Climate Climate & Energy

‘Hansen has been wrong before’–Maybe, but not about the climate!

(Part of the How to Talk to a Global Warming Skeptic guide)

Objection: In 1988, Hansen predicted dire warming over the next decade -- and he was off by 300%. Why in the world should we listen to the same doom and gloom from him today?

Answer: While in some instances it is ignorant repetition of misinformation, at its source this story is a plain lie.

It’s time for a real ‘food vs. fuel’ debate

Can U.S. farmers keep filling the nation’s bellies as they scramble to fuel its cars? Given its evident gravity, the question has drawn remarkably little debate. Like it or not, though, more and more food is being devoted to fueling the nation’s 211-million-strong auto fleet. High gasoline prices, a dizzying variety of government supports, and […]

Check out the latest entries in the celeb-biofuels biz

You’ve heard of BioWillie, Willie Nelson’s foray into the world of celebrity-branded biodiesel. But did you know that several other celebs, not to be outdone, have plans to unveil their own biofuel lines? During our series, Grist has been doused with requests from PR professionals to promote their clients’ fuelish products. We’re only too happy […]

It’s all about electricity

When I talked with Terry Tamminen a while back (I'll publish it some day, I promise!), he said something that got me thinking. As Schwarzenegger's top enviro advisor, he's been on the inside, making policy and being lobbied from all sides. He's also been a part of several environmental NGOs, doing the lobbying. So he's seen policy contests from both sides.

I asked him why green groups haven't been more effective on climate and energy issues. He said it's simple: when the business lobby goes after an issue, it speaks with a single voice. The chamber of commerce, the think tanks, and all the constituent industry groups agree on what they want. Then they lay it out to lawmakers.

Green groups, on the other hand, come in willy nilly, with a dozen different proposals, all stressing different things, frequently criticizing each other. It's all about biofuels. No, it's all about hybrids. No, it's all about carbon taxes. Etc.

Politicians want to balance competing demands. They instinctively want to find the middle. But without a clear picture of what the environmental "side" is, they don't know where the middle is.

So how can green groups unify their message on climate/energy? What kind of agenda could they all get behind? How could they present a unified end-goal to policymakers?

That's a complicated question, of course. But I'd like to offer up at least one take on such an agenda, for your perusal and feedback. Here goes:

It’s not the key to making renewables work

In his post on the potential of our current grid to support electric cars, John McGrath mentioned V2G in passing.

Electric cars (either hybrids or full EVs) have the potential to be a real-life silver bullet. Anyone who advocates for increased use of renewables is inevitably confronted with the problem of intermittency. With wind, the rule of thumb is that if grid energy supplied by wind grows to more than 25-30%, utilities need to spend prohibitive amounts on "spinning reserve" to even out supply.

Well, a nation driving plug-in hybrids makes for a spinning reserve of amazing proportions according to one estimate (PDF), the U.S. fleet would power the U.S. electrical grid seven times over.

What these estimates neglect is the capital costs of the batteries themselves. The assumption seems to be that since car owners have the batteries anyway, the economics can be calculated based on operating costs -- electricity and inconvenience.

Terminal Killness

City officials’ reluctance may halt LNG terminal in Long Beach, Calif. The debate over a $700 million liquefied-natural-gas terminal in Long Beach, Calif., may be coming to an end. City officials have long been squeamish about the proposed facility due to its proximity to the urban center. “It’s a risk for accident and terrorist attack, […]

We’ll Be In the Fallout Shelter

Regional nuclear war could create catastrophic global cooling, say scientists Not fully convinced that a nuclear war would suck? Perhaps this will do the trick: Scientists are reviving the “nuclear winter” fears of the 1980s, portending that even a small, regional nuke kerfuffle could trigger a devastating global cooling. Advanced computer models show that thick […]

Biofuel pioneer Lee Lynd points the way toward a “carbohydrate economy”

Well before cellulosic ethanol became the hot new fuel, Lee Lynd was immersed in it. Since 1987, the engineering professor has been leading a major academic study group on cellulosic ethanol from his perch at Dartmouth. Before that, he even wrote his undergraduate honors thesis on it. Lee Lynd. Photo: Joseph Mehling/Dartmouth More recently, Lynd […]

Grains become fuel at the world’s first cellulosic ethanol demo plant

Our plant supplants your plant: a real-life cellulosic ethanol refinery. Photo: Iogen Sometimes it seems virtually anything can be made into fuel. As though, if we had the right technology, we could throw together old T-shirts, bumper stickers, and pine cones to make a magical elixir to run the millions of cars on North America’s […]

Read and be dazzled by the techno-futurism

David asked contributors for end-of-year lists. Since I normally focus on conservative assumptions, I thought I'd use it as an excuse to look at future breakthroughs and cost improvements.

I was going to weasel by calling these "possibilities," but instead I decided to use the time-tested technique of public psychics: I'll call them predictions, crow over any that come true, and pretend the rest never happened.

1. Power storage that will make electric cars cheaper than gasoline cars.

Ultracapacitors, various lithium systems, lead carbon foam (PDF), and aluminum are among the candidates. The first storage device with a price per kWh capacity of $200 or less, mass-to-power ratio as good or better than LiOn, and ability to retain 75% or more of capacity after 1,000 cycles in real world driving temperatures and conditions wins.