A Musing Environment

Last post included about half the executive Summary of the new InterAcademy Council recommendations for our energy future. I tried to eliminate what was less important, but couldn’t find much, hence the long post.

This report covers much the same area as other reports, but has a few differences.

Responsibilities are assigned to multi-national organizations, governments, NGOs and the private sector.

Needed actions frequently include the need for the media to help understand the enormity of problems, or the role of solutions. Frequently the media tell us of a new report, but do not follow up. Most of us don’t have anywhere near enough information to make educated decisions. We can let the media know we need better and more explanations, closer to page 1.

Conclusion 1: emphasis on the need to provide energy to the poor. Not to be overlooked while we in the rich world talk about the need for all of us to cut back.

Conclusion 3: Coal will continue to play a large role in the world’s energy mix. Research and development of carbon capture and storage technology must be accelerated to reduce coal’s impact. I include this not because this is not a routine part of energy policy reports, but because much of the public hears that we can eliminate coal power soon.

Needed action for Conclusion 5:

Given the controversy over the future of nuclear power worldwide, the United Nations should commission—as soon as possible—a transparent and objective re-examination of the issues that surround nuclear power and their potential solutions. It is essential that the general public be informed about the outcome of this re-examination.

Bruce Alberts, when he left National Academy of Sciences, listed this as one of the questions Congress did not ask. A good review will help facilitate informed discussion.

What impressed you most about Lighting the Way? What differences strike you between reports at this level and what the public is hearing?

The InterAcademy Council report Lighting the Way: Toward a Sustainable Energy Future is out. I include a sizable portion of the Executive Summary here for people who prefer html to pdf. Comments soon.
Read the rest of this entry »

You can link to it from Cravens’ site for her new book coming out tomorrow, Power to Save the World. Rip Anderson shares the stage with her.

Cravens met Anderson at a party, and they argued over nuclear power. Anderson took Cravens on a tour of a coal plant, and the nuclear world, and this book followed.

Friends (Quakers) are all over the place on solutions to climate change, and what role we should play in the solution. Some of us even disagree that climate change is important for all Friends to address.

At times, our discussions sound like we’re floor 54 in the Tower of Babel.

It’s time to step back. Before we describe Truth to one another, let us explain to one another where we find Truth, and how we recognize it. If a statement is true, how important is it? Which sources do we rely on, and why? We are far from a single standard of Truth.

From Pacific Yearly Meeting’s Faith and Practice, section on the Integrity Testimony*:

Friends believe in speaking simply, avoiding misleading words or emotionally manipulative language, which could divert from the discernment of God’s will. Commitment to truth requires authenticity and veracity in following one’s conscience, illuminated by the Inner Light. When we depart from truth, we separate ourselves from God. Integrity is not simply a habit of speech, but a way of life increasingly aligned with God’s will.

When we depart from truth, we separate ourselves from God.

Friends distinguish between illumination of the inner light and a belief that we are always right. (One of my students from long ago insisted that whatever direction he faced was North. We all feel that to some extent!) We also value experiential understanding, in ourselves and others. The inner light isn’t the ego.

Leave a comment, let me know which sources of information you trust and why. Also, what will help Friends to discuss this question effectively, from the Monthly Meeting (congregation) to Yearly Meeting level, moving from Babel to the ocean of light over the ocean of darkness?

* Explanation for non-Friends:
Faith and Practice records the current beliefs of Friends. From Pacific YM’s Faith and Practice:

Testimonies are expressions of lives turned toward the Light, outward expressions that reflect the inward experience of divine guidance.

Check out Pacific YM’s Faith and Practice, or that for any other Yearly Meeting, to learn more.

Nothing in this blog should indicate that Friends do better with integrity than any other group. I just hate reading “we are better” posts.

What does peer review mean to you?

To some, it means research that is probably funded by industry or government. Many of these people believe the funder influences the quality of the work.

While this clearly happens in some fields, such as the study of particular drugs (most pharmacological research is at a more basic level, to find what and how, not to confirm the latest product), how big a problem is this otherwise? It’s pretty clear that the President isn’t able to influence the outcome of studies, rather he and Congress have most influence on which questions are asked. They can do this through earmarks, more than $2 billion/year just in science, or through the questions asked of National Academy of Sciences or President’s Committee of Advisers on Science and Technology and others. For example, a decade ago, PCAST was asked to report on Federal Energy Research and Development for the Challenges of the 21st Century. The authors recommended that the report be updated every 5 years, but a decade later the update still hasn’t been requested.

We all know stories of company doctors who never found problems with toxins (did they submit articles with that claim to journals?). On the other hand, an article I read long ago (where?) described the US system of government, businesses, and universities working together as the best system for science in the world, as the questions examined at the university level are questions people want answers to. Computer business folks approached universities in the Boston area about collaboration, and were rejected, before settling in Silicon Valley — now the two best colleges for computer science are UC, Berkeley and Stanford.

The Wikipedia description reflects how people in science are likely to see peer review:

Peer review (known as refereeing in some academic fields) is a process of subjecting an author’s scholarly work, research or ideas to the scrutiny of others who are experts in the same field. It is used primarily by editors to select and to screen submitted manuscripts, and by funding agencies, to decide the awarding of grants. The peer review process aims to make authors meet the standards of their discipline, and of science in general. Publications and awards that have not undergone peer review are likely to be regarded with suspicion by scholars and professionals in many fields. Even refereed journals, however, can contain errors….

Reviewers are typically anonymous and independent, to help foster unvarnished criticism, and to discourage cronyism in funding and publication decisions. However, as discussed below under the next section, US government guidelines governing peer review for federal regulatory agencies require that reviewer’s identity be disclosed under some circumstances.

In addition, since reviewers are normally selected from experts in the fields discussed in the article, the process of peer review is considered critical to establishing a reliable body of research and knowledge. Scholars reading the published articles can only be expert in a limited area; they rely, to some degree, on the peer-review process to provide reliable and credible research that they can build upon for subsequent or related research.

Fraud is hard to catch by this method; often it is caught when others do not produce the same results. This is the method of catching mistakes as well; peer review does not confirm accuracy, but over time, mistakes tend to be caught.

For some, the term peer review means a real study, one that is financed by some means, and there could be a problem if the financing interferes with the result. People triggered by this term are put in an awful position, since every study either falls into the category serious and peer-reviewed, or not serious.

What are your feelings about the term and why?

The National Research Council’s new report discussed the impact of biofuels of today and tomorrow on water supply and pollution.

From the Executive Summary (pictures and graphs from elsewhere):

President Bush has called for production of 35 billion gallons of ethanol annually by 2017, which, if achieved, would comprise about 15 percent of U.S. liquid transportation fuels.

USDA estimates of corn use

This goal is almost certain to result in a major increase in corn production, at least until marketable future alternatives are developed…Corn generally uses less water than soybeans and cotton in the Pacific and Mountain regions, but the reverse is true in the Northern and Southern Plains, and the crops use about the same amount of water in the North Central and Eastern regions.

In some areas of the country, water resources already are significantly stressed. For example, large portions of the Ogallala (or High Plains) aquifer, which extends from west Texas up into South Dakota and Wyoming, show water table declines of over 100 feet. Deterioration in water quality may further reduce available supplies. Increased biofuels production adds pressure to the water management challenges the nation already faces.

The Ogallala aquifer is the largest aquifer in North America.

Water Quality Impacts
Fertilizer use results in increased nutrients, nitrogen and to a lesser extent phosphorous, in groundwater and surface runoff.

Excess nitrogen in the Mississippi River system is known to be a major cause of the oxygen-starved “dead zone” in the Gulf of Mexico, in which many forms of marine life cannot survive. The Chesapeake Bay and other coastal waterbodies also suffer from hypoxia (low dissolved oxygen levels) caused by nutrient pollution. Over the past 40 years, the volume of the Chesapeake Bay’s hypoxic zone has more than tripled. Many inland lakes also are oxygen-starved, more typically due to excess levels of phosphorous….Of the potential feedstocks, the greatest application rates of both fertilizer and pesticides per hectare are for corn. Per unit of energy gained, biodiesel requires just 2 percent of the N and 8 percent of the P needed for corn ethanol. Pesticide use differs similarly. Low-input, high-diversity prairie biomass and other native species would also compare favorably relative to corn using this metric.

Dead zone expanding, and expected to reach 8,500 square miles this year.

Greater use of marginal land, except for native grasses, could increase soil loss and pollutant transport. Corn requires much more fertilizer — 50 time as much nitrogen and 12 times as much phosphorous as for biodiesel, and pesticide than other fuel sources. Low-input, high-diversity prairie biomass and other native species also do much better than corn.

Reducing Water Impacts through Agricultural Practices
There are many agricultural practices and technologies that, if employed, can increase yield while reducing the impact of crops on water resources. Many of these technologies have already been developed and applied to various crops, especially corn, and they could be applied to cellulosic feedstocks. Technologies include a variety of water-conserving irrigation techniques, soil erosion prevention techniques, fertilizer efficiency techniques, and precision agriculture tools that take into account site-specific soil pH (acidity, alkalinity), soil moisture, soil depth, and other measures. Best Management Practices (BMPs) are a set of established methods that can be employed to reduce the negative environmental impacts of farming.

Such practices can make a large, positive environmental impact. For example, in 1985, incentives were put in place to encourage adoption of conservation tillage practices. According to data from the National Resources Inventory (NRI), maintained by the Natural Resources Conservation Service, overall annual cropland erosion fell from 3.06 billion tons in 1982 to about 1.75 billion tons in 2003, a reduction of over 40 percent (http://www.nrcs.usda.gov/TECHNICAL/NRI/).

In addition, biotechnologies are being pursued that optimize grain production when the grain is used for biofuel. These technologies could help reduce water impacts by significantly increasing the plants’ efficiency in using nitrogen, drought and water-logging tolerance, and other desirable characteristics.

Soil erosion decreased 43%.

The water impact of biorefineries will be less overall, but locally it could be large.

A biorefinery that produces 100 million gallons of ethanol per year would use the equivalent of the water supply for a town of about 5,000 people…use of water is declining as ethanol producers increasingly incorporate water recycling and develop new methods of converting feedstocks to fuels that increase energy yields while reducing water use.

In 2006, 4.9 billion gallons of ethanol supplied 2.4% of US fuels on an energy basis (about 1.5 gallons of ethanol provides the same energy as 1 gallon of gasoline). 100 million gallons of ethanol would supply enough fuel for 29 such towns.

Key Policy Considerations
Subsidy policies have driven dramatic expansion of corn ethanol production.

From a water quality perspective, it is vitally important
to pursue policies that prevent an increase in total loadings of nutrients, pesticides, and sediments to waterways. It may even be possible to design policies in such a way to reduce loadings across the agricultural sector, for example, those that support the production of feedstocks with lower inputs of nutrients.

Cellulosic feedstocks, which have a lower expected impact on water quality in most cases (with the exception of the excessive removal of corn stover from fields without conservation tillage), could be an important alternative to pursue, keeping in mind that there are many uncertainties regarding the large-scale production of these crops….

Biofuels production is developing within the context of shifting options and goals related to U.S. energy production. There are several factors to be considered with regard to biofuels production that are outside the scope of this report but warrant consideration. Those factors include: energy return on energy invested including consideration of production of pesticides and fertilizer, running farm machinery and irrigating, harvesting and transporting the crop; the overall “carbon footprint” of biofuels from when the seed is planted to when the fuel is produced; and the “food vs. fuel” concern with the possibility that increased economic incentives could prompt farmers worldwide to grow crops for biofuel production instead of food production.

Conclusions
Though biofuels are a marginal additional stress on water supplies in the US today, they have probably already affected Gulf hypoxia. The anticipated increase in biofuels over the next decade could lead to problems of water supply and pollution in the absence of policies.

hypoxia

The Arctic showed an abrupt increase in temperature around 1920, a cooling, and then a steadier climb beginning in the 1960s. Increased greenhouse gases are pretty well correlated with the second increase, but what caused the first?

20th century: Arctic temperature Hugo Ahlenius, UNEP/GRID-Arendal

Worldwide, the results aren’t quite the same.

Climate change mostly anthropogenic — variations depend partly on volcanoes, also El Nino/La Nina conditions. (El Nino years tend to be warmer — 1998 was hot because of El Ninl; this is now the temperature.)

Notice that the temperature change in the Arctic is much greater than elsewhere. Among other reasons, there is significant positive feedback — water absorbs most light, ice reflects most light.

The September 7 Science (here for research article, here for perspective, subscription needed) reports on a study of a Greenland ice core, to correlate the effect of aerosols (airborne particles) on temperature. Soot warms the area by increasing absorption (though most other aerosols cool the Earth).

Traces of vanillic acid and sulfates tell us where the soot comes from. The former indicates burning coniferous trees, from summer forest fires, the latter burning fossil fuels, then mostly in the winter.

The cores, covering 1788 – 2002, showed relatively stable black carbon for 60 years (neglecting large volcanos); soot and vanillic acid concentrations were highly correlated . From 1850 – 1951, soot levels were significantly higher, particularly in winter, up to 10 times as high, and correlated not with vanillic acid, but with sulfate. After, soot values declined, though they remain higher than before 1850.

Cleaner air in North America deposited less carbon at this location, even as Asia became a more important source of soot.

The change in absorbed sunlight is of minor importance in the Arctic winter, still,

McConnell et al. estimate an average Arctic warming effect from soot of more than 1 W/m2 between 1850 and 1951, peaking in 1906 to 1910 at more than 3 W/m2–eight times the natural forcing. For comparison, the globally and annually averaged forcing from the total anthropogenic CO2 increase in the year 2006 was ~1.7 W/m2

More records need to be examined, but it does appear as if a major contributor to early 20th century warming for the Arctic has been found.

Most of you have seen this:

September Arctic sea ice is in decline, go here to see the animated version of how it changes from year to year.

The animation goes from 1979 to 2007, here are the end points of the show:

Arctic 1979 – 2007

Minimum occurred September 16, 4 days later than the usual.

One factor that contributed to this fall’s extreme decline was that the ice was entering the melt season in an already weakened state. [National Snow and Ice Data Center] Research Scientist Julienne Stroeve said, “The spring of 2007 started out with less ice than normal, as well as thinner ice. Thinner ice takes less energy to melt than thicker ice, so the stage was set for low levels of sea ice this summer.”

Another factor that conspired to accelerate the ice loss this summer was an unusual atmospheric pattern, with persistent high atmospheric pressures over the central Arctic Ocean and lower pressures over Siberia. The scientists noted that skies were fairly clear under the high-pressure cell, promoting strong melt. At the same time, the pattern of winds pumped warm air into the region. While the warm winds fostered further melt, they also helped push ice away from the Siberian shore. NSIDC Research Scientist Walt Meier said, “While the decline of the ice started out fairly slowly in spring and early summer, it accelerated rapidly in July. By mid-August, we had already shattered all previous records for ice extent.”

A couple of years ago, the worry was that by 2100, the Arctic could be ice-free in the summer. Now people are wondering about 2040 or 2030.

Stranded polar bears

Nuon is also wooing customers away from German providers by offering “nuclear-free electricity” at attractive rates-electricity that will be produced in coal-burning power plants in the future.

From Der Spiegel

Not only coal, but coal with even higher GHG emissions, imported not only from nearby Poland, but from South Africa.

How will Germany make enormous reductions in greenhouse gas emissions and switch to renewables? Currently, Germany’s per capita GHG emissions in 2000 (12.3 tonnes carbon dioxide equivalent) are 40% higher than France’s (8.8 tonnes CO2-e), largely because of the difference in electricity production.

About half (pdf) of German reductions, about 60% of CO2 reductions from energy, since 1990 came from wall-fall. This would have been a combination of changes in East Germany, and an economic recession. The rest is due to policy decisions.

So what does the German energy mix look like? Note: mineral oil is petroleum.

In spite of all we’ve heard about German renewables, twice as much energy comes from coal as nuclear, and nuclear is almost 3 times as productive as all renewables together. How does the 4.6% renewables break down in 2006?

For electricity, in TWh:
wind 26.5
hydro 21.5
photovoltaics 1
biomass and biogas 10
landfill and sewage gas 3.1

For heat, also in TWh;
biomass 76.5
solar thermal 3
geothermal 1.6

So most German renewable energy comes from biomass and biogas.

It doesn’t begin to compare to the amount of new coal Germany may build:

From cities like Stade in northern Germany to Karlsruhe in the south, power companies want to both build 30 new coal-burning power plants and modernize several older plants…

Size isn’t provided, but 30 new coal power plants, 700 MW each, 70% capacity factor, would provide 130 TWh. This differs from the assumptions in Germany keeps adding coal power, if you can guide me here, please do!

Germans are to be commended on their addition of wind, their willingness to heavily subsidize a low-GHG source of electricity. Hopefully, they will continue when they reverse their nuclear power as pretty much everyone recommends. For example;

Deutsche Bank

Germany will miss its CO2 emission targets, face rising electricity prices and become “dramatically” more reliant on Russian gas if it keeps to its policy of phasing out nuclear energy, a new study warns.

International Energy Agency

The IEA praises Germany’s commitment to sound energy policies and now urges the government to reconsider the phase-out of nuclear power and to focus on energy market reform and climate policy…

Losing the nuclear option will have significant impacts on energy security, economic efficiency and environmental sustainability. Eliminating nuclear from the supply portfolio will reduce supply diversity, increasing reliance on energy imports, particularly natural gas, which is not diversified enough. Shutting down productive assets before their useful lifetime will also impact economic efficiency, requiring additional near-term investments in new capacity that could otherwise be avoided. Finally, generation from nuclear power is free of greenhouse gas emissions. While additional renewables capacity, along with energy efficiency gains, could certainly make up some of the resulting gap, there will be greater reliance on carbon-emitting fuels. Without a doubt, a phase-out will limit Germany’s full potential to reduce its emissions. The IEA urges the government to reconsider the decision to phase out nuclear power in light of these adverse consequences.

Face of European security concerns, Vladimir Putin

Third world countries are adding coal power, the US is adding coal power, and Germany is adding coal power. Note about article: it appears that the greenhouse gas emissions cited only refer to the actual burning of coal, and do not include life cycle costs. While these vary by region, British analysis shows a low emissions of 970 g/kWh, and a high GHG cost of 1,300 g/kWh.

German coal

Germany has an installed capacity of 20.6 GW wind, with a capacity factor of about 20%. So these windmills produce as much electricity as 4.1 GW windmills running at maximum all day long.

Currently 26 coal plants are under construction or are planned in Germany. Assuming 70% capacity factor, assuming 600 MW/plant (does anyone have the German numbers?), if 26 plants are built, Germany will have added 16 GW in new coal capacity, equivalent to 11 GW running at maximum all day long.

Not a good trend, adding decades in new coal power, even if some of today’s more inefficient coal plants are closed.

From Making Sense of—and Progress in—the American Culture War of Fact

Individuals’ expectations about the policy solution to global warming strongly influences their willingness to credit information about climate change. When told the solution to global warming is increased antipollution measures, persons of individualistic and hierarchic worldviews become less willing to credit information suggesting that global warming exists, is caused by humans, and poses significant societal dangers. Persons with such outlooks are more willing to credit the same information when told the solution to global warming is increased reliance on nuclear power generation….

We … devoted considerable attention to figuring out precisely why culture exerts this effect, and whether anything might be done to counteract the resulting cultural polarization on global warming beliefs. We conducted an experiment, the results of which show that the impact of culture on the processing of factual information on climate change is highly conditional what sort of policy people anticipate will be used to address it.

In the experiment, subjects were supplied with one of two versions of a newspaper article reporting a study by a group of scientific experts. In both versions, the report was described as finding that the temperature of the earth is increasing, that humans are the source of this condition, and that this change in the earth’s climate could have disastrous environmental economic consequences. In one, however, the scientific report was described as calling for “increased antipollution regulation,” whereas in another it was described as calling for “revitalization of the nation’s nuclear power industry.”

The results of the experiment showed that subjects receiving the “nuclear power” version of the article were less culturally polarized than ones receiving the “anti-pollution” version. That is, individualists and hierarchs who received the “nuclear power” version were less inclined to dismiss the facts related by the described report—that the earth’s temperature was increasing, that humans were the cause, and that the consequences would be dire if global warming were not reversed—than were individualists and hierarchs who got the “antipollution” version, even though the factual information, and its source, were the same in both articles. Indeed, individualists and hierarchs who received the “antipollution” version of the news report were even more skeptical about these facts than were hierarchs and individualists in a control group that received no newspaper story—and thus no information relating to the scientific report that made these findings.

Translation: when it sounds to me as if others are willing to change their minds about nuclear power, then the situation must be serious. When it sounds to me as if they are using the cause d’jour for more of the same, I tend to disbelieve.

It’s long been my observation that while many accept that climate change is serious, they don’t accept that climate change is serious because little is asked of us. We aren’t asked to change our manner of living substantially, we aren’t asked to change our favorite solutions, or our favorite demons.

When Union of Concerned Scientists changes its views on nuclear power because of concerns about climate change, both environmentalists and anti-environmentalists in the US will move climate change higher up our to-do list.

figure credit

A new poll asks people from various countries:

Agree or disagree
Human activity is a significant cause of climate change.

It is necessary to take major steps soon.

Support or oppose
Wealthy countries give financial assistance and technology to less wealthy countries that agree to limit their emissions.

In the US, 71% believe human activity is a significant cause of climate change. Of the countries surveyed, only Turkey (70%), Egypt (66%), and India (47%) scored worse.

In the US, 59% support major steps very soon, tying us with Turkey. A number of countries scored worse: Kenya (53%), Nigeria and Germany (50%), Russia and Egypt (43%), South Korea (48%), and India (37%).

In the US, 70% support providing support to less wealthy countries. A plurality in three countries oppose limiting emissions at all in less wealthy countries: Egypt (53%), Nigeria (50%), and Italy (49%).

I’m not surprised by German lackadaisical attitudes toward climate change; they seem to be heavily invested in opposing nuclear power and preventing speed limits on the Autobahn. Australians’ and Americans’ new-found interest is heartening. Based on the response of the Indian public, it appears that more general education is important.

More general education would probably benefit discussion in most of the countries — in only 3 countries do 85%+ support major steps soon: Spain (91%), Italy (86%), and France (85%). No wonder so many governments are having trouble reaching agreement on solutions.

Whenever power plants are proposed, the accompanying statement generally says, “will power h houses” and “will reduce GHG emissions as much as taking c cars off the road”. Today, we’ll look at the first claim.

Most articles assume that each house uses electricity at the rate of 1 kW, that is, every 24 hours a house uses 24 kWh, every year, a house uses 8760 kWh. How accurate is this? For California, it’s a good assumption.

I’ll choose two other states to check, though, Ohio and Texas, arbitrary choices.

In Texas in 2001, the average person used 5,600 kWh in the home. In Ohio, it was 4,200 kWh. Today’s per capita use is likely at least as high.

TX: 5,600 kWh/year * 1 year/8,760 hours = 0.64 kW
OH: 4,200 kWh/year * 1 year/8,760 hours = 0.5 kW

The average American uses electricity somewhere between 0.4 kW and 0.7 kW. Look at your daily use on your bill, and divide by 24 hours to get the rate of use for your house.

The average Texas household has 2.74 people. The average Ohio household has 2.49 people.

TX: 0.64 kW/person * 2.74 people/house = 1.75 kW/house
OH: 0.50 kW/person * 2.49 people/house = 1.24 kW/house

So a power plant would need to average 1.75 GW in Texas, 1.24 GW in Ohio, to power 1 million households.

The capacity factor tells us how much electricity a power plant produces, compared to its rated capacity. A nuclear power plant, with a 90% capacity factor, produces only 90% as much electricity. The average US windmill currently produces only 27% as much, though this varies regionally and is presumably increasing. The average German windmill only produces 20% of its rated capacity.

If a power plant is built outside California, or other low-electricity states like Hawaii, don’t assume that the 1 kW/house rule holds.

Middle Atlantic Division

Want a pictoral representation of how your state compares?

Rick Diamond began this season’s Lawrence Berkeley Labs Science at the Theater series with questions about how much greenhouse gas we emit daily. The 18 pound bag of charcoal — looks like coal — poured onto the stage represents Californian emissions, about half that of the typical American, more than double typical person worldwide. About 1/3 of American emissions are buildings (half residences), 1/3 transportation, and 1/3 industry and agriculture.

So what are the largest sources of residential emissions? Put these in order:

• computers and TVs
• other appliances
• lighting
• space heating
• water heating

Then check page 7 of Diamond’s talk.

Want to know where you can reduce emissions in your house? Check out LBL’s Home Energy Saver. You’ll see how you compare to other houses in your zip code with recommendations on reducing your own energy use. An energy efficient house in Berkeley (all houses are old, so this requires retrofitting rather than new construction) can cut greenhouse gas emissions by half. You can also see typical costs of using various appliances, as well as comparing costs of the washer for cold water/cold rinse vs. hot water/warm rinse.

Nationally, to change our buildings, by category:
• low hanging fruit: $500/person
• big intervention: $3,500/person
• deep retrofit: $18,000/person
• above +3kW photovoltaics (solar panels) for everyone: $28,000/person

The house in Kabul starts out lower emitting, more modest than American houses. Interestingly, both emissions and per capita emissions were significantly higher two decades ago (see slides 29 and 30). LBL created a foam panel, foam sandwiched between cellulose cement boards.

A house in DC

The house in DC is the House of Representatives, plus other house buildings. See more on Greening the Capitol. Surprisingly, some people were still using incandescent bulbs, unusual for public and government buildings: 12,000 incandescent bulbs in desk lamps.

The Chicago Tribune has an Antarctica section. See pictures of penguins, how climate change is affecting them, and what the penguin world will look like in 2100 (very, very dark much of the year, as penguins move closer to the South Pole).

Other pictures include studying ice cores and the loss of artifacts from the Scott expedition.

Penguins and climate change

Some energy sources are built with big public attention (nuclear and solar come to mind), while others appear to be ignored. With all those coal power plants stopped in Texas and elsewhere, how many coal power plants are being built?

From Reuters, the US is building 7.6 gigawatts (GW) in coal power plants, about 7.5 of today’s nuclear power plants, about 5 of the new ones.

Location Size (MW) Completion
Arkansas 665 2010
Colorado 750 2009
Iowa 790 2007
Nebraska 660 2009
Nevada 200 2008
S. Carolina 640 (2) 2007, 2009
Texas 600, 750 2009, 2010
Wisconsin 600 (2), 500 2009, 2010, 2008
Wyoming 90 2008

Near construction are 400 MW in Arizona, 30 MW in Colorado, 1,500 MW in Illinois, 2,100 MW in Kansas, 600 MW in Ohio, 950 MW in Oklahoma, and 660 MW in W. Virginia. About 140 plants are in the permitting process.

Coal plant near Omaha

From the Washington Post

From the top of a new coal-fired power plant with its 550-foot exhaust stack poking up from the flat western Iowa landscape, MidAmerican Energy Holdings chief executive David L. Sokol peered down at a train looping around a sizable mound of coal.

At this bend in the Missouri River, with Omaha visible in the distance, the new MidAmerican plant is the leading edge of what many people are calling the “coal rush.” Due to start up this spring, it will probably be the next coal-fired generating station to come online in the United States. A dozen more are under construction, and about 40 others are likely to start up within five years — the biggest wave of coal plant construction since the 1970s.

The coal rush in America’s heartland is on a collision course with Congress. While lawmakers are drawing up ways to cap and reduce emissions of greenhouse gases, the Energy Department says as many as 150 new coal-fired plants could be built by 2030, adding volumes to the nation’s emissions of carbon dioxide, the most prevalent of half a dozen greenhouse gases scientists blame for global warming….

Sokol says that until new technologies become commercial or nuclear power becomes more accepted, coal is the way to meet that demand.

Someone sent me a recent position paper from the Union of Concerned Scientists. I ran out of energy part way through responding to their points.

Over time we accrue a lot of worries about nuclear power, I certainly did. Then we need to ask ourselves, are these concerns legitimate? How do they compare to the dangers of not using nuclear power? So it’s reasonable to have a lot of questions! I was personally surprised at what I learned when I began looking into what I “knew”.

Nuclear waste is also addressed here.

Nuclear waste is a pretty insignificant problem whether or not a permanent site has been chosen. More than any other fact about nuclear power, this stunned me when I learned it. I was quite skeptical, and spent a lot of time checking that statement. I had thought the dangers of nuclear waste were serious, but I could find no justification for that belief in scientific literature.

I went to sites like Union of Concerned Scientists, as well — what did environmentalists say? It turns out that UCS and other say “large amounts of radioactive waste”, “lasts a long time”, etc. They never told me that anyone would die from it—I filled in the “how many” blank myself. Meanwhile, tens of thousands of Americans die yearly from coal waste, including from coal power plants CA owns (21% of CA electricity), hundreds of thousands of Chinese, etc. Each year. Coal waste from CA electricity kills several hundred people each year, not counting the effects of climate change.

Coal power plants expose us to 4 times as much radioactivity as a nuclear power plant will over its complete life cycle, from mining to hundreds of thousands of years of waste decay. And if the radioactivity in nuclear waste were such a problem, why are those who are worried not launching major campaigns to get people to move from areas with very high radioactivity, such as Denver, Portland, Pennsylvania, where the increase in radioactivity over a place like SF is of much more importance than living near a radioactive waste site, much more importance? Or even more, Ramsar, Iran, where background radiation is 100 times the maximum exposure to anyone anytime from nuclear waste (about 300,000 years from now, after the waste has had time to migrate through Yucca Mountain, exposure will peak) without any apparent increase in cancer rate?

Radiation Exposure varies. The average exposure from TVs is more than the living directly outside a nuclear power plant, but both are considerably smaller than from other choices.

From the Department of Health:

The exposure of an individual to cosmic rays is greater at higher elevations than at sea level. The cosmic radiation dose increases with altitude, roughly doubling every 6,000 feet. Therefore, a resident of Florida (at sea level) on average receives about 26 mrem, one-half the dose from cosmic radiation as that received by a resident of Denver, Colorado, and about one-fifth of that by a resident of Leadville, Colorado (about two miles above sea level). A passenger in a jetliner traveling at 37,000 feet would receive about 60 times as much dose from cosmic radiation as would a person standing at sea level for the same length of time.

If you smoke one cigarette/day, add 280 mrem to your exposure (typical US exposure is 360 mrem). It seems to me that if worried about radioactivity, first address smokers and people who live in areas with high natural background radioactivity.

EPA Map of Radon Zones

Zone 1: predicted average indoor radon screening level greater than 4 pCi/L (picocuries per liter); Zone 2: predicted average indoor radon screening level between 2 and 4 pCi/L; and Zone 3: predicted average indoor radon screening level less than 2 pCi/L.

I have never seen any indication in the scientific literature that nuclear waste is a difficult technical issue, see National Research Council Disposition of High-Level Waste and Spent Nuclear Fuel: The Continuing Societal and Technical Challenges (2001). It is a social issue.

What are the Union of Concerned Scientists arguments?

UCS:

Prudence dictates that we develop as many options to reduce global warming emissions as possible, and begin by deploying those that achieve the largest reductions most quickly and with the lowest costs and risk. Nuclear power today does not meet these criteria.

Well, we can spend $3 billion in CA subsidies for solar, in addition to federal subsidies, between now and 2017, and by then we will have as much electricity from solar as from 40% of the nuclear power plant that could be built with the same money. Hopefully we’ll do BOTH. But calling solar or/and wind quick is probably overstating the case. One solar panel or windmill doesn’t take much time to build, but to construct a nuclear power plant’s worth does.

Nuclear power is not the silver bullet for “solving” the global warming problem.

True — we need every possible solution and then some.

A major expansion of nuclear power in the United States is not feasible in the near term. Even under an ambitious deployment scenario, new plants could not make a substantial contribution to reducing U.S. global warming emissions for at least two decades.

Misleading — do we want to build coal plants that will last for decades, or nuclear power plants, or natural gas? Also, we could have new nuclear power plants as early as mid-decade, possibly as much as 30 GW in plants by 2020, close to double that by 2025.

Until long-standing problems regarding the security of nuclear plants—from accidents and acts of terrorism—are fixed, the potential of nuclear power to play a significant role in addressing global warming will be held hostage to the industry’s worst performers.

I’m not sure what they are talking about, though these are frequent themes of UCS—nuclear power plants are on 90% of the time, including one month for refueling every 12 – 18 months. What are they talking about? Why are acts of terrorism at Diablo Canyon anywhere near as likely or as likely to be terrifying as at the Richmond oil refineries?

An expansion of nuclear power under effective regulations and an appropriate level of oversight should be considered as a longer-term option if other climate-neutral means for producing electricity prove inadequate.

Um, the analysis has been done — they sound a lot like the VP at my first high school: she would order books, then see if there was money left before ordering the next set of books, then see if there was money left before ordering the next set, then…. People pretty good with calculators have already done the calculations, and the other methods alone (and, I think, other methods WITH expanded use of nuclear power) come off inadequate. WITHOUT nuclear power, they are highly inadequate indeed.

Spent fuel rods can, however, be stored safely in aboveground steel cylinders (“dry casks”) for at least 50 years.

Yes.

Etc, etc, etc. Which of their points has particular resonance with you?

I don’t see UCS changing its views until its subscriber base does. They are so highly associated with their position, that not only do the people in charge have to change their views, but they risk subscription donations. The Economist suddenly changed its views on climate change by changing one of the VPs, maybe UCS and nuclear power will go through a similar transition. Scientists worked hard with UCS over a very long period to get it to be first, as interested in climate change as in nuclear power, and now, even more interested.

UCS is only a good source of information to the extent that their understanding represents that of policy experts and scientists. Statements such as “begin … deploying those that achieve the largest reductions most quickly and with the lowest costs and risk” with the idea that any of the sources they promote are lower cost than nuclear power (some efficiency solutions are, though not all, but wind, solar, etc. cost more), that the amount of net GHG reductions we could usher in over 2 decades with all non-nuclear solutions together equal what we could achieve with nuclear power alone, the let’s wait to see what works argument — to the extent that UCS is able to slow down the introduction of nuclear power, people will die. I don’t know if people will die from the lack of shifting to nuclear power in the millions or more — it depends on how much time we have to stop some of the worst excesses of climate change. Well, except that today’s US coal plants over 40 years killed more than a million people, ignoring the effects of climate change. So the direct problems of coal are also bad.

Expressing concerns about nuclear waste necessarily promotes solutions that create fossil fuel waste.

The Committee of the Environment of Berkeley Friends Meeting invites you to come to two follow up Q/A sessions to the series on climate change we had in the spring of 2007.

Child care, hospitality and snacks before the sessions will be provided. Sessions are from 1 to 3 PM, 2151 Vine St. on the corner of Walnut Street in Berkeley

Earlier presentations posted here.

September 16
The Science of Climate Change and Individual Reduction of Greenhouse Gas Emissions will focus on the science of climate change and what we can do to decrease our own greenhouse emissions. Karen will begin with a half hour presentation on climate change, followed by Q&A and discussion.

October 7
Policy and Technology Solutions to Climate Change Karen will repeat her presentation on nuclear power. Q&A on policy and technology solutions will follow. Check out the policy/technology presentation, as this will not be repeated.

This year’s series:

• Tropical Rainforest : Challenges and New Hopes
Saturday, October 20, 2007; 8:30am-4pm
Oakland Museum of California

• Global Climate Change and Its Influence on Evolution
Saturday, February 9, 2008; 8:30am-4pm
University of California Museum of Paleontology, Berkeley

Each day, you’ll hear 5 – 6 scientists talk about their own research into these subjects. This series targets teachers from elementary school to community college, but plenty of just plain people attend as well. Cost is $30 each day, or $55 for both.

The not yet completed building for California Academy of Sciences.

Lawrence Berkeley Labs presentations in the Berkeley Repertory Theater, 5:30 – 7 PM:

• Reducing Our Carbon Footprint: A Low Energy House in Berkeley, Kabul, and Washington DC. Rick Diamond September 17

• Reducing Our Carbon Footprint: Frontiers in Climate Forecasting. Bill Collins October 22

• Reducing Our Carbon Footprint: Converting Plants to Fuel. Chris Somerville November 12

Free. See you there!