writeaboutwarming

April 14, 2019 I'd never heard of the International Renewable Energy Agency (IRENA) before, but the 160 countries and regional intergovernmental agencies that comprise its membership have released a report entitled Global Energy Transformation: A Roadmap to 2050. I ran across a summary of the report at Think Progress, and I thought I'd share parts of it with you. This is an important report. The members of IRENA base their research on the premise that renewable energy sources, as the most accessible energy on earth, can accelerate conversion to electricity on a global scale while meeting agreed-upon climate objectives. (I should mention that member countries must also belong to the United Nations.) Their report maintains that because prices of key clean energy technologies are dropping, as much as 85% of the world's energy could come from renewable energy sources, primarily solar and wind. Keeping the global temperature increase below two degrees Celsius, or 3.6 degrees...

March 3, 2018 - Scientists at the University Of California, Irvine; the California Institute of Technology; and the Carnegie Institution of Science recently published an article stating that the United States could meet 80 percent of its electricity needs with solar and wind power. To sweeten the deal, the price of solar and wind have been dropping rapidly. The remaining 20 percent could be provided by alternate sources of energy such as hydropower, geothermal, and biomass. These sources currently meet 8.5 percent of electrical demand, and can be expanded. The remaining deficit would be met by managing demand. The larger grid required for transmission of solar and wind power would have to be continental in scale, or 12 hours' worth of the energy would have to be stored in new facilities. This degree of expansion would require hundreds of billions of dollars in investment. Storing the electricity with today's cheapest batteries would cost a trillion dollars, although the price...

In 2007, the amount of solar power installed in the U.S. was 1.1 gigawatts (GW). As of 2017, that amount has increased to 47.1 GW. Enough to power 9.1 million average American homes. If you're thinking "we've still got a long way to go," you'd be right. On the other hand, increasing installed power by 4300% deserves some attention.  How'd we do it? The Department of Energy played an important role. In 2011, they initiated a program called The SunShot Initiative. They set targets for the years 2020 and 2030, by which times generating solar power would have become more affordable. More affordable on a utility scale, more affordable on a commercial scale, and more affordable on a residential scale. Thus far, they've succeeded in hitting the 2020 goal for utility-scale generation. Needless to mention, they reached that goal three years early. The goals, it should be mentioned, don't take subsidies into account. It's the technology, in the case of uti...

April 8, 2015 - As petro-profit continues its downward spiral, investors are seeking out The Next Big Thing.  More and more of them say the future belongs to solar energy.  Companies like Tesla, Google, and Apple are investing in solar.  In fact, Tesla will soon announce the release of a "home battery" that will help store power generated by rooftop solar panels.  While there's a part of me that questions how well solar will work in a warming world, where warm air that holds more moisture will create more thunderstorms, I'm pleased that Americans are finally looking beyond fossil fuel. Oddly enough, the word "Americans" now includes American conservatives.  Though they may not always feel free to spell out their support, they come pretty close in places like Florida, where Floridians for Solar Choice welcomes members from both the tea party and the Christian Coalition, as well as liberals, environmentalists and retailers.  More and more of us seem to be a...

June 3, 2013 – It’s interesting, on a number of levels, that leaders of the Atlanta Tea Party (ATP) are challenging utility company Georgia Power over its reluctance to increase use of solar power.   That, and the escalating costs of construction of a new nuclear power plant.   First and foremost, I’m perplexed that ATP co-founder Julianne Thompson found it necessary to assert that the organization’s position “certainly isn’t anything personal.”   Why is she denying what no one thinks is true to begin with?   Does she believe she is pre-empting other questions as well, by making a rhetorical statement?   She goes on to say that ”one of our core values is promoting the free-market system.” The San Francisco Chronicle expands on this remark by pointing out that the electricity market in Georgia is not free.   Electric utilities have exclusive rights to serve customers in designated areas of the state; the majority of customers cannot choose their provide...

May 9, 2011 – A very important report was issued by the IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change) today. The 2200 member scientists of the U.N.-sponsored organization have found renewable energy sources to hold the key to the future. (We might actually have one if we use them!) The report targets 450 ppm of greenhouse gases as the upper limit, beyond which life as we know it would not be sustainable. This level of GHG concentration exceeds the more ideal level of 350 ppm considerably, perhaps a tacit admission on the part of the report’s authors that they no longer think the lower concentration is achievable. The IPCC believes that 80% of the world’s energy needs can be met by renewable energy sources, and that the financial investment required would amount to only 1% of GDP, or approximately five trillion dollars over the next decade. The very plain implication of such numbers is that failure to make the small investment needed would be nothing short of criminal. The lack of fo...

October 26, 2009 – I’d like to review a very important book today. Brown, Lester. Plan B 4.0: Mobilizing to Save Civilization. New York: W.W. Norton & Co. 2009. Before I do, allow me to correct a misstatement in a previous article. I believe I erroneously referred to Brown as one of the “unsung” heroes of the environmental movement. That, as it turns out, is rather far left of the truth. I’ll quote directly from the dust jacket of this book: “Lester R. Brown is the president of Earth Policy Institute, an organization dedicated to building a sustainable future. Described by the Washington Post as ‘one of the world’s most influential thinkers,’ Brown started his career as a tomato farmer. Shortly after earning a degree in agricultural science, he spent six months living in rural India, where he became intimately familiar with the food/population issue. Brown later became head of the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s International Agricultural Development Service. In 1974, he fo...