Strive for green

I came across an interesting article in the New York Times today contrasting how Denmark and the United States have pursued energy policy since the 1970s. Here is a great excerpt from the article:

Unlike America, Denmark, which was so badly hammered by the 1973 Arab oil embargo that it banned all Sunday driving for a while, responded to that crisis in such a sustained, focused and systematic way that today it is energy independent. (And it didn’t happen by Danish politicians making their people stupid by telling them the solution was simply more offshore drilling.)

It is encouraging to see articles like this that indicate the United States is finally waking up to the reality that we need to transition away from fossil fuels in order to secure a prosperous future.

Living in Berkeley makes it incredibly easy to get access to locally grown and sustainably produced foods. With an abundance of farmer’s markets, and incredible stores like Berkeley Bowl, we’re pretty lucky here. The abundance of good food options has been shaped significantly by geography and a highly progressive population.

I was rather surprised then to read an article making the argument that good meals from quality ingredients should become a pinnacle of conservatism. The following is an excerpt from the article:

The proposal, put slightly differently, is that our attitudes toward food—which nourishes and sustains us, which binds us most fundamentally to place, family, market, and community—provide a measure of our respect for what Russell Kirk called the “Permanent Things.” We are not just what we eat but how we eat. The cultivation and consumption of our meals are activities as distinctively human as walking, talking, loving, and praying. Learning to regard the meal not merely as something that fills our bellies and helps us grow, but as the consummate exercise of beings carnal and earthbound yet upwardly and outwardly drawn, is a crucial step in the restoration of culture. The suggestion that the inculcation of such values might be an essential part of an adequate education ought to resonate beyond the confines of the doctrinaire Left.

Not directly related to all things green, but I just had to post this spoof of last week’s New Yorker cover “The Politics of Fear“:

I attended an outstanding event in San Francisco today called the “1st Solar Symposium.” Essentially, the speakers explained the drivers of solar success in Germany (read feed-in tariffs), and discussed how to make solar big in the US, and namely the Southwestern US. The following are notes taken during the symposium:
(I heard the presentations will be posted here in the next couple days)

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First Speaker: Prof. Eicke Weber, Director / Fraunhofer-Institute ISE

“The Future of Solar Energy”

• Eric was a professor @ UC Berkeley for 20 odd years in material science.

• He says, the question is, how can German successes happen in California?

Weber answers question, why should we transform our energy economy?

1. Climate change - over the past 450,000 years, global temperature and CO2 concentrations have been correlated. Our current 380PPM of CO2, takes us much higher than previous levels during this period, and it is scary to think what might happen if temperature follows the same trend as before. Weber showed something similar to the following graph from here:
   
2. Oil crisis - Until recently, this was a secondary driver of creating a new energy economy, but now that prices have shot up so drastically, it has become the primary. Regardless of whether we have hit peak oil, or whatever, the rising prices mean we need to switch to renewables with predictable prices. Weber said: “The oil production will never keep up with the global needs”
3. Geo-political instability of oil producing nations

By 2020, the world will need 20TW of energy and solar is the best future way to meet this demand.

He mentioned an idea that would place 6 3.3TW solar installations around the world to meet the 20TW demand (this would require six 340X340 kilometer squares of solar panels!).

Weber: “PV power is the most expensive renewable today, but will be the least expensive down the road.”
PV in the US costs about $.25/Kwh and about .45/Kwh in Germany.

Total PV power capacity installed last year: 2GW
Fraction installed in Germany - 1GW!
Fraction installed in US - 300MW.

Current majority of installed capacity is Silicon based PV:

1. Singly crystal Silicon cells - high efficiency, but very pricey
2. Poly/multi-crystalline Silicon cells - less efficient, but cheaper and easier to produce.

Reaching economies of scale to make solar cost competitive: “In order to get solar energy to be as cheap as fossil coal/oil plants, all we have to do is increase solar production to 100x what we do today.”

Grid parity: given technology improvements, and ramping up of production, should happen in 5-7 years! Already reached parity in some markets.

Silicon shortages: Si is the second most abundant element on earth, so it is not in shortage, but purified silicon is.
Solutions to Si shortages:
- Thin film solar (less efficient)
- Increased production of purified Si
- Thinner cells
- Upgraded metalurgical grades (dirty Si) to make solar cells
- Using highly efficient cells in concentrators

How to make photovoltaic systems happen in California/US:

• Quota systems that force utilities to do solar
• Rebate systems - good for idealists
• Power of the feed-in tariff:
  The feed-in tariff gives everyone who invests a solid return on investment. With feed-in tariffs, it’s no longer just the idealists who want solar - anyone who wants to get a good return on investment can make a return! Weber’s CA/US feed-in proposal: 20 year guaranteed feed-in price, where only your production is metered, with no cap on total production.

Comment on Distributed vs. Utility-scale solar:

Utility-scale solar is great for sunny areas but not cloudy, while distributed can be used in cloudy places like Germany or San Francisco.

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Whew, I’ll get the rest of these notes up tomorrow… following is the rest of the lineup:

11.00 am           “Experiences with the German and European Market
Access Programs”
Gerhard Stryi-Hipp, Managing Director / German Solar Industry Association

11.30 am           “The US Prior to the 2008 Presidential Elections - Status and
Perspectives of Solar Promotion on a Federal Level”
Rhone Resch, President / SEIA, Washington D.C.
12.00 pm           Lunch
1.00 pm            “An US Company’s Experience with US German Cooperation - Benefits
of International Solar Partnerships”
Gunter Ziegenbalg / Managing Director, Signet GmbH

1.30 pm            “A German Way to Enter International Solar Markets”
Helmut Gehle / Sales Director, Solar Technologies, Schuco USA LP
2.00 pm            Coffee Break

Panel Discussion: “International Perspectives: What are the Most Promising Incentives to Develop the US Solar Market”

2.20 pm            Two Points of View
- V. John White, Executive Director / CEERT, Sacramento
- Adam Browning, Executive Director / The Vote Solar Initiative, San Francisco
3.00 pm            The Political Side
- Prof. Eicke Weber, Director / Fraunhofer-Institute ISE
- John L. Geesman, Former Commissioner / California Energy Commission
The Solar Associations’ Side
- Rhone Resch, President / SEIA
- Gerhard Stryi-Hipp, CEO / German Solar Industries Association
The Companies’ Side
- Suvi Sharma, President & CEO / Solaria Corp.
- Helmut Gehle, Sales Director, Solar Technologies / Schuco USA LP
The Solar Initiative Side
- Adam Browning, Executive Director / The Vote Solar Initiative, San Francisco
4.30 am            “California’s Leadership: Building an Environmentally and Economically
Sustainable Future”
Lt. Governor John Garamendi

Tonight, a good friend sent this article about Obama’s vision for making Nevada a major renewable energy producer. I went to high school in Nevada up at Lake Tahoe, and I still visit my family there whenever I have the opportunity. It is great to hear that Obama, who Strive for green is enthusiastically rooting for, sees the potential for Nevada to become a major part of future US energy independence.

In the article, I really liked reading this statement from Obama:

“When John F. Kennedy decided that we were going to go put a man on the moon, he didn’t put a bounty out for some rocket scientist to win,” Obama said. “He put the full resources of the United States government behind the project and called on the ingenuity and innovation of the American people, not just in the private sector but also in the public sector.”

At the end of the article, there is a mention that the BLM (Bureau of Land Management) is placing a 22 month moratorium on any further solar development on its lands in order to do environmental assessments. I’m all for making sure sensitive land is protected, but 22 months!? I

Maybe the moratorium is the work of the Bush appointed director of the BLM Jim Caswell - based on information found during a quick search, he is not the type of guy you would expect to be friendly to alternative energy projects. Maybe its for “good” reasons, but at the same time there have been no shortage of ill-intentioned environmental acts under the Bush administration.

In any case, Strive for green can’t waint for Obama to win!

Tonight I went to an event at the Berkeley Ecology Center called “Rethinking Plastics.”  Stuart Moody from the environmental/spiritual organization Green Sangha was the presenter, and he covered all the harm that comes from irresponsibly consuming and disposing plastic.

Plastics are an amazing invention with incredibly valuable applications, but I was astounded to learn facts like this one: in the northern Pacific, for every one pound of zooplankton there are 6 pounds of plastic!

There were a number of saddening pictures of birds, sea turtles, and marine mammals killed by swallowing or becoming entangled in plastic. A team of researchers who collected samples from all over the Northern Pacific found plastic particles in every sample they took.

When plastics are discarded by ships or washed into the ocean by rivers, they start breaking down into small pieces, but never actually biodegrade. So what happens is a grocery bag gets converted to thousands of plastic particles that contaminate every bit of water and all the things that live in it.

Stuart Moody went on to talk about recycling and how ultimately the plastic we recycle still ends up in the landfill or in the environment as it goes through a process of “downcycling.” Downcycling is the process by which something like a plastic water bottle cannot be recycled into another plastic water bottle so it is made into things like polar fleece or trex logs, which end up in landfills as the fabric deteriorates or a structure is torn down for rebuilding. The real solution then is not to recycle but to use less plastic in the first place.

A disturbing part of the presentation came when Stuart discussed the toxins present in most plastics - like reproductive system disrupting Phthalates. These toxins have been found in every part of the world, and can cause male infertility, premature puberty, asthma, cancer, and insulin resistance (diabetes).

So I left the presentation appalled that our irresponsible use of plastic is filling the Pacific with a toxic brew, sickening and killing millions of animals, and ultimately reducing our own quality of life. Plastic is an amazing thing, but it is simply ironic that something that was supposed to make our lives better is now coming back to haunt us in a big way.

More resources:

• Algalita Marine Research Foundation - Excellent body of research and information about plastic trash in the Pacific.
• Fake Plastic Fish: Blog by Beth Terry from Oakland about trying to eliminate all her plastic waste.

Browsing the SF Chronicle’s home page today, I noticed a headline titled “Doomsayers predict new world oil crunch” in spot #7 of the Most Read articles section.

I was immediately skeptical given the fact that the word “new” was used in the title! As it turns out, the article is from August 31st, 1998! A striking line reads: “Based on a controversial theory, they fear world oil demand will begin to exceed supply as early as about 2010.”

Check out the story here.

A personal message from the author:

Since October of ‘07, I have been involved in a green marketing campaign. My passion lies in creating and using technology to solve problems, but after graduating from UC Berkeley, I decided that it would be an important first step to understand how people perceive environmental problems and how to reach them with solutions. My focus over the last two years developing and marketing an internet startup and a green marketing campaign has brought me to a point where I feel confident that I have developed a solid core of marketing knowledge and experience.

Now I find myself considering the future of the United States, and what I see are two possible scenarios:

1. Maintain the status-quo:
   We as a nation proceed in the same direction we have been for decades now, and continue to be a nation focused on irresponsibly mass-consuming, and relying on foreign sources of oil. Given that the marginal cost of extracting additional quantities of fossil fuels will continue to climb along with global demand, this scenario results in the United States and its citizens essentially going bankrupt. We are already seeing the first signs of this scenario manifest in rising energy and product prices. If this happens, pretty much any career path has a dismal future, and we will find ourselves scrambling desperately to keep the country running.
2. Become energy-independent:
   It is no mystery that the American lifestyle is highly dependent on oil - in the united States, we consume the energy equivalent of 8 tons of oil per person per year, while countries like Japan use about half that amount, and Peruvians use just 1/16th what the average US citizen does (Earthtrends). Every day, we import about 13 million of the 21 million barrells of the oil we consume, and at current prices a basic calculation shows we are sending about (13,000,000 barrells * $130/barrell) = $1,690,000,000 dollars abroad each day (CIA world fact book)!

   Beyond the pure insanity of how much money we are sending away, using oil contriubutes to a whole host of environmental problems, not the least of which is global climate change. So in this scenario, we wake up as a country, and elect leaders with the vision and determination to make the United States energy independent. In this future, developing renewable sources of energy like solar and wind become the major drivers of our economy. We simplify our lives and come to realize that we can live great lives without buying and consuming endlessly. I don’t know about you, but this future sounds pretty good, and full of opportunity.

Considering these two scenarios, I have decided to set my sights on exploring and pursuing opportunities in renewable energy. And if the second scenario or anything close to it happens, there will be endless opportunities. I get excited thinking about developing products and businesses that will not only make a profit, but will also help this nation become energy independent, its citizens safer, and the environment healthier! I have always been captivated by technology and passionate about the environment, and what better place to combine these interestes than renewable energy. What exactly I do next is uncertain, but it should be an interesting journey!

- Nicholaus K. Harris, June 17th, 2008

Greetings readers, I have a confession to make. Global warming “skeptics” have been right all along - global warming is just a giant hoax perpetrated by our secret society! I was inducted into the secret society of global warming by my professors when I attended UC Berkeley from ‘02 to ‘05, but we are winning so I see no reason to lie anymore!

The only one I know of so far that has gotten it right is Chip Giller from Grist.org when he wrote:
“So-called “global warming” is just a secret plot by wacko tree huggers to make America energy independent, clean our air and water, improve the fuel efficiency of our vehicles, kick-start 21st-century industries, and make our cities safer and more livable. Don’t let them get away with it!”

Our powerful secret society, which happens to include in its membership the vast majority of climate and earth scientists, is trying to convince people that anthropogenic greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions are increasing the base-line temperatures of long-term geo-climate cycles. There are plenty of folks who know the truth, but we are trying to discredit them by suggesting that a lot of their leaders are sponsored by our opponents who do not want the clean, independent, and prosperous future we envision.

First, our teams of deranged liberal, tree-hugging hippie-scientists at institutions like UC Berkeley fabricated models suggesting that the gases in the atmosphere are responsible for keeping the planet warm. We were able to get people to buy into our theory that when humans add more of those gases than would naturally be released, then more heat from the sun will be trapped, thus warming the earth! Ha, fools!

Now we are working on the next step. We think we have come up with a pretty good way to scare people: we tell them that if several centuries ago the temperature peak of a geo-climate cycle saw us hit a particular mean global temperature, then the peak of that same cycle in a couple more centuries will be several degrees warmer due to all the GHG humans release in addition to what is released naturally. Also, we suggest that the low points of cycles from this point forward will not be as low as they were in the past. Watch the way the world will eat this up!

We’re pretty excited about our secret plot, so we produce vast amounts of seemingly credible peer-reviewed research and reports to back up our hoax! I doubt we will ever “all be in agreement” let alone in “2 centuries,” but the good news is that we do not have to get every single person in the world on board in order to start working towards our secret plan!

As long as we can scare the majority enough, we’ll be able to achieve our wicked plan to “make America energy independent, clean our air and water, improve the fuel efficiency of our vehicles, kick-start 21st-century industries, and make our cities safer and more livable.”

We have already fooled most people with our hoax, and like I said, you can’t stop us now!

How do you get an office to stop using Styrofoam coffee cups when they had problems with dirty re-usable mugs in the past?

One of my co-workers asked me yesterday what my thoughts were on switching to more expensive biodegradable cups.  Here is my response:

The classic “Reduce – Reuse – Recycle” concept is the best way to approach this, in that order.

Reduce:
Encourage employees to use fewer cups (or none at all!)
Best accomplished by putting up a printout next to the cups about the environmental/health effects of Styrofoam with something like this from Grinning Planet:

“Styrofoam, which is generically known as polystyrene, is bad news for the environment and for your health.  In the environment, polystyrene is extremely non-biodegradable and breaks down very slowly. But as it does break down, it can leach styrene—the single-molecule form of polystyrene—into groundwater. If your trashed Styrofoam cup somehow finds its way into a nearby body of water, it can eventually break up into small pieces, with the pieces being ingested by marine animals. None of the above environmental effects are good, but the health effects of drinking from polystyrene cups are even worse. The styrene in the cup migrates into the liquid and gets into your body as you sip your beverage. Hot, fatty, acidic, or alcoholic beverages increase the rate of styrene migration. ”

You don’t have to encourage employees to bring in their own mugs; seeing this sort of information may be convincing enough!

Switch to cups that are made from less environmentally-damaging materials.

Both of the links (1 and 2) to cups you included look good – pretty much anything is better than Styrofoam. And again, if there is some sort of print-out that talks about how these cups are biodegradeable but still require resources to produce, I would guess that most employees would not be so wasteful, and your costs would be recouped.

 Reuse:

A couple simple facts about waste, and resources next to the cups and a couple suggestions for how to minimize their impacts may be enough to get employees to start re-using the same cup, or bringing their own.

I.e. these facts, again from Grinning Planet:
” *  Employees:  Bring in a mug! … and quit using Styrofoam cups, period. This is an easy one!
* Visitors:  For visitors, it’s a little more complicated. Perhaps your company will spring for a few dozen mugs that bear the company logo; or, if the budget is limited, maybe just plain white mugs. If an order of any type of new mugs is simply unaffordable, ask each employee to bring in an old mug or two to start a pool of mugs for visitors to use. Ask people to only bring in mugs that are not embarrassingly stained or chipped. (An no pottery-class rejects, please!) It’s also a good idea to get employees to agree among themselves on a system for ensuring that the mugs get washed and put away after meetings.”

 Recycle:
Even if you don’t go with biodegradable, paper mugs will be better for the environment and health-wise. And you can recycle them. Recycling isn’t all it is cracked up to be since it still takes a lot of resources to recycle then create a new cup, but it is better than just throwing it away.

Hope this helps some others facing this issue!