Science/Environment The Carbon Debate, pt III

[DivideandMultiply]

OK build one then. It makes more sene than a national broadband for the money. Would there be any obstacles to building a tidal power plant in Port Phillip Bay?

2000 is just a number I plucked out, that would represent a significant reduction in coal burning.

How does Tidal power go at ebb tide?
Similarly how many of those Solar stations can store energy?

Why would I build one?

Each of the CSP stations use liquid salts and have energy storage capabilities.

Likewise most modern designs for tidal stations include pumps which are activated at periods of high energy but low demand, to artificially raise estuarine levels to give increased control over output at times of high demand. Much like how hydro power works.

Both options, but especially CSP stations are capable of delivering baseload power generation given the right conditions.

 

[Norwegian Blue]

There are also a variety of proposals for equal to and far larger tidal stations in other countries (such as the UK and Russia). The technology is there, what is needed is simply government approval and time in a number of cases.

Actually what's needed is money. Governments have wisely got out of the generation investment business, leaving that to private industry. If someone stumped up the cash to build a hypothetical large scale solar or tidal power station, governments would bend over backwards to get approvals through.

The problem is that the capital costs for solar are around six times that of coal/gas generation per MW of installed capacity. I'm not sure what the costs of tidal are but I'd be willing to bet that either they're considerably more (otherwise investment money would go there rather than wind) or Australia doesn't have many suitable sites (for tidal to be most effective you need narrow, fast flowing channels and large differences in tide heights).

From Tim Flannery today:

A report, to be released today by chief commissioner Professor Tim Flannery, notes Australia’s vast potential from sunlight and wind, saying solar PV and wind could be the cheapest forms of power in Australia for retail users by 2030, if not earlier, as carbon prices rise’’.

Note the qualifiers there. "By 2030". "Could be". "As carbon prices rise". The first two are very dependent on the price for solar continuing to come down, something that's not clear. The third assumes carbon prices will rise, when the current plan to link our price to the EU is likely to push permits down.

 

[Upton Sinclair]

This is worrying - could potentially be a biggest problem than the warming caused by carbon.

http://www.newscientist.com/mobile/...lready-dissolving-in-southern-ocean-acid.html

In a small patch of the Southern Ocean, the shells of sea snails are dissolving. The finding is the first evidence that marine life is already suffering as a result of man-made ocean acidification.

"This is actually happening now," says Geraint Tarling of the British Antarctic Survey in Cambridge, UK. He and colleagues captured free-swimming sea snails called pteropods from the Southern Ocean in early 2008 and found under an electron microscope that the outer layers of their hard shells bore signs of unusual corrosion.

As well as warming the planet, the carbon dioxide we emit is changing the chemistry of the ocean. CO2 dissolves in water to form carbonic acid, making the water less alkaline. The pH is currently dropping at about 0.1 per century, faster than any time in the last 300 million years

 

[SaintsSeptember]

This is worrying - could potentially be a biggest problem than the warming caused by carbon.

http://www.newscientist.com/mobile/...lready-dissolving-in-southern-ocean-acid.html

In a small patch of the Southern Ocean, the shells of sea snails are dissolving. The finding is the first evidence that marine life is already suffering as a result of man-made ocean acidification.

"This is actually happening now," says Geraint Tarling of the British Antarctic Survey in Cambridge, UK. He and colleagues captured free-swimming sea snails called pteropods from the Southern Ocean in early 2008 and found under an electron microscope that the outer layers of their hard shells bore signs of unusual corrosion.

As well as warming the planet, the carbon dioxide we emit is changing the chemistry of the ocean. CO2 dissolves in water to form carbonic acid, making the water less alkaline. The pH is currently dropping at about 0.1 per century, faster than any time in the last 300 million years

Victoria bailed out of the Energy marked, and to be honest they had ballsed up a lot of the SEC organisation. It wasn't all bad though.
Remembering that CO2 was not "evil" at the time, they built very good , efficient power stations, and planned well for future needs.

I dont think that private enterprise have even considered investing much in the way of capital.
Cheap construction, fast payback is always going to be the name of the game.
OK apply carbon tax and they may build something more substantial, but unless the tax all goes back to the consumer its going to really affect the power price.

I'm not completely sure how the power grid works, but as I understand it, its all driven by spot prices, cheapest source comes on line first and the others come on as demand increases.
I don't think it would be overly complex to legislate a mandate for them to select the power source in terms of lowest greenhouse emissions first.
( Would be pretty simple to audit ).

 

[DivideandMultiply]

Actually what's needed is money. Governments have wisely got out of the generation investment business, leaving that to private industry. If someone stumped up the cash to build a hypothetical large scale solar or tidal power station, governments would bend over backwards to get approvals through.

The problem is that the capital costs for solar are around six times that of coal/gas generation per MW of installed capacity. I'm not sure what the costs of tidal are but I'd be willing to bet that either they're considerably more (otherwise investment money would go there rather than wind) or Australia doesn't have many suitable sites (for tidal to be most effective you need narrow, fast flowing channels and large differences in tide heights).

From Tim Flannery today:



Note the qualifiers there. "By 2030". "Could be". "As carbon prices rise". The first two are very dependent on the price for solar continuing to come down, something that's not clear. The third assumes carbon prices will rise, when the current plan to link our price to the EU is likely to push permits down.

The highlighted is a given. As it is for all new projects, costs for CSP and tidal power are decreasing rapidly as the technology improves and in some cases will soon be comparable to that of energy generation from fossil fuels.

Having said that the second paragraph is not entirely accurate. Ivanpah for instance will have only slightly greater construction and total capital costs in comparison to a coal fired plant of similar capacity and the cost of generating electricity will be comparable to natural gas.

 

[DivideandMultiply]

This is worrying - could potentially be a biggest problem than the warming caused by carbon.

http://www.newscientist.com/mobile/...lready-dissolving-in-southern-ocean-acid.html

In a small patch of the Southern Ocean, the shells of sea snails are dissolving. The finding is the first evidence that marine life is already suffering as a result of man-made ocean acidification.

"This is actually happening now," says Geraint Tarling of the British Antarctic Survey in Cambridge, UK. He and colleagues captured free-swimming sea snails called pteropods from the Southern Ocean in early 2008 and found under an electron microscope that the outer layers of their hard shells bore signs of unusual corrosion.

As well as warming the planet, the carbon dioxide we emit is changing the chemistry of the ocean. CO2 dissolves in water to form carbonic acid, making the water less alkaline. The pH is currently dropping at about 0.1 per century, faster than any time in the last 300 million years

Ocean acidification is a huge issue.

One of many things that frustrates me about the climate change debate is it effectively sidelines many other pressing environmental issues in the eyes of the public. They simply get lumped together as hippy nonsense or conservationist malarky.

For example the rate of species loss at the moment may exceed that experienced in the earths last major extinction event (end of the Cretaceous).

 

[Upton Sinclair]

Ocean acidification is a huge issue.

One of many things that frustrates me about the climate change debate is it effectively sidelines many other pressing environmental issues in the eyes of the public. They simply get lumped together as hippy nonsense or conservationist malarky.

For example the rate of species loss at the moment may exceed that experienced in the earths last major extinction event (end of the Cretaceous).

We're definitely entering a new geological epoch, the Anthropocene will be very distinct in the future geological record (defined by a very thin strata of plastic).

 

[SaintsSeptember]

The CO2 is not man made. It was in the altmosphere, when the earth was hotter and older.
Granted it can turn the earth back to that condition.
Why was the ocean not acidic then? or was it?

 

[Upton Sinclair]

The CO2 is not man made. It was in the altmosphere, when the earth was hotter and older.
Granted it can turn the earth back to that condition.
Why was the ocean not acidic then? or was it?

Carbon can only be "made" by stars dude...

That carbon would not be in the atmosphere now if we didn't dig it up and burn it and it WILL return it to those conditions

And, yes, the ocean has acidified before. Vast swathes of shallow ocean turned into toxic dead zones and the life that thrived and died in those toxic pools of algae eventually became the super-oil fields like Ghar in Saudi Arabia.

http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anoxic_event

 

[Upton Sinclair]

The CO2 is not man made. It was in the altmosphere, when the earth was hotter and older.
?

Read this

http://theconversation.edu.au/our-e...real-how-were-geo-engineering-the-planet-1544

 

[SaintsSeptember]

Read this

http://theconversation.edu.au/our-e...real-how-were-geo-engineering-the-planet-1544

There's bound to be effects. Hell its not like the human race has any goal other than to keep populating. Its weird really, as individuals we are pretty intelligent , but as a total society its hard to rate us above ants.

 

[Upton Sinclair]

There's bound to be effects. Hell its not like the human race has any goal other than to keep populating. Its weird really, as individuals we are pretty intelligent , but as a total society its hard to rate us above ants.

The extent of the effects though, as laid out in that article, just blows my mind. I mean, its impressive, a testament to the greatness of our species. Unrivalled. Unparalleled. Problem is though if we don't learn to manage our astounding powers then we'll end up turning them against ourselves.

 

[DivideandMultiply]

We're definitely entering a new geological epoch, the Anthropocene will be very distinct in the future geological record (defined by a very thin strata of plastic).

Hahahahahaha.

Oceanic warming and acidification are two very real concerns.

We could realistically be looking at the loss of nearly all of the worlds major reefs and further devastation to global populations of phytoplankton, which in itself may accelerate a vicious spiral. Over fishing has done a lot of harm, but these two are also big marine biodiversity and population killers and both could have drastic global consequences.

 

[DivideandMultiply]

There's bound to be effects. Hell its not like the human race has any goal other than to keep populating. Its weird really, as individuals we are pretty intelligent , but as a total society its hard to rate us above ants.

Hey man, ants are cooperative, highly organised and efficient.

Cooperation at a human level is less instinctual and requires an "intellectual" common ground, which means common goals and shared outcomes. To reach the greatest consensus then the lowest common denominator must rule, which is often an expression of the worst parts of our nature. It also means short term thinking, or a focus on the immediate reigns supreme.

 

[fishardansin]

Hahahahahaha.

Oceanic warming and acidification are two very real concerns.

We could realistically be looking at the loss of nearly all of the worlds major reefs and further devastation to global populations of phytoplankton, which in itself may accelerate a vicious spiral. Over fishing has done a lot of harm, but these two are also big marine biodiversity and population killers and both could have drastic global consequences.

Yes for a fun experiment we should put in a bigger effort to wipe out whales, sharks and tuna to take out the top of the food chain while we wipe out the bottom with acidification to see what happens. Either we'll be ok or humans will "make their mark". Either way you can't lose!!!

 

[Norwegian Blue]

Having said that the second paragraph is not entirely accurate. Ivanpah for instance will have only slightly greater construction and total capital costs in comparison to a coal fired plant of similar capacity and the cost of generating electricity will be comparable to natural gas.

That's just plain wrong. According to it's wikipedia page(*), it will cost $2.2 billion for 392MW installed capacity, coming at $5.6 million per MW. As a rough rule of thumb, peaking gas turbines cost around $1million per MW with coal roughly double that.

As I said earlier to Upton, I'd love to live in a world where solar is cost-comparative to fossil fuels. But pretending we're there already doesn't make it so.

(*) Usually disclaimers etc etc.

 

[SaintsSeptember]

That's just plain wrong. According to it's wikipedia page(*), it will cost $2.2 billion for 392MW installed capacity, coming at $5.6 million per MW. As a rough rule of thumb, peaking gas turbines cost around $1million per MW with coal roughly double that.

As I said earlier to Upton, I'd love to live in a world where solar is cost-comparative to fossil fuels. But pretending we're there already doesn't make it so.

(*) Usually disclaimers etc etc.

No one likes direct action, but if the goverment were to build some of these ( for a fraction of the cost of bringing fast internet to a few people in remote locations ), they could re-sell that to operators at a much reduced price.
As I mentioned earlier it would be easy enough to mandate that power distributors take the lowest greenhouse emmitting power first or at least a formula combining price and greenhouse emissions.

 

[Upton Sinclair]

Putting Victoria's lightning storm in context

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2012/07/120710133009.htm

Researchers are working to identify exactly how a changing climate will impact specific elements of weather, such as clouds, rainfall, and lightning. A Tel Aviv University researcher has predicted that for every one degree Celsius of warming, there will be approximately a 10 percent increase in lightning activity.
This could have negative consequences in the form of flash floods, wild fires, or damage to power lines and other infrastructure, says Prof. Colin Price, Head of the Department of Geophysics, Atmospheric and Planetary Sciences at Tel Aviv University. In an ongoing project to determine the impact of climate change on the world's lightning and thunderstorm patterns, he and his colleagues have run computer climate models and studied real-life examples of climate change, such as the El Nino cycle in Indonesia and Southeast Asia, to determine how changing weather conditions impact storms.
An increase in lightning activity will have particular impact in areas that become warmer and drier as global warming progresses, including the Mediterranean and the Southern United States, according to the 2007 United Nations report on climate change. This research has been reported in the Journal of Geophysical Research and Atmospheric Research, and has been presented at the International Conference on Lightning Protection.

 

[DivideandMultiply]

That's just plain wrong. According to it's wikipedia page(*), it will cost $2.2 billion for 392MW installed capacity, coming at $5.6 million per MW. As a rough rule of thumb, peaking gas turbines cost around $1million per MW with coal roughly double that.

As I said earlier to Upton, I'd love to live in a world where solar is cost-comparative to fossil fuels. But pretending we're there already doesn't make it so.

(*) Usually disclaimers etc etc.

Is it? Why did you quote the value for gas turbines?

Coal is usually 3-4 times that (sometimes higher), not two, with nuclear 5-9 times the value quoted. Total capital costs can be highly variable and depend especially on location and the price of labour in a region.

Adjusting for inflation Loy Yangs A/B would have a capital cost of roughly $3,900 per kW in 2012 (similar to a rough current average of 3.5K per kW). What you will find is that most of the new CSP projects sit about 1.2-1.5 times the capital cost of coal stations per kW and the prices are falling, but about 3/4 the cost of nuclear. Rio Mesa for instance is planned to come in at a capital cost of $4,000 per kW of capacity (1.14xthe projected average for coal).

So no, it isn't plain wrong.

 

[Upton Sinclair]

And say hello El Niño! Todman should pay attention, while the desal plant might not be the best policy response, the idea we can just ignore water security on the basis that it rained for a couple of years and Flannery supposedly said it'd never rain again is just stupidity.

And these events are becoming hotter and more frequent.

A SEVERE heatwave is forecast for large parts of inland Australia with temperatures in the mid-40s expected across three states, the Bureau of Meteorology (BoM) warns.

The heatwave will hit from Tuesday and continue through the weekend.

BoM Assistant Director Weather Services, Alasdair Hainsworth, said a large, hot air mass from northern Australia was being drawn southeastwards by a slow-moving, low pressure trough.

The excessive heat was moving slowly east, driving up temperatures in central, southern and eastern Australia, he said.

Temperatures are expected to peak in the mid 40s over inland South Australia, western NSW and northern Victoria on Thursday.

Temperatures will remain in the high 30s and low 40s through the weekend for large parts of NSW and the Queensland border region.

"We haven't seen an early season, prolonged heatwave like this since November 2009, which was a record hot month for Australia," Mr Hainsworth said.

 

[Todman]

And say hello El Niño! Todman should pay attention, while the desal plant might not be the best policy response, the idea we can just ignore water security on the basis that it rained for a couple of years and Flannery supposedly said it'd never rain again is just stupidity.

And these events are becoming hotter and more frequent.

From the ABC a month ago.


http://www.abc.net.au/news/2012-10-24/forecasters-surprised-by-el-nino-turnaround/4332260

The weather bureau is predicting a big change in Australia's forecast this summer, with an El Nino no longer expected.
Average rainfall is predicted in the coming months in the absence of El Nino - Australia's major weather pattern in the 21st century which brings drought-like conditions.
The chief climate forecaster says it is the biggest turnaround in weather patterns since records began.
"Come September, all of a sudden, the temperature started to cool down, the trade winds started to become a little bit enhanced, and the cloud patterns and other indicators like that headed away from El Nino," the bureau's manager of climate prediction services, Dr Andrew Watkins, said.
"So this is what we're looking at as climatologists, giving us the heads up about what may happen over the next few months, and indeed what we're seeing now is a backing off from those El Nino thresholds."
Dr Watkins says they are not sure why there has been a cooling down.
"It actually is quite a unique situation if we end up not going into an El Nino event," he said.

 

[Upton Sinclair]

From the ABC a month ago.


http://www.abc.net.au/news/2012-10-24/forecasters-surprised-by-el-nino-turnaround/4332260
[/B].

Good find! I hadn't heard about the ENSO turning neutral, that is definitely an interesting development. But, you have to ask yourself, if we're getting heatwave conditions comparable to the last El Niño when we're in a negative phase then what will it be like when the system switches to an El Niño, what kind of heat waves will we get then. And if this isn't ENSO then its being influenced by warmer global temperatures. Either way, doesn't bode well for your 'head in the sand' approach to public policy response.

Meanwhile:

THE world is on the cusp of a "tipping point" into dangerous climate change, according to new data gathered by scientists measuring methane leaking from the Arctic permafrost and a report presented to the United Nations on Tuesday.
"The permafrost carbon feedback is irreversible on human time scales," says the report, Policy Implications of Warming Permafrost. "Overall, these observations indicate that large-scale thawing of permafrost may already have started."
While countries the size of Australia tally up their greenhouse emissions in hundreds of millions of tonnes, the Arctic's stores are measured in tens of billions.
Advertisement

Human-induced emissions now appear to have warmed the Arctic enough to unlock this vast carbon bank, with stark implications for international efforts to hold global warming to a safe level. Ancient forests locked under ice tens of thousands of years ago are beginning to melt and rot, releasing vast amounts of greenhouse gases into the air.
The report estimates the greenhouse gases leaking from the thawing Arctic will eventually add more to emissions than last year's combined carbon output of the US and Europe – a statistic which means present global plans to hold climate change to an average 2degree temperature rise this century are now likely to be much more difficult.
Until very recently permafrost was thought to have been melting too slowly to make a meaningful difference to temperatures this century, so it was left out of the Kyoto Protocol, and ignored by many climate change models.

I strongly urge ppl to read the whole article and to share it as widely as possible:

http://m.smh.com.au/environment/climate-change/where-even-the-earth-is-melting-20121127-2a5tp.html

 

[Norwegian Blue]

Is it? Why did you quote the value for gas turbines?

Because GTs are the lowest cost peakers going around and make up the bulk of installed capacity in Australia in the last 5 years.

Coal is usually 3-4 times that (sometimes higher), not two, with nuclear 5-9 times the value quoted. Total capital costs can be highly variable and depend especially on location and the price of labour in a region.

Adjusting for inflation Loy Yangs A/B would have a capital cost of roughly $3,900 per kW in 2012 (similar to a rough current average of 3.5K per kW). What you will find is that most of the new CSP projects sit about 1.2-1.5 times the capital cost of coal stations per kW and the prices are falling, but about 3/4 the cost of nuclear. Rio Mesa for instance is planned to come in at a capital cost of $4,000 per kW of capacity (1.14xthe projected average for coal).

I got my estimates of capital costs of coal from ACIL's study for AEMO. They quote figures just over $2,000 per kW for coal. Is your figure of $3,900 per kW arrived at by taking the costs of the original build and adjusting for inflation? If so, that's the wrong way to go about it. Way back when governments built power stations, they did so in a hopelessly inefficient manner, which is part of the reason they got out of doing it.

The most recent coal fired generation built in Australia was Kogan Creek (black coal, 2007) in Queensland, which cost $1.2 billion for it's 750MW, $1600 per kW.

So no, it isn't plain wrong.

Happy to go with exaggerated.

Throw in the fact that, unlike solar, coal is baseload with a much higher capacity factor, and solar just can't compete on either a reliability or cost basis. That's why government policy has had to prop up the industry over the years.

 

[Norwegian Blue]

As I mentioned earlier it would be easy enough to mandate that power distributors take the lowest greenhouse emmitting power first or at least a formula combining price and greenhouse emissions.

All that says is that you have no idea how generation is currently dispatched. Solar is already dispatched outside the bidstack, as is wind (subject to network constraints). All your suggestion would do is force hydro to generate when it didn't want to.

In any case, we've already got a formula which combines price with emissions. It's a $23 / tonne carbon price which is supposed to make lower greenhouse emissions technology cost-competitive with fossil fuels. It doesn't, but that's another story.

 

[Todman]

I strongly urge ppl to read the whole article and to share it as widely as possible:

http://m.smh.com.au/environment/climate-change/where-even-the-earth-is-melting-20121127-2a5tp.html

Upton, the world end according mayan calendar next month, spend your last weeks with a smile, some cheer and a joke.

Stop worrying, just appreciate what time we have left.