Download Energy Decarbonization Tools: 2a. Wind

Climate Change: The Move to Action
(AOSS 480 // NRE 480)
Richard B. Rood
Cell: 301-526-8572
2525 Space Research Building (North Campus)
[email protected]
http://aoss.engin.umich.edu/people/rbrood
Winter 2012
March 8, 2012
Class News
• Ctools site: AOSS_SNRE_480_001_W12
• 2008 and 2010 Class On Line:
– http://climateknowledge.org/classes/index.php
/Climate_Change:_The_Move_to_Action
• Projects:
– First Meetings:
•
•
•
•
Education: 23 February
Cities: 8 March
Regional: 13 March
Universities: ?????
The Current Climate (Released Monthly)
• Climate Monitoring at National Climatic
Data Center.
– http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/oa/ncdc.html
• State of the Climate: Global
Reading Response: Due March 14, 2012
• Pacala and Socolow, “Stabilization
Wedges,” Science, 2004 (link)
• Socolow, “Wedges Reaffirmed,” Climate
Central, 2011 (link)
•
Reading responses of roughly one page (single-spaced). The responses do
not need to be elaborate, but they should also not summarize the reading.
They should be used by you as think pieces to refine your questions and
insight from the readings. They must be submitted via CTools at least two
hours before the start of lecture for the relevant readings.
Wedges on the Web
• Carbon Mitigation Initiative @ Princeton
University
Today
• Energy supply decarbonization ‘tools’
–
–
–
–
Energy efficiency
Renewable energies
Carbon sequestration
Biofuels
• Some organizing figures
• Structure of problem solving
Pielke Jr. argues
• The need for technology to make solutions
possible.
• Inequity of wealth, access to basic resources,
desire for economic growth makes energy use
an imperative
• Must go
– From, we use too much energy, fossil fuels are cheap
– To, we need more energy, fossil fuels are expensive
We need to de-carbonize energy
Energy Decarbonization Tools:1. Efficiency Gains
• The low-hanging fruit!
• Essentially three kinds:
– End-use electricity efficiency (fluorescent bulbs instead of
incandescent bulbs)
– Energy generation efficiency (coal plant operating at 60 %
efficiency instead of current 40 %)
– Transportation efficiency (60 mpg instead of 30 mpg)
• Efficiency gains are generally cheap mitigation options
• But will only get so far before cutting into primary energy
used for economic activity
Energy Decarbonization Tools: 2. Renewable energy
• Hydro-power
– Already widely
used - not much
potential for
expansion
• Wind
– Abundant and
competitive
• Solar
– Photovoltaic (PV)
– Concentrating solar
Energy Decarbonization Tools: 2a. Wind
• Probably most promising
renewable energy source
Wind energy cost in $/kWh
$0.40
$0.30
$0.20
• Supplies ~1 % of world
electricity, ~0.3 % in US
• Is cost-effective against coal
and natural gas
• Is undergoing very rapid
growth
$0.10
$0.00
1980
1984
1988
1991
1995
2000
2005
Energy Decarbonization Tools: 2a. Wind
• Advantages:
– Wind energy is relatively
mature technology and is cost
effective
– Can be utilized at all scales
• Large wind farms
• On small agricultural farms
– Total theoretical potential of
wind energy on land/near
shore is 5x current energy
consumption
Large potential for
expansion
Energy Decarbonization Tools: 2a. Wind
• Disadvantages:
– Dependent on Production Tax Credits
provided by congress (~2 cents/kWh) to
be competitive
– Horizon pollution and NIMBY siting
problems
– Birds…(though this is often over-stated
– about 1-2 birds per turbine per year)
– Wind is intermittent! It can therefore not
make up a large fraction of base load
(unless effective energy storage)
Energy Decarbonization Tools: 2b. Solar
• Essentially three kinds:
1. Solar heat
–
–
Water is heated directly by
sunlight
Used cost-effectively on
small scale in houses
2. Solar photovoltaic (PV)
–
–
Uses photo-electric effect
(Einstein!) to produce
electricity
Supplies ~0.04 % of world
energy use
3. Solar concentrated
–
–
Use large mirrors to focus
sunlight on steam turbine or
very efficient PV panels
More cost-effective than just
PV
Energy Decarbonization Tools: 2b. Solar
• Advantages:
–
–
–
–
Enormous theoretical potential!
Applicable at various scales
(individual houses to solar plants)
Solar heating can be cost effective
Economy of scale and/or
breakthroughs might reduce costs of
PV and solar concentrated
• Disadvantages
–
–
–
PV and solar concentrated are
expensive! Currently only costeffective with government subsidies
Intermittent – can not make up large
portion of base load (except with
storage capability)
Covers land with solar panels
Energy Decarbonization Tools:
3. Carbon Capture and Sequestration (CCS)
• Main idea:
– Burn fossil fuels for
electricity/hydrogen production
– Capture CO2
– ‘Sequester’ it in geological formation,
oil/gas field, or ocean floor
• This principle is immensely
important for future CO2 mitigation!
– Fossil fuels are abundant and cheap
– Renewable energy generally not
mature enough to replace fossil fuels
– Coal-fired power plants with CCS
could provide low-carbon energy at
competitive costs
CCS: Carbon Capture
• Both conventional and modern types of
coal-fired power plants can be adapted for
CCS
• Conventional coal-fired power plant:
– Burn coal in air (much like the old days)
– Exhaust gas is ~15 % CO2 (rest is mostly
nitrogen and water vapor)
– Exhaust gas flows over chemicals that
selectively absorb CO2 (‘amines’)
– The amines are heated to ~150 ºC to give up
the CO2 and produce a (nearly) pure CO2
gas that can be sequestered.
• Modern coal-fired power plant:
– Coal is burned with pure oxygen in a
gasification chamber to produce hydrogen
and CO2
– The CO2 is filtered out and the hydrogen is
burned for electricity
CCS: Sequestration
 CO2 can be sequestered at ~1 km underground, here pressure
is high enough to liquify CO2, which helps prevent it from leaking
 Several options for sequestering CO2:
1.
2.
3.
4.
Depleted oil/gas reservoirs
(can even be used to
enhance oil/gas recovery –
reduces costs)
Deep saline (brine)
formations – these are
porous media in which
CO2 can be stored and
dissolve in the salty water
Use for coal-bed methane
recovery (one of those
‘unconventional’ fossil
fuels)
Ocean floor (very
controversial!)
CCS: economics
• CCS could become cost-effective with
future carbon legislation
Energy Decarbonization Tools: 4. Biofuels
• Initially hailed as a sustainable
substitute for oil
• Can help reduce oil imports and
improve national security
– In US, this is probably main motivation
for recent push (“addicted to oil”,
Bush’s 2006 State of the Union)
• Two main kinds of biofuels:
1. First generation:
Produced by converting sugar in corn,
sugar beets, etc., into ethanol (alcohol)
2. Second generation:
Produced through “cellulosic
conversion” of biomass into sugar,
then sugar into ethanol
• Climate change impact of different
biofuels is very different!
Biofuels – First Generation
• In US, mainly corn-based ethanol
– Heavily subsidized by federal government to reduce oil dependence
(~$1.90/gallon)
• Effect on climate change is negative:
– Energy used in production is comparable to energy content
– Significant amounts of N2O (a potent GHG) can be produced through fertilizer
use
– Often, more carbon would be sequestered by letting crop land lie fallow
– Raises food prices  Tropical deforestation, which releases more carbon
than saved from fuel production over > 30-year period
Source: Fargione et
al., Science, 2008
Biofuels – Second Generation
• Produced from plants containing cellulose
– Cellulosic conversion to sugar is very difficult and expensive! (cows
have 4 stomach compartments for a reason…)
• Second generation biofuels are better for climate change:
– Similar amount of carbon sequestered as fallow cropland
– But, competition with food could still lead to tropical deforestation and
net release of carbon!
US 1st
generation
biofuel
US 2nd
generation
biofuel
Biofuels – do they help or hurt?
• In general, biofuels that compete with food will not contribute to
mitigating climate change
– Direct link between food demand/prices and tropical deforestation
• Production of first generation biofuels (directly from food such as corn)
is not a solution to climate change and should be avoided!
• Production of second generation biofuels (from biomass) is only helpful
if it doesn’t compete with food production (so not grown on cropland)
– Second generation biofuels from marginal farmland or agricultural waste
could play important role, but is currently not cost-effective
– Could play an important role in mitigating transportation emissions if
breakthroughs in cellulosic conversion are made
Some Biofuel References
• Searchinger, Ethanol and Greenhouse
gases, 2008
• Tilman, Biofuels and Food and Energy and
Environment, 2009
• Fargione, Biofuels and Land Use, 2008
• Royal Society, Biofuels, 2008
• DOE, Energy and Water Use, 2006
Water Energy Intersection
• Both energy and water are
critical resources
• Many areas already suffer
water stress
– note Africa, India, China, where
greatest population growth is
projected to occur
• Projected to become worse with
increasing population, pollution,
and climate change
– Dry areas are generally projected
to become drier.
• Must address energy challenge
without exacerbating water
scarcity
Energy Summary (1)
• Energy is far more important to policy
makers than climate change
– Energy Security
– Existing versus Potential Futures
• Interface of Climate, Economics and
Policy
– Standard of living
– Employment
Energy Summary (2)
• Energy is highly controversial amongst climate
scientists worried about mitigation
– Role of nuclear energy
• Jim Hansen and nuclear energy
• Rocky Mountain Institute
• Union of Concerned Scientists
• Nathan Lewis Summary
– Coal with sequestration
– Nuclear with breeder reactors
– Solar with technology development
Today
• Energy supply decarbonization ‘tools’
–
–
–
–
Energy efficiency
Renewable energies
Carbon sequestration
Biofuels
• Some organizing figures
• Structure of problem solving
Summary Points: Science
Correlated Observations
CO2 and Temperature Observed to be
strongly related on long time scales (>
100 years)
CO2 and Temperature not Observed to be
strongly related on short time scales (<
10 years)
Land Use / Land Change
Other Greenhouse Gases
Aerosols
Internal Variability
Theory / Empirical Evidence
CO2 and Water Vapor Hold Heat Near
Surface
Theory / Conservation Principle
Mass and Energy Budgets
 Concept of “Forcing”
Validation
Prediction
Earth Will
Warm
Attribution
Consequences
Observations
CO2 is Increasing due to Burning Fossil
Fuels
Feedbacks
Air Quality
“Abrupt” Climate Change
Science, Mitigation, Adaptation Framework
It’s not an either / or argument.
Adaptation is responding to changes that might occur from added CO2
Mitigation is controlling the amount of CO2 we put in the atmosphere.
Responses to the Climate Change Problem
Autonomous/
Individual
Policy/
Societal
Reactive
Anticipatory
Adaptation
Mitigation
Summary Points: U.S. Energy
McKinsey 2007: Large
Thinking about the lay of the line …
Oil Consumption - Production
CONSUMPTION
PRODUCTION
Energy Information Administration
ENERGY VERSUS HUNGER
RICH VERSUS POOR
HUNGER
ENERGY
Thanks to Maria Carmen Lemos
Amigos de la Tierra Int. y
Acción Ecológica 2002.
Today
• Energy supply decarbonization ‘tools’
–
–
–
–
Energy efficiency
Renewable energies
Carbon sequestration
Biofuels
• Some organizing figures
• Structure of problem solving
Granularity
• No matter how we cut through this
problem we come to the conclusion that
there is a lot of granularity within the
problem. This granularity represents
complexity, which must be used to
develop a portfolio of solutions rather than
to classify the problem as intractable.
The previous viewgraphs have introduced
“granularity”
• This is a classic short-term versus long-term
problem.
– Ethics
– Economics
– Reaction versus anticipation
• Similarly, regional versus global
• Rich and poor
• Competing approaches
– Mitigation versus adaptation
– Transportation versus Electrical Generation
– This versus that
We arrive at levels of granularity
WEALTH
Need to introduce spatial scales as well
Sandvik: Wealth and Climate Change
LOCAL
TEMPORAL
NEAR-TERM
LONG-TERM
GLOBAL
SPATIAL
Small scales inform large scales.
Large scales inform small scales.
What is short-term and long-term?
Pose that time scales for addressing climate
change as a society are best defined by human
dimensions. Length of infrastructure investment,
accumulation of wealth over a lifetime, ...
LONG
SHORT
Election
time scales
ENERGY SECURITY
CLIMATE CHANGE
ECONOMY
0 years
25 years
There are short-term issues
important to climate change.
50 years
75 years
100 years
Structure of Problem Solving
(http://glisaclimate.org/home )
Projects
Use of climate information
• Research on the use of climate knowledge
states that for successful projects, for
example:
– Co-development / Co-generation
– Trust
– Narratives
– Scale
• Spatial
• Temporal
Lemos and Morehouse, 2005
Projects
• Broad subjects and teams defined
• Meeting 1 with Rood
– Now to early March: Project vision and goals
• Meeting 2 with Rood
– Mid to late March: Progress report, refinement of goals if needed
• Class review
– Short, informal presentation, external review and possible
coordination
• Oral Presentation: April 10 and 12
• Final written report: April 25
Project Teams
• Education / Denial
– Allison Caine
– Nayiri Haroutunian
– Elizabeth McBride
– Michelle Reicher
Project Teams
• Regional
– Emily Basham
– Catherine Kent
– Sarah Schwimmer
– James Toth
– Nicholas Fantin
Project Teams
• City
– Jian Wei Ang
– Erin Dagg
– Caroline Kinstle
– Heather Lucier
Project Teams
• University
– Nathan Hamet
– Adam Schneider
– Jillian Talaski
– Victor Vardan
glisaclimate.org
• Goal to facilitate problem solving
– Based on class experience
– Support narratives
– Build templates for problem solving