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?