February 19th, 2013 · Comments Off on Elementary arithmetic beyond Joe Nocera’s grasp?
New York Times columnist Joe Nocera has put up How Not to Fix Climate Change. In private correspondence, in bringing this to my attention, one person commented that reading this “lowered my IQ by 20 points,” another “elementary arithmetic seems beyond his grasp”, and third that the title should have been “demonstrating multiple levels of ignorance in a highly public way”. Nocera, in short, is arguing for Keystone XL using some arguments that quickly become head-scratching with even the briefest of scrutiny:
Let’s quickly tackle these points.
Like it or not, fossil fuels are going to remain the world’s dominant energy source for the foreseeable future, and we are far better off getting our oil from Canada than, say, Venezuela.
Sigh. Why does the New York Times editorial staff let such propagandist errors to go through. What is the basic point of the Keystone XL pipeline? To take DilBit (diluted bitumen) from the Canadian Tar Sands projects to Gulf Coast refineries and make them available for export into the international market place. Right now, upper Midwest refineries are buying DilBit at a discount from world prices because Tar Sands producers don’t have cheap and easy ways to get their product onto the world market (and into Chinese diesel fuel supply). Keystone XL will actually facilitate not just increased tar sands production but also the reduction of Canadian tar sands production in the U.S. market place and an increase in fuel prices in much of the Midwest.
the climate change effects of tar sands oil are, all in all, pretty small.
First, this basic argument is like saying ‘who cares if a kid pees in the swimming pool, there is a lot of water …’ Every increment, in and of itself, can be portrayed as somehow ‘small’ but there is the impact of many incremental inputs. 100 kids peeing … 1000?? When do you say no to pissing into waters where others want to swim?
And, well, contrary to Nocera’s shallow claims, the Tar Sands represent a lot of carbon emission risk. As per Scientific American’s reporting:
Alberta’s oil sands represent a significant tonnage of carbon. With today’s technology there are roughly 170 billion barrels of oil to be recovered in the tar sands, and an additional 1.63 trillion barrels worth underground if every last bit of bitumen could be separated from sand. “The amount of CO2 locked up in Alberta tar sands is enormous,” notes mechanical engineer John Abraham of the University of Saint Thomas in Minnesota, another signer of the Keystone protest letter from scientists. “If we burn all the tar sand oil, the temperature rise, just from burning that tar sand, will be half of what we’ve already seen”—an estimated additional nearly 0.4 degree C from Alberta alone.
Pretty small, Joe???
And, continuing with the misleading and faulty logic and attacks on those trying to forestall tar sands development, Joe wrote
very clear about what they hope to accomplish. Oil companies have invested upward of $100 billion to extract the unconventional oil in the sands. A pipeline is the only way to export it. The Keystone pipeline is Canada’s Plan A. Plan B is a pipeline to British Columbia, which would get the oil to China. If the president blocks Keystone, and the First Nation tribes continue their staunch opposition to the western pipeline, then Canada will have the second largest oil reserves in the world — and no place to sell it. The assumption of the activists is that by choking off the supply of new oil sources like the tar sands, the U.S. — and maybe the world — will be forced to transition more quickly to green energy.
As Joe highlights in a set up to criticism of “activists” is that the tar sands are bottled-up in the central US and central Canadian market space without a truly cost-effective path to international markets. And, if one thought getting Keystone XL approved is difficult, watch out for “plan B” dying in the face of First Nation opposition.
However, the point is not just what the companies have invested but what they might invest. Right now it is difficult and expensive to export DilBit, which sells at a serious discount into the Upper Midwest compared to world market prices. Keystone XL will create something like $40 million per day or over $10 billion per year in additional profit opportunities. With the ability to earn perhaps $20 more per barrel, would that not encourage more destructive Tar Sands operations and at an accelerated pace?
Joe’s piece isn’t utterly wrong and perhaps he gets it partially.
The emphasis should be on demand, not supply. If the U.S. stopped consuming so much of the world’s oil, the economic need for the tar sands would evaporate.
True, if demand collapsed and if prices fell dramatically, then the incentive to devastate Canada’s boreal forests for expensive tar sands oil would collapse as well. Joe’s argument that we need lower oil prices to stop tar sands is perhaps the only one that’s actually correct. However, the reason why the oil companies are exploiting tar sands is precisely because we’ve run out of the cheap stuff and now need to go for the dirty and expensive one to feed our addiction. (Which, by the way, is proof (okay, strong evidence) in itself that high prices are not sufficient to reduce our demand massively.)
Truly, while there has been and continues to be a serious focus on reducing demand, there has become a serious recognition of a basic mathematical truth: if humanity exploits all of the carbon ‘on the financial books’ we have cooked the planet’s ability to support modern human civilization. There is not a single person involved in the efforts to forestall Keystone Xl who is not supportive of efforts to reduce demand (through efficiency, better planning, conservation, alternative fuels, etc …) even as they recognize the importance of stopping Keystone XL as part of the path toward constraining destructive Tar Sands exploitation.
like to see oil companies pay a fee, which would rise annually, based on carbon emissions. He said that such a tax could reduce emissions by 30 percent within 10 years. Well, maybe. But it would also likely make the expensive tar sands oil more viable
Okay, see some problems here?
A carbon fee — which makes any and all fossil fuels (including carbon) more expensive — is somehow going to make tar sands more viable? Please explain how making, lets say, every barrel of oil — due to carbon fees — more expensive by $25 will incentivize more tar sands production rather than foster drives for greater energy efficiency and alternative fuels? And, since tar sands exploitation has a higher carbon footprint than other oil production, wouldn’t this actually put tar sands at a competitive disadvantage with other lower carbon footprint options? Isn’t such a carbon fee directly addressing Nocera’s claim that focus should be on reducing demand? In fact, the carbon fee would disincentivize investment in “expensive tar sands” because it would favor lower cost production (by definition), raise tar sands costs more than lower polluting oil options, and create financial uncertainty for investors and businesses considering 20, 30, 40 year implications of $10 billion+ investments. A carbon fee (especially one that is guaranteed to increase) would create tremendous uncertainty and would undermine tar sands oil viability in multiple ways.
Nocera states “the strategy of activists … is utterly boneheaded”. On reflection, what Nocera has provided an accurate depiction of his self-contradicting broadside against those working to foster paths to avert catastrophic climate disruption.
A carbon tax is essentially a way for policymakers to increase the price of fossil fuels and curb consumer demand without giving producers more incentive to exploit harder-to-reach supplies. There are plenty of arguments for and against a carbon tax, but by itself, it wouldn’t give an added boost to pricey new fossil-fuel sources.
You might think an A-list business reporter for the NY Times would know basic economics. But not in the case of Joe Nocera. …
Last year, Nocera took exception to my saying he joined “the climate ignorati,” asserting that I was casting him as a “global warming denier.” But as I noted at the time, the ignorati are, as Google reveals, “Elites who, despite their power, wealth, or influence, are prone to making serious errors when discussing science and other technical matters.” The shoe fits.
But Nocera doesn’t seem to be a fan of basic economics, as he proceeds to misunderstand Hansen’s policy proposal and offer the laughably wrong argument that a price on carbon would increase the market viability of the dirtiest oil with the highest production costs.
Pro tip: Raising the price of a commodity does not improve its market position. In fact, raising the price of a commodity reduces demand for that commodity. This principle is known in economics as “supply and demand.”
If you want to argue that activists shouldn’t focus on Keystone, you can’t just establish that rallying around and/or blocking Keystone won’t reduce carbon emissions much. So what? Why not try it? Something’s better than nothing, after all. Even if it’s a total waste of time, that may be unproductive, but it’s not counterproductive.
No, you have to establish that the Keystone campaign is impeding or preventing something else better and more effective from happening. That’s what it means to say the Keystone campaign is counterproductive — that it’s detracting from other, superior climate efforts.
What are these other efforts, and how is a focus on Keystone impeding or preventing them? That’s the causal relationship folks like Revkin need to establish to make their case, but they are maddeningly vague about it.
Comments Off on Elementary arithmetic beyond Joe Nocera’s grasp?Tags:Energy
February 18th, 2013 · Comments Off on In honor of the Lite Brigade and science denialism
The poem below comes from a post by Greg Laden and refers to a group of hapless fossil fools that provided a tiny (10-15 person??) presence at Sundays #ForwardOnClimate rally in Washington, DC.
The Charge of the Lite Brigade by Greg, Lord Mockingyou
Half a brain, half a brain,
Half a brain onward,
All in the valley of Climate Change
Rode the six hundred.
“Forward, the Light Brigade!
“Charge for the facts!” he said:
Into the valley of Climate Change
Rode the six hundred.
“Forward, the Lite Brigade!”
Was there a man inform’d?
Not tho’ the soldier knew
Someone had blunder’d:
Theirs not to make reply,
Theirs not to reason why,
Theirs but to do and die:
Into the valley of Climate Change,
Rode the six hundred.
Carbon to right of them,
Carbon to left of them,
Carbon in front of them
Tornadoes and thunder;
Superstorm’d with surge befell,
Blindly awash in the the swell,
Into the rise of temps,
Into the mouth of Hell
Ocean acidification.
Flash’d all their untruths bare,
Flash’d as they denied in air,
Science and data there,
Charging and lying, while
All the world wonder’d:
Plugged in the battery-charger,
But the coal based grid was broke;
Hannity and Rush they
Reel’d from the IPCC report
Shatter’d and sunder’d.
Then they got a new contract, but
Not the six hundred.
Carbon to right of them,
Carbon to left of them,
Carbon behind them
Hurricanes with thunder;
Superstorm’d with surge befell,
New Orleans went to Hell,
Tea did not come out so well
Lies through their jaws brought Death
Told science to go to Hell,
And left it all to them,
Storms for our grandchildren.
What were they thinking, crazed?
O the wild charges they made!
All the world wondered.
WTF are have they said?
Look at the Lite Brigade,
Ignorant six hundred.
Comments Off on In honor of the Lite Brigade and science denialismTags:Energy
Last Tuesday evening, President Obama warned Congress that he would use executive authority to act on climate change is Congress continues to prove itself unwilling and unable to take action.
for the sake of our children and our future, we must do more to combat climate change. … I urge this Congress to pursue a bipartisan, market-based solution to climate change… But if Congress won’t act soon to protect future generations, I will.
There are things that are Executive Branch decisions, arenas where the President can act without asking “Mother, May I” of Representative John Boehner and that too large a cohort of anti-science syndrome sufferers in charge of the U.S. House of Representatives.
One arena: determining whether industrial projects that cross international borders are in the national interest. Top of the political agenda right now: Keystone XL pipeline.
The decision should be simple as the Keystone XL pipeline is not in the U.S. national interest for a range of economic and environmental reasons. Sadly, the reality of Keystone XL has been masked by $10s of millions (if not $100s of millions) of propaganda distorting its economic implications and downplaying its climate change impacts (in the shadow of $billions spent to undermine understanding of and action on climate change). And, sadly, the State Department process has had serious flaws (ethical, technical, analytical) that have surfaced and suggesting that the clarity of how Keystone XL is not in U.S. national interest has been clouded in the Department’s review. Those propaganda efforts and inadequacies in review process don’t change reality. Fundamentally, Keystone XL will undermine U.S. economic performance while fostering ever mounting climate change pollution.
While Keystone XL, in and of itself, will not guarantee that we have crossed the Rubicon to unstoppable catastrophic climate chaos, the reality is dire and, well, rather terrifying. We now face a simple reality,
Specifically and categorically, we must cease making large, long-term capital investments in new fossil fuel infrastructure that “locks in” dangerous emission levels for many decades. Keystone is a both a conspicuous example of that kind of investment and a powerful symbol for the whole damned category.
The afternoon of 17 February 2013, Americans in their thousands, in their 10s of thousands will be in front of the White House calling on the President to take action in line with his State of the Union declaration that “we must do more to combat climate change.”
Mr. President, it is time to stop waffling and draw the line in the sand against fossil foolishness and “cease making large, long-term capital investments in new fossil fuel infrastructure that “locks in” dangerous emission levels for many decades.”
‘Forward, the Light Brigade!’
Was there a man dismay’d ?
Not tho’ the soldier knew
Some one had blunder’d:
Theirs not to make reply,
Theirs not to reason why,
Theirs but to do & die,
Lord Tennyson’s Charge of the Light Brigade stands as one of the most famous English-language historical poems. It also could be stated as one of the most infamous as well.
Memorializing essentially unthinking actions of those blindly caught up in an archaic technology and archaic approach to warfare, the poem immortalizes a Crimean War charge of a British light cavalry brigade — armed with sabers — against a well prepared Russian artillery position. In short, 17th century warfare confronted 19th century technology and — beyond wounded and dead British soldiers and cavalry horses — the result is a heroic poem about an utterly stupid act.
While this poem resonates with many about heroism, the reality is that it is as much — if not more — about unthinking blind obedience to stupidity. With this in mind, it seems ever so poetic that advocates of 19th century energy technologies have adopted the moniker “Light Brigade” as their tag-line for counter-protests against those seeking to foster adoption of 21st century energy systems to confront 21st century challenges and seize 21st century opportunities.
This coming Sunday, at the Washington, DC, rally against the Keystone XL pipeline, these fossil fuel pollution promoters will be wearing bright yellow shirts with an assertion that those advocating for sensible energy policies are advocating blackout conditions putting aside that better energy management, energy efficiency, power storage, and renewables are providing an ever greater portion of the answer to America’s — and humanity’s — electricity requirements with every passing day. These yellow fossil fuel promoters won’t, it seems likely, discuss how coal has dropped from over 50 percent to under 35 percent the U.S. electricity list without any blackouts occurring due to coal’s more limited role in the U.S. electricity grid. They won’t talk about how solar and wind electricity have more than doubled in the past four years. They won’t talk about how, electron-for-electron, new wind power is now cheaper than new fossil fuel electricity in most places in the world. They won’t talk about how solar electricity prices are plummeting, very much like happened with computing technology as production ramped up. They won’t talk about health and particulate and climate change and other costs that blacken the benefits from their fuels of choice. These yellow fossil fuel promoters will be stating lots of “facts” but not discussing much truth.
As an excellent example of the distorting nature of their fossil-foolish propaganda, the “light brigade” propagandists will be focusing on electricity at a protest which is about liquid fuel. Hmmm … perhaps someone should remind them of the vast divide between the transportation energy system (liquid fuel) and electricity.
Just as the Light Brigade’s soldiers went heedlessly into battle, pitting archaic technology against modernity, this pollution-supporting ‘light brigade’ is thrusting itself forward advocating yesterday’s technology to attempt to forestall movement forward to tomorrow’s. And, just as the British Light Brigade went unthinkingly into battle almost 160 years ago under orders from above, one has to wonder whether those willing to put on these yellow shirts are questioning who is pulling the strings and where the funding comes from to pay for their threads and back their deceitful messaging.
February 14th, 2013 · Comments Off on GAO reports Climate Change one of top US government risks
As part of its responsibilities to support more informed Congressional decision making and inform members of Congress about key issues, since 1990 the Government Accounting Office (GAO) has provided a list of key high-risk areas.
identified as high risk due to their greater vulnerability to fraud, waste, abuse, and mismanagement or the need for transformation to address economy, efficiency, or effectiveness challenges.
Limiting the Federal Government’s Fiscal Exposure by Better Managing Climate Change Risks. Climate change creates significant financial risks for the federal government, which owns extensive infrastructure, such as defense installations; insures property through the National Flood Insurance Program; and provides emergency aid in response to natural disasters. The federal government is not well positioned to address the fiscal exposure presented by climate change, and needs a government wide strategic approach with strong leadership to manage related risks.
Mitigating Gaps in Weather Satellite Data. Potential gaps in environmental satellite data beginning as early as 2014 and lasting as long as 53 months have led to concerns that future weather forecasts and warnings—including warnings of extreme events such as hurricanes, storm surges, and floods—will be less accurate and timely. A number of decisions are needed to ensure contingency and continuity plans can be implemented effectively
The morning after the President actually discussed climate change in the State of the Union address, a group of prominent people are heading to the White House to risk arrest in a call on the President to live up to those words on the need to act on climate change. The Keystone XL pipeline, in and of itself, isn’t enough to ‘cook the planet’ — it is, however, a key tool to foster expanded production of Canadian Tar Sands. And, along with failures to reduce coal consumption, that expanded production could be enough (even without considering all other issues) to hammer in the last nail on the potential for humanity to avert catastrophic climate chaos.
Jeremy Grantham — an excellent financial analyst and advisor — is a powerful symbol of mounting business and financial concerns. [Update: just learned that Grantham will be there but will not risk arrest although his daughter will …]
Rev Lennox Yearwood, Jr, is the head of the Hip Hop Caucus and is representative of youth, religious, and the rainbow reality of concerns over climate change.
Julian Bond — truly a civil rights legend — links climate change issues to the rich legacy of our nation’s struggles for civil justice.
Darryl Hannah provides an example to our other ‘stars’ about the need to put their celebrity on the line and in the struggle to avert Climate Disruption.
Randy Thompson — a Nebraska rancher — provides a powerful symbol of American farmers’ growing realization of how climate disruption is already impacting their lives and of how promoting fossil foolish development is simply, well, outright foolish.
Michael Brune — the Executive Director of the Sierra Club — is a strong symbol of how seriously traditional environmental organizations are taking the struggle against climate change and against Keystone XL
As for the last, the Sierra Club has never authorized civil disobedience in its 120 year history … until now.
2012 was the hottest year on record, half the country is in severe drought, and Superstorm Sandy just flooded the greatest city in the world–New York. A global crisis unfolds before our eyes and immediate action is required. President Obama has the executive authority to make a significant and immediate impact on carbon pollution, and he can begin by saying no to Big Oil by rejecting the Keystone XL tar sands pipeline.
Civil disobedience is the response of ordinary people to extraordinary injustices. Americans have righted the wrongs of our society – slavery, child labor, suffrage, segregation, and inequality for gays and immigrant workers – with creative nonviolent resistance.
Climate change threatens the health and security of all Americans, and action proportional to the problem is required–now.
After several years of essentially ignoring Climate Change in the State of the Union address, President Obama spoke forcefully about climate change and clean energy in the speech. While there are some significant problems embedded in the discussion, such as praise for natural gas, there is significant material worth cheering, supporting, and building on.
Amid all of this, perhaps the best might be P+P=P. Priority + Payoff = PROMISE!
If we want to make the best products, we also have to invest in the best ideas. Every dollar we invested to map the human genome returned $140 to our economy. Today, our scientists are mapping the human brain to unlock the answers to Alzheimer’s; developing drugs to regenerate damaged organs; devising new material to make batteries ten times more powerful. Now is not the time to gut these job-creating investments in science and innovation. Now is the time to reach a level of research and development not seen since the height of the Space Race. And today, no area holds more promise than our investments in American energy.
This is an excellent and truthful statement.
And, as can be seen after the fold, the State of the Union blows through the Climate Silence barrier and signals that President Obama won’t return behind it.
BREAK for a moment: As for Marco Rubio and the Republican response,
Rubio “God gave us Coal, Oil, and Natural Gas”. Okay, then who gave us the sun, wind, waves, and other renewable resources? #SOTU
Secretary of State John Kerry’s first major international meeting came with Canadian foreign minister John Baird. At the press conference, Secretary Kerry faced (and essentially shunted aside) questions about Keystone XL. A Climate Hawk as U.S. Senator, Secretary Kerry faced a difficult situation: Canada is pushing hard to enrich itself with the world’s worst environmental disaster and the United States has to decide whether it will help worsen the situation as the Department of State in nearing the end of a process of review of the Keystone XL pipeline.
In short, the question the Department of State must answer:
Is Keystone XL in the U.S. national interest?
And, more briefly, the answer:
No.
With full explanations after the fold, here are reasons why Keystone XL is a reckless, dangerous, and counter-productive project that should not be allowed to proceed.
In short, Keystone XL would
Contribute to increased greenhouse gas emissions;
Foster accelerated damage to one of the most important carbon sinks;
Create risks for water sources;
Facilitate expansion of the most destructive industrial project on earth;
Increase spill risks of extremely difficult to clean-up and damaging Dilbit in extremely sensitive ecosystems;
Divert resources from efforts to reduce American and global dependence on fossil fuels;
Increase gas prices for much of the American Heartland;
Increase profitability of oil interests ripping up the boreal forests by taking money out of Americans’ pockets; and,
Damage American leadership around the globe as we struggle to mitigate climate change.
If this seems a long list, it is.
Despite the $10s ($100s) of millions spent on partial truths, disinformation, and propaganda, the fundamental facts demonstrate that this project should not go forward, that it is counter to U.S. national interest.
Crippling drought. Devastating wildfires. Superstorm Sandy. Climate has come home – and the American people get it.
The first step to putting our country on the path to addressing the climate crisis is for President Obama to reject the Keystone XL tar sands pipeline. His legacy as president will rest squarely on his response, resolve, and leadership in solving the climate crisis.
On 17 February 2013, President’s Day, 100,000s of American citizens will be in front of the White House calling for the Obama Administration to recognize — and declare — that the Keystone XL pipeline is not in the U.S. national interest. Join them.
Virginian Republican legislative initiatives have earned the Commonwealth unpleasant nation (and global) wide attention in recent years. Whether the abuse of public resources to undermine Virginia’s academic reputation with anti-science legal shenanigans (2010 to present); the social, moral, and medical outrage of trying to require unnecessary ultrasounds on women seeking to execute their Constitutional right to control their own medical destinies (2012); or the anti-democratic efforts to redistrict (out-of-cycle) to manipulate the Commonwealth’s Senate districts and to shift the Electoral College votes from Virginia to skew away from voters’ intent, Virginia’s GOP has provided lots of substantive reasons for intensely outraged attention to their anti-science, anti-constitutional rights, and anti-democratic tendencies.
These flashpoint issues have masked other serious issue after issue.
While the threat to the Electoral College and the legislation to redistrict the Commonwealth’s Senate seats are capturing the majority of attention, Governor Bob McDonnell’s very troubling and damaging transportation proposal is receiving minimal (if any) national attention. And, this matters. For example, McDonnell’s (damaging, non-sensical, backwards moving, etc …) proposal to eliminate the Commonwealth’s tax on gasoline would make Virginia unique of the 50 states in not having a user tax on fuel to help pay for transportation costs. With polluter interests heavily behind this, it is not hard to imagine that having this become law in Virginia will quickly become leveraged for legislative action across the nation. We will have a shift from the lunacy of 2008’s discussion of a “gas tax holiday” to a nation-wide call by the “Drill, Baby, Drill” crowd for “No Gas Tax”. This bad policy, damaging on fiscal and environmental grounds, will resonate politically and must be snuffed out at its source before it becomes a conflagration flaring up in state after state.
Within McDonnell’s plan are a litany of problems such that discussing them takes more pages than the (long) proposal itself and thus they merit addressing one after another (after another after another after …) in separate discussions. This post thus turns to a one particular angle of consideration of one of the bad proposals in the bill: Bob’s punitive $100 fee on alternative fuel vehicles. While the full section is after the fold, here are the key points:
While the governor’s plan will eliminate the Virginia gasoline tax, the federal gas tax of 18.5 cents will remain. The majority of federal gas tax revenues are returned to the states for transportation projects, and Virginia typically receives approximately $1 billion per year in federal gas tax revenue. And the more alternative fuel vehicles on the road, the less of a share Virginia will get of that federal tax.
Therefore, the governor’s plan proposes an additional $100 fee for alternative fuel vehicles to ensure that these drivers continue to contribute to Virginia’s transportation networks, which they use every day.
While there has been real outcries about this ridiculous fee on alternative fuel vehicles/hybrids — where there is a “user fee” imposed on hybrid drivers (that is unassociated with actual use) while removing the major user fee (gasoline taxes) — this fee is truly reminiscent of the “New Math” craze …
Let’s work through this …
A hybrid vehicle is roughly 25% more efficient than its equivalent non-hybrid.
The Prius is 50 miles per gallon.
A ‘non-hybrid’ version might be about 40 miles per gallon.
Thus, the difference between a high-end hybrid and the equivalent non-hybrid, mile driven, is roughly 1/5th the level of tax.
$100 fee against the 18.5 cent federal gas tax.
At 18.5 cents, it is 5.4 gallons per $1.00.
To achieve $100 requires buying 540 gallons of fuel.
At 40 mpg, this would translate to 21,600 miles of driving.
At 50 mpg, this would translate to 27,000 miles of driving
Looking at differential in another angle, the difference is 1/5 of the gas tax
For having a hybrid car rather than non-hybrid, the Prius (or Ford Fusion C-Max or …) would have to drive five times as far to meet the $100 savings.
E.g., the Prius driver would have to drive 135,000 miles in order to meet the $100 difference between owning a hybrid and a non-hybrid vehicle
That 135,000 miles represents roughly 10 years of driving.
Governor McDonnell seeks to justify a punitive $100 fee on alternative-fueled vehicles due to the asserted loss of gasoline taxes. The “lost” gasoline taxes represent roughly the lost gas tax equivalent of 10 average driving — are you starting to feel like Governor McDonnell is lost within New Math?
Governor McDonnell’s transportation has a section, beginning on page two, entitled: “Math Problem Background”.
As the example provided here shows, the reality is that Gov. McDonnell’s wrong-headed transportation concept is filled with problem math used to support problematic policy constructs.
“I invested in a hybrid car to do my part to make the air we breathe cleaner and our climate safer,” said Chester resident Laurel Snode, owner of a hybrid Honda Insight and a participant in the car parade. “We wouldn’t tax non-smokers to fund more public ash trays. Punishing Virginians who want to be part of the solution and pollute less makes absolutely no sense. It will only do more harm.”
February 1st, 2013 · Comments Off on President Obama giving “Godfather” a medal
Later today (scheduled for 1415 eastern), President Obama will award the National Medal of Technology to a true hero: Art Rosenfeld.
Simply put, Art’s is a name that every American should know.
He has had a profound impact on essentially all of our lives.
And, if there is any real regret to be had, it is that our national polity has been so inept that Art’s work has not impacted us even more significantly.
Called by many “the Godfather of Energy Efficiency“, Rosenfeld has help drive many significant advances in American energy efficiency standards and help establish core infrastructure to enable future advances. He is, quite simply, one of the greatest achievers/heros of ‘invisible energy‘ and his quite tangible achievements remain invisible to most Americans.
Rosenfeld founded the Center for Building Science at the Berkeley Lab back in 1975 and served for ten years on the California Energy Commission (retiring from there in 2010).
Rosenfeld has had such an impact that a unit of measurement exists:
the Rosenfeld (symbol: Rs). One Rosenfeld is equal to 3 billion kilowatt-hours per year, which represents the electrical output of one 500-megawatt coal-fired power plant under a set of standard assumptions. In reference to such a standard coal plant, one rosenfeld of saved electricity also avoids emissions of 3 million metric tons of carbon dioxide per year.
While Art Rosenfeld is just one man, we might say that he is prolific because his work is responsible for 10s (and quite likely 100s) of Rosenfelds.
One might expect that the Secretary of Energy (whose resignation has just become public) had a role in having this award event occur:
When U.S. Energy Secretary Steven Chu appeared on the “The Daily Show” in July 2009, he bantered with host Jon Stewart about energy-efficient “white roofs,” a powerful tool in the race to combat climate change.
Chu credited much of the research on white roofs to “Art Rosenfeld” …
Art is admired the world over,” Chu said in an interview with the Mercury News. “He’s a very distinguished physicist who recognized that the energy problem is huge. Art was my example of someone who said, ‘I have to stop staying on the sidelines, and get involved.’ “
To get a sense of Rosenfeld, this article is a good place to start:
The oil embargo of 1973 prompted him to make a career switch.
“I’d lived abroad, and it was a basic fact that the Japanese and the Europeans use a lot less energy than Americans,” said Rosenfeld. “One Friday night I was in my office and I realized that all of the lights were on in the building. It took me half an hour to go around and turn them all off. Some of the light switches were hard to find; there were bookshelves in front of them.”
Today, President Obama is giving an award to a true American hero, “The Godfather of Energy Efficiency”.
Tomorrow (and for all the days that follow), let us hope that President Obama works his hardest to create more Rosenfelds.
THE WHITE HOUSE
Office of the Press Secretary
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
February 1, 2013
Statement from the President on Secretary Steven Chu
I want to thank Secretary Chu for his dedicated service on behalf of the American people. As a Nobel Prize winning scientist, Steve brought to the Energy Department a unique understanding of both the urgent challenge presented by climate change and the tremendous opportunity that clean energy represents for our economy. And during his time as Secretary, Steve helped my Administration move America towards real energy independence. Over the past four years, we have doubled the use of renewable energy, dramatically reduced our dependence on foreign oil, and put our country on a path to win the global race for clean energy jobs. Thanks to Steve, we also expanded support for our brightest engineers and entrepreneurs as they pursue groundbreaking innovations that could transform our energy future. I am grateful that Steve agreed to join in my Cabinet and I wish him all the best in his future endeavors.
See after fold for live feed from White House which, at 1415, should have the medal award.
executive authority to act on climate change is Congress continues to prove itself unwilling and unable to take action.
arenas where the President can act without asking “Mother, May I” of Representative John Boehner and that too large a cohort of 
well, rather terrifying. We now face a 
international meeting came with Canadian foreign minister John Baird. At the press conference, 
