Advice to Obama on energy

I don't necessarily always agree with Robert Rapier, but he's one of the most cogent and comprehensive thinkers on U.S. energy policy and he has an open letter to President-elect Obama on his energy plan.  The highlights:

A 4-point program
1). Minimizing per capita energy usage
2). Finding sustainable, affordable alternatives
3). Managing the down side of the production peak such that severe shortages are avoided.
4). Communicating to the public the nature of the problem, and explaining why sacrifice is needed.

Rapier's criticisms of Obama:

• We will need more domestic fossil fuel production in the near term to bridge the gap between fossil fuel and renewables (windfall profits taxes will kill exploration)
  
• Prices must rise to constrain consumption [YES]
  
• Reliance on ethanol to supplant oil means long-term unsustainability - corn farming depletes soil nutrition, fertilizer comes from natural gas, and irrigation (and ethanol production) deplete aquifers [true, we need a next-generation biofuel, but mostly we need plug-in hybrid cars]
  
• We need nuclear to help bridge between coal-fired electricity and (capital-intensive and often rural) renewable electricity [NO - for what nuclear costs, we could probably build enough renewables with battery storage]
  

Rapier's agreement with Obama

• Plug-in hybrids
• Incentives for wind, solar, geothermal,
• Weatherizing homes
  

Why this blog misses the point on energy prices

If you read this piece, you're left with the impression that Democrats may be clinging to policies that keep energy prices high and that they're endangering their environmental message as people pay more attention to their pocketbook.  (Note: who has a pocketbook, anyway?  Gotta love the media for the inane metaphors for America's tough problems). 

The implicit message is that energy prices could be lower, if only we did something else. 

Wrong.

Energy prices are going up.  Period.  Oil is becoming more scarce relative to demand.  Same for coal, natural gas, etc.  Demand keeps rising (it's a world market, and the Chinese and Indians want to drive, too).  So even if we drilled our brains out, we're not going to be able to put enough oil on the market to drive prices down.

Renewable energy will prove cheaper in the long run, because fossil fuel price inflation will soon pass the cost of renewables (and has, in several markets).  And because many renewables are fuel-free (solar, wind), they won't become more expensive over time (though new wind turbines and solar panels can become more expensive, since they're made of metals and other materials that are also on the world market). 

So, America, listen up: THE ERA OF CHEAP ENERGY IS OVER.  Anyone who says differently is selling something.

Electricity: an addition to fueled power plants

Why do we go to so much effort to find, process, and combust or react fuels to generate heat for electricity when all that heat is already provided? This nice essay reflects on the follies of power generation from fossil fuels and nuclear when there's an abundance of free heat (read: geothermal) underground to meet all our water boiling (for steam turbine) needs. Here's a taste:

An even more popular way to boil water with fuel is to blast the tops off of mountains and then dig out the carbon that was sequestered by nature eons ago. We then crush and wash this carbon and store the poisonous residue in ponds. We hope to find a way to safely dispose of this waste someday too, but the rest of the poison, the sulfur, mercury, and heavy and radioactive metals fly out of the smokestack when we burn the coal to boil water. Every ton of carbon we burn unites with oxygen atoms from the air to go up the stack as 3.7 tons of CO2. Since this CO2 has been causing nasty climate problems, we are working on a way to hide it in underground caverns. Unfortunately hiding this much CO2 costs a lot of money so we're spending $407 million next year hoping for a breakthrough idea.

Energyville: what's your energy mix?

Want to try your hand at developing a practical and environmentally-sound energy mix for a city of the future? Check out Energyville, a simulation by Chevron. You can select from several conventional and renewable power sources and the game rates your selection by its economic, environmental, and security impact.

President Bush: codifying environmental degradation since 2001

Coal mining has been in the news with the trapping of six miners in a collapsed Utah mine and the subsequent death of three rescuers in a second collapse. The federal government has joined the fray, with an announcement that new rules will expressly allow the longtime practice of mountaintop removal for coal mining. The tradeoff is that this method of mining is substantially safer than underground mines, but significantly more destructive to the environment.

The technique involves blasting off the tops of mountains and dumping the rubble into valleys and streams...Mountaintop mining is the most common strip mining in central Appalachia, and the most destructive. Ridge tops are flattened with bulldozers and dynamite, clearing all vegetation and, at times, forcing residents to move.

...From 1985 to 2001, 724 miles of streams were buried under mining waste, according to the environmental impact statement accompanying the new rule. If current practices continue, another 724 river miles will be buried by 2018, the [Army Corps of Engineers] report says.

As always with this administration, however, the stink of corruption lies heavy about the decision.

The early stages of the revision process were supported by J. Stephen Griles, a former industry lobbyist who was the deputy interior secretary from 2001 to 2004...The regulation is the culmination of six and a half years of work by the administration to make it easier for mining companies to dig more coal to meet growing energy demands and reduce dependence on foreign oil.

Gee, the industry writes its own rules. That's new.

And then there's the bogus note about oil dependence. Coal is for electricity, oil is for cars. But thanks to the excellent journalism at the New York Times, that lie talking point on energy independence will reach thousands of readers. Bravo.