A Contrarian Post on the Keystone XL Pipeline

I'm going to say some things in this post about the Keystone XL Pipeline that are likely to irritate liberals and conservatives. So let me begin with some premises about what's going on in the world.

1) Global warming is a real threat. Exactly what will happen in the next 100 years is not certain at this time. Maybe global warming won't be so bad. Maybe it will be our worst nightmare. The potential downside, however, is enormous if we do not take steps to control global warming. I'm reminded that we were told by industry experts and hotshot conservatives that nuclear energy poses no significant problems. The accident at Fukushima was supposed to be a once in a thousand year incident. It's rather odd how once in a hundred year events or once in a thousand year events keep happening. The worst case scenarios for global warming are too dangerous not to be taken seriously.

2) The fossil fuels we're using today are not only more expensive, but they are much dirtier and more prevalent than they were sixty years. Even if global warming were not an issue, it is pretentious to think that pollution from fossil fuels is not an issue. The growing acidification of the oceans is a major issue. The sulfurous clouds hanging over Asia are also an issue. These issues concern everyone, particularly the U.S.

3) The exploitation of tar sands, despite many measures taken to address environmental concerns, is proof that we're in trouble if we have to turn to such a dirty and expensive fuel. Light sweet crude is in decline and has been for several years.

4) The oil industry has convinced millions of Americans that global warming is not real, that alternative energy is a job killer and that oil can continue indefinitely to solve our energy needs. All three assertions are lies and are propaganda paid for by the oil industry, with considerable help from the people who control the Republican party.

5) The hour is late. We have put off the inevitable since the 1970s. Given the lateness of the hour, it will take an enormous amount of investment and work to create an economy based on alternative energy. And it will take time. I have seen very little that puts a number on how long it will take to cut our use of fossil fuels worldwide by 50%. Here I do not have the facts, but my guess is that it will take 15-30 years.

6. To power the transition, we will need a strong economy. It very likely will take the burning of more fossil fuels to power the transition to that economy. If we abruptly stop burning fossil fuels, the transition probably will not happen. Of course, as the use of alternative energy goes up, the use of fossil fuels can go down, but the consumption of fossil fuels cannot decline too fast.

7. The use of fossil fuels may possibly drop rapidly due to declining reserves of usable fossil fuels. Though the oil industry is beginning (just barely) to admit that fossil fuels other than coal will soon become much more difficult to bring to market, we again have wasted decades by not turning to alternative fuels sooner.

8. If by chance, or through incompetence of the far right, the economy of the U.S. collapses, or even if it simply declines, it is likely more fossil fuel will go to power the economy of Asian countries. Countries like India and China show no signs that they will be cutting the use of fossil fuels any time soon. The leadership role, by default, goes to the United States. It's true that Europe can be helpful but the continuing monetary crisis in Europe shows how difficult it can be for the Europeans to lead. Keep in mind, however, that over the last thirty years, Europeans have done a much better job than the U.S. of turning to alternative energy. But they are vulnerable to swings in the oil and natural gas markets. Europe has twice the population of the U.S., and if one does not count Russia, their oil reserves are considerably less.


Okay, here it goes.

I have very mixed feeling about the Keystone XL pipeline. Despite everything, we may need it. Republicans have handled our energy problems with such extraordinary incompetence that they have threatened our future.

I find it curious that some proponents and critics of the pipeline say the building of the pipeline won't significantly bring down the price of oil. Actually, the pipeline will bring down the price a small amount—not necessarily something to cheer about. It is politically not feasible, but I believe we need to make sure the price doesn't come down too far. Better yet, we need to slowly raise prices to match the real cost of oil, including clean up and CO2 emissions. We need to stop passing on the real cost of fossil fuels to our children and grandchildren. And Republicans need to stop indulging in the fantasy that some scientist will come up with some magic solution—this is ironic given how little Republicans have faith in science and how little they are willing to pay for major buildup in research. Right wingers cannot keep cutting the budget for science while expecting miracles.

Republicans have been bad-mouthing Detroit for almost four years, but Detroit is actually moving more and more toward efficient cars. What Republicans fail to understand is that Americans need both jobs and more efficient cars and transportation (don't anyone pretend that the pipeline will create a huge number of jobs; they will create some, but that's all). That the current Republican leadership would let Detroit go under says a great deal about the incompetence of Tea Party Republicans and other right wingers.

It is ridiculous, as some 'experts' have argued, that the building of the pipeline will make us dependent on Canada. Oil from Canada is a far safer bet than depending on keeping the Straits of Hormuz open. Yes, our navy can keep the straits open and probably will have to continue to do so. But having a secure supply of oil should not be discounted. There are going to be energy disruptions in the next twenty years. I despise the tar sands, but we may need those reserves to fuel the transition.

Now I'm going to really be contradictory. To a large extent, I support the protests against the pipeline. It is disgusting that we are relying on tar sands and talking as if oil is forever and that global warming is of no concern. The protests are a sign that Americans are at last waking up to concerns about our future. The obstructionism and incompetence of Republicans will continue for some time to come until somebody starts rebuilding the party on more pragmatic lines. In the meantime, I would like to see the protests geared more towards actually getting more green energy projects installed. But no one should pretend that we can quickly go without oil.

In some respects, I find it more urgent to start going after coal. Coal is tar sands in its worst form. If Congress had any sense, no more coal plants would be built. Again, it will take time to transition, but coal plants that go offline should not be replaced. This is where green organizations should be focusing. Not just closing coal plants, but replacing them with green energy. The money is potentially there. If progressives can raise money for political causes, they can raise money to build windmills, solar roofs and other forms of alternative energy.

UPDATE:    Jan. 21, 2014

It's two years later and much has change. The only thing useful about the tar sands is that it's proof that the fossil industries are dying. The energy return on the tar sands is criminal. Why? A high energy return on fossil fuels generates wealth for society as a whole. A very low energy return, as is the case with tar sands, only helps the very rich.

The other problem is that fracking is a bubble, nothing more. One can already see major problems in North Dakota. Production will continue to climb, in some months, but the number of months when production actually falls is continuing. North Dakota is simply running into a wall. Every land owner receiving money from the oil companies should look seriously into wind turbines and the necessary power lines to send electricity to out of state markets.

Secretary of State John Kerry should not approve the pipeline. That pipeline is not in the interest of our future.

President Obama should be doing as much as he can to get alternative energy moving along as quickly as possible. Prices in alternative energy are falling. As they continue to fall, alternative energy is America's best hope for an energy future and a healthy economy.

Fossilized Leaders Mislead Americans About Fossil Fuels

Most Republican leaders and a few wayward Democrats fail to recognize several straightforward facts:

1. Fossil fuels are no longer cheap.

2. Besides fossil fuels no longer being cheap, if we take away subsidies from fossil fuels, Americans would really feel the cost.

3. But it gets worse. If we include the total costs of the damage that fossil fuel development and burning has on our country, and also the planet, the real cost of fossil fuels is in fact prohibitive. Our children and grandchildren will be paying the costs for generations to feed today's dangerous hunger for high profits by the fat cats in the fossil fuel industry.

4. If the United States began tomorrow on a massive alternative energy program, it would probably be decades before the United States would stop producing coal, natural gas, and oil. Why? Because it will take time to build up the alternative energy infrastructure. It takes time to build the factories, hire the people, train them as the technology changes, mine rare earth metals essential to alternative energy and again hire the people who will do the mining.

5. Jobs in the fossil fuel industries will take years to disappear. Why? Because as alternative energy grows, the jobs that will be lost are not the ones here at home but the ones overseas. The first thing that alternative energy will do is make the U.S. more energy secure and less dependent on the volatile politics of international oil.

6. And this is the most important: while fossil fuels are becoming more expensive, alternative energy is becoming less expensive.

Mary of The Left Coaster points out that high technology companies are increasingly turning to alternative energy. The trend towards alternative energy, despite the political fossils in Washington, is underway.

Paul Krugman in a recent column in The New York Times points out that that the costs of alternative is dropping. It's economics folks. It's capitalism the way its supposed to work.

For all the noise that Republicans make on Fox News, on the Rush Limbaugh comedy hour, and in Congress, they no longer much care about the kind of capitalism that made America great. Keep in mind this isn't the first time our country has lost its way. We lost our way in the 1890s and we lost our way at the end of the 1920s. When capitalism no longer works for a majority of Americans, something has gone very wrong.

Republicans, the ones who run the Republican Party, are the party of bankers and the wealthy. They have lost sight of why Americans usually like capitalism. Usually, and it certainly hasn't happened lately, capitalism is at its best when people pay less and less for more. Lately, for perhaps 30 years, or more, Americans have been paying more and more for less. Capitalism as today's conservative Republicans define it has failed.

Think of it: the cost of alternative energy is generally falling. Solar panels are cheaper. Windmills are cheaper. Batteries are cheaper. The price of alternative energy will continue to fall for many years to come. That's capitalism at its best. But the cost of most of other things, the real cost, including fossil fuels, are climbing—and the money that pours into the pockets of the top 1% gets larger and larger while jobs get sent to foreign countries. That is not capitalism at its best. If our democracy is to remain relevant, Washington needs to focus a great deal less on the privileges and wealth of the top 1%, and a great deal more on the creation of more jobs, productive jobs, jobs that ensure a future for a large majority of Americans.

Earthquakes and Nuclear Reactors: The Industry Pushback

The modern world has a problem. Nuclear reactors are only a small part of that problem. The fundamental problem is that we do not have in operation a truly safe and truly sustainable energy system for the type of modern civilization enjoyed by much of the world in the year 2011. Keep in mind that the technology that defines the modern world has only been around since roughly 1920, and that innovations have occurred in nearly every decade since then, so that what we define as the modern world has become increasingly complex and increasingly energy hungry.

I have no longstanding beef with the nuclear industry. In the beginning, it seemed promising, but it seems significant problems keep coming to the attention of the public and cannot be ignored at a time when the world is looking for other sources of energy to replace fossil fuels. Currently, there are over 400 reactors in the world. Before the nuclear disaster in Japan some months ago, it was common to hear discussions about vastly increasing the number of nuclear reactors worldwide. No specific numbers were consistently discussed but one can imagine we were talking about maybe 4,000 nuclear reactors being in operation fifty years from now. The chances of so many reactors being built are far less now than before the Japanese incident.

Advocates of nuclear power tend to be financially tied to their optimism about nuclear energy. If nuclear energy has any chance of succeeding in the long run, it would be helpful if there were informed advocates who did not have a financial stake. In some ways, the most disturbing aspect of nuclear energy is that safer reactors can be built but there is little commitment to do so. Why? Because our civilization is based on the bottom line. And the bottom line can be manipulated by powerful interests. The real cost of fossil fuels is far greater than what we pay at the pump. The cost of nuclear energy is far greater than the monthly bills we pay to a power company. Whenever possible, corporations, partly out of bad habit, partly out of greed, simply put off real costs to future generations.

At Forbes.com is an AP article that is appearing in a number of places. The article discusses nuclear safety in light of the earthquake and tsunami in Japan last March and the recent earthquake that hit Virginia and was felt by much of the east coast. The article in Forbes notes:

The risk that an earthquake would cause a severe accident at a U.S. nuclear plant is greater than previously thought, 24 times as high in one case, according to an AP analysis of preliminary government data. The nation's nuclear regulator believes a quarter of America's reactors may need modifications to make them safer.

That's 24 times higher than previously thought. Isn't this the way of America's business-as-usual crowd? The business-as-usual crowd always underestimates risks when there's a profit to be made.

Keep in mind that the accident in Japan is just one of the biggest of the past 60 years. Nuclear accidents have many other causes. An earthquake is only one possible cause. Back in March, The Guardian provided a list of 33 nuclear accidents since the early 1950s. These are most of the known incidents, though there have been others. The incident in Japan has since been raised to a Level 7 incident. Now notice the number, 33 accidents. And that is almost certainly an under count. Nevertheless, that's one accident every two years since 1950.

Let's go back to the AP article:

The average risk to U.S. reactors of core damage from a quake remains low, at one accident every 500 years, according to the AP analysis of NRC data.

Nuclear power generators have only been around since 1950. Japan immediately lost 3 reactors to the earthquake and the tsunami that followed. Then 3 more went permanently offline due to the extreme radiation. Yes, the accident was in Japan, but the design came from the U.S. and despite all the second-guessing, Japan is just as safety conscious and technologically adept as we are (meaning, of course, not safety conscious enough).

The NRC and the industry are playing games with the 500 years statistics (the 500 year figure, by the way, is after the NRC seems to have recognized the greater earthquake danger, 24 times more likely. Wow, so a year ago the odds were one in 12,000 years? These clearly are never-neverland statistics). There are times when statistics actually mean something. But this is not one of them. Also keep in mind that a single incident like the one in Japan is a very serious accident, far greater than if a coal power plant toppled to the ground or a few windmills got blown over.

Incidentally, I give Forbes credit for cutting one part of the AP article. In my paper, there was an odd and muddled reference by AP that according to one perspective the risk of an accident from an earthquake to a single reactor was only one in 30,000 years. No doubt, even Forbes likes to maintain its credibility (the editors of my paper simply reprint things without much proofreading or thought, like far too many papers in America). Apologies for the discussing the numbers, but when an accident like the one in Japan occurs, we see why it's important to be skeptical of such rosy industry assessments of nuclear safety. To keep things in perspective, it's important to remember that Virginia experienced only a 5.9 earthquake. Despite the small size, at least one nuclear reactor had things move several inches that shouldn't have moved at all. In the last 250 years, the east coast and the middle of the United States have experienced much bigger earthquakes.

Is nuclear energy dead? For now, probably. Today's reactors will continue producing energy but new projects are pretty much dead. In the long term, it may depend on whether Europe, Japan and the U.S. can commit to major new research in nuclear energy designs that are much safer and are cost effective. Keep in mind, that safer reactors can be built right now but the nuclear industry has shown no inclination to do so. Keep in mind that the fossil fuel industry has a similar problem. There are ways right now for recapturing CO2 and sticking it safely somewhere in the ground. But there is no commitment on any kind of serious scale to do so.

It is entirely possible that the best way forward in the next 50 years is to put fossil fuels and nuclear energy out of business. And the best way to do that is to commit to job-creating green energy and massive amounts of job-creating research for better, cleaner and more sustainable source of energy.

If All the Earth's Population Could Fit into Texas...

Sometime this year, according to National Geographic, the number of humans on our planet is expected to reach 7 billion. The prediction, of course, assumes it hasn't already happened. Now I'm perfectly aware that when one drives across Nevada or eastern Oregon or west Texas, it sure doesn't feel like a crowded planet. But I'm also aware that 7 billion people are a lot for a planet to absorb, particularly as more and more societies try for an American lifestyle, as China is so quickly learning to do. One obviously cannot object to such lifestyles if one has been personally benefiting from such economic ascendancy for a number of decades. But one can notice trends, and increasing difficulties that are dangerous to ignore.

In National Geographic, writer Robert Kunzig doesn't exactly ignore population issues but one could argue that he may be a little too much on the optimistic side. Given predictions since the time of Malthus, the odd are actually in Kunsig's favor. To ease the reader's mind, however, he offers an illustration that supposedly puts things into perspective (pg. 61-62; January 2011):

At the PAA [Population Association of America] meeting, in the Dallas Hyatt Regency, I learned that the current population of the planet could fit into the state of Texas, if Texas were settled as densely as New York City. The comparison made me start thinking.... If in 2045 there are 9 billion people living on the six habitable continents, the world population density will be a little more than half that of France today.

The part about France is a bit warm and fuzzy but it's complicated to explain why it's so wrong. So let's stick with the Texas side of it. Of course, Kunsig is in no way advocating some kind of sci-fi removal of the Earth's population to Texas. But to see what the image means or doesn't mean, let's take it seriously and have some fun with it.

In our sci-fi depiction of the world of humans, we'll skip the absurdity of how to talk 7 billion people into jamming themselves into a mega-mega city in Texas with the density of New York City. First, let's look quickly at New York. No farms and very few manufacturing plants can be found these days in New York City. Everything is virtually brought in. And every night tons and tons of material is taken out, including everything such as waste products from shredded Wall Street documents and wrappings for hot dogs sold by street vendors. No major power plant within city limits fuels the heat, air conditioning and electricity for the city. And by the way, I don't know how true it is of other cities but a number of books have been written about how New York would literally fall apart within days if the infrastructure were not constantly repaired, maintained and in some cases fueled. If the power goes on the blink in some suburbs around the U.S. for a week a two, it's very inconvenient but the suburbs wouldn't necessarily fall apart. Unfortunately, without backup generators and significant technological help, New York would.

And then there's Texas. The western third is mostly desert. The middle third has some rain but is mostly on the dry side. The eastern third is wet (see a rain map here). And no matter where you are in the summer, it gets hot. New York City already has a knack for being hot in the summer despite being somewhat in the north. Imagine what a citified Texas would be! Now the fact is, no matter where you put a Texas-sized home for the human population, no location is likely to be perfect. But keep some of these factors in mind as we imagine some serious problems:

1. Where is all the steel and cement going to come from for all those skyscrapers? China is currently in the middle of a big building boom but even the Chinese could never find the cement and steel to cover all of Texas. And you can't take that material from existing buildings. Not all that many people on Earth live in high rises.

2. Where is the water going to come from? Particularly in west Texas, there isn't that much water for the population that already lives there. In fact, no place on Earth has enough water closeby to slake the thirst of 7 billion people in a place the size of Texas. Alas, you need pipelines—lots of them. And that still might not be enough. Special shipping ports would have to be built on the coast of Texas just to accommodate the tanker ships filled with water.

3. Farmers are going to have one hell of a commute. Somebody has got to grow the food. I suppose in our sci-fi adventure we could invent some robots but—except in the movies—robots are not that cheap to make or run, and not that good. And oh, by the way, where do we get all the extra metal and parts for them? Once again, special ports will have to be built along the Texas coast to accommodate all the food shipments. I suppose some fresh truck farm produce can be grown in Oklahoma, Louisiana, Kansas, New Mexico, Missouri, and maybe a dozen other states (and maybe part of Mexico) and put on trains to the mega-mega city, but one faces the same problem all over again: how are humans going to get to all the truck farms and back home in one night? And where are the refrigerator cars going to come from and how are you going to get them in that big city of Texas?

4. The same problem goes for fisherman, loggers, miners, oil riggers, etc., etc. Mind you, it's cheating the illustration if everybody lives near where they work. If coal miners need to go to Manchuria, they're going to need supersonic jets every night. And those jets are going to need super-airports because there's going to be a lot of commuters to fly and one hell of a rush hour in the skies. Oh, wait a minutes, the states surround the mega-mega city are being used for truck farms. Where would we put the airports?

5. And exactly where would all the manufacturing plants go? And who mans them? Well, we could once again conjure those magic all-purpose robots we find in so many sci-fi movies, but where are the metals, parts, computer chips and fuel going to come from for those things? And aren't robots cheating, anyway? And how would we get human workers to those plants without more supersonic jets? Or at least hi-speed rail? Maybe we need to build those manufacturing plants before we build the truck farms (not to mention all the other farms for not so fresh food).

6. Where would the energy come from for the mega-mega city and the manufacturing plants? If we use coal and natural gas, who's going to make sure the power plants get fed? And how are you going to feed the electricity from the Yangtze River energy project all the way to Texas? How do we hook up all those nuclear power plants from France? And that's an awful lot of power lines around the world zeroing in on our mega-mega city in Texas.

7. If we were to turn on 7 billion air conditioners on a hot Texas afternoon, what would that do to the grid?

8. I want to keep this polite but what would happen to all the dog poop in a city of 7 billion? And the cat and parakeet poop? And what would happen to all those flushed toilets and all that leftover food dumped into the garbage disposal? Sooner or later, it would end in the Gulf of Mexico. Would anyone along the Texas coast go into the water? Or any river more than twenty miles south of the Oklahoma or New Mexico border? Would we need sewage pipelines to California and the Great Lakes?

9. Just where would everybody go in a hurricane? Or a tornado? Or a flood? Actually, how would we keep the mega-mega city and all those asphalt streets from flooding during a spring time shower? Hey, where would we get all the asphalt for that city landscape, anyway?

10. And sometimes strange things just happen in a mega-mega city. Over the last number of years, Texas has been developing sinkholes. That brings us back to National Geographic and a story about a 600-wide sinkhole. How wide at the base is the Empire State Building again? Isn't Yankee Stadium about the size of that sinkhole? Not to be overly macabre or anything, but where exactly would the people of the mega-mega city be buried? And if 195 countries were crammed into the mega-mega city of Texas, how many countries would you have to cross before saying goodbye to your relatives? Actually, how would the living residents of 195 countries get along? Would you need a visa to take out the garbage?

The absurdities as one can see pile up. If any reader can think of other problems with 9 billion people in an area the size of Texas, feel free to add them in comments. To be honest, I don't know how much longer the Earth's population can continue to grow. But whatever carrying capacity the entire world might have for a human population with the kind of technology and affluence generally found in the west, that capacity was probably passed some time ago.

Many in the West believe technology can always find a way to keep the world population growing. Many of these same believers once talked about hover cars and fusion being just around the corner. But the task of dealing with an ever larger population is becoming more complex, and complexity carries with it a risk that is becoming more and more difficult to ignore.

Pessimistic experts have been wrong about population for decades. I hope they continue to be wrong. But the odds are not good. Actually, if the pessimists ever turn out to be right, we're going to need optimists, lots and lots of them in the times that follow.

More Voices Say Oil Production Not Sustainable

Over time, facts slowly but surely go mainstream. We're not quite there yet but a growing number of voices recognize that worldwide oil production is not sustainable in the short term, meaning any time between now and the next 15 years, depending on who's doing the talking.

Now it may happen that oil production could surpass the 2005 high mark or even the 2008 high mark in the next two to eight years. But no one knows if that will happen. But one thing is certain: the age of cheap oil is gone. It's history.

Oil prices will continue to vary. They may even collapse temporarily as they did in 2008, thanks to the worldwide economic meltdown. We're on a roller coaster ride that will last for decades and it's not certain how things will look on the other side of a new age, an age of shortages and shifting dynamics. Of course, the more the United States and other parts of the world have their head in the sand, the more difficult it will be.

A few years ago, the conventional wisdom was that there was still plenty of oil. In a trivial way, that's true, but what there is no longer a lot of is accessible oil. Nor is there enough easy to reach oil to produce in sufficient abundance to offset the declines of older oil fields. Here's an interview from Forbes Magazine using a word many people would like to ignore: peak oil:

Charles Maxwell: The use of petroleum in the world is now up to about 30 billion barrels per year. The rate at which we have found new supplies of petroleum over the last 10 years has fallen to an average, of only about 10 billion barrels per year.

Charles Maxwell is a mainstream energy analyst. He says what others have noticed simply by looking at the facts: for some years now, the world has been using far more oil each year than it is discovering. The current shortfall is about 20 billion barrels a year. If you think of oil as a bank account, it's clear that the account is being drained.

As Maxwell points out, greed and blunders by producers are creating even more problems:

What's happening is that the increase in the world's population and greater use of oil in transportation, particularly in the emerging countries, is working to lift oil demand, and that spurs us to drain a field more quickly, but not necessarily to get a higher proportion of oil out of it. So we have technology improving production capability, but actually taking the oil out faster rather than getting much more out.

What Maxwell is saying here is that we're making poor use of our technology in an effort to sustain business as usual. But we already know that such thinking is not sustainable.

In the past year, a majority of Democrats tried to pass an energy bill that would deal with climate change while also addressing America's growing need for alternative energy. But a minority of Democrats and almost all the Republicans opposed the legislation. In the meantime, according to CNNMoney, the alternative energy sector in China is creating jobs:

China has already surpassed the United States in the amount of wind turbines and solar panels that it makes. China is also gaining on the United States when it comes to how much of their energy comes from renewable energy sources.

The country that leads in the renewable energy industry, is opening the door to more home-grown jobs.

Whatever one may think of the Chinese, American conservatives are handing them the future. Keep in mind that oil will continue to be produced in the United States for many years to come. But we are continuing to buy more and more foreign oil. This is precisely where the lie of conservatives is so obvious: foreign oil does not create American jobs. But jobs in alternative energy in the U.S. would create tens of thousands of jobs. That is a simple fact. And we ignore that fact at our own peril.

Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill Continues

No one knows for sure how much oil is spilling into the Gulf of Mexico. But pictures of the size of the spill show the impacted area growing every day. If 210,000 gallons a day are leaking from the well at Deepwater Horizon as BP says, we already have a spill of over 5,000,000 gallons. Keep in mind that a number of scientists believe the spill may be much larger.

No one knows when the leaking oil will be capped. But the oil executives—who seem to get to the top based on their public relations skills—are getting egg on their faces as they point fingers at one another and trip over their feet as more and more mistakes, blunders and misguided shortcuts are revealed. And then there's Tony Hayward, CEO of BP who told us the other day than fighting the oil spill is a bit like landing at Normandy. But now, according to The Guardian, he's telling a little different story:

Tony Hayward, the beleaguered chief executive of BP, has claimed its oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico is "relatively tiny" compared with the "very big ocean".

In an bullish interview with the Guardian at BP's crisis centre in Houston, Hayward insisted that the leaked oil and the estimated 400,000 gallons of dispersant that BP has pumped into the sea to try to tackle the slick should be put in context.

"The Gulf of Mexico is a very big ocean. The amount of volume of oil and dispersant we are putting into it is tiny in relation to the total water volume," he said.

Hayward is apparently an idiot who receives a very large paycheck every year. One has to be amazed at these things. Here's a graphic from NOAA that shows the size of the oil spill (bigger maps are available on NOAA's webpage):


That's a spill that potentially stretches along half the Louisiana coast, all of Mississippi's coast and as far east as Mobile, Alabama. The blue areas, the core of the spill, just continue to grow every hour.

Now Tony Hayward says that the gulf is very big and the spill is rather tiny. Let's take a look at the Gulf of Mexico:


The first thing I notice is that the water of the Gulf of Mexico is surrounded by land—lots of it. Along the shore are beaches, marshes, shipping, breeding grounds, hatcheries, fishing marinas, industry and lots and lots of wildlife and habitat. Hayward is a fool and doesn't know what he's talking about.

Unfortunately, the longer the oil spill goes on, the more potential there is for enormous damage. As a news story from Reuters reminds us, hurricane season is approaching:

Meteorologists say that climate conditions are ripe for an unusually destructive hurricane season, the storm-prone period that runs from June 1 to the end of November in the Gulf. Oceanographers say that could hurt the clean-up.

"If a storm comes into this situation it could vastly complicate everything," said Florida State University oceanography professor Ian MacDonald.

"All efforts on the shoreline and at sea, the booms and structures and rigs involved in clean-up and containment, could stop working."

One doesn't have to be a scientist to see the potential problems. If nothing else, a hurricane can shove oil ashore. But no doubt the public relations departments of the oil companies—as well as their Washington lobbyists—will continue to be 'bullish' about the clean-up and the future of offshore drilling.

In reality, though, it doesn't take much homework to discover that the big oil companies know truths that many Americans would rather not know. The simplest truth is that oil is no longer cheap. The second truth is that beyond the next ten to twenty years, the oil companies have no business plan to maintain worldwide oil production and they have no solution to the diminishing reserves of oil throughout the world. The third truth is that it will take ten to twenty years to develop a robust infrastructure for renewable green energy. The fourth truth is that the American taxpayer is paying to subsidize the obscene profits of the oil companies when those tax dollars should be spent protecting our future with a huge investment in green technology.

Admittedly, some oil companies are slowly getting into alternative energy. But I would not be comfortable letting the Tony Haywards of the world be involved in the new economy we need to build. In fact, that would be a mistake. In the last three years, Wall Street, the big banks and big oil have shown us how not to do business. We need change. Maybe Obama is finally understanding that change is not a political slogan but a necessity.

Republicans: Drill, Baby, Drill

The title for this post might seem a bit unfair. But no one is more associated with "Drill, baby, drill," than Sarah Palin. The Countess of Wasilla, alas, is just as dim as ever. She seems to be upset with the 'foreigners' who created the mess. Here's the Daily Telegraph story in The Vancouver Sun:

Sarah Palin has added to growing anti-British sentiment over the Gulf of Mexico oil rig disaster by saying "foreign" oil companies such as BP were not to be trusted.

The former Alaska governor and potential presidential candidate attacked the British oil company over the recent Deepwater Horizon spill and a previous one in her state in 2006.

She made the comments despite the fact that her husband Todd worked for BP for 18 years as a production supervisor. He left the company last year.

The hypocrite from Wasilla fails to note that many Americans as well as a number of American companies have been involved in the project, including Dick Cheney's old company, Halliburton. The idea that American companies are somehow exempt from oil spills is a fantasy. During Hurricane Katrina, it's estimated that at least a million gallons of oil were spilled along the Louisiana coast and out among the oil rigs.

Now BP is certainly not exempt from blame. For some years they have benefited from a green image that was not exactly justified. For example, they did a poor job of maintaining pipelines in Alaska (hey, maybe Todd can tell us about that!). I know enough about the oil business (I've been fortunate to know a handful of people who know a great deal more) to have an idea of the kind of people involved. Like many other fields, there are people who know what they're doing (usually the oil workers, specialists, geologists and most engineers), people who push the envelope in pursuit of the bottom line (usually alpha types or narcissists who bend the rules and don't care much what happens if things go wrong, largely because they have the last group on their side) and finally the bullshitters who are skilled at talking their way out of difficulties (usually amoral lawyers and public relations flacks).

Now I don't know much about Tony Hayward, the chief executive of BP, but here apparently is a taste of how he talks, at least according to Clifford Krauss of The New York Times:

"It’s only one of the battle fronts,” said the chief executive, Tony Hayward, as his leased Sikorsky helicopter hovered 1,000 feet above the spot where the Deepwater Horizon drilling platform exploded...

(snip)

Mr. Hayward said he was convinced that his oil company would eventually get the growing spill under control using a variety of tools, from a flotilla of skimmers to the spraying of chemical dispersants and the drilling of relief wells to plug the leaks on the sea floor. “This is like the Normandy landing,” he said. “We know we are going to win. We just don’t know how quickly.”

Normandy? It's not difficult to figure out which type Mr. Hayward represents, is it?

As of Friday night, May 7, no one really knows how big the oil spill is. The main attempt to seal one of the leaks is going on as I write, but no one knows if this attempt will work or how long it will work or how much oil it will stop from leaking if it does work. What is going on at Deepwater Horizon is deep water technology and that technology is just as much art as it is science. My hunch is something like this has simply been waiting to happen for some time. No doubt mistakes were made but every project like this seems to have a series of mistakes that are made, just not enough to create a major oil spill.

The BBC has a graph showing the different sizes of various oil spills over the last 43 years. It claims the Deepwater Horizon oil spill is small compared to other oil spills—well, so far. The number they give is 7,000-10,000 tonnes of oil. That's equivalent to somewhere between 2 million to 2.86 million gallons of oil. The spill from the Exxon Valdez was over 10,000,000 gallons and that spill is still regarded as one of the smaller oil spills. But much depends on what an oil spill does. The Exxon Valdez damaged one of the richest biological areas in the world and the damage is still visible to this day.

The Vancouver Sun carries a Reuters story that suggests that BP's spill is much larger:

The Gulf of Mexico oil spill may already be bigger than the massive Exxon Valdez spill in 1989 and could have dumped as much as 13 million gallons (49 million litres) of crude into waters off the U.S. coastline, a Florida oceanographer said on Friday.

Ian MacDonald, a biological oceanographer at Florida State University, said official estimates that 5,000 barrels (210,000 gallons/795,000 litres) have poured into the Gulf each day since the Deepwater Horizon rig exploded two weeks ago were much too conservative.

The real flow rate from the undersea well, based on aerial images of the oil slick and estimates of the thickness of the oil itself, is probably closer to 25,000 barrels (1,050,000 gallons) per day, MacDonald said in an interview.

I'm sure other figures are probably around. If we only take the figures from the BBC and Reuters, the spill is somewhere between 2 million to 13 million gallons. No matter how you cut it, that's a lot of oil. The truth is that 2 million gallons of oil can do considerable damage and the effects should not be minimized, particularly since the oil is still leaking. But if it's 13 million gallons, the damage along the Gulf coast is going to bite for at least a couple of decades.

Now it's been several days since the leak started. What bothers me is that there's good methods and protocols for measuring the size of an oil spill (and it worries me that the oceanographer above is probably aware of those methods). We need hard numbers and I'm curious why it's been so hard to get those numbers. Warnings from BP that the numbers might be larger are not reassuring.

Now what about future offshore drilling? Let's first state the obvious before I proceed: oil is getting costly and will continue to get more costly. There are alternatives, solar and wind being the most obvious choices in addition to major improvements in the efficiency of the technology we already use. But even if the United States took on a Manhattan-sized project to produce 80% of our energy through green technology, it will probably take 15-20 years to accomplish. And it probably cannot be done without burning oil to fuel the transition. We have a problem.

If we drill for oil the way Republicans want to drill, without bothering with green technology, and without bothering to regulate the oil companies more tightly, our economy will go into the ditch rather quickly because we simply cannot overcome the fact that U.S. oil production will continue to fall. We use too much of the stuff. The world uses too much of the stuff. And this says nothing about the effects on the world climate. And nothing about using dirtier and dirtier fossil fuels.

We will have to continue to drill. But hopefully with tight regulation of the oil companies and slowly enough so that we can measure what drilling is doing not just to our environment but to us as well. And also slowly enough to allow green technology to thrive.

Whether we like it or not, oil is subsidized. It costs considerably more than what we pay at the pump. Republicans and oil states in general are all too happy to have the government pick up the tab. The government has been bailing out the oil companies for decades and that's a fact. Here's another fact: alternative energy is now very competitive with oil, but this requires understanding that oil has become far more expensive than anyone on Wall Street, in Washington or in Houston is willing to admit. The age of oil is slowly coming to an end and we need something to replace it. And because we have dawdled for more than thirty years, we have no choice but to continue to burn oil to pay for the transition to green technology.

Thanks to Republicans, U.S. Leadership Is Eroding

China continues to make smart economic moves while the U.S., even with a Democratic president, continues to dither. In other posts I have discussed some of China's problems, including human rights failings, corruption, pollution and its growing nationalism. But, for twenty years, China has been making savvy economic moves that go beyond the cheap labor it supplies for the production of many products that once were produced elsewhere, including in the United States.

No one can argue that China's acquisition of oil has been one of its top priorities. The rise of China's economy is one of the reasons oil went up to $147/barrel in the summer of 2008. But China is also focusing on alternative energy, so much so that it is leading in areas where the U.S., by all rights, should be dominant. We are the inventor nation but we are no longer the industrial superpower we once were. For pennies on the dollar, we have been selling our ingenuity to the Chinese and others.

And it continues. The price of alternative energy is falling while the cost of producing fossil fuels is getting more expensive. Include the cost of pollution and climate change and the real cost of fossil fuels has been prohibitive for the last three decades. But facts hardly get in the way of know-nothing Republicans. Here's a story from Arizona:

Arizona was one of the healthy energy states, with a requirement for 15% renewable energy by 2025. But now a Republican state representative in the Arizona state legislature is challenging the right of the Arizona Corporation Commission to set a requirement that utilities add more renewable energy, with a bill that would strip them of the responsibility.

(snip)

The legislation the state lawmaker Carl Seel introduced is the next step in an anti-renewable energy campaign mounted by the conservative think tank; the Goldwater Institute, on behalf of several customers of the state’s largest utility, and is aimed at overturning the ruling on renewable energy.

Keep in mind that Republican policies have little to do with free enterprise. They love their no-bid contracts, monopolies, cartels and cronyism too much to practice what they preach. In reality, neither the Chinese nor Americans are practicing anything like true free markets. But there is thinking behind the moves the Chinese are making as opposed to the bizarre notions of Republicans and, unfortunately, a few Democrats. Although the Chinese will have to install conventional power plants for some time to come, they clearly have a long-term vision of not only using alternative energy but being the leading builder of such equipment:

Renewable energy industries in China are adding jobs rapidly, reaching 1.12 million in 2008 and climbing by 100,000 a year, according to the government-backed Chinese Renewable Energy Industries Association.

Yet renewable energy may be doing more for China's economy than for the environment. China is on track to pass the United States in total power generation in 2012 — and most of the added capacity will be from coal, which is forecast to represent two-thirds of China's capacity in 2020.

As China seeks to dominate energy-equipment exports, it has the advantage of being the world's largest market for power equipment. The government spends heavily to upgrade the electricity grid, committing

$45 billion in 2009 alone. China's top leaders are focused on energy policy: On Jan. 27, the government announced the creation of a National Energy Commission composed of Cabinet ministers as a "superministry" led by Prime Minister Wen Jiabao.

Regulators have set mandates for power generation companies to use more renewable energy. Generous subsidies for consumers to install their own solar panels or solar water heaters have produced flurries of activity on rooftops across China.

China's biggest advantage might be its domestic demand for electricity, which is rising 15 percent a year. To meet demand in the coming decade, according to statistics from the International Energy Agency, China will need to add nearly nine times as much electricity generation capacity as the United States will. As a result, Chinese producers of generating equipment enjoy enormous efficiencies from large-scale production.

There's no guarantee that China's economic growth will continue at its current pace or that China can avoid a number of pitfalls in the next 20 years related to other problems it has. But given the behavior of politicians in Washington and our increasing reliance on China's products as well as its loans, I wouldn't bet against Beijing.

In category after category, U.S. leadership has been eroding for some thirty years. It's ridiculous that some 40% of our economy now depends on financial services that in turn largely depend on little more than our good name. Financing the purchase of fossils fuels from oil producing countries or financing alternative energy equipment built elsewhere only succeeds in killing American jobs. That pattern cannot be sustained.

How Much Oil Will Iraq Produce?

If the purpose of invading Iraq was about oil, the results have been disappointing. Although Iraq has had a few good quarters in the last two or three years, they have not been able to put together a year of production equal to pre-invasion levels. And it's been three decades since Iraq reached it maximum output. Wars, corruption and incompetence share blame for Iraq's poor performance.

Of course the oil is still sitting in the ground. Everyone agrees there is still a sizable reserve. Here's the latest concerning Iraqi oil:

Head of Iraq's State Oil Marketing Organization, Falah Alamri, said that the country plans to start crude oil shipping operations in March and prepares to export larger volumes of crude in the future, Reuter reported.

Another site carries the same Reuters story. They have a picture that may or not be contemporary and yet it seems to fit what I know of Iraq's petroleum industry for the last thirty years.

It's hard not to be skeptical. Stuart Staniford has a post in The Oil Drum that's also skeptical but he explores the possibility of Iraqi oil production rising from a little more than 2 million barrels/day in 2009 to 12 million barrels/day by 2017. Here's an excerpt from Staniford's post:

At this stage, it seems too soon to say the Iraqis definitely will succeed. But the scenario that they might seems worth serious consideration.

(snip)

There doesn't seem to be too much dispute that Iraq has enough reserves to support far higher production than has actually occurred in the past.

(snip)

Iraq held two rounds of auctions for oilfield management contracts in 2009 that the large international oil companies have responded to. The first round, in June, were for fields that were already in production and set up contracts in which companies get paid a fee per barrel for all production over the existing level. The second round, last month, were for fields not yet on stream. The Iraqis seem to have driven hard bargains - the oil companies are being paid a flat fee per barrel that is generally under $2/barrel in the safer parts of the country, and thus will not benefit from high oil prices - all price risk/reward remains with the Iraqis. Nonetheless they were able to attract some bids from large competent oil companies with a track record - the likes of Shell, Exxon, Statoil, and Lukoil, and have been signing preliminary contracts with them. According to the oil ministry, the total contracts awarded amount to 12mbd of production, and this could be achieved within six years.

Staniford always has good graphs. Below is just one of the them:



It's simply not possible these days to post such a story without checking to see if the Chinese are paying attention. They are:

Iraq's oil exports amounted to 1.97 million barrels a day in December 2009, an increase of 950,000 barrels over November, the preceding month, according to latest statistics from the Iraqi Ministry of Oil. And a significant change in the volume of exports fully reflects the rapidly-rising momentum from an aspect of current oil production in the country.

In line with requirements for its government to sign a contract with foreign energy firms, Iraq would increase its crude oil to 12 million barrels a day from the current 2.5 million barrels in the next six years; at the same time, its gas production would increase to 144 million cubic meters from the present 48 million cubic meters. Representatives of some OPEC member nations, however, regard that Iraq’s practice for a large-scale increase of oil production is inconsistent with the OPEC’s current strategy for "limited production and oil price protection", and this could cause volatility on the future global oil market.

Admittedly, the article doesn't say all that much, but it's in the opinion section of the People' Daily Online. That means it's news China wants to be noticed. Despite the optimism of Iraq's oil sector, China and Stuart Staniford agree: there may be increased production from Iraq but we're also likely to see increased volatility in the world's oil markets.

In the long run, a plug-in or hybrid car not only sounds like a bargain but may also offer peace of mind.

The Rise and Fall of the Age of Oil: Opportunity or Endgame?

A couple of years ago I read a book on the rise and fall of several periods of Chinese history. Some emperor would fight a few wars, unite a few more provinces than the last emperor, and his heirs would thrive for a few generations.

But the collapse of a dynasty often followed a similar pattern. As the population grew during the good times, the amount of tilled acreage per family dropped while taxes kept rising since the wealthy demanded more and more to keep up appearances. Sooner or later, corruption grew, more demands were placed on peasants and the emperor found himself unable to control events as easily as before.

Of course discontent would grow, generals or talented peasants would take advantage of the discontent and rebellions would flourish, forcing the emperor to impose harsh crackdowns. Meanwhile, people on the borders would notice the lack of troops in the usual places and would encroach on Chinese territory. And the encroachments would give an emperor an opportunity to use foreigners as a distraction while perhaps gaining some more territory and more taxes with it.

But eventually the emperor's army would find itself overextended with rebellions and external enemies. Throw in a famine or an epidemic along with a war that doesn't go well and collapse would soon follow. China of course never fully collapsed during these troubled periods but they sometimes could lose as much as 10-50% of their population. Suddenly, after all the troubles, there would be more acreage per family available and the period of rise would begin anew.

Such rises and falls of course are not unique to the Chinese. But about four to five hundred years ago the pattern began to change, particularly in Europe and later in the United States. First the British and Europeans found coal and better ways to burn it and use it. And Americans discovered an entire continent of virgin forests that provided firewood for over two hundred years. In the middle of the 19th century, American industry exploded with the growing use of coal and the discovery of oil.

Oil meant energy. Oil meant every acre of a 160 acre farm could be used for food and profit. Acreage for horses was no longer necessary. Oil also meant kerosene and light for longer days. It eventually meant fuel for farm tractors, industries, electrical power plants and so on.

In his book, Feeding the Fire, Mark E. Eberhart covers some of the history of coal and oil and reminds us that the British, Europeans and the United States might have had a very different history if coal and oil had not been available in such abundance for the last three hundred years. The subtitle of Eberhart's book is: The Lost History & Uncertain Future of Mankind's Energy Addiction. Offhand, it sounds like the kind of book others have written on Peak Oil, climate change, environmental concerns, the need for abundant alternative energy and so on in the early 21st century. There is some of that in Eberhart's book but he sounds more like someone in the corporate world who's reluctantly and gently sounding the alarm and providing deep background. Actually, despite some reservations I have about the book, I found Eberhart's approach refreshing since he provides a host of material I have not seen before. I don't agree with some things he says but I have learned a lot. On page 183, he writes:

Crude oil is a mixture of hydrocarbon molecules. You might think of these as strands of hairy pearls, where the pearls are carbon atoms and their hair is made of hydrogen atoms. Each pearl in the strand has two hairs, except the ones on the end, which have three. This molecular jewelry comes in different lengths, from a strand with one carbon pearl, which is methane, to strands with thirty or more carbon atoms. The number of carbon atoms controls the properties of the molecule. For example, if the strand has fewer than five carbon atoms, the molecule is a gas at room temperature; five to eighteen, a liquid; and nineteen or more a solid. The most volatile components of crude are called naphthas, which are used as solvents and dry-cleaning fluids and are characterized by strands of five to seven carbon atoms. Gasoline is the component of crude with strings of 7 to 11 [carbon] atoms in length. Kerosene is the portion containing strands of 12 to 15; diesel, 15 to 17; and lubricating oils are made of hydrocarbon chains of more than 17 carbon atoms. The 20-atom-plus range is where paraffin, tar and asphalt are found.

Eberhart explains that one of the things that so quickly made oil so efficient to use is that the heavier oils can be 'cracked' by baking heavy crude at high temperature under high pressure (not unlike how the shorter carbon chains are created in hot pressures found deep underground. Of course light sweet crude doesn't require as much treatment (or 'cracking') as sour heavy crude. So part of today's energy picture requires that people understand that throughout the world, the volume of heavy crude going through the refinery process (requiring additional processes, time and equipment not necessary for light sweet crude) is growing.

What I want to emphasize is that these processes are energy intensive and expensive. Expensive in terms of cost and expensive in terms of lower net energy. Sour heavy crude, however, is still preferable in many ways to coal. And the production of coal is rising dramatically, particularly if we take China into account. Regardless of what one thinks about climate change, pollution, peak oil or the environment, we have already entered a different age and it's already a harsher reality, largely because the United States for the last thirty years has failed to act. There is still time but we can no longer afford illusions.

More on Coal

I've been reading more about coal since my post on pollution and the illusions of clean coal. Because 50% of our electricity is generated by coal, it's simply not going to disappear overnight. But the U.S. government needs to get real, not ten or twenty years from now, but in the coming months.

Richard Heinberg of the Post Carbon Institute has a few observations that need to be taken into consideration as the United States and the world plan an energy future:

America's coal resources are indeed vast—none of the studies claims otherwise. However, during the past century, coal reserves (the portion of total coal resources that can be mined profitably with existing technologies) shrank much faster than could be accounted for by the depletion of those resources through mining. That is because geologists are doing a better job now of taking into account "restrictions" that make most coal impractical to mine—factors having to do with location, depth, seam thickness, and coal quality. In recent years, some nations have reduced their booked coal reserves by 90 percent or more on the basis of new, more realistic surveys.

(snip)

We also know how to store carbon: the petroleum services industry routinely injects CO2 into old oil wells to make it easier to extract the remaining crude. But the quantities of carbon dioxide sequestered this way are trivial when compared with the amounts spewed from coal-burning power plants annually. Gathering and storing two or three billion tons of carbon each year from hundreds of geographically scattered coal power plants will require the construction of an enormous system of pipelines, compressors, and pumps.

(snip)

According to the most recent estimate (from Harvard University's Belfer Center (5), at least 30 percent of the energy produced by burning coal will be needed to run the system for capturing, compressing, pumping, and burying CO2. Therefore any efficiency benefit from gasifying coal at IGCC power plants would be canceled out.

(snip)

How high could coal-based electricity prices go? During the period from 2006 to 2008, prices for some grades of US coal doubled. This year the economic crisis has lowered demand for electricity and thus for coal, and so prices have softened. However, recent experience shows that, even in the absence of serious shortages, coal prices are increasingly subject to dramatic swings.

All energy experts, including Heinberg, talk about low hanging fruit as a useful metaphor. Energy that is the cheapest to pick off the tree is the energy that gets used. In the year 2009, the key is not that we have run out of conventional energy but that we are running out of the low hanging inexpensive fruit that we have grown accustomed to picking for over a hundred years. Even without considering global warming or pollution, coal, along with oil, will only get more expensive. Meanwhile, the cost of wind and solar is getting cheaper and the bang per buck is climbing. The sooner we move toward solar and wind, the faster technological advances will be made and the faster we will move to a far more sensible future.

Even more than oil, coal is the critical issue. More than eighty years ago, the industrial world made the transition from the age of coal to the age of oil. There was a reason: oil was cheap, easier to use, easier to transport and had the advantage of polluting less than coal. Look around. We are blundering back into the coal age. A lot of wealthy, well-connected people think that's grand because of the profits they'll make and because they don't have to live near the coal plants.

One of the ironies of windpower and solar power is that anyone can buy a wind turbine (there are models you can mount on a roof) and anyone can buy a solar panel (Lowe's hardware is bringing out a do-it-yourself solar panel kit—okay, you still need to know what you're doing and there may be some paperwork). Why some Republicans, who pride themselves on their self-reliance and individualism, want to support big impersonal power companies is beyond me. I know, I know, we'll still have big power plants for years to come but relying exclusively on big power plants is a paradigm that is becoming less and less tenable. Like millions of Americans, I don't like it when my power goes out because some speculator is playing games with a power company hundreds of miles away. We need a paradigm that's more reliable, redundant and dispersed.

If we are to change, here's a simple fact: we have hundreds of coal powered plants throughout the country. These plants have a lifetime of 20 to 50 years. Taking these facts into mind, every time a coal plant reaches the end of its life cycle, a conventional coal plant should not be built to replace it. For every two coal power plants that go offline, only one at the same rating should be allowed to be replaced and only by a coal gasification plant or similar technology with carbon capture and storage.

During the coming transitional era, a power plant using natural gas should be built whenever it's difficult to get windpower or solar power to replace the second offline coal power plant. But those gas power plants will also need carbon capture and storage. Because the age of electric cars and plug-ins is coming, probably faster than most people realize, we're going to need more power plants. All the new ones that aren't simply replacing old power plants should be based on alternative energy.

Al Gore, who some people love to vilify largely because they don't handle change very well, suggests that it may be time for a carbon tax. I'm all for it. Eleanor Clift in her Newsweek column notes a poll that suggests people favor a carbon tax over cap and trade by a margin of two to one. Why? Remember those speculators I mentioned above? They're pretty much the same Wall Street characters that Clift mentions.

I suspect the smart thing to do, particularly given the current economic climate, is to institute a carbon tax on the low side and slowly work it up over the next ten to twenty years. Everyone building a new power plant is going to see the future cost of carbon and they'll find that economics will favor other power solutions. In the meantime the government is going to have to do a better job of subsidizing wind and solar projects until the technology and infrastructure is up to speed. Sure, that means borrowing but it'll pay for itself just like a smart business investment pays for itself.

The Peugeot BB1 Four-Passenger Electric Car

My Italian correspondent and frequent technology adviser, BT, says if he had the money he'd be tempted to buy the new Peugeot Electric Car which is now being produced in France. He's an avid user of trains and bicycles so I'm not all that sure how much he needs a car. Then again, he's a photographer and maybe hauling around all that equipment year after year is wearing thin.

Here's a link to some photos and videos of the new BB1. Even before I read the description, I thought it looked like two scooters bolted to a frame with some metal wrapped around. But it's clearly a head turner.

Now the BB1 is a four-passenger vehicle but the Smart electric car has been around for a year or so (it looks like it's based on the two passenger Daimler Smart car). I've spotted four or five Smart cars around the Bay Area (there's a gasoline version but at least two I saw are confirmed electric types). I've been tracking down information on the Smart car and I'm surprised there isn't a whole lot available, though here's an article from Forbes and here's something of a fan site.

Hybrid Technologies has been responsible for making successful conversions and sales but Daimler appears to be going ahead with its own version of the Smart electric car, though it won't actually sell them until probably 2012.

I notice a number of car companies are testing electric cars in various markets. Whether electric cars are made in Europe, the United States or East Asia, I hope they get support, particularly from various governments. Actually all of this is going to take time to sort out. The smaller electric cars are probably going to be replaced by medium-sized vehicles in five to ten years. True hybrids will also be in the mix. A lot will depend on battery technology (that is improving very rapidly), improvements in electric grids and undoubtedly the price of oil.

We're entering a new era and it might be a close call. But there's some room for optimism. A hundred years ago, in 1909, the auto industry was just gearing up for the modern age—a lot of improvements were made in ten years.

Alternative Energy: Beware the Gee Whiz Factor

There are several areas in the United States that lead in energy research. Three that come to mind are Massachussetts, California and North Carolina (see last post). If we are to deal with the real threats of fossil fuel depletion, increasing pollution and global warming, we not only need useful new ideas and technology, we also need to see those ideas implemented in the real world.

I would like to think President Obama gets it when it comes to the need for alternative energy. Earlier today, he gave a speech on alternative energy at MIT. The Boston Globe has the story:

“Extraordinary energy research is being conducted at this institute,’’ he said, mentioning windows that generate electricity, viruses engineered to build batteries, more efficient lighting systems, and “innovative engineering that will make it possible for offshore wind power plants to deliver electricity even when the air is still.’’

(snip)

“From China to India, from Japan to Germany, nations everywhere are racing to develop new ways to produce and use energy,’’ he said. “The nation that wins this competition will be the nation that leads the global economy. I am convinced of that. And I want America to be that nation. It’s that simple.’’

Obama has already done far more for alternative energy than his predecessor. Of course that isn't saying much since both the previous president and vice president were oil men with a narrow view of the universe and little interest in science.

But I guess I'm becoming a worrier. The end of the Boston Globe article ended with a paragraph that might be called the gee whiz factor:

Today, the state is on track to have roughly 30 megawatts of wind generating capacity, or enough to power nearly 7,900 homes, and 40 megawatts of solar generating capacity, enough to power from 6,000 to 8,000 homes, installed by the end of Patrick’s term.

Okay, I have to admit I'm a sucker for gee whiz statistics. Nevertheless, a reality check is necessary here and I'll get to it in a moment. I just want to point out that installing wind turbines and solar farms is important whether it's a single homeowner doing it or a major corporation. Every bit helps and I mean that. No matter what happens in the next five, ten, twenty years, every new alternative energy project will add a resilience factor to our nation.

But here's the problem. Let's say Massachusetts manages to go the extra mile and installs enough power for 16,000 homes in four years. That's power for 4,000 homes a year. The population of Massachusetts is about 6.5 million people. Let's fudge and say there's a million homes in the state. At that rate, it's going to take over 200 years to wean the state from fossil fuels to alternative energy. That's way too long.

Our nation needs to get much more ambitious.

Making Sure Green Technology Is Green

We already know that it's becoming harder and harder to satisfy the world's thirst for oil. In addition, with the rise of China's economy, the world is rapidly becoming aware that resources for all the new technology being developed, including some parts of green technology, may not be adequate to meet demand in the coming years. Today's technology often requires rare earth metals that are not easy to come by. New sources of such metals, at a reasonable cost, are going to be needed. In some cases, old sources need to be revived.

Now in this post I'm pursuing a slightly odd story that requires a little background. Here's a story from last month in The New York Times:

Chinese officials said on Thursday that they would not entirely ban exports of two minerals vital to manufacturing hybrid cars, cellphones, large wind turbines, missiles and computer monitors, although they would tightly regulate production.

China produces more than 99 percent of the world’s supply of dysprosium and terbium, two rare minerals essential to recent breakthroughs in high-technology industries.

Although it's good that China is not going to tighten restrictions as much as originally thought, it should be noted that they are using their hard cash to acquire all kinds of resources throughout the world, including shares in various mines and oil facilities. The United States, Europe and other countries can hardly afford to be caught flat-footed. Fortunately, for the United States, there is an economically viable source for some of the rare minerals that are needed. Here's a story in the Los Angeles Times about a mine in California:

Fear of a shortage of rare-earth metals used in high-tech military and industrial products has spawned global efforts to reopen abandoned mines, including the formidable Mountain Pass Mine in California's Mojave Desert.

(snip)

...Molycorp Minerals in Colorado, has just begun a two-year effort to restore Mountain Pass to its former role as a leading global producer. Those plans were given a boost recently amid fears that China was poised to ban exports of some of the scarcer rare-earth metals and to sharply limit shipments of others.

Effort to restore? Uh-oh. In such cases, it's best to read the rest of the article. Down further we learn that Mountain Pass Mine was closed in 2002 for environmental reasons. Before we go further, let's stop and think for a moment. If 99% of some of these minerals are mined in China and the price on those minerals is acceptable to various corporations, what are the odds that China's famous mine has environmental problems as well? And what are the odds that at least some companies who buy from the Chinese are aware that the Chinese mine has environmental problems? Ah, but we still, for the most part, live in an era of laissez-faire capitalism. Anything goes.

Fortunately, there are people concerned about the environment in the U.S. (and more so in some states). So what was the problem with Mountain Pass? Here's an informative article from David Danelski in February 2009:

...while the mine was producing vital elements, it also was polluting the soil and groundwater.

Wastewater from processing the rare earths was pumped to unlined evaporation ponds, where nitrates and other salts leached into underground water on both sides of Mountain Pass...

(snip)

Unocal owned the mine from 1976 to 2005. In the 1980s, the company began piping wastewater as far as 14 miles to evaporation ponds on or near Ivanpah Dry Lake, east of Interstate 15 near Nevada.

The pipeline repeatedly ruptured during cleaning operations to remove mineral deposits called scale. The scale is radioactive because of the presence of thorium and radium, which occur naturally in the rare earth ore.

(snip)

In all, about 600,000 gallons of radiological and other hazardous waste flowed onto the desert floor, according to federal authorities.

Again, visualize what is probably happening at that mine in China! But, hey, their prices are good. Now it appears that the previous owner Unocal and the new owners of Mountain Pass decided to clean up the mining operation. They have passed environmental inspections. They have made various improvements, etc., etc. This is all to the good. Rare earth metals have a role to play in green technology and it's that much less embarrassment if Mountain Pass is cleaned up.

But I keep thinking of that radioactive pipeline. Obviously it has to be taken apart and disposed of and that apparently is happening. Pipelines interest me because I had a great-uncle who built a natural gas pipeline from Wichita, Kansas to Chicago back some eighty years ago. A lot of Eurasia politics now revolve around pipelines running from Western Europe to Russia and from Russia to China and along many other routes as well. Who cleans those pipelines? Who cleans the spills? Anyone?

If you're still with me, bear with me a little longer. I know, it's an odd subject today! But I also keep thinking of the British Petroleum pipeline in Alaska that became a major polluter along its route because of improper maintenance. At the time, the news was a bit ironic since the then president of British Petroleum, what's his name, had a major reputation for being green. The green tag turned out to be more hype that reality.

Of course those of us who have noticed ads by the oil companies since the first oil shortages of the 70s have always been skeptical of their claims of how green and environmentally concerned they are. Sometimes, there's some truth to their claims, but most times whatever little good oil companies do for the environment has been more than offset by so many other things they do that are not good. The Exxon Valdez obviously comes to mind. Even if global warming were not a concern, pollution by companies dealing with fossil fuels has been a reality long before Rachel Carson's Silent Spring.

The oil companies of course are not alone. Over this past weekend, ads have been appearing for Clean Coal. As it happens, there currently is no such thing as clean coal. If one tweaks definitions and ignores how much cleaner natural gas and even light sweet crude are (not to mention solar and wind energy), there is such a thing as cleaner coal—barely. And there is a potential, at considerable expense, for perhaps sequestering the carbon dioxide and other pollutants put out by coal. But coal is the dirtiest fuel there is. Here's what Greenpeace says:

“Clean coal” is the industry’s attempt to “clean up” its dirty image – the industry’s greenwash buzzword. It is not a new type of coal.

“Clean coal” technology (CCT) refers to technologies intended to reduce pollution. But no coal-fired power plants are truly ‘clean’.

“Clean coal” methods only move pollutants from one waste stream to another which are then still released into the environment. Any time coal is burnt, contaminants are released and they have to go somewhere. They can be released via the fly ash, the gaseous air emissions, water outflow or the ash left at the bottom after burning. Ultimately, they still end up polluting the environment.

The article continues on making other points against clean coal. Ah, yes, Greenpeace is that leftist whale-hugging environmental group. So, what does a moderate-conservative magazine like Time magazine say?

If you paid any attention to last year's Presidential campaign, you'll remember ads touting the benefits of "clean coal" power, sponsored by the industry group American Coalition for Clean Coal Electricity. (The ads featured lumps of coal plugged into an electrical cord.) Designed in part to respond to the growing green campaign against coal power — which accounts for about 30% of U.S. carbon emissions — the ads promised high-tech and eventually carbon-free power, emphasizing coal's low cost compared to alternatives, its abundance in America and its cleanliness.

The "clean coal" campaign was always more PR than reality — currently there's no economical way to capture and sequester carbon emissions from coal, and many experts doubt there ever will be. But now the idea of clean coal might be truly dead, buried beneath the 1.1 billion gallons of water mixed with toxic coal ash that on Dec. 22 burst through a dike next to the Kingston coal plant in the Tennessee Valley and blanketed several hundred acres of land, destroying nearby houses. The accident — which released 100 times more waste than the Exxon Valdez disaster — has polluted the waterways of Harriman, Tenn., with potentially dangerous levels of toxic metals like arsenic and mercury, and left much of the town uninhabitable.

I guess the coal industry didn't place enough ads in Time. I shouldn't be sarcastic though. Coal has a friend in oil and it might not be much to ask for Exxon or Aramco to buy a major share of Time Warner.

I started this post by mentioning China. When people talk about limiting coal by turning to alternative energy, the cynics point to China. How will China's use of coal be limited? The statistics, in fact, are grim. According to Worldwatch, China's consumption of coal has more than doubled in the last nine years and now exceeds that of the United States.

I suspect, however, that the more the U.S. switches to green technology, the more China and other developing economies will follow. There are signs that this may already be happening. Unlike many members of Congress, the Chinese leadership seems aware that the age of abundant fossil fuels is coming to an end sooner than expected. We will continue to use fossil fuels for some years to come. It's unavoidable because of the time it will take to build an infrastructure based on alternative energies. But, if we're smart, healthy change will come, though not without troubles that we have already set in motion. If we continue to blunder and put off what needs to be done, we will undoubtedly face catastrophes we cannot fully appreciate at this time.

In the end, much will depends on the American people and how much they're truly paying attention. For now, I keep thinking of those pipelines and how much work it takes to keep them functional. I saw a program recently on the Monterey Aquarium in California. The aquarium brings in sea water by pipeline from Monterey Bay. It takes work to keep things from growing at the entrance to the pipeline as well as inside its walls. Is this relevant? It depends. The world's population exceeds 6.6 billion people and water is another resource that is getting scarce as populations increase and as many areas of the world turn into desert from overuse. Where will future water come from? From the sea through desalination?

In California, such a desalination facility has opened in Carlsbad, a city a few miles north of San Diego. Such facilities will need pipelines and they too will have to take environmental concerns into consideration if we are to avoid even further problems. Even green technology is going to require careful environmental thinking—but the promise of green technology is real.

And the alternative, as we are finding, has probably already set in motion catastrophes that will take enormous resilience and resourcefulness to overcome. It is only the year 2009 and the tasks for the rest of the 21st century are already difficult. Today, the task immediately at hand is to avoid making the problems insurmountable. A small step in that direction is making sure green technology is green.

Battery Technology from Oregon to the Isle of Man

A few weeks ago I wrote about lithium oxygen batteries that use air. In that battery, porous carbon is the key. It turns out there is another battery being developed that also uses air. The zinc-air battery is featured in Technology Review:

Zinc-air batteries, which use zinc metal as the anode and an alkaline paste as the electrolyte, are simple, inexpensive, nontoxic, and long- lasting. But engineers haven't been able to figure out how to recharge them. Cody Friesen, an associate professor of materials science at Arizona State University, solved the problem by using a porous electrode and a liquid solution of zinc ions and additives as the electrolyte.

There's an article in Business Week about a company in Switzerland that's about to build a plant in Oregon that will make zinc air batteries:

A Swiss company developing zinc batteries for electric cars has chosen Portland as its U.S. headquarters and manufacturing center.

ReVolt Technology LLC also announced Tuesday it's applying for $30 million in research grants from the U.S. Department of Energy.

Now notice that the Business Week article doesn't mention that the batteries are "zinc-air" batteries. The whole point of such batteries is that an important element of the battery doesn't have to be carried by a vehicle; oxygen can be drawn from the air. So I looked up ReVolt (interesting name) and confirmed that they are indeed zinc-air, though there is no mention of Cody Friesen. Maybe this means there is more than one way to create zinc-air batteries. That would be good for competition. I just wish Americans would get their projects moving a little faster.


Technology Review has another article on an Oregonian connection to the battery industry. For the first time, there has been a race of electric motorcycles on the Isle of Man. The field of electric bikes are not going to match the speed of the gasoline-powered bikes but it turns out at least two of the entrants were from Oregon. Oregon is going green maybe faster than California. Here's a key paragraph on the point of the whole race:

As the day arrives, everyone watching knows that the TTXGP will be slower than the "real" motorcycle race, the TT, because the TTXGP is an energy-limited race. In effect, the "gas tank" of an electric bike is minuscule, so to win the TTXGP the bikers must mind their energy consumption. In contrast, the gas bikers in the TT run with their throttles wide open. However, batteries' energy density has been improving at a rate of about 8 percent a year, which means that even without any other technological progress, electric bikes should run head to head with gas in about 20 years. The TTXGP is intended to make the future arrive sooner.

Let's hope battery technology gets moving a lot quicker than twenty years. For me, the highlight of the story was that the underdogs won. They had the lowest budget and the fastest time (the engineer, admittedly, was an expert on battery technology—but he kept it simple). Maybe the age of the garage inventor is not over!

Lack of Foresight and Imagination in Washington

First things first: let's stop pretending that American business can still think about the future ten to twenty years down the road. One of the ironies in our era is that the oil industry is one of the few areas of the business sector that can think ten years down the road, at least sometimes.

If there is to be change, it has to come from our government. Capitalism, free enterprise, competition and all of that will continue to play a role for many years to come but our current economic structure simply cannot deal with problems that have a long timeline such as global warming, declining fossil fuel production and the long neglected problem of world population.

To deal with problems that will play out over the next decade or two, the American government has to get involved. Unfortunately, our government has been ineffective for the last thirty years. There is some hope that the Obama Administration can renew our capacity to make things happen again. Sometimes I feel that Obama is a little behind the growing understanding of the American public but, for the most part, it's a truism that the president cannot move too far out in front of public opinion. Public opinion, of course, has very little to do these days with the American people. Public opinion is largely a fiction of the media, particularly in Washington and New York.

In the last post I wrote how the Chinese seem to have an energy policy while we continue to pretend that Wall Street experts are on top of things. We have been deluding ourselves for thirty years that free enterprise someday, somewhere, in some magical manner, will somehow take care of our energy needs and invent dreamosol, the universal energy solver. The nation that for a hundred years showed what practical men and women can do is now engaging in fantasy.

Of course some people are beginning to notice that we just may have a problem. Tern Norris and Jesse Jenkins of the San Francisco Chronicle have some very useful figures that may startle business people who like to crunch numbers:

As Congress debates climate and energy legislation, Asian challengers are moving rapidly to win the clean-energy race. China alone is reportedly investing $440 billion to $660 billion in its clean-energy industries over 10 years. South Korea is investing a full 2 percent of its gross domestic product in a Green New Deal. And Japan is redoubling incentives for solar, aiming for a 20-fold expansion in installed solar energy by 2020.

In contrast, the United States would invest only about $1.2 billion annually in energy research and development and roughly $10 billion in the clean energy sector as a whole under the Waxman-Markey bill - less than 0.1 percent of U.S. GDP. A group of 34 Nobel laureates recently wrote a letter to President Obama decrying the lack of investment and calling on him to uphold his promise to invest $15 billion annually in clean-energy R&D.

The other guys get it. How is it that we don't?

It's a given that the current generation of Republicans sent to Washington have become useless know-nothings. The thing to keep in mind is that there are also machine Democrats in Congress. 'Machine Democrats' is my catchall phrase for both Democrats from conservative states who get nervous when the status quo is threatened and Democrats in blue states who are put up by various people who know a Republican can't win but who need someone who is likely to continue business as usual. These Democrats are nearly as useless as the Republicans. The only way for our nation to move forward is for more progressive Democrats to be elected. Republicans and machine Democrats are supposedly pro-business. What they actually are is pro-privilege, pro-insider and pro-monopoly. What we need are progressive Democrats who believe that free enterprise and real competition is important while also believing that capitalism needs to work for people and not against people. Until that happens, the economy and power of the United States will continue on what is obviously becoming a downward spiral.