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by craigshieldsPosted on Posted in Renewables - Science

Here’s a sarcastic conversation I’m having with a friend in Baltimore that I post for your amusement:

Craig: Got some wicked storms back there!

Friend: Brutal. Spent the weekend with the chainsaw, cutting up trees that fell in the road. Probably one of the worst storms I’ve ever witnessed in Baltimore. 95 mph winds – and not from a hurricane. The heat wave’s been brutal, too. Not used to this 100 + degree heat for more than a day or two.

Craig: Wow, what could be causing these extreme weather events? 🙂 Just kidding.

Friend: Haha. Now Craig, it’s perfectly normal for Baltimore to have nearly two straight weeks of temperatures above 100, and massive storms with 95 mph winds ripping trees up out of the ground. Perfectly normal. 🙂

Craig: Yes, and last winter, when it didn’t even get chilly, no reason for alarm there either. 🙂

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All kidding aside, even a small increase in temperature can have profound effects on weather. Warm air holds more moisture than cool air, thus is less dense (since the gaseous water molecule is lighter than the nitrogen molecule that makes up most of our air). Like a helium balloon, the moist air rises, then cools and condenses into clouds, while the low-pressure area it leaves below causes wind. The warmer the air is, the faster and more intensely all this happens.

 

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by craigshieldsPosted on Posted in Renewables - Business

Here’s Tom Friedman’s op-ed in yesterday’s NY Times. As always, I agreed with most of it. But I point out two things:

1) He has a keen mind — one with which he has done quite well — but his popularity is largely based on tuning his writing towards optimism. I’m sorry to sound suspicious of others’ motives, but I often wonder about his sincerity; I find it hard to believe that, in the pit of his stomach, that he’s not as frightened as you and I as to humankind’s future. Friedman routinely comes up with deus ex machina concepts that he posits as the forces that will restore the U.S. to her former greatness and provide Americans with the ever-improving quality of life that we enjoyed through most of the 20th Century. (more…)

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by craigshieldsPosted on Posted in Renewables - Politics

A few weeks ago, I wrote a post about the State of Vermont in which I recalled a conversation I had with my father when I was a little boy. We were talking about his impressions of the people who lived in the states within driving distance of us in Philadelphia, and he came out with this pearl: “If you’re not from Vermont, they don’t really want you in Vermont.”

I laughed when I heard it, and it’s certainly not true as a general statement,  but I’ve come to see the point he was trying to make.  Vermonters tend to be self-styled, much like the French, I suppose one could say; they don’t ask permission to be fiercely independent on the issues that concern them. (more…)

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by craigshieldsPosted on Posted in Energy Storage

I’m joining some friends in a few minutes for a sushi dinner. This reminds me of the adage about our production and consumption of energy, which, for all intents and purposes, is the only supply chain in the world without storage. “Even sushi enjoys more and better storage than energy,” the people at Eos write on their website.

And it’s a good point. Imagine the price we’d pay for a piece of yellow fin tuna sashimi if it had to be consumed the moment the fish was caught and processed.

Our entire grid is built around a peak energy load that extends 100 hours per annum – just over 1% of the year. Imagine the benefit not having to fire up power generation plants for those few moments.

 

 

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by craigshieldsPosted on Posted in Renewables - Business

I’m happy to note that I just scheduled an interview for my next book with a gentleman I’ve been in touch with for some time: Stuart L. Smits, CEO of Citizen Green Energy. Among other things, Stuart follows utility regulation very closely, and will be a terrific source of information on one of the most important factors in the migration to alternative energy, i.e., the cleaning up of what is often described as the “Byzantine” manner in which our power utilities function. (more…)

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by craigshieldsPosted on Posted in Electric Vehicles

I just pulled back into the driveway with the first car purchase I’ve made in 15 years. My 1995 BMW 540-i died last week after 248,000 loyal miles; it was a true friend, and I’ll miss it.

Needless to say, I wasn’t looking to replace it with another eight-cylinder monster. Accelerating a 4000-pound mass of steel from 0 – 60 in 5.9 seconds used to impress me; it no longer does.  And the bigger BMWs now weigh closer to 6000 pounds, and get about 20 MPG.

I bought a 2009 VW Jetta (I never buy new cars on general principles of frugality) 6-speed diesel, noting that most drivers get close to 50 MPG.  I considered the Prius, of course, which gets about the same mileage, but I think I like this a bit better.  I’m hoping that my next car will be an EV, which I’ll charge with PV on my roof, but this just wouldn’t work in my current station in life, with fairly frequent trips from my home near Santa Barbara, California to San Francisco, about 250 miles north, and San Diego about the same distance south.

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by craigshieldsPosted on Posted in Biofuels

In June’s webinar, I interviewed Robert Orr, CEO of Landhi.  The manure from 400,000 buffaloes in a tightly confined area of Southern Pakistan is creating one of the worst ecological disasters and threats to human health on the planet.  A talented team of people stands ready to expand their pilot plant that is currently creating small but predictable amounts of compost, liquid fertilizer and biogas up to the scale necessary to tackle the problem, while generating an income stream of over $100 million annually. (more…)

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by craigshieldsPosted on Posted in Climate Change

Frequent commenter and old friend Arlene Allen writes:

Long cycle events don’t get the attention of the vast majority of us humans. We’re too used to being able to mitigate a situation in real time.

That’s precisely right. We’re not good at long-range planning on our best day, and this is not even a half-decent day, with moneyed interests aggressively distracting us from the grim realities we face.

It would be nice if our leaders would actually lead in this arena, but that’s impossible for two reasons:

1) They’re put into power by those moneyed interests; they’re simply doing what they’re told, and

2) Even if that weren’t the case, the electorate has no appetite for pain. Even absent of the corruption, they will not elect someone whose platform calls for austerity. The party will continue until the liquor runs out.

 

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by craigshieldsPosted on Posted in Renewables - Science

Duke Brooks asks:

Renewable/green energy without question is the future; the question is: When, exactly, does that future begin?

Here are a few ways I would choose to frame this:

The vast majority of our scientists tell us that climate change is already manifest, evidenced by the startling increase in extreme weather events, the melting of the glaciers, the measurable rises in the sea levels, etc. (more…)

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by craigshieldsPosted on Posted in Renewables - Politics

There’s plenty of bad news in the world, and maybe I should think twice before offering more.  But those of us following the legal proceedings around the U.S. Supreme Court decision “Citizens United” were disappointed by yesterday’s high court ruling shooting down Montana’s attempt to re-assert some level of fairness and democracy to the laws of the land. Linked above is a good article on the subject.

Though this may appear to be off-topic from our conversation on renewable energy, I urge readers to look more closely. To the degree that the mega-corporations can spend as much money as they choose to influence our elections, none of the major issues that threaten big, immediate profits, whether they’re in energy, food, pharmaceuticals, or whatever, stand a snowball’s chance in hell.

 

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