What will we do when America's lights go out?

Soon after the widespread blackouts of 2003, the Electric Reliability Organization was etablished, and it recently issued its first report. That report makes for grim reading because the nation's electric power infrastructure is on the brink of collapse.

Misguided environmental regulations, green obstructionism and the NIMBY (Not-in-my-backyard) syndrome have combined to delay the construction of desperately needed new power plants and transmission lines. The result is an infrastructure that will soon be unable to meet the demands of the American economy. Policy makers must act now to re-empower America. The ERO projects that U.S. demand will increase by 141,000 megawatts (MW) over the next 10 years. Supply, however, will increase by only 57,000 MW, and that assumes that all currently proposed new facilities are approved and built. The system will be operating below the marginal capacity needed to ensure supply reliability at all times. In other words, in peak periods like heat waves, there won't be enough electricity to go around. Blackouts will inevitably result.

One key problem is the sheer difficulty in building new power plants in America today. Politically powerful green lobby groups object to the building of any new plant that does not use some form of renewable energy, yet renewable energy cannot meet demand for power on its own.

They also object to nuclear power stations because of their supposed danger, even though modern nuclear plants have an impeccable safety record. And they oppose coal-fired plants because of their alleged contribution to global warming.

To back up their objections, many environmental pressure groups generally have large budgets and huge teams of lawyers. One group boasted of having 75 lawyers working on a measure in California.

These groups are currently running a massive campaign in Texas to prevent the building of new coal-fired plants, without which the state will be patently unable to meet its needs. Transmission lines face even worse obstruction.

Meanwhile, utilities are prevented by regulation from using flexible pricing structures to incentivize efficient energy use. A highly regulated grid is not conducive to the efficient flow of electricity. This is why the ERO has recommended a series of reforms. Foremost among these is the removal of regulatory barriers to the building of new infrastructure. Power plants and transmission lines need to be built urgently; measures that facilitate green obstructionism must be repealed. Without this new capacity, the power supply system will fail.

Let us be clear about what that would mean. The electric power supply will be interrupted when it cannot meet demand. Lights will go out. Offices will cease to function. People will freeze or swelter. Elderly people will die. If sustained, this situation will severely damage the economy. Jobs will be lost. Health will suffer. The poor will get poorer. Flows of money from America to the developing world will shrink.

I remember as a young boy in England, huddling with my family round a coal fire that was our only source of heat and light (bar a few candles) during the power disruptions of the 1970s. A world without power is not a pleasant place.

One hundred years ago, the average Westerner had an annual income equivalent to $4,000. A man could only work somewhere he could walk to; a woman spent much of her life performing back-breaking domestic labor. Medical science, while advancing, was still almost medieval in its practical application. Much has changed in the last century, but in all cases the key to freeing us from these strictures has been widespread, affordable energy. A permanent flow of electricity has powered an explosion in wealth that has enabled millions to live long, fulfilling lives free from crushing hardship. The condition of life is no longer nasty, brutish and short.

It is a moral imperative to keep the power flowing. If our forefathers a century ago had worried about the side effects of using all that energy and set in place restrictions to stop it, millions - no, billions - would have suffered as a result.

Denied the technological advances that energy use enabled, we would live shorter lives and be doomed to labor - a poorer life in every sense. We should be thankful our ancestors chose not to legislate in our interests. Rather than worrying about our great-grandchildren, we should instead be worrying about our brothers and sisters. The lesson of the ERO report is that we must take measures now to ensure the power keeps flowing.

Source





U.N. CLIMATE TALKS GRIDLOCKED

U.N. talks on fighting climate change were gridlocked on their final day on Friday as organizers faced criticism of scant progress in aiding Africa and slowing global warming. Rich and poor countries are split at the 189-nation talks about how to extend the U.N.'s Kyoto Protocol, the main U.N. plan for fighting global warming, beyond 2012 to help avert climate change that could batter the world economy. After two weeks of meetings, about 70 environment ministers have agreed on some new ways to help Africa but are deadlocked on two issues -- a review of how effectively Kyoto is working and a proposal by Russia to allow new nations to sign up. "The two big issues are still open," said Yvo de Boer, the head of the U.N. Climate Secretariat....

De Boer dismissed environmentalists' complaints that the 6,000 bureaucrats at the talks had achieved too little to help the poor amid U.N. projections of more droughts, heatwaves, famines and rising seas. "I think the conference has made very significant progress for developing countries," de Boer said, pointing to incentives to promote clean energy such as solar or wind power under a scheme that could channel $100 billion to poor nations by 2012. He also said the talks had set principles for a fund meant to help developing nations adapt to climate change. The fund is expected to grow sharply but is now worth just $3 million -- less than the $4 million cost of staging the Nairobi talks. "Rich countries should have achieved more at this conference and made more firm commitments to combat climate injustice," said Sharon Looremeta, a Kenyan Maasai leader of environmental group Practical Action.

She said many of the delegates were treating the meeting more as a holiday safari than a forum to confront what U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan called an "all-encompassing threat" in a speech to delegates on Wednesday.

Many backers of Kyoto see a planned review of the Protocol working as a possible prelude to getting more countries involved after 2012 -- especially big emitters led by the United States, China and India. But poorer states say the rich must continue to take the lead and President George W. Bush says he has no plans to rejoin Kyoto -- a scheme he views as an economic straitjacket.

A draft proposal by the chair of the meeting on Friday said commitments under Kyoto, obliging rich nations to cut emissions to 5 percent below 1990 levels by 2012, "are not adequate" to fight climate change and proposes a full review in 2008. Kyoto nations account for just 30 percent of emissions of greenhouse gases and want a more global deal. Russia is proposing a new mechanism to allow countries outside Kyoto to volunteer to cut their emissions. Some backers of Kyoto fear that Moscow is mainly seeking to help former communist states to win big credits under Kyoto since their emissions have fallen sharply from 1990 with the collapse of the Soviet Union.

Source






BRITAIN CONCEDES DEFEAT: POST-KYOTO DEAL IS OUT OF REACH

A global post-Kyoto agreement is still out of reach as the UN summit on climate change concludes its final day of talks in Nairobi, David Miliband admitted today. Speaking exclusive to Guardian Unlimited on the closing day of a fortnight of talks, the environment secretary said the summit had failed to gain sufficient momentum to agree a deal on greenhouse gas emissions because of a glaring "gap" between science and politics.

Mr Miliband lauded the significant progress made over adaptation funding for developing countries, and what he called a vigorous commitment to a works programme. But he said some "very difficult discussions" were still under way over the strength of international commitment to a deal. "Where the final drive of negotiations needs to take place over the next few hours concerns the ability to inject a new momentum in the long-term discussions of a global emissions deal," he said.

Mr Miliband held out little hope that a firm international commitment would be ratified on the final day of talks. "That is where we have a real crunch point on some of the issues we have been discussing," he said. Mr Miliband refused to name recalcitrant countries, but he hinted that industrialised and developing countries alike were hesitant. The latter group feared they would be expected to make the same level of contributions as their wealthier neighbours, he said. "There are some richer countries who are concerned that that no country can have a free pass on this, and although not all countries will take on hard targets, every country needs to play some role. "That is the essential balance. The need [is] for a global deal in which every country plays a part, but the fact is that richer countries are going to be able to contribute more. "I am confident we can offer two cheers for this process. But the third cheer is going to rely on a real drive over the next year because 2007 is going to be a critical year for putting urgency and momentum into the drive for a global emissions deal."

The environment secretary added: "One of the reflections we will have is about the size of the gap between science and politics." It was a "real issue" that only the UK and Germany had set binding, long-term targets for reducing carbon emissions. Mr Miliband said the forthcoming G8 talks in Germany would provide an opportunity to revisit the need for "urgency and drive" in moving towards a new climate change agreement to operate after the current Kyoto commitments end in 2012.

The environment secretary declined to say whether a specific adaptation funding deal had been struck to help African countries cope with climate change, but he said general overseas aid should also be "carbon-proofed". "We have to make sure there is an adaptation fund, but we also have to make sure that aid policies are generally sustainable", he said.

Mr Miliband, who is due to close the Commons debate on the Queen's speech this Monday, said he would tell government colleagues they all had a "part to play" in delivering the climate change agenda. "From the prime minister to the chancellor and the foreign secretary, and me as environment secretary, every member of the cabinet has a role to play." Earlier this week, Mr Miliband scotched rumours of a rift with the chancellor, Gordon Brown, over planned environmental policies targeted at business.

Source






SHOCK! HORROR! EU STUDY WARMS TO TECHNOLOGICAL APPROACH TO CLIMATE-CHANGE

A recent EU-funded study shows that better use of technology can combat air pollution and lower the impact of those greenhouse gases not covered by the Kyoto Protocol.

The study, published in the journal "Environmental Science and Technology" on 15 November, compared the results of 26 models of atmospheric chemistry covering the entire global atmosphere.

In a challenge to policies championed by the EU, including the much-debated emissions trading scheme for CO2, it found that current international protocols and national legislation to reduce air pollution are not sufficient to reduce global warming.

The researchers said that this was because existing policies do too little to tackle other gases such as ozone. "Even with the legislation that is in place, the models showed that emissions would still increase," the Commission said.

The researchers believe better use of existing technology is necessary to minimise the negative impacts of ozone which contributes to global warming.

The EU, North American countries and Japan currently have laws establishing limits for the concentrations of ozone in the air and other countries in Asia and Latin America are introducing them. Internationally, there is a UN convention on long-range trans-boundary air pollution that identifies specific measures to be taken to reduce emissions of air pollutants such as ozone.

The study comes as environment ministers from around the world meet in Nairobi, Kenya, for an international conference on global warming. They are due to discuss possible action to combat climate change when the Kyoto Protocol runs out in 2012.

Source






ANOTHER ECO-SCARE DEBUNKED AS WORLD'S FORESTS EXPAND

For years, environmentalists have been raising the alarm about deforestation. But even as forests continue to shrink in some nations, others grow - and new research suggests the planet may now be nearing the transition to a greater sum of forests.

A new formula to measure forest cover, developed by researchers at The Rockefeller University and the University of Helsinki, in collaboration with scientists in China, Scotland and the U.S., suggests that an increasing number of countries and regions are transitioning from deforestation to afforestation, raising hopes for a turning point for the world as a whole. The novel approach, published this week in the online edition of Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, looks beyond simply how much of a nation's area is covered by trees and considers the volume of timber, biomass and captured carbon within the area. It produces an encouraging picture of Earth's forest situation and may change the way governments size up their woodland resources in the future. "Instead of a skinhead Earth, we may enjoy a great restoration of forests in the 21st century," says study co-author Jesse Ausubel, director of The Rockefeller University's Program for the Human Environment.

The formula, known as "Forest Identity," considers both area and the density of trees per hectare to determine the volume of a country's "growing stock": trees large enough to be considered timber. Applying the formula to data collected by the United Nations and released last year, the researchers found that, amid widespread concerns about deforestation, growing stock has expanded over the past 15 years in 22 of the world's 50 countries with most forest cover. In countries where per capita gross domestic product exceeds $4,600 (roughly equal to the GDP of Chile), richer is greener. In about half the most forested countries, biomass and carbon also expanded. Earlier work showed that by the 1980s wooded areas in all major temperate and boreal forests were expanding.

Forest area and biomass are still being lost in such important countries as Brazil and Indonesia but an increasing number of nations show gains. The forests of Earth's two most populated nations no longer increase atmospheric carbon concentration: China's forests are expanding; India's have reached equalibrium.

The researchers found that among the 50 nations studied, forest area in percentage terms shrank fastest from 1990 to 2005 in Nigeria and the Philippines, and expanded fastest in Vietnam, Spain and China. Growing stock fell fastest in Indonesia, Nigeria and the Philippines, and increased fastest in the Ukraine and Spain. In absolute terms, Indonesia and Brazil experienced the greatest losses of both forested square kilometers and cubic meters of growing stock; China and the USA achieved the greatest gains. "For many years, the Earth has suffered an epidemic of deforestation. Now humans may help spread an epidemic of forest restoration," says Ausubel.

When forest transition occurs at a global level depends largely on Brazil and Indonesia, where huge areas of tropical forests are rapidly being cut and cleared. Encouragingly, in many other tropical areas forests are regrowing. Studies in Central America show tree cover in El Salvador grew one-quarter from 1992 to 2001. Forests are also recovering fast in the Dominican Republic in harsh contrast to deforested Haiti, on the same Caribbean island.

"The main obstacles to forest transition are fast-growing poor populations who burn wood to cook, sell it for quick cash and clear forest for crops," says study co-author Pekka E. Kauppi, of the University of Helsinki. "Harvesting biomass for fuel also forestalls the restoration of land to nature. Through paper recycling and a growing reliance on electronic communication, people help the transition by lessening demand for wood products."

In addition to the measurement of forest area and growing stock, the researchers offer a formula to calculate atmospheric carbon being stored incrementally in the trees of a given area, knowledge critical for mitigating climate change. A rapid forest transition on a global scale would mean that atmospheric carbon dioxide might not rise as fast as many fear.

Source

***************************************

Many people would like to be kind to others so Leftists exploit that with their nonsense about equality. Most people want a clean, green environment so Greenies exploit that by inventing all sorts of far-fetched threats to the environment. But for both, the real motive is to promote themselves as wiser and better than everyone else, truth regardless.

Global warming has taken the place of Communism as an absurdity that "liberals" will defend to the death regardless of the evidence showing its folly. Evidence never has mattered to real Leftists

Comments? Email me here. My Home Pages are here or here or here. For times when blogger.com is playing up, there are mirrors of this site here and here.

*****************************************