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Conversations about small scale solar photovoltaic panel electricity generation continue on the Claverton Energy Research Group online forum.
You have to be prepared to dodge flying nuclear trolls, but apart from that you too can contribute, as long as you have an in-depth knowledge of the price of everything in the UK electricity generation network. |
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Dear XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX, Do you think it’s possible that nobody is immune to emotional reactions to the fate of the solar power industry ? For example, you say, “I find it most frustrating that others do not even attempt to contest the factual statements or assertions I make on the basis of evidence, but simply revert to the emotive and subjective.” And yet in the very preceding paragraph you say, “…the religious diatribe of the PV industry”, which some could validly claim is an emotive and subjective statement. You seem to be quite married to the idea that the sole focus of assessing the solar PV industry should be the differential pricing between installed cost and module cost. I’m not going to argue numbers with you, but let’s take a look at money questions, if that is your sole concern. You do not appear to take into account peripheral costs, such as the cost of the electronics necessary to hook a home solar system into the grid, nor the employment costs, nor practical details such as the cost of scaffolding. |
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Category: Carbon Capture
Carbon Capture : How you’ve been caught in a trap believing we can solve Climate Change by capturing Carbon Dioxide and pumping it under the ground or the sea. World’s most ridiculous and expensive idea, ever.
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The Problem of Powerlessness #2
| On Wednesday, I received a telephone call from an Information Technology recruitment consultancy. They wanted to know if I would be prepared to provide computer systems programming services for NATO.
Detecting that I was speaking with a native French-speaker, I slipped into my rather unpracticed second language to explain that I could not countenance working with the militaries, because I disagree with their strategy of repeated aggression. |
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| I explained I was critical of the possibility that the air strikes in Libya were being conducted in order to establish an occupation of North Africa by Western forces, to protect oil and gas interests in the region. The recruitment agent agreed with me that the Americans were the driving force behind NATO, and that they were being too warlike.
Whoops, there goes another great opportunity to make a huge pile of cash, contracting for warmongers ! Sometimes you just have to kiss a career goodbye. IT consultancy has many ethical pitfalls. Time to reinvent myself. I’ve been “back to school” for the second university degree, and now I’m supposed to submit myself to the “third degree” – go out and get me a job. The paucity of available positions due to the poor economic climate notwithstanding, the possibility of ending up in an unsuitable role fills me with dread. One of these days I might try to write about my experiences of having to endure several kinds of abuse whilst engaged in paid employment : suffice it to say, workplace inhumanity can be unbearable, some people don’t know what ethical behaviour means, and Human Resources departments always take sides, especially with vindictive, manipulative, micro-managers. I know what it’s like to be powerless. |
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China Launches : Space Republic
China has launched Tiangong-1, the “Heavenly Palace“, and demonstrated an international co-operative republic of space in the making. Many technologists, scientists, engineers and military personnel in the major economies will have taken part in the coordination of this project.
Three things come to mind. First of all, China are going to experience a massive drain on domestic economic and social development in pursuit of its programme to set up a space station. Some could say this is deliberate, and that China has been convinced to spend on space to keep them from world economic dominance.
Next, the Chinese are obviously going to set up Earth monitoring systems, and are going to find out that everything the Americans have said about environment and climate, based on the data from the NASA, NOAA and UAH satellites and space occupation, is accurate; and wonder why they were convinced of the possibility of the alternative, and the necessity of going up there to find out for themselves.
And thirdly, the Chinese are going to find that they are drawn into the American and United Nations economic and military security programmes, monitoring common “enemies” – such as those breaking carbon treaties and constructing disallowed nuclear power stations.
So, not a space republic – not even a space race. More, a space replication, repeating what’s already been done before. A giant public works project that should keep the hardworking Chinese people proud for a moment.
Happy Birthday, China !
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Camp Frack : Who’s afraid of hydraulic fracturing ?
When do micro-seismic events add up to earthquakes ? Landslips ? Tsunamis ? Who really knows ? These are just a few questions amongst many about underground mining techniques that will probably never be properly answered. Several mini-quakes were suggested to be responsible for the shutdown of Cuadrilla’s activities in Blackpool, north west England early in 2011, and there have been unconfirmed links between tremors and fracking in the United States of America, where unconventional gas is heavily mined.
It is perhaps too easy to sow doubt about the disbenefits of exploding rock formations by pressure injection to release valuable energy gases – many legislative and public consultation hurdles have been knocked down by the merest flick of the public relations wrist of the unconventional fossil gas industry (and its academic and consultancy friends).
The potential to damage the structure of the Earth’s crust may be the least attributable and least accountable of hydraulic fracturing’s suspected disadvantages, but it could be the most significant in the long run. Science being conducted into the impact on crust stability from fracking and other well injection techniques could rule out a wide range of geoengineering on safety grounds, such as Carbon Capture and Storage proposals. If we can’t safely pump carbon dioxide underground, we should really revise our projections on emissions reductions from carbon capture.
[ Camp Frack is under canvas in Lancashire protesting about the imposition of hydraulic fracturing on the United Kingdom. ]
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Renewable Gas #5 : Beyond Biogas
I was speaking to a nuclear power “waverer” the other day. They said that George Monbiot or Mark Lynas was saying that since Germany has cancelled its nuclear power programme, Germany’s Carbon Dioxide emissions will increase, because they will be using coal and Natural Gas power stations :-
https://www.davidstrahan.com/blog/?p=1130
https://www.newscientist.com/article/dn20665-germany-will-use-fossil-fuels-to-plug-nuclear-gap.html
https://www.marklynas.org/2011/06/germany-italy-greens-nukes-and-climate-change/
https://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/blog/2011/jun/15/italy-nuclear-referendum
https://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2011/jul/04/nuclear-industry-stinks-cleaner-energy
https://www.monbiot.com/2011/07/04/corporate-power-no-thanks/
I explained that this was a common misconception, and that Germany is still planning to meet their carbon targets, and that it can be done even with coal and gas power plants because in a few decades’ time the coal and Natural Gas power plants will only be used a couple of weeks a year in total to back up all the renewables, such as wind power and solar power, that Germany is building.
This is not the end of the story, however.
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Flashback 2008 : Who Pays for the Re-Powering ?
2nd November 2008
Browsing at a newsagent on a mainline railway station…
The question on the front cover of Fortune magazine, Europe edition Number 20, November 2008, already on the stands is “Who Pays for The Bailout ? You do, of course”. Of course, as this Credit Crunch means Bailout argument plays out, the issue of Energy and Climate Change is lost. But the question should be all about how to create a new green economy. Who pays for the re-powering ?
A sign of the greening times – another story teaser on the Fortune magazine advises “10 Green Stocks to Own Now”, and the front of the Independent on Sunday quotes Obama claiming that Energy is his “number one priority” in his bid for presidential election, with his “Apollo” project :-
“Obama’s green jobs revolution : Democrat will lead effort to curb world’s dependence on oil; Plans to create five million new posts in clean energy projects : By Geoffrey Lean in San Francisco and Leonard Doyle in Washington : Sunday, 2 November 2008 : Obama has pledged to create five million new ‘green collar jobs’ if elected : Barack Obama is promising a $150 billion “Apollo project” to bring jobs and energy security to the US through a new alternative energy economy, if his final push for votes brings victory in the presidential election on Tuesday. “That’s going to be my number one priority when I get into office,” Mr Obama has said of his “green recovery” plans. Making his arguments in a radio address yesterday, the Democratic favourite promised: “If you give me your vote on Tuesday, we won’t just win this election. Together, we will change this country and change the world.”…”
Meanwhile…Gordon Brown and Ed Miliband (and Peter Mandelson) get off the plane in Saudi and beg for investment into green energy in the UK :-
“Gulf petrodollars help UK go green : Brown calls for Saudis to give more cash to IMF : Gaby Hinsliff, political editor : The Observer, Sunday 2 November 2008 : The fight against climate change will get an unexpected boost today from oil-rich Gulf states which will pledge to invest some of their petrodollar profits in British green energy projects. The surging oil price over the past year has left parts of the Middle East awash with cash as the rest of the world is squeezed by the credit crunch, making Arab royals some of the few active investors worldwide. The Gulf states have enjoyed a $1.4 trillion windfall from higher oil prices since 2003. Ed Miliband, the Climate Change Secretary, arrived in Saudi Arabia yesterday with Gordon Brown at the start of a tour of the region. He said some of that cash would now ‘help our firms reap the rewards from going low carbon and providing green energy to thousands of families’ under a so-called ‘green Gulf deal’ to be announced today…”
But that’s not the real reason why they are there. Ostensibly, the delegation’s serious business is about asking Saudi and other Arab oil states to contribute more towards the International Monetary Fund :-
“Gordon Brown in the Middle East : Brown hopeful of Saudi cash for IMF : Allegra Stratton in Riyadh, guardian.co.uk, Sunday 2 November 2008 15.30 GMT : Gordon Brown said today he was hopeful of success in his attempts to persuade dollar-rich Gulf states to prop up ailing national economies through a massive injection of capital into the International Monetary Fund (IMF). The prime minister spent three hours in one-to-one talks with Saudi Arabia’s King Abdullah, trying to persuade the monarch to invest in a revamped IMF. On the first leg of a four-day visit to the Middle East, and aiming to secure hundreds of billions of dollars for the fund, Brown called off a planned dinner with business leaders accompanying him so as to allow maximum negotiating time with the Saudi king. The IMF currently has around $250 billion in its emergency reserves but there are fears that, with Hungary, Iceland and Ukraine having already sought assistance and more nations expected to follow, the sum might not be sufficient. Brown hopes to persuade Gulf leaders to use some of the estimated $1 trillion they have made from high oil prices in the last few years to boost the reserves, indicating that he would like to see the current sum increased by “hundreds of billions” of dollars. The prime minister said following the talks that he was hopeful of having secured Saudi backing…”
But hang on, what’s this ? :-
“…Brown, who is accompanied by a high-level trade delegation seeking Gulf investment, including the CEOs of BP and Shell…”
What on earth are BP (formerly British Petroleum) and (Royal Dutch) Shell doing in a delegation to the Arab states begging for the IMF charity fund and green energy investment ? Is it that BP and Shell won’t pay for green energy and it’s too hard to ask the British people to pay extra tax, so they’re coming to the Arab countries for a green energy bail-in ? What is going on here ? If OPEC countries are all in the “Axis of Evil”, and no foreign oil and gas companies can get a toehold, why are BP and Shell in the government delegation to Saudi ?
Paying for new energy systems can be expensive. The European Union Emisssions Trading Scheme is saying they want 100% of carbon emissions auctioned by 2013 to pay for larger projects – Carbon Capture and Storage and new Nuclear Power. However, the costly deadweight “white elephant in the room” is not nuclear power, but dead wells.
Are they all talking about Peak Oil in the OPEC Gulf, and proposing business opportunities to the King of the House of Saud to offset the Middle East’s future total loss of business as the wells empty – offering them compensation in the form of green investment deals ? Asking the Saudis to join the green energy race now and get ahead ?
BP and Shell have benefited from the recent rise in the price of oil, profiting even as the oil price has hit millions and created impoverishment. But they’re going to have to spend a very large amount on exploration for new oil and gas from now on. So why is there still resistance to spending more on renewables ? Can BP and Shell ever be convinced to go green ? Would a barrel load of toxic news work ? No. BP and Shell can’t pay for green energy because they have to maintain the profits of their shareholders. Pensions are going to be bad enough without forcing major “British” oil companies to pay for such things as bioethanol, algae biodiesel, solar panels and wind farms.
Action to tackle climate change must be a “tight shadow” on Peak Oil and its fall – tighter than the 9.1% depletion of the largest wells projected by the International Energy Agency (IEA) To reverse the oil decline, and more so to take action on climate change, investment is required. Banks are becoming owned by oil-rich nations, but this is simply a natural outcome of poor financial regulation that led to the Credit Crunch. However, it doesn’t mean that the future will be oil and gas necessarily. This new layer of ownership of financial bodies is not significant, as it will not seriously impact the greening of energy, if people are serious about it.
What is of value here is not banking but energy itself, which underpins the entire economy. The scenario is this : Saudi Arabia will not admit in public that it’s going down because of “Peak Oil”. They would prefer to keep up the revenue, but they’re not “engineering” a reduction of supply. It’s reducing anyway.
From their perspective, allowing supplies to weaken, by not doing any new investment into raising production, would be protecting their reserves to sell in future. A good strategy – even more so as prices rise against losses of supply but strong demand (even despite the blooming recession).
I figure that what BP and Shell are doing in the Middle East is making the case to the major oil-producing states to keep on pumping.
I guess that what Gordon Brown is doing is making the Saudis an offer they can’t refuse – either the major western states will implement measures to control oil prices which would make OPEC lose revenue, or the Saudis can underwrite the global bailout.
This mission is not about green energy investment. It’s about keeping the oil flowing.
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Selling Thorium to China
Kirk Sorensen, formerly of Teledyne Brown Engineering, now of Flibe Energy
To: Claverton Energy Research Group
From: Jo Abbess
Date: 24 June 2011
Subject: “Don’t believe the spin on thorium being a ‘greener’ nuclear option”
Hi Clavertonians,
As you are, I’m sure, aware, context is everything.
I was so sure we’d escaped the clutches of the “Thorium Activist Trolls” a few years ago, but no, here they are in resurgence again, and this time they’ve sucked in George Monbiot, Mark Lynas and Stephen Tinsdale, all apparently gullible enough to believe the newly resurrected Generation IV hype campaign.
They should have first done their research on the old Gen IV hype campaign that withered alongside the “Hemp will Save the World, No Really” campaign and the “Biodiesel will Save the World, AND You Can Make it at Home” brigade. Oh, and the Zero Point Energy people.
I was, I admit, quite encouraged by both the Hemp and Biodiesel drives, until I realised they were a deliberate distraction from the Big Picture – how to cope with the necessity of creating an integrated system of truly sustainable energy for the future.
Hemp and Biodiesel became Internet virally transmitted memes around the same time as the Thorium concept, but where did they come from ?
Where does the Thorium meme originate from this time round ? I found some people took to it at The Register, where they spin against Climate Change science a lot – watch the clipped video :-
https://www.theregister.co.uk/2011/02/01/china_thorium_bet/
I would suggest that there are connections between the Thorium campaign and the anti-Climate Change science campaign, and I have some evidence, but I’m too busy to research more in-depth just now, so I’m not going to write it all up yet.
The key issues with all energy options is TIME TO DELIVERY and SCALEABILITY, and I think the option presented by the Thorium fuel cycle fails on both counts.
Yeah, sure, some rich people can devote their life savings to it, and some Departments of Defense (yes, Americans) and their corporate hangers-on can try selling ANOTHER dud technology to China (which is the basis of some Internet energy memes in my view).
Remember Carbon Capture and Storage ? The British Government were very keen on making a Big Thing about CCS – in order to sell it to the miscreant Chinese because (WARNING : CHINA MYTH) China builds 2 !! coal-fired !! power stations a week/day/month !!
THORIUM – A Brief Analysis
TIME TO DELIVERY – 20 to 50 years
SCALEABILITY – unknown
USEFULNESS ASSESSMENT – virtually zero, although it could keep some people on the gravy train, and suck in some Chinese dough
The Tyndall Centre say that global emissions of greenhouse gases have to peak AT THE LATEST by 2020. We should be thinking about rolling out the technology WE ALREADY HAVE to meet that end.
Don’t believe the hype,
jo.
PS What other evidence do we have that the Thorium meme is most likely just a propaganda campaign ? Nick Griffin of the British National Party backs it, and the BNP are widely alleged to promote divisiveness…
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George Monbiot : Wrong Choice
This chart shows why George Monbiot, Mark Lynas and Stephen Tinsdale have all plumped for the wrong choice – new Nuclear Power cannot deliver more electricity or reduce carbon dioxide emissions for us at the time when we need it most – the next few years :-
0. Massive energy conservation drives – for demand management – are clearly essential, given the reduction in UK generation.
1. It is impossible to increase new Nuclear Power capacity in less than ten years, but total UK generation is falling now, so now and in the next few years is the timeframe in which to add capacity. We cannot go on relying on Nuclear Power imports from France – especially given the rate of power outages there.
2. The fastest growing generation sources over the next few years will be Wind Power, Solar Power and Renewable Gas – if we set the right policies at the government and regulator levels.
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The toxic legacy of mined energy
We are stardust ? Well, not quite. As carbon-based lifeforms we’re actually the offspring of a young sun, composed of the lighter elements, with a low concentration of a few transition metals essential for our health and vitality. Irn Bru, anyone ?
The actual products of exploding old stars that got lodged in the crusty skin of the accreting Earth are often quite toxic to us. Over millions of years, heavy and radioactive elements, being of no use to the ecosystem, have been deposited at the bottom of lakes, seabeds, and ended up lodged in seams of coal, and caverns of petroleum oil and Natural Gas. Uranium ores and other nasties have been overlain by forests and deserts, and only rarely vent, like radon, from Vulcan’s infernal lairs.
And what do humans do ? We dig this stuff up to burn or fission for energy, and when we do it creates toxic waste, that hurts us, and the life around us. Why are we surprised that mercury from the coal power industry is killing fish and harming children ? Why is it a shock that the tailing ponds from mining tar and oil sands are devastating pristine wilderness and waterways ?
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Market Tinkering
The Conservative and Liberal Democrat Coalition Government in the United Kingdom have several competing interests to juggle when it comes to the electricity generation industry.
Any proposed tinkering in the electricity market will need to show it still promotes competition (even though new entrants will probably complain they can’t compete in auctions), even as it guarantees safe and stable power supplies, even as it needs to make sure consumers don’t get ripped off.
The Department of Energy and Climate Change have published a clearly-written consultation document on their proposals for an Electricity Market Reform (EMR), detailing various methods of intervening to ensure long-term objectives on carbon emissions and energy security :-
https://www.decc.gov.uk/en/content/cms/consultations/emr/emr.aspx
I’ve been reading some really helpful commentary on the system-wide effects of these proposals :-
https://www.decc.gov.uk/assets/decc/Consultations/emr/1043-emr-analysis-policy-options.pdf
https://www.parliamentarybrief.com/2011/01/thumbs-up-a-little-early-for-that-mr-huhne#all
So far, my conclusion is that the net effect of these proposals will be to make the electricity generators feel secure about future earnings.
I’m not convinced that anything I’ve read so far will help energy supply companies feel willing to leap the expensive investment hurdle to ensure the UK gets new low carbon power plants.
I’m not even sure if the carbon and power pricing described will deter companies from dirty power generation and direct them towards new low carbon investment.
When I happened on the levelised cost of power in the main DECC analysis document, I came to a very pragmatic conclusion :-
https://www.decc.gov.uk/assets/decc/Consultations/emr/1041-electricity-market-reform-condoc.pdf
Figure 2 (see top) shows that FOAK (first of a kind) new nuclear reactor plant designs (which is what we are told we will be getting in the UK) are probably going to yield similar unit electricity price values to Onshore Wind Power and Combined Cycle Gas Turbine (CCGT) plant using Natural Gas feedstock.
My question is : why do we need to intervene with the electricity market to incentivise low carbon generation if the cheapest technologies are the low carbon options anyway ? (Yes, I’ve deliberately forgotten to discuss Carbon Capture and Storage).
My second question is : are the financial instruments proposed for the electricity market simply a sop to the electricity generators to leverage investment in new and efficient low carbon power stations ? Come and invest in new power generation in Great Britain and see your earnings stable (or rising) !
And my third question is this : don’t the NIMBY campaigns against Onshore Wind Power realise their success means that the overall cost of electricity to the consumers will rise significantly as wind power has to move offshore ?
My conclusion is : it would be far cheaper simply to instruct the largely publicly owned banks to make investment finance available, but only for low carbon technologies and forget about trying to maintain the facade of a free market.
Power supply is virtually a monopoly – and the State is bound to maintain supply – DECC have even got proposals on the table in their main Energy Bill to buy up any power companies that fail…yet another bailout !
My print copy of New Scientist magazine slithers through the letterbox in its biodegradable plastic sheath and plops weightily on the doormat. Hours later I pick it up, and it crinkles with the promise of lots of juicy new information. What I’m not prepared for is the disappointment of the sell-out on the inside of the front cover :-
“Win a trip to the high Arctic and the deep sea : Ever wanted to see polar bears and whales in their natural habitats ? Or how about visiting the sea floor ? Here’s your chance : New Scientist has teamed up with Statoil, the global energy company, to offer one lucky winner and a guest the trip of a lifetime – to sail around the Svalbard archipelago inside the Arctic Circle, home to polar bears and whales, and to fly to the giant Troll platform, where you will visit the bottom of the North Sea. To win this amazing prize all you have to do is tell us, in no more than 100 words, which engineering project you think will have the greatest impact on human life in the next 30 years, and why. To find out more and to enter the competition go to www.newscientist.com/engineeringgreats. The closing date for entries is 2 March 2011.”
A large part of the page is taken up with a photograph of a polar bear, a poster child for Climate Change.
The implication-by-association is that Statoil want to protect the environment. But what’s their real business ? Shipping large quantities of Natural Gas – not exactly zero carbon fuel.
Not only that, but pages 10 and 11 of the magazine are an “advertising feature” on behalf of Statoil. The infommercial is in exactly the same style and typeface as the rest of the magazine, which I think is plain deceptive. Perhaps it is there to make sure that people entering the prize competition nominate Statoil’s technology as the “engineering great” for the future. That’s a bit rich. In one fell swoop the global energy industry have co-opted not only polar bears but the New Scientist magazine into the bargain !
The “advertising feature” features Carbon Capture and Storage (CCS), which is what Statoil is famous for with their Sleipner facility, where they inject excess Carbon Dioxide (CO2) from Natural Gas back into the field to store it. The “advertising feature” attempts to sell the “good idea” of CCS, but cleverly injects a bit of “balance” to take the reader along with it.
“…The conclusion so far is that the CO2 is safely stored…It’s not possible to be 100 per cent certain about this…”
I would have thought that if it’s not 100% locked down that some people might be quite unsure about relying on it. But anyway. It appears that the European Union and several other key players really believe in CCS technology, and are willing to put public funds into it :-
https://ec.europa.eu/energy/technology/initiatives/doc/implementation_plan_2010_2012_eii_ccs.pdf
https://ec.europa.eu/energy/technology/initiatives/initiatives_en.htm
The only way that any business would buy into CCS would be if there is a carbon price differential implemented – as CCS adds costs to everything :-
“…Statoil made the choice to lock up the field’s CO2 for good business reasons: the Norwegian government would have levied a tax of $50 for every tonne of CO2 it emitted…”
But fitting CCS to power plants is going to be a lot different than the Sleipner project :-
“…Then there is the question of whether the technique can be extended to CO2 produced by combustion, in particular from fossil-fuel power stations…handling flue gases from power plants is going to require significant extra cost…”
So what kind of carbon price would support Carbon Capture and Storage ? $80 per tonne ? $120 per tonne ? That’s the kind of money our leaders are willing to shell out from tax revenues to support the continued burning of coal to make electricity. Wouldn’t it be better, more cost effective, to put the money into Renewable Energy technologies and just stop burning coal ? After all, coal could get a lot more pricey in the next few years :-
https://www.businessinsider.com/the-chinese-coal-monster-running-out-of-puff-2010-11
If I were in charge, I would recommend that nobody builds any new coal-fired power stations, and that we start a phase of withdrawal from coal-burning for power generation, forget about Carbon Capture and Storage and put the public money into financing the development of Biogas, BioSyngas and Renewable Hydrogen – zero carbon gas products that could replace Natural Gas and coal entirely.
Carbon Capture and Storage (CCS) as known as Carbon Geosequestration, or more simply Carbon Sequestration was put forward as a “leading edge” technology to the IPCC from the energy industry way back in 2002 :-
https://www.climatescience.gov/Library/ipcc/ScopingPaper-SRCCS.pdf
A Special Report was published by the IPCC in 2005 :-
https://www.ipcc.ch/publications_and_data/publications_and_data_reports.shtml#2
The reasoning was as follows : coal is cheap and abundant, allegedly, and everybody (especially the Chinese) are going to continue burning it for energy for another 200 years, so we better find ways to mitigate the emissions using engineering.
The first big fail on the score card : it’s expensive. You have to spend heaps more money on not only the CCS pumping and storage infrastructure, but you have to spend heaps more money on fuel as a coal-fired power station with CCS fitted will burn something in the region of 20% to 45% more fuel (analyses vary) :-
https://www.worldcoal.org/carbon-capture-storage/ccs-technologies/
“Around 10-40% more energy is required with CCS than without…”
The second big fail, and this could be the clincher : it uses even more water than un-mitigated coal power generation, and in some places (notably China and the USA), water competition between population, agriculture and industry is appearing :-
https://belfercenter.ksg.harvard.edu/files/ETIP-DP-2010-15-final-4.pdf
See pages 42 and 46 (Conclusion).
And all this just to justify continuing to burn coal, when supply is stressed and prices are at risk of rising…
Tell me please : is anybody seriously demonstrating large volume CCS anywhere in the world apart from people burying Carbon Dioxide as a means for Enhanced Oil Recovery in old petroleum wells ?
It seems that the only way to finance CCS will be through a ridiculous international subsidy known as the Clean Development Mechanism – although why dirty coal should get it, I really don’t know. It would be much, much cheaper to stop using fossil fuels and start using green power…
The Cancun IPCC get-together ruled CCS projects into the CDM :-
And this after it having been ruled out in the 2009 IPCC hook up in Copenhagen :-
How’s Australia doing ? :-
https://news.ninemsn.com.au/national/8185689/bligh-spends-more-on-carbon-capture
And what’s the deal about “cleaner” plants ? :-
https://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2010/jul/14/un-carbon-offset-coal-plants
For more news and views from the inside :-
https://www.ccsassociation.org.uk/news/latest_news.html
(but don’t believe the map – most of the projects won’t be happening)
https://www.captureready.com/EN/Channels/Home/index.asp
(Download the newsletters – link top right)
How ready is Carbon Capture ?
https://www.geos.ed.ac.uk/sccs/Capture_Ready_CCS_power_plant_Report_for_WWF_(FINAL)_May08.pdf
https://www.environment-agency.gov.uk/research/library/position/120154.aspx
https://finance.yahoo.com/news/FutureGen-narrows-potential-apf-2858992453.html?x=0&.v=1
https://solar.calfinder.com/blog/solar-information/futuregen-clean-coal/
Fail number 3 : doesn’t look like it’s even close to getting off the starting blocks yet in the race to a lower carbon future.
Looks like we’ve all been captured by the concept of Carbon Capture, but that it’s a gossamer filament of ethereal phlogiston, wafting away in the breeze.
Bypass coal, and go straight to the concentrated solar powerhouse, I’d advise.
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We Will Get To You
Video Credit : Brooklyn Space Program
Eventually we will reach you.
Scientists are proverbially poor at communication, but we will eventually be able to explain to you what is happening to the Earth in a way that you will understand.
You need to give some time to the data, to the arguments. You need to read the significant research papers, learn how to read graphs, learn the acronyms, abbreviations, technical terms.
You will need to be able to weigh in your mind the significance of probabilities, the risks of extremes, the trends, the changing patterns.
After a while, you will start to reappraise the evidence, and start looking into the data and see the conclusions for yourself.
You will begin to appreciate the strong line of reasoning, and come to be in awe of the minds of many who work on Climate Change.
I’ve become impressed by the body of scientific evidence, that’s why I will always be aligned with the Climate Change science community.
We’re not going anywhere. We’re here, and we’re right. There has already been significant change in the Earth’s climate due to humankind’s mining-to-burn activities, and the projections are for further, possibly very dangerous change.
The scientists know what the problems are, and what the engineering solutions are. Some companies/corporations, economists and politicans and sadly even some compromised “environmentalists” promote non-solutions like carbon pricing, Carbon Taxation, Carbon Trading, Carbon Capture (and Storage), GM Crops, Nuclear Power, geoengineering – but the academies of scientists are telling you they won’t work, or won’t solve all the problems.
What is needed is wholesale removal of Fossil Fuels from the global economy in order to prevent further deterioration and disruption in the global climatic conditions. Either BP, Shell, Chevron and ExxonMobil hang up their boots forever, or they need to embrace new clean energies (not Nuclear Power) to stay in business.
Oil, gas and coal depletion in the production facilities of those countries that are national players will mean that they will go bust, because a consistently high price for Fossil Fuels is not supportable, because the global economy is so Fossil Fuel-dependent currently. This is both a buyer’s market and a seller’s market, so the price will be governed by the operation of this two-sided cartel, not by the theories of “scarcity economics”.
Either Saudi Arabia, Iraq, Iran, China, Venezuela and so on are on their way to extreme poverty, or they will embrace new clean energies (not Nuclear Power) to stay economically developed.
Meanwhile, the project of empirical scientific enquiry continues apace, and even though rich fossil fuel businesses are financing doubt, even though people with pension funds in mining pour scorn on Climate Change science, and even though the mainstream media can’t recognise uneducated propaganda when they meet it; you need to trust the intellectual community of Climate Change science researchers.
Stop listening to accusations of malpractice, dodgy data, weak methods, poor models. Do you really know what you are talking about when you pass judgement on the scientific community ? Who told you that scientists were wrong ? Can you really trust the people who tell you not to trust the scientific community ? Do you have the right or the authority to lay somebody else’s fabricated blame at the door of those whose whole lives are devoted to discovering the truth ?
Why don’t you do an integrity check on your sources, before replicating myths ?
Read the science journals and not the newspapers, is my advice.
And when it comes to the Internet, search wisely. You can’t believe every website you come across – there are some web loggers who are misled, and there are others seeking to mislead.
If you want to filter out the nonsense, try this :-
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Ride the Future
Video Found At : Energy Bulletin
The Earth keeps turning, the Sun keeps burning, and the future will look a lot different than today as we drag down Carbon Dioxide emissions “by hook or by crook”.
We have to be wary of possible “crooks”. There are still technology “snake oil salesmen” out there, trying to impose Genetically Modified crops on us, or Nuclear Power, or Carbon Capture and Storage (to justify the continued use of Coal), and using the vehicle of science to push their wares :-
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/agriculture/8048917/Climate-change-threatens-UK-harvest.html
“Climate change threatens UK harvest : Climate change could push up food prices by causing large-scale crop failures in Britain, the Met Office has warned. : By Louise Gray, Environment Correspondent : Published: 08 Oct 2010 : Rising temperatures could mean events such as the drought in Russia this summer, which pushed up grain prices, hit countries like the UK. But they said the worst effects of climate change could be limited by investment in better farming and the development of new drought resistant or heat tolerant crops. This could be done by aid money, breeding and new technologies like genetic modification (GM)…”
https://www.leeds.ac.uk/news/article/908/crop_failures_set_to_increase_under_climate_change
Look out for terms like “new crops”, “crop development” or “modified crops” :-
https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/10/101007092817.htm
https://iopscience.iop.org/1748-9326/5/3/034012/
See the use of the word “biotechnology” in the actual research paper :-
https://iopscience.iop.org/1748-9326/5/3/034012/pdf/1748-9326_5_3_034012.pdf
But, as everybody can probably guess, most farmers in the world will not be able to afford Genetically Modified crops, and anyway, nobody really yet knows if GM crops confer the benefits claimed – there is some evidence that “life scientists” don’t know the full range of effects on organisms from gene splicing.
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Tu Me Manques, David Miliband
I don’t know about you, but I’m missing David Miliband from the political fish-eat-fish top table already.
If he were to ask me, which he won’t, but anyway, if he did, I would recommend that he starts reading up about Energy production and supply, over the next 18 months or so before he gets invited, acceptingly, back into the Shadow Cabinet of the UK Government.
If he were to spend his time on the train between South Shields and Westminster looking into energy security matters, into crustal petrogeology, the Middle East oil fields, Wind Power, solar and marine options, he could make a strong comeback into the limelight – as opposed to the “lemon” light he’s been cast into, thrust into, so far.
If he becomes acquainted with the ways and wiles of engineering and fossil fuels over the next few years, the viability of Renewable Energy solutions, the transport explosion phenomenon and how to control it, then he will be able to offer solid assistance to his younger brother Teddy – who appears to be mistakenly sold on the idea of new nuclear power.
And if Ed Miliband were to ask, (again, which he won’t), I’d say – atomic energy cannot save us; carbon capture technology cannot save us; algae biodiesel can only trickle, even Frankenstein GM algae biodiesel; Peak Oil is almost definitely here; efficiency of use alone cannot save us. We have to go right out for a non-combustion, Renewable Energy future.
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America Finally Might Actually Do Something
[ UPDATE : America might not actually, finally, do something – check the resistance dinosaurs. ]
We have waited long enough for serious action States-side on Global Warming.
The bankers (apparently largely Goldman Sachs and JP Morgan with lashings of Tony Blair) had their chance to talk up the idea of Carbon Trading. What a dead duck that turned out to be !
Carbon Taxation looks like it’s a non-starter with the global economy being a whisker from utter, utter, collapse.
The Clean Development Mechanism isn’t.
(Plus, the CDM hasn’t helped those it was principally promoted to help – Africa).
The global Biofuels targets are reducing rainforest to logpiles.
The Coal Kings have been pushing the idea of Carbon Capture and Storage for well over fifteen years and persuaded…no one.
The nightwalkers from the dark, radioactive side are still scaring people and luring them at the same time. If Iran wanting Nuclear Power was tricky enough, now Saudi Arabia, UAE and Kuwait want it too, and I don’t expect the international dialogue tightrope act to get any easier.
The Congress and the Senate have seen filibuster and deal-breaking and lobbyist handshakes in dark corridors and reneging in bars.
But, at long last, it seems like Barack Obama is going to do what he hinted at, and regulate the bottom line out of Carbon Dioxide emissions, regardless of whether there’s any elected representatives passing bills :-
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What Germany Says, Germany Means
Unlike the United Kingdom, where political sensibility can quash the most logical enactment of energy policy, plans for progress voiced so tentatively you can bearly feel a ripple, or hear it over the whispering swoosh of a new wind turbine blade, over in Deutschland, what they say, they intend to happen, and they’re making serious proposals about how that’s going to be done :-
https://www.spiegel.de/international/germany/0,1518,716221,00.html
“09/07/2010 : Green Visions : Merkel’s Masterplan for a German Energy Revolution : By Stefan Schultz : Giant windparks, insulated buildings, electric cars and a European supergrid: the German government on Monday unveiled an ambitious but vague blueprint to launch a new era of green energy for Europe’s largest economy. SPIEGEL ONLINE has analyzed the plans…”
It appears to be time to wave bye-bye to German coal, incidentally, even as a strong commitment to renewable, sustainable energy is put on the table.
I wish the British Government could take a long hard look at themselves in the mirror of the future and realise what a bunch of dithering duffers they appear to be.
What we need is a proper Energy Policy, chaps, and since you’re in the hot seat you better come up with it. Elected or not, our ministers and officials need to get up out of their deep leather chairs, extinguish their pipes, don their working breeches and get digging for Britain, and I don’t mean Shale Gas or Old Coal.
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Climate Weak
An e-mail trail with a certain amount of political content…
from: Kate Shepherd
date: Tue, Aug 10, 2010
subject: Climate Week
Hello Jo
It was lovely to speak with you today about Climate Week and I’d be grateful if you could pass on the information to the rest of your team.
Climate Week, 21st – 27th March 2011, is a new national occasion on climate change, backed by the Prime Minister, Al Gore and Kofi Annan. During Climate Week, thousands of events will be run by organisations from every part of society to highlight the positive steps being taken to help prevent climate change.
I have attached a document for further information, the document includes a list of supporters of Climate Week, which range from every part of society: from the Chief Fire Officers Association to the Women’s Institute, the Girl Guiding UK to several Regional Development Agencies.
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The Independent “in association with Shell”
I rubbed my eyes, but the logo didn’t disappear. The Independent newspaper article had a graphic explaining that the article was “in association with Shell” :-
https://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/newenergyfuture/a-climate-for-european-action-2068570.html
Further clue : the author was Tom Burke, “Mr Clean Coal” to those of us that know of him.
The article was great, up until the paragraph :-
“Without deploying carbon capture and storage technologies for coal and gas, Europe has no workable climate policy…”
Well, we knew Tom Burke was going to say that, didn’t we ?
But why was the article “in association with Shell” ? Is this the start of advertising masquerading as opinion articles ?
What could possibly link Royal Dutch Shell to Carbon Capture and Storage ? The “Enhanced Oil Recovery” (EOR) angle, possibly – Shell offering to pump Carbon Dioxide down into its depleting oil and gas wells in an attempt to raise the pressure on the remaining hydrocarbon, to squeeze it out.
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Come On Over For Lunch
Shock ! Horror ! Major Climate Change Scientist spotted at Climate Camp…ah, but which one… ? How to distinguish one dressed-down, unwashed individual with dishevelled locks from any another ?
Any sign of Climate Change sceptic-denier Andrew Montford, as affectionately known as “Bishop Hill” ? Can’t make him out, but he might have responded to the banner appeal to “Come On Over for Lunch”. You never know. That might be him chopping potatoes, right in the thick of it.
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Climate Change Denial, Everywhere
Here follows an extract of a conversation I have had with members of the Claverton Energy Research Forum, which I have cut-and-paste into a more easy-to-read fashion below the fold :-
As you can see, there are Climate Change sceptic-deniers everywhere, even in the most knowledgeable and respectable circles.
Countering Climate Change denial from so-called “sceptics” takes a lot of time and energy, and is a bump-in-the-road nuisance/irritation distraction from the main priority for human civilisation, which is how to stop being addicted to Fossil Fuels.
Proponents of the proposed Great Engineering Feat of Carbon Capture and Storage, portray their heroic efforts to suck Carbon Dioxide out of industrial processes, and even out of the sky itself, as the last chance to save us from ourselves and our untidy emissions.
Thing is, even if all the extra Carbon Dioxide in the Atmosphere from the last 150 years of human Fossil Fuel burning activities could be swallowed down into rocks, filters, artificial trees, real trees and caves, all at once, when we have invented and fully developed the Geoengineering Technology for it, we would still have a globally warmed world, and still plenty of excess Carbon Dioxide in the Oceans and Land, which can still make its way out into the Atmosphere…
The enduring challenge is that we must curtail and rein in Carbon Dioxide emissions, as soon as possible, starting now. We cannot carry on burning and wait for Carbon-sucking technological marvels, that may never materialise, as Ken Caldeira and his research colleague Long Cao demonstrate :-
https://iopscience.iop.org/1748-9326/5/2/024011/fulltext
“Atmospheric carbon dioxide removal: long-term consequences and commitment : Long Cao and Ken Caldeira : [Department of Global Ecology, Carnegie Institution, Stanford, CA, USA] : Environ. Res. Lett. 5 (April-June 2010) 024011 : doi:10.1088/1748-9326/5/2/024011”
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Financial Ties : Green Taxes
The Financial Times advises :-
https://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/5dca38e0-8ac1-11df-8e17-00144feab49a.html
“Environmentalists have had a disappointing year. The Copenhagen talks fizzled and the economic crisis has overshadowed all other considerations. But the need for countries to repair towering fiscal deficits is an opening for the movement. As treasuries look for ways to raise more revenues, climate change activists should make the case for green taxes.”
So, environmental campaigners should be campaigning for green taxes to plug holes in public deficits caused by crashing banks ?
I think not.
Tax revenue that is collected on the basis of environmental pollution should always be hypothecated, committed to remediation and removal of environmental pollution.
The majority of the populations of the deficit-stricken economies (OK, then, the whole world) are quite right in resisting being locked down into extra taxation at present. Green taxes would be a financial tie too tight for most of the world’s economically stressed.
Green taxes spent on things other than green energy and energy efficiency would be a mockery.
Besides which, only very high levels of green taxation would have any impact on pollution behaviour – the “signal” from green taxes would be lost amongst general economic “instability” (that is, price rises due to other factors).
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Climate Union : Sharing Principles
Image Credit : Gilbert & George, “Nettle Dance”, White Cube
I’m in the Climate Union. Are You ?
Soon we could all be, if the expansionist plans of a group of social campaigners come to fruition.
Taking in the unions, faith communities and the usual rag-tag bunch of issues activists, the Climate Union aims to establish itself as a political force for Low Carbon.
First of all, however, it has to tackle the uneasy and prickly problem of the exact name of the movement, and the principles under which it will operate.
The flag has been flown : a set of principles has been circulated for discussion amongst the “Climate Forum”. I cannot show you the finalised document yet, but I can offer you my comments (see below).
If you want to comment on the development of this emerging entity, please contact : Peter Robinson, Campaign against Climate Change, mobile/cell telephone in the UK : 07876595993.
Comments on the Climate Forum Principles
Jo Abbess
28 June 2010
I am aware that my comments are going to be a little challenging. I made similar comments during the review of the ClimateSafety briefing, which were highly criticised.
I expect you to be negative in response to what I say, but I think it is necessary to make sure the Climate Forum does not become watered-down, sectorally imprisoned and politically neutered, like so many other campaigns.
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Unpicking Kyoto (2)
Unpicking Kyoto
Jo Abbess
20 June 2010
CONTINUED FROM PART 1
PART 2
Why Was Copenhagen Such A Washout ?
The international community, in the form of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) established the Kyoto Protocol back in 1997, a treaty that was ratified only as late as 2005 after compromises from the World Trade Organisation (WTO) for Russia. Global Climate Change negotiations, even before the Rio Earth Summit in 1992 have been beset by recurring problems.