Alternative to the CPRS (cap-and-trade)

Guest Post by Peter Lang. Peter is a retired geologist and engineer with 40 years experience on a wide range of energy projects throughout the world, including managing energy R&D and providing policy advice for government and opposition. His experience includes: coal, oil, gas, hydro, geothermal, nuclear power plants, nuclear waste disposal, and a wide range of energy end use management projects.

Below are suggestions for an alternative policy to the CPRS (the Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme – an emission cap-and-trade system proposed by the Australian Labor government). This is not a complete energy policy, but simply some fragments for possible inclusion in a complete policy.

Aim:

1.To reduce Australia’s greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions consistent with international efforts;

2.To increase, not decrease, Australia’s international competitiveness; this will result in:

a.more jobs and better remuneration for workers

b.more wealth and better standard of living for all; and

c.more revenue to support all the things we want; such as: better Health, Education, infrastructure and fixing our most pressing environmental problems such as the Murray Darling Basin.

Increasing the cost of energy has serious negative consequences for humanity, especially the poorest peoples on the planet. A policy such as the CPRS that sets out to increase electricity costs for little or no overall reduction in world GHG emissions is negligent.

The proposed alternative would help the world by supplying products and services with less embodied emissions than now. For example, the policy proposed here would maintain Australia’s aluminium industry and its jobs and provide the aluminium with less embodied emissions than other countries can. This is just one example to illustrate the benefits of this policy, but an important one.

We do not rule out an ETS or some alternative instrument in the future, but we will not impose an ETS on Australia before the USA and we will not impose an ETS that does not protect Australia’s industry and jobs to a similar extent as the USA’s legislation. (It is not clear that the USA will implement an ETS. There are signs the USA may not take this approach to cutting its GHG emissions).

What is the policy and how will it be implemented in practice?

Electricity generation will have to do the “heavy lifting” in cutting our GHG emissions. Electricity generation causes 34% of Australia’s greenhouse gas emissions, but is capable of displacing around 50% of our emissions by 2050. It is easier to make large cuts in emissions from electricity generation than anywhere else. Furthermore, if clean electricity is low cost (as proposed here), electricity will more rapidly displace gas for heating and oil for land transport over the coming decades. Electricity will replace, to some extent, oil for land transport both directly as in electric vehicles and indirectly through synthetic fuels produced using electricity. But it is essential that clean electricity be low cost for this transition to take place as quickly as possible and to avoid the need for massive, high-cost policy interventions by future governments.

Specific policies for reducing emissions from Electricity, Heat and Land Transport are outlined below.

Electricity

To cut our GHG emissions from electricity generation we will change the “Renewable Energy Targets” to “Clean Energy Targets”.

Instead of ‘20% of energy generated by renewable energy by 2020’, the target will be: ‘20% clean energy by 2020’.

‘Clean Energy’ means a mix of electricity generators that emits less than 200 kg CO2-e/MWh (kilograms of carbon dioxide equivalent per megawatt hour) by 2020 decreasing to 10 kg CO2-e/MWh by 2050 (that is about 1% of Australia’s current emissions from electricity generation).

A ‘mix of electricity generators’ means a combination of generators that can supply power on demand.  Examples of generation systems that can deliver power on demand are:

1.fossil fuel

2.nuclear

3.hydro

4.biomass

5.wind with fossil fuel back-up, energy storage and enhanced grid

6.Wind and solar with fossil fuel back-up, energy storage and enhanced grid

Some examples of generator mixes that would meet the 2020 criteria of 200 kg CO2-e/MWh are:

1.50% hydro and 50% high efficiency Combined Cycle Gas Turbine

2.50% biomass and 50% high efficiency Combined Cycle Gas Turbine

3.50% geothermal and 50% high efficiency Combined Cycle Gas Turbine

4.50% nuclear and 50% high efficiency Combined Cycle Gas Turbine

Wind and solar cannot meet the criteria because of the emissions from fossil fuel back-up generators (Lang, 2010). Australia has little more hydro capacity available. Biomass can make a contribution but at relatively high cost. Geothermal is not yet a proven technology in the Hot Fractured Rock configuration being proposed for and tested in Australia. Only nuclear can make a large contribution to meeting our energy needs and reducing emissions substantially and sustainably.

The electricity generator companies would compete to build the new generation capacity required knowing with certainly what will be the emissions requirements for the electricity generation system for the life of their investments.  They can factor this into their financial projections for the economic life of the plant. This would not be the case with the CPRS. The CPRS rules would be changed with every change of government, with spendthrift governments always needing to collect more revenue to pay for their economic mismanagement.

Land Transport and Heat

After electricity generation, the next two major sources of GHG emissions are from burning fossil fuel for heat and for land transport.

If we establish policies that keep the cost of electricity low, then low-cost, low-emissions electricity will progressively displace fossil fuels for heat and for land transport.  Land transport will be powered by electricity either directly (e.g. electric vehicles) and/or by synthetic fuels produced by electricity.

In short:

1.With these regulations we could reduce GHG emissions from electricity generation by 80% by 2050

2.Low-emissions electricity would be provided at least cost

3.Australia could continue to be competitive in world markets

4.We would avoid a large portion of our national wealth being diverted to financial fraud and to government churn and waste

5.The rate of reducing GHG emissions from heat and land transport will depend largely on how low is the cost of low-emission electricity.

How can we get low-cost, clean electricity?

One currently available technology that can provide this is nuclear energy. Other technologies, such as geothermal and solar energy may be able to in the future but are not economic now and are a high risk to base rational policy decisions on.

Nuclear energy provides low-cost electricity in many other countries. Russia is building new nuclear plants to provide electricity for aluminium smelting for the world market. This is a clear indication that nuclear generated electricity can be amongst the lowest cost electricity in the word. If it were not, they could not produce aluminium at a price they can sell it competitively on the world market. Another example is the United Arab Emirates which has just let contracts for 5,400 MW of nuclear power stations that they claim will provide electricity at ¼ the cost of electricity generated by gas. And this is in the centre of the world’s oil regions.

To achieve low cost nuclear energy in Australia our focus must be on providing low-cost, appropriately safe and environmentally benign electricity. Nuclear generation is already some 10 to 100 times safer than coal fired electricity generation, and far more environmentally benign, so achieving this requirement is not an issue.

The Australian Government cannot be taken seriously on climate change without adopting nuclear as part of its policy. But they are unlikely to implement good policy. If they implement policies that make it a high cost option, this will defeat the purpose.

Implementation Details

This policy:

1.will cut Australia’s GHG emissions from electricity generation by 8% of current levels by 2020 and by 80% by 2050;

2.is by far the least cost option to cut emissions; and

3.will give the least cost electricity of options to cut emissions.

How will this be achieved?

1.Coal power stations will be decommissioned at the rate of 1.4 GW per year.

a.They will be decommissioned as they reach their retirement age,

b.together with a small component of government buy back in a “Cash for Clunkers” scheme

2.They will be replaced with (mostly):

a.Natural gas generation until 2020, then with

b.Nuclear and efficient Combined Cycle Gas Turbines (CCGT) until 2025, then

c.Nuclear (mostly) to 2050.

3.Coal with Carbon Capture and Storage and geothermal may play a role if they become commercially viable.

4.Wind and solar power will have only a minor role unless major technological advances are achieved

5.Some Pumped-hydro will be built using existing dams – for example by connecting existing dams in the Snowy Mountains.

Implementation

1.A project like a modern version of the Snowy Mountains Scheme initially (to about 2025) to get it through about the first 15 years;

2.A Sir William Hudson type person in charge;

3.“Early Wins” – Establish research facilities in at least one major university in every state; and

4.Research – A significant component of the research will focus on how to implement nuclear energy at least cost in Australia. [For example, how will we avoid the political, NIMBY, regulatory and bureaucratic problems that have raised the cost of nuclear in USA and EU.]

Level playing field for electricity generators

What would be a genuine level playing field for electricity generators”?

1.Remove all mandatory requirements (e.g. the Mandatory Renewable Energy Targets)

2.Remove all subsidies for electricity generation

3.Remove all tax incentives and other hidden incentives that favour one generator technology over another

4.Ensure that regulations apply equally for all types of generators. Set up a system to allow electricity generator companies to challenge anything that is impeding a level playing field

5.Emissions and pollution regulations must be the same for all industries and should be based on safety and health effects on an equal basis.

Policy implications of “Emission Cuts Realities – Electricity Generation”

Some policy implications of the paper: “Emission Cuts Realities – Electricity Generation” (Lang, 2010)

1.Mandating renewable energy is bad policy

2.If we are serious about cutting GHG emissions, we’d better get serious about implementing nuclear energy as soon as possible

3.If we want to implement nuclear power we’ll need to focus on how to do so at least cost, not with the sorts of high cost regimes imposed in USA and EU

4.We should not raise the cost of electricity. We must do all we can to bring clean electricity to our industries and residents at a cost no higher than the least cost option

5.Therefore, ETS/CPRS is exactly the wrong policy

Schedule

Following is a proposed schedule for Australia’s federal Government, noting that our next Federal budget is in May 2010.

May 2010 – Federal Budget contains funding for the following to be implemented during 2010-2011:

1.Establishment of a modern version of the Snowy Mountains Authority. Terms of Reference: to implement low emissions electricity generation in Australia such that electricity costs less than from fossil fuel generation.

2.Funding for nuclear engineering faculties in at least one university in every mainland State

3.Funding of research will be largely for the social engineering aspects of implementing nuclear energy in Australia at least cost.

2010 – Government announces policies:

1.to allow nuclear energy to be one of the options for electricity generation;

2.to remove all the impediments that favour or discriminate one generator system or technology over another;

3.that 20% of emissions will be from low emissions generator mix by 2020 and 80% by 2050. A ‘low emission generator mix’ is a mix of generators that can provide power on demand and meet the emissions limits that will be phased in and become more stringent over time. For example, the limit might be 200 kg CO2-e/MWh in 2020 and 10 kg CO2-e/MWh in 2050. The rate would decrease progressively over time – but not necessarily linearly. The rate does not apply to a single generator. It applies to a company’s mix of generators. The 2020 limit could be achieved by a mix of 50% high efficiency CCGT combined with 50% of one of the following: nuclear, hydro, biomass, geothermal, solar thermal with its own energy storage. Wind cannot meet the 200 kg CO2-e/MWh for the reasons explained here: http://bravenewclimate.com/2010/01/09/emission-cuts-realities/

4.to buy back some old coal generators at a fair price in a “cash for clunkers” scheme

5.to conduct first public awareness forums throughout Australia.

2012 – Government announces policies to:

1.allow nuclear power plants to be established in Australia and under what conditions;

2.allow States to bid to host the first nuclear power station and the conditions for selection of the state – this will include a time frame for site selection to be complete by 2013 (I know its fast, but if its urgent we need to get on with it!). In the absence of states bidding and agreeing to meet the schedule the first NPP will be build on Commonwealth owned and controlled land.

3.Establish arrangements with IAEA to act as our Nuclear Regulatory Authority until we are ready to take over.

2013 –Source selection starts for our first four or five NPPs

2014 – Contract awarded for first four or five NPPs

2015 – Construction begins

2019 – First NPP commissioned.

2020 – Second NPP commissioned, and so on,

Regarding the rates assumed here for implementing nuclear power, remember that Hanford B was built in 21 months from first breaking of ground until the plant went critical (ASME (1976). That was in 1944. Admittedly this was not an electricity generating plant, but it was the first ever large nuclear plant. If we could do that 65 years ago with the first ever, why can’t we build nuclear power plants quickly now??

References

Lang, 2010. Emission Cuts Realities – Electricity Generation

http://bravenewclimate.com/2010/01/09/emission-cuts-realities/

(please click on the link to the pdf version because it contains the footnotes, references and appendices; these are not included in the abridged version on the web)

ASME (1976). Hanford B-Reactor

http://files.asme.org/ASMEORG/Communities/History/Landmarks/5564.pdf

Guest Post by Dr Jim Green. Jim is the National nuclear campaigner for Friends of the Earth, Australia.

Thanks to Barry Brook for the opportunity to contribute a post on the topic of nuclear safeguards.

Why should nuclear power proponents involve themselves in advocacy to strengthen the safeguards system? Perhaps the strongest argument is that public concern about weapons proliferation shapes as a significant constraint on the expansion of nuclear power. Here are some relevant considerations:

– Opinion polls repeatedly demonstrate a high level of public concern about WMD proliferation and national governments routinely cite WMD non-proliferation as a top-shelf national priority.

– Daily media reports about the nuclear programs in North Korea and Iran reinforce public concerns about the links between the peaceful atom and WMD proliferation.

– A 2005 survey of 1000 Australians found that 56% believe that International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) inspections are not effective while barely half as many (29%) believe they are effective (1).

– A 2008 survey of 1200 Australians found 2:1 opposition to uranium exports to nuclear weapons states (2).

– The US National Intelligence Council argued in a 2008 report that:

The spread of nuclear technologies and expertise is generating concerns about the potential emergence of new nuclear weapon states and the acquisition of nuclear materials by terrorist groups.

The Council also warned of the possibility of a nuclear arms race in the Middle East and noted that a number of states in the region…

are already thinking about developing or acquiring nuclear technology useful for development of nuclear weaponry. (3)

Nuclear power advocates who accept the need to strengthen safeguards can act individually by making submissions to relevant government inquiries, writing to government ministers, writing letters to newspapers, etc. Better still, a loose coalition of nuclear power advocates could be established to work on safeguards and related issues. It would also be welcome if the Science Council for Global Initiatives and other such organisations would take up these issues (Ed: we are, see here).

Safeguards – a snapshot and some modest proposals

The IAEA is responsible for the international safeguards system. Visits to nuclear facilities by IAEA inspectors are the cornerstone of the system. At best it is an audit system involving periodic inspections of some nuclear facilities. At worst, IAEA safeguards are tokenistic (e.g. in China) or non-existent (Russia). In addition to physical inspections, other safeguards measures such as 24/7 live video monitoring have been introduced but only at a small number of facilities. For more information on the safeguards system – and protracted efforts to strengthen it – see the ‘further reading’ section below.

Recently-retired IAEA Director-General Mohamed El Baradei has summed up the problems with his observations that the IAEA’s basic rights of inspection are “fairly limited”, that the safeguards system suffers from “vulnerabilities”, that efforts to improve the system have been “half-hearted” and that the safeguards system operates on a “shoestring budget … comparable to a local police department”. South Australian Premier Mike Rann succinctly explained the problem in 1982:

Again and again it has been demonstrated here and overseas that when problems over safeguards prove difficult, commercial considerations will come first.

Readers interested in and concerned about safeguards could consider the following, modest proposals as a starting-point for your new career as a part-time safeguards activist!

1. The IAEA safeguards department is seriously underfunded (4). The problem is widely acknowledged yet it persists year after year, decade after decade. Perhaps the Australian government could be persuaded to kick in some more money and also to pursue this issue seriously in international fora.

2. Basing the IAEA safeguards system on periodic audits seems inadequate. Perhaps a minimum requirement ought to be that all nuclear facilities of any proliferation significance have a couple of IAEA inspectors permanently stationed on-site. Nuclear facilities typically employ hundreds of people so the additional costs associated with that proposal should not be prohibitive. Alternatively, permanent on-site inspectors or 24/7 live video monitoring might be set down as a minimum requirement.

3. All nuclear facilities processing Australian-Obligated Nuclear Materials (AONM – primarily uranium and its by-products) ought to be subject to IAEA inspections (i.e. the IAEA ought to have the authority to carry out inspections of those facilities). At the moment, it is a general rule that all facilities processing AONM must be subject to IAEA inspections but exceptions are made for the flimsiest of reasons.

4. Important information about safeguards is kept secret by the Australian government and there is a compelling case for greater transparency. Examples of unwarranted secrecy include the refusal to publicly release: country-by-country information on the separation and stockpiling of Australian-obligated plutonium; Administrative Arrangements, which contain important information about safeguards arrangements; information on nuclear accounting discrepancies; and the quantities of AONM held in each country.

5. Something needs to be done about the stockpiling of ever-growing amounts of plutonium as plutonium separation at reprocessing plants continually exceeds its limited uptake in fast spectrum reactors and MOX-fuelled reactors. The problem could easily be addressed by suspending or reducing the rate of reprocessing such that stockpiles of separated plutonium are drawn down rather than continuing to expand. Failing that, one modest reform would be for the Australian government to revert to the previous policy of requiring permission to separate Australian-obligated plutonium on a case-by-case basis rather than providing open-ended permission.

6. A credible safeguards regime for Australian uranium exports depends on having a credible safeguards agency. Sadly, the federal government’s Australian Safeguards and Non-Proliferation Office (ASNO) is anything but. For example, during the 2008 Joint Standing Committee on Treaties inquiry into the Howard-Putin uranium export agreement, ASNO conspicuously failed to inform the Committee that there has not been a single IAEA safeguards inspection in Russia since 2001 and instead misled the Committee with the indefensible claim that (non-existent) safeguards would “ensure” peaceful use of AONM in Russia. (Obviously the weapons genie is out of the bottle in Russia but there are other reasons for concern such as the frequency of nuclear theft and smuggling.) A detailed EnergyScience Coalition critique of ASNO concludes with a call for an independent inquiry (5) and the Australian Uranium Association has also called for an inquiry into the role and resourcing of ASNO (6). Changes are in train at ASNO with the imminent departure of its head and deputy-head. Now is an ideal opportunity to bring about much-needed reform so readers might consider writing to foreign minister Stephen Smith calling for an inquiry and for reform of ASNO.

If you want to argue for more radical reforms than those listed above, by all means go ahead! In his book ‘Prescription for the Planet‘, Tom Blees argues that:

Privatized nuclear power should be outlawed worldwide, with complete international control of not only the entire fuel cycle but also the engineering, construction, and operation of all nuclear power plants. Only in this way will safety and proliferation issues be satisfactorily dealt with. Anything short of that opens up a Pandora’s box of inevitable problems.

He also argues that:

The shadowy threat of nuclear proliferation and terrorism virtually requires us to either internationalize or ban nuclear power.

Blees also argues for a radical strengthening of safeguards including the establishment of a strike-force on full standby to attend promptly to any detected attempts to misuse nuclear facilities or to divert nuclear materials.

References:

(1) IAEA, 2005, ‘Global Public Opinion on Nuclear Issues and the IAEA – Final Report from 18 Countries’

(2) Australian Conservation Foundation, November 2008 media release

(3) US National Intelligence Council, 2008, “Global Trends 2025 – a Transformed World”

(4) See for example Mohamed El Baradei, 2009, ‘Intervention on Budget at IAEA Board of Governors’

(5) EnergyScience Coalition, ‘Who’s Watching the Nuclear Watchdog?’, briefing paper #19

(6) See p.12 of the AUA’s submission #45 to the Joint Standing Committee on Treaties

Further reading on safeguards:

* IAEA: <www.iaea.org/OurWork/SV/Safeguards/index.html>

* Australian Safeguards and Non-proliferation Office <www.asno.dfat.gov.au>

* Medical Association for Prevention of War <www.mapw.org.au/nuclear-chain/safeguards>

* Friends of the Earth safeguards section: <www.foe.org.au/anti-nuclear/issues/oz/u/safeguards>

* Medical Association for the Prevention of War and Australian Conservation Foundation, 2006, “An Illusion of Protection: The Unavoidable Limitations of Safeguards”, <www.mapw.org.au/download/illusion-protection-acf-mapw-2006>

* Non-Proliferation Policy Education Centre, 2008, “Falling Behind: International Scrutiny of the Peaceful Atom”, <www.npec-web.org>.

* Nuclear Power Joint Fact Finding Dialogue,  June 2007, <www.keystone.org/spp/energy/electricity/nuclear-power-dialogue>

Information on the interconnections between civil and military nuclear technologies and programs:

* See the country case studies and other literature posted at: <www.foe.org.au/anti-nuclear/issues/nfc/power-weapons>; <http://nuclearweaponarchive.org/Nwfaq/Nfaq7.html>; <http://isis-online.org/nuclear-weapons-programs>.

Real holes in science

I’m sometimes asked to describe what science is. Well, there are many definitions and philosophical positions which cover this question, but to me, as a working scientist, one stands out above all others as relevant to what I do. Science constrains uncertainty. Or, to put it in a slightly longer form, science is the method that allows humans to put realistic bounds on our understanding of how the world (the universe) works and the natural laws it obeys. Although there is almost no problem in science that can be explained fully, and few ideas can be proven absolutely, science is still among our most effective intellectual tools. From the technological sophistication of our modern society, to our appreciation of the hidden mechanisms of evolution or quantum mechanics, science tells us what is possible (and plausible), but not what is, or must be.

One scientific problem for which we can never have definitive proof is the cause of past extinctions. Such events can never be replayed or observed directly, and so cannot be tested or falsified; moreover, evidence from the past is inevitably sketchy and difficult to interpret. Yet, despite these inherent limitations, we can still assess how our available data stacks up against alternative ideas, and arrive at a probabilistic judgement on what is more or less likely. The extinction of the dinosaurs is the most famous example, but there are many others. In this week’s issue of Science, I have a co-authored paper “And then there were none?” with Bert Roberts on the extinction of Australia’s megafauna and the probable role of early modern people. There is a write-up of the story in The Australian, here.

In short, we argue that improved dating methods show that humans and megafauna only co-existed for a relatively short span of time after people invaded Australia, adding weight to the argument that hunting led to the extinction of many large-bodied species. In particular, new methods for direct dating of teeth and bones at a site long been claimed to provide evidence that humans and megafauna lived side-by-side for 20,000 years, has revealed that this site actually shows nothing of the sort — the bones and stone tools are not of the same age and were probably redeposited together due to erosion and floods. Although this latest finding doesn’t ‘prove’ that humans hunted megafauna to extinction, it does withdraw an important piece of supporting evidence for the alternative climate (drought) hypothesis. So, incrementally, science advances by narrowing uncertainty. Email me if you want a PDF of the article.

More broadly, many aspects of climate science can be looked at in a similar light — especially with respect to our efforts to understand the relative importance of past climate forcing effects, and our projections of future change. We cannot ever know what will happen in the future, for a whole variety of reasons (imperfect knowledge, limitations on our models and our ability to parameterise them, uncertainty about human decisions); likewise, we cannot ever be sure just how important greenhouse gases, ice albedo, dust, volcanoes and the sun were in perturbing past climates, nor how abruptly and markedly they did this. Yet we can still assess, based on multiple lines of evidence, what is more or less likely, and make decisions on energy pathways and other globally significant human activities on this basis, under a risk management framework.

In this context, Nature has just produced a great news feature called “The real holes in climate science” (available free, here). To quote:

Like any other field, research on climate change has some fundamental gaps, although not the ones typically claimed by sceptics. Quirin Schiermeier takes a hard look at some of the biggest problem areas.

The four areas of greatest uncertainty they discuss are regional climate predictions and downscaling (an area of particular interest in my research on ecological impacts that are relevant at the population and individual scale), precipitation (where will it get wetter, drier, snowier or more barren and how quickly will these shifts occur?), aerosols (how much warming sulphates and dust suppressing, and what is the heating effect of black carbon?) and palaeoclimatic reconstruction (the ‘tree ring controversy’ and related uncertainties). I would also add feedbacks, abrupt change and slow/fast climate sensitivity to that list…

Also, be sure to read the associated editorial, Climate of suspicion:

With climate-change sceptics waiting to pounce on any scientific uncertainties, researchers need a sophisticated strategy for communication.

This provides sound advice for all scientists wishing to engage on the topic of climate change in the public arena. Which definitely includes me, now that I’ve agreed to ‘debate’ Christopher Monckton and Ian Plimer, with the help of Graham Readfearn (of News.com’s Green Blog), at The Brisbane Institute on 29 January. As many of my readers may suspect, I plan to focus on the underlying motivations for this argument over ‘holes in the science’, rather than getting entangled in the scientific details or background of the antagonists, and will propose some ideas for cutting the Gordian knot (which, in my humble opinion, ultimately boils down to a question of energy economics). This is only fitting, given my evolution of thought on the matter of climate and energy over the last year.

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From nuclear sceptic to convert

I’m delighted to reproduce an Op Ed written by my good friend Assoc. Prof. Haydon Manning, who is head of the Department of Politics and Public Policy at Flinders University in Adelaide. Haydon teaches Australian and environmental politics and is sufficiently influential (controversial) that he’s been bestowed the great honour of having a Friends of the Earth page dedicated to his writings! This piece was written for the SA Mines and Energy journal; you can read the original here.

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“Spotting Rex Connor’s Ghost”

In the late 1970s, I marched through Adelaide streets shouting: “Uranium, leave it in the ground.” Teaching environmental politics over the last ten or so years saw me prepare lectures weighing up the pros and cons of the nuclear fuel cycle. The evidence slowly convince a nuclear skeptic of the errors of his ways.

Recently, I accepted an invitation from the WA Chamber of Mines and Energy to speak at a public forum in Kalgoorlie. I argued that the good citizens of WA ought to be proud once uranium oxide starts to pass through their township as they will join what I call “the main game” on the carbon emission reduction front.

In an effort to convey this point I often draw attention to the remarkable energy punch embedded in a drum of uranium oxide. One drum, once processed and fabricated into nuclear fuel rods, will generate the same amount of electricity as approximately 6,000 tonnes of coal. In a nutshell, about 5 drums of yellowcake equates to the electricity generating capacity of your average coal freighter!

Take this a step further and look ahead a couple of decades. A drum uranium oxide supplying a so-called 4th generation nuclear reactor would, according to data supplied to me by Adelaide University’s Professor Barry Brook, equate to about 1 million tonnes of coal burning foregone. If you like, that’s something like a briefcase of yellowcake compared to a ship of coal – now that truly evokes hope for a mid-century clean energy future.

In this State we appreciate that our uranium mining story is one of world’s best practice with regard to occupational health and safety and the transport of uranium oxide. Three decades without a ‘radiation scare’ sees the majority of South Australians well aware that there is nothing to fear from uranium mining, milling and transportation. This is clearly evident with opinion polls indicating that South Australians are more at ease with the industry than poll respondents in other states.

Thirty years ago the anti-uranium mining camp spoke of grave health risk for miners. I was convinced when I marched that cancer rates would be higher for miners. Of course, history demonstrates this is not the case but that doesn’t deter the current crop of anti-nuclear campaigners efforts to scare the public.

For example, the WA Conservation Council and WA Greens Senator, Scott Ludlam, proselytize that ‘uranium is the 21st century’s asbestos’. I’m able to report that many young students I teach upon critically reviewing such arguments dismiss them and gravitate toward supporting nuclear power. They see the fact that without nuclear energy in the picture many nations will simply struggle to find a low emissions path to energy security.

It seems that South Australian political and business leaders need to robustly lobby the Rudd Government on the question of uranium sales to India. And more quietly, but I am enough of a realist to know this is unlikely, to advocate the case for hosting a high grade nuclear waste disposal facility. This could begin with the point that servicing the needs of those uranium customers who may struggle find the suitable geology for long term waste repositories dovetails well with our established bona vides dealing with uranium.

Debating with environmentalists of various ‘shades of Green’, one is often at pains to convey the point that countries like India and China will not deliberately slow their economic growth simply because climate change threatens. They seek for their citizens material wealth akin to that which we enjoy. Burning a swag of fossil fuels is a simple necessity unless viable and mature technologies present themselves as an alternative. Powering Beijing, Shanghai and Mumbai, for example, with wind and solar is an unadulterated fantasy. Whereas envisaging a future where nuclear power supplies electricity for industry, homes and transport is no fantasy.

The demand for uranium sourced in South Australia is set to soar in coming decades as we are in the box seat to help such nations. By offering low sovereign risk, a factor well known to this journal’s readership, but one not widely appreciated within the community, SA is set to become a key energy supply province some even say, ‘the Saudi Arabia of the South!’

With WA now on board with licensing uranium mines, and given that few South Australians oppose uranium mining, we should as a nation begin to look at enrichment and fuel rod fabrication. To be sure, this is a long term vision as current international enrichment capacity is well able to meet demand, but that will change and our low sovereign risk status could well see the economies eventually stack up. Of course, it will take political leadership and the dissolution of the remaining anti-nuclear sentiment within the Australian Labor Party.

Sparking a debate over uranium enrichment should be on the agenda of the major parties in South Australia. Thirty-five years ago it was on the agenda of the Whitlam Government’s Minster for Mines and Energy, Rex Connor, but implacable opposition from within the State ALP saw Connor’s vision to value add kyboshed.

A second term Rudd government may well jump the hurdle and support uranium sales to India. In that event the door may also open with regard to a more fulsome Australian engagement with the nuclear fuel cycle. If that happens I hope a third term Rann Government will investigate, as part of a long term vision, an enrichment plant.

In June 1975 Connor argued for an enrichment plant at ‘the top of Spencer Gulf’ because he figured that was ‘the safest place in Australia in regards to marine and rocket attacks … and was the best site for the plant both economically and strategically’. Connor is remembered, infamously for the the ‘loans affair’ which contributed to the downfall of the Whitlam government. Fair enough to, it was a low point in national political life! But one day he may be remembered as a visionary who saw Australia as a mature partner operating at different points of the nuclear fuel cycle.

Emission cuts realities for electricity generation – costs and CO2 emissions

“We must cut our carbon emissions immediately!“… “We have to transition rapidly to 100% renewable energy!“… “A massive nuclear build out is the only logical course of action!“… and so on. We get these well-meant but hand-waving arguments all the time, almost always bereft of real-world numbers — especially those with $$ attached. This greatly limits their utility and credibility. Without a practical, pragmatic plan, we aren’t going to get anywhere and the people in control of the purse strings will not pay them serious attention.

That’s why I’m so happy to present this new, clear-headed analysis by Peter Lang (which was spawned by in the discussion threads of previous posts on wind and solar power — their costs and ability to mitigate carbon emissions). Using Australia as a case study (although the same principles would apply in almost any developed economy that is currently reliant on fossil fuel energy), Peter considers six electricity supply scenarios for the period 2010 to 2050 — a high-carbon business-as-usual projection as a reference, and five low(er) carbon alternatives. In each of the alternatives, coal-fired power stations are retired, and not replaced, such that by the period 2035 — 2040, the last few are closed.

These analysis are simple, clearly presented and easily understood. Yet they’re also realistic in the same way that David Mackay’s energy plans are realistic — they add up (although Mackay was concerned about whether the physics are right, Lang is concerned about whether the $$ and build rates are plausible). They are an apples and apples set of plans, in the sense that they represent reasonable relative comparisons which all aim to achieve the same goal, in different ways. Like any modelling exercise, the uncertainties lie in the quality of the input data and the acceptability of the assumptions made. Peter makes them quite explicit. If you wish to disagree and propose/source your own numbers, fine, but remember that the onus is then on you to justify your assumptions.

I’ll stop and this point and let you read the analysis. Get yourself a large mug of coffee or a tall glass of wine, and settle in for an interesting read. After that, let the comments fly. I certainly have my own points to make about where I think the analysis is most/least plausible, but that can come a little later…

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Emission Cuts Realities – Electricity Generation

Cost and CO2 emissions projections for different electricity generation options for Australia to 2050

By Peter Lang, January 2010

(Download the printable 32-page PDF version here, which also includes references and Appendices).

Peter Lang is a retired geologist and engineer with 40 years experience on a wide range of energy projects throughout the world, including managing energy R&D and providing policy advice for government and opposition. His experience includes: coal, oil, gas, hydro, geothermal, nuclear power plants, nuclear waste disposal, and a wide range of energy end use management projects.

Abstract

Five options for cutting CO2 emissions from electricity generation in Australia are compared with a ‘Business as Usual’ option over the period 2010 to 2050. The six options comprise combinations of coal, gas, nuclear, wind and solar thermal technologies.

The conclusions: The nuclear option reduces CO2 emissions the most, is the only option that can be built quickly enough to make the deep emissions cuts required, and is the least cost of the options that can cut emissions sustainably. Solar thermal and wind power are the highest cost of the options considered. The cost of avoiding emissions is lowest with nuclear and highest with solar and wind power.

Introduction

This paper presents a simple analysis of CO2 emissions, capital expenditure, electricity generation costs and the emissions avoidance cost for six options for supplying Australia’s electricity. The results are presented at five year intervals for the period 2010 to 2050.

The purpose of this paper is to address two questions that were raised in discussion of three earlier papers (Lang 2009a, Lang 2009b, Lang 2009c). The papers ‘Solar Power Realities’ (Lang 2009b), and the Addendum (2009c), looked at the cost of reducing CO2 emissions using solar power. They did this by looking at the limit situation; that is, we replace all our fossil fuel electricity generation ‘overnight’ with either solar power and energy storage or with nuclear power. The papers concluded that solar power would cost at least 40 times more than nuclear to supply the National Electricity Market (NEM). The estimates were based on current prices for currently available technologies and for the NEM demand in 2007.

The first paper, “Cost and Quantity of Greenhouse Gas Emissions Avoided by Wind Generation” (Lang 2009a), concluded that wind power with back-up by gas generators saves little greenhouse gas emissions and the avoidance cost is high compared with other alternatives.

Discussion of these analyses raised two main questions:

1. The limit situation does not take into account what happens during the transition period. The earliest we could begin commissioning nuclear is about 2020. So, what should we do until then? Does it make sense to build wind power as fast as possible until 2020, at least, so we can cut greenhouse gas emissions as quickly as possible and start as early as possible?

2. The previous papers consider replacement of fossil fuel generators with one technology only rather than with a mix of technologies. This raises the question: would a mix of technologies be better able to meet the demand and at lower cost. Would a mix of solar and wind be lower cost than either alone, and lower cost than nuclear?

To attempt to answer these questions, in a ‘ball park’ way, I conducted a simple analysis of the cost, and CO2 emissions from six options (six technology mixes) for the period 2010 to 2050. The six options are:

1. Business as Usual (BAU).

2. Combined Cycle Gas Turbine (CCGT).

3. Nuclear and CCGT.

4. Wind and Gas [Gas means a mix of Open Cycle Gas Turbine (OCGT) and Combined Cycle Gas Turbine (CCGT)].

5. Solar Thermal and CCGT

6. Solar Thermal, Wind and Gas.

Throughout the paper ‘emissions’ refers to ‘CO2-e emissions’. More specifically, it refers to CO2-e emissions from electricity sent out from the power station. The figures are not life cycle emissions (see assumption 10, below).

Assumptions

Assumptions that apply to all options are described in this section. Assumptions that are specific to an option or to a technology are described under the relevant option in the Methodology section.

1. The total energy supplied is as per the ABARE (2007) projections of electricity supply to 2030, extended linearly to 2050. All options must supply this total energy for each period and all must provide the same quality of power as the Business as Usual case. To achieve this, intermittent renewable energy generators must be backed up by a responsive generator technology.

2. For all except the Business as Usual case, it is assumed that coal fired power stations can be and will be decommissioned at the rate of 1 GW per year for black coal generators and 0.4 GW per year for brown coal generators.

3. The energy deficit caused by decommissioning the coal fired power stations is supplied by replacement generating capacity. Five options for replacement generating capacity are considered. Each option comprises a mix of a few technologies that in combination are capable, theoretically, of providing the energy and the power that would have been provided by the coal power stations. That is, the mixes of replacement technologies must be capable of providing the same power quality, and of supplying it on demand, at all times.

4. The ABARE (2007) projections provide the breakdown of energy supply by nine generation types; four fossil fuel and five renewable energy. The energy supplied by the seven non-coal technologies is the same in all six options [There is one exception to this statement – see Option 3 – Nuclear and CCGT]. The Business as Usual case is as per the ABARE (2007) projections for all nine technologies.

5. The main constraint in the analyses is the assumed decommissioning rate for coal fired power stations and the assumed build rate achievable for the replacement technologies. The build rate assumptions are arguably optimistic. The achievability of the assumed build rates is discussed in a later section.

6. The capital expenditures do not include the cost of replacement of the reserve capacity margin that is needed to cover for scheduled and unscheduled outages because the reserve capacity margin is assumed to be the same for all options.

7. The analyses are intentionally simple so that non-specialists can follow the assumptions and analyses. A more thorough analysis would use sophisticated modelling to optimise the mix of technologies and to calculate the long run marginal cost of electricity sent out. All available technologies would be included in the analyses rather then the simple mixes used in these analyses. Such analyses are complicated and need sophisticated modelling capability. For examples see EPRI (2009a), MIT (2007), MIT (2009), ACIL-Tasman (2009), Frontier Economics (2009), ATSE (2008).

8. Transmission costs are similar for the Business as Usual, CCGT and Nuclear options. So no additional cost is included for transmission for the CCGT and Nuclear options. Extra costs for transmission are included for the Wind and Solar Thermal options.

9. No allowance is made for the lower energy growth rate that energy efficiency improvements will bring. This omission is offset because no allowance is made for the higher growth rate as cleaner electricity replaces gas for heating and replaces oil for land transport (either in electric vehicles or through synthetic fuels such as methanol or hydrogen that use electricity for their production).

10. CO2 emissions from nuclear and the renewable energy technologies are assumed to be zero in operation, consistent with DCC (2009), EPRI (2009b) and Frontier (2009). On a Life Cycle Analysis (LCA) basis the emissions from these technologies are small compared with fossil fuel generation. These are ignored in this simple analysis. [Lightbucket (2009) lists the results from authoritative studies of LCA emissions from electricity generation].

11. No attempt has been made to reconcile CO2 emissions calculated for the Business as Usual option with the emissions projections published by the Department of Climate Change (2009).

12. The ABARE (2007) energy projections are for all Australia’s electricity supply, both off-grid and on-grid. However, the analyses here apply the ABARE (2007) figures as if they were for grid connected electricity. This simplification means the potential for emissions reductions and the cost of the options is overstated (perhaps by 10% in early years decreasing over time).

Table 1 lists the CO2-e emissions intensities for sent out electricity in 2010 for the Business as Usual technologies.

Table 2 summarises the assumptions and inputs for the coal and replacement technologies.

Methodology

This section explains how the analyses were done.

Option 1 – Business as Usual (BAU)

The ABARE (2007) projections for electricity supply for the years 2005-06 to 2029-30 were extended to 2050 and converted from petajoules (PJ) to terawatt-hours (TWh). Figure 1 shows the energy projections for the Business as Usual option.

The CO2 emissions were calculated for the Business as Usual case by multiplying the energy by the CO2 emissions factors. The assumed emissions factors for 2010 are listed in Table 1. Emissions factors for the periods after 2010 were reduced at the rate of 1% per 5 years to account for average efficiency improvements for the existing generators and new generators. The renewable and nuclear technologies are assumed to produce zero emissions (Table 1).

To compare the cost difference between the options we need only compare the cost of the coal with the replacement technologies. All the other technologies are the same for all options.

The capital expenditure for coal in the Business as Usual case comprises two components:

a) the capital expenditure of new coal capacity added to meet the rising demand for electricity; and

b) the capital expenditure of new coal to replace old coal that has reached the end of its economic life. To work with capital expenditure, we must convert the energy figures in the ABARE projections to average power.

The energy (TWh) was converted to average power (GW) using a capacity factor of 90% (refer Table 2). As mentioned previously, this simple analysis ignores the reserve capacity margin needed in the generation system.

The amount of new coal capacity required each year for the Business as Usual case was calculated from the ABARE (2007) projections. The amount of new coal to replace existing coal at the end of its economic life was calculated as 2% of existing capacity per year [Assuming a 40 year economic life, the plants would be replaced at the rate of 2.5% per year if the capacity was constant from year to year. However, the capacity is increasing over time. In any one year we need to replace only the plants that are 40 years old. If the capacity doubles in 40 years, then we need to replace 1.25% of the total existing capacity in each year. I have assumed 2% as a round figure in between 1.25% and 2.5%.].

The capital cost of new coal capacity for the Business as Usual option was calculated by multiplying the amount of new coal capacity by the unit rate for Ultra Super Critical Black Coal (air cooled) and Ultra Super Critical Brown Coal (air cooled) (refer Table 35, ACIL-Tasman 2009).

All non-BAU options

For all options other than Business as Usual, black coal capacity is decommissioned at the rate of 1 GW per year, and brown coal at the rate of 0.4 GW per year. Decommissioning starts in 2010. All black coal is decommissioned by 2040 and all brown coal by 2035.

The amount of energy these power stations would have generated if not decommissioned is calculated. This is the energy deficit that must be supplied by the replacement generators in all the non Business as Usual options.

The CO2 emissions from the remaining coal capacity are calculated by multiplying the energy generated from black coal and brown coal by the emissions factor for that technology for that year.

The Business as Usual Option comprises projections for nine technologies, – Black Coal, Brown Coal and seven others. The emissions from all the seven non-coal technologies are the same for all options.

The following sections describe the five options considered here for replacing the energy from the decommissioned coal power stations.

Option 2 – Combined Cycle Gas Turbine (CCGT)

CCGT is built to replace the energy deficit resulting from the decommissioning of the coal fired plants. The amount of CCGT capacity required is calculated by multiplying the energy deficit by 90% capacity factor. Figure 2 shows the energy supplied by each technology.

The CO2 emissions for CCGT are calculated using a CO2 emissions factor of 0.45 t CO2/MWh, decreasing at 1% per five year to reflect increasing generation efficiency.

The CO2 emissions from the remaining coal generators and from the other seven technologies are included in the total for this option.

The capital cost for this option is calculated using the unit rate for new build CCGT (air cooled) given in Table 35, ACIL Tasman (2009), and decreasing at -0.4% pa from 2030 to 2050.

Option 3 – Nuclear and CCGT

For this option, nuclear power is commissioned at the rate of 1 GW per year from 2020 to 2025, then at 1.5 GW per year to 2030, then at 2 GW per year to 2050. The reason for selecting these rates is discussed below in “How achievable are the build rates”

CCGT is commissioned at the rate needed to make up the difference between the energy that the nuclear power can supply and the energy deficit caused by decommissioning the coal power stations. Figure 3 shows how much energy is produced by each technology.

From 2010 to 2019, no nuclear capacity is commissioned so the CCGT capacity is the same as in Option 2 – CCGT. From 2020 to 2025, nuclear is not built fast enough to replace the coal capacity being decommissioned, so CCGT is added to supply the energy deficit. After 2025, nuclear is being built faster than coal is being decommissioned. So, progressively less energy is being required from CCGT. This shows up (in this simple analysis) as a reduction in CCGT capacity. The practical interpretation of this is that the Natural Gas generation capacity would be reduced at this rate. This means that Natural Gas generation capacity would not be replaced at the end of its 30 year economic life. This begins from about 2025.

CO2 emissions for nuclear are assumed to be zero (see ‘Assumptions’ and Table 1). CO2 emissions for Coal, CCGT and the other technologies are calculated in the same way as for Option 2 – CCGT. As for capacity, the negative emissions shown against CCGT should actually be a reduction in emissions from ‘Natural Gas’ but for simplicity of calculation they are shown as negative for CCGT.

The capital cost calculations for this option are similar to those for Option 2 – CCGT. The cost of the nuclear capacity is at the unit rate in ACIL-Tasman (2009), Table 35, and decreasing at -0.9% pa from 2030 to 2035 then at -0.6% pa to 2050.

Option 4 – Wind and Gas

For this option, wind power capacity is commissioned at the same rate as the coal fired plants are decommissioned. So when all wind farms are producing full power (a rare event), the wind farms will supply all the energy that the decommissioned coal fired power plants would have supplied. When the wind farms are not producing full power, back-up generation is required to make up for the energy deficit.

Back-up capacity is provided by a combination of Combined Cycle Gas Turbines (CCGT) and Open Cycle Gas Turbines (OCGT). Equal proportions are assumed. A Capacity Credit of 8% is assumed (AER, 2009), so 1 GW of wind power capacity is assumed to be backed up by 0.46 GW of OCGT and 0.46 GW of CCGT [In practice more gas capacity will be built than this calculation indicates. OCGT and CCGT run at lower capacity factors in practice than the 90% used in this analysis for calculating the amount of capacity required]. The proportions, on the basis of capacity, are 1.0:0.46:0.46.

The energy is calculated assuming a capacity factor of 30% for Wind and availability of 90% for OCGT and CCGT. So, on average, 3 GWh of energy is supplied by a combination of Wind, OCGT and CCGT in the proportions 1:1:1. Figure 4 shows how much energy is produced by each technology.

CO2 emissions for wind generation are assumed to be zero (refer to ‘Assumptions’ and Table 1). The CO2 emissions for OCGT are calculated using a CO2 emissions intensity of 0.7 t CO2/MWh, decreasing at 1% per five years to reflect increasing generation efficiency. CO2 emissions for CCGT, Coal and the other technologies are calculated in the same way as for Option 2 – CCGT. The lower efficiency and higher emissions from the gas turbines when operating in back up mode (Lang, 2009a; Hawkins, 2009) are included in this analysis. The CO2 emissions are increased by 34% for OCGT and 17% for CCGT (Hawkins, 2009) when these technologies are operating in back-up mode. The higher emissions rate is applied to the proportion of the energy that is generated when they are assumed to be operating in ‘back-up’ mode. For simplicity this is assumed to be equal to the proportion of the replacement energy that is generated by Wind. In effect, the increased emissions factor is applied to half the energy generated by the CCGT and OCGT replacement generators.

The capital cost calculations for this option are similar to those for Option 2 – CCGT and Option 3 – Nuclear and CCGT. The capital cost of the wind capacity is $2591/kW (Average of seven wind farms listed as ‘under construction’ in ABARE (2009). This Australian cost is close to the US cost in EPRI (2009b), Table 7.1, p 7-5, which is US$2350/kW = A$2611/kW) in 2010 and decreasing in future periods at -0.6% pa (Frontier, 2009). The cost of OCGT and CCGT capacity is at the unit rate in ACIL-Tasman (2009), Table 35, increasing at +0.4% pa and +0.5% pa from 2030 to 2050.

As mentioned above, the OCGT and CCGT generators are less efficient when operating in back up mode for wind. These analyses assume that the electricity generation costs are 17% higher for CCGT and 34% higher for OCGT (Hawkins, 2009). However, only half the energy generated by these technologies is considered to be in back-up mode, so electricity cost is increased by 8.5% for CCGT and 17% for OCGT when operating in back-up mode.

Wind power is assumed to have an economic life of 25 years and gas 30 years. Wind and gas capacity installed in 2010 must be replaced in 2035 and 2040 respectively. The capital costs of replacing wind and gas at the end of their economic lives are calculated at the capital cost rate applicable for the year in which the replacement is commissioned.

Wind power requires significant additional capital expenditure for transmission and network management capability. Based on estimated costs for extra transmission capacity incurred because of wind generation in the USA, $1,000/kW of installed wind capacity is included (Gene Preston, pers. comm., 3 Nov 2009). The transmission cost for wind power raises the cost of electricity by an assumed $15/MWh on average (Gene Preston, Dec 2009, pers. comm. and EPRI, 2009a).

Option 5 – Solar Thermal and CCGT

This option is similar to Option 3 – Nuclear & CCGT but with solar thermal instead of nuclear.

The differences are:

1. The build rate of solar thermal capacity in this option (Option 5) is half the build rate of nuclear in Option 3 – Nuclear & CCGT

2. Therefore, the build rate of CCGT is higher in this option than in the Nuclear & CCGT option (to make up the energy difference). This means emissions are higher in the Solar & CCGT option than in the Nuclear & CCGT option.

3. Solar thermal capacity has an assumed life expectancy of 25 years so replacement of solar thermal capacity begins 25 years after the first installation; so replacement begins in 2045.

4. Whereas nuclear would be built near population centres, where work force, infrastructure, suppliers and services are available, this is not the case for solar thermal [The NEEDS (2009) costs are based on constructing the Andasol 1 solar thermal power station in Spain. The cost of constructing widely distributed solar thermal power stations over an area of some 3000 km by 1000 km in Australia’s deserts will be higher than the cost of constructing in Spain - where there is well developed infrastructure and larger work force nearer to the sites. To construct the solar thermal power stations in areas throughout central Australia will require large mobile construction camps, fly-in fly-out work force, large concrete batch plants, large supply of water, energy and good roads to each power station. Air fields suitable for fly-in fly-out will be required at say one per 250 MW power station. That means we need to build such air fields at the rate of about two, then three, then four per year.]. Solar thermal needs to be built in areas of high insolation (deserts) and the power stations must be widely distributed to minimise the impacts of widespread cloud cover.

5. Transmission costs are included at the rate of $1,200/kW (derived from estimates in AEMO, 2009).

Solar thermal capacity is commissioned at the rate of 0.5 GW per year from 2020 to 2025, then at 0.75 GW per year to 2030, then at 1 GW per year to 2050. However, from 2040, some of the new build is for replacing existing old capacity. Solar thermal capacity is assumed to have the same capacity factor as nuclear, i.e. 90%. This is based on NEEDS (2008) which forecasts that solar thermal will have this capability by 2020 [There is an alternative to solar thermal with sufficient energy storage for 90% capacity factor. The alternative is solar thermal hybrid. Gas generates power when the sun isn’t shining and there is insufficient energy storage. The hybrid options emits much more CO2 than CST alone and the electricity costs are higher (EPRI, 2009a, page 10-20), although this comparison is made at a capacity factor of 34% not 90%. NEEDS argues that the solar thermal with 8000 full load hours energy storage will be available and electricity costs will be less than the hybrid option by 2020. The hybrid option is not included in the options considered here].

CCGT is commissioned at the rate needed to make up the difference between the energy that the solar thermal capacity can provide and the energy deficit caused by decommissioning the coal fired power stations.

From 2010 to 2019, negligible solar thermal is commissioned so CCGT is built at the same rate as in Option 2 – CCGT and Option 3 – Nuclear & CCGT. From 2020 to 2040 CCGT is being added because solar thermal is not being built fast enough to replace the coal capacity being decommissioned. By 2040 all coal capacity has been decommissioned. So, from 2040 less energy is being required from CCGT. This shows up, in this simple analysis, as reduction in CCGT capacity. The practical interpretation of the reduction of CCGT capacity is that the Natural Gas generation capacity would be reduced at this rate. What this means is that the Natural Gas generation would not be replaced at the end of its 30 year economic life. This begins from about 2040. Figure 5 shows how much energy is produced by each technology.

CO2 emissions for solar thermal are assumed to be zero (refer Table 1). CO2 emissions for coal, CCGT and the other technologies are calculated in the same way as for Option 3 – Nuclear and CCGT. The negative emissions shown against CCGT should actually be a reduction in emissions from ‘Natural Gas’ but for simplicity they are shown as negative against CCGT.

The capital cost calculations for this option are similar to those for Option 3 – Nuclear and CCGT, except that the capital cost of transmission is added and the capital cost of replacing retiring solar thermal capacity is included from 2045. The capital cost of the solar thermal capacity is based on adjusted unit rates from NEEDS (2008), Figure 3.11, Case B [The ‘learning rates’, and hence the costs, in the NEEDS report seem optimistic (see Appendix 2)]. The rates are adjusted to attempt to make them more consistent with the way the ACIL-Tasman (2009) rates were derived. Two adjustments were made. Firstly, the initial capital cost unit rate is adjusted up by 25% to allow for the greater cost of constructing widely distributed power stations across an area roughly 1000 km by 3000 km of Australia’s deserts. Secondly, the learning rate in NEEDS (2008) is replaced with the same rate of cost reduction as for nuclear in Option 3- Nuclear and CCGT.

The capacity factor assumed for solar thermal is the same as for nuclear, coal and gas. This requires that the solar thermal power stations have sufficient energy storage for 24 hour operation and can provide for 8,000 full-load hours per year. Needs (2008) forecast that this capability could be available by 2020. The additional capacity needed to ensure full power generation throughout winter and throughout periods of overcast weather (Lang, 2009b), is not allowed for in this analysis.

As for wind, transmission is a significant cost item for solar thermal. The capital expenditure for transmission for solar thermal is calculated at $1200/kW (based on estimates in AEMO, 2009). Electricity cost includes $15/MWh for transmission.

Option 6 – Solar Thermal, Wind and Gas

For this option, it is assumed that solar thermal is commissioned at the same rate as in Option 5 – Solar Thermal & CCGT. Wind, CCGT and OCGT are commissioned at the same rate as in Option 4 – Wind & Gas. The solar capacity does not reduce the amount of gas capacity needed to back-up for the wind capacity. Gas capacity required to back up for wind does not change but the amount of energy the gas generates does change, with the gas generators working at lower capacity factors.

The energy generated by solar thermal is the same as in Option 5 – Solar Thermal and CCGT. The energy generated by wind is the same as in Option 4 – Wind & Gas. The energy generated by OCGT and CCGT makes up the energy deficit. Figure 6 shows how much energy is produced by each technology.

CO2 emissions for wind and solar are assumed to be zero in this analysis (see Table 1). CO2 emissions for OCGT, CCGT, coal and the other seven technologies are calculated in the same way as for Option 4 – Wind and Gas.

The capital cost calculations for this option are similar to those for Option 4 – Wind & Gas and Option 5 – Solar Thermal & CCGT. The capital cost of the solar capacity in this option is the same as for Option 5 – Solar Thermal & CCGT. The capital cost of the wind capacity is the same as for Option 4 – Wind & Gas. The capital cost of the gas capacity is less than Option 4 – Wind & Gas because of the contribution from solar thermal; solar thermal provides its share of energy and the gas makes up the deficit. Transmission cost is included at $15/MWh for solar thermal and for wind.

Build rates

The rate of decommissioning coal and commissioning the replacement generating capacity, for each option, is summarised in Table 3. The figures in the shaded cells are prescribed inputs and the unshaded cells are calculated values.

Electricity Costs

The cost of electricity, for coal and the replacement technologies, was calculated for each option. The electricity costs were calculated by applying the electricity cost unit rate (see Table 4 and Appendix 2) to the proportion of energy generated by each technology. Appendix 2 explains the sources and derivation of the electricity cost unit rates for use in this analysis.

CO2 Avoidance Cost

The CO2 avoidance cost (the cost to avoid a tonne of CO2 emissions) was calculated for each option. It is the difference in electricity cost between Business as Usual and the respective option divided by the difference in CO2 emission between the Business as Usual and the respective option.

Results

The results of the analyses are summarised in Figures 7 to 12.

Figure 7 compares the total CO2 emissions per year from the six options.

Figure 8 compares the capital expenditure per 5 years for the six options. The capital expenditure is for coal and the replacement technologies only. The capital expenditure for the other seven technologies is the same for all options; these costs are not included in the total capital expenditure figures shown here.

Figure 9 compares the cumulative capital expenditure of the six options.

Figure 10 shows the long run marginal cost of electricity for coal and the replacement technologies only. These costs do not include the cost for the seven technologies that are the same in all options.

Figure 11 compares the options on the basis of the CO2 avoidance cost; i.e. the cost to avoid a tonne of CO2.

Discussion

The following can be interpreted from Figures 7 and 8:

Option 1 – Business as Usual produces the highest CO2 emissions by a large margin. Capital expenditure is fairly consistent at about $10 to $15 billion per 5 years, or about $2 to $3 billion per year.

Option 2 – CCGT has the highest emissions of the replacement options. It has the lowest capital cost of all options (although it has the highest operating cost). The CO2 emissions with this option are only slightly less in 2050 than in 2010. The reason the curve turns up from 2040 is that all coal fired power stations have been decommissioned. Therefore, CCGT is being added but no coal is being removed. So we are adding emissions from the CCGT without cutting any from coal generation.

Option 3 – Nuclear and CCGT has the lowest CO2 emissions from 2020. It has the lowest capital expenditure, except Business as Usual and CCGT, for most of the period from 2010 to 2050. From 2035 the capital expenditure rate decreases.

Option 4 – Wind, with CCGT and OCGT for back-up, produces slightly lower CO2 emissions than the CCGT. However, this is achieved at high cost – about $4 billion to $6 billion per year more than CCGT. The step up in expenditure in 2040 is for replacement of the wind capacity installed in 2015. The emissions increase from 2040 as electricity demand increases and once the coal generators have been decommissioned.

Option 5 – Solar Thermal and CCGT. Solar thermal capacity is built at half the rate of nuclear, and provides half the energy. CCGT must be built faster in the solar option than in the nuclear option to make up the energy deficit. The CO2 emissions from 2010 to 2019 are the same for the three options CCGT, Nuclear & CCGT and Wind & CCGT. From 2020, the CO2 emissions from the solar thermal option are higher than from the nuclear option. By 2050, the CO2 emissions from the solar thermal option are over three times those from the nuclear option, and increasing as electricity demand increases. The capital expenditure for the solar option is substantially higher than for nuclear throughout.

Option 6 – Solar, Wind and Gas is a combination of Options 4 and 5. CO2 emissions are the second lowest from 2020 to 2050. Importantly, this option requires around $5 billion to $6 billion per year higher capital expenditure than nuclear to 2030. From 2030 to 2050 the difference in capital expenditure blows out to over $10 billion per year higher rate of expenditure for this option.

Figure 9 shows the cumulative capital cost and Figure 10 shows the long run marginal cost of electricity (LRMC). The following can be interpreted from these two charts:

CCGT is the lowest cost option throughout the period from 2010 to 2050.

Nuclear & CCGT has the lowest total cost (cumulative capital expenditure) of all options except Business as Usual and CCGT. The electricity cost for the Nuclear & CCGT option peaks in 2045 then starts to decrease as Natural Gas is decommissioned.

The steep rise in capital expenditure and electricity cost for the Wind option and the Solar Thermal and Wind option is because of the high cost of Wind and because Wind is being added at the rate of 1.4 GW per year from 2011, which is three times the rate Wind was commissioned in 2008.

The options with wind and solar thermal produce the highest cost electricity throughout.

The cumulative capital expenditure for the Solar Thermal option is about 30% higher than for nuclear. This is despite the fact that the solar thermal capacity is being built at half the rate of nuclear.

Important to note: The electricity cost for the Solar Thermal, Wind and Gas option is higher than the Solar Thermal and CCGT option. This indicates that combining renewable energy generators does not reduce the cost.

Figure 11 compares the options on the basis of the cost of avoiding a tonne of CO2 emissions. The CCGT option has the lowest avoidance cost to 2035 and then the Nuclear & CCGT option is lowest thereafter. The difference, in 2015, between the options that have Wind in their mix ($163/MWh) and those that do not (50/MWh) is because wind with gas back up is far more expensive but avoids insignificant extra emissions (see Figure 7). In the long run, Nuclear & CCGT is the least cost way to reduce emissions from electricity generation. The options with Wind and Solar are the highest cost way to avoid emissions.

How achievable are the assumed build rates?

The build rate for Business as Usual has been achieved consistently to date, so there can be no doubt that it is achievable.

The build rate for CCGT is about twice the build rate for coal in the Business as Usual case and about 15 times the current build rate for Natural Gas generation plant.

The build rate for wind capacity (1.4 GW per year) is about 3 times the build rate achieved in 2008 (0.48 GW) (GWEC, 2008). For comparison, in 2008 USA installed 8.4 GW and China 6.3 GW (GWEC, 2009). Interestingly, developed countries with larger economies than Australia, installed not much more than Australia, e.g. Canada (0.5 GW). AER (2009), Table 1.4 shows a peak for proposed commissioning of 2.8 GW in 2011. In practice, the build rate for wind will be limited by transmission capacity and the amount of wind power that can be accepted by the grid. The assumed build rate of 1.4 GW per year (500-700 turbines a year based on current turbine sizes) seems achievable in the future.

The rate of commissioning nuclear from 2020 to 2025 is 1 GW per year. That is equivalent to one new reactor per mainland state every 5 years. To put this in perspective, France commissioned its Gen II nuclear power plants at the rate of 3 GW per year for two decades (WNA, 2009). And Japan, China and Korea have been building the new Gen III nuclear power plants in about 4 years. So, it would seem the build rate for nuclear assumed here could be achieved from 2020, if necessary.

The assumed rate of commissioning solar thermal in these analyses, seems highly optimistic. The quantity of steel and concrete required is an indication of the amount of construction effort required. Solar thermal requires about 8 times more concrete and 15 times more steel than nuclear per MW of capacity (Table 5). The build rate for solar thermal, assumed in these analyses, is half the rate of nuclear, so each year we would need to construct solar thermal plants comprising 4 times more concrete and seven times more steel than the nuclear plants. But that’s not all. Nuclear would be built relatively close to the population centres, where services, infrastructure and work force is more readily available. Conversely, the solar plants need to be built in the desert regions. They will require four times as much water (for concrete) as nuclear. Water pipe lines will need to be built across the desert to supply the water. Dams will need to be built in the tropical north to store water and desalination plants along the coast elsewhere. To develop and retain a skilled work force to work in such regions will be costly. Work will be for about 9 months of the year to avoid the hottest periods. Based on the quantities of steel and concrete, towns will be required in the desert that accommodate about four times the work force required for constructing a nuclear power station. Fly-in-fly-out airports will need to be built for each town with a capability to move much larger numbers of people than the largest mining operations. Two such towns and airfields must be built per year to achieve the solar thermal build rate. It is hard to imagine how a build rate for solar thermal could be even 1/10th the build rate that could be achieved with nuclear.

The build rate for nuclear would be difficult to achieve. But the build rates for solar thermal would be much more difficult to achieve.

Sensitivity to assumptions and inputs

The results are highly sensitive to some of the assumptions and inputs. The most sensitive inputs are the projections of future capital cost, electricity cost, and the development rates for solar thermal. However, the ranking of the options under different inputs, and therefore the conclusions are robust over the ranges tested.

Answers to the questions

This paper set out to address the two questions stated in the Introduction, viz.:

1. Does it make sense to build wind power as fast as possible until 2020, at least, so we can cut greenhouse gas emissions as quickly as possible and start cutting as early as possible?

2. Would a mix of technologies be better able to meet the demand and do so at lower cost? For example, would a mix of solar and wind be lower cost than either alone, and lower cost than nuclear?

Figure 11 provides the answers.

The answer to Question 1 is ‘No’. Figure 11 shows the emissions avoidance cost for the options without wind is $50/MWh and for the options with wind is $163/MWh in 2015. In 2020, the ranking is the same but the costs are higher (see Figure 11).

The answer to Question 2 is ‘No’. The option with the mix of Solar Thermal and Wind has the highest avoidance cost of all options. It has the highest capital expenditure by far (Figures 8 and 9), and the highest electricity cost (figure 10). Its CO2 emissions are greater than the nuclear option. It has no advantages.

Figure 12 summarises the position in 2050. The figure compares the six options on the basis of the electricity cost of the coal and replacement technologies and the total CO2 emissions per year for each option. Clearly, the Nuclear and CCGT option produces the lowest emissions and the cost penalty is marginally higher than CCGT.

Conclusions

The Nuclear power option will enable the largest cut in CO2-e emissions from electricity generation.

The Nuclear option is the only option that can be built quickly enough to make the deep cuts required by 2050.

The Nuclear option is the least cost of the options that can cut emissions sustainably.

Wind and solar are the highest cost ways to cut emissions.

A mixture of solar thermal and wind power is the highest cost and has the highest avoidance cost of the options considered. Mixing these technologies does not reduce the cost, it increases the cost.

The results are sensitive to the input assumptions and input data, but the ranking of the options, and therefore the conclusions, are robust to the changes of inputs tested.

Burning the biosphere, boverty blues (Part I)

Guest Post by Geoff Russell. Geoff is a mathematician and computer programmer and is a member of Animal Liberation SA. His recently published book is CSIRO Perfidy.

This is the first of two posts on some large issues connected with global fire regimes, biomass flows, and food security. Part II will be posted in a few weeks time.

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Boverty is the human impact of too many bovines overwhelming the local biosphere’s ability to feed them … the bovines are usually cattle and more than a few African countries have precisely this problem. Their livestock is a millstone around their necks and helping to keep them poor. Well-meaning aid organisations often contribute to the problem.

The ecosystem impacts of cattle spread far and wide but it may not be the owners of the animals who suffer the impacts. Indeed, the animals can buffer their owners against the worst impacts of boverty. This is analogous to the way that drivers of large SUVs do well in collisions with smaller vehicles. The entire community suffers from the presence of the vehicles, but the owners may be the least affected.

But these conclusions are just the end point of a longish discussion. We need to start at the beginning. But before we get to the beginning, here is a MODIS satellite firemap of the planet during the last days of December 2009. The sub-Saharan cattle countries are ablaze.

This post surveys the impacts of livestock, firstly at a very general level on the biosphere due to its domination of global biomass consumption, proceeding through the cattle-specific annual planetary conflagrations as people ignite the world’s grasslands to prevent reforestation. Lastly, we look at more intimate and sometimes more indirect bovine impacts, like the accelerated degradation of arable soil, the tens or hundreds of thousands of children killed by cooking with dung, and the global increase in respiratory and heart disease from ozone increases caused by rising methane levels.

Cattle are a major causal component in all these problems. The planet’s 1.4 billion cattle have a liveweight biomass exceeding that of humans and dominate many of our adverse impacts on planetary eco-systems.

Eco footprints and plant growth

Over the past couple of decades, a variety of measures of our impact on the planet have emerged. Eco-footprints seem to be the sexiest of these, with great logos and a resonance with old folk-lore about treading lightly on the planet. I’ve always felt this measure was conceptually flawed. Converting things as different as what you had for breakfast along with electricity and water usage into a square kilometer figure is bizarre. Happily, an older, clearer measure is now making a comeback, thanks to the increasing power of those remarkable spies in the skies, the satellites that between them can weigh Antarctica, measure fire scars, spot ocean bottom trawling damage, and check out which of your neighbours has a swimming pool.

The old measure is based on photosynthesis. Photosynthesis produces plant growth and underpins almost all life on the planet. Every year the planet produces a huge quantity of plant growth, we eat some of it, other species eat some of it, and the rest either forms long-lived things like trees, or is more quickly broken down, returning its nutrients back to the soil, water and air. How much of this growth do we use?

An Austrian team has been turning out some remarkable papers cutting and dicing our usage in considerable detail using both satellite data and more normal statistical sources. Initial work by Helmut Haberl and the team culminated in a 2007 paper estimating that we use about 23.8 percent of the planet’s annual plant growth … otherwise known by the catchy name of net primary productivity (NPP). The language of the preceding sentence was a little sloppy, … we don’t actually use all of this, but we certainly appropriate it in ways that will slowly become clear.

NPP is measured as dry matter (DM). This is what’s left when you get rid of the water. If you didn’t do this, 10 kilograms of water melon would count the same as 10 kilograms of rice. The choice of this as a measurement unit is important and sensible because dry matter plant material is about 50 percent carbon. This means you can easily convert between carbon and dry matter quantities. So when I say that global NPP was 118.4 billion tonnes of dry matter in 2000, this means that about 59.2 billion tonnes of carbon was sucked out of the sky that year by plants using photosynthesis.

Even though this measure is conceptually clearer than eco-footprint areas, there are plenty of gotchas which can trick new jugglers of these numbers. First, only about half the NPP is above ground. So plenty is simply unavailable. We dig out potatoes but not tree roots. So when you cut down a tree for timber, the roots aren’t used, but they still count as appropriated. This is reasonable because the tree certainly can’t use them any more. Secondly, the NPP of an area isn’t fixed. Humans do things which change the NPP of land. They pour on fertiliser and pump in water which raises NPP. They pave paradise with parking lots or graze it to a dustbowl and NPP drops to zero.

Reducing planetary productivity

The Austrians estimate our land degradation and pavement have reduced annual global plant growth (NPP) by about 6.2 billion tonnes of carbon. That’s a pretty significant number for a couple reasons. First, because it’s not that much below the amount of fossil fuel carbon we emit annually … which is up around 8 billion tonnes! Second, because its higher than the net annual land clearance emissions of 1.47 billion tonnes. The estimated carbon released to the atmosphere due to deforestation over the industrial period is 200 billion tonnes. These numbers indicate that managing the biosphere to draw down a couple of decades of fossil fuel emissions is possible and we have two mechanisms at our disposal: reforesting areas we have deforested and thickening current vegetation … enhancing NPP. These mechanisms, used to their theoretical maximum, won’t make rebuilding our energy infrastructure unnecessary, but they can buy time. We shall see in part two of this post that rebuilding and extending our energy infrastructure to poor nations is probably essential if we are to successfully reforest the planet.

Biomass flows, global and local

Another Austrian permutation, headed this time by Fridolin Krausmann, has done more work on these datasets and has produced biomass flow data with breakdowns by country.

This shows that globally, we only eat about 12 percent of the 12.1 billion tonnes of plant material that we either crop or have our livestock graze. This provides 83 percent of global food calories. Livestock eat 58 percent of that 12.1 billion tonnes and provide the other 17 percent of calories. What about fish? Fish are just 1 percent of global calories and part of the 17 percent.

Note that the 12.1 billion tonnes doesn’t include biomass incinerated in deliberately lit fires … this is important later on.

Australia, all by itself, appropriated 468 million tonnes of plant growth in 2000. We harvested it for paper, animal feed and timber and much else besides. Our livestock eat about twice as much of what we harvest as we do and that obviously counts as our appropriation. But they don’t just eat the bulk of the harvest, they graze another 30 times more. But that’s not the end of their impact.

Is livestock consumption exceeding plant growth?

In my last post here, I referred to an estimate just published as a WorldWatch report that put the impact of livestock on greenhouse forcings at about 51 percent of the global anthropogenic total. I didn’t analyse this figure, but suggested it wasn’t unreasonable to think that land clearing, feeding, watering, housing, slaughter, transport and cooking implicit in dealing with 700 million tonnes of livestock biomass could conceivably be responsible for half of the total climate impact of 335 million tonnes of human biomass. But I was waiting for more expert analysis and still am. Many of the additions over and above the 2006 Livestock’s Long Shadow (LLS) estimate rely on close knowledge of the precise details of the FAO’s statistical data collection processes.

But on theoretical grounds, one of the most contentious inclusions in the 51 percent figure is livestock respiration … the carbon dioxide that livestock exhale. On the face of it, this seems plain wrong. All of the carbon dioxide in livestock respiration comes from the atmosphere via photosynthesis in plants. So it’s simply part of the carbon cycle. Isn’t it? The WorldWatch authors have subsequently justified this a little further, re-citing evidence given in LLS which states that animal respiration plus soil carbon oxidation (co2 flowing into the atmosphere) exceeds the drawdown due to photosynthesis by one or two billion tonnes of carbon annually. In many cases it is livestock driving the loss of soil carbon by deforestation and desertification and given that the planet’s 700 million tonnes of livestock dwarf wildlife by a ratio of about 23:3, it is possible that the planet’s total plant biomass may be shrinking under livestock’s onslaught. This is the implication of the reduction of NPP noted above and the carbon flow imbalance just mentioned.

I say may be shrinking because it’s tough to measure things like global photosynthesis or global respiration, and the figures in LLS are not the same as the figures in the Austrian work. Close, but not the same. But if the respiration plus soil carbon losses really are outstripping photosynthesis, then including at least some livestock respiration in the ledger isn’t just reasonable, but mandatory.

Fire, soil and carbon inventories

In any case, not all parts of the carbon cycle are currently excluded from national greenhouse inventories. Livestock methane is part of the carbon cycle and everybody includes that in their inventories … for good reason. Turning carbon dioxide (CO2) into methane (CH4) doesn’t increase the carbon in the atmosphere but, in effect, puts it on steroids for a decade as far as its warming effect is concerned.

Similar considerations apply to fire. Under IPCC accounting principles, CO2 emissions from fire are ignored unless the fire changes the underlying vegetation. For example, a fire in a savanna doesn’t permanently change anything, the grass comes back. But a fire that clears a tropical forest to make a pasture results in a net permanent reduction in standing carbon (the trees!) which is added to the atmosphere.

Deforestation also produces soil changes. Soil can be viewed as an organism in its own right. Its microbial inhabitants transform soil matter and emit or absorb the greenhouse gases that dominate our current concerns. There are many types of soil and zillions of types of microbes in constant evolutionary flux so getting a handle on what is happening is like holding a bowl of jelly with chopsticks and no bowl.

Anyway, most tropical soils under forest act as methane sinks but lose this property when the forest is gone. Similar results have recently been demonstrated in Australia in temperate, Mediterranean and subtropical regions. When paired sites at various stages of forest and pasture growth were compared, the trend was for nitrous oxide emissions to be lower from forests than pasture, with methane absorption also lower in pasture than in forests. So forests did more of what we want than pastures in both cases. Again, this is complex soil chemistry and other studies have found the opposite with regard to nitrous oxide.

Back in 2006 a study shocked the scientific community by claiming that living plants can produce methane. This prompted an immediate claim from a New Zealand scientist, probably with an eye on his local sheep industry, to claim that forests may have produced as much methane as the ruminants which displaced them. Unfortunately for the New Zealand sheep industry, someone was rude enough to actually do the calculations, and based on the proposed new methane source, show that the livestock emissions were 16 times bigger than the forests they replaced. As it turns out, it seems plants don’t produce methane, but they can transport methane generated in the soil.

The unquantified false claim about ruminants producing less methane than the forests they replaced is a great example of an idea which sounded plausible until the numbers showed otherwise. I’ve written previously about Tim Flannery’s plans to provide abundant meat to the planet by expanding cattle production. This is another example of a plan that becomes laughable (or more correctly cryable) when you do the numbers. Apart from the fact that the current 1.4 billion cattle provide just 1.4 percent of global calories, the injection of another 96 million tonnes of methane into the atmosphere by providing Australian levels of beef to most of the planet (excluding India) would make winding back climate forcings even harder than it is presently.

Apart from any nitrous oxide that may be emitted by soils, once cattle are added to the pasture, the nitrous oxide emissions from the cattle droppings are substantial. A global study estimated that livestock waste represents 30-50 percent of global agricultural nitrous oxide emissions. This is in addition to the emissions from the feed crops, many of which are now fertilised with nitrogenous fertiliser.

Note that for either a savanna fire or a forest fire, the methane and black carbon from the fires generate net climate warming. Methane, and a few other gases from such fires are recorded in national greenhouse inventories, but black carbon isn’t because it isn’t regulated by the Kyoto protocol. More on black carbon later. Methane from savanna burning is listed by Australia in its greenhouse inventory, but not by some developing countries, even when they do massive amounts of burning. For example, Sudan lists no methane from savanna burning in its only communication with the UNFCC in 2003, but Nigeria and Ethiopia do.

Burning for fun and profit

In most places in the world, most fires (80-90 percent) are deliberately lit by people. The major exceptions are Russia, the US and Canada where Boreal forests are regularly ignited by lightning. Australia has some of these kinds of fires also, but less commonly because we have less lightening … as indicated in this global map.

Most lightning runs from cloud to cloud, so is irrelevant to ground fires and, as far as I know, satellites can’t pick a ground strike from a cloud to cloud flash, and this map (despite the title) is actually of flashes, not ground strikes.

Tim Flannery recently speculated that removing or reducing herbivores would lead to more fires and a paper last year pointed out that wildfire and insects have turned Canadian forests into a source of carbon rather than a sink. The same paper estimates that the historical deforestation of the planet has added 200 billion tonnes of carbon to the atomosphere. Can everybody see the blazing flaming contradiction here? If we had 200 billion tonnes of carbon worth of forests before we deforested the planet for livestock and the much smaller areas that we crop and live on, where were all the wildfires back then? Certainly we had no firefighting planes and helicopters back when those billions of tonnes of forest were standing. Certainly we had no huge armies of cattle and sheep in Australia at the time before we cleared 100 million hectares. Why didn’t fires burn it all back then? Maybe we did have more natural fires, but with so much more forest, the carbon impact was of no consequence.

The main traditional driver of deliberate human fires has been to clear land and keep it cleared for livestock grazing or cropping. The latter is usually called slash and burn, or shifting cultivation. It’s a cheap and effective method. The collateral damage is generally limited to wildlife and provided Steve Parish has been and taken his pictures for all those airport tourist calendars, what other use does wildlife have? Traditionally, hunting wildlife was the third prime driver of burning. We shall see below that scientists estimate that currently about 2/3 of burning is for livestock grazing.

From a climate perspective, all three kinds of fires represent foregone biosequestration, with the first being a direct climate cost of livestock.

More recent work in the Austrian series refines the estimates of biomass burned through anthropogenic fires with better estimates on the type of burning and better country level breakdowns. Lauk and Erb’s estimates slice fires into two kinds: big fires and little fires. The big fires are almost entirely the livestock fires we have discussed. The small fires are shifting cultivation … plant food fires.

Estimating the extent and impacts of both is difficult and only possible because of new datasets on global vegetation. The satellite data showing what is on the ground can be compared to other global data on potential vegetation and also with satellite data on burn scars and actual fire detection using thermal imaging. Big brother is not just watching you, but watching your back paddock as well. The data on potential vegetation is derived from a global vegetation model which models a raft of processes using input such as current cover, soil type data, temperature and rainfall.

Globally, the big fires release about 2.5 billion tonnes of carbon. N.B. this is a carbon figure. The small fires release between 1 and 1.4 billion tonnes of carbon. There is a largish range because it’s much tougher to estimate the small fires.

If this carbon was balanced by photosynthesis it wouldn’t be a problem would it? Yes and no. Provided the quantity burned each year is constant and vegetation levels are globally maintained, then it’s not causing a net carbon increase in the atmosphere. But are both these quantities constant? The technology is a long way short of giving a real-time read out. Most of the figures I’m presenting are for a single year, 2000. The fires will of course put additional carbon on steroids and produce plenty of other nasties. The Edgar methane inventory lists methane from savanna burning at about 7 million tonnes, probably a little under the true value, but close. This is equivalent to a population of about 60 million cattle grass fed cattle.

Cattle conflagration

Included in the total of plant growth appropriated by Australia is biomass we deliberately just burned. Apart from firewood, most burning in Australia is in deliberate fires set in large regions in the north of Australia every year. The now renamed Australian Greenhouse Office calculated that some 75 percent of this burning was for cattle. This is pasture burned to keep forest regrowth at bay. We are, of course, happy for Indonesians and Brazilians to have tropical forests, but we’d rather do something more useful with our northern regions than merely mop up carbon and provide habitat for wildlife. So we set fire to it. Rainforests can and are expanding in North Queensland into areas no longer subject to human burning. In other areas of tropical Queensland grasslands have changed to closed forests with the cessation of human burning.

That mass of top end burning counts as part of the Australia’s total appropriation of 468 million tonnes of plant growth. How big a part? About 40 percent … some 139 million tonnes DM. All up, we burn slightly more biomass in northern Australia than our livestock graze over the entire continent during the whole year.

But in the burning stakes (or should that be steaks), we are small fry. The global burning picture is massive and has implications for both climate change and food security. Here is a MODIS satellite fire map from the end of July 2009. It’s worth visiting the NASA website to look at when different regions of the planet get burned. Higher resolution maps would show individual fires and not the solid contiguous region that is shown in this image.

What could limits on global burning regimes do? Globally, we burn about 3.7 billion tonnes of dry matter annually. If we reduced this burning to perhaps 2 billion tonnes, which is possible (but hard) and desirable for many reasons, then we could absorb about 1 billion tonnes of carbon. In the first year we did this, we would sequester about an eigth of the fossil fuel carbon emitted each year. As time went on, forests would regrow and absorption rates would slowly fall. As a mitigation strategy, this is significant. Not a single handed planet saver, but useful.

The next part of this two part blog deals with the continent which burns 2 billion tonnes of dry matter annually, a country of chronic undernutrion, poverty and large scale boverty. The next post is on Africa.

The most important investment that we aren’t making to mitigate the climate crisis

Another crisp piece from Steve Kirsch on HuffPo that I’d like to reproduce for you, for completeness.

If you want to get emissions reductions, you must make the alternatives for electric power generation cheaper than coal. It’s that simple. If you don’t do that, you lose.

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The US is making a huge mistake in the way we are dealing with global warming. Instead of following the old adage, “an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure,” we are doing the opposite: committing massive dollars for mitigation strategies while at the same time refusing to build the most promising new clean base-load power generation technologies developed by our nation’s top energy scientists.

The International Energy Agency tells us that every year of delay in action to tackle global warming costs $500 billion.

So what are doing about it?

U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton announced that the U.S. would join others in securing a $100 billion annual fund by 2020 to help developing countries cope with climate change.

Pouring money into token mitigation strategies is a non-sustainable way to deal with climate change. That number will keep rising and rising every year without bound.

The most effective way to deal with climate change is to seriously reduce our carbon emissions. We’ll never get the enormous emission reductions we need by treaty. Been there, done that. It’s not going to happen.

If you want to get emissions reductions, you must make the alternatives for electric power generation cheaper than coal. It’s that simple. If you don’t do that, you lose.

We don’t have to look very far to find the best area to invest in. Nuclear is the elephant of clean power technologies. It’s also very efficient in terms of the natural resources that are required to construct these power plants (less than a tenth of what it takes for the same amount of energy from renewables).

But this isn’t necessarily about nuclear. Perhaps there are other areas that I don’t know about that are also viable. The main point is this: We need to be investing billions of dollars right now in perfecting and cost reducing any technology that we know about today that has the potential to generate reliable baseload electric power at any site in the world at a cost less than a coal plant.

In the opinion of the energy experts I know, the Integral Fast Reactor (IFR) would be on anyone’s “short list” of technologies that for sure we’d want to invest in now for the long term. The Gen IV International Forum (an independent international group of nuclear experts) did an extensive study of all nuclear designs and rated the IFR the best nuclear design overall. GE-Hitachi has all the plans completed is ready to build the needed commercial-scale demonstration. Unlike conventional nuclear, IFRs can replace the burner in a coal plant, making it very cost effective to switch to the lower cost, clean alternative. The fuel to run these plants for thousands of years has already been mined and is just sitting there collecting dust. We solve our nuclear waste problem at the same time. What could be better than that?

The fact that we aren’t investing even a nickel to prove the IFR is the “canary in the coal mine.” It’s telling me that our current strategy is defective.

It makes no sense to commit $100 billion every year to mitigate the effects of climate change while at the same time refuse to invest even a nickel in one of the most promising technologies (developed at our own national labs by our nation’s smartest energy experts) that could prevent the problem from getting any worse.

The billions we invest in R&D now in building a clean and cheaper alternative to coal power will pay off in spades later.We have a really great option now — the IFR is on the verge of commercial readiness — and potential competitors such as the Liquid Fluoride Thorium Reactor (LFTR) are in the wings. But the US government isn’t investing in developing any of these breakthrough new base-load power generation technologies. Not a single one.

We are investing in third-generation nuclear which is a good short-term strategy.

But completely ignoring fourth generation nuclear (such as the IFR), is a very bad idea. Fourth generation reactors are over 100 times more efficient than existing reactors, they generate little waste, consume existing nuclear waste for fuel, and can help bring the spread of nuclear weapons under control.

We cannot be leaders in clean power by leaving our best technology on the shelf.

We need to move the world off of coal as soon as possible. Copenhagen has proven yet again that agreements to reduce emission won’t work. Therefore, an economic solution is the only option left. The best way to develop a cheaper alternative to coal is to place a few big strategic bets now on our best technologies that can do that. We have no time to waste.

(For other posts on the IFR by Steve Kirsch, click here).

Unnatural gas

Guest Post by Tom Blees. Tom is author of Prescription for the Planet – The Painless Remedy for Our Energy & Environmental Crises. Tom is also the president of the Science Council for Global Initiatives.

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Last month Bobby Kennedy Jr., a tireless advocate for the environment, gave a talk in New York City to a packed house. He spoke about the devastation wrought by coal mining and argued that we must get away from fossil fuels if we’re to deal with climate change. He also, to my chagrin (since I know he’s got my book), threw in some tired clichés about how bad nuclear power is. He then waxed enthusiastic about wind and solar power, asserting that if we build a smart grid and pour enough resources into building a lot of wind and solar production, we can have “free energy forever.” The crowd ate it up. Bobby’s a very good speaker, he’s definitely got the Kennedy knack for that.

Later, as he expanded on the renewable energy topic, he pointed out that we have abundant natural gas in the USA that we can use to fill in when the wind and solar production is insufficient. Bobby is certainly not alone in having a huge blind spot in this regard. Virtually every prominent advocate for a renewables-only future includes natural gas as a big part of the mix. Though it’s usually de-emphasized by wind and solar promoters, this embrace of natural gas generation is a tacit admission of the logistical and economic impossibility of providing all the energy humanity needs from renewables alone.

The willing acceptance of increased natural gas use by so many who consider themselves environmentalists is stunningly inconsistent with the science of anthropogenic climate change. The nearly religious fervor of the windies and sunnies virtually ignores this devil in the details. The most classic example of such willful blindness is the elevation of T. Boone Pickens to the status of environmental hero because of his plans (since scrapped, ironically) to build a huge wind farm in Texas. Back in 2004, T. Boone was infamous among these same people as the nefarious money man behind the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth, the abominable smear campaign that helped keep George W. Bush in power for a second disastrous term. T. Boone’s transformation into a darling of environmentalists is reminiscent of the “rehabilitation” of political pariahs in Maoist China. How quickly we forget.

A cynic (or realist) might well observe that T. Boone Pickens is a gas guy. That’s his stock in trade, it’s what made him the billions that freed him to support arch-conservative interests until his recent foray into the world of lefties. His political chameleon act, though, is much easier to understand if one keeps in mind the fact that the more massive the deployment of wind turbines and solar farms the more dependent we will become upon natural gas. It’s telling that T. Boone eventually abandoned plans for his mega-wind farm, attesting to his recognition that the economics simply couldn’t justify it. Ironically, he’s still pals with the big shots on the left. Ah, sweet redemption!

The use of the term “natural” has long been a problem in the food industry, where everybody and his brother wants to put the term on their packaging if their product is produced anywhere short of a chemistry lab. Consumers are suckers for the word, and the food industry knows it. So does the natural gas industry, though the use of the term for their product is one of those serendipitous appellations that predates the era of Madison Avenue spin. But let’s call a spade a spade, shall we? Natural gas is no more natural than coal or oil. And it’s high time that self-styled environmentalists stopped acting as if coal is the bad guy but natural gas is our friend.

Natural gas (aka methane) is a potent greenhouse gas, with an effect at least 20 times more potent than carbon dioxide. Though considerably shorter-lived in the atmosphere, as it breaks down it converts to the much more persistent CO2, so it is far from environmentally friendly any way you cut it. But with the widespread awareness that coal is bad news, the comparative cleanliness of natural gas (which doesn’t leave mountains of ash in its wake nor release heavy metals and other nasties as it burns) has made it the fuel of choice for filling in the massive gaps that are the inevitable corollary of increasing reliance on wind and solar power.

Like coal and other fossil fuels, though, natural gas is subject to sometimes wild fluctuations in price. The more we use it, the higher those prices are likely to rise. Reliance on supplies outside one’s own country (the case in most nations of the world) can also create real problems, as when Russia decided to use its natural gas a political fulcrum.

When it comes to the arguments between renewables and nuclear advocates, many of which have been conducted on these pages, those who argue against nuclear power have often cited it as being poor at load following, unlike natural gas turbines that can spin up and down relatively quickly. These are pretty weak arguments on a couple of fronts. For one thing, the newer nuclear power plants are quite good at load following. But any type of power plant is going to experience undue wear and tear from the increased variability that is part and parcel of wind and solar integration into the grid (particularly wind, for obvious reasons, though solar power can dip quickly when clouds move in). In areas where gas turbines have been used to compensate for the vagaries of renewables, utility companies are finding that they’re taking quite a beating, with an expected diminution in their service lives.

So how can wind and solar be best integrated into the power grid without relying on gas? And how can we do it without investing up to two trillion dollars in a smart grid?

Let’s not.

Let’s forget about integrating wind and solar power into the grid at all (except for small solar installations like rooftop solar, for those who want to go that route). Let’s remove the urgency of building a smart grid and rely instead on the gradually smartening grid we’ve already got. This relatively dumb grid works pretty well so far and we could take our time revamping it. If Gen III and Gen IV nuclear power plants are used to replace coal- and gas-fired generators we’ll get clean electricity quite reliably no matter how intelligent our grid is.

This is not to suggest that we should abandon the building of wind and solar farms (the question of their economics is another issue beyond the scope of this article). Instead of hooking them to the grid, though, we could easily and cheaply build electrolysis systems at each site to generate hydrogen, and with that hydrogen we can make ammonia (That’s NH3. The nitrogen is simply taken from the air). Indeed, the economics may warrant building ammonia plants right at the site of wind and solar farms, or at least producing the hydrogen there and trucking it to nearby ammonia plants.

This would take the problem of intermittency completely out of the picture. Hydrogen production would proceed as electricity supply allows, utilizing every watt no matter how variable its production. Similarly, electrolysis systems could be integrated into the grid at nuclear power plants so that they could run at full capacity around the clock regardless of demand. That hydrogen, too, could be utilized to produce ammonia.

Which brings up the burning question: Are cow farts carbon neutral?

Much has been made of the problem of livestock flatulence. Usually it’s tongue-in-cheek, but those with an anti-meat agenda often argue quite seriously that reducing the vast herds of animals raised for food would help remedy the global warming problem. (These are also often the same people who argue that instead of using ammonia as fertilizer we should use manure, which would necessitate increasing livestock herds from about 1.3 billion to 7-8 billion.) The contrary argument is that since these animals are eating plants their methane emissions are carbon neutral. But are they?

Take a look at how their food plants are grown. It’s almost a sure bet that the plants they eat (primarily corn and soybeans in the USA) have been grown using ammonia as a fertilizer. The food we eat is the same. According to a recent article in The Economist, about half the nitrogen atoms in our human bodies have come through ammonia plants. Ammonia production for agricultural purposes is a huge worldwide business, about $100 billion/year. And the source of most of the ammonia used in agriculture is natural gas. The hydrogen to make the ammonia (NH3) is derived from methane (CH4), a process that strips off the hydrogen and results in a great deal of carbon dioxide. Aside from the approximately 1% of this carbon dioxide that is used by the oil industry to inject into wells (much of which seeps to the surface anyway), all of it makes its way into the atmosphere either directly or indirectly. (Next time you’re drinking a carbonated beverage reflect a moment on the fact that the CO2 you’re ingesting probably came from natural gas.) So ammonia production is a significant contributor to greenhouse gas emissions the way we do it today. It might be mentioned here that the single largest producer of ammonia by far, China, produces nearly all its ammonia (28% of the world total) from coal, resulting in over twice as much CO2 per unit ammonia as that produced with natural gas.

Byabandoning the problematic integration into the electrical grid in favor of electrolysis and hydrogen production, wind and solar farms would be decreasing the use of natural gas instead of increasing it. But if we also built electrolysis systems even into our nuclear power plants (along with desalination systems), would the world have a use for the great amounts of ammonia we’d be making?

Ammonia is one of the most highly produced inorganic chemicals in the world, with over 110 million metric tons produced each year, 80% of which is used for agriculture. Clearly it would take a massive amount of electrolysis to produce such quantities, so the question of whether wind and solar could outproduce the demand is moot for the foreseeable future.

There’s yet another area that could create a far greater demand for ammonia, though, since internal combustion engines can be built that burn ammonia and produce no harmful emissions (the nitrous oxides can be removed with a catalytic converter). There’s a company that’s been building ammonia-powered tractor engines for a while now (since farmers have a ready source of fuel at their ammonia tanks). The next project is building an engine for use in over-the-road trucks.

Technology optimists look to the day when battery evolution will allow us all to drive electric cars, but commercial trucks can hardly be expected to be battery powered, and trucking is a huge industry, moving about 60% of commercial goods in the United States. Converting the world’s trucks to zero-emission ammonia power would be a boon to the environment, eliminating the diesel exhaust from millions of these big vehicles. Even if no cars at all ever converted to ammonia power (and why not build ammonia hybrids?), it would be a herculean accomplishment to produce all the ammonia the world would need for both agricultural and trucking needs. Thus there is simply no truly compelling reason at all—aside from ossified thinking—to integrate wind and solar into the grid, with all the costs and difficulties that entails.

So let’s stop the tedious arguments about how nuclear power doesn’t make sense because you have to dump too much of the power during off-peak hours. We can use the extra power for electrolysis or desalination. And please let’s stop with the ridiculous assumption that natural gas is something that’s environmentally benign. If we’re serious about dealing with climate change, fossil fuels—most definitely including natural gas—must be left in the ground.

But most of all let’s take a hard look at the whole idea of hooking wind and solar generators to the grid. The many problems associated with that concept can be eliminated in one stroke, and their energy can be put to good use to eliminate at least some of the natural gas and coal use that is currently employed for ammonia production around the world. If we ever get to the point where we get more hydrogen/ammonia from wind and solar than we can use, then we can talk about smart grids and displacing nuclear power as a primary source of electricity. Until then, let’s use nuclear’s 24/7 capability for our 24/7 electricity demand, and our variable sources for uses that work fine with intermittency. There’s simply no need to go through continual costly contortions to integrate the two.

Oh, and if we save a trillion or two by not having to build a smart grid right away, what might we do with it? Well, at the price China expects to be building nuclear power plants pretty soon, a trillion would build about 1,000 GWe of nuclear power plants (right now the whole world has about 368 GWe of nuclear capacity, 15.2% of the worldwide total electricity production). For a bit over a trillion, we could produce half of all the electricity we now produce from all sources, even if all the current nuclear plants were shut down. And yes, that means that for two trillion—the high end of the smart grid cost estimates—we could produce just about the same amount of electricity from brand spankin’ new nuclear power plants as the world produces now from all sources put together. That sounds to me like a heck of a lot better deal than a smart grid that will make it easier (yet still far from easy) to integrate maybe 20% of our intermittent electricity production into our grid.

How does it sound to you?

Temperature of science – never give up

I want to take a bit of space to reflect on the global temperature record. With 2009 ranking among the hottest years on record [final data pending] and 2010 looking likely to be the hottest ever, it’s worth understanding where these data come from and why climate scientists consider them to be so robust. (Incidentally, on my research front, Corey Bradshaw and I are currently working on a new systematic analysis of the Australian temperature station data, to better contextualise extreme heat wave events).

So, below, I reproduce “The Temperature of Science” by Jim Hansen (arguably the world’s most famous climate scientist and a fellow SCGI member). Jim has perhaps the best understanding of this topic of anyone I know. This is a post everyone who wishes to make a comment in this area ought to read.

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The Temperature of Science

James Hansen

Background

My experience with global temperature data over 30 years provides insight about how the science and its public perception have changed. In the late 1970s I became curious about well known analyses of global temperature change published by climatologist J. Murray Mitchell: why were his estimates for large-scale temperature change restricted to northern latitudes? As a planetary scientist, it seemed to me there were enough data points in the Southern Hemisphere to allow useful estimates both for that hemisphere and for the global average. So I requested a tape of meteorological station data from Roy Jenne of the National Center for Atmospheric Research, who obtained the data from records of the World Meteorological Organization, and I made my own analysis.

Fast forward to December 2009, when I gave a talk at the Progressive Forum in Houston Texas. The organizers there felt it necessary that I have a police escort between my hotel and the forum where I spoke. Days earlier bloggers reported that I was probably the hacker who broke into East Anglia computers and stole e-mails. Their rationale: I was not implicated in any of the pirated e-mails, so I must have eliminated incriminating messages before releasing the hacked emails. The next day another popular blog concluded that I deserved capital punishment. Web chatter on this topic, including indignation that I was coming to Texas, led to a police escort.

How did we devolve to this state? Any useful lessons? Is there still interesting science in analyses of surface temperature change? Why spend time on it, if other groups are also doing it?

First I describe the current monthly updates of global surface temperature at the Goddard Institute for Space Studies. Then I show graphs illustrating scientific inferences and issues. Finally I respond to questions in the above paragraph.

Current Updates

Each month we receive, electronically, data from three sources: weather data for several thousand meteorological stations, satellite observations of sea surface temperature, and Antarctic research station measurements. These three data sets are the input for a program that produces a global map of temperature anomalies relative to the mean for that month during the period of climatology, 1951-1980.

The analysis method has been described fully in a series of refereed papers (Hansen et al., 1981, 1987, 1999, 2001, 2006). Successive papers updated the data and in some cases made minor improvements to the analysis, for example, in adjustments to minimize urban effects. The analysis method works in terms of temperature anomalies, rather than absolute temperature, because anomalies present a smoother geographical field than temperature itself. For example, when New York City has an unusually cold winter, it is likely that Philadelphia is also colder than normal. The distance over which temperature anomalies are highly correlated is of the order of 1000 kilometers at middle and high latitudes, as we illustrated in our 1987 paper.

Although the three input data streams that we use are publicly available from the organizations that produce them, we began preserving the complete input data sets each month in April 2008. These data sets, which cover the full period of our analysis, 1880-present, are available to parties interested in performing their own analysis or checking our analysis. The computer program that performs our analysis is published on the GISS web site.

Responsibilities for our updates are as follows. Ken Lo runs programs to add in the new data and reruns the analysis with the expanded data. Reto Ruedy maintains the computer program that does the analysis and handles most technical inquiries about the analysis. Makiko Sato updates graphs and posts them on the web. I examine the temperature data monthly and write occasional discussions about global temperature change.

Scientific Inferences and Issues

Temperature data – example of early inferences. Figure 1 shows the current GISS analysis of global annual-mean and 5-year running-mean temperature change (left) and the hemispheric temperature changes (right). These graphs are based on the data now available, including ship and satellite data for ocean regions.

Figure 1 illustrates, with a longer record, a principal conclusion of our first analysis of temperature change (Hansen et al., 1981). That analysis, based on data records through December 1978, concluded that data coverage was sufficient to estimate global temperature change. We also concluded that temperature change was qualitatively different in the two hemispheres. The Southern Hemisphere had more steady warming through the century while the Northern Hemisphere had distinct cooling between 1940 and 1975.

It required more than a year to publish the 1981 paper, which was submitted several times to Science and Nature. At issue were both the global significance of the data and the length of the paper. Later, in our 1987 paper, we proved quantitatively that the station coverage was sufficient for our conclusions – the proof being obtained by sampling (at the station locations) a 100-year data set of a global climate model that had realistic spatial-temporal variability.

The different hemispheric records in the mid-twentieth century have never been convincingly explained. The most likely explanation is atmospheric aerosols, fine particles in the air, produced by fossil fuel burning. Aerosol atmospheric lifetime is only several days, so fossil fuel aerosols were confined mainly to the Northern Hemisphere, where most fossil fuels were burned. Aerosols have a cooling effect that still today is estimated to counteract about half of the warming effect of human-made greenhouse gases. For the few decades after World War II, until the oil embargo in the 1970s, fossil fuel use expanded exponentially at more than 4%/year, likely causing the growth of aerosol climate forcing to exceed that of greenhouse gases in the Northern Hemisphere. However, there are no aerosol measurements to confirm that interpretation. If there were adequate understanding of the relation between fossil fuel burning and aerosol properties it would be possible to infer the aerosol properties in the past century. But such understanding requires global measurements of aerosols with sufficient detail to define their properties and their effect on clouds, a task that remains elusive, as described in chapter 4 of Hansen (2009).

Flaws in temperature analysis. Figure 2 illustrates an error that developed in the GISS analysis when we introduced, in our 2001 paper, an improvement in the United States temperature record. The change consisted of using the newest USHCN (United States Historical Climatology Network) analysis for those U.S. stations that are part of the USHCN network. This improvement, developed by NOAA researchers, adjusted station records that included station moves or other discontinuities. Unfortunately, I made an error by failing to recognize that the station records we obtained electronically from NOAA each month, for these same stations, did not contain the adjustments. Thus there was a discontinuity in 2000 in the records of those stations, as the prior years contained the adjustment while later years did not.

The error was readily corrected, once it was recognized. Figure 2 shows the global and U.S. temperatures with and without the error. The error averaged 0.15°C over the contiguous 48 states, but these states cover only 1½ percent of the globe, making the global error negligible.

However, the story was embellished and distributed to news outlets throughout the country. Resulting headline: NASA had cooked the temperature books – and once the error was corrected 1998 was no longer the warmest year in the record, instead being supplanted by 1934.

This was nonsense, of course. The small error in global temperature had no effect on the ranking of different years. The warmest year in our global temperature analysis was still 2005. Conceivably confusion between global and U.S. temperatures in these stories was inadvertent. But the estimate for the warmest year in the U.S. had not changed either. 1934 and 1998 were tied as the warmest year (Figure 2b) with any difference (~0.01°C) at least an order of magnitude smaller than the uncertainty in comparing temperatures in the 1930s with those in the 1990s.

The obvious misinformation in these stories, and the absence of any effort to correct the stories after we pointed out the misinformation, suggests that the aim may have been to create distrust or confusion in the minds of the public, rather than to transmit accurate information. That, of course, is a matter of opinion. I expressed my opinion in two e-mails that are on my Columbia University web site:

http://www.columbia.edu/~jeh1/mailings/2007/20070810_LightUpstairs.pdf

http://www.columbia.edu/~jeh1/mailings/2007/20070816_realdeal.pdf.

We thought we had learned the necessary lessons from this experience. We put our analysis program on the web. Everybody was free to check the program, if they were concerned that any data “cooking” may be occurring.

Unfortunately, another data problem occurred in 2008. In one of the three incoming data streams, the one for meteorological stations, the November 2008 data for many Russian stations was a repeat of October 2008 data. It was not our data record, but we properly had to accept the blame for the error, because the data was included in our analysis. Occasional flaws in input data are normal in any analysis, and the flaws are eventually noticed and corrected if they are substantial. Indeed, we have an effective working relationship with NOAA – when we spot data that appears questionable we inform the appropriate people at the National Climate Data Center – a relationship that has been scientifically productive.

This specific data flaw was a case in point. The quality control program that NOAA runs on the data from global meteorological stations includes a check for repetition of data: if two consecutive months have identical data the data is compared with that at the nearest stations. If it appears that the repetition is likely to be an error, the data is eliminated until the original data source has verified the data. The problem in 2008 escaped this quality check because a change in their program had temporarily, inadvertently, omitted that quality check.

The lesson learned here was that even a transient data error, however quickly corrected provides fodder for people who are interested in a public relations campaign, rather than science. That means we cannot put the new data each month on our web site and check it at our leisure, because, however briefly a flaw is displayed, it will be used to disinform the public. Indeed, in this specific case there was another round of “fraud” accusations on talk shows and other media all around the nation.

Another lesson learned. Subsequently, to minimize the chance of a bad data point slipping through in one of the data streams and temporarily affecting a publicly available data product, we now put the analyzed data up first on a site that is not visible to the public. This allows Reto, Makiko, Ken and me to examine maps and graphs of the data before the analysis is put on our web site – if anything seems questionable, we report it back to the data providers for them to resolve. Such checking is always done before publishing a paper, but now it seems to be necessary even for routine transitory data updates. This process can delay availability of our data analysis to users for up to several days, but that is a price that must be paid to minimize disinformation.

Is it possible to totally eliminate data flaws and disinformation? Of course not. The fact that the absence of incriminating statements in pirated e-mails is taken as evidence of wrongdoing provides a measure of what would be required to quell all criticism. I believe that the steps that we now take to assure data integrity are as much as is reasonable from the standpoint of the use of our time and resources.

Temperature data – examples of continuing interest. Figure 3(a) is a graph that we use to help provide insight into recent climate fluctuations. It shows monthly global temperature anomalies and monthly sea surface temperature (SST) anomalies. The red-blue Nino3.4 index at the bottom is a measure of the Southern Oscillation, with red and blue showing the warm (El Nino) and cool (La Nina) phases of sea surface temperature oscillations for a small region in the eastern equatorial Pacific Ocean.

Strong correlation of global SST with the Nino index is obvious. Global land-ocean temperature is noisier than the SST, but correlation with the Nino index is also apparent for global temperature. On average, global temperature lags the Nino index by about 3 months.

During 2008 and 2009 I received many messages, sometimes several per day informing me that the Earth is headed into its next ice age. Some messages include graphs extrapolating cooling trends into the future. Some messages use foul language and demand my resignation. Of the messages that include any science, almost invariably the claim is made that the sun controls Earth’s climate, the sun is entering a long period of diminishing energy output, and the sun is the cause of the cooling trend.

Indeed, it is likely that the sun is an important factor in climate variability. Figure 4 shows data on solar irradiance for the period of satellite measurements. We are presently in the deepest most prolonged solar minimum in the period of satellite data. It is uncertain whether the solar irradiance will rebound soon into a more-or-less normal solar cycle – or whether it might remain at a low level for decades, analogous to the Maunder Minimum, a period of few sunspots that may have been a principal cause of the Little Ice Age.

The direct climate forcing due to measured solar variability, about 0.2 W/m2, is comparable to the increase in carbon dioxide forcing that occurs in about seven years, using recent CO2 growth rates. Although there is a possibility that the solar forcing could be amplified by indirect effects, such as changes of atmospheric ozone, present understanding suggests only a small amplification, as discussed elsewhere (Hansen 2009). The global temperature record (Figure 1) has positive correlation with solar irradiance, with the amplitude of temperature variation being approximately consistent with the direct solar forcing. This topic will become clearer as the records become longer, but for that purpose it is important that the temperature record be as precise as possible.

Frequently heard fallacies are that “global warming stopped in 1998” or “the world has been getting cooler over the past decade”. These statements appear to be wishful thinking – it would be nice if true, but that is not what the data show. True, the 1998 global temperature jumped far above the previous warmest year in the instrumental record, largely because 1998 was affected by the strongest El Nino of the century. Thus for the following several years the global temperature was lower than in 1998, as expected.

However, the 5-year and 11-year running mean global temperatures (Figure 3b) have continued to increase at nearly the same rate as in the past three decades. There is a slight downward tick at the end of the record, but even that may disappear if 2010 is a warm year. Indeed, given the continued growth of greenhouse gases and the underlying global warming trend (Figure 3b) there is a high likelihood, I would say greater than 50 percent, that 2010 will be the warmest year in the period of instrumental data. This prediction depends in part upon the continuation of the present moderate El Nino for at least several months, but that is likely.

Furthermore, the assertion that 1998 was the warmest year is based on the East Anglia – British Met Office temperature analysis. As shown in Figure 1, the GISS analysis has 2005 as the warmest year. As discussed by Hansen et al. (2006) the main difference between these analyses is probably due to the fact that British analysis excludes large areas in the Arctic and Antarctic where observations are sparse. The GISS analysis, which extrapolates temperature anomalies as far as 1200 km, has more complete coverage of the polar areas. The extrapolation introduces uncertainty, but there is independent information, including satellite infrared measurements and reduced Arctic sea ice cover, which supports the existence of substantial positive temperature anomalies in those regions.

In any case, issues such as these differences between our analyses provide a reason for having more than one global analysis. When the complete data sets are compared for the different analyses it should be possible to isolate the exact locations of differences and likely gain further insights.

Summary

The nature of messages that I receive from the public, and the fact that NASA Headquarters received more than 2500 inquiries in the past week about our possible “manipulation” of global temperature data, suggest that the concerns are more political than scientific. Perhaps the messages are intended as intimidation, expected to have a chilling effect on researchers in climate change.

The recent “success” of climate contrarians in using the pirated East Anglia e-mails to cast doubt on the reality of global warming* seems to have energized other deniers. I am now inundated with broad FOIA (Freedom of Information Act) requests for my correspondence, with substantial impact on my time and on others in my office. I believe these to be fishing expeditions, aimed at finding some statement(s), likely to be taken out of context, which they would attempt to use to discredit climate science.

There are lessons from our experience about care that must be taken with data before it is made publicly available. But there is too much interesting science to be done to allow intimidation tactics to reduce our scientific drive and output. We can take a lesson from my 5- year-old grandson who boldly says “I don’t quit, because I have never-give-up fighting spirit!” http://www.columbia.edu/~jeh1/mailings/2009/20091130_FightingSpirit.pdf

There are other researchers who work more extensively on global temperature analyses than we do – our main work concerns global satellite observations and global modeling – but there are differences in perspectives, which, I suggest, make it useful to have more than one analysis. Besides, it is useful to combine experience working with observed temperature together with our work on satellite data and climate models. This combination of interests is likely to help provide some insights into what is happening with global climate and information on the data that are needed to understand what is happening. So we will be keeping at it.

*By “success” I refer to their successful character assassination and swift-boating. My interpretation of the e-mails is that some scientists probably became exasperated and frustrated by contrarians – which may have contributed to some questionable judgment. The way science works, we must make readily available the input data that we use, so that others can verify our analyses. Also, in my opinion, it is a mistake to be too concerned about contrarian publications – some bad papers will slip through the peer-review process, but overall assessments by the National Academies, the IPCC, and scientific organizations sort the wheat from the chaff.

The important point is that nothing was found in the East Anglia e-mails altering the reality and magnitude of global warming in the instrumental record. The input data for global temperature analyses are widely available, on our web site and elsewhere. If those input data could be made to yield a significantly different global temperature change, contrarians would certainly have done that – but they have not.

References

Frölich, C. 2006: Solar irradiance variability since 1978. Space Science Rev., 248, 672-673.

Hansen, J., D. Johnson, A. Lacis, S. Lebedeff, P. Lee, D. Rind, and G. Russell, 1981: Climate impact of increasing atmospheric carbon dioxide. Science, 213, 957-966.

Hansen, J.E., and S. Lebedeff, 1987: Global trends of measured surface air temperature. J. Geophys. Res., 92, 13345-13372.

Hansen, J., R. Ruedy, J. Glascoe, and Mki. Sato, 1999: GISS analysis of surface temperature change. J. Geophys. Res., 104, 30997-31022.

Hansen, J.E., R. Ruedy, Mki. Sato, M. Imhoff, W. Lawrence, D. Easterling, T. Peterson, and T. Karl, 2001: A closer look at United States and global surface temperature change. J. Geophys. Res., 106, 23947-23963.

Hansen, J., Mki. Sato, R. Ruedy, K. Lo, D.W. Lea, and M. Medina-Elizade, 2006: Global temperature change. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci., 103, 14288-14293.

Hansen, J. 2009: “Storms of My Grandchildren.” Bloomsbury USA, New York. (304 pp.)

A LFTR deployment plan for Australia

Below is a guest post by Alex Goodwin, which canvasses the idea of a large-scale deployment of Liquid Fluoride Thorium Reactors (LFTR) to clean up Australia’s power generation sector. On the Energy from Thorium forums, he’s known as fnord.

Alex refers to himself as “the finance grad they keep in a deep dark hole”, reflecting the master of business in applied finance he earned at QUT in 2007. Thus, although he’s often been mistaken for a nuclear engineer or other nuclear industry professional, in reality he’s merely an interested amateur and communicator [we need more people like this]. He joined Toastmasters (a public speaking club) in October 2008, completed a Competent Communicator course in November 2009, and most of his speeches promote the LFTR concept in one way or another.

In this post, Alex is being pragmatic. For instance, one may argue over whether his subplan to upgrade lignite using LFTR process heat and so add value to our exports is a good idea, from a climate change perspective, but ultimately we’ve got to have some transition plan, and at least the one he proposes is probably more realistic than the Government’s dreams of a world powered by coal with carbon capture and storage. In the end though, we, and other coal-rich nations, will just have to face the fact that most of the coal must be left in the ground.

You can download an 8-page printable PDF of Alex’s article here.

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Clean electricity, cheap electricity, safe electricity – pick any three

By Alex Goodwin

The federal government’s Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme signals its desire for Australian carbon emissions (currently 28.3 tonnes per capita, yearly) to drop to 60% of 2000 levels by 2050, after allowing for population growth.

If it’s business as usual, I can see some difficulty meeting that goal.

However, we don’t have time for business as usual – climate change slowly parboils us all.  For those of you skeptical of global warming, there are still plenty of reasons to go full throttle nuclear – economic development, saving Australian lives from reduced air pollution, and energy/water security, to name three.  Energy and water security vastly reduces the need for Australia to undertake foreign policy adventures to secure oil and clean water supplies, saving yet more lives.

It makes sense to go after the biggest source of carbon emissions first – which, in Australia’s case, is the power generation industry.  Power generation emits nearly 14 tonnes per head, and it’s fairly concentrated, unlike agriculture (4.2 tonnes) and transport (3.8 tonnes).

Clean power generation up, and we can meet, and beat, the CPRS goal.  We can’t cut our own economic throats cleaning up our act, so we need reliable, emission-free power to avoid disrupting the Australian economy.

This can be done, for roughly the cost of Mr Rudd’s stimulus package, inside ten years, benefiting Australian national security, the power generation industry, the coal industry, and the Australian consumer.

Enter the Liquid Fluoride Thorium Reactor (LFTR).  As the name suggests, it is:

A liquid-fuelled nuclear reactor;

Running on thorium;

Toothpaste and table-salt safe;

On top of that, it’s cheap and quick to build, allowing us to have our cake and eat it too.

Table Salt and Toothpaste

What does high pressure in a pressure vessel want to do?

I put it to you, why do conventional reactors put their fuel there, at the highest pressure?

The LFTR doesn’t do this- it puts its fuel at the lowest pressure in the reactor – and if we have a leak, it leaks in, not out. We simply don’t need the massive, expensive, pressure vessel that is a conventional reactor!

I put it to you, how do you melt a liquid?

How do you melt the already-liquid water in your morning cup of tea or coffee?

Meltdown is simply not a problem in the LFTR.

Any leaking fuel drips out of the reactor and into dump tanks below, where it freezes solid. These tanks are so effective at putting the brakes on, that if the entire fuel load at full throttle dumped into those tanks at once, it would freeze solid inside 48 hours, as it sat there.  These tanks only need to be 100 cubic metres in size for a 1 gigawatt reactor.

This combination of low pressure and inherent safety, results in an inherently safe reactor that is simple enough to be mass-produced in a factory, saving 75% of the cost of a conventional reactor.

Two real prototype reactors have shown these safety benefits: the original 1968 test reactor at Oak Ridge, Tennessee, and more recently in 2008 at the Nuclear Research Institute Rez at Prague, Czech Republic.

The Bit Left Over

Since we brush the ash out of the nuclear fission fire as we go, the thorium-uranium cycle can completely extract all the energy available – like a slow combustion stove, leaving only the ash, no half-burned fuel as happens now in conventional reactors. Thus, we use a hundred times less fuel than a conventional reactor, to generate the same amount of raw heat energy.

Out of every hundred heavy metal atoms we start with, the conventional uranium-plutonium cycle leaves 30 atoms unburned, but the thorium-uranium cycle leaves less than 3. That’s more than 10x less heavy metals left over per kilo of fuel used, combined with using a hundred times fewer kilos, for a thousand fold reduction in heavy metals left over per kilowatt-hour, before we take advantage of the LFTR’s full-burn nature.

Finally, the LFTR operates at much higher temperatures than conventional reactors – high enough that we get an extra third more power out of the same amount of heat. That’s at least 130x less fuel used and 1300x less heavy metal left over per kilowatt-hour, meaning 130x less so-called “waste”. Since the processing cycle can keep all but 0.3% of the heavy metals in the salt, we have 400,000x less heavy metal going to so-called “waste” per kilowatt-hour.

1300x less heavy metal per kilowatt-hour;

330x overall reduction in heavy metal to “waste” from recycling;

429,000x less heavy metal to “waste” per kilowatt-hour.

Too much?  Simply process the leftover ash again.  Then, there will be more heavy metal in the ground you sit above as you read this, than in the ash.

You can think of LFTR as a heavy metal “roach motel” – heavy metal checks in, but it doesn’t check out.

If we take Australia’s total electricity generating capacity (48 gigawatts), double it (allowing for growth), and convert the lot to LFTR running flat out all the time, it would take 620 years for the combined ash from all those plants to fill an Olympic-sized swimming pool. As natural processes compost the ash, it becomes less radioactive than the ground you’re sitting above in 300 years.  Europe has many buildings that have been continuously used longer than that, so the compost heap can be kept secure.

And in that ash, the so-called “waste”, are valuable minerals, such as platinum (catalysts), neodymium (permanent magnets), caesium (food sterilisation), xenon (light bulbs), strontium (space probes) and gold.  Is it really “waste” if people will buy it off you?

Get Ready To Launch

Like all engines, the LFTR needs a spark plug to get going.  Merely 500 kilograms of uranium enriched to just under 20% (keeping it in the low-enriched range) gets each hundred-megawatt core going.  That’s 100 litres of uranium, not even one and a half car fuel tanks, in the exact chemical form that the LFTR uses.

After that, no uranium needs to be loaded – that hundred megawatt reactor will tootle away on the smell of an oily rag, munching one hundred kilograms of thorium per year, year in, year out.  That’s 20 litres of thorium – about half of one of those car fuel tanks.

Australia is right for the thorium – 450 thousand tonnes of the stuff, and we haven’t looked too hard.  We are similarly right for the raw uranium – 700 thousand tonnes cheaply minable.

Yes, to power that 100 gigawatt LFTR build (double Australia’s current power generation), we would need 100 tonnes of thorium each year.  Assuming absolutely no further exploration, Australia has over 4,000 years of fuel available to power itself.

To get that spark plug, we send 25.4 tonnes of raw uranium to someone like Urenco, USEC or AREVA and pay them to enrich it to 20%.  The ideal would be for Australia to develop its own enrichment capabilities, under a program like the Global Nuclear Energy Partnership, allowing it to not only enrich its own spark plugs for its LFTR fleet, but add value to the uranium it currently exports.  However, Urenco, USEC and AREVA all have enrichment plants operating now.

To decarbonise Australian power generation (48 gigawatts) would take 12,200 tonnes of raw uranium – less than 2% of our uranium reserves. [Ed: We would need this once. After that, it would be 48 tonnes of thorium per year].

Money for short

It costs 2000 dollars per kilowatt, and takes four years, to build a conventional reactor, on-site. This has already been done repeatedly in both Korea and Japan.

For 500 dollars per kilowatt, taking two years to build, we can mass produce the much-simpler LFTR in factories. A good size for Australia, with a big export market, is 100 megawatt reactor units, instead of the gigawatt behemoths common in the USA, Europe and Asia.  This has the following benefits:

- develops Australian heavy manufacturing capacity, as 480 units would be needed to convert all current Australian power generation plants

- smaller LFTR unit size mean more units are produced, speeding progress down the learning curve (getting cheaper, better, safer faster than bigger units)

- plenty of places are big enough to need a hundred megawatts but not big enough for a gigawatt

- right size to convert existing plants, using multiple units per plant site

- smaller units can be built quicker and trucked on-site, ready to install

- reduces risk for both buyer and seller

- builds capability to rapidly adapt and produce a variant for naval or spacegoing use etc

Converting existing powerplants can be done at low cost to any other alternative – we’re only changing the heat source, and using the rest of the old plant.  This includes the turbines, the switch yard, the power supply contracts – everything but the hot bit.  The conversion would then work out to three hundred dollars a kilowatt.

For a concrete example, consider Hazelwood, in Victoria’s Latrobe Valley. A world leader in carbon emission per megawatt, Hazelwood is rated at 1600 megawatts of electrical output.  It would take 16 one hundred megawatt LFTR core units to convert Hazelwood.  Total cost 572 million dollars, 30 million dollars per core, with startup fuel costs of 6 million dollars per core. This would remove 17.6 million tonnes of annual emissions permanently, at just over $4.90 per tonne of avoided carbon.

What is LFTR worth to the coal industry?

About 40 dollars per tonne dug out of the ground.

The LFTR operates hot enough to supply what is called ‘process heat’, which can be used to upgrade coal to higher, more profitable grades.  This cheap, abundant process heat can be used to push coal upgrading to new heights, while reducing the upgraded coal’s ultimate emissions by 20-25%.

Victorian brown coal, currently considered barely worth the cost of taking it out the front gate (which is why the Latrobe Valley plants each have a dedicated mine), can be upgraded to high-rank bituminous coal for powerplant or steelmaking use.  High quality thermal coal sells for around $130/tonne – as brown coal is 50-60% water, the upgraded coal gets 52 dollars per tonne dug up.

Low-rank, sub bituminous, black coals are somewhat drier (20-30% water) but still benefit from aggressive, LFTR-powered, coal upgrading.  White Energy claims, on the basis of their pre-production results, a 42 dollar per tonne increase in the upgraded coal’s value.

Since coal-fired power generation currently makes up 80% of Australia’s generating capacity, that’s 11 tonnes per head of annual emissions avoided by converting existing coal plants to LFTR.  The coal previously burned to emit that 11 tonnes per head (226.8 million tonnes annual emissions) can then be upgraded and exported, displacing a further 2.2 tonnes per head of Australian population (45.4 million tonnes annual emissions avoided by coal upgrading).

Natural gas-fired power plants also need to be converted – natural gas is far more valuable turned into petrol than burned.

That is at least 140 million tonnes of upgraded, high-grade, coal product exported instead of burned – how does an extra 5.5 billion dollars, yearly, sound?

What is LFTR worth to the power industry?

About 10 dollars per megawatt-hour of electricity generated.

High-temperature operation means more efficient power generation.  For example, Callide C power station, in Biloela, Queensland, operates at a thermal efficiency of 39%.  That means, for every megawatt-hour of electricity generated, it has to get rid of 1.6 megawatt-hours of waste heat.  Callide C gets rid of that waste heat through cooling towers that use lots of water – 1500 litres of fresh water turned into a white, cloudy plume for each megawatt-hour sent to the grid.

On the lower end, Hazelwood power station, in the Latrobe Valley, Victoria, operates at a thermal efficiency of 24%.  For every megawatt-hour of electricity, it has to get rid of 3.1 megawatt-hours of waste heat, through water-hungry cooling tours.  3000 litres of water turned into that cloudy plume.

By contrast, the LFTR runs at a thermal efficiency of 44%, using dry cooling – much like your car’s radiator, on a slightly bigger scale.  Dry cooling means a LFTR unit doesn’t have to be sited near a water source, and can go where the power is needed.  An existing water-using power station, after being converted, can then sell the water it used to draw for its own use

An intriguing possibility for coastal and barge LFTR sites is cooling them by desalinating seawater, resulting in overall production of fresh water.  Using a simple membrane distillation process, an all-coastal LFTR fleet could produce enough fresh, drinkable water to fill Sydney Harbour every 5 months, as an afterthought of generating Australia’s 2007 power consumption, 240 million megawatt-hours.  That’s half of Australia’s total drinking water consumption made independent of drought, putting a dent in the Murray-Darling’s problems.

How does an extra 2.4 billion dollars, yearly, sound?

What about the jobs?

That’s part of the beauty of converting existing powerplants – no one needs to lose their job.  In fact, more people are needed, at coal mines, to tend the LFTR cores dedicated to coal upgrading and run the coal upgrading equipment.  These added jobs are at the high end of skilled and professional labour – $100k and up per year.

Yes, we need factories to build the 500 units needed to convert Australian power generation and provide process heat.  Three such factories, building 40-50 units per year each, would each employ roughly 2000 people to build the reactors, 500 to 600 supporting the factory, and that again for mobile crews to install the reactors.  Again, this is skilled and professional work (pipefitters, electricians, engineers), with the obvious effects on the local area’s economy (250 million dollars yearly from salaries alone per factory, before counting any indirect effects).

The jobs at each onshore unit simply cannot be exported, and will be around for the next two to three plant lifetimes – 250 to 300 years of highly skilled, highly paid Australian labour really kicking the economy along.  Similarly for the factories – high tech, high value centres of excellence and heavy manufacturing, employing thousands of people and bringing in billions of export earnings – keeping that all onshore, benefiting Australian wallets.

This effort then places Australia in an excellent position for tens of billions of dollars in export earnings each year.  Supplying and installing preassembled LFTR units, taking advantage of the Australian fleet build to form centres of excellence, and operating exported LFTR units under contract, keeping the Australian Safeguards Office happy.

Just as an afterthought, we could repeat that performance (48 gigawatts of LFTR, 480 more reactor units, on Australian-flagged and crewed barges, at twice the cost of land-based versions) to clean up the world’s top 12 bad boys of carbon.

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Plant	City	Country	CO2 output (tonnes/yr)
Taichung	Lung-Ching Township	Taiwan	41.3 million
Poryong	Poryong-gun	South Korea	37.8 million
Castle Peak	Tuen Mun	China	35.8 million
Reftinskaya	Reftinsky	Russia	33.0 million
Tuoketuo-1	Tuoketuo	China	32.4 million
Mailaio	Mailaio	Taiwan	32.4 million
Vindhychayal	Sidhi District	India	29.0 million
Hekinan	Hekinan	Japan	28.9 million
Kendal	Witbank	South Africa	28.6 million
Janschwalde	Peitz	Germany	27.4 million
Suralaya	Serang-Merak	Indonesia	27.2 million
Tangjin	Tangjin-kun	South Korea	26.9 million

Thanks to coal2nuclear.com for the compilation and CARMA for the raw data.

After we’ve cleaned our own backyard up, cleaning up the 12 bad boys would stop a further 380 million tonnes of carbon dioxide each year.  Australian know-how, sweat and ingenuity would then be responsible for stopping nearly three quarters of a billion tonnes of carbon dioxide each year, at a cost of $9.85 per tonne of avoided carbon.

What’s in it for me?

I thought you’d never ask.

Cleaner air is a slam dunk – fossil fired power plants are well known as large sources of air pollution.  Convert them to LFTR, and that air pollution goes away.  And your health care costs also go down since you’re now breathing that cleaner air.

Lower energy prices follow from conversion, in two parts.  Firstly, decarbonising power generation means no carbon is emitted to produce electricity, thus no carbon tax needs to be paid or emission permits need to be bought. As a result, the standing ETS costs that would be passed onto the customer aren’t there.  Secondly, you aren’t paying for over-hyped, under-delivering “renewable” power, such as solar or wind – they have their place, but it isn’t delivering reliable power for millions of ordinary Australians.  (Germany, despite its much hyped renewable build-out, has some of the highest power prices in Europe, well above current Australian levels.  France, getting 80% of its power from conventional nuclear, has Europe’s cheapest power).

And finally, job creation.  Those factories mentioned earlier will create more than 6,000 jobs – only counting their direct effects.  An entire industry will need staffing, and the education system will need to be vastly expanded to meet the demand for qualified people, such as nuclear-qualified plumbers, pipe-fitters, engineers, chemists and electricians.  By accepting LFTR technology, you solve the ETS dilemma while benefiting from the economic side effects of high paying, permanent, job creation.

Why haven’t I heard of this?

The LFTR was originally prototyped in 1968; the US Government ultimately pulled the plug on it because there were so many ways to more cheaply produce less contaminated material usable in a nuclear device! The very reason that damned it in the USA, saves it this time around for Australia.  The Americans got it off the ground, and did a lot of the basic research, while other groups, such as Professor Hideki Furukawa at the International Thorium Molten-Salt Forum in Kanagawa, Doctor Jan Uhlir at the Nuclear Research Institute Rez in Prague, and Kirk Sorenson at the University of Tennessee, have filled in the gaps since.  It’s up to Australia to take the LFTR beyond the speed of sound.

There have been seventy thousand operational nuclear devices constructed since 1945, and not one from thorium.  Yes, it is so difficult that out of the ten countries with nuclear arsenals (USA, USSR/Russia, UK, France, China, Israel, India, Pakistan, South Africa and North Korea), none have bothered.

In Summary

Using LFTR, we can:

- solve the current ETS “problem”

- convert all our coal and natural gas powered plants, cutting their carbon emissions by 99%

- eliminate 275 million tonnes of annual emissions, forever

- upgrade coal for export (made possible by the LFTR) and eliminate another 55 million    tonnes – the coal industry pocketing 5.5 billion dollars of export earnings yearly for its trouble

- revitalise power generation, freeing it from worries about carbon emissions

- quit worrying about safety – no meltdowns, boiler explosions, etc

- power Australia while producing merely 48 tonnes of by-product per year (12 bathtubs of valuable, reusable and recyclable by-product, for such uses as lightbulbs, catalytic converters and jewellery)

Thanks are due to Professor Barry Brook (University of Adelaide) and three anonymous commentors, whose combined feedback has improved this article immensely.

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Appendix A: Benefits of converting Hazelwood Power Station to LFTR

15% more electrical generation

17.6 million tonnes less carbon dioxide emitted (allowing for associated emissions) for 15% more power

Remaining plant life extended from 25 years to at least 80 years

Makes 25 million tonnes of low grade brown coal available to upgrade to 10 million tonnes yearly of high grade upgraded coal product available for export

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Item ($ per megawatt-hour)	Now	Converted	Difference
Capital costs	11.81	22.73	10.92
Decommissioning	0.00	0.011	0.01
Fuel	11.14	0.015	-11.125
Carbon permit cost	10.86	-4.840	-15.710
Operations & maintenance	4.28	6.2	1.92
Total	38.09	24.12	-13.98

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Appendix B: Benefits of converting Callide C Power Plant to LFTR

20.5% more electrical generation

4.8 million tonnes less carbon dioxide emitted annually for 20.5% more power

Remaining plant life extended from 35 years to at least 80 years

Makes 2.6 million tonnes of mid-grade black coal available to upgrade to 2 million tonnes yearly of high grade upgraded coal product available for export.

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Item ($ per megawatt-hour)	Now	Converted	Difference
Capital costs	14.76	24.81	10.05
Decommissioning	0	0.008	0.01
Fuel	18.14	0.02	-18.12
Carbon permit cost	3.85	-4.93	-8.78
Operations & maintenance	4.08	6.20	2.12
Total	40.83	26.11	-14.72