Tag: renewable

A mighty wind

WindturbineA recent NZ Wind Energy Association newsletter carries some cheering news — enough, I thought, to deserve a Hot Topicupdate on wind energy. 2009 saw a record 50% capacity growth in wind power in New Zealand. A further 25% capacity growth is expected over the next twelve months. At the beginning of 2009 wind farms were supplying about 2.5% of our elecricity.  Currently wind generation supplies about 4%, and in the last quarter of 2009 wind generation peaked at close to 5% of total generation.

In 2009, increasing wind generation, combined with full hydro lakes, resulted in renewable generation in New Zealand providing 73 per cent of total generation – the highest level of renewable generation since 2004. Consequently emissions from electricity generation during 2009 were down to their lowest level since 2002.

The newsletter comments on the role high levels of emissions-free renewable generation will play in reducing the impact of carbon pricing on electricity prices, as the electricity sector is set to enter the Emissions Trading Scheme later this year.

The Mahinerangi wind farm 70 kilometres west of Dunedin is set to start construction in September of this year, with stage one completed by May 2011. There’s a significant local synergy with the Waipori hydro scheme which TrustPower says will allow better efficiency from Waipori. The wind farm will also improve security of supply for Dunedin and free up for use elsewhere electricity currently being imported into Dunedin from Roxburgh and the Waitaki system.

The newsletter points to the synergy between these two generating schemes as illustrating at regional level what will be achieved on a national scale as wind energy is developed and operated in combination with existing hydro generation. Essentially, the use of wind enables water to be saved in storage lakes, until the water is needed for meeting peaks in demand.

Wind farms benefit regional economies. TrustPower expects the development of Mahinerangi to result in $12 million flowing directly into the local economy. A case study of the Manawatu wind farm Tararua Stage 3 showed significant amounts spent locally during construction and ongoing annual local expenditure by the operating company.

Wind power is on the move globally. The world’s wind power capacity grew by 31% in 2009, adding 37.5 gigawatts (GW) to bring total installations up to 157.9 GW. A third of these additions were made in China. In Europe just over 10GW of wind was installed, making it the leading source of new electricity-generating technology in the region, ahead of natural gas. The prediction is that in 2014, five years from now, global wind capacity will stand at 409 GW.  (New Zealand’s total electricity capacity, from all sources, is around 9 GW.)

There’s some interesting material on prices. Because wind energy is a price taker in the electricity market it displaces more expensive generation, which is typically thermal generation. Uncertainty and risk attend the availability and cost of fuel for thermal generation. The newsletter contrasts this with the confidence about the cost of electricity over the lifespan of wind farms because they have no fuel costs, and low and well-understood operating and maintenance costs.  A report prepared by an independent consultancy for the European Wind Energy Association found that wind power reduces electricity prices. The report reviewed the findings of case studies in Germany, Denmark and Belgium, which show electricity prices were reduced by between 3 and 23 Euros per MWh depending on the amount of wind power on the system. A similar trend is seen in New Zealand in the Manawatu, where wind reduces spot prices by an average of 10 per cent.

The progress of the New Zealand turbine manufacturer Windflow Technology towards achieving international certification for its 500 kW turbine is noted in the newsletter.  It needs only approval of the tower design to complete Class 1A certification, meaning it would be suitable for use at the windiest and most turbulent sites and be capable of surviving gusts of over 250 km/h. The company sees a place for its smaller turbines on exposed ridge top sites.

Ghost riders in the shed

I was flicking through the channels on the Sky box last night — the 10-30pm news was too depressing to endure — and I stumbled on this amazing programme on the Living Channel. Originally broadcast by the BBC last December, it’s a special edition of science show Bang Goes The Theory, called The Human Power Station. Premise: show just how many energy slaves (in this case, cyclists with dynamos attached to the rear wheels of their bikes) it takes to power a family of four through an ordinary Sunday’s power use. The answer? 70, when Dad takes a shower — see the excerpt above. Oddly compulsive viewing, and informative about energy use, even if one of the presenters can resist expressing energy in units of chocolate digestive biscuits. I can’t find a repeat in the Living Channel schedules, and it’s no longer available on the BBC’s iPlayer, but keep an eye out — it’s well worth watching if you get the chance.

[Duane Eddy]

Offshore energy for export

Ben McNeil’s scenario, in The Clean Industrial Revolution, of Australia as a future source of renewable energy exported to its Asian neighbours was of necessity somewhat speculative. However a major report published this week laid out, in very concrete terms, the possibility of the UK becoming a net exporter of renewable energy, not solar in this case, but garnered from the wind and waves of the sea.

The report of the Offshore Valuation Group was sponsored by the UK Department of Energy and Climate Change, the Scottish government, and a number of large companies. Tasked with estimating the value of the offshore renewable energy resource, the group’s findings exceeded their own  expectations.

 

“The next four decades of technological development could enable us to harness a practical resource ten times the size of today’s planned deployments. Integration with neighbouring electricity networks though a ‘super-grid’ could provide access to a single European electricity market, enabling the UK to sell renewable electricity across the continent.”

The report relied on technologies already either in use or in development: offshore wind with fixed or floating foundations, tidal stream, tidal range, and wave power. It also took into account competing uses of the sea and accessibility constraints.

The resource identified by the report is very large, capable of producing six times as much electricity as is currently used in the UK. The report recognised that electrification of transport and heating will add to demand by 2050, an increase of perhaps 75% on today’s demand. Harnessing 29% of the offshore resource by 2050 would be enough to turn the UK into a net exporter of renewable electricity at an estimated cost of £443 billion with an estimated annual revenue return of £62 billion. The annual production in 2050 would be equivalent to 1 billion barrels of oil. This is the average level of production experienced by the UK’s North Sea oil and gas over the four decades leading up to 2008.

The infrastructure deployment required is similar in scale to that of oil and gas in recent decades.  To deploy the capacity by 2050 would require an average build rate of 7.2GW per year (one thousand 7.5MW turbines per year), including repowering. Of this, 5.4GW would be fixed offshore wind, with the next largest share coming from floating wind. A big plus is that 145,000 jobs could be created in direct roles.

The current EU supergrid negotiations are of major importance to any export development and the report urges that the UK take a leadership role to ensure that the UK derives maximum value from its design and implementation. Government involvement would be essential in many aspects of the development, in cooperation with industry. One is finding ways to develop innovative financing mechanisms that can match the long term risk and reward profile of renewable energy investments. This could take the form of green energy bonds designed either for corporate investors such as pension funds or for individual investors, and should be designed to deliver finance at the required scale; for the 29% harnessing option an average annual investment of £11 billion will be required between 2010 and 2050.

Another role for government is setting a national ambition to become an exporter of offshore renewable electricity. This will provide industry with the confidence it needs to invest for the longer term, it will demonstrate a strong commitment to existing renewable energy and climate targets, and it will help to guide long term policy development on related issues such as energy markets, grid and supply chain development.

The conclusion:

“The UK is now most of the way through its first great offshore energy asset, our stock of hydrocarbon reserves. The central finding of this report is that our second offshore asset, of renewable energy, could be just as valuable. Britain’s extensive offshore experience could now unlock an energy flow that will never run out.”

We wait to see what the policy makers do with the report. Peter Madigan, Head of Offshore Renewables at RenewableUK, was in no doubt about what should happen:

 

“This is a hugely exciting piece of research which sets out compelling factual evidence of the huge potential of the UK’s offshore renewable energy resource. As an association we have long been saying that the North Sea will become the Saudi Arabia of wind energy, and today’s tonne of oil and employment comparisons amply bear this out. Just as 30 years  ago, the North Sea could be our ticket for economic growth. We are looking forward to the new Government putting in place the policy framework to make this happen.”

The Clean Industrial Revolution

The Clean Industrial Revolution: Growing Australian Prosperity in a Greenhouse Age

The problem with cutting greenhouse gas emissions is that it will harm economic growth. Right? No, quite the opposite, says Ben McNeil in his book The Clean Industrial Revolution. It’s an age-old myth that doing good for the environment is bad for the economy. He’s addressing Australians, but what he has to say will arrest readers from many countries. It has certainly grabbed the attention of some prominent New Zealand businessmen who have presented every MP with a copy of the book and used it to back a call to the Prime Minister for a joint business/government task-force to focus attention on emerging clean technologies.

McNeil is a senior research fellow at the Climate Change Research Centre at the University of New South Wales. Besides a PhD in climate science he also holds a Master of Economics degree.  The two worlds are bridged in this energetic book.  Australia is very vulnerable to climate change through sea-level rise, rainfall changes, storms, and a decrease in food production. It is also highly carbon-intensive in its economy and its export industries will suffer as a consequence when the world starts to move heavily to reduce carbon emissions and impose carbon tariffs.

Such consequences can be pre-empted by a clean-energy revolution, one for which Australia is well-endowed. That hot arid interior is the potential source of vast quantities of high capacity solar power. The use of mirrors to concentrate sunlight so perfectly that the ultra-high temperatures convert water to steam is one way. Another, already under construction in north-west Victoria, uses mirrors to concentrate the sunlight on to high-performance photovoltaic panels. Solar power could replace the need for coal-fired power stations. A massive underground “hot rock” heat source can be tapped to create steam for power generation, a technique already being worked on by a number of companies at several sites throughout Australia. Wind power in the south could supply 20 percent of the country’s needs. Advanced biofuels that do not impact on food can be produced.  Biomass-fuelled electricity is already generated in some parts of rural Australia. Carbon capture and storage may hold some hope for the continuing use of coal, though not while coal companies put a miserly 0.3 percent of their production value into research, apparently believing that governments will do the work for them.

McNeil argues that Australia must take up a forefront position in the low-carbon economic future if it wants to remain prosperous. At the time of writing in 2009 he expected the emissions trading scheme to kick in, putting a price on carbon and pointing the economy towards investment in clean energy. This has been delayed, but even without it there is ample reason for the change of focus away from the carbon-intensive economy (carbon obesity he calls it).  The world will soon be crying out for clean energy technology.  Australia will continue to prosper in the future if it has used research and development to drive down the cost of renewable energy technologies, and investment to commercialise them and prepare them for export.

McNeil illustrates this with a striking imaginary scenario. A series of climate catastrophes hit the world in the 2020s. Global greenhouse gas sanctions quickly followed. Those nations with expanses of desert which had been working on the development of solar power became the energy superpowers of the 21st century. Australia led in the building of the Asia Pacific Electricity Grid following a breakthrough in transport efficiency for transmission cables discovered by Australian researchers. The grid connected Australian energy supply to its Asian neighbours.  The scenario is much more elaborated than this, but it all certainly sounded feasible.

Back to present reality. McNeil is adamant that there are solid employment opportunities in an economy focused on clean energy. More than offered by the present carbon intensive economy, and jobs which can’t be outsourced. Creating energy-efficient homes and buildings, for example, is a proven source of increased jobs. The European Commission suggests that energy efficiency creates three to four times the level of employment as an equivalent investment in a new coal-fired power station. Renewable energy requires two or three times more people for operation than an equivalent coal-based energy project. A comparison between Denmark’s wind industry and New South Wales coal industry clinches that. A renewables manufacturing industry is feasible kept based in Australia by a strong domestic market.

McNeil provides a wealth of illustrative material from many countries and forward-looking firms. He instances General Electric’s ‘Ecoimagination’ programme launched in 2005, aimed at developing low-carbon solutions. The company reports that it has never had an initiative that generated better financial returns so quickly. Cloudy Germany is the world’s largest market for solar energy and German solar manufacturing companies produce over half the world’s solar panels. German companies are positioning themselves for the burgeoning global clean-tech market. Tiny Denmark manufactures over half the world’s wind turbines, obtains 20 percent of its electricity from wind and plans to increase that to 40 percent. McNeil notes dryly that contrary to some prophesies Danes are far richer than Australians by GDP per capita, while cutting their carbon intensity by over one-third in less than ten years.

Innovation needs science, and McNeil titles one of his chapters “How Science Must Save Us”. If Finland can produce Nokia, Australia also can help shape the world, not by raw military or economic might but by “the seeding of ideas in an interconnected world.” Education and research funding are crucial for the development of science and he discusses how they can be expanded. Scientists and engineers will not only develop new generation clean energy but also seek to understand and monitor the effects of climate change on the natural ecosystems of Australia with its immense variety of specially evolved plants and animals. They will also continue to seek the development of techniques for reducing methane emissions from livestock, which produce 10 percent of Australian greenhouse emissions.

McNeil knows first hand how serious the implications of climate change are.  The disease has been diagnosed but his attention in this book is on the cure. He matches the environmental imperative of emissions reduction with the economic benefit of entering wholeheartedly into a new, clean, low-carbon industrial revolution. Climate change poses a great risk to the Australian economy, and so does their over-reliance on fossil fuels. They need to embrace the change to clean energy. The costs of not doing so will far outweigh the cost of making the change.

One doesn’t need to be an Australian to be cheered by much that the book has to say and the detail with which it is illustrated.  But the final sentence has to be conditional:

“If Australia sets strong greenhouse gas emission targets and invests in unleashing clean-technology innovation,…”

Unfortunately it’s still a big if, not only for Australia.  But here’s the rest of the sentence:

“…not only will Australia help the world as it makes the transition towards a low-carbon development pathway to solve climate change, it will bring new prosperity and employment growth to a country desperately needing economic reform in its energy policy.”

Note: There’s a short relevant interview with Ben McNeil here on YouTube.

[Check out this book at: Fishpond, Amazon.com, Book Depository]

Solar

Solar

Novelist Ian McEwan is fully aware of the dangers of climate change and concerned that renewable energy options be deployed with all possible urgency. His  memorable article in the Guardian in November 2008 makes that very clear. In 2005 he went with a group of artists and scientists to the Arctic to spend time on board a ship frozen into a fjord, a group, he says, “dedicated to understanding the effects of global warming on the remote poles, and asking ourselves what we as artists might do.” He writes about the experience in a prologue to the book Global Sustainability –- A Nobel Cause which arose out of the Potsdam Nobel symposium he was invited to in 2007.

We’ve known for some time that climate change would feature in his new novel, Solar, and wondered how. Comedy is the way he has chosen to come at so serious a subject. Climate change hovers in the background of the comic narrative around the central character.

Michael Beard is a middle aged Nobel laureate who received his prize for the work he did as a theoretical physicist in one brilliant summer in his youth.  Since receiving his leaureate he has for two decades done no work of consequence, but taken a variety of assorted tasks appropriate to his celebrity status.  Official roles with a stipend attached are his preference.

Beard is short, overweight and balding.  But the clever scientist holds attraction for a good number of women, and they certainly attract him.  His fifth marriage is coming to an end when the book opens in 2000.  He has numerous affairs whether married or not, and forthcoming sexual arrangements are never far from his mind. He is overweight because he can’t resist food.  He drinks large quantities of alcohol.  He is self-centred and self-indulgent.  McEwan himself sums it up in a television interview: “I made him rather fat and gross and rather cunning and thieving and lying and above all greedy.”

Not a very promising focus for reflection on climate change.  However McEwan deftly weaves strands of climate change concern into the narrative of Beard’s far from admirable but often highly amusing life.  This isn’t the place for a review of the novel as a literary work – there are plenty of those available elsewhere – but I’ll try to indicate some of what struck me as climate change commentary in the course of my very enjoyable read of the novel.

Early in the book Beard  is largely unperturbed by climate change. He’s not wholly sceptical. He knows the basic physics.  But he sees it as one of those background issues which governments can be expected to address and take action on.  He’s suspicious and dismissive of talk about peril or calamity.  In fact his mind is on other things and he doesn’t really take time to think about climate change.  At this point he struck me as fairly representative of a not inconsiderable sector of intelligent people who simply don’t focus on the question long enough to be disturbed by it. The indulgences which preoccupy Beard may be somewhat gross by normal standards, but they fit quite well into familiar societal patterns which preclude serious attention to serious matters.

Later in the novel Beard has had a change. Things are happening, thanks not to himself, but to the persistence of a young scientist at the renewable energy Centre that Beard nominally heads.  The young man had seen in Beard’s early Nobel work implications for a form of renewable energy which will use the power of the sun to perform artificial photosynthesis, to make cheap hydrogen and oxygen out of water, with the gases recombined at night in a fuel cell to drive a turbine. (McEwan is here drawing on the work of Daniel Nocera at MIT). After the bizarre accidental death of the young scientist Beard inherits a folder inscribed with his name in which the young man has placed all the relevant calculations of the process.  The attention Beard refused him during his life he eventually obtained after death when the older man finally read his work. As a result Beard emerges in 2005 as heavily engaged in plans to attract investment support for this new renewable energy.  In a notable passage in the novel he delivers a remarkable speech to a gathering of sceptical fund managers and investment specialists in London.  The need for renewable energy is set out with compelling clarity.  Never mind that the speech comes from an such unsatisfactory protagonist – McEwan gives his character’s scientific intelligence full range. And provides him with an audience on which it is largely wasted, for the vigorous culture of irrationalist denial has been nurtured in the solid institutions of the City.  In one luminous sequence McEwan captures both the promise of escape from the now disastrous energy path on which civilisation has depended and the thick-headed rejection of that promise in favour of business as usual. McEwan may have been cautious of didacticism, but he found in this passage a way of conveying the urgency and frustration that attends an understanding of climate change.

On to 2009 and at last Beard and his business partner are ready to launch the first project in New Mexico in which the new technology will go into production at a modest but useful level.  The necessary millions of dollars have been found, the components put to the test and everything assembled on site. On the verge of the grand opening his partner, no scientist but an excellent organiser and raiser of funds, is unnerved by all the talk he is hearing from business people and white coats on TV that the scientists have got it all wrong but don’t dare admit it.  The rise in temperature so far is negligible and now the planet is cooling.  McEwan manages to pack in most of the denialist hype which gathered strength prior to Copenhagen and make it sound like a genuine conversation.  The same goes for Beard’s scientific elucidation for his friend’s benefit.  The climax of the conversation is brilliant: “Toby, listen. It’s a catastrophe.  Relax!”   The passage is a portrayal of the extraordinary persistence of denial and the ease with which it has been able to percolate through some presumably educated sections of society.

The novel ends in a shambles befitting the life of its central character.  There’s no grand message for the world.  McEwan commented in the TV interview linked to above that novelists who try to sell too strongly a moral message usually find their novels are dead on their feet.  He clearly escaped that fate.  But along the way he fed in a good deal of the serious  concern to which he has given voice outside his fiction. The paradox that it should come through a character who personifies a good deal that is wrong with societal habits is part of the comedy.

We may expect to see writers and artists increasingly treating climate change in their work. It looms so large over society that it can’t be neglected by those who help shape our culture. Hopefully they will help prepare us for the acceptance which surely can’t be delayed for very much longer, and also help us to maintain a decent sense of humanity as we face up to the problematic future we have prepared for ourselves.