10/29 green.yahoo.com

Please add updates@feedmyinbox.com to your address book to make sure you receive these messages in the future. green.yahoo.com Why Obama's $3.4 billion smart-grid investment matters October 28, 2009 at 1:07 pm The DeSoto Next Generation Solar Energy Center in Florida will be large enough to serve the entire city of Arcadia, whose very name suggests some kind of modern-day post-oil paradise. Here's what the 25-megawatt facility, the largest solar installation in the U.S. with 90,000 solar panels, looks like on video: But there are clouds in the solar sky, and its name is the electric grid. President Obama, in Arcadia on October 27, was only too happy to align himself with hopeful symbols like Arcadia and its promise of 100 percent clean utilities producing renewable electricity. But he also used it as the backdrop for the announcement of $3.4 billion in stimulus funding for the smart grid. It's desperately needed. The DeSoto Next Generation Solar Energy Center: Needs a smart grid. (Florida Power & Light rendering) As Obama pointed out, "To realize the full potential of this plant and others like it, we've got to do more than just add extra solar megawatts to our electrical grid. That's because this grid-which is made up of everything from power lines to generators to the meters in your home-still runs on century-old technology. It wastes too much energy, it costs us too much money, and it's too susceptible to outages and blackouts." Obama made an appropriate analogy -- to the tangle of roads that existed in the U.S. before the interstates were announced (as a defense measure!) by President Eisenhower in the 1950s. "It was a tangled maze of poorly maintained back roads that were rarely the fastest or the most efficient way to get from point A to point B," he said, and that is the grid today: local power plants and small regional networks, barely capable of communicating with other grids or even with their own customers. This is a huge challenge if we truly want to switch to renewable energy, because the wind and sun are located in inconvenient places such as east Texas and North Dakota. One of the reasons T. Boone Pickens killed his massive Texas wind farm was because the grid just couldn't deliver his plentiful energy. Obama: Plugged in. (Photo: NASA) The smart grid is also crucial to make the switch from gas-guzzlers to electric cars because plugging millions of EVs into the peak usage times in the current infrastructure is a recipe for melted transformers and blackouts. But electricity is use it or lose it, and we're currently wasting billions of kilowatt-hours at night when there's low demand. With a smart grid, customers will have pricing incentives to charge only in late evening, and touch-screens in their cars (as well as cell phone apps) to make setting up a charge as easy as programming a VCR (well, easier than that). The Obama Administration outlined how the money will be spent: $1 billion for empowering consumers to cut bills and use off-peak electricity through giving them access to smart meters and dynamic pricing schemes; $400 million for improving electricity distribution, transmission and stability with digital monitoring and increased grid automation; $2 billion for enabling the optimum use of smart meters, appliances and thermostats, all in the interest of helping components of the Smart Grid to play better with other parts. This fund, the bulk of the stimulus package, will also help communications with plug-in hybrid cars and battery-electric vehicles, as well as with renewable energy sources. $25 million for expanding a manufacturing base for smart meters, transformers and appliances-though such a small amount of money is unlikely to go all that far. The $3.4 billion includes funding for a million in-home smart meters, 170,000 smart thermostats and 175,000 other "load control devices. It's also supposed to jump-start a market for smart appliances, though just how isn't spelled out. The Obama administration said this project will leverage $4.7 billion in private investment and, of course, create tens of thousands of green jobs. The administration has gotten quite adept at that claim, and with our current dismal job prospects such employment is sorely needed. Where is Van Jones when we need him? More from The Daily Green Why We Must Upgrade to a Smart Grid Ford's Better Idea: EVs and Intelligent Charging Fuel Cells or Electric Cars? GE Unveils a Glimpse of the Coming Smart Grid Seven Signs the New Energy Economy Is Here Reprinted with permission of Hearst Communications, Inc True or false? Carbon cap and trade will create jobs October 28, 2009 at 9:31 am Factcheck.org is one of The Daily Green's trusted sources of information. Here's one of its latest, all about the advertising war raging over the assertion that carbon cap-and-trade legislation will create -- or destroy -- jobs. A TV ad sponsored by business groups claims a bill to curb carbon emissions "will cost up to 2.4 million U.S. jobs" if enacted. That directly contradicts claims by President Obama and his allies who say the bill would create jobs -- 1.7 million of them according to one TV spot. Who's right? It's true that limiting carbon emissions would create some jobs -- building wind turbines or insulating homes and businesses, for example. But it's equally true that raising the cost of burning coal and oil would act as a drag on the entire economy, slowing down job creation in other industries. According to projections by the Energy Information Administration (EIA) and the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office (CBO), the net effect of the House cap-and-trade bill will likely be to slow future job growth. Using 11 different possible future scenarios, EIA projects that future job growth might be constrained by something between 388,000 (under the most optimistic assumptions) and 2.3 million (assuming everything goes badly) 20 years from now. CBO also says employment would likely be lower than it would without the legislation -- but only "a little." So claims that the bill would create hundreds of thousands of "green jobs" are misleading, at best. The government's own official economic projections indicate more jobs will be lost than created. The National Association of Manufacturers ad gets the trend line right by predicting job losses, but strains the evidence as to the magnitude. The 2.4 million figure might turn out to be true -- but only under the most negative set of assumptions. And EIA says those assumptions are "inherently less likely" than other scenarios. Analysis Opponents of the American Clean Energy and Security Act (H.R. 2454), which passed the House in June, and the Clean Energy Jobs and American Power Act (S. 1733), which was introduced in the Senate in September, say the bills would lead to significant job losses. Supporters, on the other hand, say the bills would actually create a lot of new jobs. The claims that hundreds of thousands of "green jobs" lie at the end of the cap-and-trade rainbow were a staple of President Obama's 2008 presidential campaign, and they've continued to appear in TV ads sponsored by former Vice President Al Gore's "Repower America" campaign as well as those of other groups. More recently, business interests have begun a counter-attack. More recently, business interests have begun a counter-attack. A job "killer" The National Association of Manufacturers (NAM), with the National Federation of Independent Business and several small local business associations, launched an advertising campaign in August that painted the House bill as a job killer that "will cost up to 2.4 million U.S. jobs." That figure was based on a report commissioned by NAM and the American Council for Capital Formation which estimated that the bill could cause between 1.8 million and 2.4 million job losses by 2030. More recently, EnergyCitizens.org, an alliance of mostly conservative and business groups including NAM and the American Petroleum Institute, has run a TV ad and full-page print ads in The Washington Post warning that the "unfortunate truth about Congress's climate bill" is that it could result in "2 million jobs lost." That figure comes from a report prepared by the consulting group Charles River Associations (formerly CRA International) for the National Black Chamber of Commerce, which does not support the House legislation. Similarly, the conservative Heritage Foundation think tank also says the House bill could cause a net decrease of 2.5 million jobs by 2035. But supporters of the House and Senate bills have made the creation of "green jobs" a major selling point. A job "creator" Rep. Henry Waxman of California, who cosponsored H.R. 2454 along with Democratic Rep. Ed Markey of Massachusetts, claimed the House bill would "create millions of clean energy jobs that will drive our economic recovery and long-term growth." Similarly, Democratic Sens. Barbara Boxer of California and John Kerry of Massachusetts said that the bill they introduced in the Senate in September would "stimulate the economy by creating millions of jobs in the clean energy sector." And President Obama has also hailed the passing of the House bill and the introduction of the Senate bill both in part for their potential to create "millions" of new jobs. Clean Energy Works, a coalition of "grassroots organizations" including the National Wildlife Federation and League of Women Voters, ran a TV ad in September saying that the House bill would create 1.7 million new jobs. That figure is based on a study from the liberal Center for American Progress, the group headed by former Clinton White House Chief of Staff John Podesta. It concluded that many net jobs could be created if $150 billion is committed annually to clean energy investments. Likewise, the American Council for an Energy-Efficient Economy, a nonprofit group "dedicated to advancing energy efficiency," says that the legislation could create between 400,000 and 600,000 jobs by 2020 and between 600,000 and a million-plus jobs (under an "enhanced efficiency" scenario) by 2030. Who's right? Gary Yohe, Woodhouse/Sysco Professor of Economics at Wesleyan University in Connecticut, told FactCheck.org that "job loss estimates are very difficult to interpret." He added: "The partisan estimates bracket the range of possibility, I suppose, but neither can really be believed." Both sides have a point, however. The effect of any government program to limit carbon emissions would be to raise the price of burning carbon-based fuel, particularly coal and petroleum. That's likely to cost jobs of coal miners and refinery workers, but that's just a start. Any increase in energy costs acts as a drag on the overall economy, indirectly costing jobs in all sorts of other industries. On the other hand, there's little doubt that carbon limits would increase demand for "clean" energy produced by wind turbines and solar panels, and also for energy-conserving products such as insulation and services such as energy audits and weatherization of homes and businesses. The question then becomes, will the losses outnumber the gains? The official projections The sponsors of the House bill, Reps. Waxman and Markey, asked the government's Energy Information Administration to provide an analysis in a letter last March. The EIA, which is the independent statistical agency within the Department of Energy, released the analysis in August, and posted detailed spreadsheets on its Web site. These contradict Waxman and Markey's earlier claim (made June 28, two days after the bill passed) that "[t]his landmark bill will revitalize our economy by creating millions of new jobs." EIA projected that over time, the bill would likely become a drag on the economy and reduce job creation by hundreds of thousands of jobs under any of the 11 different sets of assumptions that it analyzed. Finding this information took a little digging on our part. The EIA did not provide direct predictions of job gains or losses. Rather, it generated year-by-year projections for the total number of jobs in the economy over the next 20 years for each of a dozen "cases," one of which was the "reference case" -- a "business as usual" projection of what might happen without the bill. We have compared the job projections for each of the 11 other cases with the "reference" case. And that comparison shows fewer jobs predicted in 2030 with a cap-and-trade bill than without, under any of the 11 different sets of assumptions EIA analyzed. (These projections don't attempt to assess any job loss due to climate change, but more about that later.) Only the most severely pessimistic set of assumptions produces a predicted job loss similar to the "up to 2.4 million" figure in the NAM's ad, however. The EIA figures that there might be 2.3 million fewer jobs in 2030 if the Waxman-Markey bill went into effect, but things went badly wrong; that amounts to 1.4 percent fewer jobs than under the no-change-in-law-or-policy baseline. Specifically, this worst-case scenario assumes that government officials would be "severely limited" in implementing a key cost-saving feature of the bill known as "international offsets." These are supposed to allow U.S. companies to avoid having to reduce their own carbon emissions by paying others to plant trees or avoid deforestation in developing countries, for example. This worst-case future also assumes that nuclear power and "clean coal" technologies don't advance any faster than currently projected. But this everything-goes-wrong analysis was only one of 11 different possibilities. And EIA said that while it cannot say how probable any of them are, "both theory and common sense suggest that cases that reflect an unbroken chain of either failures or successes in a series of independent factors are inherently less likely than cases that do not assume that everything goes either wrong or right." Assuming that the only thing that goes wrong is that international offsets fail to materialize, for example, EIA projects the job loss would fall to just over 1 million. And under EIA's "basic" case, in which offsets are not severely constrained and nuclear, wind, solar and other clean energy technologies are "deployed on a large scale," EIA projects 597,000 fewer jobs in 2030 than under current policy. EIA's most optimistic projection, a "high technology" case that assumes "more aggressive assumptions about technological improvements" to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, would lead to job reductions of only 388,000, or 0.2 percent. We should note that under some of the scenarios analyzed, EIA projected that total employment might increase by a small amount during the early years of a cap-and-trade program. For example, in the "basic" case, EIA found that employment might increase by about 96,000 jobs in 2012, 42,000 jobs in 2019, and 266,000 jobs in 2024, before ending with a loss of 597,000 in 2030. The Congressional Budget Office's take The EIA's view is echoed by the CBO. In a report released in September CBO noted that the House bill would create both winners and losers. And on Oct. 14, CBO Director Douglas Elmendorf testified before the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee and said that total employment would likely decline by only "a little" as labor markets adjusted. "[C]limate legislation would cause permanent shifts in production and employment away from industries that produce carbon-based energy and energy-intensive goods and services and toward industries that produce alternative energy sources and less energy-intensive goods and services," Elmendorf said. "While those shifts were occurring, total employment would probably be reduced a little compared with what it would have been without such a policy, because labor markets would most likely not adjust as quickly as would the composition of demand for final outputs." Elmendorf, Oct. 14: In terms of the employment ... there is certainly a decline in employment in fossil fuel intensive parts of the economy. There is an increase in employment in non-fossil fuel intensive parts of the economy. The net effect of that, we think, would likely be some decline in employment during that transition because labor markets do not move that fluidly. Workers live in certain places with particular skills, and they can't immediately turn out living in some other place with a different set of skills. We got a similar view from John Reilly at the Joint Program on the Science and Policy of Global Change at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, which has run a number of independent projections on the effect of cap-and-trade programs on the economy. He said MIT's modeling shows that the House bill would cause a "small net reduction in total employment -- but quite small." An important caveat: None of these economic projections attempt to assess the effects of climate change on jobs or the economy. But CBO says it expects there will be major economic consequences should Congress do nothing to control carbon emissions. CBO, September 2009: A strong consensus has developed in the expert community that, if allowed to continue unabated, the accumulation of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere will have extensive, highly uncertain, but potentially serious and costly impacts on regional climates throughout the world. Those impacts are expected to include widespread changes in the physical environment, changes in biological systems (including agriculture), and changes in the viability of some economic sectors. By D'Angelo Gore, factcheck.org More from The Daily Green 15 Things You Can Do to Help the Environment The Clean 15: Foods With Low Pesticide Residue Six Eco Myths Debunked 11 Powerful Environmental Advertisements Six Safe Green Investments Reprinted with permission of Hearst Communications, Inc Can you still trust Energy Star? October 28, 2009 at 8:54 am The media has been taking the Department of Energy (DOE) to task over a recently released audit by the Inspector General (IG) which highlighted some well-documented shortcomings in the Energy Star program. The conclusions were not surprising -- there needs to be more testing of products to ensure compliance with Energy Star requirements and the efficiency levels required may be too weak. The new DOE has vowed to take on these problems, and in fact the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and DOE, which jointly manage Energy Star, agreed to increased testing and quicker updates in a Memorandum of Understanding that was released a few weeks ago, actually before the IG report. There isn't any real reason to lecture the agencies at this point, since they are addressing the major issues and are moving forward. When you have a program like Energy Star that has been saving energy and putting money in consumers' pockets for decades, it is better late than never. And the bottom line is still the same -- you are much better off buying an Energy Star product than anything else. The agencies are now going to make sure you will save even more. As part of the agreement, EPA will be taking the lead on all Energy Star specifications, which is a significant change. There are over 60 product categories that can earn Energy Star, meaning over 60 different decisions have to be made about what level of energy performance to require. Now, with the new agreement, it also means that there are at least 60 different markets to monitor so that the requirements can be changed if the market share of Energy Star grows to over 35%. That is a lot of work. EPA also recently released their market share report for 2008 (PDF), and it shows that some products are already well over the 35% threshold and perhaps in need of a revision. This data is great for an advocate, as it tells you how the market is transitioning to more efficient products. Market share over 35% does likely mean Energy Star has become too easy, but it also might mean that energy could be saved with a new federal minimum standard. If Energy Star has 90% market share, then the maximum level of efficiency that is "technically feasible and economically justified" (where federal standards must be set by DOE) is at least this high. If the market share is low, then incentives or education might be needed to encourage folks to invest in more efficient equipment. Lots of food for thought here. A few numbers that jumped out at me: The Audio/DVD category sits right at 35% market share and thus is ripe for revision. DVD players dominate this category and 44% meet Energy Star. Time to reassess. Energy Star residential boilers have market shares well over 50%. These boilers must be at least 85% efficient that implies the new standard level for boilers, which will be 82% and won't even take effect until 2015, is too low. 49% of laptops earn Energy Star. This is not surprising, since more efficient laptops run longer on battery power and consumers value this feature. The good news is that laptop sales dwarf desktop, which are generally less efficient. Copiers and scanners have Energy Star market shares of around 90%, meaning it's time for a new Energy Star and probably a federal standard. The remaining 10% of machines are wasting energy and actually hurting manufacturers' profits because of the capacity they have to devote to inefficient equipment just to satisfy a tiny niche. Residential gas furnaces are at 43%, meaning almost half that are sold are 90% efficient and use condensing technology. This is very good, since our agreement with the furnace manufacturers will make this the minimum standard in the chilly northern US and a new Energy Star will help push even more efficient units. Almost 80% of televisions are Energy Star. TVs are the elephant in the room when it comes to potential energy savings (easily billions of dollars wasted every year). The Energy Star requirements have been increased, and we expect most manufacturers will meet them without upping prices, so market share will probably stay high. There is just so much energy to be saved here so cheaply that we must stop ignoring TVs. California is taking the lead with the first minimum standards, but a federal standard to lock in these savings for the rest of the country is likely to follow. By Lane Burt, manager, NRDC Building Energy Policy. Originally posted in the NRDC's Switchboard blog. More from The Daily Green How to Winterize Your Home to Save Energy and Money Eight Weirdest Fuels You May Pump in Your Car Draft Snakes You Can Make Yourself A Guide to Green Home Labels What Do Recycling Symbols on Plastics Mean? Reprinted with permission of Hearst Communications, Inc Ask Umbra on Halloween treats and costumes October 27, 2009 at 7:28 pm Q. Hi Umbra, Do you have any suggestions for an environmentally friendly Halloween treat, and something that parents won't worry about? Thanks, Kim W. Ann Arbor, Mich. A. Dearest Kim, We've said lots about Halloween over the years, but there's always more to say. Which is why I dug your letter out of the email archives to suit my needs. Will my ghoulish charm convince you to overlook that haunting maneuver? This year, I've found a new list of non-food items for trick-or-treaters, and I'm ready for the 2009 Climate Change Costume Closet. I have made alterna-candy suggestions before, and now I've discovered the Green Halloween non-food treat list, which includes basic but brilliant ideas such as acorns, Band-Aids, polished rocks, and whistles (and also strange things such as recycled glass tiles). We also have a handy how-to guide to greening the rest of the holiday, and of course costume suggestions by moi. This year's costume suggestions focus less on witty and sexy (yep, that CFL costume got us all some action) in order to reflect the seriousness of the climate situation and, perhaps more important, remind people that there is a climate situation. In all fairness, I do feel that the Health Care Debate offers richer costume possibilities than the Climate Debate. But Tea Party activists and a rabid Fox are good costumes that can lead to conversations about either hot political topic. Here are my as usual brilliant ideas (some supplied by friends and family), sure to offer all of us a brief chance for informative conversation with a baffled co-Halloweener. You know, like a more-likely-to-occur elevator pitch. High Albedo: A shiny, shiny costume, which could integrate silver lame, a silver umbrella, silver boots, a space blanket, or all white items along the same lines. When they ask what you are, you say something along the lines of, "I'm albedo, you know, highly reflective like the melting ice caps." You may want to research and rehearse your response to make it less awful than that. Kerry-Boxer: Just you and a friend dressed up like John Kerry and Barbara Boxer—or you dressed up like John Kerry wearing boxing gloves—armed with talking points about why your Senate Climate bill is important. This costume will work best if—well, if you can look like the two of them, first of all, but also if you are able to inhabit your role and take on a politician's earnest enthusiasm. Then, you'll be able to trap your questioner with a barrage of helpful information about the vital importance of an effective climate bill. Say their name repeatedly and touch them on the upper arm several times in a comradely way. Waxman-Markey: Kerry-Boxer for the advanced costumer. Does anyone know what these two guys look like? Homeless Polar Bear: Sad, but true. Fundraising Maldivian:  Dressed in summery clothing, with a sign and a jar, asking for donations toward resettlement since your home is about to be underwater. If Halloween weather does not prohibit being damp, be damp. Wind Turbine: Body is pole, turbine is atop head. 'Nuf said. The Atmosphere: Probably best as a group costume in which each member chooses an atmospheric component, with most going as carbon dioxide, methane, water vapor, etc. Do not be scientifically correct in proportioning the number of carbon equivalent costumes. When individual members of the atmosphere are questioned, say something like, "I'm methane, part of the atmosphere [point to other group members]. I'm small but influential, and I can really mess those guys up." If the questioner looks askance or seems doubtful, start muttering about extreme weather events coming to the party soon. Cap and Trade: I can't quite figure this one out, other than a vague and unsatisfying idea involving swapping piles of hats. The person who does pull it off in a clever way deserves some kind of award. Keep us posted. Happy Halloween, everyone! Affectionately, Umbra Related Links: Sen. Kerry downplays prospect of floor debate this year WWLD: What would Lincoln do? Who's who on the EPW: Senate committee begins landmark climate hearings   This email was sent to topi.ireng@gmail.com.  Create Your Account Don't want to receive this feed any longer? Unsubscribe here.