Archive for March, 2009

Protectionism: But what is it being protected?

March 19th, 2009

Posted by: Roger Pielke, Jr.

The WSJ discusses Energy Secretary Steven Chu’s warning that, in the future under a domestic cap and trade program, the US may levy tariffs on foreign goods to protect American companies from foreign competition not subject to carbon pricing. Is this “climate protection” or “economic protectionism” or both? One point seems clear: regardless of the reasoning a trade war means higher prices for the American consumer, a point sure to be front and center in the cap and trade debate. Here is an excerpt:

Energy Secretary Steven Chu on Tuesday advocated adjusting trade duties as a “weapon” to protect U.S. manufacturing, just a day after one of China’s top climate envoys warned of a trade war if developed countries impose tariffs on carbon-intensive imports.

Mr. Chu, speaking before a House science panel, said establishing a carbon tariff would help “level the playing field” if other countries haven’t imposed greenhouse-gas-reduction mandates similar to the one President Barack Obama plans to implement over the next couple of years. It is the first time the Obama administration has made public its view on the issue.

“If other countries don’t impose a cost on carbon, then we will be at a disadvantage…[and] we would look at considering perhaps duties that would offset that cost,” Mr. Chu said.

Li Gao, a senior Chinese negotiator from the National Development and Reform Commission, told Dow Jones Newswires Monday that a carbon tariff would be a “disaster,” would prompt a trade war and wouldn’t be legal under World Trade Organization agreements

“It does not abide by the rule of [the] WTO and, secondly, it’s not fair,” Mr. Gao said, adding that his delegation would relate China’s concerns to U.S. officials.

Mr. Chu’s comments came amid other signs of concern among U.S. trading partners about protectionist rhetoric and legislation from Washington.

Obligated to Politicize

March 19th, 2009

Posted by: Roger Pielke, Jr.

James Hansen is once again in the news for his advocacy efforts. This time he is in the UK to help lead a political protest against coal. The Guardian quotes Hansen as saying that:

(more…)

Technology in the Courts

March 18th, 2009

Posted by: admin

Two items of recent note about how technology supports – or doesn’t – the judicial process in the United States.

Soon in San Diego there will be the first test of a functional MRI (fMRI) machine in a court case.  Defendant’s counsel in the proceeding will introduce evidence from an fMRI scan to indicate that the defendant was telling the truth.  Wired Science has the details.  In short, the idea is that lying is connected to particular activity in a part of the pre-frontal cortex.  This idea has received a share of skepticism from some researchers, and that may determine whether or not such evidence is ruled admissible.  For California law, such science-based evidence must be readily accepted in the scientific community before the courts will accept it.  At the moment it’s unclear whether the technology will make the move from House to CSI (in TV terms).

In other court related news, judges are now having to deal (H/T Scientific American’s 60 Second Science Blog) with jurors spreading news about their cases during trial via social networking sites like Twitter.  Arguably this is an old problem – jurors are supposed to keep their information to themselves, and are supposed to consider only what is admitted in court – augmented by recent technology.  Given the added expenses of sequestering a jury (and the challenge of prohibiting such broadcasting and research in any setting), its unclear how the jury system will react to this trend.

Global Governance of Science

March 18th, 2009

Posted by: Roger Pielke, Jr.

The European Commission has just released a new report titled, The Global Governance of Science. It is available here in PDF. Here is the abstract:

This report is the product of an expert group acting under a mandate from the European Commission Directorate General for Research to which legal scholars, sociologists, philosophers and political scientists from Europe, the United States of America, China and South-Africa have contributed. This report seeks to advance a vision of global governance for the common good that invokes European principles of good governance and fundamental rights. It is our belief that the European Union as a political entity situated between the national and global levels, with its principles of good governance, its charter of fundamental rights and commitments to a European Research Area, is ideally placed to encourage critical reflection and undertake practical leadership in relation to the global governance of science and innovation. Our recommendations are addressed not only to policymakers in the European Commission and the Member States of the EU, but equally to those organisations worldwide operating within and around science.

Stern on Extremes

March 18th, 2009

Posted by: Roger Pielke, Jr.

Last night I saw a talk in which the Stern Review estimates of the future costs of extreme events were cited. These estimates are based on a flawed analysis. So I thought I’d post up a mention of my paper making this case.

Pielke, Jr., R. A., 2007. Mistreatment of the economic impacts of extreme events in the Stern Review Report on the Economics of Climate Change, Global Environmental Change, Vol. 17, pp. 302-310. (Link and PDF)

Abstract

The Stern Review on the Economics of Climate Change has focused debate on the costs and benefits of alternative courses of action on climate change. This refocusing has helped to move debate away from science of the climate system and on to issues of policy. However, a careful examination of the Stern Review’s treatment of the economics of extreme events in developed countries, such as floods and tropical cyclones, shows that the report is selective in its presentation of relevant impact studies and repeats a common error in impacts studies by confusing sensitivity analyses with projections of future impacts. The Stern Review’s treatment of extreme events is misleading because it overestimates the future costs of extreme weather events in developed countries by an order of magnitude. Because the Stern Report extends these findings globally, the overestimate propagates through the report’s estimate of future global losses. When extreme events are viewed more comprehensively the resulting perspective can be used to expand the scope of choice available to decision makers seeking to grapple with future disasters in the context of climate change. In particular, a more comprehensive analysis underscores the importance of adaptation in any comprehensive portfolio of responses to climate change.

If I Were the Climate Czar . . .

March 18th, 2009

Posted by: Roger Pielke, Jr.

Over at Energy Tribune they have posted up an interview with me. One question that I answer is what I’d do if I were climate czar. Here is what I said:

1. A carbon tax at the highest level politically possible. I’d guess that this is about $5 per ton of carbon dioxide but perhaps it could be higher. The only way to know would be to have the political debate. With Exxon Mobil calling for such a tax, I think that the claims that it would be unsellable are unfounded.

2. A national (and indeed global) industrial policy focused on decarbonization of the global economy with three elements:

a. A commitment to rapid increases in energy efficiency, perhaps following the Japanese model of benchmarking industry leaders and then implementing policies to bring other industry performers to the benchmarked standard.

b. A commitment to decarbonizing energy supply, by removing incentives for fossil fuels and creating incentives for carbon neutral sources, including both nuclear and renewable.

c. A massive commitment to research, development, deployment and the entire “ecosystem” of activities associated with transformation of the global energy system. Such a system has technical, social, and political elements. Good models for what it might take are the efforts spent fighting the Cold War or improving public health over many decades. The point of such investments would be to creating an ever-advancing frontier of energy efficiency, leading to a virtuous circle with (a) above, and also to accelerate advances in carbon neutral energy supply, supporting (b) above.

3. A focus on adaptation to the combined effects of climate and society, particularly in the developing world, with a goal of making societies more resilient and less vulnerable.

4. A major investment in the air capture and sequestration of carbon dioxide as a backstop technology, in case other forms of mitigation don’t succeed. All forms of capture should be explored including chemical, geological, and biological.

5. A commitment to the sustainability of science and expertise in support of climate policy making. This would mean the institutionalization of more honest brokers (as described in my book by this title) and less stealth advocacy by experts. We are going to need climate science for many decades, so we should take care that it maintains its credibility.

The rest of the Q&A is here.

Maps of Science: Possible Policy Tool?

March 17th, 2009

Posted by: admin

Wired Science highlighted a new effort in “mapping” science – a map representing clickstreams of searches that shows connections between fields.  It’s an effort of a team at the Los Alamos National Laboratory that was recently published in PLoS ONE.  A main distinction of this work compared to others (examples can be found at Maps of Science and Places and Spaces), and is that it analyzes web searches, and other maps have tracked journal citations.  Both are useful, but there is an important difference.  The citation traffic highlights what scientific communities consider important in their specific fields, and the search traffic focuses more attention on connections between knowledge clumps.

Map of Science

I like this kind of work, and the other mapping exercises like those sampled in the Wired Science post, because I don’t think enough attention is paid to the interrelationships between clumps of knowledge.  And because often the research questions that spawn those clumps of knowledge aren’t the same questions as policy questions, maps showing possible connections have the potential to guide policymakers to more relevant knowledge, or to identifying gaps in knowledge, than through a traditional literature search.

Grants.gov Needs to Grow

March 16th, 2009

Posted by: admin

Part of the stimulus package is an increase in grants awarded across several departments.  There is a government-wide portal, grants.gov, that is designed to handle much of this traffic.  According to an Office of Management and Budget memorandum (H/T Nature News), that system is seeing a dramatic increase in usage, and may be reaching its maximum capabilities.  Thankfully, the OMB was made aware of the problem and has required agencies to develop alternatives to grants.gov in the event the system is overburdened.  While grants.gov is seeing increased traffic, it has yet to reach a breaking point.

So, for those using the grants.gov portal in the next few weeks, when you get mad at how long its taking, keep in mind that people are aware of the problem and trying to make sure it doesn’t break.

The Magic of Emissions Trading

March 16th, 2009

Posted by: Roger Pielke, Jr.

Courtesy of Benny Peiser’s CCNet is this translated German news article (thanks to BP):

Germany’s environment minister Sigmar Gabriel (Social Democratic Party) is pushing for the construction of new coal-fired power plants in Germany. “We need eight to twelve new coal plants if we want to get out of nuclear energy,” Gabriel said on Friday at a meeting of the Mainz-Wiesbaden AG (KMW) in Mainz. With regard to the opponents of the planned coal-fired power in Mainz, the minister said: “Those who demonstrate against coal-fired power will get nuclear power plants instead.” Gabriel said, the decision about which power plants are built is the responsibility of companies and not politics. He added that new coal power plants would not increase carbon dioxide emissions.

First of all, old plants would be closed. In additon, the emissions trading scheme would limit the level of emissions. “You can build 100 coal-fired power plants and don’t have to have higher CO2 emissions,” said the environment minister.

Renewable energies would not be able to close the gap in energy supply that will arise due to the shutdown of nuclear power plants by 2020, said Gabriel. Even gas-fired power plants are not a real alternative because their power generation is expensive and thus not competitive for the energy supply of industrial production.

I think that these comments say more than is intended about the possibilities under a cap and trade system.

More Simple Energy Math

March 16th, 2009

Posted by: Roger Pielke, Jr.

I am late in posting a reference to this interesting op-ed from the WSJ a short while ago by Robert Bryce on the potential role of renewables in future energy supply. Better late than never, here is an excerpt:

The latest data from the U.S. Energy Information Administration show that total solar and wind output for 2008 will likely be about 45,493,000 megawatt-hours. That sounds significant until you consider this number: 4,118,198,000 megawatt-hours. That’s the total amount of electricity generated during the rolling 12-month period that ended last November. Solar and wind, in other words, produce about 1.1% of America’s total electricity consumption.

Of course, you might respond that renewables need to start somewhere. True enough — and to be clear, I’m not opposed to renewables. I have solar panels on the roof of my house here in Texas that generate 3,200 watts. And those panels (which were heavily subsidized by Austin Energy, the city-owned utility) provide about one-third of the electricity my family of five consumes. Better still, solar panel producers like First Solar Inc. are lowering the cost of solar cells. On the day of Mr. Obama’s speech, the company announced that it is now producing solar cells for $0.98 per watt, thereby breaking the important $1-per-watt price barrier.

And yet, while price reductions are important, the wind is intermittent, and so are sunny days. That means they cannot provide the baseload power, i.e., the amount of electricity required to meet minimum demand, that Americans want.

That issue aside, the scale problem persists. For the sake of convenience, let’s convert the energy produced by U.S. wind and solar installations into oil equivalents.

The conversion of electricity into oil terms is straightforward: one barrel of oil contains the energy equivalent of 1.64 megawatt-hours of electricity. Thus, 45,493,000 megawatt-hours divided by 1.64 megawatt-hours per barrel of oil equals 27.7 million barrels of oil equivalent from solar and wind for all of 2008.

Now divide that 27.7 million barrels by 365 days and you find that solar and wind sources are providing the equivalent of 76,000 barrels of oil per day. America’s total primary energy use is about 47.4 million barrels of oil equivalent per day.

Of that 47.4 million barrels of oil equivalent, oil itself has the biggest share — we consume about 19 million barrels per day. Natural gas is the second-biggest contributor, supplying the equivalent of 11.9 million barrels of oil, while coal provides the equivalent of 11.5 million barrels of oil per day. The balance comes from nuclear power (about 3.8 million barrels per day), and hydropower (about 1.1 million barrels), with smaller contributions coming from wind, solar, geothermal, wood waste, and other sources.

Here’s another way to consider the 76,000 barrels of oil equivalent per day that come from solar and wind: It’s approximately equal to the raw energy output of one average-sized coal mine.

During his address to Congress, Mr. Obama did not mention coal — the fuel that provides nearly a quarter of total primary energy and about half of America’s electricity — except to say that the U.S. should develop “clean coal.” He didn’t mention nuclear power, only “nuclear proliferation,” even though nuclear power is likely the best long-term solution to policy makers’ desire to cut U.S. carbon emissions. He didn’t mention natural gas, even though it provides about 25% of America’s total primary energy needs. Furthermore, the U.S. has huge quantities of gas, and it’s the only fuel source that can provide the stand-by generation capacity needed for wind and solar installations. Finally, he didn’t mention oil, the backbone fuel of the world transportation sector, except to say that the U.S. imports too much of it.

Perhaps the president’s omissions are understandable. America has an intense love-hate relationship with hydrocarbons in general, and with coal and oil in particular. And with increasing political pressure to cut carbon-dioxide emissions, that love-hate relationship has only gotten more complicated.

But the problem of scale means that these hydrocarbons just won’t go away. Sure, Mr. Obama can double the output from solar and wind. And then double it again. And again. And again. But getting from 76,000 barrels of oil equivalent per day to something close to the 47.4 million barrels of oil equivalent per day needed to keep the U.S. economy running is going to take a long, long time.