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Energy and Global Warming News for May 13

Joe Romm — Thu, 14 May 2009 23:31:22 +0000

Solar Hot Water for Toronto Homeowners

Solar Thermal comes to Canada (!), and guess who’s selling them the solar panels: not us.

In an innovative joint venture, Canadian natural gas giant Enbridge Gas Distribution has teamed up with green electricity marketer Bullfrog Power and the City of Toronto to promote solar thermal systems that promise to slash residential hot water heating costs by as much as 60 percent, or about $260 per year.

Under the program, announced Tuesday, London-based EnerWorks will supply the panels, which are certified for year-round use.

Homeowners can qualify for federal and provincial rebates to offset half of the $7,000-$10,000 capital outlay. Enbridge has anted up a $400,000 grant to further reduce costs for some residents.

Moderate Rise in Utility Bills Projected in Study of Cap-and-Trade Law

A Texas study projects that the average household would pay $17 to $27 more a month by 2013 if the U.S. Congress passes carbon cap-and-trade legislation. The Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT), which operates the state’s power grid, projected that utility bills could rise by $27 if electricity use remains the same, and by as little as $17 if higher energy prices created by cap-and-trade legislation encourage consumers to use less energy.

In March, the average utility bill in Texas ranged from $110 to $160. Analysts said the ERCOT study did not consider a major long-term benefit of cap-and-trade legislation: The accelerated development of renewable energy and energy efficiency technologies brought about by rising prices for fossil fuels.

Whitehouse: Senate Is Corrupted By Carbon Pollution Cash

Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI), in a Senate hearing on the EPA budget this morning, decried the extraordinary amount of spending by corporate global warming polluters to lobby Congress. Reading from a report on new lobbying disclosures, Whitehouse noted that carbon polluters such as electric utilities and oil and gas companies have spent nearly $80 million on lobbying just in the first quarter of 2009.

Climate Pollution Cash Shaping Fate Of Waxman-Markey Clean Energy Legislation

In a moment of candor, ACES co-sponsor Rep. Ed Markey (D-MA), the chair of the subcommittee in question, explained that fellow Democrats acting as representatives for climate polluters were holding up the bill:

“If we can reach agreement with the coal sector, with the steel, with the auto sector, with the refining sector on our committee, which is very representative of the Congress as a whole, then we believe that’ll be a template for passage in the Senate, as well. Because the agreements we’ll reach will be the very same agreements that those industry leaders … will be able to represent to senators are the basis for passage of legislation that they can support.”

Members of Markey’s energy and environment subcommittee with strong ties to those sectors include Rep. Mike Doyle (D-PA: $50,942 from steel), Rep. Baron Hill (D-IN: $113,033 from auto), Rep. Jim Matheson (D-UT: $177,946 from coal), and Rep. Gene Green (D-TX: $330,613 from oil).

$3B pledge jump-starts massive offshore wind project

The world’s largest offshore wind farm, the London Array, will begin construction this summer after the British government doubled the incentives for offshore wind energy, the project’s main owner, Denmark’s DONG Energy, said today.

The 1,000-megawatt Thames Estuary behemoth had been in doubt after Royal Dutch Shell PLC pulled out of the scheme last year because of rising costs, leaving DONG with a 50 percent stake, Germany’s E.ON with 30 percent and Abu Dhabi’s renewable energy fund, Masdar, with 20 percent.

Now the three partners have pledged to invest $3 billion for the 630-megawatt first phase of the project, which will be completed in time to deliver wind energy to the London Olympics in 2012.

G.E. Announces New York Battery Factory

General Electric announced today a $100 million investment to build a new factory in upstate New York that will make batteries — a sector with huge potential, according to G.E.’s chairman and chief executive, Jeffrey Immelt.

“We think the business gets to about $500 million in annual revenue by 2015,” Mr. Immelt told Green Inc., referring to the battery business. It could become a “$1 billion business a few years after that,” he added.

The batteries to be built at the new factory are not lithium-ion, the type widely considered to be the future of hybrid and electric cars.

Instead, they are sodium-based batteries — which will help to power G.E.’s hybrid locomotives after those are commercialized in 2010. The rationale, explained Mark Little, the director of global research at G.E., is that the sodium batteries store “a heck of a lot more energy” than lithium-ion ones.

Home Energy Savings Are Made In The Shade

Trees positioned to shade the west and south sides of a house may decrease summertime electric bills by 5 percent on average, according to a recent study of California homes by researchers from the National Institute of Standards and Technology and the U.S. Department of Agriculture.

Compiled by Carlin Rosengarten

This piece originally appeared in Climate Progress.

Photo credit: Flickr/Alex Barth.

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(Posted by Joe Romm in News and Views at 3:31 PM)

Top Energy and Climate Stories for April 9

WorldChanging Team — Thu, 09 Apr 2009 22:45:47 +0000

Top Stories

E&E Daily (Subs. Req’d)
SunPower, Xcel Energy mull massive Colo. plant

Despite the recession the solar industry continues to grow. In southern Colorado, SunPower Corp. has started the ball rolling for the construction of a 17-megawatt solar PV plant, second-largest of its kind in North America:

SunPower Corp. is planning to build a 17-megawatt solar photovoltaic array in southern Colorado…. Minneapolis-based Xcel Energy Inc. would buy all of its output over 10 years….
[Colorado's] newly augmented power portfolio standard requires Xcel and other large utilities to derive 20 percent of their sales from renewable resources by 2020; 4 percent of the electricity sold must come from solar PV or concentrated solar power projects.
Xcel’s current solar portfolio consists of about 32 megawatts…. Xcel has bids out for at about 200 megawatts of concentrated solar power generation…. SunPower aims to complete construction of a 25-megawatt PV array in DeSoto County, Fla., by the end of the year.

Grid spies planted software to disrupt transmission system
(also reported by BBC: Spies ‘infiltrate US power grid’)

“Chinese and Russian cyberspies have been tampering with the U.S. electric grid and have left behind software programs capable of disrupting the entire system, according to current and former national security officials.”

In an effort to position a potentially crippling payload without the dangers of an international incident, both China and Russia have placed malicious programs in the United States electrical grid. The purposes of these programs are the disruption and collapse of the electrical grid. While the grid is currently divided and regionalized, the plans to construct a national smart grid raise questions of national security.

Legislation and Policy

E&E Daily (Subs. Req’d)
Treasury sees itself shaping emission-auction scheme

“The Treasury Department’s new energy and environment office will play a critical role in designing the auction scheme for federal greenhouse gas emission allowances in any climate regulation, according to the office’s chief.”

The Treasury Department’s announcement raises questions of agency competition for emission-auction schemes after yesterday’s declaration by Steven Chu that the DOE would play a “deep role” in crafting formulating the same emission-auction policy.

Washington Post
Science Chief Discusses Climate Strategy

“The Obama administration might agree to auction only a portion of the emissions allowances granted at first under a cap-and-trade system to limit greenhouse gas pollution, White House science adviser John P. Holdren said yesterday, a move that would please electric utilities and manufacturers but could anger environmentalists.”

New York Times
Renewables Fever Sweeps State Legislatures

“A number of states have seen a spurt of legislative activity on renewable energy — and many seem poised to take maximum advantage of the clean-energy provisions of the federal stimulus package.”

In Areas Fueled by Coal, Climate Bill Sends Chill

“From the wheat fields of the north-central region to Kansas City’s necklace of industrial parks to the brick street fronts of St. Louis, Missouri’s reliance on cheap electricity is deeply ingrained.

But few pay attention to the origin of their little-noticed savings: 21 coal-fired power plants that emit more than 75 million tons of carbon dioxide annually and generate 80 percent of Missouri’s electricity. Even residents who endorse wind and solar energy have grown accustomed to the benefits of state policies that favor coal by putting a premium on low-cost electricity. So the idea of federal climate legislation that could increase electricity bills by putting a price on emissions of heat-trapping gases like carbon dioxide is unsettling.”

At U.N. Talks on Climate, Plans by U.S. Raise Qualms

“On Wednesday, [Todd] Stern’s team offered the first broad hints of a new international climate policy for the United States, noting that more details would be submitted in a proposal to the United Nations later this month. But even in its broadest brush strokes, the American proposal differs significantly from other plans to curb carbon dioxide emissions enacted by the United Nations and the European Union.

The Obama administration’s plan would require all countries, including developing nations like China and India, to curb greenhouse gas emissions, said Jonathan Pershing, the deputy special envoy for climate change, at a news conference. The plan’s main focus is on long-range goals — as distant as 2050 — for greenhouse gas reduction.”

Shell Oil President on Cap-and-Trade

“Marvin Odum, the president of Shell Oil, appeared on [C-Span’s Washington Journal yesterday] morning, where he discussed a variety of topics — including the carbon tax vs. cap-and-trade question.”

E&E Daily (Subs. Req’d)
EPRI picked to write ’smart grid’ road map

“The nonprofit research group funded by the electric utility industry has been picked by a Commerce Department agency to write plans for standardizing components of the ‘smart grid.’”

The California based research group has received a $1.3 million contract from the Commerce Department to “identify priorities for streamlining the nation’s electric grid system.” Creating a smart grid is an essential step to lessening the United State’s dependence on foreign oil.

New York Times
Turning Up the Heat on Outdoor Heaters

Patio heaters, which critics say use unnecessary energy and emit gratuitous carbon dioxide, have become a hot issue among some European politicians and promoters of conservation. Several members of the European Parliament have called for measures that could lead to a possible ban on the devices.

Reuters
Solar-powered cooker wins $75,000 climate prize

A $6 cardboard box that uses solar power to cook food, sterilize water and could help 3 billion poor people cut greenhouse gases, has won a $75,000 prize for ideas to fight global warming.

The ‘Kyoto Box,’ named after the United Nations’ Kyoto Protocol that seeks to cut emissions of greenhouse gases, is aimed at billions of people who use firewood to cook.

Climate Change

The Economist
Sin aqua non

Local water shortages are multiplying. Australia has suffered a decade-long drought. Brazil and South Africa, which depend on hydroelectric power, have suffered repeated brownouts because there is not enough water to drive the turbines properly. So much has been pumped out of the rivers that feed the Aral Sea in Central Asia that it collapsed in the 1980s and has barely begun to recover.

Yet local shortages, caused by individual acts of mismanagement or regional problems, are one thing. A global water crisis, which impinges on supplies of food and other goods, or affects rivers and lakes everywhere, is quite another.

LA Times
What will global warming look like? Scientists point to Australia

Climate scientists say Australia — beset by prolonged drought and deadly bush fires in the south, monsoon flooding and mosquito-borne fevers in the north, widespread wildlife decline, economic collapse in agriculture and killer heat waves — epitomizes the ‘accelerated climate crisis’ that global warming models have forecast.

Science Daily
Aerosols May Drive A Significant Portion Of Arctic Warming

Though greenhouse gases are invariably at the center of discussions about global climate change, new NASA research suggests that much of the atmospheric warming observed in the Arctic since 1976 may be due to changes in tiny airborne particles called aerosols.

e360
Retreat of Andean Glaciers Foretells Global Water Woes

Bolivia accounts for a tiny fraction of global greenhouse gas emissions. But it will soon be paying a disproportionately high price for a major consequence of global warming: the rapid loss of glaciers and a subsequent decline in vital water supplies.

Complied by Carlin Rosengarten and Max Luken.

This piece originally appeared on Joe Romm's blog, Climate Progress.

Photo credit: flickr/wili hybrid, Creative Commons License.

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(Posted by WorldChanging Team in News and Views at 2:45 PM)

Brother, Can You Spare a Billion?

Ethan Zuckerman — Wed, 30 Jul 2008 18:27:07 +0000

For a little more than a year now, I’ve been carrying in my wallet a $500 Zimbabwean bearer cheque, an odd form of currency designed to expire after a few months, a recognition of the overwhelming inflation in that country. The $500 bill, worth roughly one US dollar when I bought it, was the $500,000 before Gideon Gono, the central bank governor, knocked three zeros off the bill in a campaign he called “From Zero to Hero”. That bill is now expired, but it’s a nice complement to the bill a friend just bought me from Zimbabwe - a $50,000,000,000 Agro Check. That’s fifty billion… a mere hundred thousand times the face value of my 21-month old bill. Of course, that Agro Check is now worth less than a US dollar… and it will be worth less by the time I post this note.

It’s a good conversation starter - I’ve been trying to use it for paying for drinks at bars - but it’s not very much fun if this is the bill you actually need to use to pay your debts. Doing math with sums that rapidly hit the quadrillions if you’re trying to buy something like a laptop is pretty surreal. But you’re unlikely to be able to buy that laptop with cash - there’s a restriction in the Zimbabwean banking system that prevents people from taking more than $100 billion out from a bank each day. This leads to some difficult catch-22 situations - it can cost more to go to and from the bank than you can withdraw in a single transaction. Sibangani Sibanda in the Zimbabwe Times reflects that it’s now impossible to get money in Zimbabwe without first borrowing money from friends… and that there’s less money and less friends in Zimbabwe these days.

Fortunately, Gideon Gono is here to rescue us again. Not only will the government introduce a new $100 billion bill - not enough money to buy a loaf of bread, unfortunately - but they will also lop some more zeros off the bills, possibly six zeroes. Gono is confident, saying, “This time, we will make sure that those zeros that would come knocking on the governor’s window will not return. They are going for good.”

Good luck with that, Mr. Governor. Inflation is now somewhere above 2.2 million percent, suggesting that those zeros will be back in no time. In the meantime, people are doing what they do in situations where the currency collapses - they use a hard(er) currency in response - US dollars, UK pounds and South African rand. That’s illegal, but since it’s basically impossible to use the Zim currency, it becomes pretty essential.

There’s a certain dark humor to a situation like this - at a certain point, it likely costs more to print these bills - which still feature security threads and watermarking - than they’re worth. This situation is called “negative seigniorage” in the currency world - it’s a topic of discussion in the US, where it might now make sense to eliminate both the penny and the nickel, but it likely will be a major discussion in Zimbabwe, now that the country’s currency provider is no longer willing to sell paper to the country to print more notes.

This piece originally appeared on Ethan Zuckerman's excellent personal blog My Heart's In Accra.

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(Posted by Ethan Zuckerman in News and Views at 10:27 AM)