Free riders, death spirals, cabbages and kings

From all these mistakes

We must surely be learning

     -Beatles

I don't need no sports car

I can walk anytime around the block

      -Bob Dylan

Greetings

Is it overshoot day already?  How time flies.  Happy Overshoot Day

"This means that in seven months, we emitted more carbon than the oceans and forests can absorb in a year, we caught more fish, felled more trees, harvested more, and consumed more water than the Earth was able to produce in the same period," World Wildlife Fund and Global Footprint Network said in a statement.

"The costs of this global ecological overspending are becoming increasingly evident around the world," the groups added, "in the form of deforestation, drought, fresh-water scarcity, soil erosion, biodiversity loss, and the buildup of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere."

Last year, Earth Overshoot Day fell on August 8, an indication that the world's population is accelerating the pace with which it blows through the planet's annual resource budget from year to year. 

          Just another reminder of the need to turn the "SS Industrial Economy" away from the iceberg, and quickly.  But just how quickly can we turn, and who's going to pay the bill?

          Let's take a look at utilities.  For years their mandate was to provide power reliably, and a low cost.  For their troubles, they we entitled to a reasonable profit, as determined by the PUC.  Large centralized coal and gas plants worked pretty well .  They lasted a long time, so construction costs were spread out, and a big chunk of the costs were fuel, which didn't have to be paid upfront. 

          But, times change .   Now people want clean energy.  Some people want to generate their own energy and use the utility as aback up.  Some people want to have their own back up.  Some want to walk away.     Now , with the advent of cheap rooftop solar, and cheaper batteries , it is much more feasible for customers to walk away, especially in sunny states .  For some customers, that is.  Customers who can afford the up front costs .  But once they have left, who will be left to pay for grid, and all the sunk costs that the utility has in large centralized plants?  The remaining ratepayers ?   The government ?

    

           Sound familiar?   Kind of like the medical insurance mess we are in.   Are we going to have a "hookup mandate", like the "medical insurance mandate"?

          In this post Dave Roberts explains the utilities (and our) conundrum.      And here he suggest ways to reorganize our relationship with electricity and the grid.  .

          There's a similar problem with transportation. Robert Scribbler has an enthusiastic piece about the Tesla, calling it a Beautiful Machine to Change the World   It is p[retty.  And it will go pretty fast  ( 140 mph, 0-60 in 5.5 secs)   He points to a study that says electric vehicles could reduce our CO2 emissions to  between 1/2 and 1/10th that of a fossil fuel vehicle including manufacturing.     But,  we have a huge investment in the current transportation system.  In order to move to an electricity based system we will need to scrap a lot of infrastructure  - like fueling stations , fuel trucks, tankers, tank farms, refineries,  and of course cars.

           Let's look at cars.   The current fleet is overwhelmingly fossil based -  although there are 2 million EVS they only amount to .02% of the fleet..  Sales of EVS are growing rapidly,  but they have been unable to catch up to sales of regular IC vehicles.  In fact it may take more than a decade for the EV sales to stop the continuing growth in the total number of fossil fueled vehicles.  Here is an interesting article from Robert Rapier, where he points out that EVS are not substituting for IC sales, but are merely supplementing them. 

         Its a pretty straightforward arithmetic problem.  Every year a huge number of cars are sold.  Some are replacing cars that are junked.  Some are to meet the demand of new drivers.  Last year 88 million cars were sold,  up 4.8% from the previous year.  Less than 1 million were EVS .    That 4.8% growth represents the new demand.    So let's say car sales grow 3% next year.  So that's (88*.03) =2.64 million new cars added!  Let's say the EV growth rate is 25%,  so 950,000 units would be sold.   Still more IC than EV!   The next year its around 3 million and 1 million.  The tortoise and the hare.   At some point, the EV sales catch up, and then, hopefully, oil use begins to drop.    But, as  noted, that may be ten years from now.

           (I am going to ignore, for the time being that cars consume only 50% of the oil used , and that , so far, there is no mass producued electricity based, tractor trailer, , agricultural machinery, airplane, container ship etc) ,  

       And there is still a question of how much, and how soon,  the EV sales would reduce fossil fuel consumption.  See  this study which suggests that if 75% of the fleet were electric tomorrow, CO2 emissions would drop by less than 20%.    Why is that?  Well, the electrical system just isn't that clean yet..  

       Is the electric system likely to become clean quickly?   Not as quickly as we'd like to imagine.  The size of the investment is mind boggling.  See here

"...phasing out fossil fuels over 50 years – wind and solar plants need to be installed at eight to ten times current rates by 2035.

Financially, this corresponds with capital investment in wind and solar PV plants plus batteries of around US$3 trillion per year (in 2015 dollars) and average lifetime capital cost in the order of US$5 trillion to US$6 trillion per year.

For comparison, in 2014 the International Energy Agency forecast global investment for all energy supply in 2035 at US$2 trillion per year.

This implies that total expenditure on energy supply will increase its share of world spending, reducing scope for other expenditure. "

       Here's an odd note-  even though renewables have been growing steadily, the percent of electric generation by fossil fuels has not changed in the last 10 years.

"...over the last decade (2005-2015) the share of renewables in our electricity mix has increased by approximately 5-6 percent. This is good news. However, over this same period, the share from nuclear production has decreased by almost exactly the same amount (5-6 percent)."

        So, are EV's the solution?   They might help, but not as much as we'd like to believe.  We actually need to get out of our cars altogether..   Here is a nice piece by George Monbiot  on our transportation system. His conclusion?

"Electric cars solve only part of the problem. They occupy less air, but just as much road and parking space. The resources required to manufacture them – and the volume of mines and ports and processing plants that wreck rare habitats around the world – might even intensify. While the total carbon emissions and air pollution caused by electric cars will be lower than those the fossil system produces, electricity use will have to rise. If you are among those who support electric cars but oppose nuclear power, you may have to reconsider one of your positions.

So let’s explore some pollution solutions that change this ridiculous system, rather than extending it indefinitely. Why not – through shifting road space from cars to bicycles in the form of safe cycle lanes – aim to make cycling the main form of urban transport? Why not launch a scrappage scheme that trades cars for public transport tokens

See also  this  suggesting that  we don't need "different" cars as much as we need "fewer cars"

'

"Oliver Hayes, Friends of the Earth air pollution campaigner, said: “Electric cars are critical in the fight against climate change and deadly air pollution, but they’re not a panacea. We must now build the infrastructure that reassures ordinary people that cycling and walking is safe, and invest in public transport that is consistently clean, cheap and reliable.”

   It seems the road between here and Our Renewable Future is filled with potholes.   We'd like to ride in style, and not have to give up any of our perks.  But if we don't change our ways, by  the time we get to that golden future, what do you suppose the world will look like?

         Here's one view from the IPPC.   On average its not so bad.  But there are winners and losers.  Some remain kings, some hope for cabbage.

 

Elon Musk and the Holy Grail

The ornaments look pretty
But they are pulling down the branches of the tree

    - Cake

Come in here, dear boy, have a cigar.
You're gonna go far, you're gonna fly high,
You're never gonna die, you're gonna make it if you try;
    - Pink Floyd

Greetings


     Elon Musk is a hero for our time.  A certified billionaire, he invented a new way for people to buy stuff, by just pressing a button!    His ideas are extremely revolutionary.  And visionary, too.   He is now is in the process of revolutionizing transportation,.  And recently he announced a new product which will revolutionize the way power is stored.

      The Holy Grail?  Well, that is our dream that we will be able to continue our high energy lifestyle.  Or as Doomer Dan would say -  to continue to be able to "drive around and buy sh*t"   see e.g. The Amazing New Thing    Without  all those nasty CO2 emissions.

      So with Musk at the helm,  can we relax now?

      Will his cool products help us get the holy grail?  The good life , while avoiding "dangerous" warming,  possibly  triggering unstoppable feedbacks?    (What would it take to get there?  For developed nations - perhaps cut about 50% by 2020  (2013 study) .
   
        Let's start with the car.  Its pretty darn cool.  It can go from 0 to 60 in 4.2 seconds.  Not mention 130 MPH!      

        The value of electric vehicles in addressing carbon emissions is still a matter for debate.  First of all, most agree that the emissions from an EV will vary widely, depending on the electricity production mix in the state where the vehicle is charged.  .  While some states have a low carbon mix, the US average is so carbon heavy that EV's , are about as helpful as a car that gets 40 MPG

       In addition, the manufacture of an EV uses more fossil fuels than a gas powered car.  This can create a large "carbon debt"  that may or may not be paid off, even if the car is refueled using renewable power.  For instance this report from Climate Central says.

"Another critical factor is the carbon emissions generated when a car is manufactured. Emissions from producing the battery and other electrical components create a 10,000 to 40,000-pound carbon debt for electric cars that can only be overcome after tens, or even hundreds of thousands of miles of driving and recharging from clean energy sources."

       And the "power wall" ?    At first blush it sounds like the device that has been missing from the renewable energy  story.   Solar and wind may be low carbon, but they are also intermittent.   As long as we want 24/7 power, we will need storage.  Now, it's really not an issue, because the grid itself, with all of the existing power plants, can be used a battery, providing power when needed.   At some point, if we are ever able to move to a system that it more dominated by renewables, it will be useful.

        Right now, though, the "Power Wall" is something like the Tesla.  One might say its  an expensive toy for rich people who want to give the impression they are doing something useful for the ecosystem . It doesn't do much for the biosphere, but it looks really good.  As noted by Bloomberg

"To provide the same 16 kilowatts of continuous power as this $3,700 Generac generator from Home Depot, a homeowner would need eight stacked Tesla batteries at a cost of $45,000 for a nine-year lease. "It's a luxury good—really cool to have—but I don't see an economic argument," said Brian Warshay, an energy-smart-technologies analyst with Bloomberg New Energy Finance."  

                  But let's set that aside for now.   Perhaps one could argue that it was a step towards a solution.   Why not let the rich subsidize the development of a useful part of a solution to our climate conundrum ?   Once again the holy grail .   Can we have our cake and eat it too?  Which is to say - if we move to a low carbon society - how much energy will we get?   If it is anything like what we use now, we will need a lot of batteries!

             I ran across an interesting study from the journal  Energy Policy, found here which helps to put this issue into perspective.   The authors took note of a the idea, promoted in several studies that we could create a completely renewable energy system by 2050.  ( I recognize that this is somewhat less ambitious than the goal stated above of cutting our emissions in half by 2020, but its in the ball park).   

         The authors asked an interesting question about that "all renewable" energy system.   How would get there?   And how we we keep it there I.e. handle the replacement of the units as they fell apart.   For simplicity they focused on the wind component, only.  .  They construct a scenario, under which, the installation of turbine grows , nearly exponentially, each year up to 2050.   (Needless to say, a growth rate this steep has not been seen in history, but that's OK )    From 2050 on the the worn out  units are replaced ,  requiring  construction of 12 Twatts each year.  To get an idea of the scale of  the material requirements for the maintenance period , assuming some of the material is recycled ,they compared it to material uses today .  The requirements are rather stunning, considering that under this scenario, wind provides only 15% of the power!:

"Under these assumptions, only sustaining the 24 TW of wind energy, assumed to provide 15 % of global energy demand by Kleijn and Van der Voet (2010), would need the equivalent of 11 % of total global steel production and 14 % of global copper production (based on 2012 rates of production). This means that reaching and sustaining this installed wind capacity would require quantities of steel that is similar to the current automotive industry, that used 12 % of the steel produced in 2011, while the entire sector of electrical equipment used only around 3 % (World Steel Association, 2012). The amount of copper needed for the turbines is comparable to what is used for making electric motors, of around 12 % of the global copper production, while the electric energy transmission sector use about 26 % (Achzet et al., 2011). " 

        Where would such an enormous amount of material; come from?   Looking forward, it seems unlikely that we will be able to devote this amount of materials to the construction of wind turbines, and in addition also construct large amounts of solar devices, as well as the batteries to store all the energy.    More likely, when confronted with that expense, we will continue to operate as we have, until some resource limit forces us to do otherwise.

       Many of us wish for a bright, shiny techno future.  We also dream about a world that is not being upset by droughts, fires, and rising seas.  It does not seem likely to me that we will have both of these futures.    More likely , to me, is the vision offered by Richard Heinberg.  (see e.g. useful short videos here ) A future of less energy, less consumer goods, and one which will, still nevertheless be subject to many of the climate change induced problems       This future will be a lot more difficult , if we don't prepare, because we are too dazzled by the dream of a technological "deus ex machina".