Nice TIME, Part II: I'd like to teach the world to sip, in perfect harmony; I'd like to make the world a Coke...
From a new piece I co-authored on TIME.com:
In electricity generation, energy efficiency is a must. It's just stupid not to. Since when in a capitalist economy is efficiency a bad thing, or one that entrepreneurs don't leap at? (Perhaps since inertia set in for both entrenched corporations and lazy consumers.) Beyond efficiency the major tool in the electricity sector that might help sustain our way of life is called carbon capture and storage. That's a slight (two-syllable) improvement over carbon capture and sequestration, its name until recently. Essentially, CCS catches CO2 from the waste stream of fossil-fuel, particularly coal, power plants and injects it underground for, hopefully, millions and millions of years. Essentially, we'd be re-carbonating the planet. Imagine if the entire Earth were still water, or soda syrup — we'd just be adding the carbonation.
That's the tack Bill Chameides — dean of Duke University's Nicholas School of the Environment and Earth Sciences — and I take in a new Viewpoint article on TIME.com, which you can read here.
According to modeling conducted by the Nicholas Institute for Environmental Policy Solutions (and in disclosure, my employer), without carbon capture and storage, there simply is no way to come close to achieving carbon-emission reduction goals set forth in pending legislation, S. 2191, America's Climate Security Act of 2007, or the Lieberman-Warner bill. Here is a chart taken from a policy brief (link is .pdf!) from last October:
The teal section of the chart is the contribution of fossil fuel electricity generation with carbon capture and storage — more than half of generation. Without it — at least in this model of this bill — it's either 3 billion k/Wh of dirty power or half the country goes dark.
"There's no word for the sound you hear upon opening a can of soda. But the tchk-ptoop-fshchss! of a top being popped is distinctive, immediately recognizable. It is the sound of carbonation — or CO2 — rushing from the can. And it's a sound that brings to mind a technology, much overlooked in the popular press, that could safely recapture and store much of that emitted carbon, and has the potential to prevent an impending climate catastrophe...."The fastest way to cut industrial carbon emissions immediately would be to stop burning coal and driving cars. However, this would have the unfortunate repercussions of eliminating electricity and individual motorized transportation. Without special pixie dust that magically transforms our energy system into one that is rational and fits within the biosphere, without burning carbon minerals into atmospheric gas, this process will be slow and expensive — with enormous opportunities for economic growth along the way. The energy business is the largest in the world. Remaking the largest industry in the world is an unprecedented entrepreneurial gold mine.
In electricity generation, energy efficiency is a must. It's just stupid not to. Since when in a capitalist economy is efficiency a bad thing, or one that entrepreneurs don't leap at? (Perhaps since inertia set in for both entrenched corporations and lazy consumers.) Beyond efficiency the major tool in the electricity sector that might help sustain our way of life is called carbon capture and storage. That's a slight (two-syllable) improvement over carbon capture and sequestration, its name until recently. Essentially, CCS catches CO2 from the waste stream of fossil-fuel, particularly coal, power plants and injects it underground for, hopefully, millions and millions of years. Essentially, we'd be re-carbonating the planet. Imagine if the entire Earth were still water, or soda syrup — we'd just be adding the carbonation.
That's the tack Bill Chameides — dean of Duke University's Nicholas School of the Environment and Earth Sciences — and I take in a new Viewpoint article on TIME.com, which you can read here.
According to modeling conducted by the Nicholas Institute for Environmental Policy Solutions (and in disclosure, my employer), without carbon capture and storage, there simply is no way to come close to achieving carbon-emission reduction goals set forth in pending legislation, S. 2191, America's Climate Security Act of 2007, or the Lieberman-Warner bill. Here is a chart taken from a policy brief (link is .pdf!) from last October:
The teal section of the chart is the contribution of fossil fuel electricity generation with carbon capture and storage — more than half of generation. Without it — at least in this model of this bill — it's either 3 billion k/Wh of dirty power or half the country goes dark.
Posted by Eric Roston at 4/18/2008 5:07 PM 
Categories: Technology,Coal,Climate,Global Warming,carbon,Policy
Categories: Technology,Coal,Climate,Global Warming,carbon,Policy
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