Bipartisan progress in the Senate....

Today's post: Wednesday, 10-21-2009

We need an 80% reduction in fossil fuel use by 2050 to avoid the worst global warming effects. And, practically speaking, we need to also double our electricity generation and double the useful work done per unit of electricity & other energy sources as well during that same time to have a decent economy.

At some point, the oil that we’ve been using to power much of our economy will begin to run low enough that our world economy will shrink due to lack of supply or excessive costs or both.

And, once the demand for oil picks up again with the apparent economic recovery or supply begins to plateau or drop, the prices will again go back up. That will cause more hard times economically unless we have enough alternative sources of energy to turn to.

Further, it’s extremely clear that the most supported and economically beneficial solution to add energy that does not use oil nor burn fossil fuels to release more CO2 into air that already has too much is to build massive amounts of new renewable energy production, particularly those that generate electricity & to dramatically increase energy efficiency and reduce the amount of energy that is now wasted.

And, of those the more important long range solution is to build massive amounts of new renewable energy generation.

Supporting federal legislation would help. That’s why the news I got last week that begins to make that much more likely was such welcome news.:

Senators John Kerry (D-MA) and Lindsay Graham (R-SC) published a joint op-ed piece in the New York Times on Saturday (10-10), calling for bipartisan support for passing climate legislation soon.

They stressed that clean energy is an economic & national security issue, and argued that the United States could lead the world in the increasingly competitive global clean economy. See:
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/11/opinion/11kerrygraham.html?scp=1&sq=kerry%20graham&st=cse.

(From the Clean Economy Network
CEN Weekly Intelligence Update October 13, 2009.
You can sign up for this free weekly email at http://www.cleaneconomy.net .)

Here’s a key quote from their Op Ed piece.:

“Many Democrats insist on tough new standards for curtailing the carbon emissions that cause global warming. Many Republicans remain concerned about the cost to Americans relative to the environmental benefit and are adamant about breaking our addiction to foreign sources of oil.”

Their solution is to work a compromise that does its best to combine the best and most safely doable from each party’s wish list.

Their key idea is to build an energy bill to both reduce our impact on global warming AND increase our energy independence while installing safeguards to prevent near term increases in energy costs at a rate that would cause economic harm.

With only one exception, their Op Ed piece lists a good compromise and combined wish list.

A. For global warming,

1. Take practical steps to build more nuclear electric generation plants.

Such plants use no fossil fuels and release no CO2; and a massive increase in renewable energy generated electricity PLUS more nuclear generated electricity produces a much more stable and predictable energy supply than only a massive increase in renewable energy generated electricity. Paradoxically, because that makes a massive increase in renewable energy generated electricity more practical, it may well make it more doable and faster to arrive.

2. Find and insist on clean or cleaner ways to burn coal.

We already have a lot of it & burn huge amounts of it to make electricity now which releases a lot of carbon dioxide. Carbon sequestration looks more than a bit iffy to me because it’s hard to do in volume and looks iffy to do securely plus adding a massive extra cost. But turning much of the coal into natural gas which generates much of its heat by burning the hydrogen and with far less air pollution, turning some of it into gasoline as the Germans once did during World War II, and whenever any coal or natural gas is burned in plants to generate electricity, feeding all or most of the CO2 generated to algae to make biofuels allows us to use the Carbon twice and to substitute for oil supplies that would otherwise run out sooner.

3. Increase energy efficiency.

This reduces CO2 release since you can burn the same or less amount of fossil fuels and still have economic growth. It means you no longer have to keep building more coal fired plants for example.

4. Economically safe start up of cap & trade markets.

By making them gentler and slower starting at first and more safe for the economy, you make them enactable and even in their early stages they will reduce CO2. And, by enacting them, they will eventually reduce CO2 release even more over time. Further, they begin to provide extra financial incentives to increase energy efficiency and to use and install renewable energy sources.

5. The only aspect their Op Ed piece fails to address directly is a strong emphasis on legislation ensuring massive increases in renewable energy installations.

They do however suggest that ensuring that we are competitive with the best clean technology companies in the world and developing and supporting such companies here in the United States would help ensure a strong economy. And, if that set of goals is met, it will help ensure much more building of renewable energy installations.

Clearly, however it is fostered, building of renewable energy installations in large quantities will help slow global warming.

B. For breaking our addiction to foreign sources of oil and doing so in ways that avoid over-taxing or slowing our economy,

1. Take practical steps to build more nuclear electric generation plants.

Since these plants generate electricity at night when so many more people are asleep, added nuclear power is a superb way to provide electricity at a time of day when it can recharge the batteries in all electric vehicles and plug-hybrids. That has the potential of cutting our entire use of petroleum in half or more. And that in turn makes importing far less oil from outside sources much more doable.

2. Find and insist on clean or cleaner ways to burn coal.

Since two of the more doable ways, making methane gas and gasoline from coal; and making gasoline, alcohol, diesel fuel, and/or jet fuel from algae that eats the CO2 released when coal or methane made from it is burned -- both generate fuels cars and trucks can burn with no outside oil, or ANY oil at all for that matter, needed.

3. More but highly environmentally responsible offshore oil drilling.

The level of environmental safety needed &/or direct political resistance from West Coast states suggest that this is either undoable or in far smaller volume than proponents might like in those locations.

But, the prospects both politically and from the potential amount of accessible oil are vastly better for more drilling in the Gulf of Mexico. Second, if the track record of the environmental controls is good enough there & once oil prices begin again to rise world wide, drilling off our West Coast might become more likely.

Also, both off Baja California and in the Southern Gulf of Mexico, a deal with Mexico might add yet another way to add more offshore drilling.

Lastly, as oil prices begin again to rise world wide, drilling into oil deposits offshore from our West Coast may be become economically affordable by drilling into them from rigs actually located ONSHORE.

4. Increase energy efficiency.

Every time we use new more energy efficient devices in them or retrofit more energy efficient devices and systems into our vehicles and buildings we need less oil and less natural gas or oil or coal generated electricity. That enables us to use far less oil and can substantially contribute to reducing our dependence on outside sources of oil.

5. Economically safe start up of cap & trade markets.

By making them gentler and slower starting at first and more safe for the economy, you make them enactable and even in their early stages they will reduce the amount of oil we use. And, by enacting them, they will eventually reduce the amount of oil we use even more over time. In addition, they will begin to provide extra financial incentives to increase energy efficiency and to use and install renewable energy sources and that will also reduce the amount of oil we use and sharply reduce the amount of oil we need to import.

X* X* X* X* X* X* X* X* X* X* X* X* X* X* X*

By the way, it’s my opinion that the countries that supply the oil now that we will no longer need will do fine if these things come to pass.

1. The process will take many years and they will have very slow drop offs in the amount of oil they send our way at first.

2. Since the rest of the world is developing economically, they will have other customers for most of the oil we stop getting from them.

3. These countries, particularly Saudi Arabia, have as much solar thermal reserves as they do oil. As the world turns to more renewable energy and the solar thermal industry develops more cost effective technology and economies of scale, these countries will add very large revenues from that source at about the same time they get less from oil either because they have fewer buyers eventually or when they begin to run out.

Comments on the Republican Energy plan....

Today’s post: Wednesday, 6-10-2009

We need an 80% reduction in fossil fuel use by 2050 to avoid the worst global warming effects. And, practically speaking, we need to also double our electricity generation and double the useful work done per unit of electricity & other energy sources as well during that same time to have a decent economy.

In today’s online news relating to energy I found an AP story that listed some of the ideas in the new proposals for energy by Republicans that came out earlier today.

Some things in it I liked. Some things in it I felt were mixed review items but which might be used in part to gain their cooperation for a bill with more aggressive methods that would actually get passed and enacted. One thing was clearly harmful; but has a legitimate concern behind it.

1. The thing I liked most is that most of the items are proposed as solutions instead of only listing attacks on other proposals they disliked. We need solutions -- not rejections of other proposals however justified.

2. They said they liked incentives to switch to cleaner energy sources. Since adding clean sources is the most important single part of energy policy since that will enable the rest and incentives DO work, I think incentives should be
encouraged.

It will allow some businesses to make a lot of money. But that also means we will have more renewable energy faster. That’s critical. So, I agree that rewarding those who get the job done makes sense. And we absolutely should do so.

3. The Republican proposal is to build 100 new nuclear plants in the next 20 years.
This is a point on which a win-win compromise might be built.

First the good news:

More than half the population of the United States lives in the East or Eastern Midwest from Chicago and St Louis on the West to Boston to Miami in the East and it will be a decade or two before we can get power lines built to bring wind energy from the center of the country & solar from the West to those cities. It also WOULD help to provide night time energy, and energy growth for the Eastern part of the country to build more nuclear power plants. That way we need build no more coal burning plants and can use the existing ones less and/or close the most polluting ones sooner.

Nuclear power releases no CO2 whatsoever as well.

The bad news is that by adding the complete security costs to ensure these nuclear plants are extremely terrorist resistant and the costs to build them and manage their waste even half way safely, the 100 plants goal is likely not financially doable. And building the plants is simply not safe or worth doing if these safety features aren’t fully funded.

Second, in the second half of the 20 year time period, power lines connected to renewable energy generation further to the West and improved energy storage will begin to come online.

So, a good compromise might be to agree on a first step of building 25 to 40 nuclear plants in the next 10 years. Then if that goes well and the power lines and renewable energy sources fail to show up, we could add more nuclear plants in the following 10 years. But if we barely can build 20 of the planned nuclear plants safely in the first 10 years and the power lines and renewable energy sources DO come online as expected, we can stop there.

4. They are reported as proposing that a trust fund using royalties from oil and gas be used to build more renewable energy.

This also might be a win-win compromise that could work. Rather than completely reverse the tax incentives the oil and gas industries now have it might smooth the transition to leave some of them in place and then have the oil and gas industries use much of the rest to invest in building renewable energy sites. That would provide them some ownership in the new energy sources and an incentive to develop them that they do not now have.

5. They also propose that we increase drilling and production of oil and gas from offshore and “fast-track” new refinery construction.

This also might be a win-win compromise. Adding new use of oil and gas is a BAD idea for global warming. But if these new sources of oil and gas are used ONLY to replace oil and gas that we now import it would strengthen the United States economically and increase national security. We do have large and untapped resources in the Gulf of Mexico we can tap into.

And, new refineries can be built that preplan to blend biofuels &/or liquid fuels from coal with petroleum as they come online. That will both ease the transition to using mostly biofuels AND give the existing companies an incentive to gradually build that business which will help speed it up.

6. They do NOT set mandatory targets for reducing greenhouse gas emissions or for producing electricity from renewable sources.

Here they revert to saying what NOT to do. But their stated reason makes some sense. We do want to minimize the negative impact on our economy of the energy transition while we are trying to climb out of the severe recession. That part of their idea is sound.

The problem is that NOT setting such mandatory targets will mean we get less done when we cannot afford to make that choice.

The second but grave problem is we cannot make the energy transition or slow global warming enough without global action. And, if we don’t show we are serious by setting mandatory targets, we may lose enough global cooperation to be disastrous.
So, this part of their proposal is simply not acceptable as stated.

However, their concern it is designed to prevent is legitimate.

First, we must remember that if we fail to bring renewable energy online to help contain price increases, the continuing increases in the costs for fossil fuels will derail the economy anyway.

So, to the extent mandatory targets speed up the transition to renewable energy they will HELP the economy.

However, it may make good sense to make thing like cap settings and carbon taxes initially less and increases contingent on actually having the renewable energy in place to switch to.

Then we need to use things like incentives and feed-in tariff utility financing for renewable energy and a full national commitment to build more renewable energy and make our economy much more energy efficient to ensure we have the renewable energy to switch to.

THAT combination will allow us to ratchet up the caps and carbon taxes in time but will also avoid harming the economy overall because we won’t do this until we’ve made it safe for the economy to do.