05-28-2006
Let's all move to Norway. I'm half kidding; that move would be a practical impossibility for most of us. Norway, however, is making very smart economic and ecological decisions, in stark contrast to the U.S.
The Scandinavian country is saving its oil wealth (derived from the North Sea oil platforms), as the Western world and its energy supplies face an uncertain future, $250 billion at last count. These austerity measures are happening at the same time that Norway charges its citizens about $7.30 per gallon for gas, one of the highest prices in the world. This price spurs conservation and pollutant reductions, making the driving of SUVs about as ridiculous as it is in the U.S.
Norway is also carving a vault out of a mountain in order to save two million crop seeds in the event of a global environmental and food-related catastrophe. Now that is smart preparation and decision making.
My own country seems to be committing eco-cide, since it insists on becoming the greatest debtor country in history, as well as antagonizing the rest of the world with brute-force unilateral policy decisions (i.e., invading Iraq), so that none of these countries, including energy providers that we depend upon, want to work with us anymore.
For example, even friendly neighbor Canada is out cutting oil deals with China, with the result that less oil will be exported to the U.S.
05-26-2006
All the media-fed hoop-la surrounding the new global-warming documentary “An Inconvenient Truth” is a distraction from what is an intensely serious issue for mankind. This media frenzy has more to do with Hollywood and the miasma of American pop culture; with a mingling of Al Gore's image as the man who would be king. The movie's data is compelling but the science is not new (I haven't seen the film; plan to, I've heard it's great).
All the major science academies in the U.S., Europe, and Asia have concluded that manmade emissions, including of carbon dioxide and methane, have dangerously intensified the effects of global warming. The various climate-change scenarios are well understood and have been discussed for years: melting ice caps (which is already happening at a rather alarming level); regional climate instability (e.g., the American bread basket turning into a desert); killer storms, rising sea levels displacing tens of millions of people; even the shutting down of the giant oceanic conveyor belt known as the Gulf Stream.
Greg Easterbrook in the May 24, 2006 New York Times points out this fact of scientific consensus, joining numerous recent converts among former climate change skeptics.
Two new studies even conclude that previous climatological studies may have underestimated the upcoming temperature increases.
Using the historical climate record derived from atmospheric gases trapped in Antarctic ice cores, scientists have found that natural carbon sinks like oceans, trees, and soil release more carbon as the temperature rises. Therefore, the typical range of projected temperature increases during the coming decades, which is 1.5 centigrade to 4.5C (about 2.7 to 8 in Fahrenheit), could be underestimated by as much as 75 percent.
05-23-2006
Here in New England, particularly in my region of northern Massachusetts, we just had about 15+ inches of rain in a few days. The Merrimac River became something akin to the Yangtze River, a swollen torrent with dumpsters, trash cans, and overflowing sewage deposited on to the beaches and into the ocean. Newburyport seems to have fared well in the flood, mostly because of the river width at its mouth and the large unfilled estuary and wetlands area that lies at the mouth of the Merrimac. A lesson for New Orleans.
The rainfall amount broke several local records. Individual weather events cannot strictly be attributed to climate change, but the flood was certainly emblematic of the weather extremes we can expect on a more regular basis, if we let carbon dioxide levels sore unheeded into the 400-500 parts per million (ppm) zone.
Many people in their gut feel that weather conditions have gone awry, compared with the typical occasions of hard rains, winds, and blizzards of years past.
Personally, I've now experienced two 50-100 year floods in eight months. First, the village where I was staying in Switzerland was partly destroyed by a voluminous rain that only lasted about 36 hours. A pristine 400+ year old village was overwhelmed with mud, rocks, and violent water that covered fountains, cafes, Toyotas, and Mercedes. The roads were out; we could only hike away from our apartment with Swiss emergency helicopters hovering above.
That was in August 2005. Now the rather unprecedented floods in Massachusetts just months later. Hmm, coincidence? Perhaps, not.
05-11-2006
Now here's a meeting I wish I didn't miss: the May 7-9, 2006 Sustainable Energy Forum 2006: Peak Oil and the Environment in Washington, DC. The speakers included writers, scientists, academics, and others who are highly knowledgeable about these topics (such as Kenneth Deffeyes, James Hansen, and Lester Brown), including a Swedish ministry official Mona Sahlin who discussed that country's push to achieve energy independence by 2020.
Gee, my own country put a man on the moon with far less computing power than my old laptop. Don't you think we could make massive investments of our engineering expertise to initiate a similar energy policy?
The well-written magazine TomPaine.common sense covered the meeting, if you missed it like I did. I'll be there in 2007. It's incredible how many meetings are taking place worldwide right now to address peak oil and the environment. This is encouraging, despite the inevitable portion of time spent discussing how to deal with an impending oil-starved catastrophe.
Another link you might be interested in, concerning a former U.S. president: Bill Clinton's March 28, 2006 speech on these matters at the London Business School.
By the way, if you want to respond via email to any of these writings, you can use this address (I buried the link a bit on this site): author@eeviewpoint.com.
05-10-2006
I had a nice meeting on my front lawn this week with a fellow from NexGen Energy Solutions. He came over to discuss the possibilities for solar energy and wind at my house. Like most people, I'm wary of my dependence on the local power grid, which primarily burns fossil fuels to generate electricity.
Besides, I have to put my energy choices where my mouth is at eeviewpoint.com; you know, walk the walk. Dan Leary of NexGen determined that my house and/or front yard is perfectly positioned in a southerly direction to soak up the sun from a free-standing photovoltaic (PV) array. This determination is formed from an instrument that stands on a tri-pod and resembles a sextant. The trees in the wetlands that face my front yard, however, block some of the sun, which reduces the efficiency of any arrays placed there. Those trees represent the only situation where I advocate deforestation!
I'm still interested in pursuing a grid-tied, battery-backed free-standing system of about 3.5 kilowatts, maybe five kilowatts. A five-kilowatt system in Massachusetts could generate about 6000 kilowatt hours (kWhr) per year, or about 50% (more or less) of the electricity used by a moderate-sized house.
The state provides rebates to residents via its Small Renewables Initiative. This money derives in part from a tiny increment of everybody's electric bill.
However, solar installations are quite expensive, and the rebates don't cover enough of the cost to give a substantive boost to renewables here.
For example, a 2.5 kilowatt system at a residence might cost about $20,000 to buy and install; the SRI rebate would only come to around $6,800, or about 35 percent.
So not too many citizens who derive a typical income are going to cough up $13,000 for an otherwise useful and sustainable energy system. We need to create much better financial incentives to promote renewable energy. Which is better, getting energy from the sun, or squandering trillions of dollars and thousands of innocent lives in Iraq?
05-06-2006
Have you ever wondered whether any funding or rebates are available for citizens that want to install their own renewable energy systems, such as solar panels or windmills? I did. It didn't take long to come across the Massachusetts Renewable Energy Trust (RET).
This is part of the Massachusetts Technology Collaborative, which “is the state's development agency for renewable energy and the innovation economy.”
Org-speak aside, the RET provides a fair amount of funding for renewables used by businesses, towns, and cities, including a residential installation of up to 3.5 kilowatts. These systems can cost thousands of dollars. A one kilowatt system will generate about 1200 kilowatt hours (kWh) per year in Mass. A lot of fairly big suburban houses, like the one I live in (ahem...), require this much electricity in one month.
This funding is part of the RET's Small Renewables Initiative.
A contractor will visit your home to assess the technical feasibility of solar, for instance. They'll take care of the SRI application for you. I am initiating this process the week of May 7, 2006, since I would like to install up to 10 kilowatts of solar at my house. I'll describe what happens with another writing next week.
05-01-2006
Listen to how the big chiefs are responding to our energy crisis. President Bush, in a recent speech, said that he disagreed with calls to impose a windfall tax on the giant profits of the big oil companies. The profits should be reinvested, he said, in energy sources that represent an alternative to oil.
Notice that he did not say further oil exploration and production, as he certainly would have just a matter of months ago. This is another tacit admission that even the Bush administration, with its close family ties to the oil business and pro-oil biases, now understands the compelling implications for our personal lives, economy, and national security of on-going global oil depletion.
I also like the recent quote from a New York Times editorial (April 28, 2006; “Gas Pump Geopolitics”) that described what's happening as “not your parent's energy crisis.” This one's different. It's permanent, geological.
With that in mind, the New York Times recently provided an example of the direction that energy development needs to be headed. A company called PowerLight is building giant solar-array farms involving more than 50,000 photovoltaic panels in Germany and Portugal.
The 100 acres or so of panels, such as Bavaria SolarPark in Germany, can provide enough energy to light and heat about 8000 homes. This is a great idea whose time has come; it should be replicated all over the world, and as fast as possible.