Amory Lovins is a guy the world has finally caught up to. A proponent of the "soft" energy path, his ideas got their initial boost during the 70's oil pinch.
Like E.F. Schumacher and the whole small is beautiful movement, Lovins and his micro renewables are coming back and getting some serious consideration.
The mere mention of Lovins evokes the Eugene, Oregon of my youth, when bicycles were mass transit, showers were shared to save water, and UV lights supported the local indoor cash crop.
Check out this brief Q and A with Mother Jones:
Mother Jones: What will it take for renewables to go mainstream?
Amory Lovins: We have obsolete rules that favor big over small, supply over efficiency, and incumbents over new market entrants. It's the very opposite of a competitive market. So a good dose of conservative economic principles would get us even further than trying to give technologies we like subsidies as big as the ones we don't like are already getting. Desubsidizing the whole energy sector would be a wonderful advance--level the playing field, but also let [renewables] in. The barriers that renewables and efficiency face come less from our living in a capitalist market economy and more from not taking market economics seriously, not following our own principles.
MJ: What energy policies should the next president try to enact right away?
AL: I think the important policies need to happen at a state rather than a federal level. With modest exceptions, our federal energy policy is really a large trough arranged by the hogs for their convenience.
MJ: So how could Washington best cut fuel consumption?
AL: For cars, the most effective thing would be a "feebate": In the showroom, less-efficient models would have a corresponding fee, while the more-efficient ones would get a rebate paid for by the fees. That way when choosing what model you want you would pay attention to fuel savings over its whole life, not just the first yea r or two. It turns out that the automakers can actually make more money this way because they will want to get their cars from the fee zone into the rebate zone by putting in more technology. The technology has a higher profit margin than the rest of the vehicle.
MJ: What's the most promising new energy source in terms of supply?
AL: Micropower---cogeneration, wind, sun, small hydro, geothermal, biomass, and waste fuel--is now providing about one-third of the world's new electric capacity.
MJ: If you had $1 million to invest in the energy sector, where would you put it?
AL: Efficient use. I want to do the cheapest things first to get the most climate protection and other benefits per dollar. Buying micropower and "negawatts" [Lovins' term for efficiency measures] instead of nuclear gives you about 2 to 11 times more carbon reduction per dollar, and you get it much faster.
MJ: Would you rather live next to a nuclear plant or a coal-burning plant?
AL: This is like a stupid multiple-choice-test question: Would you prefer to die of climate change or oil wars or nuclear holocaust? The right answer is none of the above.
MJ: Do you have any energy-use guilty pleasures?
AL: I take long showers, but they are 99 percent solar, so I guess it's not really guilty.
COPYRIGHT 2008 Foundation for National Progress
COPYRIGHT 2008 Gale, Cengage Learning
Tuesday, May 12, 2009
The House Whisperer
You don't have to be an Einstein to know how to prosper in the energy efficiency business. But it helps to be an Eisenstein.
In addition to his real estate-related home inspections, Ira Eisenstein is finally seeing a pickup in energy-related business, the kind where panicky homeowners call him to ask what they can do to cut their skyrocketing home energy bills.
The Princeton, New Jersey energy auditor is the owner of Strictly Business, a home inspection service that flushes out problems ranging from termites and radon to lead pipes and drafty windows.
Eisenstein and others of his trade may benefit big from the federal stimulus package, which provides money for the retrofitting of energy inefficient government buildings and even qualified existing homes and commercial buildings.
It takes a skilled, certified home inspector like Eisenstein to thoroughly diagnose a home's energy efficiency needs, which may require such solutions as blowing insulation into the attic, installing storm windows or caulking seams around a door jamb.
"I can definitely save people as much as 30 percent of their total electricity bill," Eisenstein says. "I had one guy who had a 450 dollars per month gas bill. He didn't realize he could save a third by simply tilting his radiators a certain way so as to more efficiently use the steam that fills them."
Eisenstein doesn't do a "blow door test," a fairly common procedure that identifies air leaks in a space. Instead, he “packs heat,” carrying an optical tool called an infrared thermal imaging gun.
The operator of the camera can point it at a wall or ceiling and clearly show areas where heat is escaping in winter (and conditioned air in summer). It is money down the drain.
I trailed him on one house call where the homeowner complained of high home heating bills. Eisenstein found several areas where original insulation had either been moved by electricians doing their work in crawl spaces, or had been improperly installed in the first place.
As he aimed his thermal gun on one particular area of the wall, you could see what looked like lesions of red and blue in the viewfinder.
"The camera takes numbers, temperatures, and translates them into colors," he says. "White is the hottest, black the coldest. In between, red is the next hottest, followed by orange and yellow. In winter, you can see heat escaping, as here, between the poorly insulated intersection of walls and ceiling."
Eisenstein comes off initially as a brainiac on nerd patrol. Certified mold inspection makes poor cocktail party patter. But he can be engaging and is capable of laughing at himself in the profession he calls "house whispering."
His fee typically runs $395 for a house call that can last 2-3 hours. His inspections come with a professional report, including extensive photo-documentation. He's the go-to guy for the home buyer.
In addition to his real estate-related home inspections, Ira Eisenstein is finally seeing a pickup in energy-related business, the kind where panicky homeowners call him to ask what they can do to cut their skyrocketing home energy bills.
The Princeton, New Jersey energy auditor is the owner of Strictly Business, a home inspection service that flushes out problems ranging from termites and radon to lead pipes and drafty windows.
Eisenstein and others of his trade may benefit big from the federal stimulus package, which provides money for the retrofitting of energy inefficient government buildings and even qualified existing homes and commercial buildings.
It takes a skilled, certified home inspector like Eisenstein to thoroughly diagnose a home's energy efficiency needs, which may require such solutions as blowing insulation into the attic, installing storm windows or caulking seams around a door jamb.
"I can definitely save people as much as 30 percent of their total electricity bill," Eisenstein says. "I had one guy who had a 450 dollars per month gas bill. He didn't realize he could save a third by simply tilting his radiators a certain way so as to more efficiently use the steam that fills them."
Eisenstein doesn't do a "blow door test," a fairly common procedure that identifies air leaks in a space. Instead, he “packs heat,” carrying an optical tool called an infrared thermal imaging gun.
The operator of the camera can point it at a wall or ceiling and clearly show areas where heat is escaping in winter (and conditioned air in summer). It is money down the drain.
I trailed him on one house call where the homeowner complained of high home heating bills. Eisenstein found several areas where original insulation had either been moved by electricians doing their work in crawl spaces, or had been improperly installed in the first place.
As he aimed his thermal gun on one particular area of the wall, you could see what looked like lesions of red and blue in the viewfinder.
"The camera takes numbers, temperatures, and translates them into colors," he says. "White is the hottest, black the coldest. In between, red is the next hottest, followed by orange and yellow. In winter, you can see heat escaping, as here, between the poorly insulated intersection of walls and ceiling."
Eisenstein comes off initially as a brainiac on nerd patrol. Certified mold inspection makes poor cocktail party patter. But he can be engaging and is capable of laughing at himself in the profession he calls "house whispering."
His fee typically runs $395 for a house call that can last 2-3 hours. His inspections come with a professional report, including extensive photo-documentation. He's the go-to guy for the home buyer.
Monday, May 11, 2009
Ten Thousand Miles
"A journey of ten thousand miles begins with a single step."
--Chinese proverb
True though the proverb may be, China's authoritarian government is getting out of the block quicker than the U.S. in the race to develop "clean" coal. That's one implication of recent news that China is adopting newer, more efficient coal burning technologies for its newest power plants. While the U.S. dithers, communist leadership delivers.
China, of course, is coming off a decade-long building binge of coal burning plants of much lesser efficiency and higher carbon dioxide emissions. But speedy approval and top-down edicts provide China with an advantage we don't have in getting things going quickly in the right direction.
To be clear, China's overall greenhouse gas emissions from new coal-fired plants will increase, not decrease, but the rate of increase will be less because of the country's centralized decision-making on retiring older technology and replacing it with newer technology.
Meantime, the U.S. under a new energy secretary is taking stock of things. An American initiative to develop "coal gasification and carbon capture-and-sequestration" technologies needs to speed up. Storing spent carbon deep underground or under seafloor beds promises to cut greenhouse gases in half.
U.S. investment and research into the problem are critical to solving the problem on this side of the globe. But political will and leadership are just as important. Obama has to give The Big Speech. Public education and support are crucial. Democracy is different, more deliberative and slower to move. But market and price signals are also going to be key.
The Chinese have a leg up in this regard, because they are already scaling the new technology to, well, China. With so much load to satisfy, the power generation sector is bringing a new coal-fired plant on-line every month. Thanks to economies of scale, per unit costs are reportedly less for building a new "ultra-supercritical" power plant in China than a less efficient coal-fired plant in the U.S.
--Chinese proverb
True though the proverb may be, China's authoritarian government is getting out of the block quicker than the U.S. in the race to develop "clean" coal. That's one implication of recent news that China is adopting newer, more efficient coal burning technologies for its newest power plants. While the U.S. dithers, communist leadership delivers.
China, of course, is coming off a decade-long building binge of coal burning plants of much lesser efficiency and higher carbon dioxide emissions. But speedy approval and top-down edicts provide China with an advantage we don't have in getting things going quickly in the right direction.
To be clear, China's overall greenhouse gas emissions from new coal-fired plants will increase, not decrease, but the rate of increase will be less because of the country's centralized decision-making on retiring older technology and replacing it with newer technology.
Meantime, the U.S. under a new energy secretary is taking stock of things. An American initiative to develop "coal gasification and carbon capture-and-sequestration" technologies needs to speed up. Storing spent carbon deep underground or under seafloor beds promises to cut greenhouse gases in half.
U.S. investment and research into the problem are critical to solving the problem on this side of the globe. But political will and leadership are just as important. Obama has to give The Big Speech. Public education and support are crucial. Democracy is different, more deliberative and slower to move. But market and price signals are also going to be key.
The Chinese have a leg up in this regard, because they are already scaling the new technology to, well, China. With so much load to satisfy, the power generation sector is bringing a new coal-fired plant on-line every month. Thanks to economies of scale, per unit costs are reportedly less for building a new "ultra-supercritical" power plant in China than a less efficient coal-fired plant in the U.S.
Monday, May 4, 2009
The Jevons Paradox
There was a pressing Coal Question long before the recent one, just as urgent and with consequences as dire.
The latest iteration centers on whether coal can save us by providing cheap and abundant energy for a long, long time, if only we can make it clean enough.
The 19th-century question preoccupied the considerable intellect of political economist William Stanley Jevons, who correctly foresaw coal's unsustainability as fuel for industrial England's incredible productivity, prosperity, and rise to world power.
"Are we wise," he asked rhetorically, "in allowing the commerce of this country to rise beyond the point at which we can long maintain it?"
While credit is due Jevons for his prescient analyses of (get ready) finite energy sources, sustainability, limits to growth, overpopulation, overshoot, post-global relocalization, energy return on energy input, taxation of the energy resource, renewable energy alternatives, and resource peaking (whew!), his most intriguing contribution is to the issue of energy conservation efforts, and whether they do enough to abate energy demand and forestall resource depletion.
Jevons is known for the "paradox." The Jevons Paradox states that given efficiency improvements in gadgets that use energy to get work done, demand for those energy sources will go up, not down, because they are now less costly.
"It is wholly a confusion of ideas to suppose that the economical use of fuel is equivalent to a diminished consumption. The very contrary is the truth."
Watt's steam engine is the case in point, for Jevons saw that innovations in its design over the predecessor engine improved overall efficiency, reduced the effective cost of energy and in so doing broadened the application of the use of the engine and thereby increased the demand for coal.
Jevons was on the lookout for mitigation measures, assuming as he did that coal was finite and that energy depletion posed a long-term threat to English society. But conservation, it would seem, was not the answer.
This idea is finally getting some play, although in slightly altered form, in the contemporary concern over whether automobile fuel economy is achievable or even desirable.
Take the Prius. Increasing a car's fuel economy doesn't necessarily get drivers to drive less, because they have (theoretically) cut the cost of their gallon of gas in half. As David Owen puts it in the New Yorker last month, "Increasing the fuel efficiency of a car is mathematically indistinguishable from lowering the price of its fuel; it's just fiddling with the other side of the equation."
In other words, auto fuel efficiency, delivering drivers more gas for the buck, cannot do for the environment what doubling the cost of gas did last year by pushing down oil consumption, stimulating investment in renewable energy, increasing public transit ridership and killing the Hummer.
The same can be said for those new compact fluorescent bulbs that, while delivering longer watt-hours of life, may inadvertently promote less vigilant behavior. What's the point of conserving if you leave the lights on when you walk out of the room?
Bottom line: efforts to solve the energy crisis may in fact be hobbled, not helped, by energy efficiency.
To say the least, The Jevons Paradox is alive and well, and casts a pall over the energy debate today.
The latest iteration centers on whether coal can save us by providing cheap and abundant energy for a long, long time, if only we can make it clean enough.
The 19th-century question preoccupied the considerable intellect of political economist William Stanley Jevons, who correctly foresaw coal's unsustainability as fuel for industrial England's incredible productivity, prosperity, and rise to world power.
"Are we wise," he asked rhetorically, "in allowing the commerce of this country to rise beyond the point at which we can long maintain it?"
While credit is due Jevons for his prescient analyses of (get ready) finite energy sources, sustainability, limits to growth, overpopulation, overshoot, post-global relocalization, energy return on energy input, taxation of the energy resource, renewable energy alternatives, and resource peaking (whew!), his most intriguing contribution is to the issue of energy conservation efforts, and whether they do enough to abate energy demand and forestall resource depletion.
Jevons is known for the "paradox." The Jevons Paradox states that given efficiency improvements in gadgets that use energy to get work done, demand for those energy sources will go up, not down, because they are now less costly.
"It is wholly a confusion of ideas to suppose that the economical use of fuel is equivalent to a diminished consumption. The very contrary is the truth."
Watt's steam engine is the case in point, for Jevons saw that innovations in its design over the predecessor engine improved overall efficiency, reduced the effective cost of energy and in so doing broadened the application of the use of the engine and thereby increased the demand for coal.
Jevons was on the lookout for mitigation measures, assuming as he did that coal was finite and that energy depletion posed a long-term threat to English society. But conservation, it would seem, was not the answer.
This idea is finally getting some play, although in slightly altered form, in the contemporary concern over whether automobile fuel economy is achievable or even desirable.
Take the Prius. Increasing a car's fuel economy doesn't necessarily get drivers to drive less, because they have (theoretically) cut the cost of their gallon of gas in half. As David Owen puts it in the New Yorker last month, "Increasing the fuel efficiency of a car is mathematically indistinguishable from lowering the price of its fuel; it's just fiddling with the other side of the equation."
In other words, auto fuel efficiency, delivering drivers more gas for the buck, cannot do for the environment what doubling the cost of gas did last year by pushing down oil consumption, stimulating investment in renewable energy, increasing public transit ridership and killing the Hummer.
The same can be said for those new compact fluorescent bulbs that, while delivering longer watt-hours of life, may inadvertently promote less vigilant behavior. What's the point of conserving if you leave the lights on when you walk out of the room?
Bottom line: efforts to solve the energy crisis may in fact be hobbled, not helped, by energy efficiency.
To say the least, The Jevons Paradox is alive and well, and casts a pall over the energy debate today.
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