Let’s Forget About Coal, Schweitzer

A Huffington Post story headline got me excited yesterday: “Govs. criticize national energy policy.” But when I read the Yahoo article, I was a bit let down.

The story centered on a recent weekend meeting of the National Governors Association in Charleston, S.C., and I was hoping I’d see some good state-level ideas emerge from the gathering. Instead, Montana’s Brian Schweitzer, a Democrat, argued that coal from Montana could produce enough synthetic oil to replace half the foreign oil we import. To that I say, “Are you nuts?”

Our planet became habitable for humans only because so much carbon was absorbed from our prehistoric atmosphere over millions of years, eventually to be trapped below ground as fossil fuel. Which is exactly why it’s wrong to look to look at coal and expanded domestic oil drilling as a step toward energy independence, because we’ve already released too much of that carbon back into the atmosphere in a far shorter time span than it took to store it up.

Schweitzer, of course, wants to be a good governor for his state, and if Montana has a lot of coal he wants Montana to make money from it. But he’s wrong to suggest that domestic coal is a viable alternative to foreign oil. Yes, they were discussing energy policy, but these days you can’t discuss energy without also discussing global warming. And it makes no sense to consider yet another non-renewable fossil fuel as part of a solution. Make no mistake — if we don’t burn Arab oil, someone will — it’s not like Persian Gulf oil will remain in the ground just because we’re getting oil from coal.

I’ve never been to Montana, but I’ve heard it has a lot of wide-open spaces. And because it’s not a fog-shrouded coastal region like the Olympic Peninsula, I’m guessing there’s a fair amount of sunshine falling on broad expanses of Montana. So if Governor Schweitzer had any sense, he wouldn’t be talking about coal — he’d be talking about wind farms and solar arrays. That would not only be a smarter contribution to our national energy policy, it would also be a smarter contribution to the problem of global warming.

If governors want to take the lead to make up for the administration’s failings, there are any number of states that could be in the vanguard of responsible energy policy. So I don’t want to hear about getting oil from coal, because if we look to new sources of coal as an answer to our problems with foreign oil, we’ll only accelerate global warming — and hasten our doom.

Scientists are Necessarily Cautious

A sobering story in yesterday’s Washington Post says that there is growing consensus among scientists that this year’s extended heat wave is another sign of global warming. But, according to Daniel C. Esty, a professor of environmental law and policy at Yale University, “The trend lines showing so much hot weather in recent years suggests some concern, even if we can’t say definitively this is a signal of climate change.”

Esty’s remark reflects not confusion but caution, which is good science, not bad. Scientists know all too well that whenever they make observations on the record, their credibility is at stake — and if they are to be taken seriously they must leave room for error.

This is what distinguishes good scientists from bad ones. And there are plenty of bad ones. There are bad scientists who refute out of hand the probability that global warming is a reality. There are bad scientists who blur the issue by raising doubt in the face of overwhelming evidence that they are wrong.

The debate over global warming is in some ways comparable to the debate over evolution. Evolutionary scientists are just as cautious as their peers in climate study. Not so the proponents of creationism and intelligent design. These scientists stubbornly craft scientific theories to fit the bible while ignoring scientific evidence and observation. Their research takes them not into the field but into the pages of Genesis.

It’s long been clear to me that something is amiss. I began to notice changes a few years after moving to central North Carolina from New York in the mid-1970s. At first I enjoyed the short, mild winters that were followed by long, balmy springs. But during the 1980s, springs seemed to be getting shorter, with summers arriving earlier and tending to be more brutal. And during those summers, I noticed that the nights didn’t cool down as much as they did in the few years following my arrival.

And this may be a key to the heat-wave phenomenon. According to the Post story, “…researchers at the National Climatic Data Center in Asheville, N.C., reported this week that nighttime summer temperatures across the country have been unusually high for the past eight years, a record streak.” And you don’t have to be a scientist to understand that when it doesn’t cool down as much at night, the day starts out hotter.

When the idea of global warming was first advanced in the late 1980s, scientists were careful not to predict the ramifications. One thing they offered was the likelihood of changes in weather patterns. We see this happening now.

I’m glad scientists are cautious, and I appreciate informed debate. Gradually, as more and more evidence is uncovered, the nature of the consensus will change. But nothing — NOTHING — in their caution suggests we ignore the trends and delay action. There is no agreement on when we might reach a point of no return, but what’s becoming increasingly clear is that we may be approaching it. No one at this point is saying it’s already too late — and I hope it isn’t. Some may say we won’t see the worst of it in our lifetimes, but what we’re now seeing is bad enough.

And Now, Drought?

Global-warming deniers say that what’s happening is part of a natural cycle of climate variations, but scientists maintain that human activity has altered the natural cycle. It seems logical, considering the amounts of carbon we’ve dumped into the atmosphere in a little over 200 years. To dismiss the possible connection is to gamble with human life. In addition to the gradual warming over the past several decades, consider the weather anomalies of the last two years.

Last year’s hurricanes, for instance, greater in number and in intensity than is typical. And what tropical storms lie ahead for the remainder of the season? The unusually frequent and heavy storms that have caused flooding in many parts of the Northeast this year — with summer less than half over. The prolonged heat wave that has already claimed many lives and is affecting virtually the entire country. The strain on the grid has caused numerous power outages, on top of the ones caused by storms.

And now, from the Dakotas, is this article about the ongoing drought, reminiscent of the dustbowl during the 1930s. How devastating a widespread drought would be to the United States, now far more heavily populated than in the thirties and with local agriculture almost a thing of the past. Drought in the Midwest and California alone could result in food shortages across the country.

Lives are at stake, and as I wrote in my previous post, we can’t fix it overnight. Even if we began today (which won’t happen, thanks to the current administration) it could take decades to reverse the warming trend.

One can predict the earliest signs of drought-related problems: rising prices. Already prices of food have risen thanks to increased transportation and production costs. But if the drought continues and spreads, prices will go up even further, until eventually stocks begin to decline.

There are irresponsible people in Washington that have our fate in their hands — and we put them there. It’s time for us to replace them with folks who care more about the world and its people than they do about the corporations who contribute heavily to their campaigns.

No Instant Fix for Global Warming

When voters go to the polls this November, they’ll want to remember the past summer’s heat and remember who the primary global warming deniers have been since the last 1980s. They’ll want to remember who opposed tough fuel efficiency standards for motor vehicles. They’ll want to remember who consistently stood in the way of environmental measures that might have curtailed emissions. They’ll need to be angry, and translate their anger into smart votes.

What voters must bear in mind, though, is that even if every measure conceivable to reverse global warming is passed, there won’t be overnight results. Global warming has been centuries in the making, with the most dramatic changes in world climate occurring over the last several decades. And it will probably take as many decades before we see any evidence that things have turned around. Let’s face it — the carbon is in the atmosphere now. And not only do we have to stop adding to it, we actually have to begin to reduce it.

I have little doubt that global warming will remain a campaign issue for the foreseeable future — and voters find themselves confused by opposing candidates who say they have a better way to address global warming. Worse yet might be candidates who assert that tough measures aren’t working and we’ve been made to endure a few hardships for nothing.

What’s essential though is to arrive at the most sensible course and resist diverting from that course. Things will get worse before they get better, but if we don’t do something soon, we’d better get used to worse.

Exxon’s Greed

I am amazed that there’s not a revolt in the streets as news of Exxon’s recent quarterly profits breaks. Another almost $11 billion in their coffers as motorists continue to have their wallets raped. And while I acknowledge that gas may still be less expensive here than in Europe, I would remind those who remind me of that about the general lack of the kinds of transportation options available to most Americans, options Europeans take for granted.

Exxon’s obscene profits are particularly galling when I learn that gasoline is actually a waste product, a byproduct of the refining process that oil companies could actually give away without really losing money, that they make most of their money from a barrel of oil on petrochemicals, for example, that before the advent of the gasoline engine the leftover gas was burned off. (Read this for more)

I dream of the morning when Exxon will wake up to find that demand for gasoline has suddenly evaporated, leaving their high-ranking corporate officers scratching their heads and their shareholders holding worthless shares. Could such a thing happen? Certainly not overnight. And certainly not because of anything our elected officials did that was even the slightest bit constructive.

But maybe it will begin to happen at the grass roots. Maybe localities will start innovating in small ways, and it will catch on. Like Buncombe County, NC, for instance — where I live. The county is using a process that extracts methane gas from the landfill and uses it to power an on-site power generation plant that contributes enough electricity to the grid to power 650 homes. And it appears to be happening elsewhere as well.

No doubt about it — there’s gold in waste… and waste is something we’ll never run out of. There’s gold in garbage, and there’s gold in poop. Some communities already extract methane from sewage, and it’s long been known that we can produce methane from animal manure. North Carolina, one of the leading hog-producing states in the country, certainly has an abundance of pig manure that can be put to good use.

It’s not the whole future, but it’s part of it. Or it should be. It’s one way to tell Exxon and its sister companies that their days are numbered. They may scoff now, but they’d better know — we’ve got a lot more waste than they’ve got oil. And, come to think of it, maybe they do know. Maybe that’s why they’re scalping us now, because they see the handwriting on the wall.

Dangerous Denial

Sen. James Inhofe (R-OK) is well-known for his belief that global warming is a hoax (read here). Recently, he compared the global warming message to the Third Reich’s “Big Lie” — in the tradition of Nazi Germany’s propaganda minister Joseph Goebbels. Inhofe is among the most prominent and visible global warming deniers, and he presents a clear danger to the future of humanity.

At the very least it creates confusion when there should no longer be debate. At worst, it sways public opinion in the wrong direction. There is no longer any difference of opinion among credible scientists that global warming is real and it’s a threat.

It’s worth asking: what would such scientists have to gain by advancing what Inhofe regards as a hoax? For the life of me, I can’t think of anything. James Hansen, of NASA’s Goddard Institute, who was among a handful to sound an early alarm in the late 1980s, has even put his job at risk by publicly spreading what has been an unwelcome message by the current administration.

Inhofe, on the other hand, stands to gain greatly by maintaining a position of public opposition to global warming. He is one of the major recipients of campaign contributions from energy companies, and as such he behaves as if he is in their employ. Large amounts of campaign money usually means campaign success — and Inhofe is betraying the public trust simply to hang on to his seat in the Senate.

Oklahomans are suffering the effects of a record-breaking heat wave along with almost the entire nation. Is it a symptom of global warming? Hopefully, Inhofe’s constituents will decide they cannot afford to think otherwise. Hopefully, they are smarter than Inhofe thinks they are. Hopefully, they will reject his denial and get rid of him at the next opportunity — and replace him with someone who cares about their survival.

The Heat Wave Paradox

We’ve had heat waves before, but the current one, affecting almost the entire country, is unusual. It’s providing a lesson that will probably be ignored, as lessons often are. The lesson is in the paradox: that during heat waves energy companies are stressed, and that the hotter it gets the more stressed they are because of increased demands created by people trying to stay cool. In St. Louis, hot in any summer, the problem was compounded when a powerful storm knocked out power to hundreds of thousands of customers. Is this heat wave and the accompanying severe weather another symptom of global warming? We’d be foolish to think it isn’t.

Where it’s hot, the sunshine is merciless. And this is part two of the paradox — for in all that blazing sunshine is boundless energy that could be captured and used to power all those air conditioners that are draining every power grid in the country. Solar panels on a rooftop could meet the needs of an individual home. Large arrays of them in the deserts out west could help Arizonans stay cool.

The irony is, if we’d been using solar technology since the late 1970s, when President Carter first installed a solar water heater on the White House roof (and mandated more fuel-efficient cars while we were at it), we might not be having this severe heat wave now.

Energy Independence Part 8

Bio-fuels are one component of the energy-independence equation. Back in January, in his State of the Union Address, President Bush mentioned ethanol from corn in particular, but also switchgrass. Typically, it was little more than a sound-byte. What he failed to say is, “I am launching an initiative to aggressively pursue the cultivation of crops suitable for bio-fuels. Starting tomorrow, the Federal Government, through the Departments of Energy, Commerce and Agriculture, will begin to develop programs aimed at encouraging, through incentives and grants, the cultivation and processing of crops ideal for bio-fuel use.”

Corn, though, isn’t ideal for bio-fuel. The net yield of energy is not nearly as large as other crops, notably the switchgrass mentioned by the president. While figures are imprecise, in general it takes one unit of energy to produce one and a third units of energy from corn. The potential for switchgrass is far greater.

But there’s one crop that’s never mentioned — hemp. Not long ago I posted a blog about industrial hemp — and its uses go far beyond biofuel. There are too many to mention in this posting, but check here for a comprehensive list. It’s worth pointing out, though, that right now there are several types of plastics being made from hemp. And as most of us know, petroleum has been an essential ingredient in the manufacture of plastic. Well, just imagine how much oil we wouldn’t need if we made plastics from hemp!

Why isn’t it legal to grow hemp in the United States? Well, back in the early 1920s, influential businessmen representing the paper, oil and chemical companies decided that help posed the kind of competition that could undermine their profits. So, they used their influence to persuade Congress to classify hemp as an illegal drug — and, with the help of a scare campaign against marijuana designed to influence the public, confused industrial hemp with its slightly hallucinogenic cousin, pot.

In the late 1990s, Canada legalized the cultivation of industrial hemp. It should happen in the States too.

Energy Independence, Part 7

The most abundant potential source of energy is the sun — and solar technology not new. Even decades ago, small solar cells generated enough energy to do small amounts of work — in cameras, for instance, where they measured light and adjusted the lens aperture and shutter settings accordingly. For some time now we’ve seen these small cells in calculators, where they replace batteries and function well on just the radiant energy from light bulbs.

What we seldom see are the large tasks solar cells can undertake — generating electricity on a scale large enough to power an entire home. That’s because, even though it’s available, even though it works, it’s not perceived as cost efficient. And right now, it isn’t. But it’s getting closer to be competitive with traditional sources of electricity — and this in spite of a lack of meaningful government support or sponsorship.

If there’s a problem with solar, it’s storing the energy for use when the sun doesn’t shine — which means roughly half the time. But consider this — imagine solar collectors operating full tilt during the heat of a sunny day in Florida, when temperatures are in the 90s and humidity is high. Imagine homes and businesses all running air conditioners to combat the heat and humidity. Imagine all those air conditioners — and every other appliance — operating from the very phenomenon that’s causing it to be so hot in the first place: the sun. Then imagine all the coal or natural gas that’s NOT being consumed to generate that electricity as the heat of the day wears on. Imagine that in this way fossil fuel consumption could be cut in at least half, if traditional power generation had to take over in hours of darkness.

But efficient storage of solar energy does not present a serious technical hurdle — not when national security and global health are concerned. And while solar energy may not seem to offer a direct solution to oil addiction (since automobiles seem to be the principal consumers of oil), consider this: if every home now burning oil for heat were able to rely on efficient electric heating instead, at least that much less oil would be needed. If electric cars were a viable option for certain kinds of driving and solar-generated electricity were cheap enough to compete with the price of gas, that much MORE oil would be freed up. Incrementally, we would move toward energy independence — and freedom from oil.

So what’s the hold-up? Solar energy has been around forever. Without it, we wouldn’t even be here. Without it, there wouldn’t even be any oil or coal in the ground. Without it, our cars wouldn’t be toasty warm on a sunny winter day when temperatures were in the 20s. Once again, it’s because of a lack of leadership. The last president who actively promoted solar energy was Jimmy Carter, over 30 years ago. Since then, it’s been largely ignored, shunted aside. Why? I don’t think it’s too cynical to lay the blame at the feet of big oil politics. Nor do I relieve the utilities of any guilt. Solar has the potential not only to make the US energy independent, it has the potential to make individual HOMES independent. So how can a utility bill a customer who doesn’t even need it? Power-company stockholders could say goodbye to their dividend checks.

Clearly our energy policy of the last thirty-odd years has not been in the public interest. It’s time for that to change. Between soaring oil prices and a rapidly warming atmosphere, our livelihoods and our way of life are threatened.

Energy Independence, Part 6

Until other alternative technologies are in place, Congress, with the President’s support, must legislate stricter fuel-efficiency standards. Manufacturers must be discouraged — and if necessary, prohibited, from producing vehicles that do not meet those standards. The public must accept that excess horsepower is not required for basic transportation. Similarly, while SUV-type vehicles have their place, the public must be offered alternatives that provide SUV features without the weight and fuel inefficiency of current models. The sale of used gas-guzzlers and older vehicles that do not meet emission standards should be prohibited. For those who need a car but cannot afford one that meets acceptable efficiency and emission standards, a program should be established to help with those financial concerns.

Also in the short term, development of hybrid technologies should be encouraged and, if necessary, subsidized, until hybrids replace conventional vehicles in the market. Hybrids offer an economy advantage in city driving, and emphasis should be placed on marketing them to consumers in urban and suburban areas.

Fully electric vehicles, which may be suitable for second vehicles that are most often used for errand running, should not be ruled out — especially as alternative means of power generation become available.

Bio-fuel technology should be fully exploited in the short term. While today the focus is on ethanol from corn, research has shown that other crops, particularly switchgrass and hemp, offer more promise as sources of bio-fuel — which is one reason the production of industrial hemp should be legalized in the US. While burning bio-fuels still contributes carbon dioxide into the atmosphere, because such fuels come from a renewable source, there should be no net gain in atmospheric CO2 since when crops are replaced they should absorb the gas that resulted from combustion.

For the long term, research in fuel-cell technology should be accelerated. For operation, fuel cells require the hydrogen that is extracted from water, and no emissions result from the energy they produce. The snag has been that a large amount of energy is required to extract hydrogen from water. But this can be overcome as solar energy technology is fully developed. With free energy from the sun as part of the process, fuel cells currently offer the greatest hope for energy independence.

Finally, freight railroad service should be reinvigorated, with trucks providing primarily trunk service. It makes no sense for convoys of trucks to be traveling long distance, almost paralleling existing rails, when trains can move the same amount of freight more efficiently.