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The Generator news service publishes articles on sustainable development, agriculture and energy as well as observations on current affairs. The news service is used on the weekly radio show, The Generator, as well as by a number of monthly and quarterly magazines. A podcast of the Generator news is also available.
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  • Scientists say ozone layer depletion has stopped

     

    The Scientific Assessment of Ozone Depletion 2010 report said a 1987 international treaty that phased out chlorofluorocarbons (CFC) – substances used in refrigerators, aerosol sprays and some packing foams – had been successful.

    Ozone provides a natural protective filter against harmful ultra-violet rays from the sun, which can cause sunburn, cataracts and skin cancer as well as damage vegetation.

    First observations of a seasonal ozone hole appearing over the Antarctic occurred in the 1970s and the alarm was raised in the 1980s after it was found to be worsening under the onslaught of CFCs, prompting 196 countries to join the Montreal Protocol.

    “The Montreal Protocol signed in 1987 to control ozone depleting substances is working, it has protected us from further ozone depletion over the past decades,” said World Meteorological Organisation head of research Len Barrie.

    “Global ozone, including ozone in the polar region is no longer decreasing but not yet increasing,” he told journalists.

    The 300 scientists who compiled the four yearly ozone assessment now expect that the ozone layer in the stratosphere will be restored to 1980 levels in 2045 to 2060, according to the report, “slightly earlier” than expected.

    Although CFCs have been phased out, they accumulated and persist in the atmosphere and the effect of the curbs takes years to filter through.

    The ozone hole over the South Pole, which varies in size and is closely monitored when it appears in springtime each year, is likely to persist even longer and may even be aggravated by climate change, the report said.

    Scientists are still getting to grips with the complex interaction between ozone depletion and global warming, Mr Barrie explained.

    “In the Antarctic, the impact of the ozone hole and the surface climate is becoming evident,” he said.

    “This leads to important changes in surface temperature and wind patterns, amongst other environmental changes.”

    CFCs are classified among greenhouse gases that cause global warming, so the phase out “provided substantial co-benefits by reducing climate change,” the report found.

    Mr Barrie estimated that it had avoided about 10 gigatonnes of such emissions a year.

    However, the ozone-friendly substances that have replaced CFCs in plastics or as refrigerants – hydrochlorofluorocarbons (HCFCs) and hydrofluorocarbons (HFCs) — are also powerful greenhouse gases.

    HFCs alone are regarded as 14,000 times more powerful than carbon dioxide (CO2), which is the focus of international efforts to tackle climate change, and HFC emissions are growing by 8 per cent a year, according to UN agencies.

    “This represents a further potential area for action within the overall climate change challenge,” said UN Environment Programme chief Achim Steiner in a statement.

    – AFP

    Tags: environment, climate-change, science-and-technology, united-states

    First posted 3 hours 38 minutes ago

  • Milne hopes for carbon price compromise

     

    Senator Milne has welcomed the changed approach, and says she had a useful meeting with the new Climate Change Minister Greg Combet.

    She told the 7:30 Report she used the meeting with Mr Combet to talk about introducing a carbon price.

    “It was my first opportunity since he was sworn in as Minister to sit down and talk with him about the whole issue of climate change, about renewables, energy efficiency and the carbon price,” she said.

    “They are things that he’s nominated publicly as things he wants to really progress.”

    She says no particular party won a mandate on climate change policy.

    “The advantage of this committee with experts means that you can talk about what is right, what is wrong with that position, what would work, what would not work,” she said.

    “Out of that, we hope to get a situation where we end up with a carbon price.”

    Tags: environment, climate-change, government-and-politics, federal-government, australia

  • World Bank invests record sums in coal

    World Bank invests record sums in coal

    Juliette Jowit, Observer environment editor

    16th September, 2010

    Last year, $3.4bn was invested in the dirtiest fossil fuel despite international commitments to cut emissions

    Record sums were invested last year in coal power – the most carbon intensive form of energy on the planet – by the World Bank, despite international commitments to slash the carbon emissions blamed for climate change.

    The World Bank said this week that a total of US$3.4bn (£2.2bn) – or a quarter of all funding for energy projects – was spent in the year to June 2010 helping to build new coal-fired power stations, including the controversial Medupi plant in South Africa. Over the same period the bank also spent $1bn (£640m) on looking and drilling for oil and gas.

    However, the Bank Information Centre, which examined the spending, disagreed and said the figure invested in coal was $4.4bn in the fiscal year 2009-10.

    The discrepancy is due to the World Bank not including in its figure a $1bn project in India which is funding power transmission networks for coal-fired power stations rather than the stations themselves.

    Environmental campaign groups said spending on coal in that period was 40 times more than five years ago, and claimed there was an ‘incoherence at the heart of the World Bank’s thinking about energy’ that would damage long term attempts to cut emissions of carbon and other greenhouse gases from such plants.

    ‘At the same time as the bank is seeking to gain control of the billions which will be channelled to developing countries to help them cope with global warming, the bank is still lending staggeringly large and growing sums to finance coal-fired power,’ said Alison Doig, senior advisor on climate change for the charity Christian Aid.

    ‘We know that coal is the dirtiest of all the fossil fuels – the one which most exacerbates the climate crisis which is having devastating effects on the lives of people living in poverty. We also know that by financing the building of coal power stations the bank is locking countries into coal use for the next 40 to 50 years [the life expectancy of the plants].’

    The World Bank defended its payments saying that the figures for 2010 were distorted by two major coal projects in Botswana and South Africa, while over the five year period from 2005 the bank had spent US$4.5bn on coal power, and $12.5bn on renewable energy and energy efficiency – including a record year for these sectors also last year.

    Coal plants were only subsidised when there were ‘exceptional circumstances where countries have few or no prospects for other energy sources,’ said Roger Morier, a World Bank spokesman.

    ‘Our energy portfolio is increasingly oriented to renewable energy and energy efficiency,” added Morier. “We are fulfilling our mandate of responding to the urgent needs of our client countries for access to efficient, reliable, affordable electricity, while also helping those countries to get on a low-carbon development path as soon as possible.’

    This article is reproduced courtesy of the Guardian Environment Network

  • Geothermal Energy Could Provide all the Energy the World Will Ever need

     

    “If we can drill and recover just a fraction of the geothermal heat that exists, there will be enough to supply the entire planet with energy – energy that is clean and safe,” says Are Lund, senior researcher at SINTEF Materials and Chemistry.

    Inexhaustible Source 

    Geothermal heat offers incredible potential. It is an inexhaustible energy source that is nearly emission-free. Heat energy is found in the different rock types that make up the Earth’s surface, and deeper in the crust. The deeper you get, the hotter it is.

    Around one-third of the heat flow comes from the original heat in the Earth’s core and mantle (the layer closest to the Earth’s crust). The remaining two-thirds originate in radioactivity in the Earth’s crust, where radioactive substances continuously decay and generate heat. The heat is transported to rock layers that are nearer the Earth’s surface. 

    Different Depths 

    Geothermal energy that comes from 150-200 metres below the surface is called low temperature geothermal energy. At these depths, temperatures hover between 6 and 8°C and can be extracted with heat pumps, combined with an energy well. This type of geothermal energy is exploited at a fairly large scale. 

    The Norwegian company Rock Energy wants to be an international leader in geothermal heat and energy. A pilot plant has been planned for Oslo that will collect heat from 5500 metres deep. Temperatures from this depth can heat water to 90-95°C and can be used in district heating plants. The pilot plant will be built in cooperation with NTNU, which is studying the thermal aspects of the plant.  (See illustration, left of a geothermal system as it is used today in Iceland, for example. In areas where the rocks are warmer, it is possible to simply fracture the rocks, as shown in the figure. Credit: Knut Gangåssæter/SINTEF.)

    The plan is to drill two wells, an injection well where cold water is pumped down, and a production well where hot water flows back up. Between these will be so-called radiator leads that connect the wells. The water is then exchanged with water in Hafslund’s district heating plant.

    The normal lifespan for a well like this is approximately 30 years. After that the rock will be so cooled by the cold water that has been injected into the wells that it will no longer produce enough heat. However, after 20-30 years, the heat will have built up again, and the well can be used once more. The Rock Energy facility will be a major step forward in exploiting Norway’s geothermal heat resources. 

    Supercritical Water 

    However, if we want to reduce CO2 emissions and provide clean energy on a scale that will make a difference, we will need go much further down into the Earth itself.

    Researchers at NTNU, the University of Bergen (UiB), the Geological Survey of Norway (NGU) and SINTEF believe this is possible. In 2009, deep geological energy enthusiasts formed the Norwegian Centre for Geothermal Energy Research (CGER), with partners from universities, colleges, research institutions and the industry.

    The researchers’ goal is to reach depths of 10,000 metres or more to exploit deep geothermal heat. Drilling that deep will enable wells to reach what is called supercritical water with a temperature of at least 374°C and a pressure of at least 220 bar. That multiplies by a factor of 10 the amount of energy you can extract from such an arrangement, and the amount of geothermal energy produced can match that created in a nuclear power plant.  (see lead image, which shows solutions for the future: At 10,000-15 000 meters, pressures and temperatures are intense enough to make the rocks plastic, causing any natural cracks to be pressed together. A method of generating geothermal energy from these depths might then be closed heat exchange systems. Credit: Knut Gangåssæter/SINTEF.)

    But there is a very important difference: Geothermal heat does not create radioactive waste. It is clean energy. 

    “If we manage to produce this kind of energy, it would clearly be a ‘moon landing’. This is one of the few sources of energy that we really have enough of. The only thing that we need is the technology to harvest it,” says researcher Odd-Geir Lademo at SINTEF Materials and Chemistry.

    Pros at 5000 Metres 

    Today’s oil companies are making a good living by extracting oil that is as deep as 5000 metres, where temperatures are as high as 170°C. Drilling any deeper than this results in a range of engineering problems, both in terms of the drilling itself and materials. Steel becomes brittle, and materials such as plastics and electronics will be weakened or melt. Electronics operate normally only a short time at temperatures hotter than 200°C. These problems will have to be solved for the deep geothermal industry to be profitable. 
    Nevertheless, SINTEF scientists think that Norway is in a unique position to capture geothermal heat. 

    “We have a strong and innovative oil industry this country. Because the oil industry has wanted to develop oil and gas deposits from inaccessible areas, drilling technology has evolved tremendously over the past ten years. There are test wells for oil that go 12,000 metres into the Earth. Knowledge from the oil and drilling industry may be used in the future to capture geothermal energy,” say Lund and Lademo. 

    The Norwegian drilling and oil and gas industries all demand equipment that makes it possible to drill ever deeper and to do so affordably. The oil fields that are being discovered now are generally deeper and more complicated than before. Even though there have been a number of wells in the world that have been drilled to 10-12,000 meters, the technology does not yet exist to allow for precision drilling at these depths. 

    “We have to have a common commitment. Multidisciplinary expertise is required. Here at Materials and Chemistry, we are working with an internally funded project in which we are assessing SINTEF’s overall ability to contribute. The goal is to work on projects with industry and the Research Council of Norway,” Lund said, adding, “If research and industry succeed in developing the materials and technology needed to bring up the most difficult-to-reach oil, in the long run we will be able to replace oil with geothermal energy for heating and electricity.” 

    Available Everywhere 

    One of the unique aspects of geothermal heat is that it is found everywhere throughout the world. Call it a “democratic” energy source that anyone can take advantage of, regardless of the conditions at the Earth’s surface, such as the weather.

    How far down you have to drill into the Earth’s crust to reach the temperature that you’re interested in varies from country to country. This is because the crust varies in thickness, and controls what is called the geothermal gradient. At more northerly latitudes, like Norway, the temperature increases by about 20 degrees per kilometre into the Earth’s crust. In other parts of the world, it is 40 degrees per kilometre. The average is around 25 degrees.

    The United States, the Philippines, Mexico, Indonesia and Italy are the international leaders in terms of producing electricity from geothermal energy. Iceland comes in at a surprising 8th place.

    Volcanic Activity 

    The fact that Iceland is on the list at all is because it is home to some of the most extensive volcanic activity in the world – and consequently has access to a great deal of  geothermal energy. Volcanic eruptions are too uncontrolled to allow their heat to be used for energy purposes. But weaker heat sources, such as geysers and hot springs, are used extensively both in Iceland and other countries with volcanic activity. 

    This places the country in a class by itself when it comes to using geothermal resources. Since 1930, Iceland has used geothermal energy for district heating, and today about 60 percent of the population is connected to geothermal heating in some way.

    Hundreds of holes have been drilled outside of Reykjavik to harness geothermal temperatures between 100 and 150°C. This warm water is transported to the capital through pipes with a diameter of 35 cm. The pipes are buried under roads, so that they keep the roads free of ice during the winter. Heat loss between the plant and Reykjavik is just 5°C. 

    Iceland is a Hot Testbed 

    “They’re now drilling for supercritical water in Iceland. Geothermal heat is so readily available, the country is essentially a laboratory and the biggest playground for the use of geothermal energy. We’re watching them closely to learn from their experiences,” said Lund.

    If geothermal energy is going to be produced on a scale that makes a difference in terms of energy demand worldwide, it will have to be produced everywhere – even without volcanic sources. These kinds of geothermal energy plants could then be placed near towns and energy intensive industries.

    More and more people beginning to realize that geothermal heating offers a viable energy alternative. The critical question is whether the technology required for deep, safe and economic drilling can be developed. 

    Enova Hesitates 

    Enova, a government-financed energy efficiency agency, is among the institutions and individuals who question the costs associated with producing geothermal energy. 

    “Deep geothermal heat from thousands of metres deep could be promising. But the cost picture here is still uncertain,” said Kjell Olav Skjølsvik, a senior adviser at Enova. 

    The organization has not ranked deep geothermal heat as a possible future energy source. “Many technologies are competing for this title, and we consider it more likely that a future energy system will use multiple sources and multiple technologies in a cost-effective mix,” says Skjølsvik. 

    However, Enova also recognizes the potential in geothermal energy, and has therefore granted support to Rock Energy’s project in Oslo. “We hope the project can help to clarify how mature the technology is, and help us figure out how to calculate the cost of deep geothermal heat in Norway,” says Skjølsvik. 

    “It Will Succeed” 

    Odd-Geir Lademo and Are Lund are not discouraged by these criticisms. They think it should be possible to unite industry, researchers and government to find solutions that are needed to harness the promise of geothermal heat. 

    “The oil and gas industry is conservative. To begin to develop geothermal energy from ten to twelve thousand metres deep will be expensive. But the benefits will also be enormous. That is why the industry will eventually begin to invest. In the 1960s, we were beginners when it came to pumping oil from the North Sea. Tackling that challenge was a huge boost in many ways. As a nation, we bet and we won,” says Lademo. 

    “I believe we can develop the knowledge we need about materials to get down to 300°C in ten years time. It might take 25 years or more of research and development to get down to 500°C,” Lund said, with agreement from Lademo.

    “We are convinced that this is possible. But it requires us to further develop existing technology. To do that requires money, a lot of money. Public funding is the key that’s needed to get the industry overall to invest. Geothermal energy is a unique opportunity for the oil industry to develop in a new way. They will come to realize this, it’s just a matter of time.”

    Unni Skoglund is a writer for GEMINI, the news source for research from NTNU and SINTEF

     

  • Our highly taxed and depived country folk, and other myths

     

    Leaving aside the sea change factor, people have been drifting from country to city for the best part of a century. Why? Because of the increasing mechanisation of agriculture. There is unceasing pressure for farmers to use more and better machines to replace human labour. Our farms produce more than they ever have, but need fewer people to do it.

    With the increased use of expensive machinery there’s continuing pressure for individual farms – including dairy farms – to be bigger to better exploit economies of scale. That is, for farmers to sell out to their bigger neighbour and find work elsewhere – in the nearest regional centre or in the state capital.

    The pressure comes in the form of their bigger neighbours being able to operate profitably despite falling real prices for their produce – prices at which smaller, less efficient producers can’t survive. Real prices fall not so much because of the rapacious behaviour of Woolworths and Coles but because market forces – competition between producers – cause the benefit of economies of scale to be passed on to end consumers (via the much traduced Woolies and Coles). In a well-functioning market economy it’s not the producers who win, it’s the consumers.

    Country people don’t enjoy seeing people leaving the district, and small farmers don’t enjoy being forced off the land. But are these long-standing trends a bad thing? They’re the product of the capitalist system (you’re not a socialist, are you?) and the technological advance it fosters and exploits (nor a Luddite?).

    The notion that the regions should be given a fair go is appealing, even to city slickers. But what is fair? Country people are convinced they’re being ripped off: they pay all this tax, but the city people spend most of it on themselves and send only a trickle back to the regions.

    One small problem: it ain’t true. For a start, on a per-person basis country people pay less tax than city people do. That’s because incomes in rural areas are generally lower and they have a higher proportion of retired people.

    What would be a fair distribution of government spending – equal amounts per person in country and city? Actually, governments spend more per person in the country than they do in the city. According to calculations by a government agency, spending on hospitals is 7 per cent higher in moderately accessible regions than in the highly accessible capital cities.

    In remote areas the cost differential per person rises to 14 per cent and in very remote areas to 44 per cent.

    For schools, spending per student is 12 per cent higher in moderately accessible regions, 34 per cent higher in remote areas and 60 per cent in very remote. The story for spending on policing is similar.

    But how is this possible when it’s so clear the quality of these services in country areas is less than the quality people receive in the city? It’s possible because the cost of delivering services in the regions is so much higher relative to the (small) number of people for whom the services are being provided (and relative to the number of country taxpayers).

    It’s much cheaper to deliver services to people when they’re all crammed together in a big city. Citysiders have economies of scale working for them, whereas country people have scale economies working against them. That’s no one’s fault, it’s just a fact of nature.

    When governments install some new and expensive facility in the big city, tens of thousands of people are able to take advantage of it and so reduce its cost per person (and per taxpayer). Were such a facility installed in some small town, the cost per person assisted would be remarkably high. Even if it were installed in a big regional centre, the cost per person would still be a lot higher.

    So now you know why facilities are so much better in the cities than in the region: hard economics. If you say that’s not fair and people in the country deserve equality in the quality of services provided, you’re saying you want city taxpayers’ subsidy to country taxpayers to be even greater than it is (so you are a socialist, are you?).

    Most Australians crowd into big cities and they do so for good reasons: more and better-paying jobs, plus better services, both public and private. They put up with the drawbacks of city living: much higher housing costs, unpleasant commuting, congestion, tar and cement, and less feeling of community.

    Country people prefer living in the regions for the opposite sets of reasons. It’s a free country and that choice is up to them.

    Ross Gittins is economics editor.

  • Mexico’s Push To Install 3,000 MW of Wind by 2014

     

    Another large undertaking is under way in Baja California where the Spanish electricity company Union Fenosa has teamed with US-based Sempra Energy to build two parks capable of generating 800 MW. However, their output will be siphoned across the border to California, not to Mexico’s grid. A slew of other smaller projects should add another 400 MW to the country’s power grid, observers say.

    Oaxaca Venture

    With 300,0000 inhabitants, Oaxaca is a windy region in Southern Mexico resting 1555 meters over the sea. The wind is so strong that 7,000 houses lost their roofs when a cold front passed through this past February.

    The upcoming project will see the installation of 13 to 14 wind parks to raise output to 2,500 MW by 2014. Of the 14 parks, only four are government sponsored. Overall, only 20% of all the planned wind power capacity installations will be bankrolled by the state. Some people worry that the government isn’t setting aside enough money to encourage more development.

    “We need more domestic funds to support these projects as most of them are project financed by international banks,” says Tejeda. “We also need a feed-in tariff and I hope the government will include this eventually.”

    Centeno says such an initiative is not currently on the drawing board, but that the current incentives are enough to attract foreign investors.

    That was also the view of Miguel Angel Alonso, director of Acciona Wind Power Mexico, who says the Oaxaca return rates are “very attractive.” He declined to talk about Acciona’s competitors’ projects or to comment on specific government policies to develop the wind industry, however. Acciona recently won a concession to build a 300 MW project in partnership with Mexican cement giant Cemex that will sell its electricity to the Comision Federal de Electricidad.

    Selling electricity directly to the state is rare. Around 80-90% of the turbines expected to tower across Mexico will feed corporate clients – so far Walmart and Cemex – with others expected to follow.

    Stronger Wind

    Tejeda says Acciona and the other Spanish firms will strike gold in Oaxaca. This is because the region’s wind flows more furiously than many other parts of the world.

    “Oaxaca has a lot more wind than Brazil or Europe so you get a higher output/cost benefit,” Tejeda explains, adding that the complex’s wind-turbine efficiency ratings stand at 40% compared to 20% in Spain, Denmark or Germany.

    Like Tejeda, Gustavo Camougnani, a Greenpeace campaigner, says the state must do more to support a domestic industry instead of allowing foreign firms to dominate in the market.

    “We need more of this energy to reach Mexicans, not just a bunch of rich corporates,” he says, noting Felipe Calderon administration’s current plans as having “little ambition.”

    “Wind blows harder in Mexico than other countries and it’s in fact much more abundant than in Spain. So why has Spain succeeded?” Cayuga asks. “They have invested, something that the Mexican government is failing do to because it still mainly sees itself as an oil producing country. It needs to change its mindset or it won’t develop its renewable energy potential.”

    If the government got more serious about wind, it could have as much as 43,300 MW of installed capacity by 2030, Camougnani predicts, citing Greenpeace studies.

    Tejeda was more positive about the government’s involvement, however, noting that the wind energy that will soon come online will help cut industrial CO2 emissions from growing industries. While the government could do more, “it has done a lot and the legal framework is in place.”

    He expects Mexico to continue to develop its wind market to someday supply 20% of its electricity needs, down from a meagre 1% currently.

    At least when compared to Latin American’s other wind giant, Mexico’s industry will rank second when Oaxaca is completed, Tejeda says. But certain technical glitches could delay the towering projects. Tejeda acknowledges many grid connection challenges remain and must be solved before Oaxaca comes online.

    “We don’t know how the grid is going to react once 2,000 MW suddenly switch in,” he says. “There is no experience about how to do this in Mexico but hopefully we will learn little by little.”