Coal Hard Truth #skpoli

“We depend too much on coal” — @MayorMandel #p2syyc; glad someone said that too—
Chris Turner (@theturner) May 29, 2013

.@MMandryk IEA says we have ~3 years left (worldwide) to stop building coal power to avoid 450ppm. SaskParty renewables investment is poor.—
Saskboy K. (@saskboy) May 29, 2013

The Leader-Post may be giving kudos to the Sask Party’s singular focus on Carbon Capture and Sequestration (CCS), but I won’t be. The primary reason CCS (clean coal) is getting so much Conservative and Sask Party government funding, is because it’s a hidden subsidy to the oil industry so that they can recover more oil from otherwise exhausted oil fields.

“We have a great story to tell,” Wall said.

We need more than a fairy tale, or a Sask Party narrative to save us from climate change. We need significant improvements in energy efficiency in our homes and transportation utilization, as well as plenty of increased investment in renewable energy.

On the question of overall provincial support for the environment, the NDP Opposition correctly notes the Sask. Party government cut funding for climate change activities by 73 per cent in the past two years. This is not exactly a great record for Wall when he goes to Pittsburgh or Washington to tout Saskatchewan’s clean energy.

Friends recently told me that PARC at the UofR had been cut significantly, since I last noted on my blog that PARC was a significant admission by the Sask Party that climate change is coming, and will be a huge economic and quality of life game changer. The lack of meaningful investment in renewable energy leaves Saskatchewan behind in the global economic situation emerging.

One year ago, the opposite from the oil industry:

“Our decision was essentially based on the fact that we could not see a way to make the economics of our CCS project work as we originally intended,” said Don Wharton, vice-president of policy and sustainability at TransAlta.

He said markets for pure carbon didn’t develop as expected, and federal and provincial governments took no steps to recognize the value of reduced emissions by implementing a price on carbon, for example, or a cap-and-trade system.

In short, despite nearly $800 million in government subsidies, the company had no incentive to invest in CCS.

The “Clean Coal” lie rolls on. Now it has a new timeline for implementation. Let’s collectively watch it be missed (again).

The government boasted at last week’s Boundary Dam symposium that the project will be up and running this fall and completed by next April, on time and on budget. It will reduce CO2 emissions at the plant by 90 per cent (one million tonnes a year) by shipping emissions 60 kilometres to Weyburn’s enhanced oil recovery project.

From 2009:

“The committee will complete work on the development phase by August 31, 2009, including a full project plan, engineering design, business plan, detailed budget and construction timeline.

With the financial support of the Governments of Canada and the United States, construction of the plant could begin as early as September 2009 and the plant could be operational as early as the summer of 2011. The goal for the reference plant is to test a range of technologies in the capture of up to one million tonnes of CO2 over a four-year period.”

Killer Robots From Earth

I grew up thinking that Killer Robots From Venus was a pretty amusing song. Now that we’re living in 2013, the ‘future’, we have to seriously contemplate the implications of building robots that can kill as their intended purpose. Our next-future expectations depend upon what we choose now. I’m not okay with building Terminators, just because we have the technical capability. We should be seriously concerned, even if we don’t think a Skynet scenario will play out as it did in the movies.

The consequences are dire and deadly even if the machines don’t ‘decide’ to turn against their human programmers.

“Giving machines the power to decide who lives and dies on the battlefield would take technology too far,” said Steve Goose, arms division director at Human Rights Watch. “Human control of robotic warfare is essential to minimising civilian deaths and injuries.”

US political activist Jody Williams, who won a Nobel peace prize for her work at the International Campaign to Ban Landmines, is expected to join Sharkey at the launch at the House of Commons. Williams said she was confident that a pre-emptive ban on autonomous weapons could be achieved in the same way as the international embargo on anti-personnel landmines. “I know we can do the same thing with killer robots. I know we can stop them before they hit the battlefield,” said Williams, who chairs the Nobel Women’s Initiative.

“Killer robots loom over our future if we do not take action to ban them now,” she said. “The six Nobel peace laureates involved in the Nobel Women’s Initiative fully support the call for an international treaty to ban fully autonomous weaponised robots.”

“They may be metallic, but they’re just like me and you.” – Arrogant Worms.
No, they are not just like me and you; they’re killing-machines. Don’t let computer scientists program killer robots.

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We can’t even seem to convince some people that it’s a good idea to harness wind energy, yet those same people might defend the creation of deadly robots that could quite literally be turned against them and their family giving a worst case scenario.

Oiled Up

There’s a suspicious situation uncovered at the UofR, by CBC. IPAC, the CO(2) CCS project was audited, and there were apparent conflicts of interest in how some of the money was spent. The report stopped short of saying there was crime, but implied there was the possibility of it.

Only last week I saw a CCTV ad for IPAC-CO2 appear out of nowhere, and I was unfamiliar with the logo they used until I spelled it out and realized it must be for the CCS project. This is the “heart of the Saskatchewan Party’s plan to tackle climate change”, according to Geoff Leo of CBC.

CVI is an IT provider, but they were getting over half of the budget. “There was no set of deliverables.”

One apparent conflict of interest, was Malcolm Wilson for a time being on the board of CVI. He reportedly returned shares so as to not profit from the work.

The Sask Party Minister for CIC, Donna Harpauer said “it’s a conflict of interest”. Wilson, through his lawyer told CBC that when the facts are all in, there was no conflict of interest. A Mr. Fitzpatrick, in the audio interview, said there was “no impropriety”.

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Side note: I’ve appeared in a Global TV report years ago with both Wilson, and Brad Wall.

Shell, along with the provincial and federal governments gave the UofR millions of dollars years ago to pursue Carbon Capture & Storage at their test facility at Estevan. I’ve toured it; they were using North Dakota’s CO2 gas, instead of gas from the coal plant the test site is built beside. To that point, in ~2008, no gas from power SK production had been stored. I assume that remains the case.

Why would Shell, which has little to do with coal power, invest millions into this R&D? CCS has the ‘side effect’ of forcing exhausted oil fields into extended opportunities of production. In short, put the gas down, and oil comes out. We then burn that oil without using CCS, further limiting the net benefits of CCS.

There are presently 0 “clean coal” plants in production in the world.

The U of R, despite saying they are a “clean energy” research facility, presently has 0 solar panels in production, and 1 VAT windmill in research & production.

More Power Blows

There are recent solar electricity records set in Germany, and Spain has recently seen a huge increase in wind power production. Meanwhile, SaskPower has solar power research from 13 years ago on its website, claims solar isn’t viable in the northern hemisphere, and is eyeing up more coal fired generation. The U of R has 0 solar panels in productive research (or otherwise), while my parents have 15 solar panels in productive research for the Sask. Research Council. Canada, and Saskatchewan are lagging behind, we’re becoming the technological 3rd World of G8 nations.

Here’s what a Brit thinks about their country, which apparently is ahead of Canada:

The Spanish average output is 60% higher than our highest ever peak output. That’s embarrassing.

“German wind energy industry association BWE said it expects developers to add between 3GW and 3.5GW of capacity this year”

Again, comparing to your figures of UK installed capacity of 7.77GW – Germany might install 45% of our entire wind capacity in 2013 alone.

It’s about time we became serious as a country and stopped dithering.

The UK is dithering? Oh, my. What are Saskatchewan “leaders” thinking? Are they even living on this planet? When those of us who are, attempt to talk to them about it, they’re more likely to arrest people than listen, apparently.

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Here’s what the UK grid looks like right now.

SaskPower: At Least 13 Years Out of Touch

I’m sorry Canada, and the world. I’ve tried to convince my province’s public utility that there are huge benefits from dialing down the reliance on coal burned electricity, but they won’t listen. They haven’t even removed or updated a shockingly out-dated “Solar” page on their website that lists information that became obsolete a decade ago. There are such great advances in research, and cost expectations of renewable power, I can’t easily accept that the business people at the utility company are so daft. (They don’t even recognize that Spain’s in the northern hemisphere, so I shouldn’t be so surprised.)

I hope others join me in asking for the tangible results the “clean energy research chair” has brought the UofR thus far, as the province’s leading clean energy research facility. Ask the UofR how many windmills, and how many solar panels it has in research or in production. The answer presently is 1 windmill and 0 solar panels. There are farmers in Saskatchewan with more of each. Is the SaskParty government funding our universities so they can get into this very important area of research? Not really.

I’m hoping another recent letter to my MLA will help prod them along, but unless more people start to put some pressure on the utility company to modernize, I don’t think we’re going to be able to collectively do our part to limit Saskatchewan’s gross impact on air pollution and climate change. I’m really very sorry for not being more effective at such a crucial point in human history.

Condemn An Industry

I often condemn the tar sands oil industry as a communist owned, unethical, dirty mess that’s destroyed Canada’s reputation just for a quick (geological-time) buck.

There are engineers writing for Fox News that are condemning the green economy, and green jobs, because they are uncreative hacks responsible for depressing our economy further instead of building the solutions they claim can’t exist.

So let’s make a deal? If renewable power gets the same level of government subsidy that oil, gas, and coal get (& have had for over half a century), and comparable restrictions in production sites and waste disposal, and renewables still can’t compete on a dollar per watt basis, then I’ll shut up.

As Close As We’ll Get

SaskAdapt.ca feels like waving the white flag, but it is an important website, and a project at the UofR. It’s also the closest we’ll get to an admission from the Sask Party government that climate change is real, and is a grave threat to our people (and every living thing today).

Speaking of this, has anyone heard a peep from the Office of Climate Change, touted by the Ministry of Environment about two years ago? I haven’t, but I did give a call to the Climate Change branch of Environment, and they said they are it, the office set up in the wake of the legislation for the Office of Climate Change.

Solar Tour

On the weekend I had a fantastic tour of the Regina area, along with my parents, seeing the sights highlighted by conversions to solar energy. Solar PV, and active and passive solar heating were demonstrated in locations adjacent to the General Hospital, Shannon Road in south Regina (part of where I’m running to be a city Councillor), and as far away as Craven and Katepwa were explored too.

-Solar oven and solar cooker
A garter snake enjoying a pond aerated by a direct solar pump.

-A sponsor who has installed some of the systems seen on the tour.

Wind systems were on display sometimes too. This one was at Jim Harding’s place.

I missed them all posing, but this is an interesting shot, with so many angles in it.

James is facing the camera, Greg is profile, and I’m not sure who is facing away.

-A ‘simple’ battery charge controller, used with one panel on Shannon Rd.

Take a look at inverter statistics from a Net Metered, ground mounted, 15 PV panel array installed in southern Saskatchewan for over a year. It’s using Enlighten micro-inverters.

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Tonight, on the Rick Mercer Report, he installs solar panels with Mike Holmes.

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Here’s a featured Enphase array.

Good Thing It’s ^Not Pollution, Eh?

- Research and Innovation Centre at UofRegina; site of “clean energy” investment by Shell and other fine fossil fuel financiers.

One of the more ridiculous logical fallacies that climate change denialists use is that carbon dioxide can’t be pollution because it can also be breathed by plant life. It’s really sweet they care so much about plants’ respiration, but I’m a little more concerned with the survivability of humanity instead of worrying that plants won’t have more than sufficient CO(2). (Never mind that most of these same people would probably soak dandelions with chemicals that would make your newborn’s toes curl.)

Why do I bring this up? Carbon Capture and Sequestration (CCS) is hitting some tough times. Sadly, this is the “clean energy” technology that the one basket UofR has most of its “clean energy” research eggs in.

Here’s why the oil industry isn’t bothering with CCS:

“Our decision was essentially based on the fact that we could not see a way to make the economics of our CCS project work as we originally intended,” said Don Wharton, vice-president of policy and sustainability at TransAlta.

He said markets for pure carbon didn’t develop as expected, and federal and provincial governments took no steps to recognize the value of reduced emissions by implementing a price on carbon, for example, or a cap-and-trade system.

In short, despite nearly $800 million in government subsidies, the company had no incentive to invest in CCS.

Let’s keep in mind that the Harper Cons haven’t merely poured hundreds of millions of dollars into CCS: they’ve in fact done so to the exclusion of any other climate-change funding (since their initial period of poorly-feigned interest in the environment when Stephane Dion was Lib leader).

6 years later, and there’s no Made in Canada solution to climate change, as I predicted very easily. There are plenty of Made in America excuses, however. And as our society focuses on technologies that are designed to benefit the oil and coal industries, we shortchange innovation in renewable energy technology. The UofR has more than 12,000 students, yet it has one VAT windmill in testing mode on its ~18 buildings, and zero production solar panels that I’m aware of. Yet it’s a world leader in CCS research. Could it be the Conservatives and Sask Party are content pretending that they are investing millions into Big Oil and Coal’s “clean energy”, while their investment will be totally useless to private [and crown] industry producing electricity?

Opportunity Cost; Opportunity, Lost. At least too much CO(2) means some healthy plants… somewhere. I guess human vegetables like to look out for their own kind.

Green Party of Sask AGM ; Hot Wind

I helped out at the Green Party of Saskatchewan’s AGM this year. It’s the first Green anything AGM I’ve been to. I’ve previously been to a Sask Liberal leadership convention as a member a decade ago, and the NDP convention last year as (a blogger) media. The results of the executive elections are available, and there’s a TV clip from local CTV News.

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@saskboy @rlegaarden I have it on good authority that wind turbines are the leading cause of herpes.—
Bill Oates (@wjoates) April 30, 2012

The anti-wind power crowd will be all over this story, purposefully (or accidentally) misrepresenting it as saying that wind turbines “cause” global warming. In fact, if you read it to the end, you’ll see the warming on the ground is localized. Needs more study, but it’s pretty unlikely that it contributes in the same significant way as coal fired electricity that wind is replacing.

@saskboy @rlegaarden The onion had all of this stuff figured out a while ago irregularclimate.planet3.org/archives/wind-…—
Dan Moutal (@scruffydan) April 30, 2012