Get Energy Smart! NOW!

One of the exciting things nowadays is that there are so many exciting developments in the energy arena, many of them suggesting the promise of a breakthrough that could help change the world to something better. Sweden’s Global Sun Engineering is pursuing just such an opportunity. Their Matarenki Light is a tracking system, with mirrors concentrating the sun’s power on photovoltaiic cells. One of the challenges with CPV (concentrated photovoltaiics) is the heating of the cells. Problems can create opportunities. The cooling system is, in essence, a solar hot water system. Thus, the Matarenki Light will provide both electricity and hot water.

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Certain words and phrases seem to roll off the toungue. For some, when it comes to energy, “coal is indispensable” seems to be one of those terms. On 11 November, a Brookings Institution team released a “letter” to President-Elect Barack Obama and had a panel presentation in which these words just rolled from the keypad and rolled off the toungue. From the memo:

Coal is abundant, indispensable and—if carbon emissions continue unabated—devastating for the earth’s climate.

Simply put … huh?

We can, if we choose to, take a path to retire coal from our electrical grid. Truth be told, any reasonable cap and trade (or carbon tax) program will create the pressure to drive coal out of our system.
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There are many greenwashing efforts for gas guzzling McSUVs, seeking to put a green shine on polluting behemoths. Normally, these come from well-paid hacks and company publicity machines. Sometimes, however, you have to ask yourself, “What were they thinking?”

This is truly the case with the naming of the Chevy Tahoe Hybrid as the Green Car Journal’s Green Car of the Year. Amid the overall absurdity of naming a 20 mpg, 5500 pound, $50,000+ light-duty vehicle that will mainly end up in suburban drive-ways (typically with just one person in them when driven) somehow green, one has to wonder at the “names” associated with the award. These include Carl Pope, Sierra Club’s executive director; Christopher Flavin (Worldwatch Institute), Jonathan Lash (World Resources Institute), and Jean-Michel Cousteau (Ocean Futures Society).

Let’s be clear, the Tahoe Hybrid is less bad for the environment and less problemmatic for America’s oil addiction than the traditional Tahoe behemoth, but ‘less bad’ doesn’t mean “green”.

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Another guest post from Energize America board member DoLittle SooThere.

Nov. 4th was a great day for progressives as well as community-based energy solutions. Little-noticed ballot Issue 1A in Boulder County, CO, passed by nearly 2:1, marking an historic milestone in our country’s quest for energy independence/security. Ballot 1A approved $40M in local EE/RE bonds for local residents and businesses who wish to invest in energy efficiency or green energy generation, and is similar to Berkeley’s $80M solar roof bond program.  Bonds are paid back on property taxes-and the obligation stays with the home so repayment is assured even if the house is sold.

While we desperately need strategic federal energy policy leadership, the actual battle to Energize America will be fought in the trenches of local communities such as Boulder.  More after the jump.

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Politico published a science story by Erika Lovley so bad that, well, there is no legitimate reason to post directly to it directly as opposed to Joe Romm with New media same as the old media. Politico pimps global cooling for Hill deniers, David Roberts with Politico’s journalist malpractice, The Way Things Break with “Scientists” and the media (a far too mild title for the circumstances), Steve Benen on “The Gore Effect”, and Brad Johnson with Politico’s Erika Lovley Promotes Toxic Stupity About Global Warming. If you have the stomach for it, you can get to Lovley’s display of scientific ignorance through these posts. But, first, don’t those titles start to give you a taste for just how bad a job she did with this piece?

In short, Lovley lovingly lays a case for imaginery concerns about whether global warming is really something to be concerned about, that there is a

“growing accumulation of global cooling science and other findings that could signal that the science behind global warming may still be too shaky to warrant cap-and-trade legislation.”

Hmmm, might be worthy to actually cite in the discussion reputable climate scientists, no? However, that seemed beyond Erika’s rolodex with the dominant stream being global warming denier after denier. As Brad Johnson put it,

Lovley unquestioningly quotes extremist denier Joseph D’Aleo, Sen. Jim Inhofe’s (R-OK) aide Marc Morano, and Cato Institute fellow Patrick Michaels in a piece littered with bald assertions and slanders against the scientific community without any basis in reality.

Reality, it is hard to see the basis for this article. Perhaps we should simply count Erika’s works as not science writing, but science fiction. But, in that case it would be an insult to the vast mass of science fiction writers who have some association with reality and real facts somewhere in their work. This travesty of an excuse for journalism is truly difficult to explain. Payments from the right-wind sound machine or the fossil-fuel industry? A job application with Senator Inhofe (R-EXXON)? Perhaps a writing sample for The Onion?

Having a readout on miles per gallon gets most drivers to drive better, in ways that increase safety and reduce fuel usage. With minimal additional cost, these feedback systems can help to improve fleet fuel efficiency through fostering changed behavior by the users (the drivers). This is an impact that better car design, hybrid technologies, and similar fuel efficiency systems do not inherently have. Thus, this is an additive effect on top of any other efforts to improve that fuel efficiency.

Improved car (transportation) fuel efficiency is critical to Winning the Oil End Game but is only a portion of the challenge of reversing our greenhouse-gas emissions patterns and turning away from the most dire Catastrophic Climate Change implications.

Real-time feedback works in cars and is increasingly part of new car dashboards. Where else could we install real-time feedback systems into our daily lives to change energy usage patterns and reduce energy use? Real opportunities exist in the home …
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That might as well be the title of the Wall Street Journal article Surprise Drop in Power Use Delivers Jolt to Utilities.

An unexpected drop in U.S. electricity consumption has utility companies worried that the trend isn’t a byproduct of the economic downturn, and could reflect a permanent shift in consumption that will require sweeping change in their industry.

OH NO!!!! Americans using less electricity and this might be something permanent rather than simply a lousy economy.

Now, as for the ‘lousy economy’, as we have yet to hit bottom and have a long way to go, hard to assert (yet) that it is not economic distress that is driving reduced energy use. Perhaps people are ‘turning off lights’ to save pennies in the face of economic distress. And, patterns begun in economic turmoil could become life’s new patterns. Thus, unlike what the Wall Street Journal’s coverage might suggest, there is much to hope for as to a start in a shifting of American culture toward more energy efficient patterns.
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Larry Summers is now officially part of the senior Obama Administration team on economic issues. Let us be clear, energy and global warming are cross-cutting issues, so cross-cutting that stances on views on these issues should be examined against essentially all appointees. While Summers has the shadow of a controversial early 1990s World Bank memo about ‘exporting’ pollution to the developing world, he has written far more recently about these issues. In 2007, Summers published two pieces directly on the question of Global Warming as part of his ft.com ‘blogging’ gig.

• We need to bring climate idealism down to earth, 29 April 2007
• Practical steps to climate control, 29 May 2007

What do these pieces seem to tell us about Summers’? (1) That he believes the science and (2) he believes a properly incentivized free market structure is the right way to tackle the challenge.

And, more recent comments have reinforced those views, such as this published just this fall in Harvard magazine (pdf):

Right now, of course, the focus is on the spike in energy prices. But greenhouse-gas emissions are closely related. Each year, the science on global warming becomes more sobering. Each year, our ability to hit the Kyoto or other targets targets for controlling those emissions recedes. So that is a large part of any energy policy the next president has to pursue.

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For much of this year, the US Chamber of Commerce has been engaged in a public campaign related to energy issues.   Early in the year, the Chamber aligned themselves with the National Association of Manufacturing in battling against any meaningful action on global warming, including running ads against action strongly reminiscent of the infamous Harry and Louise anti-health care advertising.  In mid-2008, the Chamber’s Institute for 21st Century Energy, under the direction of General James Jones, USMC (retired) began to take a more prominent role in energy discussions. (Yes, by the way, the Jim Jones being rumored for a senior position in the Obama Administration (National Security Advisor?), an earlier rumored potential Obama Vice-Presidential selection, and a  McCain supporter/advisor.)

The Institute  has had a progression of documents, starting with a statement of principles, then Energy Security in the 21st Century; Facts, Choices, and Challenges (40 pages),  later the Blueprint for Securing America’s Energy Future (76 pages), and most recently A Transition Plan for Securing America’s Energy Future (27 pages).

This is the first (and purposefully) brief discussion of this effort. First off, let us be clear, there is interesting material within these documents and, well, even some elements to praise. Even so, writ large, these documents lay out a reckless vision for the future that represent an absolutely inadequate response to Global Warming.  As for that last, the documents significantly underplay the relationship between energy practices and global warming (oops, they use “climate change” exclusively) and the implications from catastrophic climate change. (See after the fold.)

There are foci and emphasized items which, well, would serve the nation, the globe, and the future if they were laughed off the table. And, throughout the documents there are both minor and major contradictions unresolved.

Even so … the nation’s future will not be strengthened without business engagement. Change is required from government, from individuals, and from all elements of the business community. That the Chamber of Commerce has chosen to engage with substance on energy issues and is mentioning (even if downplaying) climate change should be welcomed, even as their engagement merits serious examination and analysis … examination and analysis that will be forthcoming in these pages.

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A guest post from a fellow Energize America board member, DooLittle SoThere, who actually manages to do much, actually.

Welcome to my journey.  I am pursuing LEED PA certified to increase my sustainability knowledge base, to help guide my restoration of an historic opera house, and to improve my chances of landing a green collar job after 20 years in high tech – despite an economy on life support and a sea of job seekers.  Anyone interested in cleantech, efficiency, sustainability or the environment can benefit from formal LEED certification as it integrates these critical and frequently separate elements into a practical whole, and enables you to think more systematically about each as well.  A LEED AP is generally recognized as an expert in the field of sustainable design and can add significant value to a cleantech career.  And, who knows, LEED certification may help you get that coveted green collar job as together we Energize America. 
 
More on LEED and LEED PA after the jump.

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