It is known that monopolies are not hotbeds of innovation. Utilities in the US generally don't have much incentive to reduce rates and no incentive I'm aware of to reduce emissions. Are there any places (countries, municipalities) where you have seen utilities done well that people should study? In the US specifically, do you think a utility structured as a public benefit corp could serve to address the incentive problems?
You've mentioned before studying philosophy back when you were in university, which philosophers or philosophical topics did you most enjoy learning about back then? And which have most influenced your worldview since then as an adult?
What to you think about the attempted restart of the Santa Ynez Oilfields? California now imports the majority of it's oil from the Middle East and Alaska. At it's peak Santa Ynez produced 35MBoe a year, enough to make a very serious dent in those imports, and therefor a very real and significant reduction in emissions.
Are you always against this type of thing? Or is there a real tradeoff that should be considered?
LLNL's Sankey US energy flowcharts have been updated. (See https://flowcharts.llnl.gov/) It looks like they've revised energy generation estimates for renewables downwards for the past several years. E.g., wind and solar estimates for 2022 are half of what was reported a year ago. What gives? These new renewable numbers are discouraging. Could we get an expert on what to make of the changes?
Yeah, so they changed to use a straight 3413 Btu/kWh instead of 8000ish Btu (avoided fossil energy). They say this is in line with international stds. I'm not sure there is an international std, but maybe IEA? I think others do try to account for the fact that wind & solar electricity avoids waste. Michael Liebreich and Michael Barnard write a lot on the fallacy of primary energy accounting. (I.e. it "rewards" inefficiency.)
Does it ever seem like "the left hand doesn't know what the right hand is doing," in the administration as regards renewables? Sort of form 'em, sort of neutral/fair/equitable? "Level playing field," "Not picking winners," etc.
From the newest Sankey, It appears that the EIA still counts the rejected "primary" thermal energy from nuclear, which seems to be in favor these days among the geopolitical and macho nerd classes.
Your podcasts provide valuable insights into various public and private initiatives. However, I’d like to see more analysis on the current state of US emissions and trends. Are these initiatives genuinely making a difference in reducing global emissions, or could the rebound effect be undermining those efforts, leaving us in a still highly emissive environment? François (a proselyte fan of your podcasts)
As people electrify, remaining users of methane for heat etc. will need to pay increasingly high rates to maintain the infrastructure. Right? Did I miss a pod that discussed how this can be avoided, or at least abated? Thanks.
I just heard mention of something that might be of interest. I gather that some (or all) communities in the Netherlands have a sort of "orderly shutdown" plan for methane, and somewhere there may be a publication of a case study of Utrecht. I have *NOT* found this with a quick Googling.
The plan is reportedly mapped out to decommission gas in 25 years by shutting down segments, systematically, and avoiding the death spiral that would happen if they tried to maintain the entire network to the end.
The mention was on the "Redefining Energy Tech" podcast with Michael Barnard. I'm linking to the Overcast link to the episode at the 31 minute mark. Let me know if you need more help finding the episode. They don't present great options, IMO, as this is not their primary podcast.
There’s something highly effective and relatively low tech everyone can do or encourage: convert ecologically destructive landscapes (at home or in public spaces) into eco-positive ones that improve soil, conserve water, reduce fossil fuel use, provide beauty, eliminate toxic chemicals and, especially, restore biodiversity. Please invite Doug Tallamy on your podcast or someone similar. He is a brilliant and inspirational communicator about this (see https://homegrownnationalpark.org/doug-tallamy/).
I was very unexpectedly interested in the past week's episode of the Zero podcast. It just got me thinking about the potential impact of using ride-hailing services. Like, could I actually stop paying so many *thousands* of dollars per year to have a car? Could I send a message to the American car industry that they failed me?
My opinion on the climate impact of owning an EV has been all over the place in the past couple of years.
A recent Heatmap effort might clarify why one's "opinion on the climate impact of owning an EV has been all over the place." In the methodology link below, they specifically discuss how calculated CO2e/kWh to charge an EV from the grid can be "all over the place," depending on whether one looks at short term/current marginal emissions or long term marginal emissions. The latter emissions being lower, and the decrease from replacing an ICE with and EV being greater. They don't address it specifically, but one can further decrease EV charging emissions by charging when variable renewable generation is locally peaking, which hopefully also encourages utilities to build VRE as opposed to "we need more baseload thermal generation."
The podcast should be available to all, not sure about the other stuff and the paywall.
One point that struck me was how purchasing an EV now creates a demand push which incentives further improvements in the vehicles and batteries (and most likely reductions in CO2e embodied within) and charging infrastructure and hopefully clean generation. As opposed to waiting for the cars, chargers and grid to be perfected, since waiting for perfection is endless.
And yeah, the Big 3 keep falling on their faces, and now Tesla/Elon is going off on some weird tangents to put it mildly.
“Cutting federal bureaucracy” has been the GOP’s number one priority since Ronald Reagan famously said “Government is not the solution to our problem.” In just 40 years, in a blink of an eye, unregulated corporations have undermined our government’s ability to protect our environment, our health, and our democracy. In a few weeks we will have the opportunity to rectify these issues, please don’t let your vote go to waste.
since it can take 15 years or more to permit a new solar installation or the upgraded grid to move the power to where it is needed. The 32 federal agency approvals; numerous state and local permits; native American permits; and then the NIMBY lawsuits are excessive. These delay progress and balloon costs. This is the government harming our health, innovation and progress not the private sector. Permitting needs to be vastly streamlined when the project impacts the fight against global warming!!!!
Now that Trump will be out next President, I am curious what others are doing to juice every bit of Climate progress out of the remaining Biden administration. I have heard Leah Stokes say we should focus on getting IRA and BIL funds out to the states as rapidly as possible. What else should we be working on?
This could also include measures to mitigate the harm Trump will do. Thanks!
@bill thanks for the suggestion, tomorrow's pod (and every episode moving forward) should be "ad" free for paid subs! I'll check it myself too, but lmk if it works for you.
Technical difficulties... turns out this is hard to do without splitting the newsletter into two distinct streams, something we're trying to avoid. Still attempting to figure this out!
What are the chances of getting solar balcony type setups approved in the US? It would be great to have an episode digging deep into what we can do to accelerate the transition that gets around the utilities and local permitting slowdowns, etc
Even if we avoid a Trump dictatorship, and that's no better than an even money proposition, we aren't likely to meet the current climate targets. Hopefully, progress on transitioning to renewables will continue but we're also going to have to live with some level of warming.
I understand why climate activists don't want to talk about mitigation, because they think it can lull people into believing we can live with ever rising temperatures. However, simply throwing up our hands and saying "we are all gonna die if we don't meet net zero by Year X" isn't a solution either. I know Volts is heavily focused on renewables, but maybe Dave wants to start broaching topics associated with mitigation as well.
Helene and Milton are more proof of global warming impacts. The problem we face is increasing power use and getting alternative power from rural America to the urban areas of highest demand. That means more alternative energy sites and more modifications and upgrades to the grid. Both of these require excessive permitting that can take 15 years or more. The cost and time needed is onerous and forces us to remain on fossil fueled power. Why don't we take the coal fired plants and replace the firebox with small nuclear devices to create the steam. The turbine generation and grid ties already exist. the small nuclear plants can be built in a factory and permitted before installation. The reuse of the footprint, turbine generators and grid ties reduce the time needed and the costs. That can be an excellent transition plan until we can get the permitting for more solar, wind, geotermal , and hydro installations and the grid connections needed to bring the power where needed. Why is there not more activity to do this. in addition, the employees terminated from coal plants that are shut can be rehired and retrained to support previously hurting community economies.
The Federal Commission for Canine Flourishing has updated nutritional recommendations to ALL THE TREATS on your birthday. Make sure you abide by the new guidelines!
The opinions on GreenH2 are disingenuous to us that are working on cost effective production and transportation methods. My company, Green Edison Technologies Llc has developed and Copyrighted the process. Several Middle Eastern oil economies have approached us to either purchase the process to "catch and kill" to protect their franchises.
--- MAILBAG QUESTIONS ---
It is known that monopolies are not hotbeds of innovation. Utilities in the US generally don't have much incentive to reduce rates and no incentive I'm aware of to reduce emissions. Are there any places (countries, municipalities) where you have seen utilities done well that people should study? In the US specifically, do you think a utility structured as a public benefit corp could serve to address the incentive problems?
You've mentioned before studying philosophy back when you were in university, which philosophers or philosophical topics did you most enjoy learning about back then? And which have most influenced your worldview since then as an adult?
What to you think about the attempted restart of the Santa Ynez Oilfields? California now imports the majority of it's oil from the Middle East and Alaska. At it's peak Santa Ynez produced 35MBoe a year, enough to make a very serious dent in those imports, and therefor a very real and significant reduction in emissions.
Are you always against this type of thing? Or is there a real tradeoff that should be considered?
LLNL's Sankey US energy flowcharts have been updated. (See https://flowcharts.llnl.gov/) It looks like they've revised energy generation estimates for renewables downwards for the past several years. E.g., wind and solar estimates for 2022 are half of what was reported a year ago. What gives? These new renewable numbers are discouraging. Could we get an expert on what to make of the changes?
It looks like the EIA has updated the way it calculates the primary energy consumption of electricity generation:
https://www.eia.gov/state/seds/seds-change/index.php/
Yeah, so they changed to use a straight 3413 Btu/kWh instead of 8000ish Btu (avoided fossil energy). They say this is in line with international stds. I'm not sure there is an international std, but maybe IEA? I think others do try to account for the fact that wind & solar electricity avoids waste. Michael Liebreich and Michael Barnard write a lot on the fallacy of primary energy accounting. (I.e. it "rewards" inefficiency.)
Does it ever seem like "the left hand doesn't know what the right hand is doing," in the administration as regards renewables? Sort of form 'em, sort of neutral/fair/equitable? "Level playing field," "Not picking winners," etc.
From the newest Sankey, It appears that the EIA still counts the rejected "primary" thermal energy from nuclear, which seems to be in favor these days among the geopolitical and macho nerd classes.
Your podcasts provide valuable insights into various public and private initiatives. However, I’d like to see more analysis on the current state of US emissions and trends. Are these initiatives genuinely making a difference in reducing global emissions, or could the rebound effect be undermining those efforts, leaving us in a still highly emissive environment? François (a proselyte fan of your podcasts)
As people electrify, remaining users of methane for heat etc. will need to pay increasingly high rates to maintain the infrastructure. Right? Did I miss a pod that discussed how this can be avoided, or at least abated? Thanks.
Update II: A short article from a year ago, slightly expands the recent podcast conversation.
https://cleantechnica.com/2023/05/11/some-gas-utilities-are-leading-the-way-into-the-future-others-are-actively-in-reverse/
Update: Transcript is here:
https://cleantechnica.com/2024/10/23/methane-expert-rob-jackson-of-global-carbon-project-talks-solutions/
I just heard mention of something that might be of interest. I gather that some (or all) communities in the Netherlands have a sort of "orderly shutdown" plan for methane, and somewhere there may be a publication of a case study of Utrecht. I have *NOT* found this with a quick Googling.
The plan is reportedly mapped out to decommission gas in 25 years by shutting down segments, systematically, and avoiding the death spiral that would happen if they tried to maintain the entire network to the end.
The mention was on the "Redefining Energy Tech" podcast with Michael Barnard. I'm linking to the Overcast link to the episode at the 31 minute mark. Let me know if you need more help finding the episode. They don't present great options, IMO, as this is not their primary podcast.
https://overcast.fm/+BAQo4eclX4/31:00
There’s something highly effective and relatively low tech everyone can do or encourage: convert ecologically destructive landscapes (at home or in public spaces) into eco-positive ones that improve soil, conserve water, reduce fossil fuel use, provide beauty, eliminate toxic chemicals and, especially, restore biodiversity. Please invite Doug Tallamy on your podcast or someone similar. He is a brilliant and inspirational communicator about this (see https://homegrownnationalpark.org/doug-tallamy/).
--- CLIMATE JOBS & OPPORTUNITIES ---
Yeah, you want to move to Minnesota and you want a clean energy job!
https://www.cleanenergyresourceteams.org/job-board
--- EVERYTHING ELSE ---
What would it take for Dave to finally quit twitter and join one of the alternatives?
I was very unexpectedly interested in the past week's episode of the Zero podcast. It just got me thinking about the potential impact of using ride-hailing services. Like, could I actually stop paying so many *thousands* of dollars per year to have a car? Could I send a message to the American car industry that they failed me?
My opinion on the climate impact of owning an EV has been all over the place in the past couple of years.
https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/ubers-boss-makes-case-forcing-companies-evs-akshat-rathi-u6mve/
A recent Heatmap effort might clarify why one's "opinion on the climate impact of owning an EV has been all over the place." In the methodology link below, they specifically discuss how calculated CO2e/kWh to charge an EV from the grid can be "all over the place," depending on whether one looks at short term/current marginal emissions or long term marginal emissions. The latter emissions being lower, and the decrease from replacing an ICE with and EV being greater. They don't address it specifically, but one can further decrease EV charging emissions by charging when variable renewable generation is locally peaking, which hopefully also encourages utilities to build VRE as opposed to "we need more baseload thermal generation."
The podcast should be available to all, not sure about the other stuff and the paywall.
https://heatmap.news/decarbonize-your-life/
https://heatmap.news/decarbonize-your-life/methodology
I found the discussion on the podcast to be even more enlightening. https://heatmap.news/podcast/shift-key-s2-e9-decarbonize-your-life
One point that struck me was how purchasing an EV now creates a demand push which incentives further improvements in the vehicles and batteries (and most likely reductions in CO2e embodied within) and charging infrastructure and hopefully clean generation. As opposed to waiting for the cars, chargers and grid to be perfected, since waiting for perfection is endless.
And yeah, the Big 3 keep falling on their faces, and now Tesla/Elon is going off on some weird tangents to put it mildly.
“Cutting federal bureaucracy” has been the GOP’s number one priority since Ronald Reagan famously said “Government is not the solution to our problem.” In just 40 years, in a blink of an eye, unregulated corporations have undermined our government’s ability to protect our environment, our health, and our democracy. In a few weeks we will have the opportunity to rectify these issues, please don’t let your vote go to waste.
since it can take 15 years or more to permit a new solar installation or the upgraded grid to move the power to where it is needed. The 32 federal agency approvals; numerous state and local permits; native American permits; and then the NIMBY lawsuits are excessive. These delay progress and balloon costs. This is the government harming our health, innovation and progress not the private sector. Permitting needs to be vastly streamlined when the project impacts the fight against global warming!!!!
--- CLIMATE EVENTS & MEETUPS ---
Climate Action Week Sydney March 10-16, 2025 Call for Event Submissions more info at www.caw.sydney
If you are in Minnesota, we’ve got you covered for clean energy events and meetups!
https://www.cleanenergyresourceteams.org/events
--- SHARE WORK, ASK FOR HELP, FIND COLLABORATORS ---
Now that Trump will be out next President, I am curious what others are doing to juice every bit of Climate progress out of the remaining Biden administration. I have heard Leah Stokes say we should focus on getting IRA and BIL funds out to the states as rapidly as possible. What else should we be working on?
This could also include measures to mitigate the harm Trump will do. Thanks!
Would it be possible for paid subscribers to get a version of the podcast without the ad and the electric buzz noise?
@bill thanks for the suggestion, tomorrow's pod (and every episode moving forward) should be "ad" free for paid subs! I'll check it myself too, but lmk if it works for you.
Technical difficulties... turns out this is hard to do without splitting the newsletter into two distinct streams, something we're trying to avoid. Still attempting to figure this out!
What are the chances of getting solar balcony type setups approved in the US? It would be great to have an episode digging deep into what we can do to accelerate the transition that gets around the utilities and local permitting slowdowns, etc
Is the carbon dioxide to methanol conversion method offered by the company SpiralWave an effective solution?
Even if we avoid a Trump dictatorship, and that's no better than an even money proposition, we aren't likely to meet the current climate targets. Hopefully, progress on transitioning to renewables will continue but we're also going to have to live with some level of warming.
I understand why climate activists don't want to talk about mitigation, because they think it can lull people into believing we can live with ever rising temperatures. However, simply throwing up our hands and saying "we are all gonna die if we don't meet net zero by Year X" isn't a solution either. I know Volts is heavily focused on renewables, but maybe Dave wants to start broaching topics associated with mitigation as well.
Do you believe sector specific carbon tax is worthwhile or even political viable? Examples: carbon tax on data centers or taxing NO emissions.
Helene and Milton are more proof of global warming impacts. The problem we face is increasing power use and getting alternative power from rural America to the urban areas of highest demand. That means more alternative energy sites and more modifications and upgrades to the grid. Both of these require excessive permitting that can take 15 years or more. The cost and time needed is onerous and forces us to remain on fossil fueled power. Why don't we take the coal fired plants and replace the firebox with small nuclear devices to create the steam. The turbine generation and grid ties already exist. the small nuclear plants can be built in a factory and permitted before installation. The reuse of the footprint, turbine generators and grid ties reduce the time needed and the costs. That can be an excellent transition plan until we can get the permitting for more solar, wind, geotermal , and hydro installations and the grid connections needed to bring the power where needed. Why is there not more activity to do this. in addition, the employees terminated from coal plants that are shut can be rehired and retrained to support previously hurting community economies.
HAPPY BIRTHDAY ABNER!!
The Federal Commission for Canine Flourishing has updated nutritional recommendations to ALL THE TREATS on your birthday. Make sure you abide by the new guidelines!
The opinions on GreenH2 are disingenuous to us that are working on cost effective production and transportation methods. My company, Green Edison Technologies Llc has developed and Copyrighted the process. Several Middle Eastern oil economies have approached us to either purchase the process to "catch and kill" to protect their franchises.
Thank you for all your work and how you share it!