Race To Cut Vehicle CO2 Emissions

The EU is keen to push through proposals that would commit car manufacturers to limit new vehicles to carbon emissions of just 95g per kilometer (about the same as the current Toyota Prius) by 2020.

The proposals are still being voted on by MEPs (Not sure what the schedule is), but they are the EU's response to the US's recent commitment to 93g/km by 2025 (An enormous ask for a US car industry that has fought any and all emission cut plans for decades, but I'm sure they're up to it once they get over the denial stage).

Apart from helping out in the fight against climate change, it will also cut drivers' fuel bills, and create tens of thousands of new jobs. More here.

The only fly on the wind-screen is that car companies are becoming adept at fiddling the official emissions tests (See here). The EU need to sort that out quickly. A new test may be out by 2016 but the manufacturers are fighting it. Of course.

New Nuclear Plant Approved For UK

Hinkley B Power Station

The UK government has given the go-ahead for the first nuclear power plant to be built here for 25 years.

Although there's a lot to be sorted out before the build starts (like how much is to be paid for the electric it generates), it could be on-line by 2020.

The plant will be built by EDF at Hinkley Point in Somerset, which is already the site of 2 others. Once complete, it should provide enough power for 5 million homes, or about 20% of all homes.

Nuclear may not be ideal in many people's eyes (myself included) but it's the best, low carbon option for the job at the moment (as I explain here).

So, providing the government negotiates the right price for the energy, and the plant is delivered on schedule, I welcome it. I also hope there'll be a few more to follow.

Original news item here.

Germany: Looking For A Revolution

A few months ago I told you how Germany's rejection of nuclear power was driving it back towards coal-fired energy. Hardly ideal for such a green nation.

Now, however, it appears they are planning a green revolution by filling the gap left by nuclear with more solar and wind energy. Currently, renewables provide about a quarter of their electric. By 2050 they want it to be 80%!

That would be spectacular for renewables when you consider how intermittent some sources, like wind and solar, can be.

I was wondering how they were going to achieve this. Well, the answer may lie here, a 6 page report from German company Siemens.

Apparently the plan has the following elements:

• Make the cost of renewables competitive with coal.
• Build a network of highly efficient electricity transmission lines.
• Developing and expanding energy storage (to store the energy that can't be used immediately from solar and wind, for later use when there is demand).
• Build high-efficiency, quick start gas power stations to fill in when there's a shortage of supply from intermittent sources.
• Make coal-fired more efficient... (Ah, so there will be new coal!)
• Carbon capture and re-use.
• Smart grids (see my earlier post)
• Energy efficiency (To reduce demand in the first place).
• Balancing demand with supply (an example here)
• Cost effective financing for energy reduction

I wish the Germans luck with this bold and well thought out plan. It's nothing short of what the world will need to do if and when we decide to tackle climate change.

Geoengineering and Cirrus Clouds

The picture on the left is of cirrus clouds - The beautiful, feathery, high altitude clouds we all know and love.

Unfortunately, the more of them there are, the warmer the planet. This is because they're actually made of tiny ice crystals which trap heat in the atmosphere.

They're not the root cause of the climate change (that would be CO2) but it's been realised that, by dispersing enough of them, we could balance out all the warming effect we've had so far....

It was David Mitchell of the Reno Desert Research Institute that suggested the original cloud-busting idea back in 2009. Now Trudo Storelvmo and his team from Yale University have used climate modelling to test the idea. By adding powdered bismuth triiodide into the layer of the atmosphere where cirrus form, it greatly reduced their occurrence. Done on a global scale it would wipe out the 0.8 degrees C of man-made warming made so far.

Unfortunately, if you get the concentration wrong (always possible in something as dynamic and complex as the real atmosphere), it would have the opposite effect. Not good.

Even if we did understand enough about the atmosphere to safely achieve the effect we wanted safely: a) We'd have to continue doing it year after year; b) It wouldn't make climate change go away. It would just continue building (as CO2 levels keep increasing) until our efforts we're cancelled out; c) Ocean acidification, which could have disastrous effects on marine life, would continue to increase unabated.

So much for that idea then.

[Source: New Scientist 26th Jan 2013]

Poles Apart

Poland has been to the European Court of Justice (ECJ) arguing that the European Union's mechanism for cutting CO2 emissions across the EU was unfair to them. This is because the EU's system uses natural gas-based benchmarks whilst Poland's economy is run almost exclusively on coal (See picture).

Basically this means that, when the EU hand out allowances under it's Emissions Trading System (ETS), Poland won't be getting enough. Effectively driving up the price of their energy year after year and raising the prices of goods and services. Of all the 27 countries in the EU, they will end up being hit hardest by the ETS.

The ECJ dismissed their complaint, saying the EU had not acted unfairly.

The Poles, understandably, were dismayed by the verdict and are considering whether to appeal.

Whilst I understand their reluctance to drop coal (They have lots of it and it's very cheap), they should just accept the inevitable and do just that. The EU was already commited to dramatically cutting carbon emissions before the Poles joined. Regardless of how this was to be done, Poland would have to make big changes anyway. Or did they think they'd be exempt?

Instead of fighting it (They've already vetoed EU plans to cut emissions faster. See here), they should start working out how to make the switch now. They could begin that by talking to one of their own major energy providers, PGE, who already have ideas in that direction.

At the end of the day, whilst the transition may be painful, they can console themselves that they will be playing their part in sparing future generations of Poles the nightmare of climate change.

More background here.

Renewable Heating For Glasgow

As you may know, the Industrial Revolution started in Britain. In many ways it's what put the "Great" into Britain during the 19th century. Underpinning it all was the fact that we had huge resources of coal on which our various industries (and rail system) were based.

So the unsung heroes of the Revolution were hundreds of thousands of coal miners, who toiled away in appalling and often dangerous conditions for the benefit of the nation. Without their sacrifices I doubt we'd be the economic power we are now.

A couple of centuries after it all began, the UK has closed most of it's coal mines because they're uneconomical and with them went most of the mining jobs. This had a pretty devastating effect on many of the local communities and, sometimes, they never recovered.

But now it seems, many of the abandoned mines could gain new life and, maybe, give something back to those local communities.....

Glasgow has many such abandoned mines under it, most of which are flooded. This simple fact has an unexpected benefit: The water, cool though it is, has enough heat in it for ground source heat pump technology to provide heating for houses. In fact, it's been doing this for 17 homes in Glasgow for the last decade.

Now Glasgow city council and the British Geological Survey (BGS) have joined forces to find out if this can be extended to more homes. The BGS have been mapping the extent of the mines and believe that it's possible for them to provide up to 40% of the city's heating. Not only that but, during the summer, the heating process can be reversed to provide cooling for buildings like hospitals.

The BGS also say that, with abandoned, flooded mines underlying many towns and cities across Britain, the technology could be rolled out to them as well, cutting heating bills for thousands of people at a time when fuel costs are going out the roof.

Some more background here.