Electricity Transformation - part 3

Timeframe for Completion

I certainly hope ACEEE’s projection will be realized, and will work to be part of the effort. However, it may be too soon to declare that’s going to happen. Not everyone is on board and some fiercely oppose this movement.

The report titled “REN21 Renewables Global Futures Report” shows the stark difference in future renewable projections among different industries and viewpoints. Not surprisingly, large oil companies such as Exxon Mobile project renewable share in electricity production will be still 16% even in 2040. (In this report, DOE target in one of the figures shows similar number). Environmental organizations such as Greenpeace pictures it’s share reaches 61% in 2030 and 94% in 2050.

People and groups who are between those two extremes are increasingly shifting their positions. For example, IEA(International Energy Agency), who used to publish conservative lower projections, started to project higher figure. Their most aggressive projection shows 31-48% renewables by 2035 and 57-71% by 2050.

Building industry is another example. An article in Builder Magazine, “Energy Use Projections for U.S. Buildings are down sharply” explains:

Since 2005, the U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) has published its projections for energy consumption by buildings. Its 2011 projection for residential and commercial buildings, which it released recently, is nearly 70% less than its projection in 2005 (see chart).

Using its latest calculations, EIA estimates that consumers will spend $3.66 trillion less on energy between 2012 and 2030 than EIA projected in 2005 that they would spend over that period. And if the country’s architects and builders adopt the most efficient building technologies, those savings would exceed $6 trillion.

In its 2011 projection, EIA estimates that while building floor area would increase by nearly 39%, ... And if the building sector uniformly applied the best-available technology, energy consumption would actually decline by 9.2% and CO2 emissions would recede by 16.5% (see chart).

The article further states that 50% to 80% of a building’s energy consumption can be reduced through design. With all things considered, 25% reduction in 10 to 15 years appears reasonable. That’s enough to eliminate nuclear production. In order to eliminate coal and natural gas as well, we need substantial increase in production side of sustainable energy.

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Electricity Transformation - part ２

Description of Each Renewable Energy Source

I will explore energy efficiency as I believe it must be the first priority. Just like in nation's debt reduction or personal finance, if money is wasted foolishly and nobody pays attention to curve the spending, problem will continue and likely result in sudden bankruptcy. This is true even with some revenue increase. Building asset takes time while depleting it can happen quickly. Improving energy efficiency is like understanding your cash flow and balance sheet, setting up budget and paying off your debts.

Based on Rockfeller Foundation published paper titled “United States Building Energy Efficiency Retrofits”, over 3,033 Trillion Btu (roughly 900 million MWh) of energy can be saved by investing $279 billion to energy efficient retrofit for residential and commercial buildings in US, which would save $1 trillion over 10 years period in return. Commercial sector savings in this paper, published in March 2012, is 1,141 TBtu. DOE website currently states they strive to reduce commercial sector consumption by at least 1,600 TBtu, which is higher than one by projected in Rockfeller paper.

ACEEE(American Council for an Energy-Efficient Economy), in it’s report titled “The Long-Term Energy Efficiency Potential”, suggests by improving building shells, residential and commercial sectors can reduce 40-60% of heating and cooling loads in existing buildings and 70-90% in new buildings. DOE states over 50% of energy in buildings are used for cooling and heating. This suggests, roughly speaking, more than 25% of energy used in build environments can be reduced by improving building shells alone. That equivalents to over 1 billion MWh we don’t need to produce every year.

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Electricity Transformation - part 1

I have been taking some interesting courses through Coursera. "Global Sustainable Energy" was one of them. I wrote following as one of the homework assignments last June. Energy climate is rapidly changing. Data I gathered here is already outdated - for better I may add. What I wrote seems widely accepted now.

Introduction

According to EIA data, the US generated roughly 4 billion KWh of electricity in 2012. Its breakdown by source indicates about 68% was from fossil fuel sources (coal, natural gas, and petroleum). Below is the total breakdown:

• Coal 37%
• Natural Gas 30%
• Nuclear 19%
• Hydropower 7%
• Other Renewable 5%
• Biomass 1.42%
• Geothermal 0.41%
• Solar 0.11%
• Wind 3.46%
• Petroleum 1%
• Other Gases < 1%

Coal use, although still the biggest single source, has declined from 48% of total electricity generated in 2008 to 37% in 2012. The same data shows the percentage of natural gas rose from 21% to 30% during the same period. Many argue that natural gas simply displaced the portion of coal because coal become too expensive while natural gas became cheap; I won’t disagree. But, what about the causes behind coal’s increased cost? Higher quality coal near the Earth’s surface had been mostly mined out. Evidence implicating coal’s role in pollution and environmental damage was piling up. Many voiced concerns that translated to tighter regulation, which led to expensive coal power. Coal was no longer cheap and abundant, and so lost its market appeal.

The fossil fuel industry’s solution was to select the easiest and quickest replacement: natural gas. As it produces less CO2 and other pollutants than coal, it was misleadingly tagged as “clean fuel.” Faced with taking lesser evil situation, most are accepting natural gas. However, there are many concerns remain. Industry and major media emphasize the benefit and pushing for transportation use and export while downplaying and possibly covering up the long term environmental and health risk.  

Coal and natural gas, both fossil fuel, will cease to supply our energy economically probably a lot sooner than most want to believe. Best solution forward is to stop wasting the energy we are paying dearly by improving efficiency, and develop renewable resources which pose far less environmental risk and very low operational cost for long term.

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春です。日本では桜前線が北上中とか。こちらではRedbudが満開です。

昨日まで出ていた雷雨の予報は外れたようで、雨が降った形跡なし。日照りが続いていて各地の貯水池は60〜70%のキャパのはず。すでに節水レベル3だから、頼みの春に雨がふらないと、夏をどうやって乗り越えるのか。いままで節電の対策はほぼできることはやってきたので、今年のフォーカスは節水、、、かな。

花粉舞い　雨ふらず　空を見上げて　ため息をつく