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Tilley's Track

by Prof Allen Tilley |
Oct 7, 2009

Disclaimer: the material in this section is not necessarily the policy of the Sierra Club. The referenced materials are the responsibility of the publishers/writers and Mr. Tilley’s analysis is intended to provoke thought and action, but not necessarily endorsed or held as policy by the Sierra Club.

About Allen Tilley

October 7, 2009 - SUBJECTS:  The grid; drought; x shellfish; 1 m. slr; CO2 down 3%; CCS; JEA to juwi to First Solar; weight loss by CO2
1.  Construction of transmission lines for renewable energy involves a balance of state and federal actions.  Legal obstacles are thicker in the East, making it difficult to move before the stimulus funding authorization expires in 2011.  The Interior Department and the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission can move to build the grid if Congress does not (though there are some legal hedges to be mown).  http://www.nytimes.com/cwire/2009/10/01/01climatewire-us-prepares-more-regulatory-moves-in-case-cl-90466.html?pagewanted=all

 2.  A Columbia U study found that the recent drought patterns in the SE US are more heavily related to population increase than to global warming.    <http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/02/science/earth/02drought.html?_r=5>    This regional finding does not include the SW US, Australia, or East Africa.  G.w. deniers are publicizing the finding as if it did.  http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/africa/the-great-drought-in-east-africa-1797003.html  Climate is disrupting food and water supplies, and the suffering will probably increase in coming years.  Overpopulation plays its part.  http://www.truthout.org/100309G

 3.  Within 10 years regions of the Arctic Ocean will be so acidic they will dissolve the shells of mussels and other shellfish, with knock-on effects throughout the ecosystem.  http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/oct/04/arctic-seas-turn-to-acid

 4.  Stefan Rhamstorf, a sea level rise specialist at Germany's Potsdam Institute, estimates that we are in for a meter of sea level rise this century and another in coming years, even if we control emissions.  The estimate is lower than some other recent figures.  Thanks to Natasha Chapman for the item.  http://www.reuters.com/article/environmentNews/idUSTRE58S4L420090929

 5.  The International Energy Agency projects a 3% fall in energy-related CO2 emissions this year, courtesy of the recession.  http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601082&sid=aPktdmq4Z9pI

 6.  The 25 Sept. issue of Science featured a section on carbon capture and sequestration.  Energy Secretary Steven Chu's editorial on p. 1599 defended the $3.4 billion in stimulus money going to CCS by observing that the US, Russia, China, and India account for 2/3 of the coal reserves, and "it is highly unlikely that any of these countries will turn their back on coal any time soon."  Presumably the ability of coal interests to corrupt the political process ensures their survival for the present.

Coal use produces 18 billion tons of CO2 a year worldwide-40% of the carbon emissions.  Chu states that the cost of other pollution control measures proved lower than early estimates, and the costs of CCS, too, may turn out to be lower than we now anticipate (though I observe that the highball estimates typically come from foot-dragging industries, as is not the case this time).  Still, new (and perhaps cheaper) sequestration technologies are under consideration, the G-8 leaders have called for "at least 20 CCS projects by 2010," and the US has entered into a joint research project on CCS with China.  Chu hopes to see widespread deployment of CCS within 8-10 years.  "This is an aggressive goal, but the climate problem compels us to act with fierce urgency."

 It appears to me that Secretary Chu, who knows the cost and inefficiency of CCS better than I, and is aware that coal is being outpaced by renewable energy as a first-choice energy source, does not believe that coal interests can be politically defeated in the time available to act, at least not internationally.  If we must have coal, then we must have coal with CCS.

 7.  First Solar is providing a 20 megawatt installation in Ontario, Canada, no one's idea of a prime area for solar power.  http://www.renewableenergyworld.com/rea/news/article/2009/10/enbridge-to-acquire-20-mw-project-from-first-solar?cmpid=WNL-Wednesday-October7-2009   First Solar, which achieved grid parity with two CA installations a few weeks ago, subcontracted with juwi for the Jacksonville Electric Authority's 15 mw solar farm.  Juwi has since sold the package to the Public Service Enterprise Group of New Jersey.  JEA initially contracted with juwi for the installation.   http://finance.yahoo.com/news/PSEG-Solar-Source-and-juwi-prnews-3786824416.html?x=0&.v=1

 8.  55 million years ago in the PETM, a period similar in climate to the one we are triggering, soil-dwelling creatures (as well as many other life forms) decreased in body size by about half.  http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/10/091006155913.htm

October 1, 2009 - SUBJECTS: Kerry-Boxer; EPA acts on CO2; Duke & FPL choose electric; 9 thresholds; modelling disaster; Cassandras of Climate

1.   The Senate is now considering a comprehensive energy bill, the Kerry-Boxer bill or the Clean Energy Jobs and American Power Act.  It is a companion to the Waxman-Markey American Clean Energy and Security Act passed by the House, and if adopted by the Senate would be harmonized with that bill and sent to the President.  The Senate bill is expected out of committee by the end of October.  Majority Leader Reid, when asked if he thought the bill would be passed this year, responded "Yup."  Kerry-Boxer ups the greenhouse gas emissions cuts by 2020 to 20% from 17% in the House bill, on a 2005 base, and is said by its sponsors not to add to the deficit.  In fact, it was projected by a UC-Berkeley study to  increase the gnp slightly, and to create many more jobs than it costs.  It will go through a great deal of modification before it comes to a vote.  http://www.ens-newswire.com/ens/sep2009/2009-09-30-02.asp  While the targets in either bill are inadequate to avoid serious climate dangers, the bills would create the modes by which adequate measures might be enacted, and provide a starting point for US engagement in international actions.  Britain's Tyndall Center has calculated that avoiding more than 2° of warming would take a "planned recession" to achieve a 70% emissions reduction by 2020; more severe measures than contained in either bill probably lie ahead, but they provide a starting place which we now lack.  http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/earthnews/6248257/Planned-recession-could-avoid-catastrophic-climate-change.html

 2.  The EPA announced a program to curtail 70% of US greenhouse gas emissions by regulating sources producing more than 25,000 tons of CO2 a year.  The program covers CO2 and 5 additional greenhouse gasses.  (The Kerry-Boxer bill does not preclude the EPA from regulating coal, as does Waxman-Markey.)  The proposal is several months from enactment and will surely be litigated.  http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/01/science/earth/01epa.html?_r=5&partner=rss&emc=rss

With the EPA plan and the Kerry-Boxer bill, the US has moved much closer to serious action to mitigate global warming.

 3.  Duke Energy and Florida Power & Light announced that they are committing to corporate fleets of plug-in hybrid and electric vehicles.  http://www.nytimes.com/gwire/2009/09/24/24greenwire-utilities-make-big-bets-on-electric-vehicles-52566.html   Two of the largest utilities in the country are taking climate change seriously; so is our government.  The two following items say why it is so important that we complete the actions which we have begun. 

 4.  A study in Nature identifies nine thresholds beyond which the earth may not be pushed without disastrous consequences:  those involved with climate change, ocean acidity, the ozone layer, freshwater use, the movement of nitrogen and phosphorus, the amount of land used for crops, aerosols, biodiversity, and chemical pollution.  Civilization has developed under benign conditions of all nine areas.  To continue, we must understand our location with regard to danger points on all nine.  One of the authors observes that now it is as if we were driving on a mesa in the dark without a map.  The authors, a group of 29 ecologists, attempt to identify the danger points of seven of the areas.  We have probably passed those points in three: climate change, nitrogen/phosphorous, and diversity.  http://e360.yale.edu/content/feature.msp?id=2192    While you are entertaining the idea of thresholds crossed and imminent, you might as well go ahead and read the linked article on what a post-human earth might be like.  ("It's a rats, weeds, and cockroaches kind of world.")  http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg20427281.300-posthuman-earth-how-the-planet-will-recover-from-us.html?DCMP=OTC-rss&nsref=climate-change

 5.  A study by the UK Met Office ran 17 different climate models including the positive feedbacks (often ignored) and concluded that unless emissions are curbed we may expect 4° (C) of warming by midcentury.  That would mean 16° in the Arctic, less elsewhere.  http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn17864-no-rainforest-no-monsoon-get-ready-for-a-warmer-world.html?DCMP=OTC-rss&nsref=climate-change

I hope you will now return to item 1 with a renewed determination to see us do what has to be done. 

 6.  Paul Krugman in his NY Times column "Cassandras of Climate" reflects on the darkening climate forecasts and the new urgency of action.  (Please forgive him for substituting CO2 for methane in his comment on permafrost.  He's still got the picture.)  "So the time for action is now.  O.K., strictly speaking it's long past.  But better late than never."    http://www.nytimes.com/2009/09/28/opinion/28krugman.html?_r=5&partner=rss&emc=rss

September 12, 2009 -SUBJECTS: 10:10; Arctic & 10:10; African floods; collapsing Arctic ecosystems; 2 gigs in China; Obama turns to g.w.; coal permits held

1.  The people who made The Age of Stupid have organized a movement called 10:10 to cut greenhouse gas emissions in the UK 10% by the end of 2010.  The Prime Minister just signed on.  http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5h8Q8voX7FfHCjQSBSq--rfhRmfYw

2.  A study of Arctic warming in Science confirms that human emissions have overwhelmed a natural cooling period; it also confirms a major climate model.  The piece by George Monbiot at the end of this Truthout link is also worth reading.  It describes the inadequacy of current mitigation proposals, and endorses the 10:10 pledge.  http://www.truthout.org/090609G

3.  Over 430,000 people in 6 West African countries have lost their homes to flooding linked to global warming.  70 have died.  Thanks to Henry Thomas for the subject.  http://en.afrik.com/article16141.html

4.  North Atlantic plankton species are moving north in search of cooler water and the cod, which depend on the plankton, are unable to follow them.  The knock-on effects of the loss of the cod, a top predator, cascade through the entire ecosystem.  Fishing restrictions will not be able to preserve the cod as a commercial catch. http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/environment/article6827389.ece   Walrus are congregating on Alaska shores as the sea ice on which they normally rest disappears.  They are under consideration for status as an endangered species.  http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090910/ap_on_re_us/us_sea_ice_walrus  Caribou and other species are also suffering.  A major aspect of the problem is the rapid pace of change in the Arctic.  http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=warm-future-climate-now-in-arctic

5.   First Solar has signed a deal for a 2 gigawatt photovoltaic installation in Mongolia.  They are now the world's largest solar company.   http://www.nytimes.com/2009/09/09/business/energy-environment/09solar.html?_r=5    You may remember that First Solar achieved grid parity a couple of weeks ago with a California project producing power at an unsubsidized $.075/kilowatt hour.  They are ahead of the industry in that, but Nanosolar hopes that general grid parity is only a few years away.  They are building a thin film plant in Germany which can produce a panel every ten seconds.  Their new printing press can produce a gigawatt of solar cells a year.  http://www.businessgreen.com/business-green/news/2249191/nanosolar-unwraps-berlin

6.  On September 22 President Obama will address the UN General Assembly to open a climate summit.    http://theenergycollective.com/TheEnergyCollective/47713   The President is also expected to announce a joint climate agreement with China during his visit there in November.  http://www.nytimes.com/reuters/2009/09/04/us/politics/politics-us-china-climate-us.html  We are approaching a national focus on climate change mitigation.

7.  The EPA is holding 79 requests by the coal industry for mountaintop removal to consider their impact on water quality.  (Loud cheers.)  http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601103&sid=aQNSu8BmNXdY

September 5, 2009 - SUBJECTS: Forecasting climate; smart grids; ad for Plot; space solar; dying aspens; China-US accord?; Ontario vs. coal; beyond CO2

1.  NASA is mounting CLARREO, a $600-800 million satellite-based program to monitor climate change.  Thanks to Cherrill Heaton for the news.  http://www.dailypress.com/news/dp-local_nasa-clarreo_0902sep02,0,560054.story   Climate forecasting will be coordinated world-wide beginning in 2011.  http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090904/ap_on_re_eu/un_un_climate_conference   A leading German climate modeler reported to the UN World Climate Conference that cyclical changes in ocean circulation could lead to a temporary global cooling in the next 10-20 years.  If true, it would complicate the challenge of educating the public to an effective climate program.  In any case, it illustrates the need for accurate climate forecasts.  http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn17742-worlds-climate-could-cool-first-warm-later.html?DCMP=OTC-rss&nsref=climate-change

2.  If you have been as confused as I about the usage of "smart grid," this column will provide company and consolation.  We probably need separate terms for consumer energy usage feedback systems on the one hand and large-scale power management systems on the other, and should just go ahead and refer to any advanced, computerized energy supply system as a smart grid.  Once a term has broadened it is hard to squeeze it back into a narrower meaning.  http://www.renewableenergyworld.com/rea/blog/post/2009/08/what-the-heck-is-smartgrid-anyway?cmpid=WNL-Friday-September4-2009

3.  Ad, off-topic: I've published An Introduction to Plot in the Modes of Experience.  The theory has finally become clear to me in something like complete form, and I hope to have made the book easy to read.  The two-fold Table of Contents, viewable at Amazon, serves as an outline and index of the book.  $14.99 at Amazon.com.  http://www.amazon.com/Introduction-Plot-Modes-Experience/dp/143923504X/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1252076240&sr=8-1

4.  Space-based solar power is getting attention recently.  As Joe Romm warns, it is pricey and need a life-cycle analysis for carbon (including the process by which the hydrogen rocket fuel is produced).  http://e360.yale.edu/content/feature.msp?id=2184 <http://e360.yale.edu/content/feature.msp?id=2184>   Japan is developing a 1 gigawatt orbital system.  http://www.businessgreen.com/business-green/news/2248739/japan-planning-space-solar

5.  Aspens are dying off in the Rocky Mountain states.  Global warming-related drought and warm winters are being blamed. http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20090904/us_nm/us_usa_forests_aspen

6.  President Obama's visit to China in November could see a joint agreement on climate.  The two countries account for 30% of the world's carbon emissions.  Japan is concerned that China might use the accord as an alternative to mandatory emissions caps in a post-Kyoto UN agreement.  http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/china/2009-09/05/content_8658415.htm

7.  Ontario plans to close two coal power plants in 2010, cutting its coal use by 40%.  It plans to eliminate the filthy stuff entirely by 2014.  http://www.thestar.com/news/ontario/article/690868

8.  The UN Environment Program urges that we attack the range of greenhouse gasses along with carbon dioxide.  A wider assault would have side benefits for health and agriculture.  http://www.reuters.com/article/environmentNews/idUSL449824520090904?feedType=RSS&feedName=environmentNews

September 2, 2009 - SUBJECTS: RPS issues; sack activism?; transp. news; Aquabank; smackdown video; India's solar plans; EPA set to declare

1.  As California prepares to meet a goal of 33% renewable energy by 2020, it is wrestling with issues which will emerge in other states.  How much of the power must be produced within state boundaries?  Job growth in the state will depend on the answer.  How far should industrial rates be allowed to rise?  How will they go about fast-tracking construction permitting and transmission lines?  http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-powerfight29-2009aug29,0,969296.story

2.  Adam Sacks argues in Grist that we must now prepare, and prepare others, to live with the consequences of climate change.  I was steered to this column by the UF BEST list.  http://www.grist.org/article/2009-08-23-the-fallacy-of-climate-activism    If you read the column:  I don't understand why we should not do everything we can to control greenhouse gas emissions, or why we would not want to develop whatever technology might help us heal the world and to live in it.  We need to redefine corporations so that they serve the general good.  But I agree that we need to begin talking about how to live in the world we are constructing.  Sustainability is always local to an environment.  Ours is on the move, and we need to catch up. 

3.  A Transportation Research Board study finds that compact community development could save 1-11% of greenhouse gas transportation emissions by 2050.  (Findings, page 116.)  Other savings and efficiencies could arise from building practices and land use.    http://www.trb.org/Main/Public/Blurbs/Driving_and_the_Built_Environment_The_Effects_of_C_162093.aspx?utm_medium=etmail&utm_source=Transportation%20Research%20Board&utm_campaign=TRB+E-Newsletter+-+09-01-2009&utm_content=Customer&utm_term   
The League of American Bicyclists has quantified the benefits, especially the financial benefits, of bicycling.  http://www.trb.org/Main/Public/Blurbs/The_Economic_Benefits_of_Bicycle_Infrastructure_In_162207.aspx?utm_medium=etmail&utm_source=Transportation%20Research%20Board&utm_campaign=TRB+E-Newsletter+-+09-01-2009&utm_content=Customer&utm_term

4.  If solar and wind power are to provide reliable electricity they require some form of energy storage.  Compressed air, batteries, hydrogen generation, and (for solar) heat storage are among the possibilities.  So is kinetic power.  Water can be pumped with surplus power to create a water head, and used to drive a turbine to patch periods of lower power production.  But not every place has a suitable elevated water reservoir.  Riverbank Power Corporation of Canada has developed Aquabank for such places.  Shafts sunk under watercourses from rivers or other water sources contain 250 megawatt turbines to produce power as needed to supplement a renewable power source.  When power is in surplus it is used to pump the water back up to its source.  Two projects are underway in Maine and New Jersey and 15 more are planned.  I found this on Joe Romm's blog, which excerpted the August 29 story under this link's "news" tab.  http://www.riverbankpower.com/page.asp?id=6

5.  Take a look at "Solar Panel Smackdown" on Grist for the shortest and funniest political ad around.  http://www.grist.org/

6.  India has plans to generate 100 gigawatts by 2020, and more after that, through a desert solar installation but will need support from developed countries.  http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/8232958.stm

7.  The EPA is set to declare CO2 a dangerous pollutant, a move which would require it to regulate emission under the Clean Air Act (no matter what the legislature does).  http://www.truthout.org/090109W 

August 31, 2009 - SUBJECTS: No trial scheduled; biomass in FL; Stirlings sprout; Age of Stupid; costly adaptation; interactive map; N20 vs. ozone

1.  The US Chamber of Commerce wants the EPA to stage a trial of climate science.  The EPA declines.  The strategy is to convince the public that climate science is controversial, in dispute.  http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-climate-trial25-2009aug25,0,901567.story

2.  ADAGE is building the first of a series of 50 megawatt biomass power plants 80 miles west of Jacksonville.  http://www.adagebiopower.com/news/news_first_facility.php  Gainesville has contracted for a 100 megawatt biomass generator.  http://www.gru.com/AboutGRU/NewsReleases/Archives/Articles/news-2009-05-07.jsp    Biomass Gas and Electric is building a 43 megawatt plant in Port St. Joe. http://www.biggreenenergy.com/Default.aspx?tabid=4314    All plants will burn wood waste.

3.  The 1.5 megawatt Maricopa Solar project in Arizona is the first industrial application of Stirling Energy System's concentrating solar generators.  Tessara Solar expects to have 1000 megawatts of Stirling's low water use systems installed in Arizona, California and Texas by the end of 2012 and has another 2000 megawatts in development.  (Video.)  http://www.renewableenergyworld.com/rea/news/article/2009/08/video-srp-tessera-to-build-1-5-mw-stirling-energy-plant-in-arizona?cmpid=WNL-Wednesday-August26-2009

4.  The Age of Stupid will premiere in a live broadcast Sept. 21.  Regency and Tinseltown will carry the feed.  "Launching the UN's Environment week, The Age of Stupid's September 21st Global Premiere will be an epic live event from a celebrity-packed solar cinema in New York City and will beam out through satellite links to 700+ cinemas in 55+ countries. . ..  Oscar-nominated Pete Postlethwaite (In The Name of the Father, Brassed Off) stars as a man living alone in the devastated world of 2055, looking back at "archive" footage from 2007 and asking: why didn't we stop climate change when we had the chance?"  Thanks to Lad Hawkins and Jim Crooks for passing on the info from Leslie Kirkwood.  The film is said to have moved its first audiences to tears.

5.  A new report finds that the costs of adaptation to climate change through 2030 will be many times greater than the UN has estimated.  http://www.nature.com/news/2009/090827/full/news.2009.871.html

6.  The Nature Conservancy has developed a (somewhat clumsy) interactive online estimator of regional temperatures and precipitation in 2100.  http://www.climatewizard.org/ 

7.  A NOAA study indicates that nitrous oxide has become the most significant threat to the ozone layer. http://www.reuters.com/article/environmentNews/idUSTRE57Q4V720090827?feedType=RSS&feedName=environmentNews

August 21, 2009 - SUBJECTS: China focusses; UN warning; weak wheat; Norwegian methane; debate; grid parity for film; Platinum development

1.  A report by some of China's leading climate scientists and policy experts opens the door for firm emissions targets, speaks approvingly of a carbon tax, and names 2030 as the year when the country's emissions could peak.   http://en.ce.cn/National/Politics/200908/18/t20090818_19805900.shtml    Reuters appends a handy emissions chart to the story.  http://www.reuters.com/article/GCA-GreenBusiness/idUSTRE57G34W20090817

2.  UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon said that a failure to reach an effective climate agreement in the Copenhagen talks will lead to incalculable human suffering.  He chose Incheon, Korea, for the talk.  The UN turned the tide of the Korean War there with a landing in 1950, as he hopes the UN will turn the tide on climate change this fall.  http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20090817/sc_afp/unskoreabanclimatewarming

3.  Wheat grown under CO2 concentrations expected by mid-century has significantly less protein and iron, and more lead, than currently.  Grains are smaller.  On the other hand, cadmium decreased.  http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn17617-wheat-gets-worse-as-co2-rises.html

4.  Over 250 plumes of methane have been observed off the coast of Norway.  The volume suggests that around 20 megatons of methane are being released annually from the region.  The gas could come from deep within the earth or from destabilized methane hydrates (clathrates) on the ocean floor.  Clathrates around the rim of the Arctic Ocean hold billions of tons of methane and are generally stable up to 18° C.  Melting of the clathrates can lead to one of the nightmare tipping points of global warming-enough methane could be released to spur runaway warming over which we would have lost control.  http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn17625-as-arctic-ocean-warms-megatonnes-of-methane-bubble-up.html?DCMP=OTC-rss&nsref=climate-change   Methane release from the region is significant at around 6% of the world total, but if it is from clathrates it is occasioned by an anomalously warm current.  I take the release to be a reminder of what is ahead if we do not act. The chances of passing an oceanic clathrate tipping point this century are rated low by people I have read.  On a clathrate destabilization 635 million years ago:  http://www.nsf.gov/news/news_summ.jsp?cntn_id=111554  Four years ago RealClimate ran a primer on clathrates.   http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2005/12/methane-hydrates-and-global-warming/  The best way to lose sleep over methane is to contemplate melting permafrost.  http://climateprogress.org/2008/05/23/tundra-part-2-the-point-of-no-return/

5.  Paul Kingsnorth argues that the long descent of industrial civilization is not worth mourning, and George Monbiot responds that the suffering along the descent is so great that we must do what we can to reverse it.  http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/cif-green/2009/aug/17/environment-climate-change

6.  First Solar has reached grid parity with a 12.6 megawatt California installation.  Power from the unit costs 7.5 cents/kilowatt hour (unsubsidized); power from fossil fuels in the area costs 9 cents/kwh.  First Solar employs thin film pv panels.  http://earth2tech.com/2008/12/21/report-first-solar-reaches-grid-parity/     First Solar has contracted with Southern California Edison for two plants totaling 550 megawatt capacity.  They are now building for $1/watt and are shooting for $.65-70 in coming years.  Thanks to the UF BEST list for the good news.  http://earth2tech.com/2009/08/18/first-solar-scores-yet-another-cali-utility-deal-550-mw-for-sce/

7.  A 1.3 million square foot mixed-use sustainable community near Victoria, Canada, has earned LEED Platinum status for its residential  phase.  The entire project is only 35% complete but has sold or leased 95% of its residential units.  http://www.renewableenergyworld.com/rea/news/article/2009/08/dockside-green-setting-a-new-standard-for-green-building?cmpid=WNL-Friday-August21-2009

August 17, 2009 - SUBJECTS: Installer school; Holdren interview; Pine Island melts; better batteries; API astroturf; CAP energy retrofit program

1.  Solar America Cities is a Department of Energy program to train solar installation trainers.  The link is to a 2 minute video on the program.  http://www.renewableenergyworld.com/rea/video/inside-the-solar-america-cities-train-the-trainer-program?cmpid=WNL-Friday-August14-2009

2.  Elizabeth Kolbert interviewed administration science advisor John Holdren for e360.  He reports on his trip to China, his hopes for climate legislation, and his thoughts on mitigation and adaptation.  http://www.e360.yale.edu/content/feature.msp?id=2179

3.   Pine Island Glacier in Antarctica is melting four times as fast as it was 10 years ago, and has dropped as much as 90 meters since 1994.  Ice sheets at both poles are destabilizing at unexpected rates.  "It's like removing a cork from a bottle."  http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/8200680.stm

4.  New carbon nanowire electrodes can take six times the charge of current ion battery electrodes, and are easier to make.  Among other benefits, the new batteries will greatly increase the range of electric autos.  From the UF BEST list.  http://www.technologyreview.com/energy/23240/   (This is the second battery breakthrough recently.  From the listing of May 22:  http://www.epsrc.ac.uk/PressReleases/oxlithbattery.htm )

5.  The American Petroleum Institute is staging 20 anti-energy legislation rallies in as many states this month to provide soft Democratic senatorial votes in the target states with the impression of citizen resistance.  A public relations campaign will reinforce the rallies.  Shell is declining to participate. http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2009/aug/14/us-lobbying 

6.  Buildings account for 40% of US greenhouse gas emissions.  Retrofitting them for energy efficiency can cut their emissions by 20-40% with readily available methods and technology-and the program will pay for itself from the energy it saves, creating jobs along the way.    The article (and the linked 56 page report from the Center for American Progress) details "Rebuilding America," a $500 billion program to retrofit 40% of existing buildings by 2020.  http://climateprogress.org/2009/08/15/rebuilding-america-a-policy-framework-for-investment-in-energy-efficiency-retrofits/

August 13, 2009 - SUBJECTS: G.w. & security; eSolar tower; Sacramento FIT; UN says g.w. tops; Atlantic storms; protests; RealClimate

1.  "The sense that climate change poses security and geopolitical challenges is central to the thinking of the state department and the climate office," said Todd Stern's top climate negotiator.  Security considerations will be prominent in the deliberations of the Senate when they take up energy legislation.  The Department of Defense will now include climate change in their planning.  General Anthony Zinni, former Head of the Central Command:   "We will pay for this one way or another.  We will pay to reduce greenhouse gas emissions today, and we'll have to take an economic hit of some kind.  Or we will pay the price later in military terms.  And that will involve human lives."  Jim Crooks referred me to the story.    http://www.nytimes.com/2009/08/09/science/earth/09climate.html?partner=rss&emc=rss

2.  eSolar has activated a 5 megawatt solar tower, the first in the US.  The company has plans for three further US installations delivering up to 465 megawatts.  http://www.businessgreen.com/business-green/news/2247544/esolar-flicks-switch-first

3.  Sacramento, CA, has introduced a feed-in tariff program which is not doing as well as it might.  Some believe the underperformance is due to inadequate (and overly complex) tariff rates.  http://www.renewableenergyworld.com/rea/news/article/2009/08/smud-announces-feed-in-tariffs-but-can-program-deliver-as-promised?cmpid=WNL-Wednesday-August12-2009

4.  U. N. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon called climate change the greatest challenge facing the world.  That will be no news to most on this list, but I was glad to hear him pronounce it so.  http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5iD-Q9xM8KDYJ5QsdbxchAkGCMtgQD99VTG300

5.  A NOAA study finds that the recent increase in Atlantic storms may be due to more sensitive detection; another study published in Nature, that the US Atlantic coast experienced about as many storms a thousand years ago as today.  http://www.nytimes.com/2009/08/13/science/earth/13atlantic.html?_r=1&emc=tnt&tntemail0=y

6.  Increasing numbers of acts of civil disobedience are beginning to overwhelm the ability of media to report them (that is, the abilities of those outlets which try to report them).  The article tends to overstate the impact of civil disobedience-the over 100 coal plant plans scuttled in the last couple of years were victims of litigation by the Sierra Club, the Natural Resources Defense Council, and other groups much more than of the civilly disobedient.  Clearly, though, the acts of disobedience are having a political influence.  Activity is increasing as the Copenhagen talks approach. http://www.truthout.org/081209T

7.  If you haven't checked RealClimate recently, now is a good time.  The site sports recent good articles on carbon sensitivity and the PETM, on Lomborg's backing for geoengineering, and on the failure of models to predict the high melting rate of Arctic sea ice.   http://www.realclimate.org/

August 5, 2009   SUBJECTS: China closes coal; efficiency saves; NCS; warnings; need for same; adaptations; EIA RES costs; CA adaptation plan

1.  China is closing 7,467 small coal plants, meeting their target 18 months ahead of schedule thanks to the recession.  http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090730/ap_on_re_as/as_china_environment

2.  A conservative estimate of the impact of a more vigorous energy conservation program than has yet been funded concludes that we could cut 23% of emissions by 2020, saving $1.2 trillion in energy bills.  The annual cost would be about $52 billion (and the annual benefits, $130 billion).  Thanks to Tom Larson for the item and for his reading notes, which I have used here.  http://www.nytimes.com/2009/07/30/business/energy-environment/30energy.html <http://www.nytimes.com/2009/07/30/business/energy-environment/30energy.html>   The report itself:  http://www.mckinsey.com/clientservice/electricpowernaturalgas/downloads/US_energy_efficiency_full_report.pdf

3.  Obama administration officials John Holdren (Science Advisor) and Gary Locke (Secretary of Commerce) have testified that we must prepare to adapt to the effects of global warming even if we mount an effective mitigation program.  We urgently need a new National Climate Service to provide detailed regional projections (much like England's Hadley Centre).  http://www.straitstimes.com/Breaking%2BNews/Tech%2Band%2BScience/Story/STIStory_410533.html    The story is based on testimony to the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation July 30.  http://commerce.senate.gov/public/index.cfm?FuseAction=PressReleases.Detail&PressRelease_id=e026c10d-7ca8-4fec-85ad-bb7bc38d70f5&Month=7&Year=2009  The National Climate Service would be implemented by H.R. 2407, which passed committee on June 3.  http://www.govtrack.us/congress/bill.xpd?bill=h111-2407

4.  Here's a general presentation on global climate disruption John Holdren gave about a month ago.  The three parts of the video add up to just over 20 minutes.  http://www.oneclimate.net/2009/07/14/john-holdren-on-climate-change/ <http://www.oneclimate.net/2009/07/14/john-holdren-on-climate-change/>   15 of Australia's top climate scientists drafted this snapshot of the climate situation.  http://www.smh.com.au/opinion/climate-change-poised-to-feed-on-itself-20090731-e4gi.html?page=-1

5.  A survey of 19 countries finds that most people want strong action on climate change and feel that their government is not giving it a sufficiently high priority.  Concern was lowest in China, Russia, and the US; Brazilians showed the highest concern.  http://www.ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=47887 <http://www.ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=47887>   Perhaps concern in the US would be higher if I did not have to go to a German news agency story published in Singapore for item 3, and if the news in item 4 were more widely available.  This Newsweek story on how the situation has become worse than we thought should help the cause.  http://www.newsweek.com/id/208164

6.  Mustard plants are blooming earlier and Scottish wild sheep are getting smaller in examples of responses to climate change.  Evolutionary pressures are already producing adaptations.  http://e360.yale.edu/content/feature.msp?id=2178

7.  The Energy Information Agency has released a study of the cost of the renewable electricity standard set in the Waxman-Markey bill which passed the House.  From the Executive Summary:  "Given the amount of eligible renewable generation projected in the reference case, the RES is not expected to affect national average electricity prices until after 2020.  As the required RES share increases to its maximum value in 2025, the value of RES credits increases, and impacts on national average electricity prices become evident.  The peak effect on national average electricity prices, 2.7 percent in the RESFEC case and 2.9 percent in the RESNEC case, occurs as the required renewable share ramps up more rapidly than the demand for electricity is growing.  In the later years of the projections, the impact on national average electricity prices is smaller, as the impact of the RES requirement on the cost of coal and natural gas, fuels whose use is reduced by added renewables, is increasingly reflected in electricity prices.  By 2030, electricity prices are projected to be little changed from the reference case in both RES cases, with 2030 prices less than 1 percent higher than in the reference case. "      http://www.eia.doe.gov/oiaf/servicerpt/acesa/index.html    The Department of Energy is offering up to $30 billion in loan guarantees for renewable energy projects.  http://www.energy.gov/news2009/7722.htm    In the first third of 2009 renewables accounted for 11.1% of US energy generation, surpassing nuclear.  http://www.renewableenergyworld.com/rea/news/article/2009/07/sun-day-analysis-renewables-account-for-11-of-us-energy-production?cmpid=WNL-Wednesday-August5-2009 

8.  California has released a draft of a climate adaptation strategy.  Measures on pages 9 and 10 of this summary include lowering per capita water consumption 20% by 2020, restricting development in at-risk areas, and incorporating up-to-date climate information in planning efforts.  http://www.energy.ca.gov/2009publications/CNRA-1000-2009-027/CNRA-1000-2009-027-D-ES.PDF

July 30, 2009 - Subjects: Grid flywheels; algaic Exxon; China's solar subsidy; cloud feedback; The Hub; Kennedy on coal

1.  Beacon Power of Massachusetts is adding 5 megawatts of flywheel  energy by year's end to the New England grid to provide power storage and frequency regulation.  The company has secured a government loan for a 20 megawatt plant.  http://www.renewableenergyworld.com/rea/news/article/2009/07/beacon-power-connects-1-mw-flywhell-system-to-new-england-grid?cmpid=WNL-Tuesday-July21-2009

2.  ExxonMobil is putting $600 million into producing algaic ethanol.  http://www.renewableenergyworld.com/rea/news/article/2009/07/exxonmobil-to-launch-biofuels-program?cmpid=WNL-Tuesday-July21-2009

3.  China has offered a 50% subsidy for solar projects over 300 kilowatts.  http://www.reuters.com/article/marketsNews/idUSPEK12570920090721?sp=true

4.  In the July 24 issue of Science, a study of the role played by clouds in global warming suggests that clouds increase warming through a positive feedback.  As oceans warm and atmospheric pressure falls, clouds thin and let in more heat.  When the ocean cools and pressure rises, the process reverses.  Changes in cloud cover, then, may play a positive feedback role and should be included as a source of warming in climate models if the effect is verified.  The study is based on data from ocean sectors.  

5.  Joe Romm and the Center for American Progress have put together The Hub, a gathering of info and arguments on the energy transition.  http://climateprogress.org/2009/07/25/the-hub-resources-for-a-clean-energy-economy/

6.  Robert Kennedy says that we could greatly improve our emissions by dropping regulations which require coal to be the fuel of first resort and by retrofitting older coal plants as natural gas hybrids.  In the short term, natural gas can replace coal while we build the renewable plants to take over the load.  Solar plant construction costs are now comparable to those for coal.  An admirable article for its substance and force.  http://www.huffingtonpost.com/robert-f-kennedy-jr/king-coal_b_245117.html 

July 19, 2009 - Subjects: Assessing ACESA; energy in the Senate;  Chinese competition; temp forests champs; 1st solar hybrid ship

1.  Jim Hansen believes strongly that the Waxman-Markey bill is inadequate to the task at hand.  His arguments are worth the read.  His references to agricultural and forestry practices which will reduce atmospheric carbon are to agrichar and reforestation.   http://www.huffingtonpost.com/dr-james-hansen/g-8-failure-reflects-us-f_b_228597.html   Joe Romm has attacked his arguments with (essentially) the response that the EPA has not yet regulated carbon and is unlikely to, that the targets are likely to be increased but must start somewhere, and that the offset mechanism is sufficiently guarded.  Al Gore's argument is that beyond Waxman-Markey there is no plan B.  http://www.huffingtonpost.com/joseph-romm/nasas-james-hansen-mostly_b_229459.html     My judgment is that ACESA effectively ends traditional coal plants and provides a workable frame for energy transition.  But Jim Hansen deserves the last word, "Strategies to Address Global Warming & Is Sundance Kid a Criminal?"  He explains the situation, offers a  solution, and says why he was willing to be arrested protesting mountain top removal.  You can't ask for more than that from 8 clearly written pages.  http://www.columbia.edu/~jeh1/mailings/2009/20090713_Strategies.pdf

2.  Senator Barbara Boxer is the primary climate strategist in the Senate.  She is already at work on the Senate version of an energy bill.  It may come to a vote as early as September, but Sen. Boxer has recently said that it may not be acted upon until next year.  She plans to offer the bill on Sept. 9, immediately following the August recess.  Majority Leader Sen. Reid has set a deadline of Sept. 28 for the four committees involved to offer legislation.  Senator Kerry, one of Sen. Boxer's active supporters, believes that the 60 votes will in the end be there to pass it but is less hopeful of the 67 votes needed to pass the international treaty expected to come from the Copenhagen conference this December.    Senator Boxer remarks that we cannot predict votes on a treaty yet to be negotiated.  http://www.truthout.org/071309G The Copenhagen talks, and the US legislative process as well, should proceed as if we faced a global security crisis on the scale of an alien invasion.  Copenhagen is a conference about "the survival of life on earth as we know it."  http://www.nytimes.com/2009/07/13/opinion/13iht-edleggett.html?emc=tnt&tntemail0=y    Paul Krugman, in the same issue of the New York Times, speaks to the same effect.     A report to be published next month by the Millennium Project offers the hope that the crisis will inspire us to move from our current adolescent international behavior to adulthood.  (That is my hope, too, in my book Plots of Time.  We have the chance to find out what it means to be at home on the earth as adults.)  http://www.independent.co.uk/environment/climate-change/the-planets-future-climate-change-will-cause-civilisation-to-collapse-1742759.html

3.  That China is vigorously pursuing renewable power tech is no news, but it is news that the NY Times is presenting it as a competitive threat (mainly, they worry about Chinese protectionism).  Let's compete.  Even if it is not quite adult to approach the problem that way. http://www.climateark.org/shared/reader/welcome.aspx?linkid=132777   Suntech has just signed to produce 1.8 gigawatts in four new Chinese solar projects.  Surely we can top that.  http://www.businessgreen.com/business-green/news/2245997/suntech-projects-provide-8gw 

4.  Cool, temperate, moist forests are the champs of carbon sequestration, far outperforming tropical forests.  http://news.mongabay.com/2009/0717-forest_carbon.html

5.  The world's first hybrid solar ship has just made its maiden voyage from Japan to the US with a load of Priuses.  http://www.businessgreen.com/business-green/news/2246269/prius-takes-ride-aboard-solar

July 12, 2009 - Subjects:  CO2 caps; solar tech; Obama strategies; G8 agrees; GCM w/plankton; UK olives; Harmony's plant; Saharan solar for EU

1.  The Princeton team of Socolow and Pacala, with associates, has devised a global carbon allocation which targets unusually high individual consumption.  They believe that the method is more fair than other suggested schemes, and will appeal to poorer as well as to wealthier nations.  Thanks to Rod Sullivan for the news. http://www.redorbit.com/news/science/1716765/new_princeton_method_could_help_allocate_carbon_emissions_responsibility_among/index.html?source=r_science

2.  Scientific American explains the industrial use of concentrating solar photovoltaic cells.  The technology uses much less water than solar thermal, and less space and less silicon than standard photovoltaic.  http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=hybrid-solar-cells-photovoltaic-utilities

3.  David Roberts writing in Grist argues that Obama is pursuing agreements with small groups of other nations, as well as the UN process, to control greenhouse gas emissions.  The general strategy (though not the goals) is a Bush inheritance .  http://www.grist.org/article/2009-07-07-obama-strategy-international/

4.  At the G8 meeting wealthy nations adopted an aspirational goal of an 80% cut in emissions by 2050 and urged developing nations to cut 50%.  While the agreement should have been stronger, it is significant that there was an agreement at all.  http://www.truthout.org/070909K

5.  Climate modelers have begun to include phytoplankton in their projections.  The results will be available next year.  http://www.miller-mccune.com/science_environment/next-generation-climate-models-1317

6.  An English farmer adapting to climate change is growing peaches and olives, and has his eye on pineapples.  I wonder when the frost line will ascend far enough to allow citrus to grow well in North Florida.  The Hadley Center in Britain is said to be working on a global model powerful enough for detailed regional predictions but the project will not be finished for a couple of years.  (They already offer regional projections for the UK.)   http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/agriculture/crops/5785670/Olives-and-peaches-blossom-in-Britain-as-farmers-adapt-to-climate-change.html

7.  Harmony, an environmentally responsible community in Osceola County, has teamed with FSU to construct a hybrid 5 megawatt thermal solar panel-biofuel power plant on its 10,000 acre site.  That's enough for 2,000 homes.  The plant will cover 30 acres.  The developer expects that it will be significantly cheaper than a photovoltaic installation (they're using aluminum panels to collect the heat) and that it will provide continuous power.  http://www.orlandosentinel.com/news/local/osceola/orl-harmony-fsu-solar-power-plant-071009,0,7580449.story

8.  The German project to supply Europe with solar power from the Sahara Desert is on track to produce 20 gigawatts by 2020.  http://www.reuters.com/article/GCA-GreenBusiness/idUSTRE56945C20090710

July 6, 2009 - Subject: Extinctions; cement CO2; China's efforts; Korea's efforts; hurricane prospects; LA to get 0% coal; hunger report

1.  We are not making headway in slowing the pace of extinctions.  http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20090702/sc_afp/environmentbiodiversityspecies

2.  CO2 emissions from cement production by the 18 leading firms have been cut by a third between 1990 and 2006, even as output rose.  We should really be converting to polymeric cement, which has the potential for zero emissions if the power used to produce it is renewable.  http://www.businessgreen.com/business-green/news/2245354/world-largest-cenment-firms

3.  China is supporting renewable energy development vigorously but not yet getting rid of coal, though they are moving to halt new construction in some areas.  They expect to have 30,000 megawatts of wind energy at 7 cents per kilowatt hour by the end of 2010, only slightly above the local price of coal.  Solar projects are proceeding in the Gobi Desert.  "There's not much other use for it."  http://www.climateark.org/shared/reader/welcome.aspx?linkid=131837   

4.  South Korea has dedicated $85 billion (2% of annual GDP) to support of green initiatives over the next 5 years.  They hope to develop competitive automotive applications and have adopted targets geared to be stricter than the new US auto regulations.  Thanks to Jim Crooks for the news.  http://www.reuters.com/article/GCA-GreenBusiness/idUSTRE5651Y720090706

5.  According to a Science article by GA Tech climatologists, new variations on the El Niño pattern in the Pacific could lead to more hurricanes reaching land in the Atlantic.  http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/07/090702140835.htm

6.  Los Angeles gets 40% of its power from coal; by 2020 that will 0%.  Rates will rise, but other costs (asthma treatment, e.g.) will drop, and the value to society, even ignoring global warming, will be positive, according to the city government.  http://www.reuters.com/article/environmentNews/idUSTRE56165X20090702?feedType=RSS&feedName=environmentNews&sp=true

7.  Oxfam reports that climate shifts have left millions hungry in Africa and elsewhere, with hundreds of millions at risk.  http://www.reuters.com/article/environmentNews/idUSTRE56500F20090706?feedType=RSS&feedName=environmentNews

July 1, 2009 - Subjects: BTU, BTU; Canadian copycats; warming sulphur; cyanide sorgham; missing sea grass; CA rule ok; dud bombshell

1.  After the vote on the American Clean Energy and Security Act, House Republicans chanted "B.T.U., B.T.U." in reference to the proposed Clinton/Gore energy tax in 1993, an issue they exploited (along with health care reform, which they also opposed and propagandized) to take back the House and Senate in the following year's midterm elections.  The energy tax was the major climate initiative of the Clinton years.   http://www.climateark.org/shared/reader/welcome.aspx?linkid=131405    Paul Krugman considers opposition to the climate bill a form of treason against the planet, given the urgency of the legislation and the announced reasons for opposition in the House.  http://www.climateark.org/shared/reader/welcome.aspx?linkid=131537  

 2.  Canada will match whatever emissions standards are enacted in US climate legislation in order to avoid trade penalties currently in ACESA.  The decision will impact several industries, including shale oil production.  http://www.theglobeandmail.com/report-on-business/industry-news/energy-and-resources/canada-to-match-us-climate-change-rules/article1202636/

 3.  As well as causing global dimming, sulphate aerosols can combine with soot and other pollutants to increase warming.  The balance of heating and cooling effects varies regionally.  http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/06/090629200808.htm

 4.  Tests with sorghum (used widely as cattle feed) and cassavas, a major food crop, show that as CO2 increases they produce more cyanide and yield less food. http://uk.reuters.com/article/idUKTRE55S2KY20090629?sp=true

 5.  29% of sea grass has disappeared.  Around 70% of marine life depends on the sea grass meadows.  The largest losses have been suffered since 1980.  http://www.reuters.com/article/environmentNews/idUSTRE55T18S20090630?feedType=RSS&feedName=environmentNews

 6.  The EPA has approved California's request to set its own limits on greenhouse gasses.  While the California limits are due to become national as of 2012, the approval does correct a Bush-era decision.  http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/06/30/AR2009063001527.html?wprss=rss_nation

 7.  Much has been made of a supposedly suppressed EPA report with supposedly devastating implications for global warming theory.  The report has surfaced, and has no devastation to deliver.  Unfortunately.  http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2009/jun/30/network-climate-change 

June 27, 2009 - Subjects: HFCs/HCFCs; Synth. Rept.; AltaRock's quakes; Scotch bill; ACESA; S. Italy to be desert

1.  Refrigerants such as HFCs and HCFCs are significant greenhouse gasses which would contribute about a third of global warming by mid-century if not controlled.  http://www.reuters.com/article/environmentNews/idUSTRE55L62H20090622

2.  Here's a short version of the Synthesis Report from the recent Copenhagen conference.  As a consensus report, it had to please representatives of all 70 nations attending, but as you will see from the executive summary on page 6 it provides a good platform for negotiations next December.  http://www.pik-potsdam.de/news/press-releases/files/synthesis-report-web.pdf    RealClimate's account of the report is followed by an interesting discussion of the (im?)possibility of avoiding over two degrees of warming, among other matters.  http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2009/06/a-warning-from-copenhagen/#more-690

3.  A geothermal energy deep drilling project by AltaRock Energy near Basel, Switzerland, probably set off a series of earthquakes three years ago.  The project was halted.  The same company is now drilling north of San Francisco; they did not disclose the Basel experience.  http://www.nytimes.com/2009/06/24/business/energy-environment/24geotherm.html?th&emc=th

4.  Scotland has passed an ambitious energy bill which would cut emissions 42% by 2020.  http://www.businessgreen.com/business-green/news/2244814/scotland-passes-world-ambitious 

5.  The House has passed the Waxman-Markey bill, the American Clean Energy and Security Act, 219-212, with 44 Democrats voting against it and 8 Republicans voting for it. There was great celebration in my house at the passage.  I hope ways are devised to punish the 44 and reward the 8 (so as to encourage senators).  I give up on most of the rest, busy trying to disguise planet-destroying greed with sprigs of lies (on job loss and cost, repeated endlessly),  hypocrisy (they pretended to be defending the little guy), and cardboard patriotism.  Representative Doggett (D, TX) explained that he had decided to vote for the bill during the floor debate.  It was not that he was persuaded by the bill's supporters; he was appalled by the flat earthers, deniers, and inane arguers among the opposition.  Greenpeace and Friends of the Earth opposed the bill, too, as too weak, but they were not represented in the debate.  The Post analysis shows that women representatives saved the day.  Regionally, we may thank the Northeast and West.  The Florida delegation voted heavily to submerge most of the state and turn the rest into savannah and scrub.  The Post article links to a sketch of the bill's provisions.     http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/06/26/AR2009062600444.html?wprss=rss_nation     Senator Boxer hopes to have the Senate bill prepared by August and passed in September (a comment not covered in this article).  She intends that it patch up some of the weaknesses in the House version.   http://www.reuters.com/article/latestCrisis/idUSN26329882 

6.  Southern Italy faces desertification and climate refugees from Africa.  http://www.ansa.it/site/notizie/awnplus/english/news/2009-06-25_125345332.html 

June 20, 2009 - Subjects: 1st US admin. rept; ACESA allocations; hidden solar; Arctic HC4; CO2 record; less dimming; COP 15 synth. rept

1.  "Global Climate Change Impacts in the United States" is the Obama administration's first report on global warming.  It adds nothing new but pulls together the available information, and that quite conservatively (e.g. the lowball sea level rise projection).  The report backs no particular mitigation strategy.  See particularly the Key Findings link on the left.    http://www.globalchange.gov/publications/reports/scientific-assessments/us-impacts

2.  The Waxman-Markey bill is, of course, being propagandized.  One common theme is that 85% of the allocations are being given away to polluters, and that the bill is therefore not worth supporting.  It's really 25%, and the bill is well worth our support and criticism.  I found this Grist article useful in analyzing the allocations.  http://www.grist.org/article/2009-06-15-waxman-allowances-myth/

3.  Jay Huebner sends this overview of solar cells which have been integrated into building materials.  http://pubs.acs.org/cen/email/html/cen_business_87_8724bus1.html

4.  This Scientific American article profiles Arctic researcher Katey Walter and her measurements of methane emissions from melting permafrost.  http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=the-peril-below-the-ice

5.  CO2 levels are at their highest level in the last 2.1 million years, according to a Science article.  http://news.mongabay.com/2009/0618-co2.html

6.  Another Science article calculates that global dimming has less of a cooling effect than previously thought, .3 watts/square meter vs. .5 watts.  That is good news, for it means that particulates shield us from only about 10% of the warming we would otherwise suffer.  The particulates settle out within days, so if we control the burning of fossil fuels which, along with forest fires, are the primary source of the particles, we will almost immediately experience an increase in heat and the effects of that heat.  The new calculation means that the effect will be less dangerous than we had expected, on the whole.  http://www.reuters.com/article/environmentNews/idUSTRE55H59720090618?feedType=RSS&feedName=environmentNews

7.  A Climate Change Conference of over 2000 scientists from 70 countries in Copenhagen last March received over 1400 studies.  The conference was a run-up to December's meeting to draft an international climate agreement; one of the purposes was to update the IPCC 2007 report.  http://en.cop15.dk/news/view+news?newsid=1561    The synthesis report from the conference indicates that we cannot escape 2 degrees of warming and should prepare for yet more.  http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/0,1518,631262,00.html   I do not find the synthesis report itself online yet; it will be presented to the Danish Prime Minister next Thursday, and perhaps will be available then from the Climate Change Conference site.

June 11, 2009 - Subjects: Intl. plans; no reefs; no oysters, shrimp; better heater; PG&E hits 50%; FEMA & g.w.; IEA, EIA; green jobs

1.  The new Canadian carbon trading market includes land use sources.  http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20090610/wl_canada_afp/environmentwarmingcarboncanada China hopes to achieve 20% renewable energy by 2020.  It is resisting emissions limits, preferring the pointless Bushism of carbon intensity limits (emissions per unit of economic activity).    http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/jun/09/china-green-energy-solar-wind    Japan is shooting for 15% emissions reductions by 2020, but is using 2005 as its base year, following the US precedent.  That's no solution at all, thanks to feedbacks.  http://www.boston.com/news/world/europe/articles/2009/06/10/un_climate_chief_rich_nations_short_on_co2_goals/?rss_id=Boston.com+--+Latest+news    France is moving toward a carbon tax, to begin in 2011.  http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20090610/sc_afp/franceenvironmentclimatetax    US House Republicans are presenting an energy bill with 100 new nuclear reactors, lots of oil drilling, and a prohibition on EPA regulation of greenhouse gasses.  http://www.climateark.org/shared/reader/welcome.aspx?linkid=129643    It's not a useful response to the problem.  Serious solutions cannot be halfhearted, though.  Moving toward, but not achieving, an adequate set of controls won't earn us any points from nature if we set off the methane feedback from melting permafrost, for example.  Scientific American editorializes that bold strokes are needed now to save the climate.  http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=bold-strokes-needed-now

 2.  A British study finds an unexpected and massive collapse of coral reefs throughout the Caribbean.  "There are no detectable complex reefs." http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/national/reefs-collapse-across-caribbean-study-says/article1175531/

 3.  A US Senate hearing received testimony that global warming and other modes of habitat destruction  are already devastating coastal marine life.  Oysters are not reproducing in Washington and shrimp are leaving the Gulf of Mexico.  http://news.yahoo.com/s/mcclatchy/20090609/sc_mcclatchy/3249010

 4.  Surface Power, an Irish company, is producing a greatly improved solar water heater.  http://www.renewableenergyworld.com/rea/news/article/2009/06/surface-power-moritz-group-sign-20m-solar-thermal-distribution-deal?cmpid=WNL-Friday-June12-2009

 5.  With its third large solar contract this year, Pacific Gas & Electric now produces half its power carbon-free. http://www.renewableenergyworld.com/rea/news/article/2009/06/pg-e-purchases-more-solar-power?cmpid=WNL-Friday-June12-2009

 6.  FEMA is undertaking a study of the impact of climate change on flood insurance.  Their report, due next April, is likely to influence coastal insurance in ways which will inhibit construction.  The report is also likely to identify such inland risks as increased flash flood exposure.  http://www.climateark.org/shared/reader/welcome.aspx?linkid=129759

 7.  The Director of the International Energy Agency calculates that carbon must reach $180 a ton by 2030, and governments must increase support of renewable energy six-fold from current subsidy levels, if we are to avoid catastrophic warming.  http://www.financialpost.com/reports/story.html?id=1674049   In a reversal of previous statements, the US Energy Information Administration predicts a sharp decline in oil reserves, a decrease in demand, and a growing reliance on tar sands and other alternative sources of oil.   http://www.truthout.org/061109R

 8.  Green job growth in the US is now 2.5 times the general job growth.  http://features.csmonitor.com/economyrebuild/2009/06/10/report-green-jobs-outpacing-traditional-ones/    A Times-Union story this morning reports that Florida's green job growth is third worst in the country, thanks to the efforts of the recent legislative session.    http://www.jacksonville.com/news/metro/2009-06-12/story/green_energy_business_growing_slow_in_florida_report_says

June 8, 2009 - Subjects: Renewable $; land use; 350 ppm; India's solar plan; floating wind power; Germany's last glacier; NASA site

1.  According to a UN report, in 2008 for the first time more money, $155 billion, was invested in renewable energy that was invested in fossil fuels and nuclear power.  That is four times the renewable energy investment in 2004.  http://www.ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=47108

2.  An article in Science finds that attempts to control CO2 emissions which limit industrial and other fossil fuel sources but ignore controlling land use become costly, ineffective, and destructive to the food supply.  http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/abstract/324/5931/1183

3.  Two years ago I circulated a draft of the article in which James Hansen et al. conclude that to procure an earth much like the one on which we have lived we must move from the current 386 ppm of CO2 to less than 350 ppm.  Because we are now in the process of our best chance at negotiating effective climate change legislation, because a number of people have joined the list in the last two years, and because the article has withstood scientific scrutiny well, I am linking it again in its final state.  http://arxiv.org/abs/0804.1126    

4.  India's National Solar Mission plan would generate 100,000 megawatts by 2030 and twice that by midcentury.  It includes distributed solar generation (3 kw rooftop units), a feed-in tariff, and a gas tax. http://greeninc.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/06/05/could-india-become-a-solar-leader/?emc=eta1    The plan, marked "Final Draft," was obtained by Greenpeace of India.  http://www.greenpeace.org/international/assets/binaries/national-solar-plan     The plan apparently developed within a general National Action Plan adopted a year ago.  http://www.pewclimate.org/international/country-policies/india-climate-plan-summary/06-2008    BusinessGreen.com says that release of the plan is being delayed by the Indian bureaucracy.  http://www.businessgreen.com/business-green/news/2243426/india-invest-22bn-bid-become

5.   A 2.3 megawatt floating wind turbine has been launched off Norway.  The manufacturer, Siemens, expects that over time the cost will approximate that of land-based systems.  http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/8085551.stm

6.  Germany's last glacier is being covered with a tarp to protect it from summer melting.  http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601100&sid=aZ9Zo1Sc6AFY&refer=germany

7.  Shelley Edson sends this NASA Earth Observatory site which tracks a range of environmental changes-in this case, deforestation of an area in the Amazon.  http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/Features/WorldOfChange/deforestation.php

June 4, 2009 - Subjects: New CS tech; UN draft treaty; ACESA summary; watching life; VT FIT; Home/Earth 2001; x-160 villages

1.  SolarReserve has patented a molten salt technology developed by Rocketdyne, an aerospace company, which stores heat "almost indefinitely."  The salt is heated by mirrors to temperatures over 1000° and is used to generate power through a steam turbine.  The aerospace technology supplies the nozzle through which the molten salt flashes water to steam, similar to a rocket's thrust nozzle.  The Santa Monica company is building a jumbo concentrating solar power project at an undisclosed desert location.  http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-fi-rocketdyne-solar29-2009may29,0,5098126.story    I can't help wondering if the new technology is a factor in a move by the administration to boost solar research support by 85% (and to cut tidal and wave by 25%; Europe has a firm edge in those technologies).  The new design gives concentrating solar thermal a good claim (along with geothermal) to supply base load generation because the improved heat storage capacity assures steady power production.  http://news.yahoo.com/s/mcclatchy/20090531/sc_mcclatchy/3242509_1    $350 million of the current $467 million offered by the Department of Energy in research support goes to geothermal research; the deadline for the grants is in mid-July.  http://www1.eere.energy.gov/geothermal/news_detail.html?news_id=12541

 2.  A first draft of an international climate agreement has emerged from UN negotiations.   http://www.truthout.org/060209EA    No one is particularly happy with it yet.  Generally, the developed nations want the developing to spend more (2% of their gnp), and the developing nations want the developed to adopt more stringent emissions targets (25-40% by 2020 on a 1990 base; the US is the holdout, arousing unhappy memories).  But the new draft is a start toward the Copenhagen talks this fall.  http://www.ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=47062

 3.  The House Energy and Commerce Committee has released a brief summary of the American Clean Energy and Security Act (Waxman-Markey).   The 6 page document is linked at the bottom of the following site.  Coal plants built this year and beyond are effectively required to practice carbon capture and sequestration.  That takes us off coal.  The emissions targets are anemic but will surely be improved.  http://energycommerce.house.gov/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=1635:committee-releases-updated-summary-of-american-clean-energy-and-security-act&catid=122:media-advisories&Itemid=55

 4.  The Smithsonian is organizing a broadly based virtual observatory of life on earth.  Part of the purpose is to record the effects of climate change on the biosphere.  They are soliciting volunteer observers.  http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20090601/lf_nm_life/us_observatory_2

 5.  Vermont has passed a feed-in tariff which will allow Vermonters to sell energy generated by home units back to the grid.  It is the first state to pass such a program.    http://www.renewableenergyworld.com/rea/news/article/2009/06/vermont-fits-become-law-the-mouse-that-roared?cmpid=WNL-Wednesday-June3-2009     The Governor was not happy with the law but allowed it to take effect without his signature.  Although the Public Service Board controls the rates, the Governor protests the cost and believes the state had enough support for renewables without the FIT.  The legislature obviously disagreed.    http://governor.vermont.gov/tools/index.php?topic=GovPressReleases&id=3497&v=Article

 6.  The French documentary Home is just released.  Shots of the earth's beauty and diversity frame an appeal for environmental action.  http://www.youtube.com/homeproject   While I'm at it, the 2 hour ABC special Earth 2001 illustrated the likely course of business-as-usual global warming (and not a worst case scenario, as the commentary said) through the experiences of a girl born in 2009.  With comments by John Holdren, Fred Krup, E. O. Wilson, and other familiar figures, it is well worth watching if it is repeated.  Clips and comments are available online.  I wish they had said that we are in for a lot of warming (and storms, rising seas, and drought) no matter what we do.  People need to be prepared.  http://abcnews.go.com/Technology/Earth2100/ 

 7.  160 villages in northern Syria have been deserted in the last two years due to climate change-linked drought.  http://www.zawya.com/Story.cfm/sidANA20090602T111843ZHSA47/160%20Syrian%20Villages%20Deserted%20Due%20To%20Climate%20Change

May 30, 2009 - Subjects: IPEEC; Destiny; free forum; 1% down; c&t; white roofs; human costs; 39% by 2030; adaptation; Russian reverse

1.  Nations with the world's leading economies have joined in the International Partnership for Energy Efficiency Cooperation, based in Paris.  http://www.energy.gov/news2009/7420.htm 

2.  Destiny, a new eco-community designed to be sustainable in central Florida, was orphaned, along with other green projects, by the Florida legislature but has found support from the Clinton Climate Initiative. http://www.destinyflorida.com/index.php?src=news&srctype=detail&category=News%20on%20Destiny&refno=65

3.  A free online virtual energy forum on June 24-25 features Fred Krupp, Amory Lovins, and other notables.  If the speeches get boring you can browse an exhibitors' hall.  http://virtualenergyforum.com/ 4.  As much as 1% of the 2.8% drop in US CO2 emissions in 2008 came from new renewable energy sources, especially wind.  http://www.eia.doe.gov/neic/press/press318.html

5.  While the allowances in the current Waxman-Markey cap and trade bill would be given away, the caps would still impose limits due to strain some sectors of the economy, and the allowances would not stay free.  Costs will be partly up to the EPA in that they will oversee regulation of the allowances.  The linked article is a useful overview of the cap and trade proposal.    http://www.nytimes.com/gwire/2009/05/26/26greenwire-carbon-allowances----the-glue-in-house-energy-10416.html 6.  Secretary of Energy Steven Chu recommends that we paint our roofs white.  http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2009/may/26/chu-us-climate-change

7.  The first comprehensive assessment of the human cost of global warming finds that it is harming over 300 million people now; the number will double by 2030, and the cost, now $125 billion, will rise to over $300 billion.  The current death rate is 300,000 a year and is projected to reach half a million a year by 2030.  http://www.businessgreen.com/business-green/news/2243197/global-warming-already-costing    The Lancet calls global warming the greatest health threat of the 21st Century.  http://www.reuters.com/article/americasCrisis/idUSN14495466 

8.  Without new policies and binding pacts, the US Energy Information Administration calculates that global CO2 emissions will increase 39% by 2030.  http://www.reuters.com/article/environmentNews/idUSTRE54Q3BY20090527?feedType=RSS&feedName=environmentNews 9.  Adaptation must become part of climate change planning, but the scientific base for such planning is slim and little has been done.  http://e360.yale.edu/content/feature.msp?id=2156

10.  Russia has quietly reversed its policy stance on global warming, accepting that it poses great risks and must be countered.  http://www.nature.com/news/2009/090526/full/news.2009.506.html?s=news_rss

May 26, 2009 - Subjects: PV costs; psuedorenewables; China's tough talk; animal viruses; bottletop wings; FL's failures

1.  On page 15 of the May 15 issue of Science is a brief article, "Photovoltaics Power Up," by Richard Swanson.  It summarizes what has been reported in several studies linked in this list: that the levellized cost of newly constructed pv power is generally competitive with that from natural gas (much better than peaking costs, roughly equal to that of combined cycle), that the cost is dropping while the cost of natural gas generation is rising, that wind is yet cheaper and solar thermal only marginally higher (and both dropping), that the Wall Street Journal editorial page and other such sources are wrong in asserting the contrary, and that the obvious new construction choice is now renewable energy.  The article points out that while the manufacturing costs of thin film pv are lower than those for the conventional chips, installation costs, efficiency,  and the larger footprint of film bring the two technologies into parity. The article mentions nuclear and improved conventional generation as serious choices for power generation along with renewables and energy efficiency "as we transition to a carbon-free electric grid over the next half century."   I assume he means fast neutron reactors or other third or fourth generation nuclear technologies rendered economically viable, and projects a carbon capture technology which has become safe and affordable.  I summarize at length because the Science article is available only by subscription. 

 2.  As we have seen in Florida, the nuclear, waste management, and coal industries are eagerly trying to get legislation which would define them as renewable.  It's another argument for proceeding with straight emissions caps of some sort.   <http://www.climateark.org/shared/reader/welcome.aspx?linkid=128399>

 3.  In the Major Economies Forum in Paris, the US argued against China's vigorous target of at least 40% emissions cuts by 2020 from a 1990 base.  The currently proposed US cut amounts to 3% from that base.  <http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20090525/sc_afp/climatewarmingtalksmef>   China's stimulus package has about double the green investment of the US package (according to the China Daily).   http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/bizchina/2009-05/25/content_7937667.htm    But AFP, the French press agency, reports that the Chinese renewable portfolio target is 6% by 2020, excluding hydropower.  http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20090525/bs_afp/chinaenergyinveststimulus   Carbon capture technology is just as expensive and problematic in China as it is here.  http://www.reuters.com/article/GCA-BusinessofGreen/idUSTRE54O15Y20090525   Where else will such large emissions cuts come from?  Surely not all from conservation.  I conclude that the Chinese are taking even stronger external positions that they are internally.  I wonder if they are not trying to build domestic support, and making a serious internal effort, while undertaking a somewhat exaggerated diplomatic initiative to embarrass other world powers and claim leadership on the issue.  I would like for everyone to take them up on the 40% target in Copenhagen this December.

4.  The World Animal Health Organization reported that 71% of 126 surveyed countries were "very concerned" that global warming is increasing the range and type of viruses among animal populations, many capable of transmission to humans.  http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5juSZWAzuXVVSJDgWOtwbrlbJWalw 

5.  Putting tiny holes in the wing of an airplane can reduce fuel consumption by as much as 20% through the same principle which produces a hum when you blow across a bottle top.  http://www.businessgreen.com/business-green/news/2242830/bottletop-technology-slash

6.  This Miami Herald story reviews the energy accomplishments of the last FL legislative session and observes that "energy efforts have gone nowhere."  Luckily, the momentum has shifted to Washington (or Beijing).  Thanks to Jim Bier for the story.  http://www.miamiherald.com/news/breaking-news/story/1060914.html

May 22, 2009 - Subjects: Weather blog; US-China talks?; new battery; opinion study; Lakoff; new CAFE; MIT study; bill passes committee

1.  Ed Carter recommends the article "Stabilization of CO2" on the Weather Underground blog.  It remarks on an article affirming that CO2 persists in the atmosphere for over 1,000 years (about half of the CO2, as I recall from a Hanson article, with the other half going into various sinks over that time) and reports on the effect of mitigation levels.   <http://www.wunderground.com/blog/RickyRood/show.html>

 2.  The Guardian states that the US and China have been in negotiations for a climate change agreement to be announced in advance of the Copenhagen talks this summer.  <http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/may/18/secret-us-china-emissions-talks>   The story claims that the US position was a 20% cut in emissions by 2010, but Joe Romm reports that it is a mistaken reference to a Chinese energy intensity target.  <http://climateprogress.org/2009/05/19/secret-china-deal-chandler-carnegie-holdre/>  

  3.  A British team has developed a battery with ten times the storage capacity at less cost than the designs currently available.  It will have applications in electric cars and portable electronic devices as well as in energy storage for solar and wind generators.  <http://www.epsrc.ac.uk/PressReleases/oxlithbattery.htm>

 4.  Global Warming's Six Americas 2009 is the most sophisticated analysis yet of US attitudes on the topic.  Based on interviews in the fall of 2008, the Yale and George Mason study finds much more support for firm action to mitigate climate change than is usually detected by less detailed studies.  Over half the population are in the categories of Alarmed or Concerned.  7% is Dismissive, the only group which said they would not support a fuel efficiency standard of 45 mpg.  Even they would support rebates for purchases of solar panels and fuel-efficient vehicles (pages 18-19).  Your membership in this list probably places you among the Alarmed (page 28).  (If you are not yet Alarmed, take a careful look at item 7.)   <http://environment.yale.edu/uploads/6Americas2009.pdf>  

 5.  George Lakoff, the Berkeley linguist who has written extensively on the public policy implications of metaphor and rhetoric, describes the way those who wish to inspire action on climate change should frame their messages.  <http://www.truthout.org/052109EA>

 6.  The Obama administration has announced new CAFE standards with support all around.   The consensus was not easily gained, though.  At 3 a.m. Monday Ford almost bailed out.  <http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-emissions20-2009may20,0,7406918.story>

 7.  The most comprehensive modeling project yet of the likely course of climate change indicates that the climate problem is at least twice as severe as estimated six years ago: over 90% confidence of a rise of over 9 degrees (F) by 2100, compared to a projection of just over 4 degrees in a 2003 study by the same MIT group.  Improved economic modeling and new data which lessen the chances for reduced emissions account for some of the difference.  The project indicates the necessity of early and decisive action.  "There is no way the world can or should take these risks," said Ronald Prinn, co-author of the study and Director of MIT's Center for Global Change Science.  <http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/05/090519134843.htm>

 8.  The Waxman-Markey cap-and-trade bill has passed the House Energy and Commerce Committee, where many of its most determined opponents were concentrated.  <http://news.yahoo.com/s/politico/20090522/pl_politico/22852>  

7.  The 76 countries represented at the World Oceans Conference heard that the oceans are in danger of becoming acid baths from the burning of fossil fuels.  Immediate action to control emissions is necessary to slow the pace of destruction.  On the subject of fixes, I am refraining from listing the battles over the current Waxman-Markey climate bill because it has not yet taken final shape and because the verdict on the direction it has taken so far is unclear to me.  James Hansen finds the bill wholly inadequate to the problem, while Al Gore supports it as a necessary first step in the proper direction.  <http://www.ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=46869>  

May 18, 2009 - Subjects: New solar cell; PG&E contract; AR rooftop solar; Aussie solar; WAIS slr halved; SE US energy report; Oceans conference

1.  A new concentrating solar cell developed at the University of Lleida in Spain is said to achieve an efficiency of 60% and have 1/10th the footprint of a standard photovoltaic unit.  It is not yet commercial.  <http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/05/090505202912.htm>

2.  Pacific Gas and Electric has signed a record contract for 1,300 megawatts of solar power through the thermal tower technology.  This brings the company's total contracted renewable power to 20% of its projected needs. <http://www.renewableenergyworld.com/rea/news/article/2009/05/pg-e-and-brightsource-sign-contracts-for-over-1300-mw-of-solar-thermal?cmpid=WNL-Friday-May15-2009>

3.  An Arizona utility is piloting a 1.5 megawatt project in which they will install and maintain 2-300 rooftop photovoltaic units, guaranteeing the customers no rate increases for 20 years. <http://www.renewableenergyworld.com/rea/news/article/2009/05/aps-pilot-program-could-see-interconnected-solar-rooftops?cmpid=WNL-Friday-May15-2009>

4.  Australia is building a world record 1000 megawatt solar power plant.  It will be part of a network of solar power stations across the country.  <http://www.reuters.com/article/environmentNews/idUSTRE54G0C820090517?feedType=RSS&feedName=environmentNews> 

5.  A Science magazine article finds that a sufficient part of the West Antarctic Ice Sheet is unlikely to melt even with expected warming so that the projected sea level rise from the WAIS (over many years) should be cut roughly in half to about 11 feet.  The North American coast will see 25% higher rises due to changes in gravity and the earth's rotation. <http://www.independent.co.uk/news/science/melting-ice-could-cause-gravity-shift-1685201.html>

6.    Southeast Energy Opportunities: Local Clean Power, a report by the Southern Association for Clean Energy, the World Resources Institute, and Southface, shows how the region can attain as much as 30% renewable energy within the next 15 years.  Thanks to Tom Larson for the report.  <http://www.cleanenergy.org/images/stories/local_clean_power_wri.sace.southface.pdf>                                                            

7.  The 76 countries represented at the World Oceans Conference heard that the oceans are in danger of becoming acid baths from the burning of fossil fuels.  Immediate action to control emissions is necessary to slow the pace of destruction.  On the subject of fixes, I am refraining from listing the battles over the current Waxman-Markey climate bill because it has not yet taken final shape and because the verdict on the direction it has taken so far is unclear to me.  James Hansen finds the bill wholly inadequate to the problem, while Al Gore supports it as a necessary first step in the proper direction.  <http://www.ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=46869>  

May 11, 2009 - Subjects: Solar costs; states progress; best light bulb; first evacuation; Chu's priorities; CCS plans; new tidal generator

1.  Todd Sack objects to JEA's figures on the cost of solar:  "In regards to the costs to make solar power in Fl, an 8-fold difference between solar and coal sounds excessive.  Aren't the numbers around 6-8 cents/kwh for coal and around 26 cents for solar?  This would mean only a 3-4 fold difference. Plus, current coal plant use is at capacity-- any new coal plant would be vastly more expensive due to the unknown costs of sequestration."  I used JEA's figure in my letter to the Times Union, based on the TU's story, but share Todd's opinion that it is high.  Perhaps one of the JEA people on the list could explain it to us.  The following article on the current state of the pv solar industry makes it clear just how cheap solar power is becoming, and already is-$.93 a watt production cost, in First Solar's case.  http://www.renewableenergyworld.com/rea/news/article/2009/05/a-brief-look-ahead-innovation-in-solar-energy-continues-despite-slowing-economy?cmpid=WNL-Friday-May8-2009 <http://www.renewableenergyworld.com/rea/news/article/2009/05/a-brief-look-ahead-innovation-in-solar-energy-continues-despite-slowing-economy?cmpid=WNL-Friday-May8-2009>

 2.  The New America Foundation has released a spread sheet with the states' progress on climate mitigation.  33 are making headway.  <http://newamerica.net/pressroom/2009/state_climate_policy_tracker_reveals_progress_33_states_0>

 3.  Lemnis, a Dutch firm, has produced a light bulb which is energy efficient, recyclable, dimmable, and lasts 25 years.  It goes on sale from Amazon in July for $50 (6 watt version, not quite equivalent to most 60 watt bulbs).  <http://greeninc.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/05/06/racing-to-build-a-better-light-bulb/>

 4.  The first evacuation of an entire community due to manmade global warming has occurred on the Cartaret Islands. <http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/georgemonbiot/2009/may/07/monbiot-climate-change-evacuation>

 5.  Energy Secretary Steven Chu announced that his agency will no longer fund research into hydrogen fuel cells for cars.  The story does not give the reasons, but they include intractable problems with the production, distribution, onboard storage, and lifecycle energy efficiency of hydrogen as a fuel for personal transportation.  The fuel cell has a future in energy storage (use spare power to produce hydrogen to burn when energy is sparse) and for industrial uses.  Finally, the Department of Energy will no longer fund oil and gas exploration.  <http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/08/science/earth/08energy.html?partner=rss&emc=rss>

 6.  FutureGen, a cancelled experiment in turning coal into hydrogen while capturing and storing the CO2, is back on (see the previous link).  That promises to be wickedly expensive energy.  China is building a similar project:   <http://www.climateark.org/shared/reader/welcome.aspx?linkid=127075>    The technology is so risky, expensive, and cumbersome, and so unlikely to be deployed in any effective way within any time scheme in scale with the global warming problem, that I can understand the push for it only as a response to pressure from coal companies.  (That requires me to believe that the same concessions are being made in the US, China, Britain, and Germany, where a model CCS plant is in operation or close to it.)  <http://business.timesonline.co.uk/tol/business/industry_sectors/natural_resources/article6256316.ece>  
 If CCS is indeed a political concession, I hope it works to clear the way for a genuine energy transition and not to delay the transition by wasting funds and energy in creating a false hope.  If it is truly a technology with a future I fail to discern, even better luck to that.  

 7.  A UK firm hopes to begin production on a tidal generator this summer.  It is a simple triangular affair which requires no drilling and is anchored by its own weight.  The prototype will produce 1.2 megawatts of energy.  They hope to begin marketing it in a couple of years.  <http://www.businessgreen.com/business-green/news/2241976/tidal-energy-preps-2mw-sea-bed> 
 

May 5, 2009 - Subjects: Nature on C; cosmic gas; CST; coal falling; Chinese wind; junk economics & GOP propaganda

1.  This Nature news article outlines the case for achieving a heroically small limit on total carbon emissions through immediate action.   <http://www.nature.com/news/2009/090429/full/4581091a.html>   This news article sums up the two Nature articles on which the preceding discussion was based and provides links to them.  The articles should influence policy planners to drop the idea of percentage emissions targets in favor of a limit on gross greenhouse gas emissions.   <http://www.scidev.net/en/climate-change-and-energy/scientists-put-carbon-ceiling-at-a-trillion-tonnes.html?utm_source=link&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=en_climatechangeandenergy>

 2.  Many contrarians assert that global warming is driven largely by variations in cloud cover due to fluctuations in cosmic radiation.  A modeling of the effect indicates that cosmic radiation is too weak a forcing by two orders of magnitude to account for observed warming.  <http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/full/324/5927/576-b?sa_campaign=Email/sntw/1-May-2009/10.1126/science.324_576b>

 3.  Concentrating solar thermal power plants are under construction which store heat in the form of molten salt so that energy can be produced at almost any time.  Some plants provide steam to conventional natural gas or coal plants, reducing their fuel consumption. <http://e360.yale.edu/content/feature.msp?id=2144>

 4.  Plans remain active for only 59 of the 220 coal plants proposed since 2001.  The Sierra Club reports that 97 have been scuttled and the others are on ice.  They may never be built, though the Energy information administration predicts that coal will contribute 47% of the country's power by 2030.  (I don't see how.  Coal is already becoming prohibitively expensive; a price on carbon will make it less competitive yet, and carbon storage increases the cost and lessens efficiency.)  <http://www.reuters.com/article/environmentNews/idUSTRE5406SX20090501?feedType=RSS&feedName=environmentNews&pageNumber=1&virtualBrandChannel=0>   A group of Australian scientists have written to the heads of the country's coal companies to warn them that coal plants are doomed.  <http://www.smh.com.au/environment/global-warming/dear-coal-plants-youre-doomed-20090430-aozx.html>    Canada is moving to phase out traditional coal plants but is moving toward major investments in carbon capture and storage.  <http://business.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20090429.wrcoal29/BNStory/Business/home>

 5.  China has tripled its target for wind energy to 100 gigawatts by 2020.  It now supplies 12 gigawatts, up 60% since 2005.  Renewable energy in China gets fixed rate tariffs and carbon credits.   <http://www.voanews.com/english/2009-05-01-voa34.cfm>

 6.  Paul Krugman observes that the opponents of energy transition are following junk science with junk economics. <http://www.climateark.org/shared/reader/welcome.aspx?linkid=126255>   While individual Republicans not only support but, like the governors of CA and FL, have led the energy transition campaign, the party at large has adopted an obstructive stance. <http://www.gop.gov/talking-points/09/04/29/talking-points-on-the-democrat>   The Florida Times Union has been following those talking points in their stories on energy. 

April 29, 2009 - Subjects: SCA LCFS; corp prop; 280 mw solar; Hansen on c&t; CH4 from wetlands; Arctic rept.;ARPA-E etc

1.  California has passed the world's first low carbon fuel standard, which requires that a percentage of vehicle fuels be non-carbon emitting.  The rule is expected to cut the state's gasoline consumption by a quarter in the next decade.  It takes into account land-use effects, to the distress of crop ethanol producers. <http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-green-fuel24-2009apr24,0,1347527.story>

 2.  In 1995 the Global Climate Coalition, comprised for the most part of the largest fossil fuel companies, suppressed a report by its own scientists saying that the impact of CO2 on climate "is well established and cannot be denied."  The group disbanded in 2002, but its ghost lives on in corporate propaganda campaigns and in the testimony of some witnesses (and the shameful antics of some legislators) in the House hearings on energy last week. <http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/24/science/earth/24deny.html?emc=eta1>

 3.  Abengoa Solar of Spain is building a 280 megawatt thermal solar plant in Arizona using molten salt as the heat medium.  Salt is stable at high temperatures and suited to thermal energy storage. <http://climateprogress.org/2009/04/23/arizona-csp-solar-thermal-storage/>

 4.  This exchange of letters between James Hansen and the Australian Office of Climate Change is notable for Hansen's critique of cap and trade. <http://www.columbia.edu/~jeh1/mailings/2009/20090424_Australia.pdf>

 5.  A 50% increase in atmospheric methane 11,600 years ago was probably due to wetland expansion and not melting clathrates on the sea floor.  The finding in this April 25 Science article means that clathrates may be more stable than previously assumed, which would be good news indeed. <http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/04/090423142457.htm>

 6.  The Arctic is suffering accelerated change.  Methane and black soot may now be as important as CO2 to the transformation of the Arctic ecosystem. <http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2009/apr/28/climate-change-poles> As part of a global pattern of change, the report on the Arctic could spur action at the Copenhagen conference this December. <http://www.reuters.com/article/environmentNews/idUSTRE53R33020090428?feedType=RSS&feedName=environmentNews>

 7.  The Department of the Interior has published guidelines for the development of offshore non-hydrokinetic power, including wind and solar installations.  Revenues will be shared with the adjacent states. <http://www.mms.gov/ooc/press/2009/press0422.htm>   A 350 megawatt NY-NJ project with a 700 megawatt potential seems set to go under the new guidelines. http://www.lipower.org/newscenter/pr/2009/042009_coned.html>

 8.  President Obama has funded the Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy (ARPA-E) within the Department of Energy.  ARPA-E will encourage research into clean energy technologies.  The first Funding Opportunity Announcement offers $150 million in grants.  ARPA-E was authorized by Congress in 2007 but given no funds until now.  The Dept. of Energy is also opening 46 Energy Frontier Research Centers, budgeted at $777 million. <http://www.whitehouse.gov/the_press_office/Fact-Sheet-A-Historic-Commitment-To-Research-And-Education/>

 April 12, 2009 - Subjects: Wilkins Shelf free; energy studies; wind vs. coal; Aussie model; aerosols in the Arctic; geoengineering

1.  An ice bridge connecting the Wilkins Ice Shelf in the West Antarctic to islands pinning it in place has disintegrated, facilitating the breakup of the shelf generally.  While the Wilkins is floating ice and will not influence sea level, its disappearance could hasten the breakup of land ice by removing a barrier to the movement of glaciers to the sea.
<http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/7984054.stm>   Joe Romm has a good summary blog (with references and links) on sea level rise this century.
<http://climateprogress.org/2009/04/05/west-antarctica-ice-sheet-sea-level-rise-peninsual-ice-shelf-collapse-global-warmin/>

2.    Many universities are offering programs in clean energy and sustainability to meet a new student demand.
<http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-energy-students29-2009mar29,0,362299.story>

3.  Interior Secretary Ken Salazar said that offshore wind off the East Coast can replace coal as the primary energy source for the country.
<http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090406/ap_on_re_us/offshore_windmills>

 4.  The effects of climate change have hit Australia earlier and harder than other developed countries, which makes it a kind of glimpse of the future.  (East Africa supplies another.)  Tim Flannery narrates the video; click at the very left edge of the video link.
<http://www.chicagotribune.com/features/lifestyle/green/la-fg-climate-change-australia9-2009apr09,0,771386.story>

 5.  Increasing black carbon and decreasing sulfates in the atmosphere have been a major forcing in Arctic and Northern mid-latitude heating.  The good news is that control of fossil fuel combustion can have a quick influence on those aerosols, so that the Arctic might be more responsive to quick intervention than we had thought.
<http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/04/090408164413.htm>   Older and thicker sea ice in the Arctic is now at a record low.
http://www.truthout.org/040809EA <http://www.truthout.org/040809EA>

 6.  Science Advisor John Holdren reports that the US administration is discussing geoengineering to avoid (especially) warming in the Arctic, which could lead to more dangerous developments-the disintegration of the Greenland ice sheet, interference with the marine circulation system, melting permafrost and the consequent methane release, and the destabilization of the methane hydrates on the ocean floor.
<http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090408/ap_on_sc/sci_obama_science_adviser>
Holdren warns that climate change is already dangerous and may become unmanageable unless we act quickly and decisively.
<http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2009/04/08/MN2416V8Q9.DTL>