New Vote Vets Ads - Energy Independence

[evnow]

But for OUR energy, I'd like to see whatever combo of wind, solar, hydro, nuclear, etc. that we need to get the job done with MINIMUM reliance on foreign oil. The greener the better, but importing oil as our country's lifeblood is not a good idea.

Apparently you didn't read the rest of my post. If you import anythng at all - you are relying on "foreign" oil. If you don't import anything - nobody will import from us. The international trade collapses.

 

[AndyH]

Delivers only 10% of the wind power?
Does that mean that 90% of the installed wind machines are sitting idle?
If so, ... what a waste!
Who made such an apparently unproductive investment?

Require Texas to make a "real" AC grid-synchronized, committed connection in several spots to the electrical grids of each surrounding state.
Currently, I heard that there is only one connection across the Texas state line, and that is high-voltage DC, so it can easily be dropped, and thus is not really "committed" to maintaining the US power grid.

With the added connections, delivering wind power from west Texas to US users would likely be much easier. But, perhaps the wind power is only there for Texas, to use when the oil supply dwindles?

There are a number of investors in the various wind farms. Pickens ordered >680 turbines from GE for what was to be the largest farm in the Texas panhandle. The promised transmission lines aren't yet ready, so he put more than half on hold and bought 300 to plant in the N Central US where transmission capability exists. 680ish windmills...$2 billion...1000MW equivalent to two coal plants or a nuke...bought by one investor. What can we do with others involved?! Or if we kept the $27 billion we sent overseas to buy oil in March?!

Texas has a grid. Yes - it's not got a lot of connections to the rest of country but by design. And no - more connections to the east or west grid wouldn't free up the W Texas wind as the grids can't handle the extra energy without becoming a 'plasma related incident'. When the grid can handle it, the windmills are throttled up. The rest of the time they're not.

Think about this, though - is a huge centralized grid really what we want or need? What might the grid need if we had more regional/local generation? How can we reshape the grid and our power system so that instead of building another coal plant, a power company spends a couple billion on decentralized rooftop solar? Dear Heaven - we could power the entire country with an assortment of battery storage units and PV on the roof of every WalMart! (Battery? BOB! Check out the battery Presidio TX uses to stabilize its power. It was either $25M for a battery that can run the town or more than $50M to run 60 miles of new wires.)

We have enough wind to run the country. We have enough solar capability - in PV and solar thermal. Every landfill in the country creates methane - San Antonio has tapped one of their largest landfills and it's supposed to be creating over 1million CF/day. That methane can be used to run gas power plants and long-haul trucks.

That paragraph above is enough to create hundreds of thousands of jobs, revitalize cities and towns (as it's already done for Sweetwater TX), add a huge tax stream to cities and states, give us cleaner air, feed an EV fleet, and eliminate most if not all imported oil. And let this country stop sending $27 billion each month out of the country to buy oil.

What else can we do with that money? After our grid is upgraded, clean power is on-line, and our move to EV is ramping up, maybe we could pay down the debt, rework our foreign policy to help rather than just secure oil fields, and completely fund universal health care?

Fertilizer and pesticides are petrochemicals and are required to sustain our industrial farming. Here's the rub. The Russian Dacha farms - about 2.2 acres each - are more productive per acre without machinery, fertilizer, pesticides or a lot of labor - and the food is higher quality. Who really benefits when most of our ground is covered in industrially-farmed corn which is turned into corn syrup so that 40% can become Coke and Pepsi?

How do we want our future to look? And do we have the guts to make it happen? Or are we just going to sit around and complain?

 

[garygid]

Roofs of all Wal-mart stores could power the US ... I suspect not.

Estimating ... 4335 Walmart locations, perhaps 500 x 600 feet of roof -> approx 4x50x6 M = 1.2 billion sq feet of roof.

At my house, the PV generates about 7kw peak from 15x33 = 500 sq ft -> about 1000 kWh per month (33 kWh per day) -> about 1 kWh per hour, or 1 kW average. So, estimate 2 kW average from 1000 sq ft.

2 kW x 1 million, is only 2000 megawatts, a lot short of our current electrical-only US power usage of about 500,000 MW average. But, perhaps with 250 times the area of all the Wal-mart stores, one would have a start.

US electrical-only power consumption is about 4,000,000,000 MWh/year = 365 x 24 -> 36000/4 -> 8000 hrs per year, so 500,000 Mw average.

Note this does not count the power needed to replace the wood, coal, natural gas, or oil burned in transportation, heating, industrial processes, etc. I suspect that this power is several times greater than our electrical usage.

But, perhaps I made a mistake in my estimations?

 

[sparky]

Apparently you didn't read the rest of my post. If you import anythng at all - you are relying on "foreign" oil. If you don't import anything - nobody will import from us. The international trade collapses.

I have to admit I'm a tad bit confused by this argument. I thought the issue was energy independence rather than sustainability. I may rely on Brazil for my mangos but being cut off from their mango supply would hardly alter my way of life. However, due to the way they are produced and shipped, relative to the caloric value, they're not a sustainable food.

Having a national policy for energy independence is not unlike our policy that props up our food supply. We make sure to grow and store enough food to feed our population even if it's possible to buy food from elsewhere. It's as much a part of our security posture as strategic nukes. Yes, that food is grown in an ultimately unsustainable fashion, and I know our policies about food have other corruptions but likewise, the principle of energy independence is different than energy sustainability.
It's an important difference because people who vote for energy independence can vote for coal, drilling in pristine wilderness and breeder reactors. People who want both energy independence and sustainability have the more complicated set of equations to which you referred. Hopefully, that phrase attributed to WInston Churchill still applies to us, "Americans will eventually do the right thing, but not before exhausting the alternatives".

 

[garygid]

If it is NOT sustainable, then it is only a temporary "independence", a false, and perhaps misleading and even destructive goal, like burning (almost) all the wood in the country for heat (see Haiti).

 

[evnow]

I have to admit I'm a tad bit confused by this argument. I thought the issue was energy independence rather than sustainability.

I think a lot of people don't realize that the modern industrial world is powered by fossil fuels - oil in particular. Every bit of industrial product we make is dependent on oil and on international trade.

You can't change one part of the large system, without affecting other parts. You can't look at energy independence in US in silo - the whole world (atleast all the major trading countries) has energy security or none of us have.

 

[evnow]

We have enough wind to run the country. We have enough solar capability - in PV and solar thermal. Every landfill in the country creates methane - San Antonio has tapped one of their largest landfills and it's supposed to be creating over 1million CF/day. That methane can be used to run gas power plants and long-haul trucks.

Oil has fantastic properties - very high energy density, a 100 times higher than any battery we have. It is both an energy source and a energy storage unit. Solar & wind are diffuse sources of energy. They are also intermittent. You run the numbers - and you will see we are in an impossible situation, in terms of economics, scalability and time required. I'm not even talking about the technical challenges, yet.

Ofcource, if we took this project as an equivalent of WW II, yes, we can probably do quite a few things. But even that required major sacrifices & life style changes. Does our politics allow for this ?

Which is what I've been saying - it is not possible to achieve any of the "green" goals without lifestyle changes & sacrifices. And that no politician will talk about - and thus American Democracy is not built to handle major changes quickly. It is made for propagating "business as usual" and resisting any and all changes.

 

[evnow]

Roofs of all Wal-mart stores could power the US ... I suspect not.

Estimating ... 4335 Walmart locations, perhaps 500 x 600 feet of roof -> approx 4x50x6 M = 1.2 billion sq feet of roof.

According to this DOE pdf

http://www1.eere.energy.gov/solar/pdfs/35097.pdf

We would need only 10 million acres of land—or only 0.4% of the area of the United States—to supply all of our nation’s electricity using PV.

4335 walmarts have 1.2 B sq ft = 27,000 acres.

So, PV on all walmarts can supply a grand total of 0.27% of our energy needs.

BTW, this also gives us an estimate on how much it will cost @ $1/w or $10/sq ft. This is not taking into account installation costs or new transmission lines needed.

$43 Trillion. Current total US debt is $ 12 trillion, for comparison.

ps : To get a better understanding of the scale and magnitude of the problem, consider this. Total worth of every company in the world is needed to do this "project" ...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Market_capitalization

The total market capitalization of all publicly traded companies in the world was US$51.2 trillion in January 2007[1] and rose as high as US$57.5 trillion in May 2008[2] before dropping below US$50 trillion in August 2008 and slightly above US$40 trillion in September 2008

 

[AndyH]

Thanks Gary and evnow for the fact check on WalMart. I apparently either misremembered what was supposed to be a more limited power input or...something. I haven't yet found the doc I thought I remembered.

evnow - I 'get' that you're looking at a completely sustainable balanced end result - and that's my view of the goal as well. But as you beautifully pointed out - this Titanic has an oil noose around it's funnels and it'll take a lot to overcome the momentum and turn the ship while also chipping away at the ropes. I guess the old saying about having it fast, cheap, or good - chose any two - applies. But at some point, someone has to decide to turn hard to port and send someone out with a machete or two.

From what I know about the Vote Vets view - their energy goal is to stop buying oil from folks that are shooting at us. It's not about cutting imports from Canada and is certainly not about stopping Bananas Japanese car imports.

You might enjoy Robert Baer's book "Sleeping with the Devil - How Washington Sold our Soul for Saudi Crude". Mr. Baer is a retired CIA analyst that spent most of his career in the Middle East. His view of the world isn't commonly seen in the press or in political speeches.

I suspect you're right when you say that most folks don't know that nearly everything in their house or life is either made of oil or got there with oil - including the majority of our food. I also suspect they don't realize that the Saudi oil exporting infrastructure can be severely impaired for 1-2 years with nothing more than a couple of the inflatable boats and plastic explosives used to put a hole in the side of the USS Cole.

Baer's 'Devil' was published in 2003. Here's a quote from the prologue:

"So what exactly would happen to the price of oil [after an attack on the Saudi pipeline or oil processing system]?I've surveyed contact in the oil industry, but no one could come up with even an approximate figure. Apparently, good econometric forecasts on this kind of scenario don't exist. They tell me, thought, that initially we could count on seeing oil hit $80 or $90 a barrel, based on supply and demand. But this does not factor in the panic that would ensue - wild speculative buying. And then there is the wild card of run-of-the-mill disruptions ocurring at the same time, like in Nigeria or Venezuela. Now we have oil selling at way over $100 a barrel. But what if chaos in Saudi Arabia slopped over th e border into the other Arab sheikhdoms that collectively own 60 percent of the world's oil reserves? My contacts wouldn't even touch that one, but my guess is that we'd see oil at $150 a barrel or a lot higher. It wouldn't take long for everything to follow suit: economic collapse, world political instability, and a level of personal despair not seen since the Great Depression."

Sound familiar?

The DOE says we can supply 20% of our energy needs with wind by 2030. Pickens has proven we can do it faster. MacKay shows that we can supply the population of the US with their average 250kWh/day with concentrating solar in a 375x375mile square. MacKay also points out that the typical energy use in Europe is 80kWh/day. I can confirm, having lived in England and Germany for a total of seven years, that quality of life isn't compromised at 80kWh per day.

I know that individuals around the world are already self sufficient. I know also that there are 'intentional communities' springing up all over the planet. Neither group has had to sacrifice or reduce their standard of living or give up cars or hot tubs or internet access - they report their standard of living has improved along with their health and overall sense of happiness.

Andy

 

[garygid]

My home uses 15 to 20 kWh per day typically, and up to 40 or 50 kWh per day during 2 months of heavy air conditioning.

Since two of us live here (2 x 250 = 500), who is using the other 450 kWh per day?

1. Industry with lights, etc. on all day (they pay a lower rate than I do, I suspect)
Maybe industry needs a lot of "greening"?

2. Pumping water back uphill at night to generate electricity during the day
(yes, we do that here in CA)

3. Government and Municipal uses ...

It must be getting used somewhere!

Where is there a good breakdown of the users (uses) of electricity in the USA, apparently about 4000 billion kWh per year.

 

[garygid]

If we could convert all of our energy uses to electricity (my hot water and heating from natural gas, and gas for the car, for example), how much more electrical energy would we need (2x, 4x, 10x)?

 

[evnow]

Here it is ...

 

[sjfotos]

Well. I expected a somewhat high 'loss' percentage, but that is much higher than I would have thought.

 

[AndyH]

If we could convert all of our energy uses to electricity (my hot water and heating from natural gas, and gas for the car, for example), how much more electrical energy would we need (2x, 4x, 10x)?

The 250 kWh/day number from MacKay already factors in home, transportation, and losses.

All the details of both the problem and various renewable solutions are outlined by MacKay. Get the book, download the PDF, or read chapters on line. Without Hot Air

A quick overview of the American problem:

Redoing the calculations for North America

The average American uses 250 kWh/d per day. Can we hit that target with
renewables? What if we imagine imposing shocking efficiency measures
(such as efficient cars and high-speed electric trains) such that Americans
were reduced to the misery of living on the mere 125 kWh/d of an average
European or Japanese citizen?

Wind

A study by Elliott et al. (1991) assessed the wind energy potential of the
USA. The windiest spots are in North Dakota, Wyoming, and Montana.
They reckoned that, over the whole country, 435 000 km2 of windy land
could be exploited without raising too many hackles, and that the electricity
generated would be 4600 TWh per year, which is 42 kWh per day
per person if shared between 300 million people. Their calculations ass-
umed an average power density of 1.2 W/m2, incidentally – smaller than
the 2 W/m2 we assumed in Chapter 4. The area of these wind farms,
435 000 km2, is roughly the same as the area of California. The amount
of wind hardware required (assuming a load factor of 20%) would be a
capacity of about 2600 GW, which would be a 200-fold increase in wind
hardware in the USA.

Offshore wind

If we assume that shallow offshore waters with an area equal to the sum
of Delaware and Connecticut (20 000 km2, a substantial chunk of all shal-
low waters on the east coast of the USA) are filled with offshore wind
farms having a power density of 3 W/m2, we obtain an average power of
60 GW. That’s 4.8 kWh/d per person if shared between 300 million people.
The wind hardware required would be 15 times the total wind hardware
currently in the USA.

Geothermal

I mentioned the MIT geothermal energy study (Massachusetts Institute of
Technology, 2006) in Chapter 16. The authors are upbeat about the pot-
ential of geothermal energy in North America, especially in the western
states where there is more hotter rock. “With a reasonable investment
in R&D, enhanced geothermal systems could provide 100 GW(e) or more
of cost-competitive generating capacity in the next 50 years. Further, en-
hanced geothermal systems provide a secure source of power for the long
term.” Let’s assume they are right. 100 GW of electricity is 8 kWh/d per
person when shared between 300 million.

Hydro

The hydroelectric facilities of Canada, the USA, and Mexico generate about
660 TWh per year. Shared between 500 million people, that amounts to
3.6 kWh/d per person. Could the hydroelectric output of North America
be doubled? If so, hydro would provide 7.2 kWh/d per person.

What else?

The total so far is 42 + 4.8 + 8 + 7.2 = 62 kWh/d per person. Not enough
for even a European existence! I could discuss various other options such
as the sustainable burning of Canadian forests in power stations. But
rather than prolong the agony, let’s go immediately for a technology that
adds up: concentrating solar power.

Figure 30.3 shows the area within North America that would provide
everyone there (500 million people) with an average power of 250 kWh/d.

The bottom line

North America’s non-solar renewables aren’t enough for North America
to live on. But when we include a massive expansion of solar power,
there’s enough. So North America needs solar in its own deserts, or nuclear
power, or both.

 

[AndyH]

If it is NOT sustainable, then it is only a temporary "independence", a false, and perhaps misleading and even destructive goal, like burning (almost) all the wood in the country for heat (see Haiti).

Yup - plenty of things that won't work. Unfortunately it's a LOT easier to examine what might go wrong and thus be paralyzed. And that plays right into the hands of the folks that want to maintain the status quo. Haven't American presidents been telling us for 30 years that we addicted to oil and that we have to fix the problem? And in 30 years have we done anything? Let's see...in the 1970s we imported about 25% of our oil. Today we import about 68%. YES! We did something! :lol:

I used to really hate it when my dad told me to 'do something, even if it's wrong'. Years later, after experiencing the tar pit-like paralysis by analysis, I recognize the amazing freedom movement brings. Change course if necessary, but we have to get off our collective tuckuses first!

 

[garygid]

Weren't some recently-past President(s) trying to tell us that there is no problem?

 

[Jimmydreams]

Haven't American presidents been telling us for 30 years that we addicted to oil and that we have to fix the problem? And in 30 years have we done anything? Let's see...in the 1970s we imported about 25% of our oil. Today we import about 68%. YES! We did something! :lol:

Little known fact: Jimmy Carter had PV solar panels installed on the White House roof. Nice.
Ronald Reagan had them removed. Not so nice.
:shock:

 

[garygid]

Placing PVs close to the usage points cuts down drastically on the "losses", said to be over 2/3 of the electricity generated.

Also, a lot harder to terrorize than a huge field in a remote location.

 

[evnow]

Placing PVs close to the usage points cuts down drastically on the "losses", said to be over 2/3 of the electricity generated.

The 2/3rd losses are not line loses. They include heat loss of incandescent lamps for eg.

Also, a lot harder to terrorize than a huge field in a remote location.

PV is completely useless unless you have backup - and a huge battery. Currently PV sounds cheap since it uses the grid as the battey. If you include battery costs PV or wind starts looking fairly bad. That is where the solar thermal comes a little better because of possibility of using liquid salts to store energy cheaply.

 

[garygid]

I do not think any energy source is perfect. Even a coal-fired plant is "down" occasionally for various reasons. Redundancy appears to be quite important. Reducing the HUGE waste in "transportation" would be a first place to look. Designing so that much more energy use is not "critical", but helpful, or convenient ... would be another start. All the sources that tend to cut down the peak loads, and shedding non-critical loads, would be another good start.

So, at this point, considered as part of a larger system, I think the daytime PV does indeed help.

Read the book "Energy Addiction, can we Kick the Habit" (perhaps not yet/still available).

Or, read "Must we Destroy the Planet to Feed our Addiction?".