When the US Dept. of Energy recently released the latest edition of its Annual Energy Review, that naturally included updated versions of their “flow diagrams”, which are still the most useful set of graphics I’ve seen for understanding the sources and uses of all energy, coal, petroleum, natural gas, and electricity in the US.

This time around, let’s do electricity:

(Click on the image above to see the full-size version in a new window.)

You can find links to all of the flow diagrams from the Annual Energy Review on the AER’s home page, in HTML and PDF format.

The things I find most interesting in this one include:

• The relative sizes of the sources. Coal really is about half, as much as we wish it were otherwise, and oil is a barely perceptible sliver (don’t tell the media; they still love their decades-old conviction that the US still generates a sizable portion of its electricity with oil). Renewables, while still smaller than we’d prefer, is mostly conventional hydroelectric power.
• Conversion losses practically leaps off the screen. This is (mostly) the energy lost in burning fuel to heat water to make steam to spin a turbine to pump electrons. When I show this chart to middle school students and tell them what “conversion losses” means, they give me the most withering, “Just how stupid are all you adults, anyway???” look. Aside from those awkward moments, it’s a good reminder that we decide things like how to generate electricity via economics, not energy or natural resource conservation.
• Transmission and distribution losses are tiny. The almost universal misunderstanding among mainstreamers is that T&D losses are a huge factor in their electricity costs, when it just isn’t so. By comparison, conversion losses are 24.8 times higher.
• The relatively even balance between residential, commercial, and industrial consumption. My guess is that while the commercial and industrial sectors are hardly paragons of environmental concern or even conservation purely for the sake of saving money, they’re probably on the whole much better than the residential sector. If my guess is right, then the low-hanging fruit for electricity conservation is in our homes and not at our jobs.
• Transportation’s share of consumption is so tiny you almost need a magnifying glass to see it. How much do you think that will change, on a percentage basis, in the next ten years?

Not bad for one diagram, eh?

I know, you’ve heard it all before from me and at least a few others: The energy/water nexus is going to bite us hard, and it’s already started. You need water to make electricity (for the most part) and you need energy to provide water. Climate chaos can change the quantity and characteristics (e.g. temperature) of the water available for thermoelectric plant cooing at most locations, meaning that every time we build a thermoelectric plant we’re making a decades-long bet that we’ll have the needed cooling water, and that we can use it without causing other major problems downstream.

Once again, this has gone from “nice theory” to “ugly fact”, as Joe Romm points out in France imports UK electricity as summer heatwave puts a third of its nukes out of action:

To avoid maxxing out on my July quota of irony in the first week of the month, I will simply report this as a straight news story. The UK Times reports:

With temperatures across much of France surging above 30C this week, EDF’s reactors are generating the lowest level of electricity in six years, forcing the state-owned utility to turn to Britain for additional capacity.

Fourteen of France’s 19 nuclear power stations are located inland and use river water rather than seawater for cooling. When water temperatures rise, EDF is forced to shut down the reactors to prevent their casings from exceeding 50C.

…

EDF warned last month that France might need to import up to 8,000MW of electricity from other countries by mid-July — enough to power Paris — because of the combined impact of hot weather, a ten-week strike by power workers and ongoing repairs.

EDF must also observe strict rules governing the heat of the water it discharges into waterways so that wildlife is not harmed. The maximum permitted temperature is 24C. Lower electricity output from riverside reactors during hot weather usually coincides with surging demand as French consumers turn up their air conditioners.

One power industry insider said yesterday that about 20GW (gigawatts) of France’s total nuclear generating capacity of 63GW was out of service.

Much of the shortfall this summer is likely to be met by Britain, which, since 1986, has been linked to the French power grid by a 45km sub-sea power cable that runs from Sellindge in Kent to Les Mandarins.

A statement from EDF played down the heat problems, saying that the French system continued to meet customer demands — but similar heatwaves have caused serious problems in France in the past.

In 2003, the situation grew so severe that the French nuclear safety regulator granted special exemptions to three plants, allowing them temporarily to discharge water into rivers at temperatures as high as 30C. France has five plants located by the sea and EDF tries to avoid carrying out any repairs to them during the summer because they do not suffer from cooling problems.

Aside from the energy/water nexus point, which, try as I might, can’t be stressed too much, this situation also highlights a more general issue: The danger of becoming so reliant on one form of electricity generation. It’s very appealing to say, “All we need to do is standardize nuclear power plants. Come up with one design for the entire plant, make sure it works as desired, and then replicate it.” The problem is that then you have a large portion of your electricity generation, whether based on nuclear or any other technology, that has the same strengths and weaknesses. And in a time of rising temperatures and shifting rainfall patterns, cooling water for river-fed thermoelectric plants is quickly emerging as a much more serious weakness than we thought, as great as fuel supply and CO2 emissions.[1]

The reason for this “surprise” is simple: We’ve become accustomed to a remarkable level of stability in our climate. There are certainly anomalies that arise on yearly and shorter time frames, including drought, heat waves, and severe winter weather. But for a long time we’ve been able to look at places like the continental US or most of Europe and predict with confidence that certain locations will “always” have a good supply of cooling water for an electricity plant. We then build the plant with a 40 to 60 year, or longer, lifespan, and sleep soundly, “knowing” everything will work out.

Thanks to climate chaos, that’s suddenly a much riskier bet, and we’ll increasingly have to build thermoelectric plants that use much less or no cooling water, or site them on gigantic, some would say Great, lakes or near the oceans. At least I’m hoping we’ll have the sense to do that before we suffer a major electricity crisis, much worse than Europe in 2003 or what almost happened in the US SE a couple of years ago. Of course, we’ll still have to deal with the installed base of thermo plants for decades. Consider it yet another example of how our past ignorance, kicked up a notch with at least a pinch of hubris, will force us to live with decisions we wish we could undo.

[1] No, I’m not overlooking the issue of the size of the individual generating plants, in case you were wondering. If you build a 1GW generating plant, you have to deal with the problem of losing a lot of electrons all at once if/when it goes offline, for whatever reason. The more diversified and decentralized our electricity generating infrastructure is (and therefore the less we try to force any technology into being a silver bullet), the less vulnerable it is to individual outages.

NYISO (New York Independent System Operator has released Alternate Route: Electrifying the Transportation Sector: Potential Impacts of Plug-In Hybrid Electric Vehicles on New York State’s Electricity System [17 page, 277KB PDF]. From the executive summary:

Plug-in Electric Hybrid Vehicles (PHEVs) represent a new stage in the evolution of hybrid electric vehicles in which the electric “plug” for charging batteries has the potential to supplement the “pump.” Several automobile manufacturers have announced plans to introduce PHEVs. President Barack Obama has called for new programs to support PHEV development and deployment. In New York State, Governor David Paterson has announced the creation of the New York Battery and Energy Storage Technology Consortium (NY BEST). The Consortium, one of the first of its kind in the nation, will focus on the development and manufacturing of advanced and affordable battery technologies for the purpose of advancing the PHEV industry here in New York. General Electric also announced a new initiative for the development of advanced batteries, with manufacturing facilities expected to be built in New York State.

The timing and magnitude of potential electric load from PHEVs will be determined by several key factors. These include consumer acceptance of PHEVs, the advancement of battery storage technologies, and the availability/location of PHEV-charging infrastructure. Two studies, one by Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL) and another conducted jointly by the Electric Power Research Institute (EPRI) and the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) concluded that incremental load for PHEVs in New York would be in the range of 7,000-8,000 gigawatt-hours per year (GWH/yr)by 2030.

PHEV load can also migrate and occur intermittently, as PHEV-charging opportunities (as an electric load) expand beyond the owner’s home and depend on travel schedules. If charging patterns are managed properly, PHEVs with loads in the range predicted by these studies could be served by the existing New York bulk power system. The migratory nature of this load, however, does require further analysis to fully assess the impact of PHEV load on local electric distribution systems.

If the charging pattern of PHEVs is not managed effectively, loads of this size could require significant additional generation capacity. Rate design to encourage off-peak charging, coupled with time-of-use rates, and Smart Grid/Advanced Metering Initiatives, would facilitate favorable charging behavior. Advanced communication protocols between the recharging location and an evolving Smart Grid could also facilitate effective management of charging patterns.

The EPRI (Electric Power Research Institute) has released an interim version of their “Report to NIST on the Smart Grid Interoperability Standards Roadmap”. From the cover letter on the document:

Under the Energy Independence and Security Act (EISA) of 2007, the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) has “primary responsibility to coordinate development of a framework that includes protocols and model standards for information management to achieve interoperability of smart grid devices and systems…” [EISA Title XIII, Section 1305]

In early 2009, responding to President Obama’s energy-related national priorities, NIST acted to accelerate progress and promote stakeholder consensus on Smart Grid interoperability standards. On April 13, NIST announced a three-phase plan to expedite development of key standards.

This document is input into the first phase: engaging utilities, equipment suppliers, consumers, standards developers and other stakeholders in a participatory public process to identify applicable Smart Grid interoperability standards, gaps in currently available standards and priorities for new standardization activities.

…

NIST is now reviewing EPRI’s synthesis of stakeholder inputs received through the end of May 2009, as presented in this document. In addition, NIST is inviting public comment on the EPRI deliverable. A request for comments will be issued in the Federal Register. Comments can be submitted electronically to smartgridcomments@nist.gov or by mail to: George Arnold, 100 Bureau Drive, Stop 8100, National Institute of Standards and Technology, Gaithersburg, MD 20899-8100.

Along with this EPRI deliverable, NIST will review the comments received. By early fall, NIST intends to issue its Smart Grid Interoperability Standards Roadmap, which will set priorities for interoperability and cybersecurity requirements, identify an initial set of standards to support early implementation, and list plans to meet remaining standards needs.

For more information, go to: http://www.nist.gov/smartgrid/

The document is here [291 page, 5.8MB PDF].

On this one, only the hardest of the hardcore energy geeks need apply.

I’ve long believed that in our quest to match electricity supply and demand, especially when both are varying, that it’s easy to overlook physical storage. We keep looking for the sexy solution, like gigantic lithium batteries, when a more economical solution could be vastly simpler. Probably my favorite example of this approach is pumped storage, in which water is pumped from a low to a higher reservoir and then allowed to flow back and drive a hydroelectric generator.[1]

A close second is flywheels: An array of big honkin’, heavy wheels on high-tech bearings that store energy by spinning it high speeds. When you need to tap the energy they contain, you let them drive generators. Again, see the Wiki machine for some details.

I bring this up because there’s at least a little movement on the flywheel front, as described in: Storing energy for when needed:

The state [NY] is ready to invest $2 million to build a flywheel-based electricity storage system designed to help reduce greenhouse gases, which cause global warming.

The plant will house an array of massive flywheels spinning at up to 16,000 revolutions per minute. They’re designed to store excess power from the electrical grid, releasing it as needed to match the ebb and flow of statewide demand for electricity to avoid brownouts and blackouts.

Smoothing the electric supply is now done by ramping up fossil-fuel-powered electric plants, which burn coal, oil and natural gas. Emissions from those plants produce carbon dioxide, identified by an international scientific consensus as the cause of global warming.

… Instead, 200 flywheels — each a rotating disk 7 feet tall and 3 feet wide — will spin, using motors that draw excess energy from the power grid when it is not needed.

…

Because of an almost total lack of friction, the flywheels can spin out power for about a hour, meaning power plants won’t have to increase capacity to meet demand.

A 20-megawatt flywheel plant, like the one planned for the seven-acre facility, should prevent the release of up to 12,000 tons of carbon dioxide each year. That’s equal to saving 20,000 barrels of oil or taking about 2,000 cars off the road.

In the longer run, the ideal solution would be to link things like wind and solar PV across large geographic areas via a supergrid. The rationale for such an approach is is simple: Wind might not blow all the time in any given place, but it’s always blowing somewhere. Build a lot of wind farms and link them, and you can relatively efficiently funnel electricity from where it’s generated to where it’s needed.

But building that level of supergrid is anything but a cheap, easy, or quick proposition. Just getting the right-of-way access for the transmission lines across state, county, and local jurisdictions in the US would be a nightmare, even before you addressed the “real” issues of funding and implementation. With that preferable solution delayed (possibly indefinitely), I expect to see more use of localized and on-site electricity storage.

In other words: Flywheels, baby!

[1] See the Wikipedia entry on pumped storage for a fascinating overview of how it works and how widely it’s used (hint: a lot more than most people think).

One of the responses I always hear from the “I don’t know what I’m talking about, but I bet I can stump the energy geek with something he hasn’t thought of!” crowd when I mention PHEVs and EVs is something along the lines of, “But what if you recharge the battery with electricity made from coal???”

The answer, as you can see below, is that you still reduce CO2 emissions a lot, even in that worst-case scenario.

The description of the graph from the source page (linked below):

Estimates from the GREET model (see Argonne National Laboratory’s information on GREET) show that passenger car PHEV10s produce about 29% fewer carbon emissions than a conventional vehicle, when plugged into an outlet connected to the typical U.S. grid. Even when PHEV10s are charged using power generated completely from coal, carbon emissions are about 25% less than those of a conventional vehicle. The use of light truck PHEV10s reduces emissions by 28% when charged on a typical grid and 23% when charged on power generated from coal. The carbon reductions are greater as the length the vehicle can travel on electricity increases.

(As you’ve probably guessed, a PHEV10 is a PHEV with a 10-mile battery range, etc. “Typical grid” electricity is defined as “50.9% coal; 20.1% nuclear; 16.7% natural gas; 11.0% renewable energy; and 1.3% petroleum”.)

See this page for the tables of data used in the graph.

Be prepared to execute a world-class eye roll. It seems the US Dept. of Energy stinks at, well, saving energy in their use of IT hardware. The report Department of Energy Efforts to Manage Information Technology Resources in an Energy-Efficient and Environmentally Responsible Manner [30 page, 1.2 MB PDF], by none other than the Depart of Energy, says:

Despite its recognized energy conservation leadership role, the Department had not always taken advantage of opportunities to reduce energy consumption associated with its information technology resources. Nor, had it ensured that resources were managed in a way that minimized impact on the environment. In particular (from the summary cover letter):

• The seven Federal and contractor sites included in our review had not fully reduced energy consumption through implementation of power management settings on their desktop and laptop computers; and, as a consequence, spent $1.6 million more on energy costs than necessary in Fiscal Year 2008;
• None of the sites reviewed had taken advantage of opportunities to reduce energy consumption, enhance cyber security, and reduce costs available through the use of techniques, such as “thin-client computing” in their unclassified environments; and,
• Sites had not always taken the necessary steps to reduce energy consumption and resource usage of their data centers, such as identifying and monitoring the amount of energy used at their facilities.

We concluded that Headquarters programs offices (which are part of the Department of Energy’s Common Operating Environment) as well as field sites had not developed and/or implemented policies and procedures necessary to ensure that information technology equipment and supporting infrastructure was operated in an energy-efficient manner and in a way that minimized impact on the environment. For example, although required by the Department, sites had not enabled computer equipment power management features designed to reduce energy consumption. In addition, officials within Headquarters programs and at the sites reviewed had not effectively monitored performance or taken steps to fully evaluate available reductions in energy usage at their facilities. Without improvements, the Department will not be able to take advantage of opportunities to reduce energy consumption and realize cost savings of nearly $23 million over the next five years at just the seven sites reviewed. We noted that the potential for reduced energy consumption at these sites alone was equivalent to the annual power requirements of over 2,400 homes or, alternatively, removing about 3,000 cars from the road each year.

In a word: Ouch.

In more than one word: When some entity–individual, business, government office, university, whatever–fails to take steps that save energy, reduce environmental impact, and return an instantaneous financial benefit for no cost, then someone has screwed up.

Which begs the question: How diligent are you in taking these steps? Did you put your electricity vampires on cheap switched outlets? Do you use the power settings on your computers? Do you use ceiling fans (assuming you have them) to minimize your use of air conditioning? And, yes–did you change your light bulbs?

Have you taken any steps to make your workplace or your kids’ schools more energy efficient?

If the answer to any of these is no, then how much of a financial benefit (or guilt avoidance) do you need to make you overcome your inertia and take action?

www.azstarnet.com: Key senator calls for 100 new reactors in 20 years:

Tennessee Sen. Lamar Alexander called Wednesday for doubling the number of nuclear reactors nationwide, a potentially $700 billion proposal that calls for building 100 more over 20 years.

…

“I am convinced it should happen because conservation and nuclear power are the only real alternatives we have today to produce enough low-cost, reliable, clean energy to clean the air, deal with climate change and keep good jobs from going overseas.”

…

The country’s 104 commercial nuclear reactors produce 20 percent of the nation’s electricity, while most of its energy comes from carbon-producing coal. The last reactor to come online was the Tennessee Valley Authority’s Watts Bar Unit 1 reactor in Spring City, Tenn., in 1996.

Steve Smith, director of the Southern Alliance for Clean Energy, called Alexander’s proposal “reckless.”
“Nuclear power is a problem, not a solution,” Smith said. “New nuclear reactors are expensive, create significant water use and thermal pollution risks to our communities and produce radioactive waste that after 50 years we still have no long-term solution for.”

…

Alexander said he would increase federal loan guarantees now being offered for the first four reactors to as many as 12 to “jump start” the nuclear revival.

Fascinating. Is the Senator saying that all we need to do is rely on conservation and nuclear powered electricity to deal with climate change? He says they’re our “only real alternatives”, so clearly they’re enough to deal with the problem all by themselves or the battle is already lost. Perhaps the Senator should re-think that particular sound bite.

And as for Steve Smith’s comments, I would add that a much greater use of nuclear power also creates a much greater dependency on shifting and therefore less reliable and less predictable water supplies for cooling. This is a point that’s often lost in such discussions: Many people point out that nuclear power plants have a high water draw, but not nearly that much in terms of water consumption, which is unarguably true, and is typically cited to show that nuclear plants don’t make as big a dent in water supplies as some people assume. But the flip side to that situation is that regardless of how the water is used (merely a draw vs. gone-for-good consumption), the plant still requires that flow to operate. Build a nuclear plant, and you’re assuming that you can predict a viable source of cooling water at that location for the next 50 years, likely longer.[1]

I would also like to know what Senator Alexander’s long-term plan is for the additional 6 tons of nuclear waste these new plants will produce (in addition to the 6 tons generated by our current plants) every day.

[1] In the US, nuclear plants are typically licensed for 40 years, but many have recently been renewed for an additional 20 years.

Greenpeace has thrown down the gauntlet (by which I mean mouse pad) and issued the Cool IT Challenge, “a campaign to turn IT industry leaders into climate advocates and solution providers.” From their About page:

This website exposes the gap between what the IT industry could do to fight climate change, and what they’re doing today. As the leaderboard shows, there’s a long way to go (hint: They’re scored out of 100). [Note that as of this posting, the scorecard’s best rating was a measly 29.]

The Cool IT Challenge is a climate change campaign born of the experience of the Greenpeace Guide to Greener Electronics: Public pressure, humour and a bit of luck can move even the most stubborn industry giants into action.

Why start a climate campaign for the IT crowd?

Our planet is on the brink of runaway climate change and the consequences will be catastrophic. Our changing climate affects everyone.

The Information and Communications Technology (ICT) sector creates two percent of global greenhouse gas emissions. That’s the bad news. The good news is that its services and products could cut the world’s emissions by an estimated 15 percent when applied in industry, buildings, transport and power sectors. Smart 2020, A report by The Climate Group on behalf of the Global e-Sustainability Initiative (GeSI), with independent analysis by McKinsey & Company, has all the details.

Politicians will meet in Copenhagen this December to agree a successor to the Kyoto Protocol. A strong Copenhagen deal will create the right market conditions for a massive roll-out of smart technologies — the stuff that the IT industry makes. So you might expect IT CEOs to be lobbying governments for a strong deal? Well they’re not… yet.

Assessment 1: May 2009

The first results of the Greenpeace Cool IT Challenge expose the IT industry’s inadequate leadership in tackling climate change despite its claim to have the immense potential to enable 15 percent cuts or more in all global greenhouse gas emissions by 2020 (Source: Smart2020 Report).

To really deliver on this potential the IT industry needs to look beyond just cutting its own emissions and deliver climate solutions for the rest of the economy while urgently using its influence to call upon world leaders to deliver a climate saving deal at the UN Climate Summit in Copenhagen in December.

The Cool IT Challenge will be updated regularly, with the second version debuting in August.

(You can find the report mentioned above and more information about Smart2020 on the project’s web site.)

Based on my personal experience in the computer business, I enthusiastically agree.

I’ve contended for a long time that one of the biggest sources of wasted energy in the IT sector is caused by Windows, specifically its boot times that you can measure with a sundial.[1] I’m convinced that this is why so many users leave their PC’s on 24/7: It’s the only way to get a quick start up time, and they don’t see the immediate cost of leaving a PC on constantly, as that expense only shows up at the end of the month, and even then it’s blended in with all of their other electricity consumption. (Perhaps we need to steal an idea from those instantaneous MPG meters in some cars and create a little desktop widget that lets you configure a power consumption level and price of electricity so it can show you how much your PC usage has added to our electricity bill in the current session and month. Hmm. Might be time to whip out ye olde programming tools.) Each individual laptop or desktop PC doesn’t consume much power, but multiply that by a lot of hours and then by many millions of PCs just in the US, and you’re talkin’ about some pretty hefty energy waste.

The other area where IT people really do a poor job is data center cooling. The numbers I’ve seen say that for every watt consumed by hardware to do real work, it takes another 1.0 to 1.5 watts to cool it. Add to that the fact that many data centers have horribly misconfigured and mismanaged cooling, which typically run 24/7, of course, and the amount of waste is staggering.

Why, one might well ask, would IT managers not be much more aggressive about squeezing waste out of their operations? I think the answer lies in two factors:

First, good old fashioned inertia and ultra conservative practices. They’ve done things one way for years and had very little trouble with hardware outages, so they’re extremely hesitant to mess with their operations, particularly when it comes to cooling data centers. Many people in that business will choose to stay the course, even if they’re pretty sure they’re paying more for cooling than is truly necessary, rather than make a change to save some money and wind up triggering a much more expensive failure because they didn’t adequately cool their hardware.

Second, many facilities have cut personnel to dangerously low levels. They’ve taken “doing more with less” from a hackneyed slogan to a fetish, and in the process created an environment where their people are running as fast as they can just to keep even with “must do” work. There’s simply no human resource available to evaluate and implement any sort of data center reorganization plan.

But there is a lot that can be done, even in such a strained environment. New, less power hungry chips and disk drives will reduce the energy appetite of PCs and data centers, without the owners even realizing it. Plus, the continued adoption of virtualization technologies in data centers can often let them do the same job with less hardware. And who knows, maybe some day PC users will learn to turn off their bloody systems at night, along with their cable modems and networking gear.

Hey, a computer and energy geek can dream, can’t he?

[1] Here I’m talking about real world boot times, not a synthetic benchmark that boots a fresh installation with nothing at all added. Firing up Windows and waiting for it and your obligatory Internet security software package to reach a usable state (meaning it’s no longer saturating the disk with I/O and making even the simplest action painfully slow) is a study in annoyance.

VCT meaning, of course, a voluntary carbon tax. The intent is to focus on those cases when people voluntarily pay more than they have to for some good or service in order to lower their carbon emissions. It’s expressed in monetary units per unit of CO2, as in dollar per metric ton of CO2 avoided.

For example, my wife and I live in New York State, where we can select our electricity supplier. In the Rochester area, we can choose from about 8 or 10 different options (as best I can remember), one of which is a “100% green” provider that buys all of its electrons from wind farms and small hydro. That’s the one we use (big surprise), at a cost penalty of about 0.6 cents/kWh. We use about 400 kWh of electricity per month, so we’re paying an additional $2.40/month, averaged over a year.

How much CO2 are we avoiding, though? That’s a little tough to say, as we have a nuclear plant nearby, plus this part of NY gets a lot of hydro power from Niagara Falls, but NY also gets an unusually high portion of its electricity from oil burning plants. For the sake of example, I’ll assume that our normal electricity supply would have 25% of the US average CO2 emissions/kWh, which works out to 0.335 pounds/kWh. For our 400 kWh/month consumption, that saves 134 pounds of CO2/month, or 0.06 metric tons/month. Our VCT is therefore $40/metric ton of CO2 avoided.

You can do similar a calculation for buying a hybrid car, assuming that the price of gasoline is low enough that your miles driven/year won’t save enough on fuel costs to make up for the higher initial purchase price (and also taking into account the higher residual value of the vehicle, tax breaks, etc.).[1]

With any such calculation, if the combination of inputs yields a net cash savings, then your VCT is negative, and you’re making money by avoiding CO2 emissions. If those savings get large enough (as they are for CFLs, for example), then we’re in that golden zone where even the people who think global climate change refers to the changing of seasons will start to take action.

So, one might well ask, what is the point of this little exercise?

First, I think this is a valuable way to look at personal consumption, as it lets even those individual consumers on a tight budget determine how best to shift their consumption patterns to achieve the most good. If you live in an area that predominantly gets its electricity supply from cola plants, but your have the option of paying that extra 0.6 cents/kWh for green electrons, then avoiding that 2.095 pounds CO2/kWh means your VCT is a mere $6/metric ton. If you don’t drive much, then you might well conclude that buying a hybrid car works out to a much higher VCT, and is therefore a much lower priority.[2]

A problem here is that we don’t always have the information we need to make lower-CO2 buying decisions. How many products on the shelf of your local store have CO2 labels on them? I know that this kind of labeling has been on at least some food products in the UK for a while, something I would love to see take root in the US. This is going to be a major stumbling block as transition from our habits of business as usual/mindless consumption to a broader awareness of the ramifications of our actions and mindful consumption. Once again, we’ll be living measured lives on a managed planet.

Second, I think VCT is also a useful metric for assessing our own personal commitment to taking action. If you’re absolutely convinced that climate chaos is real and very serious, and you think that we need to put a price on carbon emissions, then how much are you doing (read: paying) in your daily life to combat it? Writing a blog, forwarding e-mailed articles to your friends, and making the obligatory snide comments about Hummers are all little more than window dressing, even if the last one makes you feel particularly superior. It’s long past time to get in the game to whatever level of commitment each of us can afford.[3]

[1] The case of a hybrid car is particularly nasty, since it requires you to guess about two of the critical inputs: The price of gasoline throughout the in-service life of the car, as well as the price you’ll get for it at trade-in/sale time. My personal view is that we likely won’t see too much of a gasoline price run-up in the US this year (barring any of the usual unforeseen circumstances), but that starting in mid-2010 or later, things could get gratuitously interesting as the world continues to pull out of this mother of all recessions and we start to feel the impact of peak oil and the results of the current drop in oil field exploration and development. The residual value of a hybrid is even thornier. If gasoline prices somehow stay low, then in six years, say, you could find not much of a premium on your trade-in. If gasoline prices are “high”, you could get a pretty decent premium. If they’re “very high” and car companies have been rolling out ever greater numbers of PHEVs and EVs, then you might see no premium at all (or a negative one) for your gas guzzling Prius or Insight.

[2] And you might conclude that the best option is to do what I did in 2003: Buy a small, very efficient non-hybrid car at a much lower price and employ mild hypermiling to stretch your gasoline consumption even further. Then you wouldn’t really care about fluctuations in the resale value (because of the low initial price), and you could pour some of that money you didn’t pay for the car into better home insulation, more efficient appliances, or some other energy- and CO2-saving alternatives.

[3] I’m not dismissing the efforts of people in local environmental groups who do things like give presentations about climate change and teach others about the problem and what to do about it. Those efforts have a very low VCT. Divide the combined one-time labor value of the volunteers by the total CO2 savings they trigger in their audience, and I bet that in most cases you get a vanishingly small VCT coupled with a very respectable CO2 savings.

My post yesterday on the drop in hydrogen fuel cell funding by the US government (Hydrogen: Happy trails time?) is getting a lot of hits over on The Energy Collective, and there were a couple of comments by Garry Golden that deserve a more thoughtful reply than a quick comment. So I’m taking the slightly unusual step of replying at length here and then posting a link to my response on TEC (which will likely run this post).

As I write this, Garry has made two comments, and I’ll quote from them and respond to each. I’m going to make my best good-faith effort to be true to the spirit of his comments; any mischaracterization is solely my fault and accidental, and I apologize in advance.

Lou, No flaming intended here- no personal attack intended- as I know how these conversation descend quickly. But these types of posts frustrate me to no end. Too much Joseph Romm’s paradigm-bound speak here that puts all things hydrogen into the ‘freak’ camp. And hints of attempts to characterize all people who speak reasonably about the potential of hydrogen as wackos. I grow tired of this from Romm - especially when the Case for Plugins is weak and completely aligned with all the challenges of H2. Hard to store, ‘not a fuel’, carbon footprint depends on how you produce, it.

Just to be clear: I certainly don’t put the pro-HFC people in the freak or wackos camps. I reserve those for the Apocalypticons and Cornucopians.

I disagree that the case for plug-ins is “completely aligned with the challenges” of HFCVs. Even ignoring things like the Tesla (which I consider to be little more than a techno parlor trick, thanks to the price), real world EVs and PHEVs will be on the market in the US from major manufacturers in one to two years. And those will be units for sale, not on a lease (like the Honda FCX, which is an enormous per vehicle money loser). That says all we need to know about PHEVs and EVs making it over the first major market hurdle, i.e. mass produced at affordable (which is not to say cheap) prices, and HFCVs not being there yet.

The only thing keeping PHEVs and EVs from selling like crazy right now to at least a certain segment of the US population (more on this below) is the price of the batteries. We know how to do everything else in the car, and at an affordable price. We know how to make the batteries physically perform, too, but not at a low enough price.

HFCVs face more hurdles. They need better fuel cells and better on board H2 storage, both at dramatically better prices than anything we have right now, before we even get to the refueling infrastructure.

As for refueling, there are only two ways to make mass quantities of hydrogen. We can reform it from natural gas, which creates a lot of CO2 we then have to either sequester or release into the air, neither of which is a good answer. Or we can use electrolysis to make it from water, which takes a lot of electricity. However we make it, we then have to compress, distribute, and dispense the hydrogen, all steps that take more energy. I know I’m long past the point of sounding like a broken record, but I think that any serious discussion of hydrogen as a vehicle fuel has to start with Ulf Bossel’s “E21″ paper, Does a Hydrogen Economy Make Sense? [PDF]. He goes into quite a bit of detail on the energy losses for both EVs and HFCVs from the original flow of green electrons all the way to the wheel, and calculates that EVs get exactly three times the number of miles per unit of green electricity as an HFCV fueled via electrolysis.

In my opinion, that’s a showstopper. Assume that we can get the entire hydrogen infrastructure for free, plus we can make and sell the vehicles for the same price as an EV or PHEV. We’re still stuck with the exceedingly nasty problem of climate chaos and how we clean up our electricity supply (which we’d have to do no matter what happens with the transportation sector if we’re to get to an 80% CO2 emissions reduction by 2050). That means we’ll need to get as much out of every green kWh as possible, whether it’s fueling a data center or a car or municipal street lighting. And that’s where the factor of three becomes a back breaker.

Whether you or I or anyone else is tired of worrying about how we fuel the production of hydrogen is irrelevant. (And for the record I am quite tired of worrying about the seemingly endless interdependencies we run into when talking about energy and environmental issues in the context of economics and (ugh!) politics.) Unless someone can come up with a zero or nearly zero CO2 source of hydrogen that makes the entire grid-to-wheels system as efficient as PHEVs or EVs, HFCVs won’t be able to compete.

Infrastructure costs for plug ins? How much will it cost to build wall sockets for our vehicle fleet? Are we really betting on ‘plug ins’ as the solution. Which automaker has stated this as the final end state platform? None that I have recorded. We are the beginning of electrification and hydrogen has a role in delivering electrons. At the end of the day next generation electric propulsion systems will integrate batteries, fuel cells and capacitors. Not one device is likely to provide the right size, cost, performance, et al for vehicle applications.

To make use of a few million PHEVs or EVs right now we need precisely zero infrastructure investment in the US. As I’ve pointed out many times on this site, there’s a huge market for 100 to 150 mile/charge EVs in the form of the Nth car in a two (or more) car household. We will certainly see a diversification of transportation solutions, as you point out, but saying that there’s a high infrastructure cost for getting PHEVs and EVs into the game just isn’t true, just as we shouldn’t assume the cost of a coast-to-coast hydrogen infrastructure is a prerequisite for HFCVs, something I said in my original post.

Why does hydrogen necessarily have a role in delivering electrons? We can make the technology work, and might, with a lot of hard work and some luck, be able to drive the vehicle cost down enough to be affordable. But that doesn’t mean it’s a worthwhile option in the long run. That’s like arguing that corn-based ethanol should be a major component of our liquid fuels sector because we make a lot of it today. As my wife is fond of reminding me, just because you can do something doesn’t mean you should. (Don’t ask.)

First, yes there is an electric grid. But those sockets were/are built for appliances in homes, not vehicles. (They weren’t even built for mobile devices- hence the headaches of finding a recharge plug in airports or cafes) Access to wall sockets is overstated. I live in Brooklyn and actually don’t have a garage. And if we took a snapshot right now of all the world’s parked vehicles- how many would be within 10 feet of a socket (upgraded or not)? I can see EVs for managed fleets– but not the mass market. This is one of my great frustrations is that people assume we can just bring on EVs without spending money on infrastructure. Startup darling Better Place and Shai Agassi have demonstrated that car companies and govts (local/national) do want a viable infrastructure before they invest in EVs. Better Place is estimating that the Bay Area alone (stations/switch out stations) will cost $1 billion. Then run estimates BP has priced for Israel, Denmark, Australia and Hawaii. It’s not free. EV grid access is not ubiquitous. And (again, not trying to flame or get emotional) but how can we have this conversation without statement of reality. The grid was not built for roadside assistance.

Again, this is putting an artificially high barrier in front of PHEVs and EVs. And adding recharging outlets in places like airports, hotels, parking decks, business and university parking lots, etc. can happen in a piecemeal fashion much easier than can adding hydrogen refueling capacity. Once plug-in vehicles are on the road in appreciable numbers, many organizations will find they have an incentive to provide their visitors or employees with recharging facilities. Some will be free (employee benefits), some will be discounted or subsidized (airports and government offices), and some will be full grid price plus a markup (whoever can get away with it). And don’t underestimate the value of quick charging, as I first wrote about in March of 2008 (The revolution is in the second plug). That allows the centralization of recharging stations and a much cheaper infrastructure build out, while still allowing those with easy access to an overnight plug to exploit that option, as well.

2) In terms of EVs and batteries pulling ahead of H2 Fuel cells- I don’t see it. We are in Year 0 or Year 1 of the EV age. There are no commercially viable product lines out there. Just a handful of promising platforms. But there is no declared winner in electric propulsion support systems. I think EV advocates miss the challenges of moving vehicles- and pricing out costs of batteries over next 5 to 10 years as fuel cells (via membrane price reduction) offer a more competitive and higher performance system. We are early on in a multi-decade long transition- and I cannot say that batteries have ‘won’. Not at all. It’s just that the combustion engine has lost. And we can all celebrate that!!! H2 (solid state storage via MOFs, hydrides is actually progressing nicely. And nanostructured catalysts to produce H2 via reforming or low temp electrolysis are moving forward.

Of course there are no winners, and I would certainly not claim that there are what I would consider widely available and successful PHEVs and EVs on the market as I type this. But for the reasons I’ve mentioned above, I think they’re far closer to being ready for prime time than HFCVs, and will ultimately out-compete them. I don’t know what the technologies you mention will deliver in the future, but again, we can’t escape two realities: Whatever we come up with has to result in a mainstreamable grid-to-wheels system that matches plug-ins for efficient use of our scarce green electricity supply and also puts us on a track for the scale of greenhouse gas reductions we need. If that happens and hydrogen turns out to be a major part of the answer, then great! I’ll be the most obnoxious, relentless supported of HFCVs one could imagine, simply because the demonstrated facts would demand it. I don’t have any skin in the game regarding which mixture of solutions works for us, I just want us to find at least one combination that can provide the functionality we want and at a bearable price in terms of dollars and environmental impact.

Last week the blogosphere was chattering about the two papers in Nature that addressed the issue of how much of the world’s remaining fossil fuels humanity could burn before we triggered an unacceptable level of climate change. In writing about those articles (It’s Crunch Time), I said:

Casting the situation as a limit on how much of the remaining fossil fuels we can burn in a given time window strikes me as extremely useful. I don’t mean to suggest that legislators and deniers around the world will suddenly slap themselves in the forehead and exclaim, “Oh! Now I get it! Let’s get to work!” But it does seem like a much more approachable way to frame the limits to our behavior than is talking about parts per million of CO2 in the atmosphere. (I’m assuming that the math all works out, and that the authors used reasonable, mainstream estimates for the recoverable reserves of fossil fuels.)

I remember quite clearly thinking how much that news felt like the study I’ve mentioned so many times, Ulf Bossel’s “E21″ paper, Does a Hydrogen Economy Make Sense? [PDF], that does a thorough analysis of the efficiency of a hydrogen fuel cell car vs. an EV.

We now have what feels like another article that seems to ring true in the same unmistakable way, this time concerning biofuels, as described in Green Car Congress: Study Finds Bioelectricity Better Option Than Liquid Biofuels for Transportation Output and GHG Emissions:

A new life cycle assessment comparing the performance of bioelectricity and ethanol from a variety of pathways with respect to transportation kilometers and GHG offsets achieved per unit area of biofuels cropland concludes that bioelectricity used to charge a battery electric vehicle outperforms ethanol for a combustion engine across a range of feedstocks, conversion technologies, and vehicle classes.

The study by University of California, Merced, Assistant Professor Elliott Campbell along with Christopher Field of the Carnegie Institution’s Department of Global Ecology and David Lobell of Stanford University, found that bioelectricity produces an average 81% more transportation kilometers and 108% more emissions offsets per unit area cropland than cellulosic ethanol. A paper on the work appeared in the 8 May issue of the journal Science.

The authors point out their study looked at only two criteria, kilometers travelled and greenhouse gas offsets, but did not examine the performance of electricity and ethanol for other policy-relevant criteria such as water consumption, air pollution or economic costs.

…

The net transportation output per hectare is larger for the bioelectricity case. With BEVs and ICVs of similar size, one can travel farther on biomass grown on a hectare of land when it is converted to electricity than when it is converted to ethanol…For this case, the gross transportation output per hectare is 85% greater for bioelectricity than cellulosic ethanol. This is largely due to fact that the small SUV BEV has an electric motor that is 3.1 times as efficient as the internal combustion engine of the small SUV ICV for highway driving.

—Campbell et al. (2009)

See GCC’s article for more results from the paper, which is not generally available to the public, as well as the university’s press release.

Just to take a blatant guess, I would say that the economic cost (see below) would have to be less for the bioelectricity case; once the crop is harvested (which has to be done no matter its intended use), I can’t imagine that transporting the crop to an electricity plant and burning it would cost more than converting it into ethanol and then transporting the ethanol to a gas station.

Water use might be a more problematic situation; converting the biomass into ethanol takes some water, but so does cooling the thermoelectric generator that burns biomass in the bioelectricity case.

I think we need at least one more study on this.

Related articles:

• Scientific American: What Is The Best Way to Turn Plants into Energy?
• Technology Review: Biofuels vs. Biomass Electricity

Of course, work on biomass to liquid technologies won’t end once word of this study spreads, nor should it, given how early we are in the transition away from petroleum based vehicle fuels. One big breakthrough hit the news feeds just yesterday, Biofuels Digest: Breakthrough at Mascoma holds potential for 60 percent drop in production cost of cellulosic ethanol; ‘golden dream’ of CBP is closer than thought:

In Massachusetts, Mascoma will announce later this morning a breakthrough that is reducing the cost of cellulosic ethanol production by up to 60 percent in lab tests.

The breakthrough relates to consolidated bioprocessing (CBP) - a transformational technology which the DOE/USDA 2006 Roadmap called “the ultimate low-cost configuration for cellulose hydrolysis and fermentation,” and which reduces or eliminates the need for added enzymes to process pretreated lignocellulose into ethanol.

Mascoma is reporting that, in the lab, based on multiple runs with reduced enzyme requirements, it is seeing normalized per gallon operating costs in March at just under 40 percent of the June 2008 baseline.

Assuming this 60% cost reduction is real, it’s a tremendous advance, although it wouldn’t seem to address the basic point of the study quoted above and “field to wheels” efficiency.

Are we finally seeing hydrogen fuel cell vehicles heading off into the general direction of the sunset? Possibly, although I wouldn’t bet my keyboard on it.

WSJ: Running on Empty: Obama Budget Cuts Funding for Hydrogen Car:

President Obama’s proposed 2010 budget calls for cutting funding for a program at the Department of Energy that carries out research on hydrogen technology for vehicles by roughly 60%, or $100 million, as part of an effort to shift to technologies “with more immediate promise.”

The administration’s proposal illustrates how much has changed in Washington and the wider world of vehicle research in recent years. Six years ago, President Bush called for new federal funding for research into how to produce and distribute hydrogen and then store it in tanks so it can be used in fuel-cell-powered cars.

…

Because hydrogen is the most abundant element in the universe, and using it to power cars would be so clean, proponents have often described it as the Holy Grail of alternative fuels.

But lately, enthusiasm among auto makers and politicians has been shifting away from hydrogen toward electric vehicles. One reason: the enormous projected cost of developing an infrastructure of hydrogen filling stations. The National Research Council, an arm of the National Academy of Sciences, said last year that the total cost of deploying a national hydrogen network could be as high as $200 billion, including $55 billion in government aid through 2023. And that amount, the council said, would be enough to put only two million hydrogen cars on the road - a small fraction of the total U.S. vehicle population of about 300 million cars and trucks.

Here we go again. First we have the “hydrogen is the most abundant element in the universe” idiocy, which just might be the the all-time best example of a true but totally irrelevant energy factoid. Then we have the “cost of the infrastructure” canard. Ouch.

On the abundance of hydrogen: Of course it’s abundant. It’s also in places and forms that make it very inconvenient (read: expensive) to use as a motor vehicle fuel. This is why you so often hear people say that hydrogen is not an energy source, but an energy carrier. You have to consume a lot of electricity (and possibly natural gas, if you go that route instead of electrolysis) just to make the hydrogen, and then you have to consume quite a bit more electricity to compress it for storage in a fueling station and on board the vehicle. You put a lot of energy in to get energy out, about three times the amount of energy per mile driven that you would need to charge a battery in an EV. Think of the hydrogen fueling infrastructure as an inefficient and very complex way to recharge a battery in the vehicle.

Without belaboring the point for the Nth time, let me point out that hydrogen as a transportation fuel has several very high hurdles to get over, and the refueling infrastructure is not high on the list.

“But wait!”, I can imagine people saying, “wouldn’t it cost A Lot Of Money to build even a minimal hydrogen refueling system from coast to coast in the US???” Of course it would, but that’s not what any rational person would consider doing, at least initially. You could build out a refueling infrastructure at a much lower ratio of stations to population, compared to gasoline stations, simply because there would be so many fewer HFC vehicles on the road for years. As the vehicles sold, companies like our friends who provide us with gasoline would leap at the chance to add hydrogen dispensing facilities to some of their existing stations so they could sell us another form of fuel.

The immediate economic hurdle for HFC vehicles is the cost of the vehicles themselves, assuming you can come up with a design that provides enough range per tank, has no performance issues at high and low temperatures, has an acceptable longevity for the fuel cell, etc. Yes, with more R&D and the proper invocation of the ghost of Adam Smith to endow your project with the proper economies of scale savings, you just might be able to get the price below, say, $100,000 for a Civic-size car in the next 10 years. Maybe.

Beyond that gigantic hurdle there’s the climate chaos factor I’ve mentioned countless times. If we’re really struggling to make an 80% reduction in our CO2 emissions by 2050 (and make no mistake, it will be a struggle), then we won’t have the luxury of consuming three times as much clean electricity per mile in an HFC vehicle as we would an EV. As we electrify transportation, imagine having to build three times as many nuclear power plant, wind turbines, concentrating solar power plants, etc. to support that sector of the economy. We’ll be hard pressed to find an affordable combination of conservation and clean electricity generation to make our CO2 reduction goals as it is, without this huge burden being added to our to-do list.

Is this really the end of the HFC vehicle nonsense? I doubt it. Even though the current administration is moving in the right direction, they won’t be in power forever. Before we know it, whether it’s in 2012 or 2016 or whenever, the US will elect a president much more like George W. Bush than Barack Obama, and we’ll see enough policy reversals to give any observer whiplash.[1] I only hope that PHEV/EV technology is advanced enough and has demonstrated enough market success that even a profoundly disappointing, stupefyingly weird selection by the voters at large would not resurrect HFC vehicles.

[1] If you think I’m being overly cynical or skeptical, consider recent US elections history, particularly the dual nightmares of 2000 and 2004, from which we’re still trying to awake, and convince me I’m wrong.

One of the sentiments I hear a lot from various people I speak to about energy and environmental issues is a desire to put a wind turbine on their home. I think this is a combination of factors at work, including wind’s (deserved) reputation for being a very clean, renewable energy source, and people wanting to avoid paying their monthly electricity bill, or at least reduce it greatly.[1]

This undercurrent came to mind when I read Small Wind: Southwest Windpower Gets Funding for Home Turbines:

For all the talk of a new “Apollo Program” or “Manhattan Project” to meet America’s energy needs, is the answer to think small?

Plenty of big-name energy investors think so, pouring fresh funds into a company that makes tiny wind turbines for residential use. The idea is to bypass the traditional model of big, centralized power generation stations—whose need for equally large power transmission systems are creating such an expensive headache–to provide electricity on a home-by-home basis.

Investors including GE Energy Financial Services, Altira, Rockport Capital Partners, NGP Energy Technology Partners, and Chevron’s CTTV Investments participated in a new $10 million funding round for Southwest Windpower, based in Flagstaff, Ariz.

In the context of hundreds of billions of dollars of federal stimulus spending, the amount is miniscule. But the idea is big. Southwest Windpower’s Skystream residential turbine can meet more than half a typical home’s energy needs, the company says—and more cheaply than by buying power from the grid. On windy days, residential systems can sell power back to the electric grid, helping shave power bills further and giving power companies access to clean energy.

I’ve never been convinced that small scale wind power would ever be more than “a niche of a niche” in terms of how much power it generated or how much atmospheric CO2 it helped us avoid creating. Still, thanks to the links in the above article, I did a little digging around, and found some good news and some not so good news for those lusting after their very own wind turbine.

First, let me start with the stimulus overview [PDF] provided by Southwest Windpower. In that document and the related spec sheet [PDF], they talk about their Skystream turbine, which has a service life of 20 years and a rated generating capacity of 2.4 kW. See the spec sheet for graphs that map wind speed to both power and monthly energy generation, and the wind resource maps linked from their page Is wind right for me?.

So, is wind right for me?[2]

I checked the wind map for NY State [PDF] to see what they had to say about Rochester. As best I can tell from the odd way the map is colored, they have Rochester in a light green area, which indicates an average wind speed of 11.2 to 12.3 mph, but at a height of 30 meters, the lowest height for which NY data is available. The price quoted for the Skystream model includes a 33 foot tower, quite a bit short of 30 meters, and I suspect it makes a big difference in ow much wind I could catch. In Rochester, we get some incredibly windy days, but we also get stretches of days (like right now) when there’s not enough wind in my neighborhood to muss your hair, let alone spin a turbine. I’m skeptical of that 11.2 to 12.3 mph number, but I’ll use it anyway.

In the stimulus overview [PDF], Southwest Windpower says that the Skystream costs $14,000, with a federal incentive of $4,200, leaving the pre-state incentive cost at $9,800. Eyeballing their cost vs. wind speed graph in that same document, it looks like 12.3 mph average winds over 20 years results in an electricity cost of about 12.5 cents/kWh. This looks like a very reasonable estimate. The spec sheet says that at 12.3 mph the Skystream produces 400 kWh/month. That’s a total of 96,000 kWh/month, or 10.2 cents/kWh, without adding anything for maintenance or interest payments. I would definitely call their estimate accurate, at least as much as any estimate based on averages can be, even though they seem to be making a generous assumption about the needed tower height. Speaking as a consumer, I would definitely consider installing a turbine like this, assuming I had the land, even though the electricity cost would be slightly higher than I pay now for grid electrons.

But wait–there’s more, as in more incentives. The NY State incentives are, to no one’s surprise, vastly more complex than the federal incentives. (My fellow New Yorkers who have filed state income tax forms will know instinctively what I’m talking about.)

The NY State incentives include model-specific values, plus a set of multipliers(!?) to raise or lower the incentive, depending on who is using the turbine. For the Skystream the residential incentive is a whopping $7,200. This drops the cost of the Skystream to $2,600, while the cost of electricity plummets to a mere 2.7 cents/kWh.

It seems that financially small scale wind turbines are a good deal for residential use, provided they’re heavily subsidized. With no incentives at all, the cost of electricity is about 14.6 cents/kWh, at least 3 cents/kWh above what my wife and I pay for 100% green electricity (which comes from wind and small hydro).

So, what to make of all this?

• The economics are more attractive than I thought. I doubt that small scale wind turbines will be broadly economically compelling on their own, unless the price of grid electricity rises sharply in many areas. But for many consumers just the federal incentives alone are enough to make this kind of investment attractive.[3]
• Small scale wind power will continue to be severely limited by the proximity of neighbors. Currently, the spacing requirements are such that only people living in rural or semi-rural areas can install an appropriately sized tower. There will be more creative wind power solutions, such as smaller generators that can be mounted on a roof, as well as turbines optimized for use on office and apartment buildings, schools, etc. For most home owners, solar panels will make much more sense, especially as their price continues to drop.
• My guess is that a residential wind turbine would make little sense without a net metering system in place, which (of course) varies greatly from state to state in the US. I would expect that without net metering some of the gusty winds in Rochester, often at night, would be totally wasted. The turbine would be produce more electricity than we consumed, and we’d get no economic benefit from it.
• The incentive programs (yeah, I’m looking at you, Albany) need to be much simpler. I would prefer to see the incentives based on the average wind speed at the installation site and the size of the wind turbine–in other words, tied to the amount of electricity you actually generate. Even better yet would be to ditch the up-front incentives and estimation process entirely and use a feed-in tariff, which would give consumers a strong incentive to conserve electricity and maximize their net metering receipts, since those would be at a higher cost per kWh than the normal grid rate.
• If we had the space, I would be working overtime to convince my wife that we simply had to have one of turbines, if only for the cool factor.

[1] This is part of the general American desire to “stick it to the man”, whether said man is an oil company, an electricity or natural gas supplier, OPEC, or whomever.

[2] My house isn’t a serious candidate for a this type of wind turbine, as a 33 foot or 30 meter would be far too close to my neighbors, even if I could get the local permits to erect the tower. I will assume for the rest of this post that I do have the proper buffer between properties, which Southwest Windpower says usually requires a one-acre plot of land.

[3] I realize that the cost of electricity is about to start changing dramatically in at least some parts of the US. Putting a price on CO2 emissions means higher prices, likely by a few cents/kWh, for people who primarily get their electricity from coal plants. And by “economically compelling” I mean a price that’s attractive enough to get the attention of and entice the non-energy geeks in the population, you know, the other 99% of consumers.

The EDF (Environmental Defense Fund) has released the document Energy-Water Nexus in Texas [36 page, 2MB PDF]. From the executive summary:

As we confront the challenges posed by climate change, decisions on supplying energy and water to the world’s growing population should no longer be made in isolation. The challenges facing Texas and the rest of the globe require that we recognize the deep inter‐connections and trade‐offs involved in deciding how to meet power and water needs in an increasingly resource constrained world.

This report is the first in a series designed to explore aspects of the energy-water nexus in Texas. It examines the water requirements for various types of electricity generating facilities, both for typical systems nationwide and here in Texas. It also addresses the use of energy by water supply and wastewater treatment systems, comparing national averages with Texas specific values.

Future installments in this report series will include case studies of the implications for energy of future water supply strategies for Texas and more place‐specific water supply implications of the future fuel mix for electricity production. There are several other aspects of the energy‐water nexus that are being investigated by several other entities but are not contemplated in this series, including hydroelectric power generation, unconventional fossil fuel production, and the development of biofuels such as ethanol. Analysis of available data for Texas reveals that approximately 157,000 million gallons (482,100 acre‐feet) of water annually – enough water for over 3 million people for a year, each using 140 gallons per person per day – are consumed for cooling the state’s thermoelectric power plants while generating approximately 400 terawatt‐hours (TWh) of electricity. At the same time, each year Texas uses an estimated 2.1 to 2.7 TWh of electricity for water systems and 1.1 to 2.2 TWh for wastewater systems each year – enough electricity for about 100,000 people for a year. These estimates for water and wastewater combined represent approximately 0.8 to 1.3% of total Texas electricity and 2.2 to 3.4% of industrial electricity use annually. The report presents a geographic distribution of the current water use for electricity generation and electricity use for water supply and wastewater treatment, which may be useful as policymakers begin to examine these aspects of the energy‐water nexus.

…

In the future, water use for electricity generation will depend on several factors, including the fuel mix for new generating capacity, the type of power plant and the type of power plant cooling systems that are deployed. Likewise, the amount of electricity used to pump, treat and deliver public water supply and to treat wastewater will depend on choices about water source and treatment technology. These trends, and trade‐offs still need to be better understood, but it is undeniable that there will be important implications for water and energy policy at the state and local level.

Things continue to develop on the EV front, with some fascinating news coming from Detroit Electric, a company I had barely heard of. Let me take a minute or three to quote from and deconstruct their announcement from March 30th (emphasis added):

Detroit Electric to produce and market full line of innovative Pure Electric vehicles in US, UK, EU and China beginning 2010

KUALA LUMPUR, March 30, 2009: Detroit Electric Holdings Ltd and PROTON Holdings Berhad today announced a strategic partnership to mass produce Pure Electric Vehicles. Detroit Electric will integrate its patented electric drive systems into the vehicles.

…

“Today’s agreement with Proton will put Detroit Electric on the fast track to bring a full line of innovative, practical and affordable pure electric vehicles to the global market,” said Albert Lam, Detroit Electric’s Chairman and Chief Executive Officer. “We chose Proton due to its state-of-the-art production facility, commitment to research and development, cost efficiency, and stable, high-quality workforce.”

By 2012, Detroit Electric plans to sell more than 270,000 Pure Electric Vehicles in Europe, UK, China and the United States. The vehicles will be priced between USD 23,000 and USD 26,000 for the city range model and between USD 28,000 and USD 33,000 for the extended range model. Styling changes will distinguish Detroit Electric’s vehicles from Proton’s existing line-up.

The vehicles will be based on Detroit Electric’s unique, patented electric drive system that greatly reduces the electric motor’s size and weight. The underlying Magnetic Flux Motor Technology and well-proven Lithium Polymer Battery Technology allow pure electric vehicles to achieve a single-charge range of 180km (111 miles) for the city range model and 325km (200 miles) for the extended range model.

…

On the current global downturn in automotive markets, Lam expressed confidence that Pure Electric Vehicles will attract a diverse base of consumers despite the tightening credit market, lowered consumer confidence, unstable oil prices and stricter fuel economy regulations.

“Our target audience are those who purchase practical and affordable vehicles. This makes our products fit the pockets of a very wide audience – from professionals and executives, to mothers, students and small business owners.”

I think this is interesting, on several fronts.

• As the title of the release says, these cars are headed for the US, EU, UK, and China, all in 2010. Even assuming the usual public relations fudge factor/production slips, that’s still good news for those of us eager to drive on electrons and not ancient algae.
• Notice that they’ll be marketing two basic models that differ in their battery size/driving range per charge. This is something that I’ve been talking about for a long time, and I expect other companies to follow suit. It makes no sense to offer a car to the public with only a single choice for something as basic as the battery range.
• Similarly, I expect to see car manufacturers (or third party companies) offering replacement or add-on batteries for even greater range. Upgrading an EV’s battery pack is vastly easier than is changing the engine or transmission in a gasoline engine car, so I expect a lot of entrepreneurs to leap into this market, even more than the number of places that are already converting Priuses to PHEVs.
• Taking that upgrade notion even further, I would expect to see some after market conversions using quick-recharge batteries. Quick recharge capability dramatically extends the car’s effective drive range, meaning at least some drivers will be willing to trade off the standard battery pack for a slightly more expensive, quick recharge version that might have only 75 to 80% of the single-charge driving range. As correspondent JD pointed out, quick recharge packs would require a broadband electrical outlet and not the dial up level of power most of us have in our homes, but I would expect a lot of people would be willing to pay an electrician to add a 220 volt outlet to their garage.
• Notice the vehicle pricing in the release. If Detroit Electric can sell a 111-mile range EV in the US in 2010 for $23,000, you can bet that larger companies with more economies of scale leverage can do it, too. At that price, the EV revolution will kick into overdrive quicker than you can say, “Holy Thomas Edison!”
• Notice what the pricing says about the battery cost. Assuming the vehicle gets about 5 miles/kWh, then the extra 89 miles of driving range (plus some other minor, unrelated goodies, I’d guess) will cost $5,000, or an additional 17.8 kWh of battery capacity for about $280/kWh. Based on other prices I’ve seen quoted for vehicle-scale battery packs, this is pretty aggressive, and it says a lot about the expected decline in the cost of batteries.
• I don’t know how well Detroit Electric will succeed in the US. My gut feeling is that they’ll be overrun by EVs from Nissan and Mitsubishi, and possibly some surprise late entries from Toyota and Honda.
• Somebody remind me again why anyone is excited about hydrogen fuel cell vehicles?
• I’ve been telling people for years that we’re headed for an explosion of change and options in cars that will rival what we saw with the arrival of HDTV’s and cell phones and other mobile devices. That sound you hear in the background, the one that’s vaguely reminiscent of the “going to warp speed” effect from Star Trek movies and TV shows, isn’t entirely your imagination; it’s the entire US (and world) transportation sector beginning to change itself.

The US Dept. of Energy has issued a set of spreadsheets on the use of alternative fuel vehicles, available from two web pages:

EIA Alternative Transportation Fuels-Supplier Data

EIA Alternative Transportation Fuels-User and Fuel Data

A few observations:

• This data is just for government and other organization fleets and does not include individual owners. This is not obvious from a quick reading of the web sites or even some of the data. See the questionnaire that was used to collect the data [PDF] and the instructions for the form [PDF], as well as table V7 (afvtrans_v7.xls) on the second page linked above that breaks out vehicle owners by category (with none for private individuals).
• Similarly, keep in mind that this data does not seem to take into account passenger light rail, although it does include buses and heavy duty trucks.
• The total amount of gasoline displaced by the use of all alternative fuels was about 4.8 billion gallons of gasoline equivalent in 2006 (table C1), compared to roughly 218 billion gallons of oil used for transportation in the US in 2007 (Annual Energy Review, Diagram 2). So alternative fuels are still a pretty small percentage of US transportation use, not that anyone should find that surprising.
• The distribution of vehicles by fuel:
  • E85 vehicles (only those actually being used with E85 and not regular gasoline): 364,384, 52.4%
  • Natural gas variants (CNG, LNG, LPG): 275,426, 39.6%
  • Electricity: 55,730, 8.0%
  • Hydrogen: 223, 0.03%
  • Other: 3

  Again, not a huge surprise, all things considered.

As always, for more US transportation stats than you could want, see the Transportation Energy Data Book, published by the Oak Ridge National Laboratory.

What’s the one thing that could make the US’ burgeoning love affair with CNG as a motor vehicle fuel, a seriously boneheaded move (see Stop the CNG insanity! for the details), even worse? How about well intentioned but dangerously myopic legislation? According to this item on Green Car Congress, we’ve reached that dubious milestone (emphasis added):

US Congressman Dan Boren (D-OK-02), Democratic Caucus Chairman John Larson (D-CT-01), Congressman John Sullivan (R-OK-01) have introduced a bill to expand the use of natural gas as an alternative to conventional transportation fuel.

Provisions of the New Alternative Transportation to Give Americans Solutions Act, or NAT GAS Act (H.R. 1835) include:

• An 18-year extension of three critical tax incentives that focus on natural gas as a transportation fuel, the purchase of natural gas-fueled vehicles (NGVs), and the installation of commercial and residential natural gas refueling pumps.
• Currently, the alternative fuel credit expires at the end of 2009, and the vehicle and refueling pump credits expire at the end of 2010. The legislation would also modify the current tax credits to provide even greater incentive for state and municipal fleet managers to buy natural gas vehicles and engines.
• A new tax credit for auto manufacturers that produce natural gas and bi-fuel vehicles.
• A requirement that by the end of 2014 at least 50% of the new vehicles purchased and placed into service by the federal government to be capable of operating on compressed or liquid natural gas.
• Grants for light and heavy-duty natural gas vehicle and engine development.

I’m not surprised by the two representatives from Oklahoma pushing this, as that state is a major natural gas producer. Why Larson from Connecticut is involved is a mystery.

I’m sure the reasoning behind this bill goes along the lines of:

• The US suddenly finds it has a lot of natural gas (thanks to the ramp up in recent years from non-conventional production).
• CNG is cheaper than gasoline and also less prone to price swings.
• CNG is “cleaner” than gasoline.
• CNG vehicles are existing, proven technology.
• Let’s use lots and lots of CNG to power motor vehicles!

As I explained in Stop the CNG insanity!, the problem is that while CNG is indeed “cleaner” than gasoline, it still results in a reduction of CO2 emissions that’s far short of what we need to contain climate chaos. And, unlike PHEVs and EVs, CNG vehicles won’t get any cleaner as we make the upgrades to our electricity generation and distribution infrastructure that are inevitable, regardless of how we fuel our vehicles.

The worst part of this legislation is the text I bolded above. Forcing the US federal fleet to be 50% CNG/LNG capable is a spectacularly bad idea. One could not imagine a clearer example of something I’ve said countless times on this site: Public policy should pick strategies, the market should pick tactics.[1] In other words, pass laws that say 50% of the US federal government’s vehicles have to average less than X grams of CO2 emissions per mile, and let the buyers and sellers figure out how to do that. Locking the government in 2014 into a non-trivial percentage of CNG vehicles, when we’re right on the cusp of a PHEV and EV revolution, is politics, in the worst sense of the word, run amok.

So, I say again: Stop the CNG insanity!!!

[1] Clearly there are times when technology-specific legislation makes sense, as in production tax credits for wind or solar, or R&D funding for battery development, although I’m sure others can and will quibble with “clearly” and “makes sense” in my assertion.

Ford is starting to separate itself from GM and Chrysler, and in more than the oft-mentioned “they’re the only US company not asking for a handout way”, as important as that is today in fact and in perception. Even better, they’re showing conspicuous signs of a deep understanding of the challenges facing their industry in the coming years, not just this year or this quarter.

The latest example is evident as Ford readies mix of all-electric and plug-in hybrids (emphasis added):

Amid questions over the viability of General Motors and Chrysler, Ford will detail its fuel-efficient car strategy and show off an all-electric Focus and hybrid Fusion sedan on Wednesday.

Company executives are scheduled to demonstrate the cars and update its “sustainable mobility technology” plans at the New York International Auto Show. The company says it is on track to bring both all-electric cars and plug-in hybrid vehicles using a new generation of lithium ion batteries to market starting next year.

The company already offers hybrid vehicles that use a combination of a gasoline engine and a battery, charged by regenerative braking. Next year, it will release an all-electric commercial Transit Connect van, which is expected to have a range of 100 miles and top speed of 70 miles per hour.

Ford is also working with auto supplier Magna International to release an all-electric compact sedan in 2011, which will get about 70 percent better mileage than non-hybrid models. This car will be a Focus-size vehicle that will go 100 miles on a charge, said Greg Frenette, the assistant chief engineer of battery electric-vehicle applications at Ford.

Then in 2012, Ford expects to release a plug-in version of one of its current hybrid vehicles. The anticipated mileage will be about 120 miles per gallon for the first 30 miles and then the vehicle will get the mileage of a traditional hybrid–in the 40 miles per gallon range, Frenette said.

…

The obvious advantage of a gas-electric combination is a longer range since a person taking a long drive can refuel at a gas station.

But a raft of companies, including Nissan, Mitsubishi, and start-ups Tesla Motors, Detroit Electric, and Miles Electric, are developing pure electric cars, betting that a car with a roughly 100-mile range will appeal to consumers.

In Ford’s case, it expects that its battery electric sedan will primarily fill the role of a household’s second car in North America. The battery, supplied by Johnson Controls Saft, will be able to store about 20 kilowatt-hours, said Frenette.

“People will find in a course of week that using a battery-electric vehicle not only saves costs on the fuel bill, but it also makes a positive statement about their concern about the environment, the global warming issue, national energy security and the convenience of not going to a gas station,” he said.

On a regular U.S. 110-volt outlet, a battery that size would require a 12-hour charge to replenish. Although it’s not necessary, people could install a 220-volt outlet at home to cut charge time in half or plug in at public places, like malls or offices, Frenette said. He said ultimately, two-hour charges are possible and safe.

Excuse me while I leap to my feet and yell, “BINGO!!!”[1]

Ford has posted details of their plan on their web site, and there’s plenty to like.

The key point is something you’ve all heard me talk about endlessly–the usefulness of a 100-mile range EV as a second car. Once customers get a little taste of owning one of these vehicles, and they see that (1) they save a lot in gasoline and maintenance expense, and (2) they almost never have to drive all the cars in their household over 100 miles on any given day, they will absolutely love these cars. I commented the other day that Nissan will find the proverbial knee in the curve with their EV offerings; it’s looking like Ford will be joining Nissan, Mitsubishi, and other companies in that club.

The 12-hour recharging time sounds bad, but that’s for a full recharge of an empty battery.[2] If you drive 33 miles on a given day, which is much closer to the norm, our recharge time is only 4 hours.

At this point, I have no idea how the GM and Chrysler train wrecks will sort out. But I do know that, as with almost any major disruption of an existing economic situation, there will be winners and losers and more than a few surprises as the problem and our responses to it unfold. Right now we’re seeing the worst of the downside, thanks to all the unemployment and uncertainty caused by the banking, housing, and car company messes. But eventually we’ll awake from this nightmare to find a landscape that’s very different in some ways, yet still very recognizable.

Let me anticipate and respond to some of the e-mail I expect to receive about this post:

“We need to kill off the car culture in the US! The problem is we travel too many miles!” No problem. Show me how to get from where we are, in terms of the physical layout of cities and suburbs (you know, those places outside of cities where so many homes and businesses and schools and religious institutions and medical facilities and government offices, etc. are), to a model where a big chunk of our current travel is no longer necessary, and in a time frame that reduces the oil and carbon intensity of the US economy quicker and cheaper than electrifying cars, and I’ll sign up for it in a heartbeat. Ditto for the “light rail is the answer” crowd; show me how it works within the real world constraints of geography, current development, and the economic pressures squeezing every level of government in the US, and I’ll be a tireless proponent.

“But we get half of our electricity from coal! And coal is evil! EVIL!!!” Yes, coal truly is evil. You’ll get no argument from me on that point. But the pressure of climate chaos ensure that we have to clean up our electricity generation (and update the grid) regardless of how we fuel our cars, so electrifying cars means that as we fix those other problems the installed base of PHEVs and EVs will only get cleaner. By comparison, relying on non-plug-in hybrids or CNG puts a relatively high floor under the CO2 emissions from personal motor vehicles. And we won’t be able to clean up our electricity generation as quickly as we’d like, so wasting triple the kWh/mile on hydrogen fuel cell vehicles (compared to an equivalent EV) will be an unaffordable luxury.

“You’re just a corporation-loving economist!!!” Oh, please. No one, and I mean no-bloody-one, has to remind me of the horrors that corporations (or governments or religious institutions or any other concentration of power) have visited on the innocent. So go ahead and rant all you want, but the bottom line is that we’ll need both government and business to work with individuals to help us all get through the current economic challenges and then deal with peak oil and climate chaos. As I said above: If you can make a case for a different and better way to achieve the same goals, I’m very eager to hear it.

[1] Actually, I yelled something I care not to repeat on a family-friendly web site. Use your imagination.

[2] 20kWh charging over 12 hours requires 1,666 watts, which at 110 volts is 15.14 amps, about the maximum current you could safely require.

The energy/water nexus continues to gain recognition, even if not as quickly as I’d prefer. The latest proof of this tardy trend is an article from the Wall Street Journal, Water Worries Shape Local Energy Decisions:

Last month, Tri-State Generation and Transmission Association, a utility that provides power to mostly rural areas, agreed to conduct a major study to see if it might meet growing energy needs through energy efficiency and not a big, new coal-fired power plant, as it had proposed for southeast Colorado.

One reason for the move was a challenge by Environment Colorado, an advocacy organization, about the amount of water a new plant would require.

Changes like these are happening with increasing frequency, particularly in the arid West, as mounting concerns about water begin to shape local energy decisions.

In some cases, power companies are pulling back from plans to build traditional power plants that require steady streams of water to operate. In others, renewable-energy projects such as wind farms or solar arrays are gaining momentum because their water needs are minimal.

…

The electric-power industry accounts for nearly half of all water withdrawals in the U.S., with agricultural irrigation coming in a distant second at about 35%. Even though most of the water used by the power sector eventually is returned to waterways or the ground, 2% to 3% is lost through evaporation, amounting to 1.6 trillion to 1.7 trillion gallons a year that might otherwise enhance fisheries or recharge aquifers, according to a Department of Energy study.

The study concluded that a megawatt hour of electricity produced by a wind turbine can save 200 to 600 gallons of water compared with the amount required by a modern gas-fired power plant to make that same amount.

…

Nuclear plants face particular scrutiny, since they require more water than any other form of steam generation. Virginia Power, a unit of Dominion Resources, is facing a legal challenge over its right to draw one million gallons of water a minute per reactor from a man-made lake it uses to cool its North Anna nuclear power plant and into which it discharges heated water. The utility built the lake in 1978 exclusively for the plant’s cooling purposes.

A group called the Blue Ridge Environmental Defense League Inc. argued that heat is a form of pollution and said the state water board shouldn’t have renewed the plant’s water permit. Last month, a state court upheld much of the environmental group’s case; the utility plans an appeal. Dominion says the man-made lake is a private body of water and therefore shouldn’t fall under the federal Clean Water Act.

Water is also emerging as an important point for analysts in the investment community. “We definitely have noticed more companies having water issues,” said Swaminathan Venkataraman, an analyst at Standard & Poor’s credit-rating agency. “If it continues, it will give renewables another important advantage.”

An excellent article. Go read it.

My guess is that this will continue to be a “low level” issue for some time in the US, at least until the first time we see a major portion of a region’s electricity generation taken offline by low water levels or water that’s too hot for cooling purposes. Then it will suddenly leap into the forefront of energy issues, and people will be proclaiming that it’s a “paradigm shift” of epic proportions.[1]

Let me stress this yet again, because I know that a lot of people still aren’t getting it at the DNA level: Account for all the costs of every form of energy we use, especially those costs that today aren’t directly attributed to that energy use. That means all greenhouse gas emissions, water draw and consumption, all the horrors of coal mining and fly ash management, nuclear waste management, mercury emissions — the whole smash. Even include the protests from the people who don’t like the aesthetics of wind turbines[2] and solar panels. And do it all in the context of our best, most up-to-date understanding of climate chaos and economics.[3] Then determine which energy sources we should be relying on; I’m guessing that the “renewable six” (wind, solar, wave, tidal, geothermal, and hydro) will look even better relative to other sources than they do now.

[1] And as many others have pointed out before me, when someone says something is a “paradigm shift” it almost always means that they weren’t paying attention for a long time as the trend developed.

[2] I’m still puzzled by the people who don’t like the appearance of wind turbines, and I suppose I’ll never understand it.

[3] And by “economics” I’m talking about not just the immediate monetary costs, but things like how public policy can be used to encourage far more conservation than we typically practice here in the US.