Thursday, June 30, 2016

Our Renewable Future 2

Let’s start with a mind blocking illustration from the book we are penetrating:

Combine harvesters in 1902 and 2014

What we will discuss now is not putting horses in front of the modern tractor or the harvester – instead how we will go on with as much as possible of what we have today. The old picture is based on the fact that ¼ of the farmer’s production or fields must be set aside for the horses – and in the food system we have, that is not possible. But we must find other ways of pulling the machinery than fossil fuel!

And some malicious readers thought the ending picture last column was to indicate that wind power doesn’t work – oh, no! It was only to indicate that we possibly need some thinking about how solar and wind technologies must develop further – maybe away from, expensive and very vulnerable (esp. in a changing climate) modern super high technology. We find in the book such questions about “appropriate technologies”. And, actually, we are not new to wind power, for instance, but formerly it was more local, domestic and simple than today’s high tech.

To be brief when presenting an important and mind setting new book isn’t easy or not even intelligent. You might loose more supporters than gain some. The authors are very balanced and only trying to open our minds for a necessary switch from fossil to renewable energy. Fossil is finite and soon out – what sustainable substitutes do we have and what levels of sustainability can be reached (and what the costs)? What changes to our infrastructure must be made and what can we afford both environmentally and economically (with receding finances due to climate change and end of cheap energy)?

So let’s see what the authors have come up with, but unfortunately briefly – the interested reader will have to find the book OR use the internet to find the newly released free on net version.

The book’s introduction is very interesting and was used by me intensively for the first part of the about 3 planned. It is extensively illustrated by pictures, tables and diagrams, most of them up to latest findings from involved agencies and researchers. Depending on space, I’ll be happy to give some examples now and then. The one below is basic – if we want to know what has happened since 1950/60 when we were somewhat in balance with extraction and use of energy – well, enough to start thinking about what to do if we exceeded limits (and many researchers was warning in books like “Limits for Our Existence” already in 1962). As you see from the diagram, the global tipping point (100 exajoules) was passed about 1960 – we missed that chance and cannot survive missing our last chance, for sure!


Figure I.3. World primary energy consumption by fuel type, 1850–2014. Primary electricity converted by direct equivalent method.

The author of the book mentioned above, Prof Georg Borgström, gave us architecture/planning students a lecture in 1963 or 64 and his conclusion never left me – “we have just a few years to decide our future – you better start thinking how buildings and towns should look like for the future”.

Chapter 1 – Energy 101 starts with a statement: It is impossible to overstate the importance of energy. Without it we can do literally nothing. And further – modern civilization’s energy use (including climate change), together with the inevitable energy transition from fossil fuels to renewables will be the defining trends for this century.

The chapter is very educational and ought to be among the texts for our younger students as it explain the ”Basics of Basics” of what is energy. I’m sure the Boidus readers know the laws of thermodynamics, net energy and EROEI (Energy Return On Energy Invested), LCA (life cycle analysis) and operational and embodied energy (carbon footprints). Consequently I don’t have to repeat those basics (as I have written about them in earlier Boidus columns) but for the new readers, this chapter is basic.

Chapter 2 about our current energy system is also very basic for the observant reader and very much a lived experience due to the confidence we have/had for so called “colonial sciences”. But we are given some interesting figures, indeed:  the world is presently using about the equivalent of 100 billion barrels of oil a year!

If that is translated to human muscle energy ( and an average human can generate around 100 watt-hours of energy). Working 8 hours 5 days a week for a year (no holidays), a hard worker would produce 208,000 watt hours (or 208 kilowatt-hours). World annual energy usage thus equals the annual energy output 734.4 billion humans. Then you understand how many “energy muscle slaves” we would need to keep todays standard for the developed, industrial countries. Up to the industrial revolution, we were basically depending on feudal serfs and slaves and we don’t want to go back to those times for some “progress”, do we?

On Energy Rich – Energy Poor the authors note that some countries use a lot more of energy than people in others. In fact, there is an obvious connection between energy inequality and economic inequality (not a self evident note from US writers, sorry to say). Even in between highly industrialized countries- for instance, Germany enjoy a high standard of living, yet use only a little more than half as much energy (per capita) as citizens of the United States and Canada.(see below):


Figure 2.3. Per capita gross domestic product and energy consumption of various countries, 2012.
Source: World Bank, World Development Indicators

Well, in short, the end of the fossil fuel era does not simply imply the era of energy inequality! To make it more serious, the middle to poor income countries will have a huge problem in raising finance for the evident need for renewable energy. We have to read further in the book we have for another part 3, planned for the August issue of Boidus Focus.

Now we are going to Sweden for the marriage of my child boy, now 30 years old! What kind of future will he and his family have? A fossil fuel empty world or a renewable energy world, I’m worried.


Jan Wareus 28/06/2016



Our Renewable Future




This picture from a modern solar farm is borrowed from a very interesting new book:
“Our Renewable Future” by Richard Heinberg and David Fridley, Fellows of the Post
Carbon Institute in the US.

I find the book so important that I like to share some of its narrative with the
development professionals and readers of Boidus – very condensed and abridged, of
course, but hopefully enlightening for its readers.

Ugo Bardi, professor at the University of Florence in Italy and vividly writing and
blogging about resource depletion, system modeling, climate science and renewable
energy writes about this book:

“The future of renewable energy is obscured by ignorance, noise, ideology, and all
sorts of misconceptions. Our Renewable Future describes the reality: the transition is
possible, but it wont be easy.”

According to the authors they have been ‘tiptoeing’ through the renewable minefield
and consequently they are presenting the mainstream (boosters) as well as dissident
views (critics) on the renewable energy complex that we must handle when heading
to a renewable future, whether we are ready or not. Depending on how quickly and
intelligently we move the transition along, daily life could improve or deteriorate
significantly, but will never be the same, we understand from the authors analysis.
Energy is embedded in so many aspects of modern life and we need serious
discussions about the future of economy, consumerism and economic justice and
equity. And new skills and concepts are needed for the development professionals
and physical planners re. buildings, construction, infrastructure, urban design and
communication. It is also important to revise, change and transform contemporary
technologies and its problematic footprint in the developed world - a tremendous task
to reach a sustainable post-modern future. It must be remembered that all we in the
industrialized world have built so far is to suit the characteristics of fossil fuel and a
change of mind is needed!

Apart from these general basics, we have to make the transition away from fossil
fuels that are soon depleted and on the way out (and nuclear power is not a realistic
substitute) and successfully re-think and re-tool how we use energy – and how much
we use – not just its source. When bio-fuel is basically out (except for aviation and a
few farmers with suitable waste) - you remember the report that stated the simple
fact that even if every tilled field on earth is producing bio-fuel instead of food, it will
only be enough for our present communications and fracking also soon out as hyped
up way of “scraping the drums” (as oil professionals say – and delusions about Saudi
America), leaves renewable solar and wind, for better or for worse, as society’s
future energy sources. The inevitable transition of technologies and the fact that
renewable energy will not possibly meet future ‘eternal growth’ but possibly a
restricted but decent standard level of what we now have, will also force us to live
differently – more sustainable and in accordance with the resources he have and can
recycle for the future.

As I see it, a transition to a renewable future is necessary for the existence of
humans and most life on earth. We are already experiencing the climate change with
all its consequences, created by the blindfolded industrial society and already many
limits are reached or are very soon reached – so called tipping points for continued
safe life on earth. Unprecedented hurricanes, flooding and droughts are everyday
happening where it shouldn’t happen, distress, calamity, hunger and death are
everyday news and all created by burning of fossil fuel. We have a responsibility to
arrest as much of this as possible. At least not enhance the problems we have
created. But this is not an easy task as the decisions are political and unfortunately,
the debate is already quite polarized and politicized. As a result, realism and nuance
may not have much of a constituency. I guess it’s time for emergency committees
and political crisis coalitions instead of the usual party overbids on eternal growth
and progress.

However, everything is not well in the renewable energy field – the majority of the
solar and wind supporters are delusive albeit they disdain fossils and nukes and are
convinced that solar and wind have unstoppable momentum and will eventually bring
with them lower energy prices and millions of jobs, contrary of those who say that
intermittent energy sources are inherently incapable of sustaining modern industrial
societies and can be build only with massive government subsidies as being “not
bankable” any longer.

Despite the conclusions stated above, the authors didn’t set out to support or
undermine these two messages. Instead they made a thorough account and analysis
of what renewable energy sources are capable of doing and how a transition toward
them is going – there were only two basic assumptions. Fossil fuels are soon history
and nuclear power unrealistic in the long run.

It is interesting to examine the large scale use of solar and wind power as basis for
industry and national power grids. I will in coming columns highlight some disturbing
facts among many positive developments that I happened to find on various sites like
e.g. Resilience, Post Carbon Institute and many personal blogs by dissident energy
experts.

It is positive that that a few countries have taken the first steps on the “renewal
road”. We will have a quick look in coming columns and now I like to conclude this
text with some basic points from Our Renewable Future book we are dealing with:


  •  We have developed much during the industrial period and most was undertaken
with the tacit assumption that societies always have more fossil energy with which
to maintain and operate its ever expanding infrastructure – without any long-
range planning guiding. The fossil-fueling of the economy happened bit by bit,
each new element building on the last, with opportunity leading to innovation.
What was technically possible became economically necessary…and hence
normal;
  •  There is a problem with the mindset with most of modern (voting) man – the ignorance of the realities of changing conditions for the future. Solar, wind, hydro and geothermal generators produce electricity, and we already have an abundance of technologies that rely on electricity. So why should we need to change the ways we use energy? Presumably all that’s necessary is to unplug coal power plants, plug in solar panels and wind turbines and continue living as we do currently, they seem to think;
  •  But the next few decades are forced to to see a profound and all-encompassing energy transformation throughout the world. Whereas society now derives the great majority of its energy from fossil fuels, by the end of the century we will depend primarily on renewable sources like solar, wind, biomass and geotechnical power.
  •  How would a 100% renewable world look and feel? How might a future generation move through a typical day without using fossil fuels either directly or indirectly? Where will the food come from? How will they move from place to place? What will the buildings they inhabit look like, and how will those buildings function? Visions of the future are always wrong in detail and often even in broad strokes; but sometimes they can be wrong in useful ways. Development professionals, architects and planners must start thinking about this to avoid too many mistakes done now that will constitute hindrances for a well functioning renewable future!
Our renewable future will have many problems and a few energy projects are already after some years indicating massive over-cost implications, doubtful environmental consequences and failures not predicted after just a few years of testing. We have to deal with these as well as the positive experiences in the next column.



After 19 years of facing the wind, this German turbine fell to it. It’s starting to happen a lot. It is estimated that more than 1000 turbines of the existing 25000 must be decommissioned every year at an enormous cost due to aging.




Jan Wareus       16/06/2016
janwareu@yahoo.com