Just the Facts, Sir

In a media landscape in which TV stations with the word ‘news’ in their title transmit editorials thinly disguised as actual news and representing only one side of the political spectrum, it’s fair to say that legitimate news media have a greater responsibility to present us with well-researched, intelligently balanced news.

This is not to say that such media shouldn’t be able to include editorials and op-eds in their offerings, but it was distressing to read in the Washington Post on April 25th – the very day that over 100,000 people attended the Earth Day Climate Rally on the National Mall – a piece entitled ‘Five myths about green energy‘.  It was written by the conservative Manhattan Institute’s Robert Bryce*, whose positions on renewable energy are well-known (and mainly disparaging).

In fairness, Bryce makes well-argued points about such issues as dependence on imports and the definition of ‘green’ jobs, although an intelligent debater might well be able to introduce counterpoints to his arguments.  But the larger point is that his platform betrays a narrow understanding of the reasons for renewable energy and the fact that those reasons – be they energy independence, pollution control, sustainability or climate change mitigation – demand new paradigms and asymmetric ways of thinking.

How much is too much?

Bryce’s first point is that “solar and wind technologies require huge amounts of land to deliver relatively small amounts of energy, disrupting natural habitats.” To that, we can only reply “yes, they do require a lot of land.”  (Note that we’re not even going to get into what conventional power plants do to natural habitats).  But our continuing sustainability needs demand that we find renewable alternatives to most – eventually nearly all – of today’s conventional power sources, irrespective of cost, while our continuing energy needs demand that we do this irrespective of real estate considerations.  The paradigm we have reached is not one in which we compare acreage, nor out-of-pocket costs, between alternatives, then choose the smaller or the cheaper.  It’s one in which we understand in general terms the implications of not responding adequately to the climate challenge, understand that there’s no cost too high nor any real estate consideration too onerous to keep the planet hospitable to our species, and make the obvious consequential choice.

Or, as one might respond to those who opine that GHG reductions/conservation/clean energy development is just too darned expensive: “Too expensive for what, exactly?”

How green are we?

Bryce also cites as a myth the notion that the U.S. is a laggard in adopting green policies, an odd position to take one day before the long-awaited Kerry-Graham-Lieberman energy/climate bill was delayed yet again by partisan infighting in the U.S. Senate.  But to make his point, he touts the 2.5% drop in per capita energy consumption in the U.S. since 1980.  We, and the planet, have news for Mr. Bryce.  The planet doesn’t care about per capita energy use, only total energy use.  And since 1980, the number of capitas in the U.S. has increased by some 75,000, or nearly a third.  So as a country, our energy consumption – and carbon emissions – have increased by about 30%.

If you have to wangle the math. to make your point, perhaps there’s something wrong with your point.

Where are those green jobs?

Then there is the issue of domestic ‘green’ job creation.  Bryce points out that since the Chinese are able to produce solar panels and wind turbines much more cheaply than we can, thanks to their low labor costs, they will benefit most from any upsurge in green jobs.  To a large extent, he has a point.  And one direct response would be to call for a comprehensive reduction in U.S. wages to restore our competitive position.

Seriously, though…

It’s obvious that many green jobs will be created in the U.S. simply because the work of planning, installing and managing clean energy systems has to be performed in situ.  But again, there’s a larger point that should be addressed here.  Forty years ago this month, we celebrated the first Earth Day, an event that recognized the need to improve our stewardship of planet Earth, our island home in the universe.  At that time there were a number of pioneers in this country trying to make their voices heard about developing clean energy sources such as Solar, to reduce fossil fuel usage and its concomitant pollution.  They largely went unheard and unheeded.  Half-way between then and now, other voices started to be raised in concern over the increase in heat-trapping gases in our atmosphere.  Many of us – including many in our Government – do not hear or heed those voices today.

All truth passes through three stages. First, it is ridiculed. Second, it is violently opposed. Third, it is accepted as being self-evident.

-Arthur Schopenhauer

Had our ears and minds been more open at any time in the last forty years to those voices and their message, we could have put American ingenuity and entrepreneurship to work to give us world leadership in renewable energy technologies.  Instead, we regard Chinese dominance in this new, huge industry as a fait accompli;  worse, our lawmakers work to ensure it comes to pass, by weakening or defeating legislation that could establish a world-class renewable energy industry in the USA.

Mathy Fuzz

It’s when Bryce tries to convince us that the use of zero-emissions energy sources instead of coal plants for electricity does not reduce emissions that he approaches the bizarre.  He claims that in Denmark, “the poster child for wind energy boosters”, “carbon dioxide emissions from electricity generation in 2007 were at about the same level as they were back in 1990, before the country began its frenzied construction of turbines.”

This simply doesn’t pass the sniff, or any other, test.  Denmark gets between 20% and 25% of its electricity from wind, almost all of which displaces coal-generated power.  It would be inconceivable if that did not lead to massive reductions in carbon emissions.

Not only inconceivable, but untrue.  According to Sune Strom, economist with the Danish Wind Industry Association, the country’s wind turbines now abate nearly twelve times as much CO2 annually as they did in 1990 (see table, ‘Abatement of CO2 in tons/year’).  Strom explains: “In Denmark a wind turbine abates the CO2 from the marginal power production plant that would have produced the power if the turbine did not do so.  In Denmark this means a coal-fired power plant.”

      1990            2009

# of turbines              2,663            5,111

total capacity                 326            3,484
in MW

actual
production                    567            6,716
in GWh

abatement of
CO2 in                           862              862
tons/GWh

abatement of
CO2 in                     489,099    5,789,364
tons/year

The table shows another interesting, ‘though incidental, point:  one figure that has not changed in nearly twenty years is the one shown as ‘Abatement of CO2 in tons/GWh’.  Quite simply, this is just a benchmark figure that shows how much CO2 emission one can expect to abate per unit of electricity when switching from a coal plant to a clean energy plant.  As such, it’s a fixed figure – a reference number, if you will – which wouldn’t change no matter how many years the table covered, nor how many turbines were in use.

And this raises the inevitable question:  When Bryce claimed that there had been no reduction in emissions despite the doubling of wind turbine numbers in Denmark, did he read the wrong line?  (See “If you have to wangle the math.” above).

*author of Power Hungry: The Myths of ‘Green’ Energy, and the Real Fuels of the Future, PublicAffairs, April 2010