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Can Obama's clean energy plan save the climate?

13 01 09 - 05:37 Can Obama's clean energy plan save the climate?



By Eoin O'Carroll


In a major economic speech Thursday at George Mason University, President-elect Barack Obama called for doubling domestic production of alternative energy over the next three years.

Mr. Obama's American Recovery and Reinvestment Plan - a stimulus package expected to total at least $800 billion - will put energy front and center. The plan includes boosting the efficiency of homes and government buildings and kick-starting domestic clean energy. To quote from Obama's speech:

To finally spark the creation of a clean energy economy, we will double the production of alternative energy in the next three years. We will modernize more than 75 percent of federal buildings and improve the energy efficiency of 2 million American homes, saving consumers and taxpayers billions on our energy bills. In the process, we will put Americans to work in new jobs that pay well and can't be outsourced - jobs building solar panels and wind turbines; constructing fuel-efficient cars and buildings; and developing the new energy technologies that will lead to even more jobs, more savings, and a cleaner, safer planet in the bargain. Obama also pledged to develop a national smart energy grid that would "save us money, protect our power sources from blackout or attack, and deliver clean, alternative forms of energy to every corner of our nation."

Obama's change.gov site gives the details of the plan, which include $150 billion over 10 years in clean-energy funding and a requirement that 25 percent of American electricity come from renewable sources by 2025

Reactions

Grist's Kate Sheppard reports that big environmental groups are for the most part pleased. Her story includes quotes from the leaders of the Sierra Club ("win-win"), the Alliance for Climate Protection ("a crucial first step"), Friends of the Earth ("a refreshing break from the past"), and the Blue Green Alliance ("the smart way to think about economic development").

Ms. Sheppard notes, however, that the plan does not include specific provisions for funding mass transit, an omission that worries some environmentalists.

As CNN reports, some key Democrats have criticized Obama's stimulus plan, saying that it relies too heavily on tax breaks instead of direct investment. At Climate Progress, Joseph Romm, a former Clinton energy adviser, cites a story in Environment & Energy Daily that notes that, of the plan's expected $300 billion in tax breaks, only $10 billion go toward clean energy, a ratio that Mr. Romm calls "distinctly unimpressive."

Others are wondering if Obama's clean-energy goals are even possible. Reuters reports that Rex Tillerson, the CEO of Exxon Mobil, believes that doubling domestic production of renewables in three years will be "very challenging," in part because he believes the United States cannot double its output of biofuels and lacks the manufacturing capacity to build enough wind turbines.

Mr. Tillerson believes that the best way to boost clean energy is to impose a carbon tax, a belief shared by Al Gore; Obama's Energy Secretary-designate Steven Chu; and Obama's economic adviser Lawrence Summers, but not by Obama himself, who supports a cap-and-trade scheme.

But will it do the trick?

Assuming that the US actually could double alternative energy production by 2012, how far would that go toward solving the climate crisis?

A little. According to the US Department of Energy's Renewable Energy Data Book [PDF], 9.4 percent of total US energy production - this includes both electricity and transportation - comes from renewable energy sources, mainly hydropower and biomass. (Another 11.7 percent comes from nuclear power, which is not mentioned in this plan.)

The remaining nonrenewable energies - oil, coal, and natural gas - contributed to the roughly 7 billion metric tons of carbon dioxide equivalent greenhouse gas emissions that the US belched out in 2007, according to the Energy Information Administration.

Let's be wildly optimistic and assume that every single one of these new geothermal stations, solar concentrators, and windmills will take a bite out of the most carbon-intensive source of energy: coal.

Coal accounts for one-third of US energy production, and, according to a 2006 spreadsheet by the EIA, emits about 2,300 million metric tons of CO2 equivalent, which is about one-third of the total. So if the US were to increase renewables to account for 10 percent more of our overall energy production and reduce coal production by the same proportion, then we'd reduce our total greenhouse gas emissions by about 10 percent.

I'm making two other huge assumptions here. First, that US energy production won't change at all except for the increase in renewables, and second, that all of these wind turbines and solar power stations have a negligible carbon footprint. In other words, this 10 percent figure is probably too high, unless the US also makes major improvements in energy efficiency.

And it's not enough to curb climate change, even if every other country effected a similar emissions reduction.

According to the UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change's Fourth Assessment Report, if the world's wealthy countries were to cut their emissions by 25 percent to 40 percent below 1990 levels (US emissions are now about 15 percent higher than they were in 1990), carbon dioxide concentrations would stabilize at 450 parts per million, the figure that the UN panel believed was the safety threshold.

But a report by top climate researchers published last year in The Open Atmospheric Science Journal found that the UN panel ignored crucial feedback loops. The true safe threshold, they said, is 350 parts per million. This number, the report concluded, should be respected "[i]f humanity wishes to preserve a planet similar to that on which civilization developed and to which life on Earth is adapted."

Current atmospheric greenhouse concentrations are at about 387 parts per million and rising.

So a 10 percent emissions reduction is a modest start, and getting up to 25 percent renewables by 2025 would be another baby step, but if the world's leading climate scientists are right, these by themselves won't be enough to save us from catastrophic climate change. Used tags: , , , , , ,

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Under Obama energy plan, cars would be cleaner but costlier

Wednesday 28 January 2009 at 10:37 am Under Obama energy plan, cars would be cleaner but costlier



By Mark Trumbull and Daniel B. Wood





Boston and Los Angeles - President Obama's first big push for US energy independence - centered on tougher fuel-efficiency standards - is likely to impose new costs on an already reeling auto industry, consumers, and probably taxpayers.

But his moves on Monday, which come amid a growing consensus that America needs to radically revamp the way it uses energy, may have an upside, too. For one, they may help Detroit drive faster down an inevitable road toward efficiency. The resulting retooling of factories, too, may have some stimulative effect on a struggling economy. more

Coal-ash waste poses risk across the nation

Tuesday 13 January 2009 at 06:42 am Coal-ash waste poses risk across the nation



By Mark Clayton


The billion-gallon wave of toxic coal-ash sludge that burst from a power-plant retention pond and buried 300 acres of rural Tennessee hints at a far larger problem: hundreds of similar threats nationwide.

More than 1,300 coal-ash waste sites are dotted across the United States, about half of them actively used, federal data show. Some are landfills. The rest are "surface impoundments" (storage lagoons), which, like the one in Tennessee, mix ash with water.

Coal ash has some beneficial uses. It can be mixed with concrete to make roads, for example. But storing coal ash in a retention pond - common at coal-fired power plants nationwide - can be a threat to the environment and humans as well: The ash contains many toxic metals, including arsenic, lead, and chromium.

At least 67 coal-ash sites have been found to be damaging drinking-water supplies in communities across 23 states, the US Environmental Protection Agency reported last year. But those EPA-identified sites grossly understate the threat, environmentalists say.

EPA study finds only 13 'safe' coal-ash waste dumps

Among an additional 155 landfill and surface-impoundment sites in 36 states reviewed by the EPA in 2007, all but 13 had no liner or an inadequate clay liner. Most - two-thirds of them - had no liner at all. An impermeable liner is needed to keep toxic metals from leaching from the ash into groundwater supplies.

This concerns Kevin Madonna, who, with his law-firm partner, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., keeps a close eye on water pollution issues. Using last year’s EPA data, Mr. Madonna cross-checked coal-ash lagoons and landfills that had either a clay liner or no liner to see which ones were close to human populations and waterways.

One-third are close to human populations

Of the 155 waste sites, more than one-third were close or very close to significant human populations; two-thirds were near or very near key waterways, Madonna found. About half of the sites were coal-ash surface impoundments (lagoons).

"You have toxic wastes leaking into water bodies from probably every single one of these lagoons," Madonna says. "It's a huge mess."

Little is known about coal-ash storage sites, which are lightly regulated by states and exempt from federal hazardous-waste regulations. Many are decades old, which increases the potential for leakage and containment failure, experts and environmentalists say.

Lisa Evans, an attorney for Earthjustice, an environmental group, says the EPA underestimates the problem. "Most impoundments are not monitored at all," she says. "The list of sites identified by the EPA in 2007 is far from comprehensive."

Needed: impermeable liners for waste sites

An earlier EPA report to Congress in 1999 showed that about three-quarters of some 300 active surface impoundment sites were unlined, Ms. Evans says. Of those that were lined, most were probably lined with clay, which is an inadequate barrier to toxic metals and invites contamination oflocal ground water, says Charles Norris. Mr. Norris is head of Geo-Hydro Inc., a Denver-based consulting company that has analyzed the hydrogeology of such structures. An impermeable composite (plastic) liner is what’s required, he and others say.

The problem is perhaps most acute among nearly 100 coal-ash storage lagoons in two dozen states across the country. Many of these ponds are far larger and far more toxic than the one that burst at the Tennessee Valley Authority's Kingston power plant at Harriman, Tenn., on Dec. 22.

That assertion is based on data released Jan. 7 by the Environmental Integrity Project (EIP), a Washington-based watchdog group. Their analysis of EPA data showed volumes of heavy metals that were larger than those at Kingston being deposited at other power-plant waste sites.

Aresnic, lead pose threat to well water

Arsenic levels in waterways near the Kingston spill were far above safe drinking water standards, according to EPA samples taken after the accident. Such toxins can be removed at water treatment facilities, but pose a threat to drinking water wells,

Some power-plant surface impoundments are 1,500 acres in area and contain perhaps 55 million cubic yards of material. That's several times the size of the Kingston facility.

Environmentalists say Tennessee a warning sign

"Our analysis confirms that this problem is truly national in scope and that Tennessee may end up only being a warning sign of much more trouble to come," EIP director Eric Schaeffer said in a statement. He also warned of what he called "inadequate oversight and monitoring of land-based disposal and other 'storage' of these toxic wastes."

Just ask Jan Nona, a retired secretary who lives in the little town of Michigan City, Ind., two miles from a coal-ash landfill that has grown to be several city blocks long, several blocks wide, and a few stories tall. Only part of the landfill is lined, so toxins like boron have leached into the city ground water.

"I used to have a well with sweet water - until the boron level got too high," she says. "Me and my neighbors have had to give up our wells now that they have boron, manganese, molybdenum, and other things in them. We've got test results that boggle the mind."

Sturdiness of impoundment dams an issue

Others are more concerned about a catastrophic release. In the past eight years, two other big dam breaks have occurred in coal-ash impoundments, one in Georgia and one more recently in Pennsylvania on the Delaware River. Both spills killed river life for miles and cost tens of millions of dollars to clean up.

Just how sturdy are the hundreds of dams holding back hundreds of millions of cubic yards of coal-ash slurry? Many of these dams are made of compacted coal ash, as was the case at the TVA facility, rather than of compacted earth, which is more stable.

But "coal ash is not in equilibrium with the environment," Geo-Hydro's Mr. Norris says. "It reacts quite strongly with any water that comes in contact with it. I've read the inspection reports from the TVA facility. It's pretty clear this is material that is internally degrading." (On January 9, a second spill of waste from a TVA coal-fired power plant came at its Widows Creek facility in northeast Alabama. This time it was not coal ash escaping, TVA officials said, but about 10,000 gallons of gypsum from a cooling-system pond, the Knoxville News Sentinel reported.)

Averting the problem might have cost one-tenth as much as cleanup

At the Kingston facility, TVA officials did not pursue a $25 million proposal to dry out the sludge and ship it to a properly lined landfill, despite evidence that the lagoon dam was weakening, according to published reports. Instead they turned to less-costly alternatives. Would tighter regulation have helped?

Maybe. But in the 28 years since Congress enacted 1980's Solid Waste Disposal Act and required the EPA to report back on whether to regulate coal combustion waste (CCW), EPA attempts to regulate the material have fallen before vigorous utility industry lobbying, lawyer Evans says.

In 2000, for instance, the EPA determined that CCW did not warrant regulation as hazardous waste. It subsequently cut most funding to develop national regulations and instead began drawing up voluntary guidelines, Evans says.

Since then, however, the EPA has "collected significant new data and new analyses," says Matthew Hale, director of EPA's Office of Solid Waste, in a statement responding to Monitor queries. EPA is now analyzing data gathered in its 2007 study, he said, "and will consider this information as we continue to follow up on the regulatory determination on the management of coal combustion waste."

Utility group says better state regulations will suffice

A utility industry spokesman says it has been joined by many others, including states, to lobby against federal hazardous waste regulation. State regulation is working, despite the Kingston collapse, according to Jim Roewer, executive director of the Utility Solid Waste Activities Group, an industry trade association. "A lot of people are claiming that if coal ash is not regulated as a hazardous waste at the federal level, then it's not regulated," he says. "States do have programs, and they aren't static and have become more stringent over time.... Tennessee and other states will be reviewing their programs" in light of this spill.

Priorities for solving the problem are clear, environmentalists say

But environmentalists say the solution is obvious: Phase out all wet storage of toxic coal ash; immediately inspect and begin monitoring coal-ash storage and disposal units; begin federal regulation of all coal-ash storage and disposal by year's end.

This daunting problem may be solved by putting coal ash in dry, specially-lined landfills to keep water out. Cleaning up the Kingston spill will cost 10 times what it would have cost to dry and ship the ash to a proper landfill, Evans says. "It's a problem that has a clear solution," she says. "We just need to decide to do it." more

Toyota to bring plug-in Prius to US market this year

Tuesday 13 January 2009 at 05:52 am New York - Toyota's plug-in Prius will be unveiled at the 2009 North American International Auto Show alongside another green vehicle from Honda, the plug-in Insight, though the Honda plug-in won't be on the market until 2010.

While Toyota is harping about making it into the U.S. market yet this year, in all likelihood, the latest Prius model with an extended range will be in showrooms in 2010.

At the same time, Honda's Insight is being lauded as the most affordable hybrid plug-in to ever hit the market, whose base sticker price is under $20,000. But Honda says the Insight will go on sale in April. more

Can Obama's clean energy plan save the climate?

Tuesday 13 January 2009 at 05:37 am Can Obama's clean energy plan save the climate?



By Eoin O'Carroll


In a major economic speech Thursday at George Mason University, President-elect Barack Obama called for doubling domestic production of alternative energy over the next three years.

Mr. Obama's American Recovery and Reinvestment Plan - a stimulus package expected to total at least $800 billion - will put energy front and center. The plan includes boosting the efficiency of homes and government buildings and kick-starting domestic clean energy. To quote from Obama's speech:

To finally spark the creation of a clean energy economy, we will double the production of alternative energy in the next three years. We will modernize more than 75 percent of federal buildings and improve the energy efficiency of 2 million American homes, saving consumers and taxpayers billions on our energy bills. In the process, we will put Americans to work in new jobs that pay well and can't be outsourced - jobs building solar panels and wind turbines; constructing fuel-efficient cars and buildings; and developing the new energy technologies that will lead to even more jobs, more savings, and a cleaner, safer planet in the bargain. more