SoCal Congressmen support appeal of toll road decision
The controversial Orange County toll road proposal, intended to relieve traffic on the gridlocked Interstate 5, is being revisited. The ruling of the California Coastal Commission, rejecting the proposal back in February, is being appealed to the U.S. Secretary of Commerce. The Secretary has the authority to overrule the Coastal Commission because the route at issue for the proposed toll road runs through Camp Pendleton Marine Corps base and is leased to the state.
The appeal, launched by the Transportation Corridor Agencies, is being supported by eight local Congressmen, Gary Miller (R-Diamond Bar), Ken Calvert (R-Corona), John Campbell (R-Irvine), Ed Royce (R-Fullerton), Dana Rohrabacher (R-Huntington Beach), Darrell Issa (R-Vista), Duncan Hunter (R-Alpine) and Elton Gallegly (R-Simi Valley).
It will be interesting to see how this conflict is resolved. The situation typifies the conflict between creating more efficient roadways and protecting the environment. Clearly the resolution of these types of conflicts must be a balancing act. Ideally, “all or nothing” solutions can be avoided.
16 year old boy figures out how to biodegrade plastic bags
By now it is common knowledge that plastic bags have a substantial environmental impact. However, according to this article, an 11th grade student in Ottawa named Daniel Burd, may have changed this fact. Apparently, Burd, through work on his science project, discovered that plastic bags can actually be at least partially biodegraded in a matter of months, when exposed to bacteria under the right conditions.
The Record newspaper, based out of Ontario, describes Burd’s efforts as follows:
First, he ground plastic bags into a powder. Next, he used ordinary household chemicals, yeast and tap water to create a solution that would encourage microbe growth. To that, he added the plastic powder and dirt. Then the solution sat in a shaker at 30 degrees.
After three months of upping the concentration of plastic-eating microbes, Burd filtered out the remaining plastic powder and put his bacterial culture into three flasks with strips of plastic cut from grocery bags. As a control, he also added plastic to flasks containing boiled and therefore dead bacterial culture.
Six weeks later, he weighed the strips of plastic. The control strips were the same. But the ones that had been in the live bacterial culture weighed an average of 17 per cent less.
Additionally, under a second iteration of his experiment, Burd was able to decrease the weight of the plastic by 32%. According to the article, Burd’s discovery does have the potential to be applied in the real world. And to boot, Burd took home $30,000 in prizes and scholarship awards from the science fair.
While oil prices boom, refinery profits contract
Although some of our political leaders assert that in response to high gas prices, we should build more refineries, according to this article, some American refineries have chosen to cut their production over the last year in response to sharply decreased revenues. Contributing to this decrease in profit is the dramatic increase in the price refiners must pay for the oil they purchase that is then refined, coupled with a shrinking domestic demand for gasoline. (Domestic oil consumption has dropped by over 3% in the past year.) As a result, while the price of raw oil has gone up 100%, the cost of refined gasoline has increased only 39%. Consequently, refiners have decreased their production capacities by about 5-10%.
It seems to us that if the high cost of gas was due to insufficient refinery capacity, then the existing refineries would be operating at full strength right now. (Indicating a demand greater than existing supply.) However, this is not the case. If anything, instead of insufficient refinery capacity, there is probably insufficient competition amongst refiners. Maybe industry consolidation has created a situation where refiners can voluntarily decrease their production levels, instead of ramping up to meet existing demand? Collusion is not always announced (a la OPEC) and can instead result from a marketplace controlled by only a handful of companies that can implicitly behave anticompetitively.
Finally, if there isn’t sufficient domestic demand for gasoline to take up all of the existing refiners’ capacity, then how come every time there is a storm or fire at a major refinery, the price of gasoline spikes dramatically. With the standard caveat that we do not have an economic or energy policy background, this does not seem to jive. It seems to us that refiners, along with most other parties along the global oil supply chain, have too little competition, and therefore too little incentive to produce their product at full capacity.
High energy prices spur the reopening of old coal mines
With energy costs skyrocketing, old coal producing regions throughout the world have sprung back to life. In Japan, coal production is at its highest point in nearly forty years, after a long period of contraction due to high labor and extraction costs. With the world price of oil and other commodities at all time highs, re-opening old mines and the expansion of existing mines throughout the world has boomed. Illustrating the dramatic increase in prices, the cost of a metric ton of coal shipped from Australia to Japan in 2003 was $23.25. Now it is almost $140.
Of course, along with this increase in coal production and use, comes an increase in greenhouse gas emissions. While high oil prices has encouraged alternative energy investment and development, it is also apparently fueling old energy re-development. Hopefully this won’t prove to be a net-wash.
Process allows landfills to produce energy and reduce greenhouse effects
Unbeknownst to many people (ourselves included), garbage dumps can be a meaningful source of alternative energy production. As the waste that is piled up in a landfill breaks down, it releases copious amounts of methane gas (whose greenhouse effect is 20 times worse than CO2). Consequently, landfill operators have begun to install pipe systems that capture these gasses in order to use them in energy production. Once captured, the methane (aka “biogas”) is burned in a traditional power generation process. Although the burning of methane releases CO2, this is substantially less harmful to the environment than the methane in its original state.
The recent surge in waste-to-energy projects stems from federal tax incentives and state laws requiring the use of certain percentages of clean energy. However, opponents complain that biogas is not actually a renewable energy source since it is derived from human excess (trash). While these critics are literally correct since human waste is not created by Mother Earth, it seems silly to denigrate attempts to turn a negative (human garbage and excess) into a positive (an energy source that reduces the greenhouse effect).
As with most forms of alternative energy production, we were not surprised to learn that this waste-to-energy process is most developed in Europe. We can only hope that the next administration and Congress will implement policies that will encourage alternative energy development. Maybe then, hearing about innovative processes like turning waste-to-energy will no longer be such a surprise to us and our readers.
Obama emphasizes commitment to coal
Given that the United States sits on over a quarter of the world’s coal reserves, we obviously will not be abandoning this source of energy production anytime soon. Nonetheless, it was a little disheartening to see Barack Obama re-emphasize his commitment to coal in a series of campaign ads (including the YouTube clip above), in an apparent attempt to garner votes in the coal rich state of Kentucky. (Which he ultimately lost by a significant margin.)
We have praised Obama in the past for staying out of the McCain-Clinton gas tax pander. Unfortunately, he is still a politician and apparently has been trying to rally support from voters in the coal producing primary states, like Kentucky and West Virginia, as well as general election coal producing states, like Pennsylvania and Ohio. There is something about Obama being in favor of reducing greenhouse gas emissions so long as he doesn’t put the coal industry at risk, or alienate any voters, that doesn’t quite sit right.
Google joins major investment in BrightSource Energy
Google, which announced back in November that it would be investing millions of dollars in the pursuit of renewable energy sources that would be cheaper than coal, recently joined a major round of financing for BrightSource Energy. The $115 million round of financing will go towards developing and growing BrightSource’s solar thermal business (the process where solar panels focus the sun’s heat on a liquid, turning it into steam, which is then used to turn a turbine which generates electricity).
Google, which used its philanthropic arm, Google.org, to make the investment, has more than just an investor’s interest in the development of renewable energy sources. Google’s network of computers and servers use a tremendous amount of energy. As the cost of energy increases, so does the cost of operating Google’s business. This has created a unique situation where the private interests of a massive corporation have aligned with the greater good. Fortunately, Google has a track record of innovation and accomplishment, which bodes well for the future of renewable energy.
LA introduces major water conservation and reuse project
For anyone who grew up in Southern California in the late 1980’s or 90’s, the concept of water conservation is a familiar one. However a concerted public effort to conserve water in this arid region over the last decade or so has been surprisingly absent. This is all going to change due to a major water conservation and reuse plan introduced by Los Angeles Mayor Villaraigosa.
With concerns over a growing population, which is predicted to increase LA’s water demand by 15% in the next 25 years, coupled with fears that climate change is going to decrease the already limited natural water supply, it appears government officials are beginning to take action.
The Mayor’s plan to reduce water usage entails a combination of enforcing already existing water laws regarding the watering of lawns and sidewalks, as well as introducing some new stricter restrictions. However, it is the plan to recycle local water that is cause for some controversy. Currently one of the largest single sources for LA’s water is the groundwater basin under the San Fernando Valley. However years and years of pumping out this water has left the basin running out of new supplies. To deal with this shortage, the Mayor intends to revive a proposal from years ago that would use highly treated waste water to refill the Valley’s underground water basin.
While this proposal has elicited cries of “no water from the toilet to the tap,” it is clear that dramatic steps are required to continue supporting this massive civilization we have placed in the middle of a desert. According to the plan, half of the 15% projected increase in water use is to come from conservation efforts, and half is to come from recycling of waste water. The plan is projected to cost $1.5 billion in infrastructure and conservation programs.
Photo credit. [The photo is of the Owens Valley in the Eastern Sierra Nevada, where much of LA’s water is taken from.]
Germans debate continued solar subsidies
There is a debate going on inside Germany regarding the appropriate level of subsidies that should be allocated to solar energy generation. After years of government encouragement, solar energy generation in that country has boomed. In fact, the world’s largest manufacturer of solar cells, Q-Cells, is based in Germany. Now critics are arguing that these subsidies have led to unreasonably high energy prices. On the other side, solar proponents counter that without government protection, Germany’s dominant solar energy industry will go the way of past world leaders, like the United States and Japan, whose governments failed to maintain high incentives for solar power.
One of the unique components of Germany’s solar energy policy is that it requires power companies to purchase all of the energy generated by solar panels, even if they are just located on a private citizen’s roof. This has created a huge demand across the country to install solar panels on a micro-level.
While we are far too removed from the intricacies of domestic German energy policy to be able to take sides in this debate, it is interesting to see how much effect governmental policy (subsidies) can have on the development of alternative energy sources. But with these subsidies, there is always the danger that the alternative that is being encouraged may turn out to be a less than ideal solution. (Not that we believe there is any indication that solar energy is a bad solution.)
We feel that while governments should take measures to encourage clean technology, mechanisms that properly price the cost of externalities into polluting energy sources (i.e., carbon taxes), rather than subsidies for alternative sources, may prove to be a more efficient solution. Of course budding technologies often require some propping up, but at some point they must be able to stand on their own. And one way of ensuring this is to properly price the cost of energy generated from fossil fuels through a carbon tax. Subsidies may be necessary at first, but should probably not be a long-term policy.
Comparison of the candidates’ oil and energy policies
Looking at this comparison by Reuters of the presidential candidates’ energy and oil policies, it is clear that Senators Obama and Clinton are proposing more aggressive legislation than McCain. Nonetheless, the good news is that all three candidates have significantly more pro-environmental policies than the current administration. So at least we know some change is on the way. Whether it will be enough to make a difference, we shall see.
Some of the highlights of the comparison:
On gas prices:
McCain and Clinton want to suspend the federal gas tax this summer.
Obama wants to temporarily stop filling the Strategic Petroleum Reserve.
On fuel economy:
Clinton wants to increase average efficiency standards to 55 miles per gallon by 2030.
Obama wants to double the current standards by 2026.
McCain has not yet released a specific target but indicates he wants to decrease our dependence on foreign oil.
On biofuels:
All three candidates support dramatic increases in biofuel production and distribution.
McCain reasserts his green policies
The widely covered political story on Monday was about a speech Sen. McCain gave in Portland regarding global warming. In the speech, McCain attempted to distinguish himself from George Bush’s approach towards the environment by stating, “I will not shirk the mantle of leadership that the United States bears. I will not permit eight long years to pass without serious action on serious challenges.” Some of McCain’s specific policy proposals include: mandatory limits on greenhouse gas emissions, the implementation of a cap-and-trade system, and promising to engage China and India diplomatically to encourage international environmental efforts.
While it is clear that McCain is significantly more pro-environment than the majority of his fellow Republicans (he was the only Republican candidate to be in favor of emission limits and was also the co-sponsor, along with Sen. Lieberman, of one of the early Congressional attempts to implement a cap-and-trade system), he has still received substantial criticism for his environmental voting record, and recently, along with Sen. Clinton, proposed the “lose-lose-lose” policy of repealing the federal gas tax during this summer’s driving season. If he is really going to convince pro-environment voters that he is a real pro-environment candidate, he may have to ramp up the requirements in his proposed legislation, and will definitely have to work on his consistency (as does Sen. Clinton).
… And more on the lose-lose-lose of the McCain/Clinton gas tax proposal:
First “lose” = it would likely be ineffective, as the oil companies will probably just raise prices to make up for the spread.
Second “lose” = but if effective, it would remove an incentive to drive less and use mass transit more.
Third “lose” = it would remove a major source of revenue which is needed to fix our aging transportation infrastructure.
Has a tipping point been reached with gas prices?
Apparently gas prices have finally reached some sort of tipping point, as public transit ridership numbers are growing at the fastest rate in at least a decade. While public transit ridership has been slowly growing over the past several years (with a 2.1% growth last year), it is predicted that average growth will reach 5% or more this year, as high gas prices and a slower economy drive more commuters on to public buses and trains.
Denver, which recently began work on a major public railway expansion, has seen ridership numbers increase by 8% compared to last year. And for the first time since 1991, the federal Energy Department predicts that Americans will consume less gas this year than last.
Evidence is slightly mixed in Los Angeles, but appears to indicate that the roads are clearing a bit, while public transit use increases as well.
This is all good news for proponents of mass transit and confirmation that political opportunists who have advocated the lifting of federal gas taxes (while also espousing their pro-environment credentials) are completely off-base. Unfortunately for McCain and Clinton, even if all mainstream economists are uniformly wrong in their belief that any tax reduction will be met with an equivalent increase in prices by the gas companies, (and that their policies therefore would result in a lowering of gas prices), they would be releasing the recent pressure that has led to this increase in public transit ridership and decrease in road congestion.
If we have, in fact, reached some sort of tipping point with gas prices and transportation, then the policy proposals from our leaders should be “how can we take advantage of this shift in daily behavior,” instead of “how do we reverse it by trying to lower gas prices?” This is an opportunity and we, as a society, need to take it.
China seeks green technology from Japan
Chinese President Hu Jintao, while visiting Japan today, expressed his hopes that Japan would share environmental technology with China, as it attempts to deal with the side-effects of its rapid growth. Apparently, while anti-green leaders in America assert that environmentally oriented policies will do too much damage to our economy, countries like Japan, are using green tech to not only improve international relations with its neighbors, but could see a profitable export industry develop, as well.
Proponents of comprehensive environmental policy reform in America have long argued that a shift towards a green economy will not “wreck” us, as warned by President Bush, but instead will provide economic growth and trade opportunities into the future. In fact, the policies of our current “pro-economy” leaders, like Bush, have led to the current situation where solar power development is shifting to Europe, where it has found a friendlier policy in place. Fortunately, it is still early in this global shift, and therefore imperative that the next U.S. president help to formulate and implement a policy that will nourish green industry, rather than sending it abroad.
NPR looks at massive Vegas development’s green aspirations
NPR had an interesting radio piece on a massive new development in Las Vegas called City Center that is aiming to achieve a LEED Silver rating. The piece looked at some of the purposes behind the LEED rating system (basically to standardize the environmental credentials of developments), as well as some criticisms (e.g., that since LEED ratings are based on a point system, a development that installs bike racks could receive the same credit as a development that installs a costly but efficient heating system). The radio piece runs for about five minutes and is pretty interesting, especially for anyone who has read our previous posts about LEED.
McCain campaign continues to disregard economists on gas tax
Yesterday, Republican National Committee Chairman Mike Duncan indicated on MSNBC that he didn’t trust economists’ analysis that cutting the federal gas tax will not lead to an equivalent lowering of gas prices. It seems McCain and Clinton have committed themselves so deeply to this populist, anti-”elitist” position that there will be no turning back from it.
[Hat tip: GristMill]
