Forest fire burn acreage in the US is down 90% since pre-industrial times and down 80% since the 1930s, but scientists have determined : “37% of the area burned by wildfires in the West since 1986 — nearly 19.8 million … Continue reading →
via Real Climate Science
May 16, 2023 at 02:34PM
On 11th May an article appeared on the BBC website with the heading “Renewable energy projects worth billions stuck on hold”). It bemoaned the fact that [b]illions of pounds’ worth of green energy projects are on hold because they cannot plug into the UK’s electricity system” and stated that “[s]ome new solar and wind sites are waiting up to 10 to 15 years to be connected because of a lack of capacity in the system…”.
This evening, BBC Radio 4’s PM programme followed up with an interview between Evan Davis and Ben Wilson, Chief Strategy Officer for the National Grid, which contained more than a few interesting snippets.
ED: Now, if you build a new wind or solar farm, helping to de-carbonise the electricity grid in Great Britain, be aware you might have to wait fifteen years for National Grid to connect your facility to the Grid. In fact, there are real worries that it is the Grid which is the constraint on building up renewable energy. Ofgem wants things to change, it says the current National Grid regime is not fit for purpose, some of the delays are unacceptable. National Grid wants thinks to change, but why is there such a problem? Earlier I spoke to Ben Wilson, Chief Strategy Officer for National Grid, and I asked him if I wanted to build a wind farm, what would the process of connecting it to the Grid be?
BW: You have to come to us with an application, and so you have to indicate the size of the project, where the project will be located. We then work out where on the existing network that will need to connect in to, and then that in turn would determine what new infrastructure is required. And then we’ll work out whether any reinforcement of the network deeper into the network is required. Large-scale connections will then have an impact on power flows on the Grid as a whole. If we can connect you without doing that additional reinforcement initially, we will do that, and then we will make a connection offer to you which will have a date in it and will detail those works. If that’s acceptable you then accept that, and then you are in the connection queue, you’re in the connection pipeline for your connection.
ED: How long will I have to wait to get connected to the Grid?
BW: We’ve got about 170 Gw of connections in the pipeline, and more than half of that is within a…is being offered a connection day within twelve months of what has been requested by the customer, so essentially is on time. And that ranges between sort of now through to about ten years from now depending on the scale of the project.
ED: So hang on, there are people waiting ten years to connect their projects. Obviously, they probably won’t build the project if they’re not going to be able to connect it for ten years, but, but, but well theoretically if I order now I might be told “Yes we’ll fit you in in 2033”.
BW: If you want to connect a very large, many hundreds of megawatts or even a gigawatt scale, offshore wind farm, and if you’re coming new in a place which requires new transmission infrastructure to be built to connect that, then it can take that long, absolutely, to offer you the capacity. And that’s a function of what’s already in the connections system ahead of you and it’s also a function of how long it takes to build a new transmission line.
ED: Everybody – the regulator, the investors in renewables and National Grid – everybody agrees we’ve got to speed this up if we’re going to meet any kind of 2035 target for de-carbonising the electricity system. I understand it takes a long time to get planning to build transmission cables and all of that, I understand that. Why there is a queue; why – it sounds like the old GPO, you know, when you ordered a telephone and there would be a big wait for two months while they would deign to install it for you. Why do you not just have the resources, once you’ve got the permission, to get on with the work?
BW: So, it’s, again, we’ve got to come back to the scale point to start with. So peak demand on the system is about 50 Gw today, and I just mentioned that at National Grid alone we have 170 Gw in the queue, and I think for the system as a whole it’s more like 280 Gw. So we are dealing with a transition here where we have multiples of the entire system in the queue ahead of us, so this is a, you know, an absolute step-change and inflection point, so that scale point can’t be made strongly enough. We do need to make changes: so we have a strict first come first served system at the moment under UK regulation where if you come and make a connections application you go back to the back of the queue even though not all the projects in front of you are actually ready to connect at the date they’ve been offered or in fact may ever connect. So we’re advocating for what we call “connect or move”, which means if you’re not ready at the date that you’ve been offered, then you have to get out of the way. So we don’t want people sitting in the queue blocking people behind them who have got ready to go…
ED: Projects which are ready…
BW: Yeah, exactly.
ED: How much difference are all the measures you’re proposing and Ofgem are proposing – the change in the queue – how much difference is this going to make? Or do you see this as just carry all the way through to 2035?
BW: I see the collective changes that we have been proposing, that Ofgem has been proposing today, I see those making a significant difference. So we could see years come off certain applications. So we will start to see that coming through. It is important to note, though, the targets for 2030 and for 2035, they are ambitious targets, there is risk attached to them, and we do collectively all need to do things differently if we’re going to hit those targets.
ED: Just a final one. Shouldn’t you have seen this coming, that we needed to adapt the Grid to the 2035 carbon tar…the target for de-carbonising electricity? And it’s been obvious for quite a while that we’re not…that the Grid is slowing the whole process down?
BW: You know, I’d point to the progress that has already been made. You know, the UK is one of the most de-carbonised advanced economies, I think our national emissions, the last time they were this low was in the 1890s, so I think we have seen this coming and a lot of progress has already been made. But the scale of transition ahead of us – these are, you know, once in several generations worth of changes, the scale of this means that everybody’s got to come together and push through these changes if it’s going to happen. It’s not for one company or for one party alone to deliver.
ED: Ben Wilson there, the Chief Strategy Officer at National Grid.
via Climate Scepticism
May 16, 2023 at 01:53PM
By Paul Homewood
You would think a large financial house would be able to employ someone willing and able to understand a set of accounts. Unfortunately, it seems not.
Legal and General Investment Management (LGIM) recently published a paper that sets out the company’s position on decarbonisation. Written by Nick Stansbury and Justine Schafer of their “Climate Solutions” department, makes the remarkable claim that ‘the cost of transitioning [to Net Zero] is no longer an especially relevant factor’.
Is the magic money tree going to provide, you might wonder? But it’s not that. In fact, according to the authors, we have solved most of the technological problems already:
"A low carbon energy system is now so cheap, that further improvements in costs and efficiencies are no longer likely to have as large an impact on the pace of change as they have had historically…Science and engineering have already delivered much of the cost reduction that we need."
I think I may have a bridge to sell Mr Stansbury.
In support of this extraordinary claim, the authors cite figures from the International Renewable Energy Agency (IRENA), showing long-term reductions in the cost of wind and solar. The naïvety is breathtaking. The energy sector is notorious for being full of wild claims about cost revolutions. Those working in the field usually learn to check and double check what they are told, and to view every claim with a critical eye. LGIM rather give the impression of having stepped into this den of thieves in good faith but without thinking too hard.
If they had decided to dig a little bit deeper, they might have noticed the interesting detail that IRENA translates all its cost figures into US dollars. With most renewables deployed outside America, performing that currency conversion introduces a spurious downwards trend into the cost figures, simply because there has been a long-term appreciation of the dollar against other countries.
They might also have attempted to verify IRENA’s numbers in some way. After all, a tiny think tank like the GWPF can manage to do it; why not a huge financial house? Their army of analysts, lawyers and accountants could surely have found their way to Companies House, where financial accounts of windfarms are readily available, and to Ofgem’s data portal, where generation data can be downloaded.
I know this is a bit radical, but they could actually have recalculated the cost numbers themselves! Had they done so, they would have found little or no sign of reducing costs for offshore wind, and indeed of increasing costs onshore. And don’t get me started on the eye-watering system costs associated with renewables.
Instead we get what is essentially a public relations document, regurgitating renewables marketing fluff.
via NOT A LOT OF PEOPLE KNOW THAT
May 16, 2023 at 12:40PM
From Heartland Daily News
The Biden administration released new emissions control standards for vehicles. Billed as the “most ambitious climate regulations” ever, they have captured headlines, but technical realities and high costs have both rules headed straight for a brick wall.
The light-duty category covers cars, trucks, and vans, and requires 67% of all new car sales to be electric by 2032. The heavy-duty category covers 18-wheelers, buses, and other work-related vehicles and requires half of new buses and a quarter of new truck sales to be electric by 2032. For comparison, last year, electric vehicle sales made up 5.8% of new car sales and less than 2% for heavier trucks. These proposed standards are not ambitious but rather represent a new level of regulatory lunacy.
The Clean Air Act (CAA) requires the EPA administrator to set vehicle regulations aimed at reducing pollutants from light-duty vehicles that negatively impact public health and the environment. In setting these standards, the administrator must take into consideration the feasibility of new technologies as well as costs. Team Biden promised as much when they committed to establishing a “data-driven” goal. But it’s hard to see how any serious expert would support the notion that, in less than five years, when car companies will begin designing the model year 2032 vehicles, they can develop enough electric vehicles, procure the massive amount of critical minerals needed for the batteries, and convince skeptical consumers to massively shift their purchasing priorities to meet this goal.
Despite numerous federally sponsored incentives, electric vehicle adoption rates remain low for a variety of reasons. Even with major advancements in EV technology, recharging batteries still takes hours, while filling up gas tanks takes minutes. Coupled with a limited network of charging stations, EVs continue to be a hard sell. Even the majority of current EV owners still rely on gas-powered vehicles—78% own a second gas-powered car to supplement their transportation needs.
Future demand isn’t there either. A new AP-NORC poll found only 19% of Americans are “very likely or extremely likely” to go electric. Gallup similarly poured water on the enthusiasm claim, suggesting Americans are “slow to adopt electric vehicles.” More troubling for EV backers: Even if this push was possible, the U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) forecasted just 9% of U.S. vehicles would be electric by 2050.
The administration displays tone deafness by touting expensive alternatives to reliable gas-powered cars. Many Americans are struggling to afford eggs and meat in the inflationary economy. It’s highly unlikely lower and middle-income folks are planning to purchase a car with an average cost of $54,000. The availability of taxpayer subsidies doesn’t change that equation. To date, most EV drivers are in households that make at least $150,000 per year or more. In states like Mississippi, where the median income is around $50,000, EVs are cost-prohibitive and regulations like the proposed Biden standards will only make those costs go up.
One of the nation’s leading auto manufacturing groups called the proposal “aggressive” and “unprecedented” even for them—suggesting the administration is going too far too fast. Their statements should be heavily considered given the industry has already invested billions to expand vehicle electrification. Although the industry has adopted the transition narrative, they are rightfully concerned with the expedited timeline and unrealistic expectations in the current proposal.
Despite serious technical hurdles and overwhelming preference by consumers for gas-powered vehicles, Team Biden seems done with the carrot approach and is using a regulatory stick to force its all-EV future on Americans. The courts may once again be the saving grace.
Critics have an opportunity to present legal arguments against the EPA. The biggest legal elephant in the room is the West Virginia v. EPA decision that invoked the “major questions” doctrine. Specifically, the Supreme Court made clear that agencies must point to “clear Congressional authorization” if they take actions of “vast economic or political significance.” One can argue in this instance that the EPA does not have the ability to restructure the entire transportation industry in the same way the agency did not have the ability to redesign entire energy markets in the West Virginia case.
The current rules, as proposed, have numerous technical and legal vulnerabilities. They also stand to undermine environmental progress as Americans will undoubtedly settle on driving older cars longer instead of amassing serious debt to acquire a new, less reliable car. As a result, the reach of new technologies and the affiliated benefits such as reduced pollution and safer roads will fail to materialize.
Mandy Gunasekara is the director of Independent Women’s Forum’s Center for Energy and Conservation and previously served as Chief-of-Staff at the U.S. EPA. Follow her on Twitter at @MississippiMG
Originally published by RealClearEnergy. Republished with permission.
To read more about new emissions standards, click here.
To read more about Biden’s EV push, click here.
via Watts Up With That?
May 16, 2023 at 12:39PM
Iowa Climate Science Education 