Back in 2003 James Hansen was saying that we had about 10 years to get ourselves organised to tackle global warming and climate change. You ignore him at your peril.
For three days this May some of the best minds on the planet attended a curious meeting at Cambridge University, the St James’s Palace Nobel Laureate Symposium, to contribute their ideas and authority to some of the world’s most pressing challenges, in this case the climate crisis and its implications.
The choice of topic is not surprising. This was the second such meeting. The first was two years earlier at the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research in Germany. So the list of participants included one Hans Joachim Schellnhuber, Director of said Potsdam Institute, Malte Meinshausen from the same place, Rachendra Pachauri, the IPCC head honcho, Lords Gidden and Stern, and a fella called Steven Chu, Secretary of Energy for the USA.
The message from our intellectual elders is captured in the phrase:
The fierce urgency of now…
As it happens the folk at Potsdam have been putting a bit of flesh on that message.
One of the more interesting scenarios for stabilisation I’ve seen recently came from Bill Hare of Potsdam in Chapter 2 of the Worldwatch Institute State of the World 2009 report:
Figure 1: Bill Hare’s stabilisation trajectory for a safe climate
This he reckons is the “emissions pathway required to limit warming to below 2 degrees Celsius with higher confidence”. Start early, go hard and reach zero emissions by 2050, then go negative. The trajectory is designed for a safe landing. After flirting with 2C the temperature is meant to come back to 1C above pre-industrial in the latter part of this century.
The same sort of thinking was contained in the Climate crunch issue on Nature where Malte Meinshausen did much of the heavy lifting. The basic concept here was that there is a limited remaining budget of gigatonnes of carbon that we can put into the atmosphere before we hit 2C. The cumulative quantity of emissions is what’s important. Since industrialisation we’ve already used up half our allowable budget. We can do the same again and that’s it.
It is commonly thought that if we start later we have to cut harder, but that’s OK provided we reach the same end point by 2050. What Meinshausen et al are saying is that if we start later we have to hit that end point sooner. It’s the area under the line on the graph, stupid!
Hare was looking at a safe climate scenario. Meinshausen based his calculations on the riskier kind of scenario being adopted politically around the world of a 50% reduction from 1990 levels by 2050 and zero by about 2080:
Figure 2: Meinshausen’s stabilisation path and related temperature values
This scenario has a 75% chance of not breaching the 2C limit. The graph comes from an article by Stefan Rahmstorf, where he puts the situation in, well, very plain and simple German. (For plain English, see RealClimate.) The budget for 2000-2050 is 1000gt of CO2 (or around 1500gt CO2e). But oops! we’ve blown a third of it already in the years 2000-2008! So our options are spelt out in Meinshausen’s second graph:
Figure 3: Meinshausen’s emissions reduction options
If we leave peaking global emissions from 2010 until 2015, the penalty is that the annual reduction rate goes up from 2% to 3.6%. I was actually shocked by the difference every five years makes. Remember the words of our elders!
50% reduction by 2050 depends on peaking in 2010. If you leave it until 2015 it has to be 90% by 2050 for the same climate outcome. Leave peaking to 2020 and we need zero by 2045.
Now the Germans have taken the remaining emissions budget and looked at the implications for individual countries if the budget is allocated equitably, based on population. Then they’ve specified how many years it would take major emitters to blow their budget at current emissions rates. Here are some of the results:
Figure 4: Future responsibility for emissions
A few things stand out. Firstly, the US is in a hopeless situation. If, say, they bought credits from India and other developing countries there would be a massive transfer of wealth.
Secondly, no-one should be buying credits from China, which might come as a surprise to them.
Third, the future of the planet does depend critically on what the US and China do.
Australia presumably is worse placed than the US.
What the world has been doing lately is illustrated in Will Steffen’s recent report which contained this graph:
Figure 5: CO2 emissions from 1990 to 2007
The Raupach et al 2007 paper which contained the original graph indicated that 70% of the increase in emissions was coming from developing and transitional economies. There is obviously an urgent need to equip these countries with renewable energy technology.
I think the Germans’ approach is rational and gives a new gloss to the phrase “common but differentiated responsibility”. Paying for the external cost of our lifestyles and exercising responsibility towards both the planet and posterity. We know that that the world does not operate according to reason but what the Germans have done provides a useful perspective with which to judge the outcomes of Copenhagen.
Speaking of which, it is not yet clear, to me at least, what we can expect from Copenhagen. This BBC story suggests three main options. Yvo de Boer, executive secretary of the UN climate convention (UNFCCC) said:
Three options were on the table, said Mr de Boer: a completely new document, an extension of the Kyoto Protocol, or a “series of decisions” made at the Copenhagen talks.
The developing countries are insisting on specific pledges of cuts by the developing countries, which would come from an extension of the Kyoto protocol. A completely new treaty is not going to happen at Copenhagen; there is no time.
What they are shooting for now, it seems, is a political framework
an “overarching decision” that sets individual targets for industrialized countries, and determines what level of emissions reductions major developing countries are willing to make by 2020.
Then leaders need to
set a deadline for a treaty that works out those details.
They will also need to settle on an assistance package for developing countries. In this regard the EU is now proposing a 100bn euros a year to 2020 of which they will supply about a quarter. It’s not a lot. Whether this is a circuit breaker remains to be seen.
Stephen Chu’s attendance at the St James’s Palace Nobel Laureate Symposium notwithstanding, (it happened just after the publication of the Nature “Climate Crunch” issue, so he would have seen the graphs) he has to bring the American people, or at least Congress along with him. The US may not commit at all unless the Senate passes the climate bill.
Obama won’t go Copenhagen to make things happen. He’ll only go if things do happen without him. Besides he’ll be busy collecting his Nobel prize.
The target of a 17% reduction from 2005 levels I understand equates to 4% from 1990. So at best we’ll get a FAIL from the US in terms of what the world needs from them. Not even close.
The difficulty domestically in the US is well-illustrated by the report that 10 Democrat Senators want a protective tariffs provision to shield the steel industry against imports from China and other developing nations. That would make the Chinese “very frustrated and angry”. But the US senators may not play ball unless China itself comes up with some commitments. They would be looking for numbers.
Please note that the planet doesn’t benefit except perhaps marginally from the export of the American steel industry.
To complicate matters, senators Boxer and Kerry have now cooked up an energy bill (mentioned in the earlier link) proposing a reduction of 20% from 2005 levels. It seems that the Republicans will ensure that nothing goes anywhere, at least until after Copenhagen.
China’s Hu Jintau recently made a splash by pledging at a UN summit to cut “carbon intensity,” or the amount of carbon dioxide produced for each dollar of economic output, over the decade to 2020. There is a question as to what that actually means. In all probability it means, inter alia, (a) that Chinese emissions will continue to grow, but not as fast as they might have done, and (b) that Chinese reliance on coal, currently at about 70%, would remain for at least several decades.
We live in a world where both population and per capita GDP are expanding. Adam Barnes has calculated that we need to reduce emissions per unit of GDP by 66% by 2050 if we just want to keep emissions at their present dangerous levels. That’s based on a population increase of 50% and a mere doubling of per capita GDP.
If we are shooting for an 80% reduction by 2050 we’ll need a 96% reduction in emissions per unit of GDP, assuming 50% population growth and 3% pa growth in per capita GDP.
China plans to cut “energy consumption per unit of GDP by 20 percent between 2006 and 2010.” If you believe them, at their GDP growth rate that would still lead to rising emissions.
Raupach et al found that world energy intensity in relation to GDP had steadily decreased during the 20th century, but began to increase in the 21st. We need to do something about it but by itself it’s not enough.
China plans to get 15% of its power from renewables by 2020. That’s less than Australia’s RET of 20% but makes for a very large industry. I’m not sure whether it includes nuclear, very likely it does.
On a recent thread Roger Jones commented that the Chinese are working on a big integrated model with all their energy sectors to peak emissions and decline within three decades. The scientists think it can be done, the policy makers are not yet convinced. This finds support in a recent BBC story where the best prospect held out is peaking at 2030. More likely 2040.
Given where they would be then, this is also a “fail” in terms of what the world needs.
As everyone heads off to Barcelona for the penultimate gabfest, to me the prospects for Copenhagen, at best, don’t look all that good.
I’ll finish with some comments from me, totally unqualified lay person. First, two degrees isn’t safe. This from the RealClimate link:
We feel compelled to note that even a “moderate” warming of 2°C stands a strong chance of provoking drought and storm responses that could challenge civilized society, leading potentially to the conflict and suffering that go with failed states and mass migrations. Global warming of 2°C would leave the Earth warmer than it has been in millions of years, a disruption of climate conditions that have been stable for longer than the history of human agriculture. Given the drought that already afflicts Australia, the crumbling of the sea ice in the Arctic, and the increasing storm damage after only 0.8°C of warming so far, calling 2°C a danger limit seems to us pretty cavalier.
Second, I would understand that the Meinshausen scenarios are worked out with models that don’t include the longer term feedbacks James Hansen talks about. Even reaching Bill Hare’s 1C target would leave ice melting more than it is at present.
Third, as we saw in looking at Susan Solomon’s work, if we hit zero emissions tomorrow the climate would take a long time to recover. Delays measured in decades have consequences measured in centuries.
Fourth, no-one really knows when we might hit one of those dreaded tipping points that could by themselves ramp up the temperature a couple of degrees, or perhaps freeze Europe over.
That and more is why I’d prefer to take Bill Hare’s stabilisation path and shorten it to reach zero by 2030. But I guess it will take the world at least 10 years to wake up. By then it will be desperately close to game over as far as our emissions budget is concerned.
I think at least some of the European policy makers know. It’s the Americans, the Chinese and the rest of us that need to wake up.
The Holocene has been good for us as a species, but right now I fear we are heading somewhere else.
I apogogise for the length of this one, which is beyond my usual self-imposed limit, but I couldn’t solve the problem. I was particularly interested in the fact that Steven Chu was the only senior policy maker at the St James Symposium. Perhaps he was the only one that could qualify, but I can’t help thinking that inviting him was strategic.
You might be pleased to know that my next post won’t be on climate change as such, but I can’t promise it will be cheerful.
No apology necessary Brian. Without hyperbole your posts are consistently the best things I read about climate change anywhere on the web.
The downside is that they’re so frigging depressing. What am I bequeathing to humanity? We’re going to have kids in the next 18 months.
Very very depressing.
patrickg, I’m about to post to my daughter some photos we took of my grandchild when we saw them recently. She’s 18 months old and is such a positive little tike, in that exploration stage, when a leaf or twig is a source of curiosity and wonder.
It’s very, very sad.
No disrespect to Brian, Patrick, but there’s a lot of really well written material on the web in a variety of registers and with different focii which would compare well with Brian’s excellent work here. So perhaps a touch hyperbolic …
I feel confident Brian would agree.
Sure I agree, Fran. No argument. It’s even generous to me and better than I rate myself.
In some ways you are only as good as the last thing you’ve written and it is always with some trepidation I press the “publish” button.
“The Holocene has been good for us as a species, but right now I fear we are heading somewhere else.”
I dunno if I’d call that hyperbole tho. What evidence is there that we aren’t headed that way? I think we have pother problems as or more important than climate change myself, but … its certainly a big one. I’d be more worried about the state of the oceans right now actually, in fact I am. And are we in the sixth, or on to the fifth mass extinction event yet? etc etc.
Brian, I have a comment in moderation (three links)
Fran, they’re the best things I read about it, and I stand by that.
I’m not saying it’s the best thing in the world, for everyone, for all time etc. But for me, that statement is true without hyperbole. You’re entitled to your own opinion, but a compliment is hardly denigrating other writers.
Jules … I think the hyperbole was about the praise rather than about the holocene reference.
We would be entering the sixth mass extinction, if it happened. The last was at the PETM 55.8 million years ago …
I didn’t suggest you were denigrating other writers Patrick and you are of course entitled to your opinion. I was merely making the point that there’s lots of really well written stuff out there, for a range of audiences.
Greg Craven for example, writes some excellent material for non-scientists.
thanks Brian, and don’t ever apologise for length.
Well, I read widely on the topic, on the net, and I vote for Brian for best, most acessible exegesis and analysis out there.
Great post – and I’m inclined to agree that Copenhagen may not brings result – particularly as the US congress is dragging its heels. The context here of course is that back in 97 Clinton and Gore ultimately couldnt commit the nation without a number from Congress, and then of course the Senate ratifying the treaty (then Bush dumped the whole thing) – and Obama doesnt want the same headache. But even so, its doens show what BS the Liberal party here is spinning – Copenhagen will be sunk if every nation did the same and brought nothing to the table.
But those irrelevant LNP losers aside, I feel very strongly that global citizens have to become the other party at these talks. too many government are there representing national carbon lobbies, smugly imagining that by doing so they will somehow be speaking for their own people.
Bullshit – first, those economies who stay carbon heavy might as well get BORN TO LOSE tattooed on their forehead. If you cant see where this is headed (towards trade penalties on recalcitrants, to the new boom industries being those with lower emissions; to value added global trade being about who will sell, and which losers will buy cleaner tech) then you’re selling national jobs down the toilet – not protecting them.
2nd – ordinary people will increasingly embarrass their own governments over inaction. Im sorry, but you wont get to wear the cloak of “economic patriotism” for long – governments who represent only carbon lobbies will be increasingly be regarded as treacherous, corrupt and illegimate.
jules, this year I’d planned to write more about the oceans and the future of food. Just didn’t get time. My next post will be on food and the bloke whose ideas I’ll be writing about says explicitly that it’s a bigger problem than climate change.
I tend not to think about which is worse, they are all bad and all related.
Fran, most lists of the great extinctions I’ve seen don’t list the PETM, although I understand that there was a significant changing of the guard within species. It is interesting that Hansen in writing about the PETM actually confuses it with the Permian-Triassic of 251mya. I think this graph from the Wikipedia article is interesting.
Brian it certainly seems to be a bigger problem than Global Warming.
I spose we could always eat jellyfish.
This is all very well but what is the remediation program?
What we really need is a firm program that will have an immediate impact on CO2 emissions.
The most serious impediment to this is the belief that some-how there is a magic pill that will solve the problem. If only there was such a thing as clean coal, if only there was such a thing as nice happy nuclear energy.
The stress should be on immediate, we do not have the time to indulge in boffin fantasies. Even if the solutions are not very glamorous we need them now, not fifteen years in the future.
So what are the near term technologies that can be implemented on a global scale?
Number one: Convert all power generation to gas, preferably coal seam methane but any gas will do.
Advantages:
1. Fast, there is a huge operational facility for the manufacture of gas turbines as well as a very large and easily expandable facility for the steam tailing plants.
2. Efficient, Combined cycle Gas Turbine plants are the most efficient method of power generation known. They achieve about 70% thermal efficiency vs about 35% for nuclear and 40% for the best coal plant. Even on natural gas they will reduce CO2 emissions by at least 50%.
Number two;
Install energy storage systems in every home in the developed world. These would need to be about 20 kWH, in Australia this would result in 80 GWH (useable)of dispersed energy storage on the East Coast. This will flatten the After Diversity Maximum Demand to less than 1 kW and result in distribution energy savings of about 20% by my modelling. It will also have the effect of increasing the Annual Capacity Factor of Wind to 100% of the maximum theoretical also Solar.
Number 3
Install Ammonia injection in every car and truck in the country. This will cut vehicle emissions by 50% without the need for any major vehicle modifications.
That should buy us time.
Will we do it?
No Fucking Way.
The dreamers will dream about nuclear heaven, solar heaven, geo-thermal heaven and while they dream the waters will rise, the seas will turn acid, the lands will turn to deserts and the birds will fall from the sky.
Huggy
Thank you for your posts Brian, you do a great job of drawing the various threads together and presenting a coherent analysis of the various positions.
Tongue half in cheek – who wants to place bets about NZ setting up offshore processing facilities for Australian climate refugees by the year 2050?
Dj
Good idea bro
Whereabouts exactly bro?
What are we going to eat bro?
Huggy
And yet, Brian, as noted in WIKI …
I find this one interesting not only because it is the closest to us, but the temperature anomaly closest in speed to our own.
Of course, a rise of 2.74degC in 200 years (1900-2100) would imply achieving the 6°C in something less than 600 years, making it only about 35 times faster than the anomaly at the PETM.
oops … forgot to unblock last text …
[Fran fixed, I think]
What better place to warehouse Australian climate refugees than the west Island itself DJ?
White Australia started life as an offshore detention facility, it may well finish that way too!
And Huggybunny – sadly, yes, the pessimism of my intellect (which I fight through optimism of will) agrees with you.
The sad fact is we may be too limited as a species for to act on forecasts alone, no matter how dire. We will probably leave it too late, by evolutionary instinct. Its the Achilles heel in the fight or flight mechanism – for all our advances, we still have to directly see trouble coming at as with a club to act decisively.
Humanity, meet frog in boiling pot of water.
Now don’t get me wrong HB@14 … apart from our difference of opinion on nuclear, I agree with your enthusiasm for getting on with it.
Nevertheless, I see a paradox in your approach.
On the one hand you are dismissive of proposals for nuclear in Australia, amongst other things, on the basis that there’s no prospect of it steppling up to shoulder the burden any time soon here. I suspect you’re right. Earliest in practice for the first plant would probably be 2025.
But then, having outlined a series of quite interesting proposals you say:
If you don’t think this is possible, why are you proposing it? You were asserting your schemes as viable and practical as opposed to the stuff of fantasists. I find this argument persuasive. It wouldn’t matter if I had the answer to all our problems if I could think of no way to sell it. I’d have to accept that what was saleable was preferable. That’s kind of why in Australia, I support, amongst other things, replacement of coal with gas — as much of it biogas as possible.
But if proposing the improbable is OK, what’s wrong with proposing nuclear?
Roger Jones @ 7, I’ve just released that one to retrain the beast that you’re OK but your substantive comment is nowhere to be seen, unfortunately.
I can only think it might have gone to spam rather than moderation and was tipped out accidentally by someone clearing the spam. Shouldn’t happen, as your gravatar stands out, but I can’t think of anything else. Could you try again, perchance, splitting it into two? I’d value your comment.
“If you don’t think this is possible, why are you proposing it?”
I think HB’s saying its quite possible, but that hopelessly compromised clique of carbon industry muppets (aka our leaders) wont do it anyway.
On the other hand, once the Liberal party learns than the UK switched to natural gas and made huge CO2 reduction as a result, they might tug the forelocks into line.
Depends if they’re old or new money. We’ll might get the Monarchists to swing if we tell em the Queen pronounces it “garss”.
dj, if you want to scare yourself go here and listen to the first 15 minutes of the podcast of Ideas 2.
Dead people arriving in boats from Africa in the Canary Islands. EU mounting naval patrols to turn back African refugees. India building a 3m high fence 400km long to keep the Bangladeshis out.
Lots of real planning going on in intelligence/defence establishments about climate refugees in the 2020s.
200 million in Mexico/Central America, many will want to move north. Elsewhere in the tapes, Italy and Spain being overrun and northern Europe closing the borders. 100 million plus Chinese heading for green fields in Siberia.
Brian, I don’t need to scare myself any more – I’ve had to read and source material for researchers on related areas as part of my work. I’m currently trying to get this across to my wife as we are discussing whether to have another child.
One of my favoured starting points with people about this issue is telling them to go look at the material you refer to. These people do not stuff around. I often dread that some of them relish the ‘opportunities’ that such situations may provide.
All I can say is I’m certainly glad that everyone in my family has an EU passport and that my whale-camouflaged submersible should be up and running if NZ provides a better option. Dunedin might even be tolerable in Winter.
In the meantime, I shall be working on my TARDIS project and readying my plans to recruit a crack black-ops team of eco-libertarian socialist cadres to kidnap the leaders of the G20 and take them to the world of 2100 and threaten to leave them in the middle of a climate refugee camp unless they pull their shit together.
If you are reading this comment I haven’t quite fixed the problem with the thingamawhatsit. Those poor mice…still, must go on.
Frab Barlow, wot I am saying and Lefty E got it, is that entrenched interests will fight these short term efforts in every way possible because their “asset” (Coal) will become worthless. BTW you can also reduce iron ore to iron using gas. You crush the iron ore to powder, than you pour it onto an Inconel belt and you pass it into a furnace at 1100C and you get pure iron powder out the other end. To make steel you add some carbon, but as this then sequestered it is not an issue. Convert both power generation and iron and steel manufacture to gas and suddenly coal is worth nothing at all, that’s the problem.
Fran I am afraid that you have a tendency to sophism.
Proposing the improbable is not OK. In effect it lets the proponents for the status quo off the hook. They can point to these fantasy options as a solution when in fact thay are basically of no use at all.
I guess you have to decide where you stand
Huggy
Brian. I keep myself awake already thinking about the state of the planet, the death of the oceans and global warming, without your very worthy assistance…
maybe it is the fight or flight thing, the human nature bit, but the optimistic part of me says surely we are intelligent enough to avoid our own mass extinction. What really worries me is not the data or the projections, its the fact that inaction seems to be based on the same sort of thing, we don’t know exactly what will happen but let’s hope it works out, somehow. That seems to me to be a recipe for disaster, which I suspect others will recognise as well. Whatever happens when things get desperate, it won’t be women and children into the lifeboat first.
The problem is David_H, there are no life boats. No one to rescue the life boats, no where for the life boats to safely land.
Roger’s lost comment was to tell us that he and his colleagues did a briefing on this general topic last Thursday (well, six briefings to be exact.) Some notes on the briefings have been posted here.
A quick squizz reveals some interesting stuff. It seems China has used the GFC stimulus to aspire to leadership in the low carbon economy (see p11). But they will peak at 2030 at the earliest and will probably increase 3.8%pa from 2005 to 2030. The good news is that this is a 30% improvement on pre-GFC planning.
Global emissions are expected to grow by 50% by 2030 or 1.7% pa (see p.17).
For policy implications go to p37ff. I gather that there is still a chance that we might scrape through and if we do the drive towards a low carbon economy by a power as competitive as China might be one of the reasons we do.
Bernice, David.
Oh there will be lifeboats, they will be gated communities, ringed in with razor wire and guarded by ruthless mercenaries in helicopters and tanks. Power will come from nuclear reactors, food from plantations, water from desalination plants. These sanctuaries will be under the care and protection of the Military Industrial alliance. The rich (mostly) white residents will survive, in fact do more than survive, they will romp in their air conditioned domes play in the artificial snow fields and generally have a good time.
Sorry Brian, Fran but the little green nuke you ordered for your academic retreat will never arrive, the big end of town gets first dibs, understand?
Democracy in the face of the biggest existential crisis of all time ? Forget it. You pays or you stays on the outer wasteland where they dump the rubbish and the nuclear waste.
The privileged ones from the sanctuaries will probably hunt you for sport – providing the ambient radioactivity is low enough.
Meantime the flotillas of refugees will be taken out with nuclear weapons in the blue (ish) water.
This will be the brave new world, unless you lot get off your academic arses and actually do something instead of dreaming of wonder cures.
Huggy
Mr Bunny #32 – the best thing about the imagined survivor communities for the rich is that they wont work. In an engineering sense. I have no doubt that some of our ruling elites are quite happy to imagine this is what salvation will look like, but it aint gunna work. Not even all of their money will make their own version of Logan’s Run.
Biggest problem is maintaining it. Things, bits, gizmos break. A lot really. Even the most ambitious of spares stockpiling wont come close to guaranteeing continuity of operation. And the more integrated and complex a system, the more likely it is for the $2 washer to bring the whole thing to a grinding halt.
Blessed are the meek; for they shall inherit the earth. Over to you, then bacteria.
Bernice @ 33
Yerbut they will try, there wil be workshops, electronics labs and all that.
The real problem for the owners of this conurbation will be that they need to employ an underclass to do all the shit-work as well as make spares and stuff. Rather like a microcosm of the present state of Capitalism. However to make it work the pretence of democracy and freedom will be torn aside. They also need to create a guard class who are to protect them from the dying hordes on the outside. There will be the constant threat of revolt by the underclass and the guards, there will be a constant state of emergency.
Not pretty, but they will try, they will see no other way. You want to see what this place will look like ? Go to Abu Dhabi. Now that is an artificial world.
Huggy
A couple of years ago a highly credentialled group in the US looked at the security implications of climate change in a report entitled The age of consequences – pdf. I’d say they were almost as pessimistic as Huggy about the survival of democracy, even in advanced economies. They assumed that democracy would fail in the US and that in Europe the rest would simply abandon Holland to the sea.
At about the same time the Germans published a report Climate change as a security risk – even bigger pdf. The difference was striking. The belief in government and co-operation between states was simply assumed, although it was emphasised that there could be an increased danger of state failure in poorer countries.
I know it’s a big ask, but I’m still optimistic about the power of co-operative effort once the true danger is recognised.
Back @ 12 Lefty E was talking about economies that restructured themselves for a low carbon future. There is an assumption that there is a first mover advantage, but this is not always so. Angela Merkel as President of the EU and convenor of the G8 in 2007 did a fine job in lining up the troops to take the whole thing seriously and get some emerging consensus about the long term goals. I recall at the time her stressing the competitive advantages in being ahead of the pack.
But you have to go down the right track and invest in the right things. Barry Brook argues that they pissed a lot of money up against the wall in their solar program.
Huggy @ 15 says that we should
I gather from previous threads, Huggy, that you are talking about solar systems that you are actually working on and which are a quantum step ahead of existing technology. So sometimes it is the second, third or later mover that gets the prize after the first movers have created the market.
Any comment?
Brian, I actually think we have a chance, if we immediately adopt a program similar to the one I have outlined. We must grasp at the low hanging fruit right now.
The real danger is the magic pill solution that comes from technologies that will be too little too late and in any event only cover a small part of the problem.
We can muse forever on perfect solutions, debate the pros and cons of this and that, in short behave like the stereotypical academic, but these musing will not have any effect.
We can, on the other hand take up a program of pragmatic change that may not be perfect but that will buy us time to drag our manufacturing, power generation and transport industries out of the 19th century. This will require a revolution that is even more profound than the last Industrial Revolution. The entire structure will have to be changed beyond recognition. Along with this will have to go the concomitant social relations.(If this sounds a tad Marxist for you guys then so be it).
So please stop bleating about wouldn’t it be nice if we had nice reactors and nice solar panels and nice geothermal.
Think about stuff we can do now and then think about stuff we can do next.
We need a staged program not future music.
Huggy
Brian @36: “So sometimes it is the second, third or later mover that gets the prize after the first movers have created the market.”
There’s a book written by a couple of the profs at London Business School called IIRC “Fast Second”. Essentially they think that the best financial rewards go to the guys lurking behind the bushes, waiting for the first lot to beat a path throught the jungle with their bush knives. Then they go charging past the first lot (who are now bruised, battered, and drained from their ordeal) once the path has broken through to the clearing on the other side.
It may well be true.
A bit lacking in integrity and gumption (i.e. initiative, guts, spunk, call it what you will), for my tastes.
Typical business school idea…
That may well be right, Brian, but one you can guarantee: Australia is at 0% risk of being the first mover in anything economically innovative in the future growth markets of low carbon tech.
My fear is we’ll be last.
I guess I worry about us pissing high carbon investment up a wall when its almost certainly doomed to a short life span.
Oops, sorry, that last was not a barb aimed at you Brian. Hope you didn’t take it that way?
It’s just that I sat through endless lectures by people who had never really produced anything, except 20/20 vision after the fact about what other people had been trying to achieve.
There’s a joke that goes something like: “Why did the business school prof not pick up the $100 note on the footpath? Because he knew that an efficient market would not leave easy money lying around…”
I’m with Huggy on how we need to respond:
“Think about stuff we can do now and then think about stuff we can do next.”
“We need a staged program not future music.”
Brian, I was publishing papers about the absurdity of the German solar program 10 years ago.
However I was not so stupid as to jump to the conclusion that nuclear was the only answer.
The absurdity of one does not validate the other.
Germany, for example, sits upon vast water based geothermal resources that would provide unlimited energy for hundreds of years. Exploitation of these would carry about the same delays as a nuclear program and a lot less social friction.
Yes I am working on some advanced stuff, yes the late adopter manufacturers sometimes have an advantage. There is actually a very large and dynamic distributed generation/smart network push coming from within the power supply industry itself. Given the right sort of network the need for large centralised generators is dramatically reduced and the reliability and efficiency increased. I have a role in this program.
This global development makes nukes into dinosaurs and demonstrates how out of touch are some of the academic commentators.
Huggy
Lefty E @39: “I guess I worry about us pissing high carbon investment up a wall when its almost certainly doomed to a short life span.”
There’s a saying to the effect that your area of former strategic advantage is also your blind spot. We are all somewhat anchored to our pasts.
Aussies generally adopt new technology much faster than a lot of other nationalities, perhaps partly because we have a short past history.
However, in the case of coal, we might have a candidate for a humungous anchor to the past. This may seriously limit our adoption of new energy technologies.
HB @41: “There is actually a very large and dynamic distributed generation/smart network push coming from within the power supply industry itself. Given the right sort of network the need for large centralised generators is dramatically reduced and the reliability and efficiency increased. I have a role in this program.”
That is fabulous news!
This really does seems to have the makings of a revolution in the way we manage energy. I can hardly wait…!
In a way, it sounds a bit like the transition from large mainframe computers (as existed when I first started working) to distributed computing power and LANs. Back at the end of the 80’s Shell announced that they intended to have a computer on every desk. It seemed an outrageous, extravagant thought at the time. Nowadays we think nothing of a computer in every home, even on every child’s desk!
How far off is the smart network from becoming reality, Huggy?
Trackback to: Go for Growth http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fjKBf1N2Wls
That was SO GOOD, Lefty E!!!
Made my day!
Not for a nanosecond, Elise
Huggy @ 41, the answer I was expecting and hoping for.
Elise yes the smart grid transformation does look a bit like the advent of the desktop computer, but I would not overdo the analogy.
The electricity providers have been driven to this by the fact that their existing assets (poles and wires) are 50 years old and in a really bad state. Have a look around at the poles and wires in inner Brisbane and you will see what I mean. It’s about replacement time, if the utilities can stretch the time before an asset has to be replaced that is lot of money saved. If they can stretch the time and replace the asset with a lower cost but smarter and more efficient version that pleases the bean counters even more. These networks were designed and installed in a time when Ice was being delivered for ice chests, most people had a toaster and a few lights and that was it. That they work at all with our complex poor power factor loads is surprising.
What the new paradigm opens up is the possibility to incorporate a large range of very diverse and often low CO2 generation sources, such as gas fired co-generation from hospitals and even hotels and sugar mills (Bagasse) These are difficult to manage without the “smarts” infrastructure.
In Europe biogass from community owned facilities in villages is increasingly important as a generation fuel.
Also the direct incineration of house-hold waste can contribute but the luddites don’t like it
http://www.greenpeace.org/international/campaigns/toxics/incineration/the-problem
Apparently they would rather see it in landfill and have us drink the diluted leachate.
To answer your question:”How far off is the smart network from becoming reality, Huggy?”
The answer is that much of it is already in place, Smart meters are already being rolled out, air conditioner control from a central point is being trialled-very interesting.
Australia has had a thing called ripple control for yonks, this allows the utilities to turn on your hot water at the optimum time. The US of course does not have ripple control on the basis “no-one is going to tell me when I turn my Goddam hot water on”. This is the country that has a single phase transformer for every house and that requires about 2 power stations to provide the magnetising current for these. Here we share 3 phase transformers that are vastly more efficient.
I could go on, must say the the US is on board with the smart grid, even if they do have problem with this socialistic sharing commo stuff.
Unfortunately there is no way they will make more than a token effort at CO2 reduction.
Huggy
There was an article in Der Spiegel about smart grids a short while ago.
Decentralizing Electricity: The Coming Energy Revolution
Apart from the climate change mitigation, I think a lot of Europe is fairly wary of being overly reliant upon a proto-fascist Russia for their energy and anything that can lessen the actuality or the potential for such a reliance will be viewed positively by the population.
Brian, that German document is jam packed with great bedtime reading. Can’t wait to start on the US one. Cracker of a storm here tonight which I can’t help but describe in terms like “the gods must be really angry”
David H or whatever, I must confess that I haven’t looked at the documents for two years and only then from a narrow perspective. I’ve had a quick scan of the German one just now. Great graphics! I must find time to have a closer look!
I suspect you might be a bit disappointed in the US one by comparison.
I meant to add there was a RealClimate post about the US document, with a long comments thread as usual. I think that’s where I got the link to the German report.
RE patrickg
I monitor media about climate change for an env. NGO. This is the best article I’ve read anywhere on the net on this topic. Mad props Brian!
We know all this, but if you suggest radical change, even here at lefty do-gooder central, you jumped on by “pragmatists” like Labor Outsider and told you’re being completely impractical. What’s practical about zero emissions by 2045? If you accept the science, you must surely accept that radical change is required now. If you don’t, you may as well join the denialists.
What China plans and what China does might be two different things. Right now the Chinese authorities are presiding over a stupendous credit bubble that’s funneling money into infrastructure they don’t need, and export capacity for customers that no longer exist. Witness the astonishing demand for our iron ore, and you can’t tell me steelmaking is a climate friendly industry.
But hey, Australia’s going gangbusters, so who cares? My super balance has recovered and my house is up 10% since May. Woo hoo!
Cool. How does that fit with the peak-emissions-by-2010 plan?
Shorter US Congress: we’re too busy denying affordable healthcare to our citizens to help save the planet.
Huggy @47, how would the smart grid transformation fit with a lot of households, apartment blocks, and small businesses adopting localised BlueGen power generation from natural gas?
Elise,
The BlueGen type systems will fit very well wih the smart grid. Given enough of them it would be possible to use them as peaking generation back into the grid. A command from some central controller could turn as many as required into the network.
The cost that I have is about $8000:00 in mass production. The good thing about them is the high conversion efficiency.
http://www.cfcl.com.au/Assets/Files/BlueGen_Launch_Information_(Web)_May-2009.pdf
Yep they fit very well.
Huggy
Huggy @56, that’s great news!
Better half is agreed that we will buy one of those little numbers as soon as they are available. Wonderful man – willingly indulges my enthusiasms for green technology gizmos!
If lots of people take this up, it will be interesting to see the effect on the profits of coal-fired electricity generators…
Elise,
I am watching the Danes fighting coppers over a coal fired power station. If enough people (8 million) install your sort of stuff we could close down about 4 coal fired stations,
My only caveat is down to good old Svante August Arrhenius, he was the guy who worked out that for every 10K increase in temperature the reaction rate of a given chemical process doubles (roughly).
The downside of this is that high temperature gadgets often have a lifetime that is brutish and short.
Solid Oxide Fuel Cells, the type in your gadget, have to run very hot, I am totally sceptical of the claimed 15 year lifetime. I would be pressing this point with the salesperson.
You can read about the law here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arrhenius_equation
Huggy
There is an article in today’s Fin Review by Susan Shirk who worked in the Clinton administration and is now director of the UC Institute on Global Conflict and Co-operation entitled “Hu in the driving seat for Obama visit”. That gives you to message about Obama’s forthcoming visit to China.
Climate change?
Because they won’t agree about anything much at all.
I think no-one wants the Copenhagen talks to fail, but when they are finished there will still be a lot of work to be done.
That was what Karl Falkenberg said. He’s the European Commission’s director general for the environment.
Svante August Arrhenius
Predicted global warming in 1905 due to CO2, thought it was a good thing – also racial hygiene so he gets a mixed report.
From Wiki”Arrhenius estimated that halving of CO2 would decrease temperatures by 4 – 5 °C (Celsius) and a doubling of CO2 would cause a temperature rise of 5 – 6 °C[4]. In his 1906 publication, Arrhenius adjusted the value downwards to 1.6 °C (including water vapour feedback: 2.1 °C). Recent (2007) estimates from IPCC say this value (the Climate sensitivity) is likely to be between 2 and 4.5 °C. Arrhenius expected CO2 levels to rise at a rate given by emissions in his time. Since then, industrial carbon dioxide levels have risen at a much faster rate: Arrhenius expected CO2 doubling to take about 3000 years; it is now estimated in most scenarios to take about a century.”
Well we cant say no-one warned us.
Huggy
Yep, there a three issues: how do cut India and China in while maintaining “cmmon but differentiated responsibiity”; how to finance climate change action in developing countries; and 3rdly will the US COngress break out of partisan gridlock for long enough to realise the world’s on fire, and they are responsible historically for the largest portion (30%).
here are those “historical emissions” numbers (as at year 2000). China is of course rising over time since (now the single largest emitter annually), but as CO2 stays in the atmosphere for ages, this historical data is critical to the politics:
USA 30%; Europe 27%; Former USSR 14%; China, India and Asia 12%; Japan 4%; South America 4%; Africa 2.5%; Australia 1%. (World Resources Institute)
Lefty E,
All the signs are that the US will not do any-thing real at all about reducing its CO2 emissions, likewise China or India.
Here is what is going to happen:
1. There will be a rapid rise in sea levels due to the loss of the Greenland ice.
2. There will also be a rise in the number and severity of storm surges.
3. New York will be hit with the daddy of all storms, sea water in the streets.
4. Mad screaming panic will set in.
5. Boffins will convene, thousands of greenies will run naked through the streets
6. Professors will seek grants to study the matter
7. Insane carbon sequestration schemes and solar sunshade proposals will emerge
8. Police forces will be given emergency powers to quell the concerned masses.
9. Global martial law will be established
10.Professors will seek more grants
11.Christian fundamentalists will blame it all on sodomy
12.Vast sums of money will be spent upon a scheme to orbit giant parasols
13 The Parasols will mysteriously disappear
14.Professors will seek more grants to study the loss
15.Thousands of Greenies will run naked through the streets
16.Bob Brown will suggest we turn out the lights (when it comes to his turn to run)
17.The US will bomb China with thousands of nukes
18.Russia will join in
19.India Pakistan France and Israel
20.Nuclear winter will set in (remember that?)
21.Nuclear winter will offset global warming
22.We will be saved.
Huggy
Lefty E’s commentary on the Huggybunny Prophecy:
“Huggybunny was an optimist.”
In all seriousness though – I look forward to seeing ‘Climate Action’ countries as a trading bloc, with preferred status to non-polluters.
They’re begging for a bit of stick – US, China, and us here in AU for that matter. See how that works for your economy, mofo! Punish them with high-carbon tariffs. Small problem of two security council vetos, sure, but we’ll work something out.
You think they dont care? China is crawling all over Africa and Brazil for resource security, handing out dollars like you wouldn’t believe. China will blink. Dunno about the US.
Thank you Brian for an excellent post.
Huggy @ 63 “Here is what is going to happen:”
Cassandra in Agamenon (1230) by Aeschylus
Ootz @ 66, don’t worry, Clytemnestra is going to sort that slut out pretty soon.
Seriously, It is going to take the eqivalent of a major Greek tragedy to get us off our arses.
Huggy
Going back to LE @ 62, I think the developing countries can only go so far with the argument, you stuffed it up so you fix it.
The point that the Germans at Potsdam are making is that we have to all look forward and all put our shoulder to the wheel.
Al Gore was making the point on Breakfast today that attitudes in the developing world are changing. India looks ready to accept restrictions (I have heard that this is in return for a seat on the Security Council, but that might be just a rumour.) Egypt realises that 40% of its agriculture is on land one metre above sea level. Mexico, one of the countries to be affected most, is talking about contributing to the developing world assistance fund, rather than receiving.
The game has changed out of sight since Stern in 2006. Back then people were putting forward stabilisation scenarios that ran clear off the end of the graph, which stopped at 2100, with actual stabilisation envisaged about 2300. Remember Stern thought that the carbon sinks could absorb harmlessly the first 5gt of carbon (18.35gt of CO2). All we had to do was stop emitting above that and it would be apples.
Now people are realising that we have to get to zero and below, well ASAP really. But the message is not fully being taken on board by the policy makers yet. Nevertheless, the game is changing.
Huggy, “…don’t worry, Clytemnestra is going to sort that slut out pretty soon.”
Yeah by killing Agamemnon, the original Mammon?
In relation to Smartgrid transformation, I question how quick these smart technologies can be implemented. Not for the technologies sake but for the bureaucracy and entrenched powers in the utility industry. Lets face it decentralisation is going to challenge the energy squatocracy and the unions in the utilities. My personal experience with Ergon, for example, lead to me questioning their ability to change. Just simply to get me connected to the grid from a relatively new subdivision was a drama from start to the end. At first they insisted that there is now power available at my address, even though I quoted the pole number in front of my property and so on. It culminated when the regional public relation officer had to ring me up to ask where abouts I live because they would like to come and read my meter for the first time! Further, from the beginning I informed them that I’d be installing PV system and require a suitable 2 way meter. No what did they install, you guessed it. After nearly two month they had to send lines people back to swap meters. Meanwhile I have been feeding into the grid at no cost to them. Small fish I know, but I doubt systemic incompetency is only present on that scale. When I asked above mentioned Community Liaison manager how much confidence he has into their assets management system, he was very sheepish and mentioned something about that they have a new contractor to read the meters. When the contractor turned up to read the meter for the first time, on a special trip from Cairns (120klms return) so they could finally bill me, no one told him that there is a scheduled ‘maintenance’ power outage for most of the day on our main feeder. And since I ‘ve got one of them new fangled meters no luck reading them.
My guess is, with Barnabys obstinacy goes a healthy dose of politicking to keep things as they are for the entrenched energy squatocracy. From coal to generation to distribution to asset management, in their thinking, they are going to loose control in a decentralised system.
Absolutely Brian – but owing to the lamentable state of the media overage of international climate politics in this country (the more you read, the more you realise how poorly served we are by our 2nd-rate press), Im not sure most punters realise how this has played.
Im sure the thread is only read by the honourable exceptions, but here goes anyway: basically, the principle of “common but differentiated responsibility” (ie we all act, but at different levels according to historical responsibility) was formulated at the earth Summit in 92. This was given some teeth by the Kyoto protocol in 1997 – which involved both North and South signatories, but only imposed “binding” targets on 36 industrialised countries.
But the whole plan all along has been that the successor model to Kyoto (commencing in 2013) would then commmit the “South” as well (partic China, India, brazil) to “binding” targets – albeit at a different levels to the “North”. This successor model is what is being debated at Copenhagen, and at precursor meetings like Bali.
The big change that has occurred since 1997, of course, is that China has since 2005-6 become the number one polluter annually (21% plays US 20% of global emissions).
So, the formal issues now are:
- how to differentiate binding targets
- how to finance mitigation in the “South” (it was agreed in principle at Bali that the North will fund that, but no details yet – except a proposal of overall figure from the EU)
The “informal” issues are:
- can the US congress lay off denying affordable healthcare to its own for long enough to get off its lazy fat carbon-toxic butt, and pass a figure that can be taken by the US executive govt to Copenhagen
- China and India are in a Mexican stand-off with the North – waiting to hear what the North offers before signing on to binding cuts. EU will play ball, US arent looking good.
- less relevantly, this shows the bankruptcy of the LNPs position. If everyone took their position nothing would happen. Its effectively the “hands high, surrender and die like a coward” position.
Ootz
She killed them both, no half measures with this lady.
Ergon is totally useless, they would have to be the most retarded of the utilities.
I work with another large utility on smart grid implementation. They have an elightened management and are pushing hard. Yes there are a few backward elements.
One of the problems is that the government has no advisers that seem to even begin to undertstand what we are on about. The smart money in the utilities is on the smart grid and distributed generation.
Huggy
Huggy #63,
we should go straight to thousands of greenies running naked in the streets and bypass the other disasters. Publicly nude dreadlocks would beat the deadlock because folk would find that prospect much more frightening than being inundated by floods if biblical proportions. Action and international agreements would be instant. I would be prepared to forego the many lucrative grants you foreshadow to see that happen.
Floods of, not if
Lefty E @ 65: How do you propose the world punish the Chinese? Haven’t you noticed that the Anglosphere has out-sourced its entire manufacturing sector to China? We don’t make anything anymore. Go to the mall and try to find something not made in China.
Even if we whacked huge carbon tariffs on Chinese made goods, they’d just devalue the Yuan and make it cheaper.
Ootz @69 and Huggy @71:
My meter looks like it was made in 1965. I reckon I’ll have the same meter in 2020.
I would have though the smart money in the utilities is on gas, gas and more gas.
pardon me for linking to a press release from my boss, but I’d like to point to the important action taken by the developing nations (people here can make up their own mind about the criticism of Rudd et al).
One issue I’ve not seen discussed much re: whether we’re going to get a new ‘architecture’ global agreement, or whatever, is the all-important issue of monitoring, evaluation & compliance – and this brings into play the critical importance of a global target for GHG reductions / temperature rise / ppm (however is best to do it). Otherwise developed countries can just write themselves something wonderful and never have it checked, and buy off the more corrupt developed nation leaders, leaving the poor carrying the can.
So bravo the African nations & their supporter nations in Barcelona. More power to their arm.
Well if they can ride bikes in the nude http://www.worldnakedbikeride.org/
surely the greenies could put their money where their mouths are and take us back to the stoned age.
Er now I have a closer look at that link perhaps its not such a good idea. Have to be an aesthetics committee to vet applicants.
Huggy
Huggy, I look bad enough in lycra shorts (unless I wear a really baggy T-shirt), so there’s no way I’d cycle naked. (Actually, there are a couple of other reasons too.)
Huggy @ 71
Surely you must be joking? Are you talking Federal or State or both? Have you had any support at all from Govmts and their agencies and is your experience in that respect broadly shared in emerging technologies?
And @ 77 in relation to your aesthetic committee, remember what we are after is shock value.
Carbonsink, I hear what you are saying re gas, but living in the regions has got its practical limitations. For example I was looking with interest at Huggys bluegen link. I could not find any information on its gas consumption and how the gas is connected. Whether it needs to be connected to a central distribution, such as it exists in the cities or if it can be run of an independent tank.
Brian @65,
Re: your passing on of information that India might do a deal for a SC seat, do you recall where you heard this?
Ootz,
I have been going to Canberra for over 20 years, have sat on committees, given evidence at enquiries and so on. Let me tell you the place is totally infested with content free managers who have the say. Yes there are people who understand stuff but they are kept in dingy back rooms and fed on Grech meat.
I am not brave enough to make any comment on the aesthetics of nudity question as I run the risk of being totally slapped down by a feminazi. http://australia.worldnakedbikeride.org/
The Bluegen apparatus depends upon a supply of piped natural gas, you could probably run it stand alone on bottled gas but beware, you will need a small battery to cope with load peaks and a voltage source inverter as well (not one of those crap current controlled things they use for grid connect).
Yes, suitably modified, they would make a good Remote Area Power System.
Huggy
Go here for greenies cycling nude for the environment and click on the photo gallery.
Rewi @ 80, I do remember, but I’d rather not say
Let’s say it wasn’t a red hot tip, but it’s an intriguing idea. Stranger things have happened!
African countries are boycotting the current climate talks, arguing that rich nations are not doing their fair share.
This blog doesn’t get much diversity these days.
Anyway — after that depressing post I am happy to be the person to bring you the good news. Things aren’t as bad as you think. Human quality of life will continue to increase. Your children and grandchildren will look back at our lifestyles today and wonder how we ever did without the schmergofigaminator (or whatever funky things they have in the future).
Every generation has convinced themselves that they were the people living through the most important point in history… the turning point… the end days… whatever. It’s probably not true. Malthus died. One day, Hansen will die too. And then in 50 years our happy rich grandchildren will be explaining to us how some new future problem is going to kill them, and how their generation is the one that is living through the most important point in history. And we will nod and smile.
In short: don’t be scared.
John Humphrey intoned …
For privileged people, plus ca change is a comforting mantra. The idea that one day, one year and one generation will be much like the other is mollifying. Most like to think that their children will be slightly better off than they were and theirs better off still. When I press submit, I’m planning to follow your implicit advice for as long as I can — possibly for about ten minutes, before being mugged by reality.
I do note though that you are a self-confessed pro-capitalist ‘libertarian’ who pays lip-service to the mainstream science on climate change, which puts me in mind of the internet practice of ‘concern trolling’. As Saul Alinsky would put it:
Life cannot go on as it is now John. There is no technological quick fix which will allow us to stay with b-a-u. That is the substance of the mainstream science to which you pay such frivolous regard.
I mean gas for centralised electricity generation. If you’re off-grid then that’s a whole different issue where renewables become far more practical, by that only affects a tiny percentage of the population.
John Humphreys @ 84: Is there anything more annoying than a smug libertarian? Fran, don’t bother engaging. Its more cult that ideology. Hopefully we can use them as sport when the dark times come.
Just to try and quell some of the raging inferno’s above a quote from Roy Spencer:-
“Despite the fact that the magnitude of anthropogenic global warming depends mostly upon the strengths of feedbacks in the climate system, there is no known way to actually measure those feedbacks from observational data.
The IPCC has admitted as much on p. 640 of the IPCC AR4 report, at the end of section 8.6, which is entitled “Climate Sensitivity and Feedbacks”:
“A number of diagnostic tests have been proposed…but few of them have been applied to a majority of the models currently in use. Moreover, it is not yet clear which tests are critical for constraining future projections (of warming). Consequently, a set of model metrics that might be used to narrow the range of plausible climate change feedbacks and climate sensitivity has yet to be developed.”
“
John, have a look at Figure 9.20 from IPPC AR4 p.720. I’ve copied it as Figure 2 in this post. The uncertainty is well-constrained on the lower side, but not on the upper side. This has implications for risk.
That’s not the whole story, but policy makers are delinquent in their duty if they don’t respond to the current state of the science at any given time. Waiting for the science to be clarified to the nth degree is not a responsible option.
Kohler on why the weak US dollar is killing any chance of a deal at Copenhagen:
Cool. The Aussie dollar is strong because we export climate destroying rocks, which lowers our local carbon permit price. You gotta love that! Which geniuses invented the CPRS again?
Possibly John Humphreys, but just on the *off chance* that informed scientists rather than clueless ideologues turn out to be on the money, your grandchildren might just pretend they aren’t related to some silly old flat-earth reality-denier, smiling and nodding to himself in the corner.
And who knows, by that time we might have even learned to take personal responsibility for our actions, and clean up the mess we make, rather than leaving it to others.
Now there Lefty, you aren’t suggesting that we might have obligations to people who do not yet exist, are you? Typical socialist scam to steal my property and hand it to undeserving … (voice trails off)
My advice , ignore the troll.
He is under the bridge and will drown.
Huggy
Yay for LeftyE for some of the most concise words I’ve read. Fran of course is another nouveau capitalist lurking in the guise of a concerned pseudo lefty whose real concern is identified by her obsession with property but I disagree with HB insofar as the creek near my place hasn’t seen enough water to drown a rat let alone a troll. Call me a freak but maybe we should think about the planet as deserving of our care and attention.
amusing …
Who saw Dave Letterman last night when he asked Al Gore about him soon becoming a billionaire?!? Al said that, yes Dave, he had invested in carbon trading and that if he hadn’t he would have been called a hypocrite by the same crowd…. made some sense actually?!? Who here has an opinion on that particular saga??!!
LeftyE, amusing as the youtube clip is, less amusing is the idea that all we need to do is replace the howard and costello images with Krudd and Swanee and everything else remains the same.
Sorry Fran, I don’t know what came over me…
Carbonsink c@89: You are right, Alan Kohler did a good job of explaining why it is crazy for Kevin Rudd to be advocating an international cap and trade system. It’s complexity and uncertainties re future permit price coupled with the effect of currency movements and free trade agreements will have every country juggling to minimize the damage it does to them.
One of the ironies at the moment is that countries with high per capita emissions such as the US and Australia are also running with chronic, large trade deficits. This means that the very countries who should be acting to provide credibility to the emissions reduction campaign are reluctant to act because they are scared of making a bad trading situation worse.
The second irony that the US could solve many of its economic woes by launching a war on emissions. However, these benefits will not occur if the WTO forces the US to import much of the equipment required to achieve. The benefits to the economy will only occur if the US is allowed to crank up its industry to produce the required equipment internally even if this costs more than importing.
The US government wouldn’t produce the stuff itself. Private firms wouldn’t either with the Chinese virtually pegging the yuan to the US dollar.
Yvo de Boer was responding to claims by developing countries that they
“The second irony that the US could solve many of its economic woes by launching a war on emissions. However, these benefits will not occur if the WTO forces the US to import much of the equipment required to achieve. The benefits to the economy will only occur if the US is allowed to crank up its industry to produce the required equipment internally even if this costs more than importing.”
The WTO is there to enforce internationally agreed trade rules. It does not force countries to import, it prevents countries from discriminating against foreign production unless that discrimination is sanctioned by existing trade rules. The idea that the only way a country can benefit from low emission technologies is to produce it itself, demonstrates an enormous lack of understanding of basic economics. You also have to understand that prior to the sale of a final good, the value add in different parts of the value chain can occur in multiple countries.
Undermining the enormous progress that has been made in recent decades to reduce global trade barriers to allow countries to promote domestic industry would be a tragedy and the negative welfare effects would significantly reduce the net benefits of acting to reduce global emissions.
In my view Kohler did a pretty poor job because he doesn’t seem to understand that all of world trade occurs in an environment where there is enormous uncertainty about future prices and exchange rates. It is one of the reasons we have derivatives markets to help firms manage that risk. Ever heard of hedging?
LeftyE @ 90, you forgot to mention said ancient flat-earhter would also probably be drooling and interfering with himself in his corner.
What I forget to mention to John Humphreys is that I have some coastal real estate he might be interested in.
Dont worry – be happy!
However, we can be reasonably certain that the $AUD will be strong when international demand for black death is strong, which almost certainly coincides with times when global emissions are rising rapidly. The stronger dollar lowers the price of carbon permits in AUD sending precisely the wrong price signal to local polluters and allowing them to emit more.
Cool.
The special report on Australia will be available tomorrow our time but in the meantime the Centre for Public Integrity’s investigation into the efforts of the fossil lobby to derail Copenhagen is both enlightening and depressing.
Might as well pack up and go home now, carbonsink. The cornucopians have won the field.
When my TARDIS is up and running I’m planning on giving Julian Simon a creampie to the face!
“However, we can be reasonably certain that the $AUD will be strong when international demand for black death is strong, which almost certainly coincides with times when global emissions are rising rapidly. The stronger dollar lowers the price of carbon permits in AUD sending precisely the wrong price signal to local polluters and allowing them to emit more.”
Except, when there is a shift in expecations about the demand for coal (upwards), that will push the spot and future price UP, counteracting the effect you outline above. You have to think through your thought experiment to its end….
In news just in:
I think this is the Boxer-Kerry energy bill mentioned in the post. It calls for a 20% reduction rather than a 17% reduction by 2020.
The Republicans had been calling for a full EPA analysis and then boycotted the EPA briefing organised by Boxer.
“…and then boycotted the EPA briefing organised by Boxer.”
Yes, climate skeptics – afraid of facts and information. What a bankrupt position.
Labor outsider @100: You said”
This all sounds very nice but the unfortunate result was that it effectively prevented the US from producing goods and services that it couldn’t afford to import without running up unsustainable levels of foreign debt. In effect, the free trade rules you applaud stuffed the US economy and created the debt levels that were a major contributor to the GFC. For the sake of world economic stability the free trade rules need to be changed so that countries are able to replace imports with internal production when the alternative is the growth of unsustainable debt.
Given its current debt levels the US could not afford to launch a major clean electricity building program if they are forced to import some of the equipment required for this program.
On the other hand the US could afford to do this if it was allowed to produce the equipment required internally. In fact, this option would have the potential to stimulate the economy and revitalize the US manufacturing sector.
The world is not going to get an effective agreement to reduce emissions without US leadership. We are not going to get US leadership if the price is increased US debt or a contraction of the US economy.
We have to get over the idea that what is stopping US leadership in emission reduction are the flaws in the US ability to think rationally and start thinking about the real problems behind US reluctance. We also need to have a hard look at the damage that the free market extreme has caused and its effect on the ability of individual countries to take initiatives without putting their economies at risk.
John D, there was a proposal by Keynes at Bretton Woods when the rules were being set for an Imternational Clearing Union which would have automatically fixed trade imbalances like this. The Americans knew better. They had a trade surplus and wouldn’t have a bar of anything that might pare it back.
George Monbiot talks about it in his book The age of consent. I’m sure LO knows all about it.
Just in:
The rich-poor split is alive and well.
It is indeed Brian, but then again – a new German government study finds that developing countries are actually way ahead of us: http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2009/11/07/2736241.htm
Are we really going to let “common but differentiated responsibility” mean we do LESS?
Once again, I have to ask: are Europeans the only adults in the world, prepared to clean up after themselves?
That’s surprising in relation to China and India and I hope it includes forests in Brazil. But good news, nevertheless.
David Spratt lets fly. European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso in The Age in September
Potsdam Institute Director Hans Joachim Schellnhuber said
Yes, the certain entrenched interests have been trying the spread the view that the intransigence of China and India would be the key problem.
That nonsense didn’t even make it to the Copenhagen starting line – its already clear the non-EU developed countries will pose the key problem: US, Canada and Australia.
I for one hope the world places punitive and damaging economic sanctions on all three of us if we dont ante up. Get us in a headlock and thump us against a wall, world!!
Re: Bluegen ( HB, Elise circa 55)
The MD of Ceramic Fuel Cells Limited , the co behind bluegen, (asx stock ticker cfu), was interviewed on Inside Business yesterday morning.
Points he makes: hot water is a by product; it’s being rolled out as ‘fully integrated combined heat and power systems with .. utilities and appliance companies within Europe’; British and German governments support the technology, and Germany offers cash incentives to people who install the units; In Aust, the main barriers (are the) utilities here, their ability or their willingness to pay for the electricity that householders are going to produce’; and the device ‘doesn’t qualify as part of the renewable energy certificate schemes.. (tho) the unit does reduce greenhouse gases more than putting in a similar sized solar PV system’;
THing is: the device produces annually 17,000 kilowatt hours of electricity cf average Melbourne Melb. household demand of 6-7,000 kwh.
To me that says: IF you remove the most profligate 25% of users, (thus dropping the average use by the remainder to say 4 kwh/y), THEN equipping the most parsimonious of that remaining 3/4 of households ( thereby maximising net energy exported to grid) with devices they will largely cover the energy needs of 3/4 of housholds, no need for coal power stations ( except by the profligate few).
I’d put my hands up, at the 1500 kwh/yr we use, we’d be able to export 90% of a bluegen devices capacity. If the excess bluegen distributed greenerpower was onsold at say twice the domestic per kwh tariff, the unit ( and my power bills) would be paid off in a cuppla years. My gas bill would be a different matter, of course, but the big picture is: these devices make elctricity at 60% efficiency, (and better system efficiencies with hot water energy recovery), so its a big step in the right direction, and we can shut down coal mines and power with a gradual rollout, limited by the scale of production of the units. No wonder Australia’s utilities are avoiding it like the plague.
Ive got a ‘Buy’ on yttrium players: (China ( 95% control of global rare earth mining) has a report before State Council ‘Rare Earths Industry Devlopment Plan 2009-2015′ which recommends a total ban on yttrium exports.; China buys 25 years of australia’s natural gas output. China (via state backed corp) snaps up 25% of an australian yttrium miner, for peanuts, with FIRB approval. Hmmm, a picture is emerging ….
One Arhennius giveth, and the other Arhennius taketh away.
From Glenn Milne’s column in todays Organ. GOLD! http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/opinion/one-step-ahead-of-the-polls/story-e6frg75x-1225795552934
“…think of it this way,” the polling insider said, “more people in Australia believe in climate change than God. As far as politicians are concerned the view is that in late middle age you either develop prostate problems or you become a climate change denier.”
By all accounts there was a brawl at the G20, with the same recalcitrants. I heard Swan say that we shouldn’t come up with numbers until we know what is decided at Copenhagen. Someone should tell him there won’t be an agreement at Copenhagen unless the poor countries can see the colour of the rich countries money (or maybe that is the idea). The poor countries have been serially dudded before.
Yes Brian – we’ve really got to get the news out that Adolescent Albion is the problem here.
Danny, your link doesn’t work, but here is the item, plus a link to another site that talks about the cost of the domestic unit etc:
http://www.abc.net.au/insidebusiness/content/2009/s2736377.htm
http://www.businessspectator.com.au/bs.nsf/Article/Ceramic-Fuel-launches-home-generator-SA3XN?OpenDocument
Also, while I’m here, this is a recent item about algae derived biofuels, so there are at least a couple of bridging technologies seem to be moving forward:
http://www.adelaide.edu.au/news/news36561.html
Here’s a chart that compares the efficiency of various biofuel crops [Washington University]:
http://www.seattlepi.com/dayart/20080503/biofuels_compare.gif
fb, thanks for the links. This quote reinforces the notion that public policy is beholden to vested interests
In other words, the profitability of private power resellers is more important than reducing carbon emissions.
Whereas this seems like just dumb policy
since anything that produces electricity three times more efficiently has to figure in a broad carbon reduction scheme even if it does use a non-renewable fuel. It doesn’t seem like too big a leap to go from main natural gas to some other bio-gas such as methane.
Danny @117, There is something else you can use your BlueGen for, besides electricity in the home and hot water as an efficient byproduct. It would supply enough energy to recharge an electric car or two, during the night.
For example, in the magazine ReNew they use a 16 kWh lithium iron phosphate battery pack for a converted Hyundai Getz, called an Electron (how appropriate!). Anyway this 16 kWh charge would take you 120 km. Since most people only commute a total of say 30 km to-&-from work (a quarter of a charge), you would only be topping up 4 kWh/car.
A 2 kW system could produce about 16 kWh during the night, which would amply cover charging a couple of electric commuter cars, with plenty to spare.
If I understand it correctly, the BlueGen produces less than half the carbon footprint of coal-fired power for the same number of kWh. Furthermore, electric engines are also apparently much more efficient than combustion engines. The overall footprint should be significantly less.
Has anyone run the numbers to compare the carbon footprints – overnight charging your electric car/s with the BlueGen, versus coal-fired power, versus using petrol or diesel engines?
Furthermore, BlueGen is complementary to Solar PV, dropping the overall carbon footprint of households without compromising on their energy security.
If the Rudd government gives REC credits for heat pumps but not for BlueGen, then they are not really serious about lowering the Australian emissions.
This is fiercely urg . . . what was that . . .Oh, OK. . . we are going to put off for a bit longer making any decisions.
but it is still fiercely urgent – everybody still needs to fly to Hopenchangen for group hugs. ok?
Roger Jones and others, I believe there are some tests underway
http://twitter.com/#search?q=pwnednudierun
To partially answer my own question @124: “Has anyone run the numbers to compare the carbon footprints – overnight charging your electric car/s with the BlueGen, versus coal-fired power, versus using petrol or diesel engines?”
Consider the converted Hyundai Getz with the 16 kWh lithium iron phosphate battery pack: 16 kWh gives 120 km of driving, or 0.13 kWh/km.
If the power was from normal household electricity, generated using coal-fired power, then we have about 1 kg CO2 emissions per kWh. Thus charging the car produces 130 g/km emissions. The best ECO cars and small diesels also produce 130 g/km.
If the power was from BlueGen electricity, then it has about half the emissions per kWh, so charging the car would produce 65 g/km emissions. This would provide a significant improvement in the annual carbon footprint for most households, which would have cars producing more than 200 g/km (and thus more than 2 tonne/year for each car, assuming 10,000 km/year).
To my knowledge there are no cars commercially available with emission levels this low, not even the latest Prius (which is somewhat over 100 g/km, IIRC). A few European car manufacturers have prototype diesel-electric cars which could produce similarly low levels of emissions.
In terms of running costs for the electrified Hyundai Getz, say we assume 30c/kWh (i.e. peak electricity rates) then for 100 km we have:
Electrified Cost/100 km = 0.13 kWh/km * 100 km * $0.30/kWh = $4
By comparison, say petrol prices are $1.50/litre and it is city commuter driving @ 10 litres/100 km then we have:
Petrol Cost/100 km = 10 L/100 km * $1.50/L = $15
The electrified car is about a quarter of the running cost, assuming peak electricity rates. Off-peak recharging overnight would be at about one-third of this cost, say 10c/kWh, and thus the running cost of the car would be only $1.30/100 km.
Hey, how good is that!
$1.30 to drive 100 km, and you can wear your green halo as well…!!!
So elise, say a greenish superannuation fund
- took up the challenge of managing the cornerstone financing of a distributed green(er than coal) power company, based on Bluegen or other sofc technology,
- whereby participants (= holders of greensupershares) hosted bluegen units, which sound amenable to automatic remote management and accounting aftere the incoming gas is connected, and the outgoing power is metered,
- and sold the excess greener power onto the grid at a premium over browner power, contributing to the mandated RET tally, (such as is the case in germany and some US states), creating an earner for the distributed greener power company
If you were allowed to, as a hupothetical wageslave, would you be keen to have *some* of your compulsory super, AND the government rebate your investment would attract, (like your investment in suburban solar pv does) put into such a hybrid super fund/ greener power infrastructure financing vehicle, if the numbers stacked up to deliver returns on par with say capital guaranteed funds?
Since the objectives are to encourage reduction in aggregate power usagee, and for the facility to make money, an arrangement whereby greenersupershareholders get a supplementary dividend based on the net power they export to the grid, (encouraging mismisiation of their own consumption, and maximising the earnings of greenersuperpower copmny), could be suitably carrot like.
There are precedents for super funds being owners of power company: Industry Funds Management, an umbrella management group for 36 industry super funds, owns 350 megawatts of hydro and wind power operating in Australia, Asia and Brazil, and another 340 megawatts under construction in Chile; and the motor trades association superannuation fund is 12.8% owner of Loy Yang A brown coal power station.
It looks like the existing coalified utilities have neither the brains, conscience or guts to do their bit, so someone’s gotta step into the breach, and super funds are perfect for such a long term enterprise.
New Scientist has a look at Copenhagen. We’ve emitted 500gt of carbon. If we emit 250gt more, which at present rates will take about 20 years, we’ll have a 75% chance of staying within 2C. If we emit 500gt more that reduces to 50%.
This diagram shows emissions growth developing countries relative to developed countries.
With lags in the system and if we remove aerosols we are already committed to perhaps 1.9C.
“…2007 was fundamentally dishonest…” (Jack the Insider)
I wrote an email to the Prime Minister the other day.
If we’re going to only achieve an agreement to domestically set targets, what does that mean for the range of 5-25%? If up to 25% is predicated on internationally agreed targets, which doesn’t seem likely to be achieved, doesn’t that mean we’ve only got a domestic target of 5%?
Seems pretty light on to me.
Not sure he’ll get to read it, but, well, he does give us the opportunity to write so I thought I’d take him up on the offer.
Just assuming a successor global agreement ties us to 20% cuts by 2020…. Id like to hear HOW the ETS model would manage with the upper end of a 5-25% reduction load?
Danny @128, an interesting thought on super funds investing in new power technology. I would go further and suggest that the Future Fund should be investing in CFCL, since it is our technology developed in Australia and it is a game-changer for the future.
My current belief is that Huggybunny was on the money, suggesting that a smart grid and localised power generation (BlueGen, solar PV, small wind turbines, etc) could totally revolutionise the power generation paradigm. We may be at the cusp of something really amazing.
Further to BlueGen, it can be modulated from effectively 0 – 100% power. This means that you can use it to take up the slack from your solar PV system, thus minimising gas consumption.
Of course, if the government saw fit to arrange a decent feed-in tariff system, then households might be pursuaded to run their BlueGens flat-chat, which generates income for themselves and power for the grid. Beats the hell out of building more coal-fired power stations for our future Big Australia.
Smart meters and a smart grid makes this brave new world feasible. But we need a change of mindset in the government. Rudd/Wong need to really decide whether they are honestly trying to reduce reliance on coal-fired power or just feeding us spin.
Elise: I dunno about HB being on the money, but s/he is definitely on something. We haven’t heard about the huggybunny dictatorship for a while, it makes me suspicious.
At June 06, there were 3.755 million rswidential natural gas customers in Oz, lets say 3 million. If they were all bluegen equipped, each @ 17,000 kwh/y, that’s 51,000 million kwh/y, = 51 billion = 51 TWh. produced.
In 2006 Australia’s electricity cosumption was 187 TWh after production and transmission losses, energy sector cosumption, and aluminium exports.
So we just need to bang in and connect 4 bluegen units on average per gas household. HB had a $8k/unit cost, so that’s 8000 x 3miilion sites x 4 units per site = 96 billion bucks.
Ross Gittins reckons $97 billion went up in the Government’s explicit spending and revenue decisions since last year’s budget,’aka the economic stimulus. So let’s not say it’s an impossible spend. I’m sure the future would thank us more for that sort of enterprise than the bunch of tin sheds pretending to be school buildings that Julia has given it.
We could put the bluegen devices in the school tin sheds, schools have a good dispersal factor, as to matching population density, and they are a catchment for superannuants, aka parents. Maybe there’s a business model whereby schools leasing their sheds to the greener power providers, which actually are financially formed from part of the parents’ super arrangements, creates a distributed education financing opportunity.
However the replacemnt gets done: Power generation contributes 37% of the country’s net carbon dioxide-equivalent emissions, so the 2-3 fold higher fuel-to-power efficiencies of SOFC compared to from coal, which accounts for 77% of our power generation, would halve the coal-fired power generation CO2 imposte, meaning we would have more or less achieved a 20% reduction in the country’s net carbon dioxide-equivalent emissions.
Which would be a super thing to do with super.
Danny @134, a couple of questions.
You seem to be suggesting that only residential households should be generating the nation’s total power requirements? I am deducing this from your figures that total electricity consumption was 187 TWh, and 3 million residential natural gas customers, all equipped with 4 BlueGen units. Why only residential households? Why not install BlueGen in office blocks, small businesses, light industry, etc?
You also seem to be suggesting that the government foots the bill for all of the generation capacity? They don’t foot the total bill anywhere else, so why would they do so here? It would seem more likely that they would provide an incentive with a rebate or favourable feed-in tariff arrangement, thus paying far less, whether up-front (rebates) or by installment (feed-in tariff). The total would thus be far less than the stimulus package.
Furthermore, why would the generation capacity be installed all at once? You are talking about 3 million households @ 4 BlueGen/household, i.e. a total of 12 million BlueGen units! There is a small problem of rate of supply of units, and skilled manpower to install them. It would all take considerable time, even where there was an urgent mandate.
I did a previous blog on estimated time for installation of household solar PV, using a compound growth model, to show that even a reasonably steep rate of growth of installation capacity say 26% pa would mean a 20 year installation period. To shrink it to 10 years (a DECADE, no less) would mean an annual growth rate of about 60% pa. Surely something similar would apply here?
The cost of any rebate or subsidy is probably going to be spread out over a decade or more, even with the best will in the world. Rome wasn’t built in a day…