Green, ethical, energy issues in the news

Martyn1981 · 17 February 2017 at 1:14PM

michaels wrote: »

Therefore I can't see why if you are mandating Euro 4 for diesels for air quality reasons you would not mandate euro3 for petrol engines? If you were being logical....

I assume they will just keep stepping this up every few years till only EV's and hybrids make sense, as this move has just added about £2k pa to the cost of taking an older dirtier car into London.

With new diesel taxis being banned from 2018 and only EV's or petrol hybrids allowed, plus the leccy buses, and leccy trains, I can't imagine 'them' offering any slack to older cars regardless of the exact comparisons,

Martyn1981 · 18 February 2017 at 11:30PM

Episode of Fully Charged chatting to Dale Vince of Ecotricity about the Green Gas Mills, and the idea behind producing gas from grass instead of fracking:

Fully Charged - Ecotricity - Green Gas Mills

Martyn1981 · 20 February 2017 at 10:34AM

I may be misunderstanding this article, it is after all French and something may have been lost in translation, but it appears to be saying that large centralised generation, including nuclear may not be the way forward

The traditional model must adapt to the new realities, thus allowing the utilities to emerge from this paradox in which they have locked themselves up in order to perpetuate hypercentralized structures in a world that is becoming more and more decentralized. It is imperative to support innovations, initiatives, risk-taking, and creativity.

Fair enough, and something many have said before, but check out who is saying it:

Can solar energy carry everything?

NigeWick · 20 February 2017 at 2:52PM

Martyn1981 wrote: »

Episode of Fully Charged chatting to Dale Vince of Ecotricity about the Green Gas Mills, and the idea behind producing gas from grass instead of fracking[/URL]

If we can get half of our gas from grass, it's a great leap forward. Then, if all new builds are properly insulated perhaps biogas would supply 100% of our requirements.

Martyn1981 · 21 February 2017 at 4:56PM

Martyn1981 wrote: »

Proposed Nevada bill aims to raise RPS to 80% by 2040

Go for it! :T

California sees Nevada's 80%, and raises 20%:

New California bill ups RPS to 100% by 2045

The Golden State is stepping up its already formidable renewables game in a new Senate bill that increases the state clean energy standard to 100% by 2045 – up from 50% by 2030.

Martyn1981 · 22 February 2017 at 9:20AM

Scottish floating wind turbine test project approved by councillors. Floating turbines might be easier and cheaper to assemble/install.

Floating turbines project approved by councillors

A plan to install two floating wind turbines off the north Caithness coast has been approved by Highland councillors.

A Swedish firm has sought permission from Highland Council, Orkney Islands Council and the Scottish government for the demonstration project.

Melvich Community Council has opposed the proposal because of concerns it would ruin views across to Orkney.

The proposed site is about three miles (6km) out to sea from Dounreay.

The developer, Hexicon AB, has set up Dounreay Trì Limited to develop the project.

The scheme would also involve laying a subsea cable and building a substation.

The plan has still to be considered by the Scottish government.

lstar337 · 23 February 2017 at 12:16PM

I've never thought the numbers for burning wood pellets to reduce CO2 could stand up, now it seems people are starting to realise the truth.

It's all well and good saying you are replacing the trees therefore it is neutral, but a new tree (even many new trees) simply cannot remove as much carbon as an established tree.

My thoughts have always been that cutting down trees to produce power when the worlds already has such a huge issue with tree cutting as it is, was utter madness!

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-39053678

Using wood pellets to generate low-carbon electricity is a flawed policy that is speeding up not slowing down climate warming.

That's according to a new study which says wood is not carbon neutral and emissions from pellets are higher than coal.

According to the author, current regulations do not count the emissions from the burning of wood at all, assuming that they are balanced by the planting of new trees.

That is truly shocking!

Cardew · 23 February 2017 at 2:37PM

lstar337 wrote: »

I've never thought the numbers for burning wood pellets to reduce CO2 could stand up, now it seems people are starting to realise the truth.

It's all well and good saying you are replacing the trees therefore it is neutral, but a new tree (even many new trees) simply cannot remove as much carbon as an established tree.

My thoughts have always been that cutting down trees to produce power when the worlds already has such a huge issue with tree cutting as it is, was utter madness!

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-39053678

Using wood pellets to generate low-carbon electricity is a flawed policy that is speeding up not slowing down climate warming.

That is truly shocking!

More shocking was it led to the scandal in Northern Ireland that brought down the Government.

Nesbitt said the flaws in the scheme meant the Northern Ireland government would pay people £160 in return for burning £100 of fuel .......

the renewable heat incentive (RHI) was set up in November 2012 to encourage the consumption of heat from renewable sources in the region. In February, a whistleblower claimed that it was being abused and one farmer had made £1m from renting out an empty shed. Northern Ireland’s auditor general, Kieran Donnelly, concluded this summer that there was “no upper limit on the amount of energy that would be paid for. The more heat that is generated, the more is paid”.

Another victory for the 'If it's green it deserves a subsidy' brigade.

zeupater · 23 February 2017 at 3:45PM

lstar337 wrote: »

I've never thought the numbers for burning wood pellets to reduce CO2 could stand up, now it seems people are starting to realise the truth.

It's all well and good saying you are replacing the trees therefore it is neutral, but a new tree (even many new trees) simply cannot remove as much carbon as an established tree.

My thoughts have always been that cutting down trees to produce power when the worlds already has such a huge issue with tree cutting as it is, was utter madness!

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-39053678

Using wood pellets to generate low-carbon electricity is a flawed policy that is speeding up not slowing down climate warming.

That is truly shocking!

Hi

The issue really is one of timing ... the problem is that there seems to be a movement to either intentionally skip this in order to mislead the general public, or there's a general lack of ability to apply logic.

When comparing (say) coal to biomass fuel sources such as woodchip you have two carbon release & storage cycles to compare, these being tens-of-years vs millions-of-years. The biomass cycle simply takes carbon-dioxide from the air and energy from the sun to create an energy rich combustible fuel source which when burned returns the carbon-dioxide to the air so over the cycle time-span the process maintains a constant level of atmospheric CO2, therefore the term 'carbon-neutral' ... Against this it must be realised that fossil fuel combustion is taking carbon which was 'scrubbed' from the atmosphere & stored away underground for millions-of-years and adding it to today's atmosphere as additional CO2 ....

Whatever the measure used, whether it's CO2 per tonne of fuel or per unit energy all that the report is saying is that biomass nominally releases more CO2, totally missing the point that emissions from biomass will be biomass again within relatively few years, whilst there's no current cost-effective & scaleable technology for returning CO2 emissions from fossil fuels back to long-term storage ... so we either have reports which have illogical scientific bias being promoted by the fossil fuel sector, lobbyists who are bending the 'truth', or journalists who really don't have a clue .... you decide!

HTH
Z

Martyn1981 · 23 February 2017 at 4:02PM

lstar337 wrote: »

That is truly shocking!

I think it's a bit harsh. Firstly let me separate bio-mass from the other bio-energy schemes, which I have little to no issue with.

Bio-mass does raise concerns over pollution, but it is an alternative to FF.

I'm perfectly happy to class the bio-mass part (excluding transport etc) as carbon neutral as it should be over a 30-100yr period, but there is more to this. Having a sustainable industry means that investment is made into woodlands, be it lumber production or bio-mass. This leads to extensive re-planting programs which have actually increased the amount of trees in the US.

This is a slight cheat, but trees don't last forever, especially the faster growing ones that bio-mass tends to use. As trees die they will release the carbon anyway, which will in turn grow more trees, so the involvement of man doesn't change the cycle, it just speeds it up - yes I know this is a slightly dodgy argument, but hopefully it holds water. With FF burning, there is no replacement program, we are simply releasing millions of years of storage in just a few centuries, with no current program to put it back.

I'm torn on bio-mass, but I don't think it's evil, and I do think it's carbon neutral, but shipping the stuff from the US (we ship coal from Russia and the south Americas) is a bit 'iffy'?

[Edit - this is why I've gotten excited over the green grass gas idea from Ecotricity, as not only is it a cleaner why to produce bio-energy, but as gas it is easy(ish) to store within the current UK infrastructure, and can be used to power gas generation to balance supply and demand alongside variable renewables. Bio-mass can also do this but it's not as turn off and turn onable as gas.

I hope the idea does turn out to be viable. M.]

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