea that this problem can be managed from emissions reduction alone.
It’s nice to see the community starting to catch up with me.
I will say that I am completely certain that we will overshoot the target, perhaps by 25% or more. So, it is clear that (a) there must be a smorgasbord of solutions and (b) we are going to warm anyway. I mean, 2*C OR MORE. No matter what we do.
One thing I have been focused on is the thermal inertia of nature. We gave it a good kick in the pants, and nature has taken over from there. We continue to kick it, adding to the inertia, but even once we stop, the inertia will continue and will build. It is not clear that we have any way to reverse that course, other than to actually over-cool the planet to induce ice age-like conditions. Of course, that invites a scenario where we overshoot THAT target as well and cause epic disaster.
Quite a fine mess, eh?
So, I say that we are in for a much warmer world NO MATTER WHAT WE DO. We are going to have to adapt and that’s all there is to it. Our safest bet is to find a way to coast the warming to a stop at a new level, and let nature draw it down over the course of several centuries. It is conceivable that the climate of the past 10,000 years can return in the future if we learn to get out of the way.
But I think we need to be clear here: the goal really should not be to AVOID the warming, because nature clearly has a foot on that pedal as well, thanks to the kick we gave it. The best we can hope for it to stop kicking it and let it find a new level that is not ridiculously higher than today.
Your thoughts?
James,
30 April 2009 at 1:12 PM
I can agree with your calculation, but would like to point out that this is only capital cost, there are also operating costs to consider. Your cost estimate for nuclear is on the low side in the real world. Actual costs are more like $ 6-10 billion per GW.
And you have to factor in the cost of fuel and decomissioning.
David MacKay,
I apologize for the sniping. Feelings run high, and this is a community that has endured concerted attacks for a couple of decades now. It doesn’t help that many in the denialosphere are misappropriating your arguments to claim that sustainable energy is impossible.
Personally, I’ve been impressed with your work even when I haven’t agreed with it. I think that you do a good job of laying out the challenges we face on the way to sustainability. And certainly, there is every opportunity to get it wrong. Even so, I don’t see that we have much choice but to push for renewables. I fully appreciate that this will not be easy, and your work does an excellent job of showing just how hard it will be, but we certainly cannot continue on our current course.
As to critics, I recommend the words of Leonardo: “As to my enemies, I pay no more attention to the wind that comes from their mouths than to the wind that comes from their anuses.”
Yes, MikeN, we CAN easily see your agenda.
Cost of these alternative sources are cheaper than continuing to use irreplaceable fossil fuels or dangerous (both materially and policically) radioactive materials.
That you state without proof that they are more expensive and then state that this is 100% proof of a loss of comfort.
And it is WRONG, not irrelevant to say that an 80% reduction will take us back to the 1900’s because it doesn’t. It is the same CO2 output as we had in the 1900’s. But nothing else is the same.
It doesn’t mean the same energy use levels.
It doesn’t mean slave labour.
It doesn’t mean loss of the modern comforts that we have today.
Jim states:
” No one seems willing to answer why the big California desert CSP plant was shut down, even though it had already been built.”
Um, the reason for closing it down will have been given in the speech saying it was being closed down.
That’s what you do when you say something is closing down.
You say why.
Else there would be no point in saying something is closing down.
What is happening is that you haven’t LOOKED to find the reason why it was closed down.
This “I haven’t heard …” meme seems to be the next attack vector by denialists.
Tiresome.
John H proclaims:
“The underprivileged and disadvantaged are going to be most affected by negative effects of cap and trade”
It will? How do you figure that out?
Jim Bullis, I’m not sure what CSP project you are talking about – care to elaborate? Otherwise, try these:
http://www.solardaily.com/reports/SolFocus_And_Samaras_Expands_Solar_CPV_Project_In_Greece_999.html
http://www.solardaily.com/reports/Two_50MW_CSP_Solar_Thermal_Powerplants_In_Andalucia_And_Extremadura_999.html
http://www.solardaily.com/reports/Concentrating_Solar_Power_Could_Generate_200_Billion_Dollars_In_Investment_By_2020_999.html
http://www.solardaily.com/reports/Abengoa_Solar_To_Build_World_Largest_Solar_Plant_999.html
http://www.solardaily.com/reports/Groundbreaking_Of_North_America_Largest_Solar_Photovoltaic_Energy_Park_999.html
http://www.solardaily.com/reports/The_Race_Is_On_For_1W_Solar_Power_999.html
That one is well worth reading:
MikeN #243,
After the expensive phony solutions are cleared away, we might get busy working on inexpensive ways to get close to that 80%.
Cars can be built that go fast on about a fifth the energy now required for the kind of cars we now insist on driving. Trucks can be built that use about a third of the energy they now use. We can also get twice to three times the electric energy from natural gas as we now do. Throw in some really good building insulation projects and we might start to think hopefully.
Even renewable electricity sources could start to look feasible if the demand for electricity was dramatically lowered.
But we need to make sure a lot of silly fake stuff does not get in the way. Everything is in that category until serious cost analyses are brought forward.
#241 JohnH:
As I’m going to continue repeating each time I hear a repetition along the lines of “electrical demand is highly elastic, an increase in costs will bring the economy to its knees”, I do business in a place where residential costs are currently $0.30/kWh and are known to go quite a bit higher. Life continues, lights stay on in the poorest of households. More significantly, electricity continues to be wasted at levels that rather astounding even when costs are $0.40/kWh, solid evidence that even optional electrical consumption is strongly inelastic.
If you’re going to fully explain how the costs associated with cap-and-trade would paralyze the economy and punish the poor, you need to include a convincing argument for why your hypothesis comports with $0.40/kWh electricity still leaving room for waste, even in poor households.
In #191 this odd assertion appears:
“Nuclear produces LESS CO2 than wind or solar.”
It does? So how does the uranium get to the power station? Uranium-fueled trucks???
How does the wind get to the turbine? Ah.
Ike, I don’t see nukes as a longterm solution, nor even a desirable short-term solution if we can avoid it. I am not convinced that it is inherently unsafe, but the waste is a problem, and to argue that proliferation isn’t an issue is naive.
However, I think we have two iron-clad goals:
1)Keep the economy healthy enough to support a very large R&D effort for alternate energy, mitigations, etc.
2)Reduce carbon emissions into the atmosphere
Increased nuclear power as a short-term solution is at least compatible with those goals. I also think we will have to do some geo-engineering, as much as I am worried that current models are not sufficiently developed to validate the effectiveness or safety of these solutions. We don’t have the luxury of picking and choosing solutions anymore. We have to go with whatever works.
#263 Mark,
I have looked and I will keep looking. I have asked and I will keep asking. When I ask why, I am looking for a bit more than “it was not practical,” which was what the ‘speech’ said. I want to know why.
Yeh, I am tiresome, guilty as charged.
Denialist? Huh? Try not to make stuff up to help with name calling.
I offer worthwhile solutions and have a faint hope of future financial gain in the process. Go with that if you want.
John H. asks “Why would we add to their burden of suffering if we have a choice?”
Answer: We don’t have a choice.
Next!
Mike F
30 April 2009 at 3:15 PM
See page 33. He actually doesn’t scale up, but scales down. He says that if we cover the windiest 10% of Britain with wind turbines, this will yield 20 kWh per person per day. That block of renewable energy is then suggestively stacked against the 40 kWh p.p.d. he reckons Britain needs to keep its cars rolling. Reverse that and you see that he is effectively suggesting that every person in Britain needs 40 kWh per day for driving a car.
See also my comments above. A given amount of electric energy can be put to good use with far more efficiency than the same amount of chemical engergy. Prof. MacKay leaves that fact out of his calculations.
You can be sure this 15 kWh per 100 km is attainable. Real electric cars (like the Tesla Roadster) are close to that figure in the real world. Ask yourself why he is not using this 15 kWh in his calculations, but sticks the 40 kWh. (Answer: he needs to jack up demand to make renewables seem like a hopeless enterprise)
You seem to be missing the entire point of prof. MacKay’s book. The electricity is supposed to be generated by renewable sources.
No. the 9.7 kWh chemical energy in petrol will be converted in to kinetic energy with an efficiency of roughly 20%. The electric energy that wind turbines and solar panels produce will be converted into kinetic energy in an electric car with an efficiency of >80%.
Barton Paul Levenson Says (1 May 2009 at 7:13 AM):
“Solar thermal plants store excess heat from the day in molten salts, which they then use to run the turbines at night. Some achieve nearly 24/7 operation this way.”
But of course have significant storage losses if they do so, so less overall efficiency. In addition, those solar thermal plants, with their huge arrays of concentrating mirrors, are the very ones that have what are (in my mind) unacceptable environmental effects.
“And with a smart grid, the solar during the day and the wind at night can average out, especially over large areas.”
Ignoring the fact that in many (most?) areas winds blow most strongly in the afternoon and evening.
Barton Paul Levenson Says (1 May 2009 at 7:23 AM):
“And it was only a few weeks ago when I pointed out that your single-minded reliance on comparing capital costs misses the fact that nukes need fuel and solar and wind don’t, and that goes into electricity costs as well.”
OK, so where’s your data on those fuel costs? And a comparison with e.g. the need to clean dust & bird crap off the solar mirrors every so often? Then we can add in your single-minded refusal to consider the costs of storage for a grid that has a large fraction of uncontrollably intermittent generation…
The point you seem to miss is that I’m trying to make reasonable estimates from data that’s easily available, while remaining aware of the uncertainties. You, like some others, seem to regard nuclear power with the same certainty that Catholics show towards Original Sin.
I’ll freely admit that there’s a bit of personal taste in my opinions too, though I do try to keep it separate. I’d far rather live with the aftereffects of a “worse than worse case” nuclear accident like this http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/4923342.stm than what a few of those concentrating solar plants would do to the Mojave.
Yes, but if over the next ten years we can get a large fleet of plugins on the road, and by then solar PV will have become so cheap that everyone will be putting it on their roofs, then the transition to that power source would be easy because everyone’s already got a plugin hybrid.
#269 Ike Solem,
Thanks, I will look and read.
I was talking about the California desert project which was described in Business Week, Fortune Mag, or something like that about 6 months ago. I forget the location name, but I thought the project name was “Solar One”.
But getting on with a real discussion, I am suggesting a distributed cogeneration system where electric power from natural gas can be produced at a fuel cost low enough that displacing coal as the marginal responding fuel source is a reasonable possibility.
I need convincing that the 10 cent to 20 cent electricity from CSP will be competitite as a market choice without major government assistance.
Phil Scadden,
30 April 2009 at 5:02 PM
Yes, but ask yourself why he doesn’t use this figure. Look at page 33 where he starts building his stacks of demand vs supply. Thats a 40 kWh block that he puts there. And ask yourself why he puts a block of chemical energy against a block of electric energy. The real figure that I calculated for Britain about a year ago when I first heard of this book was closer to 3 kWh p.p.d (for an electric car), not 40.
There are I believe 30.000.000 cars in Britain, with an average mileage of 9000. That is 1 car for every 2 persons yielding 4500 car miles per person per year. Multiply by 1.6, divide by 365 and you get ~ 20 car km per person per day. With my previous figure of 6 km/kWh the result is 3.3 kWh p.p.d. for private motorized transport.
Like I said above, it’s all about making the shift to renewables seem hopeless.
Ray Ladbury wrote: “Increased nuclear power as a short-term solution is at least compatible with those goals.”
My primary objection to nuclear power is precisely that, completely apart from its very real dangers and toxic pollution, it is not a short-term solution if “short-term solution” is defined as one that can make a significant contribution to reducing GHG emissions in the time frame within which such reductions are needed.
Nuclear power plants take too long to build. As Marc Jacobson of Stanford University reported in a recent study that compared alternative sources of electricity:
The new AREVA-designed EPR nuclear power plant being built at Olkiluoto, Finland is already three years behind schedule and 50 percent over budget, and the subject of lawsuits between the partners in the project (not lawsuits from “environmentalists”). This EPR plant represents the “new generation” of nuclear power plants that would supposedly be faster and cheaper to build, and free of the problems that plagued previous designs, and has been touted by the industry as the foundation of its “revival”.
So, new nuclear power plants being proposed today are extremely unlikely to even begin producing any “carbon free” electricity for at least ten years, and probably closer to 20 years.
In contrast, Jacobson’s study estimates the time between planning and operation for utility scale wind and solar power plants to be only 2 to 5 years.
By the time that new nuclear power plants can even begin to generate any “carbon free” electricity, we can build and deploy hundreds of gigawatts of wind and solar generating capacity — and that’s with today’s mainstream, already commercialized technology, let alone the innovations like thin-film solar that are just beginning to enter the market.
And meanwhile, resources directed to expanding nuclear power would be far more effectively directed towards expanding renewables and improving efficiency. Indeed, Jacobson estimates that the opportunity costs of nuclear — the CO2 emissions that result from not using the resources consumed by expanding nuclear to expand renewables and improve efficiency instead — exceed the total CO2 emissions from the entire nuclear power plant lifecycle.
Whatever else may be said about nuclear, it is not a “short term” solution for reducing GHG emissions from electricity generation.
Captcha says “1941 problem” — perhaps suggesting that we need a WWII-scale effort here …
#269 Ike Solem,
Thanks, I will look and read. Your references seem to be future plans.
I was talking about the California desert project which was described in Business Week, Fortune Mag, or something like that about 6 months ago. I forget the location name, but I thought the project name was “Solar One”. It was closed in the 1990s.
But getting on with a real discussion, I am suggesting a distributed cogeneration system where electric power from natural gas can be produced at a fuel cost low enough that displacing coal as the marginal responding fuel source is a reasonable possibility.
I need convincing that the 10 cent to 20 cent electricity that you quote from CSP will be competitite as a market choice without major government assistance. I just checked the wholesale electricity contracts out to June 2011: they range from 4 cents to 7 cents per kWhr. Where is the competitiveness?
#260 MikeN:
Scan this thread of comments and you can see you’ll do better at engagement if you bring more than vague fears of a “loss of comfort” to the table. Meanwhile, puzzling allusions to some sort of cabalistic “agenda” pursued by gratuitously comfort-robbing plotters leave you sounding faintly comical. I’d stay away from the word “agenda” if I were you. How about “plan for updating” or “course for modernization” or “abandonment of anachronistic, outmoded and increasingly dangerous methods”?
#276 Anne van der Bom
It clears up a lot when you say,
“You seem to be missing the entire point of prof. MacKay’s book. The electricity is supposed to be generated by renewable sources.”
I anticipate something much less idea.
Research and development money will be increasing, but will that make a real difference? Some obstacles in the way of clean power include:
1. Hostility to inventors and new energy technology. It used to be, back in the days of Edison, Tesla, et al., that innovators were admired. Now they are called “trolls” and accused of destroying American jobs. The courts and Congress have made patents subject to perpetual validity review and made it more profitable for big companies to steal than to innovate.
2. Big business does not like change. The status quo is satisfactory for them, and change represents uncertainty, which is bad for business. Why should the utilities, cement producers, steel companies, oil companies, and other giant polluters welcome any progress in the science and technology of pollution abatement?
3. Big science will probably get all of the research and development money for expansion of existing big budget projects, including hot fusion, CO2 sequestration, supercolliders for particle physics, and other pure science research which has so far proved of no utility. As Lee Smolin pointed out in his book, “The Problem with Physics,” applied science is sneered at, and only theoreticians get respect. String theory has starved research in other areas of physics.
4. Small business creation in America is too hard. The new technology necessary to make clean energy cheap will have to be developed by small business, since, as noted in #2 above, big business will have to be dragged along kicking and screaming. Startups will have to be significantly incentivized, and these incentives should not be allowed to big business. Presently, under federal law, a “small business” is one with under 500 employees, which sounds like big business to me. A new category, microbusiness, needs to be created for federal incentives. Incentives should include exemption of microbusinesses (under 20 employees, and under $2 million annual revenue) from the more onerous reporting, environmental liability, minority quotas, employee liabilities, OSHA hassles, and taxation (including patent “maintenance fees”), imposed by the federal government. The reason that America’s industrial base is crumbling is that new businesses are treated by the federal government like established giants, instead of being protected and nurtured for the future.
5. DOE has already given contracts for $80 billion in future spending to 16 favored contractors, which will absorb all available R&D in clean tech for the foreseeable future. This was a parting shot of the Bush administration in December 2008. http://www1.eere.energy.gov/femp/news/news_detail.html?news_id=12150
6. DOE is committed to unworkable solutions, namely chemical CO2 capture and underground dumping (“sequestration”). Chemical capture from flue gas is a much harder problem than capture from natural gas wells or IGCC gasification, due to the presence of a large 75% volume percentage of N2 (“nitrogen ballast”), fly ash, and acid-forming SOx and NOx. It has not been proven at scale. Sequestration is not a realistic hope, for reasons detailed in a scathing GAO report. http://www.gao.gov/new.items/d081080.pdf Summarizing the report: no one wants a lethal gas dump under their home, and no one wants to insure the risk that the CO2 won’t leak out, plus the transportation infrastructure to get CO2 to the injection sites will be enormous.
Here is a scalable mechanical alternative for post-combustion CO2 capture (and flue gas scrubbing) which could be retrofitted to the existing fleet of pulverized coal plants: http://www.freepatentsonline.com/y2009/0013867.pdf
Manu Phonic (209) — One solution is to replace fossil coal by biocoal, usually called biochar these days, and also replace petroleum products by the biiofeul equivalent. For the latter, just now biodiesel is possible and competative with fosil diesel in some locations; there isn’t a biogasolene yet, but give it some time.
Phil Scadden
30 April 2009 at 11:46 PM
Where I live, a perfectly placed solar panel delivers 800 kWh per year per kWp (=kW peak rated capacity). Since my roof is east/west, it will deliver around 500 kWh per year per kWp. Solar cells are available up to 20% efficiency, meaning 200 W / m². So I could turn my roof into a 12 kWp solar installation which yields 6000 kWh / year. That is enough for 35,000 km/year. I drive 30,000 km/year. 35,000> 30,000.
That was my calculation, now you show yours.
By the way, I’d just like to mention that I am far happier to be arguing about the comparative benefits of nuclear power, wind, solar, geothermal, biomass, conservation, efficiency, reforestation, organic agriculture, etc. for quickly reducing CO2 emissions and concentrations, than to be engaged in yet another argument with someone who doesn’t believe that CO2 is a greenhouse gas, or that human activities are not causing warming, or that the Earth is cooling, or thinks that AGW is a “liberal” conspiracy to destroy capitalism, etc.
David B. Benson #286 — Vehicle fuel might be made from the syngas (CO + H2) resulting from the simultaneous electrolysis of CO2 and H2O, followed by the Fischer-Tropsch synthesis. The Idaho National Laboratory (Stoots, et al.) have demonstrated this, which they have dubbed “syntrolysis.” http://www.inl.gov/factsheets/docs/syntrolysis.pdf
So CO2 might be a resource instead of a waste product, and carbon recycling might be possible. The O2 from CO2 cracking would save the cost of the air separation unit in IGCC and oxyfuel coal plants. The energy for the cracking would have to come from wind and solar and geothermal, since fossil fuels create more CO2 than they can crack.
Wilmot in point #1 of post #285 you’re so very, very wrong.
Edison’s patents were avoided like the plague. That is why Holywood started in California, where they could make a film, sell enough to make a profit and close shop before the bailiffs got the orders to get the money for the patent.
Patents are NOT up for perpetual review. They have spent the last thirty years being up for NO REVIEW WHATSOEVER.
Case in point: The JPEG patents were given to IBM ***and*** Forgent. THE SAME FREAKING PATENT!
Hardly proof of review, is it.
Big companies can steal patents and outlawyer any smaller company. See what happened to Stacker when MS ground them into dust.
Your post there is pure Neo-con Free Market Uber Alles claptrap made worse by patents and other “IP” laws being a government interference in the free market.
pete best
1 May 2009 at 4:22 AM
That is quite an understatement for an overestimation by more than an order of magnitude for something that is so easy to verify.
Ignoring no, treating with skepticism, yes.
That is primary energy. Or: the chemical energy contained in the fossil fuels we are burning. A large part of that is burnt in powerplants to generate electricity. According to Prof. MacKay’s twisted logic, we need 1 kWh of electricity to replace 1 kWh of coal that generates 400 Wh of ….. electricity.
That point is moot, since we’re talking about renewable energy here. This argument has been dealt with in other posts.
That then would make them twice as good as the 20% average conversion efficiency of the petrol car.
You are suggesting things that I never said. I never compared a petrol car to an electric car, I was questioning the assumptions of prof. MacKay about how much electricity Britain needs to keep its cars running. That’s all. You are reading too much between the lines.
How about wind? Schotland has some excellent locations, largely unused.
The classic “if it is not a definitive solution to all foreseeable problems, then it’s useless” fallacy.
Wrong. A 2 MW wind turbine in a windy onshore location can produce an amount of electricity equivalent to 2500-3000 full load hours per year. Offshore it is 3000-3500 full load hours. That is 5-7 GWh/year. No re-do your calculation with that figure.
Ray, #265.
Your quote from Leonardo seems to be dual-purpose.
Isn’t the whole thread you’re replying to “Please don’t ignore David”. So why are you quoting something that is basically saying “Ignore people. A lot”.
David MacKay
1 May 2009 at 11:20 AM
I will gladly explain. What I find misleading is that this information is not used in your supply vs demand stacks. That stack very prominently shows a 40 kWh per day block for car use, when it acutally is 3.3 kWh.
I remember some time ago that your book was also reviewed on ‘The Register’ and more or less the only message that got through was ‘we need to cover 10% of Britain in windmills to power half our cars’. Which is untrue. But somehow that was the message they took home from your book. The wrong message I might say.
dhgoza preens: “On your side you have the ignorant misunderstanding that the lesser prairie chicken is a migratory species that flies into skyscrapers.”
Well, they’re flying into wind turbines.
Or are people putting them in places DELIBERATELY to kill the little prairie chicken?
Go on, give us what it is about wind farms that is killing off the little prairie chicken.
I’m still all agog.
Mark #290 — I’m probably misunderstanding your point about patents being government interference in the free market. I certainly did not mean to post anything like the “pure Neo-con Free Market Uber Alles claptrap” you perceive. So to be clear, I agree with Abraham Lincoln (the only President to have received a patent) that the US patent system “adds the fuel of interest to the fire of genius.” And I believe that is not a bad thing. Do you disagree?
He also states: “On the other hand, the UK does have a very small remnant population of golden eagles, and it would be quite easy to intentionally site windfarms in such a way as to wipe them out, if that were my goal.”
Ah, I see.
Your problem is you think that the only reason for building a wind farm is to turn birds into chopped pate.
Do you think you may be just a little bit wrong there?
NOTE you can also site skyscrapers in a place that will kill of your little prairie chicken if that is your goal. So ban skyscrapers!!!
“#240 EL Says:
221 – The intermittent problem with wind is huge.”
And the intermittent problem with coal power or oil or nuclear (you have to stop them to service them!) is huge.
Guess what? Who said anything about replacing all our power needs with wind ALONE???
Maybe all this nuclear stuff should be considered as a medium-term stopgap. IF IT IS NEEDED.
They can’t be built quick enough in numbers enough to make a short-term difference to our energy needs and drawbacks. They are not a viable long-term solution either.
But one change IS both short, medium and long term solution:
Waste less energy.
Wilmot McCutchen (289) — Thank you for reminding me about syngas based solutions. AFAIK, there are none (yet) in commericial production. With peak oil here (already, just now, soon, take your pick) I certainly expect to see ventures being started in a few years.
Wilmot, it was your diatribe against the patent review that is BADLY in need of being applied. For a generation and more the patent system has fallen from a useful ideas clearing house to a way for big business to kill off the little player and “monetise” ideas that are worthless (rather like the bundling of bad debt and selling it on).
Small businesses benefit FAR, FAR more from a limited patent pool since they don’t have the revenue to pay for a batallion of patent lawyers to look for prior art or craft a worthless (since it doesn’t let those skilled in the art re-create the invention) patent that can be used as a stick to kill competition.
In fact, it is completely the opposite of what you say should be happening.
A blindness to reality that can only be from shilling or idealogical blinkers.
I gave you the benefit of the doubt and picked the idealogical one.