Small, simple, shared

It has been over a year since we have started blogging on issues of energy and environment. We hope our endeavour to disseminate information and encourage discussion has been noticed. Well, hope is what is left in the end! Unless we hear from you, we can only assume that the blog is being read. It is our belief that any debate is meaningful only if touches a wide audience and provokes questions and suggestions. There is no single truth, whether one exists in the philosophical dimension or the physical one! Let us learn and widen our horizons by sharing our ideas and thoughts more openly.

Share. Yes, as advocated by an expert in social media and web technologies, Chris Brogan, when he provides the strategy for business planning for 2010 in three Ss: small, simple and shared.

Whether one believes in unlimited resources or limited growth, there is growing consensus that the way to go today is local, or small. Whether this means going for smaller homes or cars, it makes economic sense as also easy manageability.

As to simple, Chris talks of ‘Talk simple. Make deals simple. Do nothing complex, because so very little needs to be complex. Remove steps everywhere. Make everything brief and simple.’

Edit your rooms. Simplify your wardrobe. Control your buying. Move into a small home. Travel in a small car. Smaller incomes can well sustain small homes and simple lives. Learn to think ‘enough’! Zen habits as he calls it.

As to sharing, more people are rediscovering the benefits of joint living. What was once within the family is now extended to beyond. Many communities are realizing how it makes sense to commonly share goods that are rarely used.

Not only are we making our lives more relaxed and meaningful, but also helping to save scarce resources like energy, food and water for the coming generations.

Do you agree that this could be a good resolution for the New Year? Are you or anyone you know doing things on these lines? Write in to us. Share.

Brazil signs bill on emissions reduction

With the Copenhagen accord reduced to a pledge and nothing legally binding about it, any commitment comes as a heartening news. It was Brazil that signed a bill this week to reduce the nation’s greenhouse emissions by 39 percent by 2020. Three important provisions were vetoed tho in a show of national interests over planetary concerns.

The bill, which was passed by the Brazil's Senate on November 24, contained strict regulations on industries to ensure the emission reductions stayed on target--including a requirement that fossil fuels be gradually abandoned as an energy source. This aspect of phasing out fossil fuels was vetoed out as also a wider allocation of government funds to ensure reduction target. The priority for small hydel projects was also voted out.

Critics talk of the bill as yet another instance of mere talk and no compliance. But this bill could also be the encouraging sign for other nations to undertake similar targets before the next climate meet at Mexico next year.

Biofuels policy announced

The Indian national policy on bio-fuels and its implementation has been approved by the Union Cabinet. The Policy endeavors to facilitate and bring about optimal development and utilization of indigenous biomass feedstocks for production of bio-fuels, says an official press release. The Policy can be visited at the Ministry’s Website www.mnre.gov.in.

Some of the features of the National Policy on Bio-fuels are:-
· Bio-diesel production will be taken up from non-edible oil seeds in waste /degraded / marginal lands.
· An indicative target of 20% blending of bio-fuels, both for bio-diesel and bio-ethanol, by 2017 has been proposed.
· Minimum Support Price (MSP) for non-edible oil seeds would be announced with periodic revision to provide fair price to the growers.
· Minimum Purchase Price (MPP) for purchase of bio-ethanol and bio-diesel would be announced with periodic revision.
· Major thrust will be given to research, development and demonstration with focus on plantations, processing and production of bio-fuels, including Second Generation Bio-fuels.
· Financial incentives, including subsidies and grants, may be considered for second generation bio-fuels. If it becomes necessary, a National Bio-fuel Fund could be considered.

The Ministry of New & Renewable Energy has taken several initiatives on various aspects of biofuel development. An exercise has been initiated on collection, screening and identification of elite germplasms of jatropha and on processing and end use technologies. The scientific agencies and the private sector have identified 25 superior genotypes/accessions of jatropha for further multiplication for demonstration at various sites in potential States.

Another exercise has been taken up on realistic costing of biodiesel which will provide guidance on review and revision of the purchase price for biodiesel. A survey has been undertaken to assess the status of Jatropha plantations in nine States.

A welcome move to have a policy in place, but the question that begs an answer is why this fixation on jatropha when there are so many native species which are more hardy and yield more?

Are we ready to take on the challenge posed by biofuels knowing the dangers of commercialization? Also, the carbon emissions aspect is still unclear. Do they reduce carbon emissions when the whole lifecycle is taken into account? Do they negatively affect the habitat of many species? Are they more energy consuming than producing?

A report published by a group of environmental organisations including Transport & Environment, Oxfam International and Friends of the Earth Europe raises fresh doubts that biofuels could cause more environmental harm than good.

The central issue is that of the impact of indirect land use change (ILUC), where agricultural land is turned over to biofuel feedstock and land elsewhere is converted to agriculture, on the greenhouse gas emissions of biofuels.

According to the report, Biofuels: Handle with Care, many international policies and legislation do not take ILUC sufficiently into account, which could mean that biofuels are releasing more greenhouse gases into the atmosphere than thought.

Is it too soon to take the leap into large scale production?

They came, they haggled, they left

It has taken some time and some thinking to decide if Copenhagen was a failure or not. It was neither, perhaps. It was a damp squib where world politicians bartered and bargained for some more time to put off the burning issue.

No legally binding commitments from the developed world nor any from the new kids on the polluting block, no peaking period for any, the Accord twice mentions the objective of limiting warming to 2 degrees Celsius, yet has no firm targets for emissions or for greenhouse gas concentrations! Worse, a reference in the accord to completing a treaty by the end of 2010 was deleted.

One thing for sure, it was the beginning of what could be an end to the Kyoto Protocoal and what it stood for – among other things, differentiated responsibilities. The US chose to remove the distinction between developed and developing and replace it with polluters and non-polluters.

The Accord says there’s a “collective commitment” by developed countries to provide fast-start financing to developing countries “approaching” $30 billion. There’s also a “goal of mobilizing jointly $100 billion a year by 2020 to address the needs of developing countries.” With already outrage in the US over the $100 bilion, remains to be seen how much of it will ever be signed. After all this was no deal, just a pledge!

Obama played the firm and resolute American as he took over the reigns of discussions from a UN-style process involving the nations of the world to one that held closed-door meetings with the powers that mattered. American media reports have decried the billions offered but backed Obama for making the change. The UN process has failed to deliver and the new world order will see more of the big and powerful deciding what’s best for the rest!

The deal was brokered between China, South Africa, India, Brazil and the US, but it disappointed African and other vulnerable countries that had been holding out for deeper emission cuts to hold the global temperature rise to 1.5C this century.

A new scientific report, the Copenhagen Prognosis, outlines the terrible challenge the world faces from climate change—as well as several paths to safety. Top climate scientists have offered a stinging indictment of the political process, noting that the unofficial commitments made are “not consistent with the expressed political will to protect humanity:”

It is time to forget the political drama and get on with work. Let us look at what kind of energy management is happening at our workplaces. Write in to us with details.

By the way, the picture shows our planet's fragile atmosphere as taken from the international space station.

Perfect fuel elusive!

Researchers at Stanford University have found that using high blends of ethanol fuel in vehicles will likely increase health problems related to ozone as well as increase the amount of certain cancer-causing chemicals in the air we breathe when compared to the use of gasoline.

E85 (85% ethanol, 15% gasoline) produces higher amounts of a group of chemicals known as aldehydes than gasoline when burned. In addition to likely being carcinogens, aldehydes are also a precursor to the formation of ozone.
In any event, while the burning of gasoline also produces ozone, the researchers found that the burning of E85 in a combustion engine produces significantly more aldehydes and ozone.

There will be variations from city to city depending on a lot of other factors such as the amount of natural vegetation, traffic levels, and local weather patterns. In the overall, ethanol is still ahead of gasoline regarding other factors. But as the writer notes, burning inevitably spews chemicals we do not want.

Reason enough to encourage electric vehicles? Or is it a matter of deciding appropriate technologies for different uses?

PWC talks of carbon debt

PriceWaterhouseCoopers LLP (PWC), recently released a study suggesting that “we have been eating into the finite carbon emissions budget more quickly than we should, leaving us with a carbon debt.”

The study goes on to note that according to its calculations and modeling, the world has been reducing its “carbon intensity,” the carbon emitted per unit of GDP, at just 0.8 percent per year between 2000 and 2008.

The study suggests that we need to change course, sharply: to a 3.5 percent annualized reduction in carbon intensity between 2008 and 2020, merely to get back on a safe path, and so that we can stabilize global CO2 parts-per-million at around 450, which the study claims is the minimum needed in order to “stand a fair chance” of limiting average global changes in temperature to 2 degrees Celsius. If the world is not on course by 2020, there will be real problems. If stasis continues, it “could require rates of decarbonization over the longer term that are incompatible with growth, and put the 450 ppm goal out of reach.”

The world GDP was generally growing through those years, so that even though carbon emitted per unit of GDP went down slightly, total carbon emissions rose, year-on-year, on the whole. In order to reach the goals the PWC study stipulates, the world would have needed to “decarbonize” at the rate of two percent per annum throughout the 2000-2008 period. We’re already seriously off-target.

In order to move forward, the world must, first, budget carbon allocations. First, that involves a roof on total gigatons of CO2: 1,300. Next, distribute that CO2 budget among various countries or groups of countries. The study suggests that China should get to emit 28 percent of that CO2, the United States 16 percent, India 9 percent, the EU 10 percent, with the rest divided up among the rest of the countries of the world.

The PWC models are predicated on a 450 ppm standard when the IPCC has warned that 450 ppm isn’t enough and will bring disaster to places like Maldives and Bangladesh.
Also, the PWC study deals with carbon intensity rather than carbon output, trying to carve out a path in which GDP growth can continue, essentially unabated, so long as the amount of CO2 dumped into the atmosphere per unit of GDP goes down.

This would have been fine so long as growth yields if atmospheric CO2 concentrations are on an unacceptable trajectory, rather than the limits for CO2 emissions. But the study notes how the opposite is happening. And that the key nations aren’t meeting obligations!

Is carbon intensity yet another way of not accepting the reality of climate change and continuing with emissions? What do you say?

Does a carbon budget make sense?

A song of hope

When 450 ppm seems a tough job, raising the ante to 300 ppm and restricting temperature rise to 1 degree may seem ridiculous to many. To climate change hopefuls, it sent the signal of never say die when Bolivia made the same proposal at Cop-15.

The Indian Youth delegation decided to provide a rapid response action for this bold leadership in the highly depressing environment of the negotiations.
And came up with the following song -

Every day their stalling and
they’re saying the same old things again
hm-hm-hm
But one bright country stands apart,
they’re sayin’ things close to my heart.
They’ve got a plan with hope in hand,
They’re sayin’ c’mon let’s just start…
Bolivia, I wish I was Bolivian
Just one degree temperature rise,
300 ppm in the skies,
cent per-cent emissions down by two thousand forty
Does anyone know the price of waiting
fighting, hating, procrastinating,
hm-hm-hm
My future stands in front of me,
while people here make history,
I hope and pray that it will be,
what the world’s children wish to see…
Bolivia…
We’ve got to take the boldest steps
there’s work to do; clean up the mess.
hm-hm-hm
My future looks me in the eye,
says to me the time is nigh
It’s time to see the world agree,
time for responsibility!
Bolivia…

The Bolivian president Morales was so impressed that he has invited the Indian group to sing the song before his address!
May hope never die.

Curbing waste at Cop-15

There are arguments, accusations, trickery, what not being reported from Copenhagen. Hope is beating a fast retreat. The hosts are not being seen in a posiitve light, at least not by the developing world. But they have taken some effort to lead by example in some things. Like what Denmark has done to make the conference energy efficient and less carbon intensive.

The Bella Center where the meet is happening is a low-lying Legoland of structures dominated by a single towering windmill. After all, Denmark is an alternative energy leader, deriving 20 percent of its energy from windmills. All of the energy used at the conference derives from renewable sources of electricity. The Bella Center underwent an efficiency overhaul before the conference, reducing its energy consumption by 20 percent.

To ensure the conference would be carbon-neutral or better, the Danish government estimated the amount of carbon likely to be expended, including the emissions incurred by the travel of visiting delegates and members of the press: 40,548 tons of carbon dioxide equivalents.

It offset those emissions by spending 700,000 euros to replace coal-burning kilns used to manufacture bricks in Dhaka, Bangladesh. Twenty new Danish-funded kilns will operate with higher efficiency and lower emissions. They will use half as much coal to produce just as many bricks, reducing greenhouse gas emissions by 100,000 tons per year.

Regarding transport, besides 100 heads of state who are provided a sedan, a minivan, and a security detail, everybody else comes by bus, train, Metro, or bicycle. Private cars are not allowed near the center, including taxis.

Besides meat that has seen ravenous consumption at Cop-15, there is paper. Thousands of reams of paper have been consumed to produce and reproduce the documents of the conference. According to a report, delegates can rarely cross a hallway without being handed a brochure, a booklet, a packet, etc ‘expressing an outrage, a hope, or an agenda’.

Recycling is obligatory at Bella Centre. The Media Center is collecting reporters’ dead batteries. Because there are many recycling bins, few trash containers, compliance is high, though not all participants have been as careful as they could be about sorting.

Plenty scope to improvise and aim higher, but this is a beginning even if only symbolic.

Certainly would help if all conferences go the same way. Small steps that lead to giant strides if many join in?

Little help from little beings

Research is exploring how organisms could be used to generate energy without photosynthesis. Converting carbon dioxide into organic molecules, liquid fuels could be made more efficiently is the belief. Maybe even pair the organisms with solar cells! Some microorganisms can use electricity to form organic molecules, such as methane. Tweak them a bit more and you could get liquid fuels?

Another approach involves microorganisms such as extremophiles. These don't use light as an energy source, nor draw energy from organic molecules, such as sugars, because those aren't available to them. Instead they draw energy from other sources, such as metal sulfides. They use inorganic molecules, such as carbon dioxide.

In a coming together of energy research and genetics, the genome structures of these has allowed scientists to identify entire metabolic pathways for converting carbon dioxide into various organic molecules. A bit more modification and these organisms produce fuels?

Or simply solar energy and inorganic catalysts to make fuel from water and carbon dioxide? Yes, artificial photosynthesis. But what is the EROEI is the troubling question? Not very high as of now.

Desperate times, desperate measures? Looks like Nature is the best teacher.

Coal gassification goes deep

In Canada’s Alberta, a project is on to convert coal to gas at depths beyond 1000 metres – the deepest ever to generate power from coal--without digging it up.
Working at that depth could lessen the threat of groundwater contamination from the smoldering decomposing coal. If the technology can get at deeper layers of coal, it could allow access to more of the fossil fuel, whether that’s good or bad!

When the project starts up in 2015, Swan Hills hopes to generate 300 megawatts of power from its coal gas while selling over 1.3 million tons of carbon dioxide per year. The CO2 could be used by oil producers and ultimately stored in oil wells. This could result in the storage of 10 to 20 million tons of carbon dioxide per year by 2020.

The pilot produced excellent gas using a pair of adjacent wells spaced 50 to 60 meters apart, installed in the coal seam with the same directional-drilling techniques behind the accelerating production of natural gas from contentious shale deposits.

Oxygen is driven down the feed well and the coal seam is ignited, driving the temperature to 800 to 900 ºC and the pressure to almost 2,000 PSI. Under those pressures, the oxygen, coal, and saline water (present in the coal and also injected via the feed well) react to form a gas that is roughly one-third methane and two-thirds hydrogen, along with some carbon monoxide and carbon dioxide. The gas is drawn to the surface via the adjacent production well, where the carbon monoxide is converted to hydrogen and CO2, and all of the CO2 is removed.

How the company managed to achieve gas flow between its wells, given the low permeability of coal squashed under 1,400 meters of rock, is not known. The standard mechanical method by which shale gas production is stimulated is the fracture of rock with high-pressure water.

Does such deep drilling into the earth cause tremors or tectonic shifts?? Do we know enough? Recently Sweden has dropped one of its geothermal projects after deep drilling caused fractures in neighbouring structures.

Save energy, make money

Accepts historical role but not responsibility! That is what the US climate envoy Todd Stern has to say about the official US stand on emissions. Nothing to feel ‘guilty’ about, says Stern! What else can one accept from political negotiations on a non-political, real crisis. And so, if the US as the biggest polluter till recently, has no regrets, why should any of the aspiring economies have, to continue doing the same?

On yet another contentious issue – that of financing poor nations to make the change – the US is again reluctant to donate. It believes health issues back home demand more money!

Though the EU just announced it would pledge $3.6 billion a year until 2012 to a short-term fund for poor countries, a draft agreement sent around Friday to the 192-nation conference set no firm figures on financing or on cutting greenhouse gas emissions.

The provisional text calls for emissions reductions by a wide range -- 50 percent to 95 percent by 2050 -- and asks rich countries to cut emissions by 25 to 40 percent by 2020, both against 1990 levels.

Todd Stern called the text "constructive" but said the section on helping developing nations lower their growth of CO2 was "unbalanced."

How can the rest of the world bring one nation to heel? Is there no way they can unite and force the issue on the US? Sounds amazing.

Not to say that America and Americans are all bad guys. Outside the ‘official’ circle, states and organizations and individuals are doing lots on the clean energy front.

Like the Leader program from companies. This is voluntary, of course. But there are strong incentives to make it work. Businesses that sign on get free technical support from government energy efficiency experts, better odds of saving money, and long-range strategic advantage.

The LEADER program is a new component of the existing and successful Save Energy Now initiative through which companies partner with DOE to conduct energy audits and assessments designed to identify the opportunities for energy and cost savings in the companies' operations.

Over 2,000 plants received energy assessments through Save Energy Now from 2006 to 2009. To date, those assessments have identified opportunities for $1.3 billion in identified cost savings, 119 trillion Btu of natural gas savings, and 11.2 million metric tons of CO2 savings.

That is something businesses the world over can surely pick a leaf from, government stands notwithstanding. Together, we may still be able to save the 40 odd island nations like Tuvalu from going down under water. What say? Perhaps it is time we ignored our governments and official stands and did what we believe is the right thing?

A crisis in the offing

Crowds like this one around a well will be more common very soon!

In India, the groundwater table in some regions is dropping dramatically. A team of researchers from the Hydrological Sciences Branch of NASA recently measured just how severe the situation is for the states of Rajasthan, Punjab and Haryana (including Delhi). The results were published in August 2009, in the online edition of the science magazine Nature.

According to these results, the water table in these regions is dropping by 17.7 + 4.5 cubic kilometres annually. During the August 2002-October 2008 study period, the groundwater loss was 109 cubic kilometres.

This corresponds to twice the volume of India's largest surface water reservoir.

By the year 2020, says a recent World Bank report, most major Indian cities will run dry. A combination of climate change, over-exploitation of groundwater and mismanagement of water are some of the reasons. Pollution which renders a large portion non-potable is also a contributor.

Pricing as we have said is one way of making water more precious and discouraging waste. But given the many below poverty line, any pricing will have to be a differential kind. Economic water scarcity (limited access to fresh water because of lower affordability) is as serious a problem as physical water scarcity.

With over 60 per cent of water used for agriculture, it calls for intervention in this sector to avoid waste and optimize the resource.

How does one solve the issue of inequity? How can we get our governments to get serious and act on this very serious issue of depleting water? Think twice before you let the water in your taps run!

Energy or water?

Energy return of energy invested is a concept well known in the industry. An equally important concept is that of Energy return on water invested (EROWI).

Water is needed for irrigation of plants and in large power plants for cooling. Nuclear plants are especially vulnerable to water scarcity. Many drain water into rivers at higher temperatures than considered safe. But nuclear power plants built next to the ocean use salt water for cooling. The resulting steam is cooled down and turned into fresh water. But of course, energy is spent for that.

Thermal plants are no exception; coal plants for instance. A "closed loop" cooling system would save water but at the expense of energy. The U.S. for example generates about 13.1 MWh per person per year. The total water consumption/person/yr there is a colossal 121,000 gallons!

In the final analysis, what should we concentrate on – saving energy at expense of water, or save water at expense of energy? Which can we live without?!

Time for inspiring speeches

That picture is how much of carbon is emitted by a single American in a week!

Most websites on energy and environment these days have only one topic – Copenhagen. No wonder with thousands of journalists and bloggers having descended on the city! Protests, secret drafts, and speeches! Great inspiring speeches! The latest ‘brilliant speech’ comes from Nobelist Obama!

It is undoubtedly true that development rarely takes root without security; it is also true that security does not exist where human beings do not have access to enough food, or clean water, or the medicine they need to survive. It does not exist where children cannot aspire to a decent education or a job that supports a family. The absence of hope can rot a society from within.

And that is why helping farmers feed their own people — or nations educate their children and care for the sick — is not mere charity. It is also why the world must come together to confront climate change. There is little scientific dispute that if we do nothing, we will face more drought, famine and mass displacement that will fuel more conflict for decades… our common security hangs in the balance.

And yet all that US offers is a 17 percent cut of its 2005 emissions by 2020, which translates to a mere 3 percent cut of its 1990 levels (which is what Kyoto Protocol had sought). There is something doubly insensitive about a country that has been historically the biggest contributor to the present carbon pile up in the atmosphere, refusing to mend, and instead insisting that any action it takes will be only if some others do the same. Of course, China and India refusing to accept legally binding targets but insisting on domestic voluntary targets does hint of doubts in achieving the same! Why else should one be wary of scrutiny?

Meanwhile, there was some silver lining from UK. The European Union has proposed cutting its carbon emissions 30 percent below 1990 levels by 2020 if other developed countries reduce their carbon emissions 20 percent below 1990 levels by 2020. But Britain’s Prime Minister Gordon Brown has said that the European Union should proceed with its 30 percent reductions targets regardless of what other developed countries are prepared to do right now.

When Barack Obama visits Copenhagen this week for the United Nations Framework Convention, awaiting him is a ton of CO2!

The actual 27-foot cube of CO2, an installation by Alfio Bonanno and Christophe Cornubert, is representation of the amount of carbon dioxide emitted each month by the average person in an industrialized country, or in the case of the United States, every two weeks.

Supported by Millennium ART, the curator of UN conferences over the past several years, the project also has plans to install additional cubes in iconic locations all over the globe during the conference.

Wow! Awesome! But finally, that may be all that will come out of the talks. Inspiring speech, awesome artwork, shrill voices as nations wrangle for their piece of the atmosphere.

All that trash

Forget the 80 million barrels of oil the world consumes every day, what about all the waste we generate? Just lean back and think about all the trash in your city. How much lies in half-decomposed state in landfills? How much litters roadsides?

Want to see a miniature version of the world and its waste? See the picture above. This is a real place outside Cairo called Garbage city and populated by a community of workers called Zabbaleen, who personally collect, sort, reuse, resell or otherwise repurpose Cairo’s waste.

This ‘metropolis’ is actually a very efficient waste management system: food scraps are fed to livestock, what can be repaired is, and everything else is recycled, sold for scrap, or burned for fuel. The Zabbaleen live at poverty levels but live a long-held tradition of scavenging as skill.

As the site says, is this how the earth will look if a giant hand caught hold of it and gave it a good shake? Maybe we have more things on the planet than humans? Scary!

Tug of war

Can we only be followers? Never leaders? That is the kind of despair many Indians are sure to feel reading the newspapers. The latest being the government’s official stand on emissions presented before Parliament, coming after China’s announcement.
India will cut its carbon intensity (tons of CO2 per unit GDP) by 20-25 percent from the 2005 levels by 2020. China has offered 40-45 percent of 2005 levels by 2020.

Sounds bigger but again, experts calculate it comes to the same as in a business as usual scenario. If China can sustain a rate of decarbonization of 3.7% per year or more that would be a very impressive achievement. However, if China is going to continue to grow its economy at 9% per year, more needs to be done, analysts feel.

Coming to the nature of the two declarations, no legal binding, but a voluntary act that will not allow international scrutiny unless linked to foreign finds. Quoting Planning Commission documents the environment minister Jairam Ramesh talks of how India has cut its carbon intensity by 17.6 percent between 1990 and 2005. That will raise many eyebrows given that there were no energy auditors in the country then. How did the government arrive at this number?

That is another matter. But does its offer mean anything at the global level? Will fuel efficiency standards that stop at labeling of vehicles serve any purpose? Or the ‘modification’ of the EC Act to allow BEE to issue certificates help? How relevant are certificates in the Indian context? Are rewards the solution or will it take applying the stick too?

Leaders of Brazil, South Africa, India and China, a group collectively dubbed the "BASIC" countries along with Sudan as the head of the G77, a larger bloc of developing nations participating in the climate talks, agreed on a new draft negotiating position that argues that the Copenhagen framework should largely consist of an extension of the current Kyoto Protocol framework for a second commitment period running from 2012-2020.

Furthermore, the BASIC nations' "non-negotiable" planks include a pledge to stand opposed to any global deal in Copenhagen that does not explicitly reject the use of carbon border tariffs or other measures to restrict trade in the context. This is exactly what the US senators are favouring!

They are insisting that any international climate framework U.S. negotiators sign in Copenhagen must include comparable action from all major economies and allow tariffs to adjust prices on imports from any nation that does not agree to bindings agreements to reduce emissions "in specific trade- and energy-intensive economic sectors."

The U.S. should seek to negotiate a new international climate agreement under which, "All major economies should adopt ambitious, quantifiable, measurable, reportable and verifiable national actions" to reduce emissions of greenhouse gases.

New or old, a treaty for sure looks doomed.

Clean smoke

While on India, the government has revealed a program to provide efficient cooking stoves to rural areas in an effort to reduce air pollution. The Ministry of New and Renewable Energy announced the National Biomass Cook-stoves Initiative, a series of pilot projects that seeks to improve stove efficiency for individual households.
An estimated 826 million Indians depend on simple cook stoves that burn solid fuel, mainly fuel wood or coal. The toxic soot can increase the risks of developing pneumonia, cataracts, and tuberculosis.

A study on the benefits from greenhouse gas reductions in India, released last month in the British medical journal The Lancet, estimates that 15 million improved stoves distributed every year for the next decade would supply 87 percent of households across India. Such a program would avoid premature deaths from respiratory infections, heart disease, and bronchitis by more than 17 percent, affecting some 55.5 million people, the study had recommended.

More-efficient biomass stoves can reduce India's climate impact as well. When soot settles on light-colored snow or ice, less sunlight is reflected into space. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change said in its 2007 assessment that soot, also referred to as black carbon, is one of the most potent greenhouse pollutants. Eliminating black carbon could quickly limit global warming due to the short period of time the particles remain in the atmosphere.

An estimated 0.5-1 billion tons of carbon dioxide-equivalent gases, notably methane, black carbon, and carbon monoxide, would be avoided, according to the study, led by researchers from the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, the University of California at Berkeley, and University College London.

The India plan is good but needs to be seen what kind of target for the program is established. If this is simply a good looking plan to take to Copenhagen or will be implemented in earnest, time will tell. Till then, millions will be smoking polluted air and burning wood inefficiently.

Do you see the star?

The Bureau of Energy Efficiency in India has finally decided to make energy labelling for electrical appliances, starting January 2010. Initailly it will be only refrigerators, air conditioners, tubelights and transformers that will come under the purview of the rule. Pumps, televisions, fans, etc will come later.

Under the proposal, ratings will be given on the basis of total energy consumed by the item.

The question then is: how many consumers will bother? Will cost or efficiency rule? Any doubts?

True, the BEE has been advertising efficiency on the media and a survey by National Productivity Council says BEE helped save 1500 MW through its schemes/campaigns. But the average Indian still remains blissfully unaware of energy consumption and the need for conservation.

Is it enough to have such labelling or take a step more and do what California did in banning high energy guzzling television sets from 2012?

Wailing wind

According to a recent report published by Global Wind Energy Council and Indian Wind Turbine Manufacturers’ Association, India has immense potential for wind energy. Wind can cater to 24 percent of electricity demand by 2030 by when the installed capacity could reach 241.3 GW from the present 10.2 GW. This is the advanced scenario where policy measures and political will play a positive role.

The report blames a lack of coherent renewable energy policy for the country not realizing wind resource. It calls for a renewable portfolio standard linked to market-based schemes such as energy certificates, and for a national feed-in tariff to ensure uniform incentives. Acceleration of approval procedures for RE projects, updated wind resource map, etc are also recommended. Meanwhile the CERC has issued the final regulations for tariff determination for renewable sources.

In the UK, a strategic assessment study has pointed to how offshore wind can generate 25 GW in the UK. Following the report, the government has adopted a plan for capacity addition along the waters of England and Wales, leading to opening 11 more sites. Around 15 billion pounds is to be invested to connect offshore grid to the national grid.

Is the Indian government doing enough to spur investments in renewable energy? What do you think?

Fill it & forget it

Oil company HPCL has introduced nitrogen filling of tyres at its Millennium Outlet at Siripuram, Tamil Nadu. It guarantees tyre pressure retention for two months. According to a company spokesman, nitrogen filling results in less inflation pressure loss, cooler tyres, increases mileage and enhances tread life, reduces wheel corrosion and prevents uneven wear and no sudden loss of pressure when punctured.

Nitrogen also significantly slows down the chemical ageing process of the rubber components, says the company. Nitrogen disperses heat very quickly and thereby enhances fuel efficiency, the reason that aircraft use nitrogen in tyres.

While the oxygen in compressed air can permeate the tyre wall reducing tyre pressure, the diffusion is much slower with nitrogen. Thus nitrogen can maintain tyre pressure for a longer time and ensures safer motoring. Running with quicker heat dispersion helps in extending tread life and reduces tyre failure.

Great! A technical improvement, but do vehicles on Indian roads need this really? Or is it just another fad? Is it more suited for racing cars? Having created such a need, is this adding to the energy budget given the nitrogen production plants required?

How much does it help to decrease oxidative ageing of tyres? Aren’t tyres killed more by nails strewn on our roads than oxidation?

There are scientific reasons for using nitrogen, like avoiding corrosion due to oxygen and compressed water vapour, etc but are these reasons enough to propogate nitrogen filling in vehicle tyres? Let us know what you think.

Nuke issues

The Kaiga nuclear scare has once again put the nuclear issue on the front burner. Yes, it was not radiation leak but an equally relevant problem. Access to radiation material. Do we need nuclear in the energy mix? How well can we handle it, especially in a country notorious for fuel pilferage, corruption, and not to say the least, poverty which often drives the action?

As we had raised the question earlier, in a scenario of hundreds of reactors dotting the landscape, and given the fuel transport issue, are we competent this potent source?

Meanwhile, indigenous development of reactors that combine uranium and thorium proves India’s technological prowess. Bhabha Atomic research center in Mumbai, India offers a detailed description of the AHWR300-LEU reactor now under development.

This has significant implications for the less well developed nations of Asia, Africa and Latin America. The design of the AHWR300-LEU contains numerous cost saving features. And India hopes to deliver these reactors to less well developed countries at a cost that will be at an order of magnitude lower than that of renewables.

AHWR300-LEU possesses several features, which are likely to reduce its capital and operating costs alongwith an emphasis on simplicity, low cost, safety and longevity. The AHWR-300-LEU will also produce a modest amount of fresh water in the cooling process.

The AHWR-300-LEU is designed primarily for export. It is provided with a double containment. Safety aspects also are taken care of with passive safety systems, removal of heat from core by natural circulation, independent shutdown systems, etc

The design of the AHWR300-LEU fuel mix prevents nuclear proliferation from spent fuel, as also minimises problems related to the long term storage of spent fuel.

Can WE walk out?

Perhaps there has not been such global closed-door discussions on a subject governed by science, well at least since the Montreal Protocol! However, unlike then, there seems no consensus on the need to unite and check the damage already done. From what news reports tell us, most nations are plotting on how best to protect their national interests of growth. Don’t ask us if there will be any nation without a liveable planet! Our policy makers and leaders seem to be missing that point somehow.

Who is to blame? The rich nations that are responsible for where we are now? Or the ones scrambling to do the same? Or both?

Indian prime minister claims that if the emission limits are imposed on the developing countries, they might not be able to address the issue of poverty alleviation and meet the basic needs of a large number of people. But the Economic Survey, 2009 has categorically stated that every year the nation loses lose 2.6 per cent of GDP to address the problems related to climate change. By further accelerating the carbon economy, the sufferings of those who are directly affected by climate change are bound to worsen. Urgent actions to mitigate these effects are needed and mere tokenism will not be enough.

Is the government serious about its national climate change plan? Is it enough to announce eight grand missions on one hand, and on the other continue with business-as-usual attitude? How does one reconcile with the ultra mega thermal plants of 4000 MW, and the carbon they will spew? Why are new plants being promised instead of improving the poor efficiency of the existing ones (less than 30 percent)?

Why is public transport so neglected? Given the large population and its needs, buses should have been given priority but it is the private automobile sector that is favoured, according to a CSE study.

Can we keep harping on our low per capita emission of India (1.5 tonnes compared to world average of 4.5 tonnes) when about 150 million Indians are stepping the accelerator on the lane of carbon-high lifestyles?

Will India and China accept binding emission cuts? Or will they walk out of Copenhagen as a protest against such demands? More important, will all of us sit up and start doing something about the carbon pile-up in the atmosphere? Can we walk out of this problem?

Look, who's knocking

It is worser than we have been told. Twenty-six climatologists—including 14 IPCC members—have released a startling update to the panel’s work, reporting that sea levels could rise and methane-laden arctic permafrost could melt much sooner than the panel had anticipated.

The new diagnosis finds that arctic sea ice is melting 40 percent faster than the panel estimated just a few years ago. Satellites have found that the global average for rising sea levels was 3.4 millimeters per year from 1993-2008. The IPCC estimated it would be 1.9 mm for that period—short by 80 percent.

Iif global warming is to be limited to a maximum of 2°C above pre-industrial values, global emissions need to peak between 2015 and 2020 and then decline rapidly.
Worryingly, global carbon dioxide emissions from fossil fuels in 2008 were nearly 40% higher than those in 1990.

Even if global emission rates are stabilized at present-day levels, just 20 more years of emissions would give a 25% probability that warming exceeds 2°C, even with zero emissions after 2030.

Several vulnerable elements in the climate system could be pushed towards abrupt or irreversible change if warming continues in a business-as-usual way throughout this century.

Now what? Can we expect some agreement at Copenhagen? Or simply a few more ‘nice, politically worded intentions’?

Flicker of hope

Hope has been fading, despite many dubbing it as the Hopenhagen summit! Ever since the US indicated its unwillingness to get a domestic legislation on emissions through before the December meet. Ever since reports seemed to hint that Obama would not make it to Copenhagen.

Being the top polluter till recently, and still the top in per capita terms, the world naturally looks to the US to take a lead.

But now in what could be a (welcome) surprise, White House officials told the Politico that the US plans to propose a near-term emissions reduction target as part of a “meaningful submission” the country will present at the talks. Even a target could be set.

The target, according to BBC, is expected to be in line with figures contained in legislation before the Senate — a reduction of about 17-20% from 2005 levels by 2020. Nothing big but an encouraging sign, alongwith reports that Obama may still make it to the meet.

And just in case, you are seeking more conclusive evidence of global warming, researchers of the UK's National Oceanography Centre, Southampton say that the widespread loss of glacial ice in the Antarctic Peninsula is unprecedented in the past 14,000 years.

That conclusion is based on detailed analysis of the thickest Holocene sediment core yet drilled in the Antarctic Peninsula. Radiocarbon dating of which reveals the oldest sediments in the core being 14.1 to 14.8 thousand years old.

Use less, price more?

Global demand for water already exceeds supply—about 1.1 billion people don’t have access to clean water—and the so-called water gap is increasing at an accelerating rate. That’s what a McKinsey study, commissioned by such water-dependent companies as Coca-Cola, Nestle, SAB Miller and Syngenta, along with the World Bank/International Finance Corp, says.

Cost-effective, sustainable solutions are available to close the gap, particularly if governments and business focus on reducing demand rather than trying to generate additional supply. Just as in the case of energy. There just is no additional source of freshwater as the population increases.

The other controversial issue the report touches on is about water as a “human right”. A scarce resource, water, must be priced in a way to drive conservation.

The report focuses on four countries with big but differing water issues—China, India, South Africa and Brazil. Collectively, they will account for 40% of the world’s population, 30% of global GDP and 42% of projected water demand in 2030.

At a World Bank news conference to launch the report, executives from sponsoring companies discussed the price aspect, as also other issues like biotech crops. Water for basic needs should be subsidized or free, but beyond that it must be priced adequately as in South Africa. Water for washing car, filling swimming pool, watering golf course, etc cannot be a right?

But in rural India, can pricing be the solution? True, free or subsidized electricity here contributes to water shortages because farmers have no reason not to pump as much water as they can out of the ground.

But poor farmers do not have the capital to invest in a drip irrigation system, so charging them more for water will also not help. Innovative financing is the solution.

Biotech crops also were suggested as a way out of the water scarcity. Intended to grow more food per acre, and considering that agriculture accounts for about 70% of global water use, biotech crops could have a big impact on the water gap. But, can we ignore the safety aspects? Loss of biodiversity, herbicide resistance, etc. It could well be a case of jumping from the pan into the fire.

Should we price water more adequately? Or focus on demand side management?

Your vote please!

The November issue of Scientific American carries an article titled "A Path to Sustainable Energy by 2030" where the authors, scientists from Stanford and California university, detail a plan to shift the world completely from fossil fuels to renewable energy. The cost runs to $100 trillion and the time frame is 20 years.
Would such a move really be sustainable?

The article tells us that currently the world is consuming about 12.5 trillion watts of all forms of energy at peak consumption. In 20 years, the demand will be up 16.8 trillion watts given growth in population and living standards.

The replacement plan calls for 3.8 million 5-megawatt wind turbines, 490,000 tidal generators, 720,000 0.74 megawatt wave converters, 1.7 billion .003 megawatt rooftop photovoltaic systems, 5,300 geothermal plants, 900 1.3-megawatt hydroelectric plants, and to top it off 49,000 concentrated solar 300-megawatt power plants and 40,000 commercial photovoltaic power plants.

A totally new infrastructure has to be put in place for the manufacture of these equipment as well as for transferring energy from the place of generation to where required. Even if airplanes powered by fuel cells as also road transport become technically and commercially feasible, there will be need to build all these new vehicles.

Will there be enough of specialized materials - particularly exotic ones such as neodymium, tellurium, indium and lithium that would be necessary for the magnets of wind turbines, photovoltaic cells and high capacity vehicle batteries? What alternative ways are there to make the components? Won’t we need to wait for technology to progress? Is recycling enough to meet all the demand?

With hydro (including tides, waves, and flowing rivers) and geothermal providing a base, wind and solar would provide the bulk of the load. This calls for a specialized grid to move the power. Yes, the Obama administration is awarding $3.4 billion in grants to modernize the national electric grid. How many in the developing world can afford to?

A smart grid to transfer power over long distances will involve miles of lines. Take for instance, the world’s largest renewable energy project, Desertec. The project now has a core group of backers and a signed agreement between 12 companies wanting to move forward with the $555 billion renewable energy belt. The DESERTEC Foundation vision is to install 100 GW of solar power throughout Northern Africa, with the goal of supplying 15% of Europe’s energy demand with clean renewable power.

Is such a total transformation from fossils to renewables possible? In such a short time?

How will governments finance the change? Even to raise $2 trillion in the US would mean increasing tax to more than 50 percent of current numbers. What about the rest of the world?

Would it be better to go for smaller local projects with local materials? In the ‘long run’ (pun intended!) what is better? A massive global project, or small local units? A total transformation or a gradual change?

Join the discussion, let us make it lively!

The moral dilemma

Now it is the UN calling attention to the connection between population rise and climate change! “Slower population growth ... would help build social resilience to climate change’s impacts and would contribute to a reduction of greenhouse-gas emissions in the future,” the U.N. Population Fund (UNFPA) says.

Today, the world’s population stands at around 6.8 billion. By mid-century, it will range between 7.959 billion to 10.461 billion, with a mid-estimate of 9.15 billion, according to U.N. calculations.

And, the difference between 8 billion and 9 billion is between one and two billion tons of carbon per year, according to research cited in the report.

That would be comparable to savings in emissions by 2050 if all new buildings were constructed to the highest energy-efficiency standards and if two million one-gigawatt wind turbines were built to replace today’s coal-fired power plants.

The report, the 2009 State of World Population, is seen as a rare departure from the UN's stand so far regarding population.

This is a key debate point to emerge at Copenhagen. Negotiators, including the European Union, have tentatively suggested that the question be considered in talks.
This has been a bone of contention between two sides. Is it population or overconsumption that has caused the problem?

Overconsumption is by far the bigger culprit, with Americans way out in the lead. The Washington, D.C., area, according to an expert, produces 25% more CO2 than all of Sweden, which has nearly twice as many people!

Population growth did not cause the climate crisis but yes, it can aggravate it. How does one stabilize the population at 8 billion instead of 9 billion? Pay people for not having children? Impose carbon tax on number of kids?! Who decides for everyone?

You bet, this is one helluva moral issue that calls for political rightness. Any bright ideas?

Whirring away

Guess the new entrants in the biannual list of the world’s 500 fastest computers? Saudi Aramco! It had two new entries and both are Dell clusters, running Intel processors and are very fast.

The national oil company of Saudi Arabia pumps about 10 million barrels of oil a day, about four times as much as Exxon Mobil Corp.

The oil industry uses Concorde-jet speed computing to aid it understanding underground reservoirs and to look for new sources of oil and gas. Aramco used another computer cluster to build a “full field model” of the Safaniya oilfield in 2008.

Whay is Aramco taking a sophisticated approach to understanding its remaining oil resources? A sign of worry about the future?

The world’s fifth-fastest supercomputer – Tianhe-1 in Tianjin, China – will be used in part for “petroleum exploration.” Not only is the oil adding to the warming, but also the supercomputers.

Ironically, the computers used by people studying climate change are doing their bit to heat up the atmosphere! On the list, supercomputers No. 89 and No. 90 belong to the United Kingdom Meteorological Office. They use IBM-powered clusters to study and predict climate change patterns. The Met’s supercomputer generates about 12,000 tons of carbon dioxide a year, making it one of the worst greenhouse gas emitters in the nation.

A vicious circle where the very means of enquiry is adding to the problem! What do you say? Should we do away with such energy-guzzling computers, just like California has planned to do away with guzzler TVs?

Rising tigers

Asia is poised to dominate the fast-growing clean energy industry by outspending the United States by at least three-to-one on infrastructure and technology, according to a new report, Rising Tigers, Sleeping Giant, which was released by the Breakthrough Institute and Information Technology and Innovation Foundation.

"Rising Tigers, Sleeping Giant" is the first report to comprehensively benchmark clean energy competitiveness and government investments in clean tech by China, Japan, South Korea, and the United States. These Asian governments will invest $519 billion in clean technology between 2009 and 2013, compared to $172 billion by the U.S. government.

Investment bank giant Deutsche Bank recently concluded that "generous and well-targeted [clean energy] incentives" in China and Japan will create a low-risk environment for investors and stimulate high levels of private investment in clean energy because those nations rely on a "comprehensive and integrated government plan, supported by strong incentives."

Needed: new ways to farm

Coming after the International Energy Agency’s new World Energy Outlook published last week which expects the global demand for oil to rise from 85m barrels a day in 2008 to 105m in 2030, a paper published by the Uppsala University in Sweden in the journal Energy Policy, anticipates that maximum global production of all kinds of oil in 2030 will be 76m barrels per day.

As the UK Energy Research Centre noted, the date of peak oil will be determined not by the total size of the global resource but by the rate at which it can be exploited. New discoveries would have to be implausibly large to make a significant difference. A field the size of all the oil reserves ever struck in the USA can delay the date of peaking by only four years. Clearly, if we fail to replace oil before the supply peaks then crashes, the global economy is doomed.

A report commissioned by the US Department of Energy shows, an emergency programme to replace current energy supplies or equipment to anticipate peak oil would need about 20 years to take effect. Columnist George Monbiot is among those who sees no hope for world economy, “but at least we could save farming”.

According to farm scientists at Cornell University, cultivating one hectare of maize in the United States requires 40 litres of petrol and 75 litres of diesel. The amazing productivity of modern farm labour has been purchased at the cost of a dependency on oil, says Monbiot. “Unless farmers can change the way it’s grown, a permanent oil shock would price food out of the mouths of many of the world’s people.”

What are the solutions? He cites two possible options: either the mass replacement of farm machinery or the development of new farming systems, which don’t need much labour or energy.

Labour is of course not as much an issue as energy in the developing world.

How fast all this can be done depends on whether we and our policy makers believe the crash will happen, and soon.

Share your ideas on how to wean farming from energy and water.

Drying up

Indian NGO Navdanya has come up with a study showing the effects of global warming on the Himalayan region, some of which are already directly impacting the lives of people.

In the Uttarakhand region, the Navdanya research shows that in the past ten years 34% of some 809 perennial streams in the region have become seasonal or completely dried up. On average, water discharge has dropped 67%.

Combined with decreasing precipitation, drought caused 50-60% crop failure in the middle to lower mountain regions in 2007-2008; in 2009 that figure increased to 90% in rain-fed subtropical areas. In Ladakh, a high altitude desert, unprecedented rainfall has led to flash floods and washing away of villages (documented in the film “The Third Pole).

Contrast this with the Ministry of Environment report “Himalayan Glaciers: A State of the Art Review of Glacial Studies, Glacial Retreat and Climate Change” by geologist V.K. Raina. It calls the changes a natural increase of temperature and loss of ice.

Whether it be the Drung Drung glacier, or the Siachen glacier or Gangotri, the report calls the retreat as small and indicative of “poor response to global warming”.

It talks of the topographic theory that maintains that because the temperature decreases with the altitude, mountain uplift causes glaciations, Himalayas should always retain glaciers in one form or the other.

Navdanya wonders how then the snows of Mt. Kilimanjaro disappeared, and how there could have been snow in the Arctic!

Finally, it assures there is no need to worry as the monsoon accounts for most of the flow of the Ganges. Navdanya counters that the monsoons account for most the river flow in the monsoons, the glacial melt accounts for flow in the lean season when it is most needed. With reducing glacial melt, the Ganges will become a seasonal river, not the perennial river that it is.

What does one make of such controversial reports? Who validates them?

Looming crisis

The World Summit on Food Security convenes next week in Rome. What will it take to produce enough food to feed the world? More food? But with agriculture turning less and less profitable, given fluid conditions of soil and water, things are not exactly conducive for increasing production.

According to Reuters, a hotspot for food security in the 21st century is India. Here, agriculture's share of India's economy continues to shrink, down to 17.5 percent from almost 30 percent in the 1990s. With no changes in farming practices, things have been a status quo. The National Sample Survey Organization found that 40 percent of Indian farmers would quit farming, if they could.

Should a second Green Revolution be ringed in by biotechnology? Or will it require a change in cropping patterns and crops?

Environmental damage from pesticides and fertilizers, over exploitation of groundwater, have made the going tough. The lessons from the Green Revolution have most experts wary of jumping into GM crops. Loss of biodiversity apart, have we enough evidence of safety? Should groundwater be regulated?

Will urban farming become a reality? If we can grow potatoes and tomatoes and a few other vegetables in our backyard in big cans, can it not help? Pitch in with your ideas on how to produce more, at less cost to the environment.

Who has the battle plan?

A new study from the Institution of Mechanical Engineers (IMechE) says that achieving the UK’s target of an 80% reduction in emissions by 2050 is unlikely and other approaches will be needed to mitigate climate change.

Applauding the Government’s emission reduction targets, it says that to achieve them would require decarbonising at a rate never seen before. (And that is pretty much the story for any nation!)

Between 2001 and 2006, the UK reduced carbon output per unit of GDP by 1.3% annually. But the rate necessary to achieve the Government’s emission reduction targets would have to top 5% annually until 2050.

To get the UK on track, says the report, would require the construction and operation of around 30 new nuclear power stations in the next five years and the retiring of a similar amount of coal-fired power generation. The country would have to increase its number if wind turbines more than ten-fold from 2600 to 27,000 by 2030 and a further 13,000 by 2050.

The report calls on the Government to adopt a ‘battle plan’ that would also include geo-engineering projects. Schemes suggested in the report include building 100,000 artificial trees to absorb CO2.

Surprisingly, energy conservation does not seem to be on anyone’s list of recommendations!

Cloudy plans

The official launch of India’s solar mission has been delayed due to opposition from coal and power ministries to the financial scheme. Discussions are on to arrive at some agreement. Meanwhile, India has also put off until 2022, from the targeted 2020, its grand plan to produce 20,000 MW from solar power. This is presumably to bring it in line with the fiver year plan cycle!

The mission slated as an ambitious one given that present solar generation is around 200 MW has had its critics from the hurried announcement earlier this year. For one, it was far too unrealistic, they said. Plus, was it just another gimmick to show off at Copenhagen?

The ministries of coal and power opposed a proposal to levy a cess of four paise a tonne of coal mined for research and development on solar energy. The main bottleneck in spreading solar energy today is cost. While it costs Rs.3-4 to generate one unit of electricity from coal (without factoring in environmental costs), it costs Rs.14 to do so from solar photovoltaic cells. Even after removing subsidies and factoring in costs, coal power is still cheaper.

But the advantage is that solar technology has been improving rapidly unlike coal powered plants. From Rs.27 to produce one unit of electricity from solar photovoltaic cells to Rs 14 in a few years tells the story.

Again, as we have been saying, the grandiose mission will need more than equal partnership from private players. How can the government make it attractive to investors, that is the big question? Any answers?

Biding time

Asian Pacific countries gathering in Singapore are backing off their pledge to cut emissions by 50 percent by 2050. APEC includes the top two greenhouse gas emitters -- China and the United States.

With most global leaders acknowledging that hopes for a deal at Copenhagen are as good as gone, and that “the Copenhagen agreement should finally mandate continued legal negotiations and set a deadline for their conclusion", the saga continues.

After two decades of treaty negotiations and a pledge by negotiators at climate talks in Bali, Indonesia, in 2007 to seal a deal in Denmark this December, nothing will happen? Will legal negotiations be anything better? As international politics plays its cards, how much long does the earth have before irreversible change? Very, very less, as science says. Not many leaders are willing to act by that.

The issues have ranged from resolving how much the rich North should pay the poor South to boost its resilience to climate hazards, to figuring out an acceptable process for all countries to measure and get credit for domestic actions that trim emissions.

Meanwhile, Forbes.com has come out with a compilation of polluting power plants. Sixty percent of the world’s electricity comes from plants burning fossil fuels and releasing carbon. Many of the highest-emission plants are concentrated in the United States and East Asia. Taiwan’s plant emits 40 million tons of carbon dioxide every year and is the dirtiest!

Going by per capita numbers Australia at 20.58 tons is leading the pack, and the US at 19.78 comes second. Taiwan emitted just 13.19 tons.

It is business as usual everywhere.

Trade your solar credits

It is common knowledge about how Germany’s feed-in-tariff has helped spur solar power in a big way. With about one-fourth the United States’ population, it has six times more solar installed, including more than 300,000 residential rooftop systems, along with multi-megawatt commercial systems. That amounts to half the world’s total solar capacity.

New Jersey is emerging a close second. Solar panels are not only appearing on residential rooftops, but on schools, churches, convention centers, and gyms, and as electricity-generating roofs over stretches of paved parking lots.

In both New Jersey and Germany, it was incentives that did the trick. Early adopters were provided with solid guarantees of economic returns on their investments. Taxes were not raised to accomplish this. Instead, utilities were allowed to raise rates minimally on all rate payers in order to subsidize those who were ready to move on installing solar systems.

New Jersey has turned to a different approach, issuing credits that can be traded like stocks or bonds on a free-floating market. Direct subsidy on every kilowatt hour of power fed into the grid or feed in tariff was what first made a dent. Since then various cities have adopted different approaches.

When the state kicked off its solar program in 2002, it relied on a small “societal benefits” charge on all ratepayers’ bills to provide a simple, straightforward rebate that amounted to about 60 percent on solar installations, combined with a full retail net metering (backwards-meter) mandate. But by 2007, the program had become so popular that it was overwhelming available funds. The state has turned not to a tariff-style guarantee, but to a complex approach that relies on a floating, market for tradable solar renewable energy credits (SRECs).

The credits are actually sold by brokers on an electronic market, like stocks or bonds, at whatever price the market will bear. At the moment, the market is bearing a fabulous price. SRECs are expected to decline in value over time, but could still be worth multiple thousands of dollars annually to the owner of a residential solar system.

That looks like a win-win situation for all. Write in to us on what you think.

Big savings from efficiency

The US division of National Grid is planning a three-fold expansion of its energy efficiency programmes over the next two years. This include a new combined heat and power (CHP) programme, incentives for customers implementing energy efficiency measures, community schemes and the use of new smart metering technologies.

The savings in electricity would add up to 1.2 million MWh – enough to power 150,000 homes for a year – and 33 million therms of gas – sufficient to heat 33,000 homes for a year.

The company, which serves over 3 million customers in Massachusetts, New Hampshire, New York and Rhode Island, has submitted the plans as part of a statewide effort on energy efficiency.

The funding is to come from an increase in customers’ bills, although ultimately the company says that the plans would help save around 2% in gas and electricity over the next two years, amounting to around $2 billion on energy costs over the lifetime of the implemented measures. Quite something?

Do we need nuclear?

UK Energy and Climate Secretary Ed Miliband recently unveiled the Government’s long-awaited National Policy Statements (NPSs), which promise an expansion of renewables, nuclear power and clean coal technology. Quoting the threat of climate change, he called for a transition from a system that relies heavily on high carbon fossil fuels, to a radically different system that includes nuclear, renewable and clean coal power.

One of the statements deals with clean coal as per which any new coal power station over 300 MW will have to demonstrate full carbon capture and storage (CCS) to be allowed.

However, environmental groups are unhappy about the ambitions to expand nuclear generation capacity. How does one justify building more nuclear power stations when there is no solution to radioactive waste and when international regulators are saying there are huge uncertainties surrounding the basic safety of new reactor designs, they ask.

Of late there has also been a global call for nuclear supplying ‘clean’ base load power. How necessary is this baseload?

Any modern electricity system doesn’t rely on any plant’s ability to run continuously; rather, all plants together supply the grid, and the grid serves all loads. All power plants fail, varying only in their failures’ size, duration, frequency, predictability, and cause. Not just renewables.

Intermittence of coal and nuclear plants also occur, except that it affects less capacity at once, more briefly, far more predictably, and is easier and cheaper to manage, point experts.

Instead of building a surplus which is left idle often, a better idea may be to go for diverse sources spread over large geographical areas but managed by a reliable, intelligent power grid.

Do we need to go for massive expansion of nuclear plants? Has anyone thought about the security implications, say during the transport of fuel? Especially in a country like India where waylaying and siphoning fuel from tankers is a well-known occurrence?

Sky the limit

There have been some vague ideas floating around, about solar space stations in space. The Japanese space agency has gone a step ahead and placed it on their mission statement for 2030!

Under the plan, known as the Space Solar Power System (SSPS), floating photovoltaic dishes several square miles across would hover in geostationary orbit outside the Earth’s atmosphere to collect solar energy and beam it down using lasers and microwave.

To prove seriousness of intent, the Japanese government has also chosen a consortium of companies and scientists charged with making the multi-billion-dollar dream of unlimited clean energy a reality in as little as 20 years. The team, called the Institute for Unmanned Space Experiment Free Flyer (USEF), also includes Mitsubishi Electric, NEC, Fujitsu and Sharp.

Giant solar cells would harvest solar energy, which is at least five times stronger in space than on Earth, and beam it down to terra firma through clusters of lasers or microwaves.

The consortium are hoping to create a one gigawatt system, equivalent to a medium-sized nuclear power plant, that would produce electricity at eight yen (nine cents) per kilowatt-hour, six times cheaper than the current cost in the country.

Will the lasers or microwaves roast birds and insects or even aircraft? JAXA maintains that the transmission technology would be safe. Time will tell.

Meanwhile who will apportion the atmosphere space between nations which will all want chunks of the abundant energy? Is it ‘asking for the sky’ when seeking an international pact on the usage of space? Especially when a pact on ground is fast disintegrating?

Slippery grounds

If one is to believe a whistleblower at the IEA, the world is much closer to running out of oil than official estimates admit. The International Energy Agency has been deliberately underplaying a looming shortage for fear of triggering panic buying as also displeasing the US, he said.

The senior official claims the US has played an influential role in encouraging the watchdog to underplay the rate of decline from existing oil fields while overplaying the chances of finding new reserves.

The organisation’s World Energy Outlook on oil demand and supply is soon to be published and forms the basis for many governments’ actions and policies. The prediction in the last World Economic Outlook, believed to be repeated again this year, that oil production can be raised from its current level of 83m barrels a day to 105m barrels, is being questioned by many. There is no firm evidence to prove this and the world has already passed its peak in oil production, they claim.

The Americans fear the end of oil supremacy because it would threaten their power over access to oil resources, was what the source said.

The growing consensus that we are close to the peak or even crossed over makes it even more important that nations make some deal at Copenhagen. A shift in economy which is not so carbon dependent is imperative to avoid severe economic dislocation, it would seem.

Just juxtapose that with the ADB report on energy demand in the Asia-pacific. Energy demand across the region is growing at an annual rate of 2.4%, compared with the world average of 1.5%. And nearly 80% of this energy need will have to be met by fossil fuels. The region currently consumes about a third of the world’s total energy supply, says the report.

The region will have to invest from $7 trillion to $9.7 trillion between 2005 and 2030 to meet the growing energy demand. Oil makes up more than 35 percent of the global energy pie.

Lying on the ground

Coming back to energy efficiency, why despite so many studies that talk of existing technology, has efficiency remained on the back bench? What prevents these technologies from being used?

Why are energy-efficiency programs around the world languishing?. Despite financial incentives for adopting energy-saving, cost-effective technology, and trust that consumers will follow their self-interest, consumers don’t seem to act like fully informed, rational decision-makers when they make energy choices.

Is this because change in behaviour and decision making have not accompanied the programs? Can we blame it on market failures?

Market barriers like the fact that the purchaser of the energy using technology is not the same as the purchaser of the energy itself could be to blame. Like hotel guests who don’t have to pay for their energy consumption, or landlords who buy cheap, inefficient technology because the tenants pay the utility bills.

Or is the answer more simple: that energy is too cheap. There is no incentive to change as status quo is comfortable.

Opinion is divided. What is your take? What can be done to pick the low hanging fruit which has since long fallen to the ground?

Car-free towns

Vauban in Germany is one of the largest car-free neighbourhoods in Europe, home to more than 5,000 people. If you own a car here, you must buy a space in a multi-storey car park on the edge of the district. Vehicles are allowed down the residential streets at walking pace to pick up and deliver, but not to park. Streets have been taken over by kids as young as four or five, playing, skating and unicycling without direct supervision.

Most of the European car-free areas prevent vehicles from entering the streets where people live. Exceptions are made for emergency vehicles and removals vans but not for normal deliveries, which are made on foot, trolley or cycle trailer. Cycling is a vital means of transport.

That seems a contrast from cities in developing nations where everybody is on a car-buying spree. More cars on the road, and most single occupants, mean roads to be widened and that means trees face the axe! Cities are beginning to look like desert landscapes. Goes without saying car-free cities/towns will need certain infrastructure in place.

More of the metal story follows. India is drowning under 4,20,000 tons of e-waste a year which is growing at 10-15 percent a year. Pollution control officials says there are only six regular recycling units in India, with an annual capacity of 27,000 tonnes.

Without recycling facilities that can handle the loads of e-waste that need to be process,97% of the waste gets recycled in hazardous conditions, where workers are exposed to toxins like barium, cadmium, copper and lead.

Health conditions apart, the problem points to a scenario where too many new and unnecessary gadgets keep pouring into the market place, displacing old but perfectly usable gadgets pouring into dumps and recycling facilities!

The fancy with gadgets is all too visible with the middle class joining the upper classes. Lessons in recycling and reducing waste are yet to pick up in the collective consciousness. Perhaps nothing short of a movement can address the problem.

Are you doing something in your community?

Technology is king

Hope never dies. New modelling shows that a better than even chance of avoiding 2 degree warming is still possible BUT only if agreement is reached and implemented within the next twelve months. Researchers from Victoria University have warned that if the world acts now, it may be possible to have global emissions peaking at about 2060 and temperatures beginning to decline by century’s end.

This can be achieved by advanced economies reducing their emissions by 80 per cent between now and 2050, with the developing countries coming on board between 2015 and 2030. Achieving this result will mean the elimination of all greenhouse gas emissions from developed countries within 50 years and from developing countries in a slightly longer timeframe.

What this will do is generate a new industrial revolution with huge investment in new technologies, industries and communities.

In a related event, India hosted a high-level technology summit in Delhi, supporting progress toward a global agreement on "climate-friendly" technologies. Technology innovation centers across the globe that allow globally available technologies to be adapted to local conditions and situations were mooted. Also proposed was the creation of a "hub and core" of expertise and best practice that could become a global resource for policymakers and implementers to exchange information and experience.

Cooperative clean energy relationships saw a start at the meeting. These included a technology cooperation agreement between India and Norway, a memorandum of understanding on smart-grid collaboration between British and Indian industry, and an announcement by Philip Hunt, Minister of State for the U.K. Department of Energy and Climate Change, that his country intends to establish three centers of innovation worldwide, including one in India.

On the question of new technology and IPR, India feels that climate-friendly and environmentally sound technologies should be viewed as global public goods, and hence IPR should balance rewards for innovators with the need for the common good of mankind. To this end, India restated its proposal for the establishment of a global fund to purchase such IPRs and distribute them as global goods where they are needed.

And if glaciers and hurricanes seem a distant threat, and if you want to know how climate change will affect your part of the world simply click on a link and see. The UK government has set up a climate change impact map.

Finally it is all about being aware of the problem and doing something about it instead of waiting for apocalypse to happen! If US consumers used existing technology to its fullest, a whole France-worth of carbon emissions can be saved, according to a study in the Proceedings of the National Academies of Science. To change behaviour, incentives and rebates could be used but unless these are substantial, change will take a long time.

And while on climate change, a word on the ethics. Amartya Sen has a moot point to make when he warns the fast developing nations against the same mistakes the west made. India and China should now make sure that non-polluting countries in Africa are dealt with the same standards of fairness and justice that they seek from the western world in any environment related settlement, he told a conference on "Trade, Urbanization and the Environment" organized by the Peking University and the Veolia Environment Institute. It would be a mistake to divide the world into old polluters and new polluters. If that was so, non-polluting in Africa will blame India and China one day for not doing enough to protect the environment when they could do so.

Clearly, some believe in technology and others in behavioural changes. What is your take?

Power down the pipe

Water distribution is the most energy-intensive activity in high and dry places. An estimated one quarter (25%) of America's electricity consumption is associated with moving and treating water. Is it any different in your city? Let us know.

Southern Nevada used about 853.8 million kilowatt-hours of electricity in 2008 to move 439,187 acre-feet of water into valley homes and businesses, according the Southern Nevada Water Authority. Another 119.2 million kilowatt-hours of electricity was used that year to treat 22,501 acre-feet of water and send it back to the lake.

When the power is mostly from coal, that means something! Utah is 93% coal dependent and has the largest average household size (3.01) - meaning water consuming appliances will be used intensively in the average home. The per-capita water consumption average in Utah is 250 gallons, way over the 75 gallon national average, with 60% of all water consumed going for yard irrigation.

The national standard in India is around 200 litres per capita per day and even in its silicon valley, Bangalore, the availability is much lesser. Equity issues aside, to pump around 900 mld of water from 300-600 depth, the BWSSB spends about 65 percent of its income (Rs 140 crores) on power!

What can you as a citizen do? For one, harvest rainwater and use recycled water for cleaning cars! Not water pumped from such distances at such costs, such power! Reduce your water print. And share your ideas.

Wasting all that energy

The developing world, where 44 percent of people lack access to electricity, could soon be one of the biggest markets for solar power, according to participants at the Solar Power International conference in California. To date, just 1 percent of solar panel production has been installed in poor nations in Africa, Asia, and Latin America. In addition to finding financing to help low-income residents install solar panels, a major challenge will be to purchase and replace the batteries to store electricity at night and on cloudy days, said the experts.

Meanwhile, US firm SunPower Corp. announced that it has produced another record-breaking solar panel with a 20.4 percent total area efficiency. The new 96-cell, 333-watt solar panel is comprised of SunPower's third generation solar cell technology that offers a minimum cell efficiency of 23 percent. In addition, the larger area cells are cut from a 165 mm diameter ingot and include an anti-reflective coating for maximum power generation. With a total panel area of 1.6 square meters, including the frame, SunPower's 20.4 percent panel achieved the highest efficiency rating of a full sized solar panel.

What do you think prevents solar from taking off in India? Why, despite so many studies and reports, are investors hesitant? What innovative financing will do the job?

Foul blows the wind?

The Normandy coast of France, once the scene of the combined onslaught against Hitler’s forces, and now a tourist attraction, is also in the center of another conflict. One that pits ecologists against renewable energy proponents. Windmills churning above the tidal flats of Mont-Saint-Michel will distract from the natural beauty of the medieval monument and potentially destroy the landscape in the future, say the former.

France has 2500 windmills producing 4500 megawatts per year; the goal is to have 8500 windmills producing 25000 megawatts by 2020. Recently, the EU recommended that it invest $ 70 million in clean energy over the coming decade, tripling windmill construction to produce 20 % of Europe’s electricity.

Interestingly, French law bans windmills closer than 1500 feet from historical monuments. The current court case concerns plans to build 300 foot high windmills on farmland in Argouges, on a plateau a bit more than 10 miles southeast of Mont-Saint-Michel. The monument attracts about 3 million visitors each year to admire the rock-top monastery.

If permitted, there are more plans for an additional 80 towers in farming communities across the entire ridgeline above Mont-Saint-Michel. Farmers embrace proposals to install windmills in their fields because of the payments they receive. They get stipends for use of the land and villages are provided tax revenue on income from electricity, which is sold to the national grid.

You can never win it all, as they say. Clean energy will require large expanses of land, whether for wind or solar energy. In India, there are accusations of fertile land being claimed as degraded land for such projects. Many question the labeling of 70 million hectares as ‘degraded land’.

But that is the price one must pay for clean energy. What do you think? Should windmills be set up regardless of any other criteria other than wind quality? Do you believe turbines affect bird life? Check out this site for a comparison on the loss of biodiversity due to climate change and windmills.

The power of the sun

Peak oil once again reared its head, this time at a lecture given by Nobel Laureate Walter Kohn in Bangalore’s Indian Institute of Science.

Oil, which makes up around 35 percent of global energy use, and the other fossil fuels will soon be exhausted, as we ‘devour the laborious work of millions of bacteria over millions of years’. As world population will have increased by an estimated 30 to 40 per cent by mid-century, energy consumption will rise. What then? Energy prices will in two decades see a steep hike and unless something is done, life will get difficult, warned the professor.

So, as the vultures in Jungle Book asked, ‘what are we gonna do?’

Well, the professor believes solar and wind power are the most promising candidates. Although, at the present time they constitute only ~ 2 per cent of the global energy consumption, “their production has recently been rising by a spectacular 30 to 40% per year, or a factor 15 per decade and 225 in 20 years. This arithmetic suggests that the entire deficit stemming from the impending exhaustion of oil and gas might be compensated in about 10 to 20 years by continuing aggressive commitment to solar and wind energy.”

By 2021, he sees a world largely dominated by solar and wind energy. The trend aside, he believes the technology leaps will bring it all closer.

Solar power has been getting cheaper for years. Panel prices declined 31 percent from 1998 to 2008 because of lower manufacturing and installation costs and state and local subsidies, according to a study released Wednesday by Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory.

But it did take a ramp up in US federal incentives to bring the cost within many people’s reach. Thousands of homeowners are finding they can pay off a rooftop solar system in just a few years and then start pocketing the energy savings. More than half the states in the U.S. and Washington D.C. offer enough incentives to cut the costs by 40 percent or more.

How many nations are willing to do that? And can afford to?

Meanwhile solar powered mobile phones are catching like fire in Africa and helping people unconnected to the grid make informed decisions.

And if land requirement was a big factor against big solar, things are changing now. The 4,500 acre solar thermal installation in California is being planned to enhance farming! From protecting tomatoes from rain (tomatoes do better if only their roots are fed), through shading cooler weather crops like salad and arugula as the climate heats up, to providing support for trellises and other crop infrastructure, symbiotic ways of harnessing food and energy are coming true.

So, do you think Prof Kohn is right?