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Since the Kyoto ETS went into effect, traded emissions have risen

From 2005 through 2007, emissions from within facilities covered by the Kyoto Emissions Trading Scheme have risen by around 1.8 percent. (If we adjust for facilities entering and leaving the system, which I'm not sure we should, that total would be more like 1.6 percent.)

This rise in emissions happened in spite of the fact the E.U. emissions as whole have fallen. This is not a secret, exactly, but when people talk about instituting cap-and-trade in the U.S. it is worth remembering this is not a case of taking something that worked, just not as well as we like, and making it better. Phase I of European cap-and-trade was a failure.

Bike-sharing in Minneapolis, and other cycling news

Just because it’s winter doesn’t mean there’s no bike news out there. To wit! Minneapolis is working on a bike-share program called, appropriately enough, Nice Ride Minnesota. But its launch has been pushed back, reports the Minnesota Daily, due to “complications in securing the $1.75 million in federal funding necessary to implement the program.” Hm, […]

Is Gen. Jones trying to grab part of the energy and climate portfolio?

Yes -- and no (unless you worry about Iraq, Afghanistan, and Al Qaeda, in which case, yes, you should worry that Jones might be talking his eye off the proverbial bomb ball).

The WashPost reported Sunday:

President Obama plans to order a sweeping overhaul of the National Security Council [NSC], expanding its membership and increasing its authority to set strategy across a wide spectrum of international and domestic issues ...

New NSC directorates will deal with such department-spanning 21st-century issues as cybersecurity, energy, climate change, nation-building and infrastructure.

A highly placed source confirms for me that national security adviser and retired Marine Gen. James Jones wants to play in areas like the outercontinental shelf (i.e. offshoring drilling) and smart grid.

Is tidal energy a possibility in Puget Sound?

Seattle may not be solar-panel savvy or a wind-power winner, but could it be a viable source of tidal energy? That's what a number of scientists, governmental bodies, and public utilities folks are trying to figure out. And they shared their progress, and their plans for the future, with attendees at the Puget Sound Georgia Basin Ecosystem Conference in Seattle.

Generating tidal energy involves taking advantage of the rhythmic rise and fall of tidal currents by planting some sort of windmill-ish technology below the surface of the water, especially in areas where water flow is restricted into a narrow passageway, such as an inlet.

Like their land-based brethren, though, these underwater windmills could have environmental impacts that include affecting salmon and marine mammal migration, disturbing bottom fish habitat, and impacting fish harvests. But just how much of an impact would tidal power have on the Puget Sound -- and how would that balance with the benefits of renewable energy generation? Well, unfortunately, no one really knows. There are limited studies on actual impacts -- and limited on-site experimentation as well.

CNN, ABC, WashPost, and AP blow Australian wildfire, drought, heat-wave story

If the U.S. media refuse to make the connection between record breaking wildfire, drought, and heat waves and human-caused global warming, why would anyone be surprised if the U.S. public doesn't put it as a higher priority or make the connection itself (see here)?

Australia knows it's facing climate-driven impacts that threaten it with complete collapse (see here). AFP (French international media) get this: "Australian wildfire ferocity linked to climate change: experts." So does Reuter's climate change correspondent in Asia: "Australia fires a climate wake-up call: experts."

I saw the CNN and ABC stories, and you can read the AP's stories, which have been published in the Washington Post and NY Times (though the NYT redeemed itself, see below). The media love a good calamity of Biblical proportion:

Hopes for new U.N. climate meeting hinge on Obama’s attendance

On Monday Reuters broke the story that U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon is organizing a summit in New York next month, where he hopes to get heads of state from major greenhouse-gas emitters (the U.S., China, and India) to talk about climate action plans. (Grist reported on the first hints of such a conference a few […]

Syncrude faces fines for duck deaths

OTTAWA — Canadian environmental authorities on Monday charged Syncrude in the death of 500 migrating ducks that landed in its oil sands sewage ponds in western Canada. The waterfowl died after being coated in April 2008 with toxic oil residue from an Alberta mine left behind in the ponds by Syncrude Canada Limited, the world’s […]

Canada loves ducks, fines oil company

"We are protective of our environment, of ducks, of conservation in this country. We have laws. We expect them to be abided by and there will be consequences for people who don't live up to the full extent of the Canadian conservation environmental laws."

-- Canadian Environment Minister Jim Prentice on the effort to fine Syncrude for tar-sands duck deaths

Big is beautiful if it breaks our dead-dinosaur addiction

I've heard arguments lately for local photovoltaic solar power (PV) from rooftops, roadways, and parking lots as a primary source of electric energy, mostly accompanied by arguments against long distance high-voltage transmission lines (HVDC). I keep picturing a revised Treasure of the Sierra Madre with bandits telling Humphrey Bogart: "Transmission lines? We don't need no stinking transmission lines!"

I think the key to this argument is whether you are satisfied with slow incremental growth in renewable energy that gradually rises to providing 20 percent of electricity use, or if you want renewable electricity use to grow large enough to displace coal, natural gas for electricity, and even natural gas for heating and oil for transport (via ground source heat pumps and electrified transport).

Let's look at data from the Carnegie Mellon Electricity Industry Center for one [PDF] PV system for one day in Prescott Arizona.

click image to zoom

New site to teach students about green vehicle technology

When you’ve got a spare moment for some mechanical learning, or know a student who does, take a look at the nifty new FuelOurFutureNow.com. The interactive knowledge center is designed to help K-12 students learn about vehicle technology, energy efficiency, climate change, alternative fuels, and the science, technology, engineering, and math that underlie fuel-efficient vehicle […]