Sustainability - - A Focus On Carbon

Energy Secretary Perry has announced an effort by the U.S. Department of Energy (USDOE) to win support from the Federal Energy Regulatory Agency (FERC) to establish a mandate that utilities must adopt fossil fuel generation to, in the words of the press release, "...requiring [FERC's] organized markets to develop and implement reforms that would fully price generation resources necessary to maintain the reliability and resiliency of our nation’s grid" [emphasis added]. See the press release here . While ample evidence exists that as the fraction of intermittent renewables (i.e., solar and wind, but mostly wind) increases on a utility’s system, that does negatively impact a utility's reliability that is a state-level issue. As such, it is within the purview of the utility and its state regulatory apparatus to address such problems. Additionally, such problems are well-known to both utilities and their state-level commissions. It's also true that corrective ac...

A recent article in  Mother Jones  details how several dozen large and influential corporations that have donated to the Republican Attorneys General Association (RAGA) have also publicly supported remaining in the Paris Climate Accord. This is an issue because RAGA has identified the Obama Administration’s Clean Power Plan (CPP) as its top legal priority to undo.  Some of the companies involved argue that their donations is in the time honored tradition of donating to politicians and issues on both sides of the isle. To this observer, that is nothing more than a thin veil of respectability that calls their position into question. Further, these organizations contributed more to RAGA than to its democratic counterpart. Quoting from the article, “During the timeframe that the 27 companies donated about $3.3 million to the Republican group, 23 of them collectively gave about $1.9 million to the parallel Democratic organization.” While it’s true that RA...

Former NASA climate scientist James Hansen and colleagues recently published an article that lays out why cutting CO2 emissions ais necessary but is no longer sufficient to reduce concentrations of greenhouse gasses (GHG) to acceptable levels.   Among their findings is that “…large CO2 extraction from the air is needed and a halt of growth of non-CO2 climate impacts to achieve the temperature stabilization…” They rightly point out that developed nations have an obligation to assist those nations since they haven’t contributed much to the problem but bear a disproportionate share of its impacts. They also point to a role for demand-side changes that provide GHG mitigation. For example, reducing meat and dairy production is needed to reduce GHG emissions from agriculture.   Other agriculture and land use changes (in addition to changes in our diets), include reducing food waste and changes in wood use “…have substantial mitigation potential, but they remain under-researc...

What if cutting greenhouse gas emissions (GHG), especially CO2, is not the same as increasing the share of electricity generated using renewables? Which would you pick? As an economist, such questions interest me. This kind of question interests me because we face a slew of problems and we have a limited amount of effort available to help solve them.  If we are able to cut CO2 emissions at a lower cost one way rather than some other way, why pick the more costly approach? For many folks, there is no question of deciding between cutting GHG and installing more renewables. They are assumed to be one in the same. Is there any evidence to suggest otherwise? Actually, there is. Electricity planning analysis performed by the Northwest Power Planning Council (NWPPC) is but one such body of work. In their 7th Power Plan, which was released at the beginning of 2016, is a chapter that addresses this very issue. Here's another source. What the NWPPC found is that cheaper and more e...

Not exactly. Let me explain. Our lack of even the most basic understanding of how the elecricity system operates (explained below) allows us to mistakenly imagine we are taking actions that will shut down CO2 emitting generators. A number of headlines read something like "California Poised To Require All Its Electricity To Come From Renewables."  SB100  appears to be a bit more complicated, however.  Plus, electricity complies to the laws of physics, not the laws we mere mortals devise. Hoefully, this post will identify several important implications of these distinctions. Recognize that electrons (what electricity consists of) going over the wires thorughout California flow from all generators located everywhere within what’s called the Western Interconnect (WECC).  Electrons are already present throughout all the electric wires in every building in every community at every moment in time. When you flip a light switch on, more electricity gets generated ...

The often cited study by Mark Jacobson et. al. that asserts it's economic to replace every fossil fuel use with either electricity from wind, water, and sun (WWS-only) or hydrogen produced using WWS-only in 139 countries over the next 33 years implies a massive construction program the likes of which we may not have ever seen. I find it useful to compare the implied construction program to what we have experienced in the recent past. Click  here  to see his paper on the 50 U.S. states. Over the next 33 years, even under his extraordinary drop in total electric load, he envisions approximately 5.8 million MW of new generation are needed (plus an additional 600GW for peaking and system stability). He reports that as of 2013, 2.71% (of 5.8 million MW) is currently installed, or approximately1.6 million MW. Such quantities indicate an extraordinary construction program, especially since the U.S. installed capacity rose by only about 177,400MWs over the eight year pe...

Last Tuesday, the OPUC Commissioners held a regularly scheduled hearing. The main topic was Portland General Electric's (PGE) proposed acquisition of 175 aMW of wind. At the hearing, which I attended, renewable and environmental advocates were out in force. Dozens of citizens showed up wearing read t-shirts, some with 350.org, others from the Sierra Club. Others wore the color red in solidarity. Commissioner Bloom, the lone Republican on the three-member Commission, read prepared remarks that were extraordinary, being delivered from the Dias. He chastised PGE for an op-ed in the Oregonian the prior Friday in which the Company's head honchos essentially pleded with the public to come to help support their proposed acquisition before the Commission. I've seen the Commissioners take witnesses to task. What I hadn't seen was a thorough admonishment of a utility at the beginning of a hearing, reading from prepared remarks. Customer groups had filed testimony opposing P...

Recently, a friend sent me a copy of Bakke’s book, The Grid.  Two days ago, after getting a draft journal article off my desk, I took it off my stack and cracked its cover.  My hope is that the remainder of it is as good as its introduction and first chapter.  It's quite an accomplishment; and a very well written one.  She quickly gets to the heart of the challenge posed by integrating intermittent renewables (a tautology, once hydro is excluded) on p. 13.  She writes ”Power production isn’t just an industry, it’s an ecology.  And renewable resources are not just about the planetary good kept from public offer by corporations with other visions for their own profitable futures.  Making American power is about how technological, biological, and cultural systems work in concert to keep our lights on, our basements and roadways clear of flood water, and fresh fish on our tables. It’s delicate in all sorts of ways….it does the reader well to remember tha...

Mark Jacobson and his colleagues have performed analysis, and argued forcefully based on that analysis, that it’s economic for the U.S., and 138 other countries, to rely solely on water, wave, and sun (WWS- only) to meet all power needs by 2050. A paper published in 2015 (Energy Environ. Sci., 2015, 8, 2093) contains a table listing the number of new generators (and the size of each one) needed by type of generation if that goal is to met. The table below was contracted using Table 2 of that publication, Number of Units Needing Installation (rounded): On shore wind, 328,000; Off-shore wind, 156,000; Wave, 35,000; Geothermal, 10,000; Hydro, 3; Tidal, 9,000; Residential PV, 75,100,000; Commercial/Gov. PV, 2,747,000; Utility PV, 46,500; CSP, 2,300. Source: Jacobson, et. al., Energy Environ. Sci. (2015), Table 2, p. 2098 While only 3 new dams are needed, the analysis assumes that the installed capacity of one new dam is 1300MW. That means 3,900MW of new installed capacit...

Surely, defining a carbon footprint isn't difficult, right?  There are various on-line tools available to allow anyone to do just that. This is an issue I've been investigating.  My reason for doing so arises from a concern that policy analysis and decision-making is as solid as the data are upon which they rest.  Recently, I came across a passage in a report titled Carbon Emissions – a Northwest Perspective that summed up the challenge, "There are multiple ways to tabulate a carbon footprint and this report’s approach will differ from others.  If carbon regulations are passed on the state or regional level then agreeing on a methodology for defining a carbon footprint will be critical."  This excerpt zeros in on the issue of using data that are consistent in their development. To date, my review of methods in California, Oregon, and Washington indicate that each state uses somewhat different approaches to develop the raw data used to define carbon footpri...

What's the significance of buying products made outside Oregon or outside the U.S.? Certainly, there are many reasons why we might care about where - and how - the stuff we buy is made. What I'm interested in is how total CO2 equivalent (CO2e) of goods purchased by Oregonians changes as the locus of production changes.  For 2005, CO2e emissions from consumption of goods and services by Oregonians resulted in 56.7 MMT CO2e (note that some but not all the goods purchased were from within Oregon). If Oregonians purchased the exact same goods and services but they were all made outside of Oregon, those emissions would climb to 67.7 MMT CO2e. If instead of buying U.S. made products, Oregonians purchased that same bsdket of goods  all made outside the U.S., total CO2e emissions jump to 113.5 MMT.

Here's an EPA document that provides quite a good overview of greenhouse gas emissions from activity across the U.S. economy. Hopefully, this compilation of GHG data (including but not limited to CO2) provides both an understanding of the range of activities that generate CO2 but also how they chage over time. I've spent some of yesterday and most of today reading through it. Here are some initial observations, mostly with an eye towards activities in and around Portland and the Tri-County Area. Land Use decisions affect overall CO2 emissions. For example, CO2 emissions are reduced by not converting ag. and forest land to development, or demolitions.  For 2015, it’s estimated that the net effect from all types of land use changes/avoiding changes was a reduction in CO2 emissions of 670MMT CO2 equivalent. Turning to electric generation, from 1990 to 2015 overall emissions rose 4 percent while carbon intensity rose ~16 percent. Most of the increase in carbon intensity was ...

By using Trump’s decision to exit the Paris Climate Accord as a justification for setting a target of 100% renewable energy, our political leaders are in reaction mode. It's like having an alcoholic in the family, something I have personal experience with.  If we use the alcoholic’s actions as the reason for our choice, we don’t change our narrative.  It's incumbent on us to act with the gravity and wisdom that changing the narrative on climate change will require.  One of the more important ways we can begin is to resist the temptation to engage in sloganeering.  It’s not “Big Oil versus Humanity."  We don’t wear the White Hats while “They” wear the Black Hats.  To be sure, sloganeering seems to be part and parcel of marketing and politics.  Even so, politics and governance are different specialties that require different skill sets. Here are three steps we can take to be smarter about climate change. First, stop drawing boxes around people and ...

A bill (SB1547) signed into law in March '16 does not contain language banning coal-fired electricity from delivery to Oregon's retail customers.  Even so, the Oregon Global Warming Commission’s 2017 Biennial Report to the Oregon legislature (Report) erroneously reports the existence of such a ban after 2030.   It also erroneously reports that both Portland General Electric (PGE) and PacifiCorp (PAC) are prohibited from allocating to Oregon retail customers any cost or benefit from coal-fired plants.  Figures 7-9 in the Report illustrate past and future CO2 emissions by these two utilities (Fig. 7 for PAC and Fig. 8 for PGE) and the statewide CO2 emission levels (Fig. 9) assume that Oregon takes credit for lowered CO2 emissions, even though SB1547 did not address coal plant operation in any way.  Furthermore, the statute in question expressly permits PGE to continue to include costs of its portion of Coalstrip in Oregon retail rates after 2030.  The law als...

Trump’s announcement that the US is withdrawing from the Paris climate accord is deeply disappointing.  His decision flies in the face of solid science on the role of human activity in climate change.  What is needed is climate policy grounded in a solid set of facts.  It is for this reason I take issue with the Resolution adopted by the Portland City Council and Multnomah County at the Council Session on June 1st.   "Until economic forms of utility-scale electricity storage are achieved, it will be next to impossible to economically replace all fossil fuel electricity generation with renewables."   Two policies were adopted in that Resolution.  Both policies apply community-wide, not just to City or County facilities.  One goal states that  by 2035  all residents and businesses in the City and County will only use electricity generated from renewables.  This means that PGE and PacifiCorp must deliver electri...

Maybe yes, maybe no.  It depends on several factors that boild down to the qualityu of the offset.  The Natural Reosurces Defense Council, NRDC, has a concise summary of the issue with some suggestions. It's worth noting that at least there is the potential for a carbon offset to reduce current CO2 emissions whereas a Renewable Energy Certificate, in and of itself, will not reduce current CO2 emissions. As the NRDC summary indicates, the first course of action is to reduce our current activity that is causing the CO2 emissions.

No, a REC does not cut existing CO2 emissions. If an existing fossil-fuels electricity generating plant is retired, that can cut exizting CO2 emissions if and only if a new one isn't built. image courtesy of groupe-edsi.com

The party who owns the Renewable Energy Certificates (RECs) gets to claim the environmental benefit.    This can lead to some counter-intuitive outcomes from renewables development. For example, if Portland General Electric (PGE) builds a utility-scale wind farm in its balancing area, it could argue that it uses the electricity it produces to meet its needs.   However, unless PGE keeps and retires the RECs associated with that electricity, PGE cannot claim the environmental benefits of that wind farm.   It could sell the RECs to some other party and use the proceeds of that sale however it choses. Alternatively, if PGE purchased RECs from any one of a number of entities that have them, then PGE could claim the environmental benefit of those RECs even if it didn’t build the PV solar or utility-scale wind farm.   image courtesy of renewablechoice.com