There are 25 messages in this issue.
Topics in this digest:
1. Hydrogen Basics, Part I: The Shape of the Hydrogen Economy
From: "janson2997" janson1997@yahoo.com
2. Climate change in the Devils Lake basin
From: "npat1" npat1@juno.com
3. Cleaner Sweep
From: "janson2997" janson1997@yahoo.com
4. Sustainable Iceland: Geothermal Wonderland Part 3
From: "janson2997" janson1997@yahoo.com
5. Here comes the sun: New solutions for world’s energy woes
From: "janson2997" janson1997@yahoo.com
6. Finally, we agree on disaster of climate change
From: "janson2997" janson1997@yahoo.com
7. Kicking Our Oil Addiction, Fixing Global Woes
From: "janson2997" janson1997@yahoo.com
8. Energy security is a non-zero-sum game
From: "janson2997" janson1997@yahoo.com
9. Focus shifts to hydrogen power.
From: "janson2997" janson1997@yahoo.com
10. TV ads that doubt climate change are 'misleading'
From: "janson2997" janson1997@yahoo.com
11. Solution to Greenhouse Gases Is New Nuclear Plants, Bush Says
From: "janson2997" janson1997@yahoo.com
12. Study predicts significant climate change
From: "janson2997" janson1997@yahoo.com
13. Nanotech Dilemma
From: "janson2997" janson1997@yahoo.com
14. Full-filling
From: "janson2997" janson1997@yahoo.com
15. Kicking the fossil fuel habit
From: "janson2997" janson1997@yahoo.com
16. US House votes to dole out $24.4 billion to DOE in fiscal 2007
From: "janson2997" janson1997@yahoo.com
17. The Global Nuclear Energy Partnership: A Roadmap to Energy Security
From: "janson2997" janson1997@yahoo.com
18. House bill reduces nuclear power funding
From: "janson2997" janson1997@yahoo.com
19. House bill reduces nuclear power funding
From: "janson2997" janson1997@yahoo.com
20. Safety a main concern in nuclear energy debate
From: "janson2997" janson1997@yahoo.com
21. Rather than face up to climate change and do what can be done,
From: "janson2997" janson1997@yahoo.com
22. The fuels of tomorrow
From: "janson2997" janson1997@yahoo.com
23. Scientists detail signs of Arctic warming
From: "janson2997" janson1997@yahoo.com
24. Fate of world climate lies with U.S., China
From: "janson2997" janson1997@yahoo.com
25. Grüne Geldanlage Die neuen Kräfte
From: "janson2997" janson1997@yahoo.com
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Message 1
From: "janson2997" janson1997@yahoo.com
Date: Wed May 24, 2006 10:27am(PDT)
Subject: Hydrogen Basics, Part I: The Shape of the Hydrogen Economy
Hydrogen Basics, Part I:
The Shape of the Hydrogen Economy
2006
Hydrogen Basics, Part II:
Hydrogen and Fuel Cell Technologies
New Mexico Business`Council
The following is an adaptation and update of a presentation made by
Cathy Padroof Los Alamos National Laboratory at the 1stNMHBC
Conference in 2005.
The NMHBC gratefully acknowledges the significant input of Ms
PadroandLANLto this presentation.
http://www.nmhbc.org/2006%20Conference/NMHBC%20Hydrogen%20Energy%
20Basics%2006.pdf
(47 pages)
http://tinyurl.com/o5ufc
j2997
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Message 2
From: "npat1" npat1@juno.com
Date: Wed May 24, 2006 1:57pm(PDT)
Subject: Climate change in the Devils Lake basin
---
May 24, 2006
The author of a May 15 letter to The Forum on Devils Lake, N.D., high water wrote: “The high water table is caused by a natural wet cycle.”
I agree that wet conditions in the Devils Lake Basin are causing high water on Devils Lake. However, I believe that the wet conditions are being influenced by climate change due to human activity.
My first experience in flood prediction was the 1979 Red River flood. My duties at work during the 1980s and 1990s included spring flood outlooks for the Red River and Devils Lake. My retirement occurred in February of this year.
On Sept. 26, 2000, I sent an e-mail to the U.S. Geological Survey from my work computer that said the hydrologic cycle on the Red River had changed. On Oct. 18, 2000, I sent an e-mail to the National Weather Service in Grand Forks, N.D., saying that climate change is now a significant component influencing the elevation of Devils Lake.
On May 13, I presented my latest work on the evidence showing climate and hydrologic change in the Red River Valley at a town meeting on global warming in Minneapolis. I believe that wetter conditions in the Devils Lake Basin will continue for the remainder of this century, and beyond.
Pat Neuman
Chanhassen, Minn.
http://www.in-forum.com/articles/index.cfm?id=127753§ion=Opinion
---
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Message 3
From: "janson2997" janson1997@yahoo.com
Date: Thu May 25, 2006 0:34am(PDT)
Subject: Cleaner Sweep
Cleaner Sweep
By Kay Luna
The machine will look a lot like a typical Zamboni, smoothing down
the ice at the Quad-City Sport Center's ice rink.
But the new eP-ICEBEAR is very different.
Instead of running on propane or electricity, this ice resurfacer —
created in part by ePower Synergies in Cordova, Ill. — is the first
one known to run on hydrogen, without any carbon monoxide emissions.
"This is a one-of-a-kind machine and it shows the future," said Bruce
Wood of ePower Synergies. "It shows hydrogen fuel powered machines
are competitive."
Officials from ePower will show off the machine at 11 a.m. Friday at
the Davenport ice rink, before it continues its tour in Boston, New
York and Pennsylvania.
The Cordova company hails the eP-ICEBEAR as one of its first hydrogen-
powered inventions since the company started 11/2 years ago. The
company is working on a hydrogen-powered forklift truck and several
other hydrogen-powered vehicles, Wood said.
"These types of applications will usher in the hydrogen age and will
precede fuel cell powered cars and trucks by maybe a decade," Wood
said.
"We are very proud. It's been a lot of work."
The eP-ICEBEAR was built in Elmira, Ontario, by a company called
Resurfice, in partnership with ePower and the Energy and
Environmental Research Center, a non-profit division of the
University of North Dakota.
Both ePower and the research center — named the National Center for
Hydrogen Technology in 2004 — say the eP-ICEBEAR is their first major
project in this niche market. The machine's operation proves
that "fuel cells are here now, today," said Jay Almlie, research
manager at the research center.
"A hydrogen economy could start today with the proper infrastructure,
like hydrogen gas stations," Almlie said.
The biggest benefit of hydrogen power: Zero emissions. When hydrogen
is mixed with air, the only substances released are water vapor and
carbon dioxide, Almlie said.
Emissions have been a problem at times for traditional Zamboni
machines. Wood said several people watching a hockey game in
Barrington, Ill., were hospitalized in December because of high
levels of carbon monoxide coming from the Zamboni, which was running
at an indoor rink.
There are more emissions to worry about with gasoline-powered
vehicles, like nitrogen oxides, sulfur oxides and carbon monoxide,
Almlie added.
"You have none of that with the hydrogen fuel source," he said.
Another upside of hydrogen power is that it could help the country
become more "energy independent," Almlie said.
"We're paying $3 at the pump, and we're going overseas for large
reservoirs of oil," Almlie said. "Hydrogen is something we can create
here without digging into Saudi Arabia for their oil."
Greg Samms, general manager of the Quad-City Sports Center, said his
facility already uses two Olympia-brand ice re-surfacers, created by
the same Canadian company that made the eP-ICEBEAR. Those machines
are electric, tethered with power cords to electrical outlets as they
run.
Samms has been happy with those resurfacers, still running great
since their purchase in 1997, but he's intrigued by the hydrogen-
powered kind.
"It's awesome to see," Samms said. "It's a one-of-a-kind machine."
Kay Luna can be contacted at (563) 383-2323 or kluna@qctimes.com.
http://www.qctimes.net/articles/2006/05/24/news/business/doc4473e8903c
4fe144435504.prt
http://tinyurl.com/h6emr
j2997
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Message 4
From: "janson2997" janson1997@yahoo.com
Date: Thu May 25, 2006 0:38am(PDT)
Subject: Sustainable Iceland: Geothermal Wonderland Part 3
Sustainable Iceland: Geothermal Wonderland
By Bill Moore
Part three in the Sustainable Iceland series on its aim to create the
world's first 'hydrogen economy'
May 24, 2006
In many ways, Iceland is unique in the world: it has more renewable
energy than it knows what to do with, both hydroelectric and
geothermal.
The island nation -- which took advantage of the Nazi occupation of
ruling Denmark during the Second World War to declare its
independence -- is located in the far North Atlantic between
Greenland and Scotland, the two nearest landmasses. It sits astride
the mid-Atlantic ridge where the tectonic plates on which ride the
European and North American land masses are slowly being wedged apart
one to two inches a year by deep volcanic magma forcing its way to
the surface.
For some unknown reason, nature saw fit to create this volcanic
island of 103,000 square km near the Arctic Circle rather than the
Equator. If it had been born further south, its population today
would, undoubtedly, be more than the current 296,737 handsome and
hardy souls that live there now; and instead of speaking a version of
ancient Norse, they'd probably be speaking Spanish or Portuguese. It
likely wouldn't have been called Iceland, either.
It is a land of stark, almost haunting beauty that reminded me of the
Wind River Range in Wyoming, a far older region of now-long extinct
volcanic activity. Where the valleys of Wyoming are covered in sage,
Iceland's much younger lava fields are covered in thick, spongy
carpets of grayish-green moss. Black cinder domes pockmark the
landscape flagging the presence of molten reservoirs kilometers below
the surface; and where lava and subterranean water meet super-heated
steam if formed creating a fabulously rich and renewable energy
resource.
Although Icelanders have known about geysers for centuries -- the
word, itself is derived from the original Icelandic -- it wasn't
until the 1930s that they were able to tap into their geothermal
endowment, starting first with a school in Reykjavik and then its
indoor swimming pool across the street. Today, virtually every
building on the island is heated with geothermal steam flowing
through an estimated 2-3000 miles of underground pipe in Reykjavik,
alone. Seventy-two percent of all the nation's energy comes from
renewable resources.
Colonies of greenhouses growing fruits, vegetables and flowers are
also heated by geothermal hot water and lighted in the winter by
cheap electricity, about 25% of which comes from the same nearly
limitless source. On the outskirts of the capital some of that power
is used to crack hydrogen from water to fuel a trio of fuel cell
transit buses. It is hoped that these buses will be the harbingers of
what will by 2050 the world's first "hydrogen economy".
To give those of us who participated in General Motor's
first "Hydrogen Pathways" press trip to Iceland a sense of the
nation's geothermal wealth -- and examples of it literally surrounded
the Nordica Hotel in Reykjavik -- we visited a geothermal power plant
on the slopes of a steaming volcanic culdera where both electric
power and steam are sent to the capital and surrounding communities.
We also heard presentations from officials at Iceland New Energy, the
University, the government and the local power company.
To appreciate the context of Iceland's truly unique situation, you
have to start with an understanding of its place atop the mid-
Atlantic ridge (illustration 1 below). Where virtually all of the
ridge is buried under thousands of feet of water, here in Iceland you
can walk across it. The photo above is of the "rift valley" where
Iceland's people pilgrimaged annually on horseback for hundreds of
years to listen to the law read and to resolve disputes. It may have
been in this very valley that its farmers agreed to limit their
flocks of sheep to prevent overgrazing and its resultant erosion of
the island's fragile top soils. On the lower left of the photo are
the rocks that make up the North American tectonic plate. The hills
in the distance stand atop the European plate, the valley between is
forming from the gradual movement of the two plates away from each
other. At the far end of the valley is a large lake (illustration 2)
and just beyond that is the 120 MW geothermal power plant at
Hellisheiði.
According to local experts, there are two types of geothermal fields
on the island: high temperature -- greater than 200 degrees Celsius --
and low temperature fields under 150 degrees C. To date, Iceland is
exploiting the equivalent of just over 8.5 terra watt hours (TWh) of
energy annually, rising to 16TWh by 2010, from both its hydroelectric
and geothermal resources out of an estimated potential of 55TWh. (See
Illustration 5). In fact, Icelanders have the highest per capita rate
of electric power use in Europe and possibly the world.
Not that everyone is in favor of more dams. There is some healthy
dissent in the country over a new dam going up in the north. One
would suspect the same would apply to over-development -- if that's
even possible -- of its geothermal resources.
Like the rest of the planet, Iceland is also heavily dependent on
petroleum to run its marine fleet and motor vehicles, all of which
has to be imported through the Esso terminal down in the harbor.
Gasoline is currently selling in Rekjavik for the equivalent of about
$6.50 a gallon. One of our tour guides, a tall Icelander named
Fredrik, intimated to me that he'd recently bought a Chinese-made
electric motor scooter to get around his home town of Hafnarfjördur
in order to save money on fuel. He calculated it costs him just 25
cents US to drive it 60 km. It would cost him $16US to do that in his
Land Rover. Of course, he can't drive it everywhere or all the time,
but it has to help for some of those short trips. Consumers in
Iceland pay the equivalent of just 7.5 cent/kwh.
Drilling Deeper
With only a small percentage of their geothermal power being taped, a
consortium of private and government agencies are planning to drill
even deeper wells in the hope to reaching super-critical steam heat 5
km below the surface that is 430-550 degrees C. Current wells can be
as deep as 2 km and cost $2 million each. The IDDP project, as it's
known, will cost $20 million. The payoff is not only super-heated
steam, but super-pressure as well, potentially 230-260 bar (3335-3770
psi). Conventional wells are 30 bar (430 psi)
Interestingly, according to a Foreign Affairs ministry official with
whom I spoke, power companies in Iceland have to sell both the
electricity and the steam to make a profit. So, the economics of
drilling fewer wells to get more power is very attractive.
According to Iceland New Energy's managing director, Jón Bjorn
Skulason, Iceland could power all its vehicle and marine fleet with
an estimated 4-5TWh/yr of electric power that would be converted into
hydrogen. That represents about half its current usage, but only a
10th of its potential energy output.
Of course, geothermal power is in its own way a finite resource. Like
oil wells, they can be over-produced. The estimate life of current
geothermal wells in Iceland is between 30-50 years, though it could
be longer. Fields do have to be managed and they aren't entirely
environmentally benign since they do bring up caustic minerals that
have to be re-injected in the field. Surprisingly, geothermal streams
also contain small amounts of carbon dioxide which is released into
the atmosphere, but as one expert explained to me, it's no more than
naturally would be released, albeit sooner than nature would have
allowed.
Iceland's challenge then is to find ways to make use of its energy
wealth without despoiling its environment. It's three aluminum
smelter plants, all owned by U.S. companies, are a case in point.
Because electric power is so cheap and abundant, it's an ideal
location to make aluminum, which is an energy intensive process and
not entirely emissions-free. CO2 is created and there is waste from
the smelting process, which we were told is dumped out into the
ocean. Many Icelanders aren't entirely happy with the smelters,
though they have contributed to the island's growing wealth. On a per
capita basis, Icelanders are some of the wealthiest people in Europe,
and the growth of private cars, including SUVs, and roaring real
estate prices testify to that.
Iceland is hoping to add one more export to its list of fish, fine
wool, chocolates, cosmetics and aluminum: geothermal energy
development. One expert calculated that just 0.1 percent of the heat
energy stored in the Earth's crust -- estimated at 5 billion
exajoules -- would be enough to power the entire planet for 13,500
years! We just have to figure out how to get to it efficiently,
economically, and in an environmentally responsible manner. That's
what Icelanders are hoping to do.
Iceland's Achilles Heel is its total dependence on outside
technology. With a population smaller than most medium-sized American
cities, they simply haven`t the resources to go it entirely on their
own. They are dependent on the outside world for all of their modern
technology from their steel-hulled trawlers to their aluminum
smelters to the corrugated sheet metal that clad their homes and
apartments. They have to trade to survive and find a way to wisely
use the energy with which they've been blessed.
That will be Iceland's biggest challenge.
http://www.evworld.com/view.cfm?section=article&storyid=1036
j2997
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Message 5
From: "janson2997" janson1997@yahoo.com
Date: Thu May 25, 2006 1:39am(PDT)
Subject: Here comes the sun: New solutions for world’s energy woes
Here comes the sun: New solutions for world's energy woes
FSU research could bring electricity to millions who now have none at
all
The number is staggering: Approximately 2 billion of the world's
people -- nearly one-third of the human population -- have no access
to electricity. Consequently, they do without many of the amenities
that people in the developed world take for granted -- everything
from air conditioning and refrigeration to television, indoor
lighting, and pumps that supply drinking water. And without
electricity to power factory operations or other commercial
endeavors, those 2 billion people remain mired in an endless cycle of
poverty.
One Florida State University researcher is working to break that
cycle through the development of new energy technologies that are
easy to install, environmentally sound and -- perhaps most
importantly -- inexpensive to produce. Anjane'yulu' Krothapalli holds
the Don Fuqua Eminent Scholar Chair of Engineering at FSU. He has
established a new research center at FSU, the Sustainable Energy
Science & Engineering Center (www.sesec.fsu.edu), which is developing
technologies that have the potential to transform much of the
developing world. Such technologies also could help the United States
and other developed nations deal with ever-rising energy costs and
combat the spread of global warming.
"The principles really are very simple," said Krothapalli, a
professor of mechanical engineering at the Florida A&M University-FSU
College of Engineering since 1983. "At SESEC, we are exploring ways
to combine existing technologies to convert solar radiation to heat;
to use that heat to produce steam to run a low-cost, highly efficient
turbine; and then to use the power generated by that turbine to run a
small electric generator. Individual homes could be equipped with
these technologies. So, rather than being connected to a vast power
transmission system, which is prohibitively expensive in much of the
world, individual homeowners would be able to generate the energy
they need."
What SESEC brings to the energy table, Krothapalli said, is the
ability to take existing technologies and find ways to make them
simple to install and operate, much cheaper to produce, and more
sensitive to the environment.
"For such a system to work in a rural village in India, for example,
it has to meet those criteria," he said. "It must be easy enough for
the average person to maintain, inexpensive enough for that person to
afford or his government to subsidize, and clean enough that it won't
exacerbate global warming."
To demonstrate the various technologies, plans are under way to build
a small, completely self-sustaining demonstration house in a parking
lot outside Krothapalli's office at the FSU Fluid Mechanics Research
Laboratory. The 800-square-foot facility, which will include both
living space and an office, will be constructed entirely out
of "green," or environmentally sensitive, materials, will produce
zero greenhouse-gas emissions, and will feature low-energy LED
lighting and other innovations.
The house's 5-kilowatt solar energy facility will even produce
hydrogen fuel to run a specially equipped automobile. The house will
serve as a precursor to the biannual "Solar Decathlon" competition
sponsored by the U.S. Department of Energy
(www.eere.energy.gov/solar_decathlon/).
Already, Krothapalli's work has generated considerable interest
around the world. Governmental officials from India, Brazil and a
number of other countries have contacted him to find out more, and he
travels regularly to conferences throughout the world to share his
ideas with fellow scientists and others.
His research also is bearing fruit in other ways. A patent for one of
his technological innovations was approved in 2005, and four others
now are under review. With a colleague, Brenton Greska, Krothapalli
recently formed an outside business, Sustainable Technology LLC, to
help bring some of the energy systems he is developing at FSU to the
marketplace. And his research has netted a $100,000 grant from FSU's
Cornerstone Program, as well as a second $100,000 award funded
jointly by the FSU Research Foundation and the FAMU-FSU College of
Engineering.
Although his research keeps him more than busy, Krothapalli still
keeps his eye on the bigger picture.
"The challenge is to fuel worldwide economic growth and a reliable
energy supply without despoiling our environment," he said. "At
SESEC, we're focusing on technologies that will ease some of the
burden that humanity places on our planet."
Weitere Informationen: www.eere.energy.gov/solar_decathlon/
www.eng.fsu.edu
http://www.innovationsreport.de/html/berichte/energie_elektrotechnik/b
ericht-60245.html
http://tinyurl.com/zw4o8
j2997
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Message 6
From: "janson2997" janson1997@yahoo.com
Date: Thu May 25, 2006 1:40am(PDT)
Subject: Finally, we agree on disaster of climate change
Finally, we agree on disaster of climate change
Email Print Normal font Large font By Julia Baird
May 25, 2006
Page 1 of 2 | Single page
Advertisement
Advertisement"THE debate is over. We know the science. We see the
threat posed by changes in our climate. And we know the time for
action is now." That was Arnold Schwarzenegger. Last year. You know
the climate change debate has changed radically when it is being
championed by the man whose steroid-riddled body portrayed post-
apocalyptic robots in the Terminator films.
And now, the man who refused to sign the Kyoto Protocol, John Howard,
has suddenly emerged as an advocate of drastic action to stop the
overheating of the Earth.
The nuclear energy debate this week has been fascinating and - no
matter what your thoughts on its use here - a relief of sorts. At
least we're all agreeing on one thing - global warming and climate
change are serious, and potentially catastrophic, problems. Serious
scientific research is no longer being misrepresented as a left-wing
beat-up propelled by mad greenies and anxious scientists. At last,
the vocal deniers are shrinking like the wicked witch of the west
drenched by a bucket of melting icecaps.
We now know that 19 of the world's 20 hottest years have occurred
since 1980 - the three hottest have all occurred since 1998. We know
that icecaps are melting, coral reefs are being bleached, floods are
more frequent and glaciers are disappearing, and that we can expect
more powerful hurricanes, drier land, more frequent fires and the
extinction of a growing number of species.
This week, a report by the Australian National University,
commissioned by the Federal Government, found that by 2100
temperatures could increase by almost 6 degrees - much more than
originally estimated. We need serious, probably painful and expensive
solutions. In light of this, many environmentalists have softened
their opposition to nuclear energy and urged further investigation or
broader use. In May 2004 the British environmentalist - and
originator of the Gaia hypothesis - James Lovelock shocked his
colleagues by
arguing passionately for a significant expansion of nuclear energy
because of the rapidity and urgency of climate change.
Lovelock has since been joined by several prominent environmental
scientists in the US and this month The New York Times leant its
weight to his stance, in an editorial headed "The Greening of Nuclear
Energy". It argued that the nuclear energy debate should be reopened
because uranium is abundant and cheap, and "nuclear energy can
replace fossil-fuel power plants for generating electricity, reducing
the carbon dioxide emissions that contribute heavily to global
warming. That could be important in large developing economies like
China's and India's, which would otherwise rely heavily on burning
large quantities of dirty coal and oil."
But what applies to the oil-guzzling US does not necessarily apply
here. Exporting uranium to rapidly expanding markets such as India
and China makes sense: they have soaring population numbers, little
coal, exponential economic growth and rocketing demand for
electricity. But we have plenty of gas, coal and coal-fired power
stations, and a small population. As Peter Costello pointed out, the
commercial imperative is slim.
And while the debate is important, we don't just need to plonk a few
billion-dollar plants on the coast or in the desert, particularly
when they will take decades to have any impact. The concerns about
bombs, disposal, waste storage and security are still valid - and the
memory of Three Mile Island and Chernobyl vivid.
What we need to do is get serious about our entire environmental
strategy, radically rethink our approach to energy and correct the
years of denial and neglect by our governments. We need to implement
all those other suggestions green groups have been promoting for
decades: renewable energy sources, solar energy, that unsigned
protocol, carbon taxes and credits, energy efficiency and investing
in wind, solar, geothermal and biomass energy like ethanol.
With wonderful timing, this week the palaeontologist Tim Flannery
received two awards at the NSW Premier's Literary Awards - the
Gleebooks Prize and the Book of the Year. His book The Weather
Makers: The History and Future Impact of Climate Change has been
on bestseller lists not just in Australia but also around the world.
When Flannery was in Canada recently, he described environmental
activism as a moral issue. He told The Globe and Mail: "I've got two
kids. What would their generation say if we sacrificed climate
stability and the polar regions and everything else, just so we could
drive big cars and continue wasting electricity? I mean, what sort of
morality is that? Those that say climate change doesn't exist, or it
doesn't matter or it's too expensive to do anything about, you have
to question what their moral framework is - where does it lie?"
Flannery concludes there is plenty we can do as individuals -
including installing solar power, seeking out green energy suppliers,
using low-power appliances and investigating fuel consumption before
buying cars. There's no reason to wait.
jbaird@smh.com.au
http://www.smh.com.au/news/opinion/finally-we-agree-on-disaster-of-
climate-change/2006/05/24/1148150325448.html#
http://tinyurl.com/eqsrn
j2997
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Message 7
From: "janson2997" janson1997@yahoo.com
Date: Thu May 25, 2006 1:43am(PDT)
Subject: Kicking Our Oil Addiction, Fixing Global Woes
Kicking Our Oil Addiction, Fixing Global Woes
By Bracken Hendricks and Ana Unruh Cohen
Special to washingtonpost.com
Wednesday, May 24, 2006; 12:00 AM
With average gas prices creeping toward $3.00 a gallon and oil
hovering at $70 a barrel, our dependence on oil has been at the top
of the news, becoming a defining political issue and a looming source
of voter discontent. The United States imports well over half of the
oil we use, spending a staggering $175.6 billion on imports last
year -- driving up the trade deficit and emboldening unfriendly
regimes awash in petrodollars. We consume a quarter of global oil but
possess less than 3% of reserves, leaving few options other than
increasing imports unless we enact policies that reduce our reliance
on oil.
But the challenges of oil are not limited to gasoline prices or
imports: They are truly global in nature. In much of the developing
world, reliance on oil has been devastating. The International Energy
Agency estimates that for every $10 hike in the cost of a barrel of
crude, the economy of an oil importing country in sub-Saharan Africa
is impacted more than ten times as much as the United States.
Furthermore, gains from debt forgiveness are being wiped out by
rising energy costs. For example, Ethiopia has spent the equivalent
of its entire debt write-off, or $1.3 billion, importing fuel over
the last three years. The environmental impacts of oil are perhaps
the most frightening of all. Each gallon of gasoline burned produces
about 20 pounds of the greenhouse gas carbon dioxide, adding to an
atmospheric concentration that is already higher than it has been in
the last 650,000 years and increasing the risks of climate
destablization.
In the face of all these problems -- what President Bush has called
an "addiction to oil" -- America faces a major test. Will we embrace
policies designed to prolong our reliance on oil, simply seeking to
drive down prices and extend supplies, or will we pair solutions to
oil security with answers to climate change? Not all oil security
solutions are created equal when examined through the lens of climate
security. As the nation decides on how to kick the oil habit,
policies must be adopted that reduce oil consumption (PDF) and
decrease greenhouse gas emissions. This must become the dual measure
of our success.
Until lately, energy legislation rarely aspired to meet this higher
standard, but recent developments may indicate a turning point. Two
weeks ago, House Democrats unveiled a crash program to transition
America to bio-fuels like bio-diesel and E-85, an 85% blend of
ethanol and gasoline, and to empower farmers in a future carbon
market. Last Wednesday Senate Democrats unveiled a plan to move
toward energy independence by 2020. The Senate plan is comprehensive
in its scope. It catches many of the good ideas that were orphaned in
recent years under this administration's focus on expanding oil
supply and consumption, and it rolls back the tax breaks and
giveaways to the oil companies of last summer's energy bill. But
perhaps most importantly of all, it explicitly links a comprehensive
domestic energy policy with measures that track carbon emissions and
their impact on the global climate.
These are promising starts, but bigger and bolder ideas are needed to
meet the challenges of oil at home and abroad.
Farm-based renewable energy, and in particular biobased fuels, have
the capacity today to deliver a secure and stable supply of fuel,
provide support for farmers, create long-term jobs for rural
communities, and make tangible reductions in greenhouse gas
emissions. American farmers are struggling to compete in today's
global marketplace, while an uneven international playing field in
agriculture keeps millions of small-scale producers in the developing
world mired in poverty. Farmers around the world share a common goal
and a mutual frustration: the inability of the global trading system
to deliver a fair market price for their products.
In Growing the World's Energy Future, the Center for American
Progress has proposed a plan to increase domestic farm revenues from
energy that would reverberate through the global economy in mutually
beneficial ways. Our energy program would boost our national security
by reducing oil imports and by linking U.S. agricultural
competitiveness to the alleviation of poverty and despair abroad --
two key elements in the appeal of terrorism in the developing world.
Many studies show that to preserve U.S. manufacturing jobs we must
rapidly convert our auto industry to produce more energy efficient
vehicles. One piece of the solution is a bill called "Health Care for
Hybrids." The Center has looked at legacy health care cost relief as
an incentive for investments in retooling U.S. plants to produce more
efficient cars and guaranteed fuel savings.
Another innovative strategy for moving off oil and rapidly driving
new technology to market is proposed by Center Distinguished Fellow
and former Senate Democratic Leader Tom Daschle and Sun Microsystems
founder Vinod Khosla. They have offered a new idea for calculating
fuel economy using a new Carbon Alternative Fuel Equivalent standard
(subscription required). This measure would guarantee that cars that
can run on ethanol actually use the fuel to displace gasoline,
ensuring real reductions in oil consumption. In fact, combining 85%
ethanol fuel with plug-in electric drive trains can achieve effective
fuel economies of hundreds of miles for every gallon of gasoline.
As long as we focus solely on oil, new solutions like mining the tar
sands of Alberta will seem like viable answers to our energy
problems, however disastrous they are to the climate. By linking oil
security and climate security, we can unleash real innovation. The
tide of political will is turning. It is time to demand real
leadership and serious investment. Time is short, and America is
ready for a change.
Bracken Hendricks is a Senior Fellow at the Center for American
Progress. Ana Unruh Cohen is the Director for Environmental Policy at
the Center for American Progress.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-
dyn/content/article/2006/05/23/AR2006052301291_pf.html
http://tinyurl.com/gvj5f
j2997
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Message 8
From: "janson2997" janson1997@yahoo.com
Date: Thu May 25, 2006 1:45am(PDT)
Subject: Energy security is a non-zero-sum game
Energy security is a non-zero-sum game
23/05/2006 20:14
MOSCOW, (Nikolai Kaveshnikov for RIA Novosti)
The next Russia-EU summit scheduled for May 25 is certain to discuss
energy. Russia and the European Union are connected not only by
pipelines, but also by the experience of cooperation within the
framework of the Energy Dialogue.
Unfortunately, the Russian-Ukrainian gas conflict has strengthened
the stand of those Europeans who distrust Russia and see what they
want to see rather than facts. According to them, Russia is using
energy deliveries for blackmailing those who reject its imperial
policies.
They refuse to see the economic essence of the conflict, or to admit
that Ukraine had paid a quarter of the market price for Russian gas
over the past ten years, and that it was Ukraine who started the
unauthorized withdrawal of Russian gas transported to Europe.
This selective European vision promoted the transformation of the
traditional thesis of energy security into "security from Russia."
The official EU stand formulated by the Council of Europe in late
March was more substantiated, yet it is difficult to accept some of
its arguments.
First, the EU has again proclaimed the task of diversifying energy
sources.
For the past few years, it has been trying to get the best of both
worlds, pressing for guarantees of increased energy deliveries from
Russia, while carrying on its energy diversification policy.
This reminds me of a bizarre declaration of love, when a man proposes
to a girl but warns her that he would continue diversifying his
private life. Moreover, Russia's attempts to diversify its gas export
routes are regarded as anti-European.
It would be better to build energy security on a balance of the
security of demand and offer. The security of the offer entails
guarantees of stable demand for the supplier's energy and opens the
door to large-scale investment in long-term projects.
Second, the EU has reaffirmed its intention to press Russia into
ratifying the Energy Charter Treaty, though it is badly balanced and
its ratification does not offer Russia any advantages. In particular,
it does not cover issues of importance to Russia, such as marine
transportation of oil and gas, trade in nuclear fuel, and the regime
of foreign investment into distribution networks.
The only argument in favor of ratification is the potential inflow of
foreign investment, which the ratification would allegedly guarantee.
But foreigners have long been investing in the Russian energy sector,
and the best examples of this are the Russian-British joint venture
TNK-BP, the Shtokman gas condensate field, and the North European Gas
Pipeline.
It is counterproductive to force unfavorable cooperation terms on a
partner. Energy security that is based on the interests of only
consumer states cannot be stable. It should also take into account
the interests of producers and transit countries.
Third, the EU has promised to do its best to spread the rules of its
common energy market to neighboring countries, including Russia. This
promise should be assessed not from the angle of Russian specifics or
falsely interpreted sovereignty, but in a purely pragmatic manner.
The goal of a common competitive gas market in the EU is to lower gas
prices for the end users. However, Russia's policy is to increase
prices in a controlled manner. The application of European rules to
Russia would put an end to the export monopoly of state-owned energy
giant Gazprom and to export control as such.
Most importantly, this will inevitably level off prices on
the "common Russian-European market." Russia is aware of the
potential economic consequences of increasing domestic gas prices to
Finland's level ($400 per 1,000 cu m).
In other words, the EU attempt to force its model of a market economy
on Russia is not an export of values, but "realpolitik" aimed at
lowering gas prices on the European market by undermining Russia's
competitiveness.
It is impossible to ensure one's security at someone else's expense.
A sustainable energy security system can be built only on equality
and respect for the interests of all parties, and on asset swaps at
all stages of energy production and supply. Russian energy supplies
to Europe will be ensured most reliably if Russian and European
companies jointly control and get profits along the entire gas route
from the well in West Siberia to the gas stove in Scotland.
And lastly, energy security should not be limited to hydrocarbons.
There is a huge potential for joint projects in nuclear power (the
Russian initiative of creating a network of international uranium
enrichment centers), energy efficiency, and the development of
alternative energy sources in energy-hungry developing countries.
Moreover, an exchange of technologies could pave the way to joint
research and educational projects. The Russian state concern for
nuclear-generated electrical and thermal energy (Rosenergoatom) and
British Nuclear Fuels Ltd. are implementing joint projects of
training nuclear power plant personnel.
The Russian and European business is acting more constructively than
diplomats, who should probably take the cue from business in this
case.
Nikolai Kaveshnikov is a researcher with the Europe Institute at the
Russian Academy of Sciences.
The opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and
may not necessarily represent the opinions of the editorial board.
http://en.rian.ru/analysis/20060523/48495098-print.html
j2997
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Message 9
From: "janson2997" janson1997@yahoo.com
Date: Thu May 25, 2006 1:51am(PDT)
Subject: Focus shifts to hydrogen power.
Focus shifts to hydrogen power.
By TERRY GANEY of the Tribune's staff
Published Monday, May 22, 2006
SunTigerVI might be the last solar-powered vehicle that engineering
students at the University of Missouri-Columbia will ever build.
Tribune file photo
SunTigerVI competed in the 2,500-mile summer Solar Challenge in 2005.
The solar-powered car might be the last one built at MU.
Hydrogen power appears to be replacing solar energy for future
national automobile competitions for engineering students at
universities across the country. As a result, engineering students at
an MU lab are making plans for a car powered by a hydrogen fuel cell.
Since 1993, MU has participated in the national Solar Challenge, in
which sun-powered vehicles compete in a cross-country endurance
contest. But the U.S. Department of Energy is apparently shifting
financial support away from the event.
"Apparently the race is off," said Rick Whelove, faculty advisor for
the MU team. "We had not received any word as to the next event.
Since no new rules have been posted and nothing has been said, we
assume that's what has happened. The event has just sort of died."
The MU solar car finished eighth last July in a 2,495-mile race from
Austin, Texas to Calgary, Canada. Eighteen teams from universities
around the country competed in the race, which usually takes place
every two years. Usually after such events, the teams get together
and compare notes.
"We consider rule adjustments and critique the event," Whelove
said. "We just kept waiting and waiting, and there was no word from
the American Solar Challenge promoters."
Because nothing has been forthcoming, many people believe future
solar-powered contests are ended. At the same time, Whelove said, the
energy department has shifted emphasis to encourage construction of
energy-saving dwellings.
Paul Hirtz, assistant director of the University of Missouri-Rolla
Student Design and Experiential Learning Center, said the solar-
powered car competition might be off entirely or merely delayed for a
few years.
"The Department of Energy has suggested we take a three-year pause on
solar racing," Hirtz said. "And there has been a suggestion of making
hydrogen cells a regular part of the event."
Hirtz believes someone might step in to assume sponsorship of the
North American car competition.
"The race may take a slightly different focus," Hirtz said. "It may
require the use of hydrogen as part of the energy storage system."
Whelove, a mechanical engineering instructor, said the MU team has
decided to develop a hydrogen-power car, although the rules for a
competition have yet to be announced.
"We've got a basic design," Whelove said. "We've got a good, strong
organization supported by the college and the university, and we've
got a number of excellent and brilliant students. We're just not sure
what's going to happen."
http://www.showmenews.com/2006/May/20060522News003.asp
j2997
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Message 10
From: "janson2997" janson1997@yahoo.com
Date: Thu May 25, 2006 1:58am(PDT)
Subject: TV ads that doubt climate change are 'misleading'
TV ads that doubt climate change are 'misleading'
By Andrew Buncombe in Washington
Published: 25 May 2006
A senior scientist has condemned as "a deliberate effort to mislead"
a series of television adverts produced by an oil industry-funded
lobbying group that seeks to portray concern over global warming as
alarmism.
The adverts, produced by the Competitive Enterprise Institute (CEI),
seek to argue that despite widespread agreement about the growing
evidence of climate change, other evidence suggests the opposite. The
adverts catchphrase says: "Carbon dioxide - they call it pollution,
we call it life."
But a scientist whose report about the Antarctic ice-sheet is
featured in the adverts has denounced the CEI and said they have
quoted his study out of context. Professor Curt Davis of the
University of Missouri-Columbia, said: "I think they are confusing
and misleading the public."
Asked if he doubted the evidence of global warming, he
replied: "Personally, I have no doubts whatsoever." Mr Davis's June
2005 study examined the ice-sheets of east Antarctic which showed an
increase in mass. However, he said his study did not look at coastal
areas which are known to be losing ice and said the "fact that the
interior ice sheet is growing is a predicted consequence of global
warming".
Green campaigners have long accused the CEI of producing misleading
and inaccurate claims about global warming and the role of mankind's
use of fossil fuels. In reality, there is a broad scientific
consensus that the planet is warming and that human activity is an
important factor in this change. Last year, the national academies of
science from the UK, US, Japan and other nations cited "strong
evidence that significant global warming is occurring" and that "it
is likely that most of the warming in recent decades can be
attributed to human activities".
Kert Davies, a Washington-based campaigner with Greenpeace,
said: "The bottom line is that we are seeing a series of last gasps
from the sceptics. They are losing ground so quickly. They are so
laughable they do not need to be parodied."
David Doniger, the climate policy director with the Natural Resources
Defence Council, said climate change sceptics did not even
represent "the minority ... they're the fringe". He added: "It's the
same as with tobacco. To claim that fossil fuel emissions don't cause
global warming is like saying cigarettes don't cause cancer."
The CEI has powerful friends. The organisation has received more than
$1.5m (£800,000) in funding from ExxonMobil, the world's biggest oil
company, to help fund its efforts to question the evidence of climate
change.
Last year The Independent revealed how one of the CEI's officials was
behind a lobbying effort to undermine support for the Kyoto treaty
among European nations. The plan sought to bring together
corporations, academics, commentators and lobbyists to undermine EU
support for the treaty. The official, Chris Horner, met with
representatives from a number of leading companies including
Lufthansa, Ford Europe and the German utility giant RWE. Mr Horner
said his approaches failed to interest the corporations.
Myron Ebell, CEI's director of global warming policy - who was
censured by the House of Commons last year after criticising the
Government's chief scientist - defended the adverts and
said "alarmists were swamping the ability to have a reasonable
debate". He dismissed Mr Davis' claim that his Antarctic study had
been misrepresented and said the media chose to report only reports
which highlighted the evidence of climate change and ignored those
that questioned it. He said: "There is no consensus about the extent
of the warming or the consequences."
A senior scientist has condemned as "a deliberate effort to mislead"
a series of television adverts produced by an oil industry-funded
lobbying group that seeks to portray concern over global warming as
alarmism.
The adverts, produced by the Competitive Enterprise Institute (CEI),
seek to argue that despite widespread agreement about the growing
evidence of climate change, other evidence suggests the opposite. The
adverts catchphrase says: "Carbon dioxide - they call it pollution,
we call it life."
But a scientist whose report about the Antarctic ice-sheet is
featured in the adverts has denounced the CEI and said they have
quoted his study out of context. Professor Curt Davis of the
University of Missouri-Columbia, said: "I think they are confusing
and misleading the public."
Asked if he doubted the evidence of global warming, he
replied: "Personally, I have no doubts whatsoever." Mr Davis's June
2005 study examined the ice-sheets of east Antarctic which showed an
increase in mass. However, he said his study did not look at coastal
areas which are known to be losing ice and said the "fact that the
interior ice sheet is growing is a predicted consequence of global
warming".
Green campaigners have long accused the CEI of producing misleading
and inaccurate claims about global warming and the role of mankind's
use of fossil fuels. In reality, there is a broad scientific
consensus that the planet is warming and that human activity is an
important factor in this change. Last year, the national academies of
science from the UK, US, Japan and other nations cited "strong
evidence that significant global warming is occurring" and that "it
is likely that most of the warming in recent decades can be
attributed to human activities".
Kert Davies, a Washington-based campaigner with Greenpeace,
said: "The bottom line is that we are seeing a series of last gasps
from the sceptics. They are losing ground so quickly. They are so
laughable they do not need to be parodied."
David Doniger, the climate policy director with the Natural Resources
Defence Council, said climate change sceptics did not even
represent "the minority ... they're the fringe". He added: "It's the
same as with tobacco. To claim that fossil fuel emissions don't cause
global warming is like saying cigarettes don't cause cancer."
The CEI has powerful friends. The organisation has received more than
$1.5m (£800,000) in funding from ExxonMobil, the world's biggest oil
company, to help fund its efforts to question the evidence of climate
change.
Last year The Independent revealed how one of the CEI's officials was
behind a lobbying effort to undermine support for the Kyoto treaty
among European nations. The plan sought to bring together
corporations, academics, commentators and lobbyists to undermine EU
support for the treaty. The official, Chris Horner, met with
representatives from a number of leading companies including
Lufthansa, Ford Europe and the German utility giant RWE. Mr Horner
said his approaches failed to interest the corporations.
Myron Ebell, CEI's director of global warming policy - who was
censured by the House of Commons last year after criticising the
Government's chief scientist - defended the adverts and
said "alarmists were swamping the ability to have a reasonable
debate". He dismissed Mr Davis' claim that his Antarctic study had
been misrepresented and said the media chose to report only reports
which highlighted the evidence of climate change and ignored those
that questioned it. He said: "There is no consensus about the extent
of the warming or the consequences."
http://news.independent.co.uk/environment/article571678.ece
j2997
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Message 11
From: "janson2997" janson1997@yahoo.com
Date: Thu May 25, 2006 2:36am(PDT)
Subject: Solution to Greenhouse Gases Is New Nuclear Plants, Bush Says
Solution to Greenhouse Gases Is New Nuclear Plants, Bush Says
By JIM RUTENBERG
LIMERICK, Pa., May 24 — With Democrats seizing the national stage on
gasoline prices and the environment, President Bush came here
Wednesday to take it back, calling for the construction of more
nuclear power plants to help reduce the greenhouse gases believed to
contribute to global warming.
"Let's quit the debate about whether greenhouse gases are caused by
mankind or by natural causes; let's just focus on technologies that
deal with the issue," Mr. Bush told workers at the Limerick
Generating Station, a nuclear power plant here in Montgomery
County. "Nuclear power will help us deal with the issue of greenhouse
gases."
Since the 2000 presidential campaign, Democrats have accused Mr.
Bush, who grew up in the Texas oil country and was in the business,
of being too cozy with the petroleum industry. He and his fellow
Republicans had previously shrugged off such charges, as well as
those from environmental groups that his administration was ignoring
scientific findings on global warming and human involvement in its
causes.
But during this crucial election year for Republicans, Democrats have
been trying to place the blame for high gas prices at the feet of Mr.
Bush and his Congressional allies.
Speaking in front of this hamlet's twin nuclear cooling towers on
Wednesday, Mr. Bush promoted the 2005 energy bill he signed into law,
which provides tax incentives, loan guarantees and federal risk
insurance for companies building nuclear plants. Before the law, he
said, only 2 companies were considering building plants, but now 16
are.
"For the sake of economic security and national security," he
said, "the United States of America must aggressively move forward
with the construction of nuclear power plants."
Mr. Bush also spoke of his administration's efforts to research
alternative energy sources, like solar panels, ethanol and wind
turbines. He said of the last, "They ought to put one big one in
Washington, D.C."
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/05/25/washington/25bush.html?
pagewanted=print
http://tinyurl.com/fsdux
j2997
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Message 12
From: "janson2997" janson1997@yahoo.com
Date: Thu May 25, 2006 2:40am(PDT)
Subject: Study predicts significant climate change
Study predicts significant climate change
DURHAM, N.C., April 20 (UPI) -- A Duke University study says the
earth will undergo significant climate change in the coming century
but not as extreme as some fear due to global warming.
"This still commits us to quite a bit of climate change, but it
leaves the door open to avoiding the largest and most devastating
consequences," says Gabriele C. Hegerl, a climate expert at Duke,
reports The Washington Post.
The climate change will occur because of greenhouse gas buildups
caused by atmospheric carbon dioxide levels, says the study.
The study, appearing in Thursday's issue of the journal Nature,
sought to refine the "climate sensitivity" value or the average
global temperature change resulting from the doubling of carbon
dioxide levels.
Past studies, using data gathered over the past century, have put the
value in the range of about 2.5 degrees to 8 degrees Fahrenheit.
The new study, which is based on data from the past 700 years, says
climate sensitivity almost certainly falls within the more
conventional range of current predictions, with only a 5 percent
chance that it will exceed 11 degrees Fahrenheit.
A spokesperson at the National Center for Atmospheric Research in
Boulder, Colo., told The Post, "It's a very solid piece of science."
Copyright 2006 by United Press International. All Rights Reserved.
http://www.sciencedaily.com/upi/index.php?feed=Science&article=UPI-1-
20060420-10334300-bc-us-climatechange.xml
http://tinyurl.com/pb5pk
j2997
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Message 13
From: "janson2997" janson1997@yahoo.com
Date: Thu May 25, 2006 2:44am(PDT)
Subject: Nanotech Dilemma
Nanotech Dilemma
Readers will notice an interesting juxtaposition in today's three
stories. The lead article explores the toxicity questions raised by
the use of nanomaterials in consumer products, such as sunscreens and
cosmetics, in which ultrafine particles are incorporated into the
formulations. The other two articles look at a completely different
face of nanotechnology: one explores the use of nano-structured
materials to improve batteries, and the third one looks at research
into using carbon nanotubes for neural prosthetics, including
artificial retinas as an aid to those suffering from the devastating
effects of macular degeneration, the leading cause of blindness in
the elderly.
So, there you have it: the dilemma facing the nanotech community.
Legitimate concerns over the use of nanoparticles in sunscreens
could, at least in the public mind, overwhelm efforts to use carbon
nanotubes to restore sight or to make a more practical hybrid car.
The debate over the safety of nanotechnology is often compared to the
one over biotech foods and crops. Although the comparison doesn't
always hold up, the biotech controversy does provide a useful lesson.
One of the initial products of the so-called ag biotech industry was
a recombinant form of bovine somatotropin (rBST) that Monsanto
introduced to increase milk production in cows. The problem, from a
public perspective, was that milk was already cheap and there was no
great need to increase production -- and who wanted another hormone
in their milk? In the aftermath of the rBST debate, Monsanto never
regained its credibility as it rolled out more ag biotech products.
The nanotech community should pay attention. It's not that the public
can't understand or deal with the risks of a new technology like
nanotechnology. But they do need to know what are the benefits. Do
nanotech cosmetics really provide the kinds of benefits that outweigh
the risks?
http://www.technologyreview.com/blog/rotman/posts.aspx?id=16903
j2997
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Message 14
From: "janson2997" janson1997@yahoo.com
Date: Thu May 25, 2006 2:49am(PDT)
Subject: Full-filling
The Engineer OnlineThursday - 25 May 2006Environment
Full-filling
Source: The Engineer
Energy experts at Aston University have joined forces with UK waste
company Biffa to investigate a new method of recovering energy from
landfill sites.
Biffa, which operates over 30 of the UK's landfill sites, currently
uses gas from these sites to power engines that generate electricity.
However, tighter regulations, along with the changing nature of the
waste that ends up in these sites, have driven Biffa to investigate
more efficient methods of recovering energy from landfill.
The company has therefore teamed up with Aston's Bio-Energy Research
Group (BERG) to investigate the potential of pyrolysis, a process
that heats organic waste to high temperatures in the absence of
oxygen and converts it into gaseous or liquid fuel.
Prof Tony Bridgewater, who heads up the Aston group, said the
technique has a distinct advantage over existing methods. 'If you
turn waste into a liquid then in principle you can run the engines on
liquids. The great beauty is that it can be stored and transported
which you can't do with a gas — you can't just close a valve on a
landfill site.'
But while the technique certainly holds promise, one of the chief
aims of the four-year project, which is jointly funded by Biffa and
the EPSRC, is to find out exactly how effective it is likely to
be. 'We don't know yet what the impact is of the contaminants on both
the yield and the quality of the oil.
'The whole idea is to find out what can be done using processed waste
as a raw material,' said Bridgewater. 'The yield will partly be a
function of how much non-organic waste there is in the materials and
also what effect that material has on the processing conditions,' he
added.
One of the driving factors behind the project is the changing
composition of landfill waste. 'People are throwing in less biogenic
fraction — things like food, cardboard and paper. The composition
also changes over the year because of moisture content and people's
eating habits, and from place to place,' said Bridgewater. The
diminishing organic and moisture content of this waste is leading to
lower rates of waste decay and a decline in landfill gas production.
Photo: Edward Moss
BERG will now begin testing a number of different waste streams in
its own pyrolysis equipment to evaluate the potential of the
technique for landfill sites. Bridgewater explained how the equipment
will be used: 'We basically want to heat the biogenic materials of a
small size as quickly as possible to a carefully controlled
temperature of around 500degrees C, then we rapidly cool the vapours
so that the overall processing time is in the order of one or two
seconds.'
This will not be the first time pyrolysis has been used for waste
disposal. The process is currently utilised at much higher
temperatures to reduce the quantity of waste to be disposed and
generate vapours that can be burned or used to raise steam for power
generation. However, the idea of running it as a fast pyrolysis
process for making liquid rather than gases is, said Bridgewater,
relatively new.
http://www.theengineer.co.uk/liChannelID/8/Articles/294623/Full-
filling+.htm
http://tinyurl.com/jeyh3
j2997
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Message 15
From: "janson2997" janson1997@yahoo.com
Date: Thu May 25, 2006 2:52am(PDT)
Subject: Kicking the fossil fuel habit
The Engineer OnlineThursday - 25 May 2006Energy & Utilities
Kicking the fossil fuel habit
Source: The Engineer
Better batteries for hybrid cars are one goal for scientists planning
to use supercomputers to model new materials at the nano-scale.
They are imitating the way the pharmaceutical industry makes new
drugs, by investigating the chemical and physical properties of new
nano-materials in the virtual realm before creating real samples.
'New materials hold the key to cleaner and lighter lithium batteries
for hybrid electric cars which will help kick the fossil fuel habit,'
said Prof Saiful Islam at Bath University's chemistry department. The
cobalt used in lithium batteries for mobiles and other portable
devices is too expensive and toxic for larger cells so the search is
on for a replacement.
In collaboration with Johnson Matthey, AEA Batteries, Mast Carbon and
St Andrews University, Islam's team aims to design novel compounds
that increase the total energy the batteries can store and make them
better at producing sudden boosts in power. The Bath group has access
to supercomputers at the Rutherford and Daresbury labs for modelling
and understanding the new materials. It will be looking at the
surfaces of nano-structured oxides. 'At the nano-scale the surfaces
of the structures become important,' said Islam.
Unusually, the findings from the computational work will be fed to
the St Andrews team which will focus on chemical
experimentation. 'Then we can help the interpretation of the
experiments, identify which directions of research are likely to be
dead ends and predict new avenues and materials,' said Islam. Their
starting points are the existing classes of materials on the cathode
side such as layered oxides that allow lithium ions to enter and be
released.
The work is part of a £2.1m government-funded project to develop
energy storage technology. Researchers at Strathclyde and Surrey
Universities are examining supercapacitors. 'Batteries are very good
at energy density but not so good at releasing it quickly,' said
Islam. 'Supercapacitors can release it quickly so the hope is to
integrate the two technologies.' This research will also be important
for methods of storing energy from renewable sources such as solar
and wind power. 'If we don't develop an efficient way of storing
energy from renewable sources it will be the equivalent of a water
company only supplying tap water when it's raining,' said Islam.
http://www.theengineer.co.uk/liChannelID/7/Articles/294622/Kicking+the
+fossil+fuel+habit+.htm
http://tinyurl.com/enj5p
j2997
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Message 16
From: "janson2997" janson1997@yahoo.com
Date: Thu May 25, 2006 3:03am(PDT)
Subject: US House votes to dole out $24.4 billion to DOE in fiscal 2007
US House votes to dole out $24.4 billion to DOE in fiscal 2007
Washington (Platts)--24May2006
The US House of Representatives Wednesday night passed a fiscal 2007
spending bill that allocates $24.4 billion to the Energy Department.
The bill passed by a 404 to 20 vote after lawmakers beat back
several
efforts to extract congressional earmarks from the measure.
In one of a handful of amendendments that was approved, the
House added
$49.5 million to the State Energy Program after David Hobson, the
chairman of
the Energy and Water Development Subcommittee, tried to eliminate
funding for
it earlier in the month.
Hobson, Republican-Ohio, said the program, which pays for state
energy
efficiency projects, is "another pork-filled program for governors."
But
others argued the program offered important energy savings and
leveraged
further efficiency investments.
Overall, the bill allocates $5.5 billion to environmental clean-
up; $4.1
billion to science programs, which are a major Bush administration
priority;
$1.3 billion for energy efficiency and renewable energy; $558 million
to coal,
oil and natural gas research; and $530 million to nuclear energy.
It also devotes $544 million for the Yucca Mountain nuclear waste
repository in Nevada and an additional $30 million for storage of
waste above
ground at centralized sites.
The House approved the Appropriation Committee's plan to slash
to $120
million the president's $250 million proposal to develop advanced
nuclear
waste recycling facilities and modern reactors. But they defeated an
amendment
to further cut the "Global Nuclear Energy Partnership" by $40
million.
The Senate will likely take up the bill next month. The two
chambers will
try to reconcile their bills later this year.
http://www.platts.com/Natural%20Gas/News/9904469.xml?t=fuelcell%
20energy
http://tinyurl.com/jnkf9
j2997
________________________________________________________________________
________________________________________________________________________
Message 17
From: "janson2997" janson1997@yahoo.com
Date: Thu May 25, 2006 3:07am(PDT)
Subject: The Global Nuclear Energy Partnership: A Roadmap to Energy Security
The Global Nuclear Energy Partnership: A Roadmap to Energy Security
by Samuel Wright Bodman
U.S. Secretary of Energy
There are three programs intended to enhance our level of energy
security and diversity in the United States by promoting safe,
emissions-free nuclear power: Generation IV, Nuclear Power 2010 and
last year's Energy Policy Act provisions for federal risk insurance.
With these progressions, we are taking our next, and perhaps our
boldest, steps.
A short time ago, our administration announced the Global Nuclear
Energy Partnership, or GNEP, as part of President Bush's Advanced
Energy Initiative. This initiative arises directly from the
president's belief that science and technology will lead us to
cleaner and better sources of energy. Innovation will propel us
toward new ways to heat our homes, power our cars, run our
businesses, preserve our environment and, therefore, ensure a safer,
more secure future.
Combined with the president's other major announcement, the American
Competitiveness Initiative, this effort recognizes that to maintain
our country's economic preeminence in an increasingly competitive
world, we simply must maintain our scientific and technological
superiority. And doing so requires a substantial and sustained
investment. In fact, the president has committed to doubling the
amount of federal spending on physical science research over the next
10 years.
This kind of investment in science and technology will be critical to
the success of GNEP, a groundbreaking international effort to expand
emissions-free nuclear energy with new technologies that effectively,
and safely, recycle spent nuclear fuel without producing separated
plutonium. There are several major advantages to such a process.
First, the energy benefits are enormous. Nuclear power already
produces vast quantities of electricity relative to the amount of
fuel required. But the potential energy we could produce from new, so-
called fast reactors using recycled fuel is even greater.
Right now, the nuclear material we dispose of from once-through
reactors retains up to 90 percent of its energy. This is an enormous
amount of nuclear waste. I don't see why – if there is a better way –
we should go through so much effort to bury so much valuable nuclear
fuel under a mountain.
Processing spent uranium fuel for use in advanced reactors would
allow us to extract much more energy from the same amount of nuclear
material. At the same time, we would also vastly reduce both the
volume and the radiotoxicity of the waste that ultimately requires
disposal. This means that rather than requiring another five, six or
ten Yucca Mountains over the coming decades just to meet our nuclear
disposal needs, we will need just one site.
At the same time, because the process will consume – rather than
separate – plutonium, proliferation risks will be significantly
reduced. Currently, 200 metric tons of separated plutonium is stored
at various sites around the world. These excesses are produced by
other nations' civilian nuclear power plants. Putting this material
back into reactors as fuel would greatly reduce the risk that it
might be stolen or seized for destructive purposes.
Finally, the partnership arrangement between fuel-cycle and reactor-
only states envisioned by GNEP will help supply the world with clean
electrical power. The agreement will offer non-fuel-cycle nations
commercially competitive and reliable access to nuclear fuel in
exchange for their commitment to forgo the development of enrichment
and recycling technologies.
If we are successful in fully implementing GNEP, we will be able to
increase energy security both here in the United States and abroad,
encourage clean economic development around the world and improve the
overall health of the environment.
These are ambitious and far-reaching goals. Indeed, I realize some
people may think we are being too ambitious.
We have not built a new nuclear power plant in this country in 30
years. Getting the first new plants sited, licensed and built, while
also resolving the challenges of building a permanent waste
depository, should be more than enough to keep us busy for the
foreseeable future. Under the new Energy Policy Act, we have
opportunities for nuclear power that we haven't had for a long time.
According to critics, we should capitalize on these advantages
without getting involved in something bigger.
I can understand this thinking. But in the final analysis, I cannot
agree with it. GNEP will not interfere with our more immediate plans
to see several new nuclear power plants built in the United States.
Getting the first new reactors underway is important – even vital.
Our administration is dedicated to following through on our Nuclear
Power 2010 plans. We are also dedicated to overcoming the challenges
regarding Yucca Mountain.
Having said that, I think that if one looks at the long-term trends
unfolding in the United States and the world, it will become clear
these more immediate plans are necessary. However, they are not
sufficient to meet the greater challenges we will face in the next
10, 20 or 50 years.
The first question we face, as other nations are moving ahead with
nuclear power, is whether we want to stay at the leading edge of this
development. We can help guide it, or we can stand by.
Right now, 130 new reactors are under construction or consideration
around the world. The explanation for this is simple. The world needs
more energy and less carbon.
Indeed, people everywhere are coming to see nuclear energy not only
as an acceptable or a responsible choice, but as a desirable one.
Important Questions
Will the accelerated pursuit of nuclear power emphasize commerce and
cooperation, or will it involve a chaotic scramble to make use of the
world's most dangerous materials? Will the global development of
nuclear energy follow a path that is safe? Will it recognize both the
promise and the danger of splitting the atom? In other words, will
this interest in nuclear technology, which is demonstrated by states
like North Korea and Iran, take place with or without the substantial
benefits and security that GNEP offers?
To clarify what I mean by that, and to explain why GNEP is not merely
advantageous but necessary, I invite you consider some of the major
events unfolding in the world and some of the challenges we face as a
nation.
First and foremost, we must always be concerned about the safety of
our nation and its people. To ensure this, we need the strongest
possible safeguards to prevent the proliferation of nuclear
technologies, materials and expertise. Keeping nuclear and
radiological weapons out of the hands of terrorists is one of our
most urgent priorities – not just for the United States, but for the
civilized world at large.
Another national security consideration is the dependence
industrialized nations of the world have on oil. As the president
noted in his State of the Union address, it is a commodity that is
currently essential to our economies, but so often imported from
unstable parts of the world. One concern is the wealth and influence
that oil provides to regimes that may not always have the best
interests of the world's democracies at heart.
A third global challenge involves the issue of national security more
broadly. Even if we were able to quickly and resoundingly defeat the
terrorist threat we currently face, we would still be confronted with
the desperate, grinding poverty that grips so much of the world.
What developed nations should, or indeed can, do about this poverty
raises complex political and moral questions. But it also raises
national security considerations, in the sense that the most
underdeveloped and "failed" states have frequently served as safe
havens for terrorists and other fanatics. Think of the Taliban regime
in Afghanistan or Osama bin Laden's forays into chaotic Sudan.
But if these underdeveloped nations are ever to build thriving
economies and achieve lasting prosperity, they will need, perhaps
above all else, access to affordable and reliable energy supplies,
particularly electricity.
Finally, there is the global challenge that confronts us regarding
the environment. Even if we were to suddenly discover massive new
reserves of oil within the territory of the United States that would
allow us to eliminate all of our oil imports, we would still have to
deal with the pollution and greenhouse gases emitted by burning
fossil fuel. Not to mention the pollution caused by other nations
would still be a looming problem.
To summarize, these are some of the most critical challenges we face:
the proliferation of nuclear materials, the political concerns over
oil dependency, the need to reduce poverty through economic growth,
and curbing or even eliminating the pollution and greenhouse gases
emitted by using fossil fuels.
The message I want to drive home today is that GNEP represents a
multilayered and sophisticated plan to address, at least in part, all
of these challenges.
Appropriate Response
These problems are not going away. The choice that confronts us today
is not whether to respond to these challenges, but how we will react
and adapt to our changing world.
We could respond to these problems in a haphazard, piecemeal and
inconsistent way. We could focus on one or two of them and let the
others fester, putting them off until a time when they have grown
more difficult and less manageable. Or we can find a better way.
For instance, we can leave open the loophole in our current
nonproliferation framework that allows states to pursue nuclear
weapons work under the pretense of developing a fuel cycle for
peaceful energy purposes. Or we can use GNEP to close that loophole.
We can continue to rely on unstable, sometimes unfriendly, nations to
fuel the world's transportation sector. Or we can develop new
technologies and set the stage for massive new sources of electricity
to power our cars and trucks, and work toward ending our dependence
on oil.
We can abandon the world's underdeveloped nations to poverty and
squalor and stand by while they struggle to meet their growing energy
needs with fossil fuels. Or we can work in cooperation with other
nuclear fuel-cycle states to provide these nations with commercially
attractive, safe and proliferation-resistant sources of nuclear
energy.
Finally, we can choose to continue pouring carbon and other
greenhouse gases into the atmosphere, or we can join the growing
global consensus that acknowledges nuclear power's enormous
environmental advantages. Electricity use in the developing world is
predicted to increase 125 percent by 2025. Generating this power
entirely with coal would mean 5 billion tons of additional CO2
emissions each year. Supplying the same amount of electricity with
nuclear reactors would, of course, generate no emissions.
I do not mean to suggest GNEP is a magic bullet that will wipe out
all of our problems. In fact, implementing GNEP will require
overcoming some serious obstacles.
Still, we must overcome these hurdles. GNEP represents the next,
necessary step in the nuclear era, which is a time in which the truly
awesome potential of nuclear power could finally be able to flourish.
One reason I am excited and optimistic about GNEP is the fact the
most substantial obstacles we face are technological. I am almost
tempted to say "merely technological." As we look around us, we see
there are many things in the world we would like to accomplish that
appear beyond our control. Humankind, unfortunately, has always been
plagued by folly, cruelty and corruption. But applying innovation and
ingenuity to difficult technical challenges is something we can do.
In fact, it is something at which Americans have always excelled. Our
history, and our great economic success, is in many ways the story of
American commitment to innovation and our capacity for technological
progress.
Side by side with this legendary ingenuity and independence, we have
also shown an unparalleled capacity to marshal our resources in the
service of great national purposes. In the last century, we fought
two world wars, survived the Great Depression, put a man on the moon,
and brought the Cold War to a peaceful conclusion. We did so by
standing shoulder to shoulder and working hard together to do what
none of us could have done individually.
I believe we can once again confront and overcome our most urgent
challenges. This time, we can do so on a global scale. We can
overcome problems that are global in scope and require nothing less
than concerted, international action.
The members of GNEP envision a world in which all responsible nations
work together to share the benefits of peaceful nuclear power. If we
succeed in these measures, we will be able to do so much: provide
vast quantities of affordable electricity, increase energy diversity,
promote economic development, reduce pollution and carbon emissions,
curtail nuclear waste and significantly reduce the risk of nuclear
terrorism.
These are enormous goals that will require an enormous effort,
dedication and perseverance. Those sterling qualities will be without
effective purpose unless they are given direction and guidance. We
need a roadmap with a deliberative, cooperative and considered plan
to direct our exertions and achieve the goals I have described. I
believe GNEP is that roadmap.
Samuel Wright Bodman was sworn in as the 11th secretary of energy on
February 1, 2005, after the U.S. Senate unanimously confirmed him on
January 31, 2005. He leads the Department of Energy with a budget in
excess of $23 billion and more than 100,000 federal and contractor
employees.
http://www.worldenergysource.com/articles%2Ftext%2Fbodman%5FWE%5Fv9n1%
2Ecfm
http://tinyurl.com/s2m6s
j2997
________________________________________________________________________
________________________________________________________________________
Message 18
From: "janson2997" janson1997@yahoo.com
Date: Thu May 25, 2006 3:23am(PDT)
Subject: House bill reduces nuclear power funding
House bill reduces nuclear power funding
Spending measure includes $130 million for reprocessing, cutting
Bush's plan in half
By H. Josef Hebert
ASSOCIATED PRESS
WASHINGTON - The House late Wednesday scaled back President Bush's
ambitious plan to resume nuclear fuel reprocessing as part of an
international program to boost nuclear power.
A broad spending bill, passed 404-20 and sent to the Senate, cuts
Bush's request for the first installment of the nuclear initiative in
half, to about $130 million. An attempt to slash it by an additional
$40 million was rejected.
The $30 billion spending measure funds the Energy Department, related
agencies and numerous federal water projects.
While lawmakers expressed skepticism about the nuclear fuel recycling
proposals, dubbed the Global Nuclear Energy Partnership, they plan to
resume full funding for development of a nuclear waste dump at Yucca
Mountain in Nevada after several years of reduced spending on the
program.
The Yucca project, which has yet to receive a license from the
Nuclear Regulatory Commission, is years behind schedule with no firm
date for completion. It is designed to hold 77,000 tons of used
reactor fuel from commercial power plants and defense facilities.
The bill provides $545 million for Yucca in fiscal 2007 beginning in
October, an increase of $95 million over this year. It is the amount
the president had requested.
The House action came on a day that Bush, touring the Limerick
nuclear power plant in Pennsylvania, called the expansion of nuclear
power and more construction of commercial reactors essential "for the
sake of economic security and national security."
He urged Congress to give him the full $250 million for the Global
Nuclear Energy Partnership.
The Senate is likely to do just that. Sen. Pete Domenici, R-N.M., who
heads the subcommittee that deals with energy funding, said he
planned to possibly seek more than $250 million.
If he succeeds, the different spending levels would have to be
reconciled.
The Global Nuclear Energy Partnership calls for stepped-up research
into reprocessing nuclear fuel, instead of using it once and then
disposing it eventually in the planned Yucca Mountain repository.
It would establish an international program under which the United
States would provide reactor fuel to other countries and then
retrieve it for reprocessing.
The United States abandoned nuclear fuel reprocessing in 1977 because
of concern that it would make it easier to steal or divert plutonium
for a nuclear bomb.
Bush's plan envisions a new technology that would not separate pure
plutonium, removing -- according to its advocates -- the
nonproliferation risks.
But the House Appropriations Committee, in a report accompanying the
spending bill, said the Energy Department has not produced the needed
details about the program's cost -- estimated into the billions of
dollars over several decades -- or the certainty of the proposed
technology.
"There's only a guess of how much it's going to cost . . . $3 billion
to $6 billion for a demonstration project," said Rep. Ed Markey, D-
Mass.
He said the proposed technology, while it may no longer be useful for
a nuclear bomb, would "not be too dangerous for terrorists to handle
for a dirty bomb."
But Markey's attempt to slash an additional $40 million from the
program was defeated 295-128.
How They Voted
Here is how local representatives voted on a federal energy and water
bill that reduces funding for the resumption of nuclear fuel
reprocessing (the bill passed 404-20):
Yes No
Lee (D) 4
Miller (D) 4
Pombo (R) 4
Stark (D) 4
Tauscher (D) 4
http://www.contracostatimes.com/mld/cctimes/news/nation/14663283.htm?
source=rss&channel=cctimes_nation
http://tinyurl.com/mzp8d
j2997
________________________________________________________________________
________________________________________________________________________
Message 19
From: "janson2997" janson1997@yahoo.com
Date: Thu May 25, 2006 3:23am(PDT)
Subject: House bill reduces nuclear power funding
House bill reduces nuclear power funding
Spending measure includes $130 million for reprocessing, cutting
Bush's plan in half
By H. Josef Hebert
ASSOCIATED PRESS
WASHINGTON - The House late Wednesday scaled back President Bush's
ambitious plan to resume nuclear fuel reprocessing as part of an
international program to boost nuclear power.
A broad spending bill, passed 404-20 and sent to the Senate, cuts
Bush's request for the first installment of the nuclear initiative in
half, to about $130 million. An attempt to slash it by an additional
$40 million was rejected.
The $30 billion spending measure funds the Energy Department, related
agencies and numerous federal water projects.
While lawmakers expressed skepticism about the nuclear fuel recycling
proposals, dubbed the Global Nuclear Energy Partnership, they plan to
resume full funding for development of a nuclear waste dump at Yucca
Mountain in Nevada after several years of reduced spending on the
program.
The Yucca project, which has yet to receive a license from the
Nuclear Regulatory Commission, is years behind schedule with no firm
date for completion. It is designed to hold 77,000 tons of used
reactor fuel from commercial power plants and defense facilities.
The bill provides $545 million for Yucca in fiscal 2007 beginning in
October, an increase of $95 million over this year. It is the amount
the president had requested.
The House action came on a day that Bush, touring the Limerick
nuclear power plant in Pennsylvania, called the expansion of nuclear
power and more construction of commercial reactors essential "for the
sake of economic security and national security."
He urged Congress to give him the full $250 million for the Global
Nuclear Energy Partnership.
The Senate is likely to do just that. Sen. Pete Domenici, R-N.M., who
heads the subcommittee that deals with energy funding, said he
planned to possibly seek more than $250 million.
If he succeeds, the different spending levels would have to be
reconciled.
The Global Nuclear Energy Partnership calls for stepped-up research
into reprocessing nuclear fuel, instead of using it once and then
disposing it eventually in the planned Yucca Mountain repository.
It would establish an international program under which the United
States would provide reactor fuel to other countries and then
retrieve it for reprocessing.
The United States abandoned nuclear fuel reprocessing in 1977 because
of concern that it would make it easier to steal or divert plutonium
for a nuclear bomb.
Bush's plan envisions a new technology that would not separate pure
plutonium, removing -- according to its advocates -- the
nonproliferation risks.
But the House Appropriations Committee, in a report accompanying the
spending bill, said the Energy Department has not produced the needed
details about the program's cost -- estimated into the billions of
dollars over several decades -- or the certainty of the proposed
technology.
"There's only a guess of how much it's going to cost . . . $3 billion
to $6 billion for a demonstration project," said Rep. Ed Markey, D-
Mass.
He said the proposed technology, while it may no longer be useful for
a nuclear bomb, would "not be too dangerous for terrorists to handle
for a dirty bomb."
But Markey's attempt to slash an additional $40 million from the
program was defeated 295-128.
How They Voted
Here is how local representatives voted on a federal energy and water
bill that reduces funding for the resumption of nuclear fuel
reprocessing (the bill passed 404-20):
Yes No
Lee (D) 4
Miller (D) 4
Pombo (R) 4
Stark (D) 4
Tauscher (D) 4
http://www.contracostatimes.com/mld/cctimes/news/nation/14663283.htm?
source=rss&channel=cctimes_nation
http://tinyurl.com/mzp8d
j2997
________________________________________________________________________
________________________________________________________________________
Message 20
From: "janson2997" janson1997@yahoo.com
Date: Thu May 25, 2006 4:03am(PDT)
Subject: Safety a main concern in nuclear energy debate
Safety a main concern in nuclear energy debate PRINT FRIENDLY EMAIL
STORY
The World Today - Thursday, 25 May , 2006 12:34:00
Reporter: David Mark
ELEANOR HALL: Now to debate on nuclear energy in Australia.
Yesterday on the program we heard from a range of nuclear physicists
selling the benefits of nuclear power in Australia. They say the
looming global climate crisis driven by fossil fuels should put the
atom back in the energy picture.
But opponents say nuclear power is still too expensive and they deny
technical advances have made it safe.
This report from David Mark.
DAVID MARK: The Executive Director of the Australian Nuclear Science
and Technology Organisation, Ian Smith, outlines these three reasons
for Australia adopting nuclear technology for electricity generation.
IAN SMITH: The first is to do with energy security and the price of
energy.
The second is to do with the greenhouse gas effects. Nuclear power is
50 times better than coal in removing CO2 from the atmosphere.
The third reason is to do with the economics. Many overseas studies
have shown that nuclear power is in fact the cheapest form of
electricity that can be produced at this time.
DAVID MARK: Now even some staunch environmental campaigners, like the
naturalist Tim Flannery, have added their voices to the nuclear
debate.
Tim Flannery believes Australia could support a nuclear industry once
the right controls were in place.
TIM FLANNERY: You know, if we can deal with the issues of
proliferation and waste disposal, which we can deal with, then, sure,
I think uranium definitely has a role to play.
DON HENRY: There's absolutely no way we should embrace nuclear
technology.
DAVID MARK: Don Henry is the Executive Director of the Australian
Conservation Foundation.
DON HENRY: We shouldn't mine more uranium. And we certainly shouldn't
have nuclear power stations. And we definitely shouldn't accept high-
level radioactive waste in Australia.
And look, the reasons are simple. This is a dirty, dangerous industry
and it's not a solution to climate change.
DAVID MARK: Nuclear supporters say the technology is now safe, thanks
to a new generation of gas-cooled reactors.
They say the most famous nuclear accident in history, the radioactive
leak at Chernobyl in 1986, was a one-off, caused by a Soviet regime
that didn't have enough money, poor construction and human error.
But Don Henry isn't buying that argument.
DON HENRY: Human error always occurs.
And we have to remember with nuclear power and with the whole nuclear
cycle that not only do we have nuclear power stations, we then have
to worry about decommissioning them and we then have to deal with
highly poisonous radioactive waste that stays highly poisonous for
tens of thousands of years.
And the risk of human error happening, the risk of a war, the risk of
terrorism or the risk of an economy going through its ups and downs
over tens and thousands of years is absolutely there.
So the safest thing here is not to touch this stuff.
DAVID MARK: You mention the problems of storing the waste.
Again, proponents of nuclear energy say the waste can be stored
safely, and in fact there is very little waste to store?
DON HENRY: We've had 50 years of the nuclear experiment around the
world and there is not yet one fully functional, large-scale, high-
level waste disposal anywhere in the world.
DAVID MARK: The Executive Director of The Australia Institute, Clive
Hamilton, is a vocal campaigner for action on climate change.
He entered the nuclear debate recently, when he suggested several
possible locations for nuclear generators in Australia.
It was an effective ruse. It got people talking. But the reality is
he's no nuclear supporter.
CLIVE HAMILTON: Nuclear power is probably the worst way, from an
economic point of view, to try to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.
It's very expensive, so even before you get to the safety concerns
and disposal of or storage of nuclear waste for tens of thousands of
years simply looking at the economics of it shows that it doesn't
stack up.
DAVID MARK: Don Henry and Clive Hamilton say the nuclear debate is a
furphy, designed to prevent the debate they believe is truly needed:
why Australia isn't rapidly adopting renewable technologies.
Nuclear proponents say their technology is cheaper, but Clive
Hamilton disagrees.
CLIVE HAMILTON: Every analysis of the comparative costs of
alternative energy systems shows that nuclear power is the most
expensive and that the range of renewable energy alternatives are
much cheaper.
So why we're not investing massively in those is sort of... is beyond
my understanding.
And to start talking about constructing a whole new industrial sector
with all of the safety and infrastructure costs involved is really…
it's a bizarre debate.
DON HENRY: We need to start dramatically cutting greenhouse pollution
in Australia today.
We can do it today with our existing suite of technologies, with a
much stronger use of renewable power, with much greater use of energy
efficiency and more use of biofuels and gas, we can cut Australia's
emissions by 60 per cent by 2050.
So in some ways this nuclear debate's a smokescreen for not acting on
climate change today.
ELEANOR HALL: And that's the Executive Director of the Australian
Conservation Foundation, Don Henry, ending David Mark's report.
http://www.abc.net.au/worldtoday/content/2006/s1647312.htm
j2997
________________________________________________________________________
________________________________________________________________________
Message 21
From: "janson2997" janson1997@yahoo.com
Date: Thu May 25, 2006 4:12am(PDT)
Subject: Rather than face up to climate change and do what can be done,
humanity may opt to let it happen
Rather than face up to climate change and do what can be done,
humanity may opt to let it happen
NS Essay
John Gray
Monday 29th May 2006
All shades of opinion are in denial about the magnitude of the
environmental challenge facing us. Our need to be comfortable may be
stronger than our will to survive, argues John Gray
During the present century, human beings are likely to experience a
change in the planetary environment unlike any in history. Climate
change is irreversible, and accelerating fast. No one, apart from a
few cranks speaking on behalf of the Bush administration, doubts that
global warming is a side effect of human activity. Accumulating
scientific evidence suggests strongly that climate change is
happening on a larger scale and more quickly than was suspected even
a couple of years ago. Observable processes such as the melting of
the Antarctic ice cap point to rising sea levels that will wipe out
much of the world's arable land and flood many coastal cities. The
face of the planet is changing before our eyes.
The message of science is clear: humans will soon find themselves in
a world different from any they have ever lived in. Altering our way
of life to cope with these conditions will be phenomenally difficult -
if it can be done at all. Yet all sections of opinion are in denial
regarding the scale of the shift and the magnitude of the challenge
it poses. Mainstream politicians and green activists differ on many
points; but they all believe that climate change can be halted or
rendered innocuous, if only we adopt the right policies. They are at
one in rejecting the fact that runaway climate change is a result of
the toxic mix of rapidly growing human numbers with worldwide
industrialisation. Across the whole political spectrum there is a
refusal to face up to this reality. This is nowhere clearer than
among the Greens, who persist in a delusional faith that sustainable
development and renewable energy can save the day.
In this consensus of denial, there are some who tell us not to worry.
So-called "sceptical environmentalists" suggest that the scientific
consensus is not to be trusted, and counsel inaction until the damage
done by climate change is undeniable. That is the view of Nigel
Lawson, who recently advised a business-as-usual strategy. Preparing
for climate change is costly and troublesome, the former chancellor
said, and we should alter our way of life only when the evidence is
incontestable. The trouble with this view is that climate change is
not doom-mongering speculation: it is already happening, and it is
foolish to shut one's eyes and hope it will go away. If it takes the
abrupt and radical form that many scientists believe is now likely,
it will have disastrous effects on the lives of millions - possibly
billions - of people.
Under the leadership of David Cameron, Lawson's own party is not so
complacent, but it, too, is in denial. Cameron talks lightly
of "green growth", and has demonstrated the seriousness of his
environmental commitment by riding a bicycle and installing a wind
turbine on the roof of his house. The underlying assumption of his
approach is that the crisis can be tackled without doing anything
difficult or unpopular. The facts tell a different story. Wind power
is not terribly efficient, and certainly cannot replace fossil fuels
as the source of most of our energy. Even if combined with other
types of renewable power such as solar and geothermal and implemented
together with rigorous policies of energy conservation, the output of
the hideous windfarms springing up across the country could not meet
the rising demand for energy that goes with current patterns of
economic growth.
Nor would a large-scale shift to renewable energy in Britain have any
perceptible impact on global warming, which is far more affected by
emissions originating in China, India and the United States. It might
be argued that Britain should do what it can to reduce emissions
regardless of the behaviour of other countries; but there is only one
existing technology that can provide energy on the scale Britain
needs while reducing its production of greenhouse gases, and that is
nuclear power - which is highly unpopular. Images of Chernobyl and
its aftermath are potent antidotes to rational thought, even if all
they tell us is how horribly unsafe nuclear technology was in Soviet
times. We live in a culture in which personal emotional comfort
counts for more than any objective assessment of risks and
consequences, and public attitudes to nuclear power reflect this. As
a type of psychotherapy for shopped-out consumers troubled by
occasional pangs of environmental guilt, renewable energy may be
quite effective. As an appropriate response to environmental crisis
it is a non-starter.
It may be too much to ask from electorates that they confront
unpalatable environmental realities. This month Tony Blair declared
that nuclear power was "back on the agenda with a vengeance". In a
speech to the Confederation of British Industry, he suggested that
the replacement of nuclear power stations - in conjunction with "a
big push on renewables and a step change on energy efficiency" - must
be considered as part of Britain's long-term energy strategy. Blair
is to be congratulated on attempting to thrust the real energy
options we face into the forefront of public debate. His intervention
comes near the end of his political career, however, and, given his
disastrous role in the Iraq war, nothing that he says on any
controversial issue will be taken seriously - even if, as in this
case, it deserves to be.
In speaking out in support of nuclear power Blair runs up against the
feel-good mentality: most people want to believe that the
environmental crisis can be solved by policies which involve no risk -
to them or anyone else. Green thinking encourages this mentality.
For example, the Kyoto treaty may have symbolic value in
acknowledging the anthropogenic origins of global warming, but it
hardly deserves the iconic status it is given by the green lobby.
None of the big three producers of greenhouse gases has signed up to
it, and even if it were fully implemented it would do very little to
alter the climate shift that is already under way. Above all, such a
treaty cannot halt the stampede to industrialisation that is the
human cause of global warming.
Global warming as we know it today is a by-product of the industrial
revolution. The temperature of the planet has been rising since
roughly 1800, when the use of fossil fuels began on a large scale.
Industrialisation and fossil-fuel use are different sides of the same
process, and it is the rising demand for energy that is fuelling
global warming. Our present industrial civilisation began with coal,
and it may well end there. Oil gained in importance in energy use
throughout the 20th century, but as light crude oil becomes scarcer
and more expensive, industrial societies are beginning to look to
other fossil fuels which are still abundant - notably coal and tar
sands. If the oil price remains high over the coming years, market
processes will make these other fuels economically viable, and many
economists think this will solve our problems. They have failed to
factor in the increase in global warming that such a shift will
entail. There are new technologies that can make coal cleaner, and we
would be well advised to develop them further if we want to limit its
environmental risks; but a global shift from conventional energy
sources to coal and tar sands is bound to increase greenhouse gases.
While shifting to other fossil fuels may make economic sense, there
is nothing in the operation of the price mechanism that registers
costs to the planet as a whole.
Green activists say they want a new global economic system in which
fossil fuels play a much smaller part and damage to the planet is
fully accounted for, but here again we are in the realm of denial.
The type of energy-intensive industrial economy that is being adopted
in India and China is clearly unsustainable. At the same time there
is not the remotest prospect that the rush to industrialisation will
be abandoned. The ruling elites of China are well aware of the
hideous damage that their breakneck industrial growth has done to the
country's fragile natural environment - far more so than the western
investors who gush on about the Chinese economic miracle. China's
rulers also know they cannot risk slowing economic expansion. Even
with the one-child policy and rapid ageing, China's population will
continue to grow for the next 50 years, and the hundreds of millions
who are moving from rural areas to towns will need jobs, housing and
transport. If enormous social upheaval and political instability are
to be avoided, economic expansion must continue whatever the
environmental consequences. The same is true in India, and throughout
the poor countries of the world.
Worldwide industrialisation has an overwhelming momentum that cannot
be stopped by political means. Part of this momentum undoubtedly
comes from continuing population growth, but any mention of growing
human numbers is now taboo in environmental debate. In the affluent
west, religious fundamentalists, neoliberal missionaries for free
markets, development economists and the few remaining Marxists are as
one in denouncing the idea that there can be too many people.
Curiously, this view has not been adopted in poor countries. China,
Egypt, Iran, India and many other developing countries have
population policies. In per-capita use of resources, it is the
richest countries that are most overpopulated, and this is often used
to suggest that it is distribution of resources rather than the
global human population that really matters. The inequalities are
real and troubling. Even so, no redistribution of resources could
enable the earth to sustain over the long term the human numbers
projected for the second half of the present century, or even those
that exist today.
The present human population of more than six billion people is
supported by a type of industrialised farming that relies on rapidly
depleting supplies of petroleum. Contrary to the romantics among
greens who look back with nostalgia to an imaginary peasant culture
of harmony with nature, farming has always been, ecologically, a
highly disruptive human activity, and this remains true today. It is
mainly the expansion of agriculture, not industry, which is
destroying the Amazon rainforest; but agriculture everywhere is
critically dependent on oil-based fertilisers. The green revolution
was at bottom a process whereby food was extracted from petroleum. A
human population of roughly nine billion - the UN estimate for the
world in 2050 - would be even more dependent on fossil fuels, with
all the harmful effects on global climate.
In a century or so, human numbers may decline as falling fertility
spreads throughout the world. In the meantime there is a bottleneck,
and governments are scrambling to secure control of the world's
remaining reserves of oil and natural gas. The resource war that is
being fought for oil in the Gulf is likely to be one of many in the
coming century, and will be accompanied by conflicts over fresh
water. Population growth, resource war and climate change are
intertwined. Without a smaller human population there can be no
solution to the environmental crisis, and one way or another human
numbers are sure to fall. Greens shy away from these facts, and
insist that climate change and conflict over natural resources can be
avoided by adopting a low-tech lifestyle. But organic farms and
windmills cannot stop the destruction of the natural world, or
support the present human population.
Rather than flirting with the fantasy of a low-tech society we need
to focus on high-tech solutions to environmental crisis. Technology
cannot change the human condition. It cannot repeal the laws of
thermodynamics, or make human beings less prone to folly or illusion
than they have always been. It cannot even deflect the current wave
of climate change, which will go on for centuries whatever we do now.
What technology can do is help us cope with the abrupt alteration in
the planetary environment that human activity has triggered - a
process of adjustment that is sure to be forbiddingly difficult. We
cannot stop climate change. If we make the most of technologies that
limit the need for fossil fuels we can avoid accelerating it.
James Lovelock has argued that we need to move away from traditional
modes of farming to the production of synthetic foods, and it seems
to me that, here as elsewhere, he points a way forward. Lovelock is
best known for his support of nuclear power - a view I have shared
since 1993, when I endorsed it in my book Beyond the New Right.
Despite Chernobyl, the risks of nuclear energy to human beings have
been greatly exaggerated. Just as important, nuclear power is vastly
less harmful to the non-human environment than fossil-fuel
extraction. For this reason alone, green activists should support it.
Yet they remain deeply hostile to high-tech solutions, and part of
the reason may be their well-founded suspicion of the idea that
humans can master nature by means of technology.
In the past, high technology has been linked with Promethean
philosophies that seek to subject the natural environment to human
will. This was the philosophy that produced ecological catastrophe in
the former Soviet Union and in China during the Maoist era - and
which, in a different ideological guise, is continuing the
destruction of the environment in those countries. In western
countries, the Promethean view is to be found mainly on the right,
among neoliberal boosters of the free market and Bushite deniers of
climate change. Given this background, it is hardly surprising that
green movements should reject technical fixes, but by doing so they
have become part of the problem rather than its solution.
Today, high technology offers the only way the human ecological
footprint on the planet can be reduced. Nuclear power has risks, not
least of terrorist attack; but it is vastly less harmful to the
planetary equilibrium than the continued reliance on fossil fuels
that is the realistic alternative. The environmental dangers of
genetically modified crops are as yet unknown, so it is right to
resist their use at present; but it is not difficult to envisage a
time when they could be less destructive of the natural world than
the further expansion of petroleum-based intensive agriculture. Far
from rejecting these new technologies, we should be developing and
improving them - not in order to further our domination of nature,
which has always been an illusion, but as ways of retreating from our
hugely overextended position in the planetary system. Green movements
look to political solutions to the environmental crisis. For them,
its source is in a defective economic system and in abuse of
corporate power. However, the planetary rebalancing that is under way
cannot be prevented by any transformation of human society, however
revolutionary. Adapting to the situation requires political
decisions, but there is no political solution to the problems we
face. The human species has overshot the planet's resources, and it
will have to use all its technological ingenuity if it is to avoid
catastrophe.
It may be that the shift in habits of thinking that is needed is
beyond human powers. We owe our evolutionary success partly to our
capacity for denial. Blind hope has often been more useful than a
rational estimate of danger in promoting human survival. Today the
tendency to shut out from conscious thought the dangers we face has
itself become dangerous, but it is a tendency that is encouraged in a
culture which prizes emotional comfort over everything else. In the
worst-case scenarios that are now looking increasingly realistic, the
result could be a change in the way we live that has no precedent in
human experience.
Abrupt climate change seems an apocalyptic prospect, and rather than
face up to it and do what can be done to mitigate its effects,
humanity may well opt to let it run its course. It is only in human
terms that climate change can be viewed as apocalyptic, however. In
the life of the planet, it is normal. A dramatic climate shift took
place 55 million years ago, at the start of the Eocene era, in which
most of the species that then existed became extinct. The planet
revived and became the richly diverse biosphere human beings are at
present destroying. The environmental change that the world is
undergoing is another such shift. Much biodiversity will be lost, but
the earth will renew itself. Life will continue and will thrive -
whether or not humans are around to see it.
This article first appeared in the New Statesman.
For the latest in current and cultural affairs take out a print or
online subscription.
http://www.newstatesman.com/200605290019
j2997
________________________________________________________________________
________________________________________________________________________
Message 22
From: "janson2997" janson1997@yahoo.com
Date: Thu May 25, 2006 4:17am(PDT)
Subject: The fuels of tomorrow
The fuels of tomorrow
Worried about the greenhouse gases your car pumps out? Sustainable
energy is the future, but what's available? Meg Carter reviews the
alternatives to petrol
Published: 25 May 2006
LIQUID GAS
WHAT IS IT?
Liquified Petroleum Gas, or LPG, is currently the most widely
available "green" alternative to petrol. Although a fossil fuel, LPG
is a bi-product of petrol which, for many years, oil companies
simply "flared off" from oil rigs. It was endorsed by the UK
Government in 2001 because of its lower carbon emissions.
WHERE CAN I GET IT
1,400 UK petrol stations now sell LPG and, encouraged by Government
support for the fuel, a number of car-makers, including Toyota, have
launched LPG vehicles in this country. "Bi-fuel" models able to run
on LPG or petrol are also now available, or you can pay around £500
to have your petrol engine converted to run on LPG.
REALITY CHECK
Although LPG produces less carbon than petrol, its emissions exceed
those of "greener" fuels, and recent Government plans to set future
fuel duty to reflect fuels' impact on the environment have prompted
car-makers to switch their attentions elsewhere. "People like the
feel-good green association you get with LPG," says alternative fuels
consultant Jo Burge. "But at around a third of the price of petrol
per litre, most people choose it because of its cost - which is why
it's so popular in countries like Turkey and Poland."
GRAINS & VEGETABLE OILS
WHAT IS IT?
Bioethanol and biodiesel are green fuels made from grain, rapeseed
and vegetable oils. They produce 65 per cent fewer greenhouse-gas
emissions than petrol because carbon emissions during production and
consumption are almost equal to the amount removed when the crops
from which they're made are grown, according to the UK government
agency, the Central Science Laboratory.
WHERE CAN I GET IT
E85 - a mix of 85 per cent bioethanol and 15 per cent petrol - is
already available in parts of the UK, including Somerset. A pilot
scheme was recently launched in Shropshire, where seven independent
petrol stations now sell B5 biodiesel produced from rapeseed or
vegetable oil. Ordinary cars are capable of running on a mix of 95
per cent petrol and 5 per cent bioethanol or biodiesel, without any
modifications. To move beyond 5 per cent, however, an engine must be
modified, which essentially means replacing rubber seals and
aluminium parts with materials not eroded by bioethanol.
REALITY CHECK
For the time being, bioethanol is more expensive than petrol because
of the cost of producing and distributing it. Also, as most petrol
stations are owned and operated by the oil industry, they have little
interest in selling it. Another concern is whether there is enough
grain, rapeseed and vegetable oil to produce the volumes of
bioethanol and bio-diesel needed to make these green fuels a viable
alternative to petrol. Despite this, a number of supermarket petrol
stations now sell petrol containing 5 per cent bioethanol as
standard - a practice expected to spread as the Government works to
meet its 2010 renewable-fuel target.
ORGANIC WASTE
WHAT IS IT?
Every bit of organic matter on Earth will eventually rot, generating
methane (below right). When released into the air, methane that traps
20 times more heat than carbon dioxide, but when burned, it releases
up to 25 per cent less carbon dioxide than the combustion of the same
mass of coal, and does not emit the nitrogen and sulfur oxides known
to damage the environment. Scientists are currently exploring ways of
converting methane into fuel for use in transport.
WHERE CAN I GET IT
Nowhere in the UK, yet. However, car designer Christopher Maltin, the
British pioneer of unleaded petrol, has developed a system to convert
organic waste into fuel, and recently showcased a car powered by
manure which pumps out only water and carbon dioxide. In Sweden,
meanwhile, a number of passenger trains now run on methane extracted
from the entrails of dead cows slaughtered for food.
REALITY CHECK
"Converting organic waste into fuel is an elegant and sustainable
solution," says Burge. "However, biogas is a local fuel - it's most
efficient to use close to where it has been generated, as moving it
around the country is costly and may, in turn, damage the
environment."
ELECTRIC
WHAT IS IT?
Cars fully powered by electricity sounds like the ultimate green
transport solution - plug them into the mains overnight, and away you
go!
WHERE CAN I GET IT
A small number of electric cars are now on the market, including the
G-Wiz - a two-door hatchback created by the Reva Electric Car
Company. Motorists are being offered free parking in Westminster and
the City of London, and a congestion charge waiver, as an incentive
to buy electric vehicles.
REALITY CHECK
Fully electric cars cost almost twice as much to buy as standard
vehicles. And although they produce no emissions they're only as
green as the electricity used to power them, says John Roberts,
director of the consultancy Arup Energy. "Arguably, their biggest
limitation is their range [typically, they run out of juice after 50
miles] and the weight of the battery," he adds. That said, a new
generation of electric cars is in the pipeline with Nissan and
Mitsubishi due to launch models in the near future.
HYBRID
WHAT IS IT?
Hybrids are powered by a combination of electricity and petrol. Car-
makers claim they are greener than standard vehicles because an
integrated electric motor helps the engine by boosting it during
acceleration, improving fuel economy. The electric motor also runs
the car when stationary to minimise emissions, and the battery that
powers this motor charges itself up with energy recovered during
deceleration.
WHERE CAN I GET IT
The Toyota Prius and the Honda Civic are two of the best-known
hybrids currently on the road. BMW, Peugeot and Citroën also have
comprehensive development programmes for hybrid electric and petrol,
and electric and diesel, cars.
REALITY CHECK
Confusion over what constitutes a hybrid is widespread. Half of
British drivers think the term refers to two cars that are welded
together, according to a recent UK consumer survey for Honda.
Moreover, many experts question just how green hybrids really
are. "Essentially, hybrids are a fuel-saving device," Burge
claims. "They can be pleasant to drive - quiet, and smooth - but
they're still basically driven on petrol and struggle to better the
efficiency of the latest diesel models."
HYDROGEN
WHAT IS IT?
Hydrogen-powered vehicles typically run on a fuel cell (which is a
bit like a battery) in which hydrogen mixes with oxygen to produce
water - a process that creates electricity, which in turn powers an
electric motor. Although water vapour is the only emission, how the
hydrogen is made in the first place is a more realistic indicator of
whether hydrogen can be called a truly green fuel. Hydrogen can be
made in a number of different ways including electrolysis - the
splitting of water into hydrogen and oxygen. It is then cooled to
turn it into liquid hydrogen, which is distributed in pressurised
cylinders.
WHERE CAN I GET IT
Honda is one of a number of car-makers developing hydrogen-fuelled
vehicles. Its FCX model is currently being piloted in Japan and the
US, where the Spallino family of Redondo Beach, California recently
took delivery of the first hydrogen-powered fuel cell car in private
use. Closer to home, a two-year project in London involving single-
decker buses powered by hydrogen fuel cells recently ended.
REALITY CHECK
"This technology is new, and we're ahead of the game," Honda UK
environment manager John Kingston claims. Even so, you'll have to
wait a while before you can buy one. "Cost is a major issue," he
admits. "Without an established infrastructure to distribute hydrogen
fuel, investment by car-makers will be limited. And until more models
are produced, production costs will make cars like this prohibitively
expensive for most people to buy."
STEAM
WHAT IS IT?
Typically, a much of the energy released when petrol is burnt is lost
through a car's exhaust system as heat. BMW, however, promises its
Turbosteamer will cut the amount of energy lost by 80 per cent, by
ensuring energy from exhaust gases is used to power a steam engine
which in turn powers the car.
WHERE CAN I GET IT
Nowhere, yet - it's still at the test stage. However, the plan is
that eventually the Turbosteamer could be fitted to all BMW models.
REALITY CHECK
"The BMW system is a clever way of recovering energy that would
otherwise be lost," says Burge. "But this is still a petrol-driven
car."
SUN
WHAT IS IT?
Solar energy seems an unlikely form of car fuel - not least in
cloudier climes. Yet car-makers have been experimenting with solar
power for a number of years. In 1993 the Honda Dream won the World
Solar Challenge, crossing from Darwin to Adelaide using only the
power of the sun. Today, manufacturers are continuing to look at ways
of incorporating solar panels into car design.
WHERE CAN I GET IT
Nowhere, yet. But Ford's recently announced plans for the new Reflex
include solar-powered headlights.
REALITY CHECK
"Solar panels to power lights is all fine and well," says
Roberts. "But it won't solve the problem of what's the greenest
alternative fuel. The future won't be about just one solution, but a
combination of many."
LIQUID GAS
WHAT IS IT?
Liquified Petroleum Gas, or LPG, is currently the most widely
available "green" alternative to petrol. Although a fossil fuel, LPG
is a bi-product of petrol which, for many years, oil companies
simply "flared off" from oil rigs. It was endorsed by the UK
Government in 2001 because of its lower carbon emissions.
WHERE CAN I GET IT
1,400 UK petrol stations now sell LPG and, encouraged by Government
support for the fuel, a number of car-makers, including Toyota, have
launched LPG vehicles in this country. "Bi-fuel" models able to run
on LPG or petrol are also now available, or you can pay around £500
to have your petrol engine converted to run on LPG.
REALITY CHECK
Although LPG produces less carbon than petrol, its emissions exceed
those of "greener" fuels, and recent Government plans to set future
fuel duty to reflect fuels' impact on the environment have prompted
car-makers to switch their attentions elsewhere. "People like the
feel-good green association you get with LPG," says alternative fuels
consultant Jo Burge. "But at around a third of the price of petrol
per litre, most people choose it because of its cost - which is why
it's so popular in countries like Turkey and Poland."
GRAINS & VEGETABLE OILS
WHAT IS IT?
Bioethanol and biodiesel are green fuels made from grain, rapeseed
and vegetable oils. They produce 65 per cent fewer greenhouse-gas
emissions than petrol because carbon emissions during production and
consumption are almost equal to the amount removed when the crops
from which they're made are grown, according to the UK government
agency, the Central Science Laboratory.
WHERE CAN I GET IT
E85 - a mix of 85 per cent bioethanol and 15 per cent petrol - is
already available in parts of the UK, including Somerset. A pilot
scheme was recently launched in Shropshire, where seven independent
petrol stations now sell B5 biodiesel produced from rapeseed or
vegetable oil. Ordinary cars are capable of running on a mix of 95
per cent petrol and 5 per cent bioethanol or biodiesel, without any
modifications. To move beyond 5 per cent, however, an engine must be
modified, which essentially means replacing rubber seals and
aluminium parts with materials not eroded by bioethanol.
REALITY CHECK
For the time being, bioethanol is more expensive than petrol because
of the cost of producing and distributing it. Also, as most petrol
stations are owned and operated by the oil industry, they have little
interest in selling it. Another concern is whether there is enough
grain, rapeseed and vegetable oil to produce the volumes of
bioethanol and bio-diesel needed to make these green fuels a viable
alternative to petrol. Despite this, a number of supermarket petrol
stations now sell petrol containing 5 per cent bioethanol as
standard - a practice expected to spread as the Government works to
meet its 2010 renewable-fuel target.
ORGANIC WASTE
WHAT IS IT?
Every bit of organic matter on Earth will eventually rot, generating
methane (below right). When released into the air, methane that traps
20 times more heat than carbon dioxide, but when burned, it releases
up to 25 per cent less carbon dioxide than the combustion of the same
mass of coal, and does not emit the nitrogen and sulfur oxides known
to damage the environment. Scientists are currently exploring ways of
converting methane into fuel for use in transport.
WHERE CAN I GET IT
Nowhere in the UK, yet. However, car designer Christopher Maltin, the
British pioneer of unleaded petrol, has developed a system to convert
organic waste into fuel, and recently showcased a car powered by
manure which pumps out only water and carbon dioxide. In Sweden,
meanwhile, a number of passenger trains now run on methane extracted
from the entrails of dead cows slaughtered for food.
REALITY CHECK
"Converting organic waste into fuel is an elegant and sustainable
solution," says Burge. "However, biogas is a local fuel - it's most
efficient to use close to where it has been generated, as moving it
around the country is costly and may, in turn, damage the
environment."
ELECTRIC
WHAT IS IT?
Cars fully powered by electricity sounds like the ultimate green
transport solution - plug them into the mains overnight, and away you
go!
WHERE CAN I GET IT
A small number of electric cars are now on the market, including the
G-Wiz - a two-door hatchback created by the Reva Electric Car
Company. Motorists are being offered free parking in Westminster and
the City of London, and a congestion charge waiver, as an incentive
to buy electric vehicles.
REALITY CHECK
Fully electric cars cost almost twice as much to buy as standard
vehicles. And although they produce no emissions they're only as
green as the electricity used to power them, says John Roberts,
director of the consultancy Arup Energy. "Arguably, their biggest
limitation is their range [typically, they run out of juice after 50
miles] and the weight of the battery," he adds. That said, a new
generation of electric cars is in the pipeline with Nissan and
Mitsubishi due to launch models in the near future.
HYBRID
WHAT IS IT?
Hybrids are powered by a combination of electricity and petrol. Car-
makers claim they are greener than standard vehicles because an
integrated electric motor helps the engine by boosting it during
acceleration, improving fuel economy. The electric motor also runs
the car when stationary to minimise emissions, and the battery that
powers this motor charges itself up with energy recovered during
deceleration.
WHERE CAN I GET IT
The Toyota Prius and the Honda Civic are two of the best-known
hybrids currently on the road. BMW, Peugeot and Citroën also have
comprehensive development programmes for hybrid electric and petrol,
and electric and diesel, cars.
REALITY CHECK
Confusion over what constitutes a hybrid is widespread. Half of
British drivers think the term refers to two cars that are welded
together, according to a recent UK consumer survey for Honda.
Moreover, many experts question just how green hybrids really
are. "Essentially, hybrids are a fuel-saving device," Burge
claims. "They can be pleasant to drive - quiet, and smooth - but
they're still basically driven on petrol and struggle to better the
efficiency of the latest diesel models."
HYDROGEN
WHAT IS IT?
Hydrogen-powered vehicles typically run on a fuel cell (which is a
bit like a battery) in which hydrogen mixes with oxygen to produce
water - a process that creates electricity, which in turn powers an
electric motor. Although water vapour is the only emission, how the
hydrogen is made in the first place is a more realistic indicator of
whether hydrogen can be called a truly green fuel. Hydrogen can be
made in a number of different ways including electrolysis - the
splitting of water into hydrogen and oxygen. It is then cooled to
turn it into liquid hydrogen, which is distributed in pressurised
cylinders.
WHERE CAN I GET IT
Honda is one of a number of car-makers developing hydrogen-fuelled
vehicles. Its FCX model is currently being piloted in Japan and the
US, where the Spallino family of Redondo Beach, California recently
took delivery of the first hydrogen-powered fuel cell car in private
use. Closer to home, a two-year project in London involving single-
decker buses powered by hydrogen fuel cells recently ended.
REALITY CHECK
"This technology is new, and we're ahead of the game," Honda UK
environment manager John Kingston claims. Even so, you'll have to
wait a while before you can buy one. "Cost is a major issue," he
admits. "Without an established infrastructure to distribute hydrogen
fuel, investment by car-makers will be limited. And until more models
are produced, production costs will make cars like this prohibitively
expensive for most people to buy."
STEAM
WHAT IS IT?
Typically, a much of the energy released when petrol is burnt is lost
through a car's exhaust system as heat. BMW, however, promises its
Turbosteamer will cut the amount of energy lost by 80 per cent, by
ensuring energy from exhaust gases is used to power a steam engine
which in turn powers the car.
WHERE CAN I GET IT
Nowhere, yet - it's still at the test stage. However, the plan is
that eventually the Turbosteamer could be fitted to all BMW models.
REALITY CHECK
"The BMW system is a clever way of recovering energy that would
otherwise be lost," says Burge. "But this is still a petrol-driven
car."
SUN
WHAT IS IT?
Solar energy seems an unlikely form of car fuel - not least in
cloudier climes. Yet car-makers have been experimenting with solar
power for a number of years. In 1993 the Honda Dream won the World
Solar Challenge, crossing from Darwin to Adelaide using only the
power of the sun. Today, manufacturers are continuing to look at ways
of incorporating solar panels into car design.
WHERE CAN I GET IT
Nowhere, yet. But Ford's recently announced plans for the new Reflex
include solar-powered headlights.
REALITY CHECK
"Solar panels to power lights is all fine and well," says
Roberts. "But it won't solve the problem of what's the greenest
alternative fuel. The future won't be about just one solution, but a
combination of many."
http://news.independent.co.uk/environment/article583897.ece
j2997
________________________________________________________________________
________________________________________________________________________
Message 23
From: "janson2997" janson1997@yahoo.com
Date: Thu May 25, 2006 4:23am(PDT)
Subject: Scientists detail signs of Arctic warming
Scientists detail signs of Arctic warming
By SAM BISHOP News-Miner Washington Bureau
WASHINGTON--Scientists described thinning sea ice, warming
permafrost, expanding shrubs on the tundra and other signs of Arctic
warming for an audience in a U.S. Senate hearing room on Tuesday,
then encouraged congressional staff to call when they need
information on the subject.
"There isn't a scientist I know who isn't pleased to answer
questions," said Matthew Sturm, a researcher at the U.S. Army Cold
Regions Research and Engineering Laboratory in Fairbanks.
Sturm and three scientists from universities around the country
offered to share basic information with members of Congress who are
puzzling through what policies the federal government should adopt in
response to the warming.
The presentation Tuesday wasn't part of an official hearing. Rather,
it was an informal "congressional briefing," an avenue frequently
used by groups trying to spread a message on Capitol Hill.
OTHER ARTICLES IN THIS SECTION
5/25/2006
- Governor releases final contract
- Board boosts pipeline value
- Temporary road plan rankles lodge owner
- Public gas line hearing in Delta draws few
- Trial opens for man accused in snowmachine death
- Receding water means Koyukuk residents could go home soon
- Friends, artists gather to honor Liz Berry
- 'Museum Day' offers a free peek at local exhibits
- ANWR drilling bill up for consideration in U.S. House
- Sen. Murkowski wants Sound oil spill settlement reopened
Tuesday's event was sponsored by the Fairbanks-based Arctic Research
Consortium of the United States, which promotes communication and
collaboration among northern scientists. The group's annual meeting
begins today in Washington, D.C., and will feature not only
scientific presentations but also speeches from Sen. Lisa Murkowski,
R-Alaska, and former Lt. Gov. Fran Ulmer, now with the University of
Alaska Anchorage's Institute of Social and Economic Research.
The meeting comes as members of Congress debate what actions, if any,
the government ought to take to reduce human production of gases such
as carbon dioxide that scientists say contribute to Earth's warming.
On Friday, Rep. Don Young, R-Alaska, voted with other members of the
House to remove a statement from a spending bill that attributed
global warming to humans. On Tuesday, Murkowski voted in the Senate
Foreign Relations Committee for an amendment encouraging the
administration to participate in negotiations under the United
Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change to, in part, reach "a
significant long-term reduction in global greenhouse gas emissions."
Mark Serreze, with the University of Colorado at Boulder's National
Snow and Ice Data Center, gave the audience at Tuesday's
congressional briefing a quick overview of the Arctic warming signs,
using charts and graphs of the latest science:
* The Greenland ice sheet, while thickening in the center and gaining
slightly in total mass recently, has been thinning on the edges due
to melting, he said. Also, the increased meltwater may
be "lubricating" the base of the ice sheets, causing them to flow
toward coasts more rapidly.
* Permafrost temperatures measured near Teshekpuk Lake on Alaska's
North Slope, while still well below freezing, increased by about 7
degrees Fahrenheit from 1977 to 2005.
* Tundra shrubs are growing larger and more abundant.
* Sea ice cover on the Arctic Ocean was the lowest ever measured both
in September of 2005 and last month.
Charles Vorosmarty of the University of New Hampshire explained how
some of these changes are self-reinforcing. Sea ice reflects about 85
percent of the sun's energy, while open water reflects only about 10
percent. Tundra reflects about 80 percent while forest reflects just
20 percent, he said. Thus, the physical and organic changes that
occur with warming can "conspire to create a strong feedback," he
said.
Serreze, after the presentation, said the existence of past ice ages
obviously demonstrates that some climatological factor is able to
overcome such a warming feedback.
That factor, he said, is apparently the reduction in incoming energy
that takes place when two things occur at the same time: The Earth
reaches the farthest distance from the sun in its orbit, and the
Earth's axis, which wobbles a bit over time, is less tilted toward
the sun on the northern end.
Those two astronomical phenomena won't occur simultaneously for
another 10,000 years, Serreze said. "So that's not going to save us"
from the present warming, he said.
The sun has also grown slightly brighter in recent years, Serreze
noted, and if it dimmed, it might reduce the amount of energy driving
the Earth's warming. But the energy arriving from the sun's increased
brightness is much less than the increased energy that has been
trapped by growing levels of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, he
said.
Volcanoes can also cool the atmosphere, but their effects are
occasional and short-lived, he said.
Serreze said the only realistic change that could combat the warming
trend would be a reduction in atmospheric carbon dioxide. Carbon
dioxide molecules now make up about 380 parts of every million parts
of air. That's well above other peaks from the past 400,000 years,
all of which topped out at less than 300 ppm, according to analysis
of air bubbles in ancient ice sheets.
Other scientists, including Syun-Ichi Akasofu, director of the
International Arctic Research Center in Fairbanks, have said that
it's still unclear how much humans have contributed to the trend.
Akasofu warned senators in a recent hearing against actions that
could have severe economic consequences with little reward.
Akasofu said he is still unsure of the human impacts in part because
global computer models, when fed historical data, do not reliably
forecast what actually has happened across wide regions.
Serreze acknowledged that scientists are still struggling to find
models that are able to match specific regional variations.
"Right now our ability to make those predictions with our current
models is less than optimal," Serreze said.
Vorosmarty noted, though, that when historic data on temperature
increases, vegetation changes, sea ice reductions and ocean dynamics
are all fed into global climate models, the computers predict a
warming trend in the higher latitudes that generally reflects what
scientists are measuring today.
The scientists also warned that change could happen very rapidly if
various factors push the climate over a tipping point.
Sturm noted that the Laurentide ice sheet, which 20,000 years ago
covered all of Canada and many of the northern U.S. states, grew very
slowly. "It went away very fast," Sturm said.
Washington, D.C., reporter Sam Bishop can be reached at (202) 662-
8721 or sbishop@newsminer.com .
http://www.news-miner.com/Stories/0,1413,113~7244~3318214,00.html
j2997
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Message 24
From: "janson2997" janson1997@yahoo.com
Date: Thu May 25, 2006 4:23am(PDT)
Subject: Fate of world climate lies with U.S., China
Fate of world climate lies with U.S., China
By Ian Hoffman, STAFF WRITER
Inside Bay Area
If energy and economic trends persist, scientists say, two nations
are likely to decide the climate for the whole planet.
So far, the United States and China are meeting energy demands by
allowing unfettered construction of coal-fired electricity plants
that will release billions of tons of carbon dioxide, a heat that
traps gas.
If those coal plants and hundreds more planned are run for their full
lifetimes — China is building one or more every week — the two
nations will drive the majority of greenhouse warming that could
increase average global temperatures as much as 14 degrees by 2100,
with more heat coming in the 22nd century.
"If we get it wrong, there's almost no hope that the rest of the
world can overcome our errors," physicist Peter Schwartz told United
States and Chinese energy experts Wednesday at a joint climate
conference in Berkeley. "The weight that rests on our shoulders is
enormous."
The United States and China are the world's largest emitters of
greenhouse gases, and each opted out of the Kyoto Protocol limiting
those emissions partly by blaming the other.
Beijing says it is unfair for developed nations to limit other
nations' emissions after using unrestricted burning of fossil fuels
to become the world's leading economic powers. Washington insists the
developing world take the lead because that is where the majority of
future emissions will be.
The problem is each nation sees the other's economy soaring on
greenhouse-gas emissions, said Tsinghua University public policy
professor Ye Qi, and "we begin to point fingers at each other. 'It's
your fault, it's not my fault....so it's your problem, it's not my
problem."'
The time for national governments to start addressing climate change
is "not only past but it's long since past," said Berkeley economist
and Nobel Prize winner George Akerlof.
It is obvious, he said, that the costs and benefits of curbing
emissions outweigh the risks of "drastically" changing the climate
and the costs of adapting to a warmer, more unpredictable world.
"I think we should have been making these decisions as though global
warming were assumed to have occurred, perhaps 20 years ago," Akerlof
said.
In economic terms, he said, the ideal solution is a gradually
escalating tax on carbon emissions.
"Then those who value their emissions more than the nuisance they
cause will have to pay," he said. "With such a tax, emissions will be
curbed and they will be curbed by the amount to which their benefits
exceed the nuisance they cause."
Technologies exist now for cutting energy consumption and substitutes
are emerging for fossil fuels, but "unless it pays people to use
them, they simply won't, so we need a carbon tax," Akerlof said.
Taxing fossil fuels is a political non starter in Congress, just as
the Kyoto Protocol was, he said, as long as the debate is framed as a
cost-benefit analysis. Instead, Akerlof said, climate change should
be cast as a moral issue.
"It's immoral for any person to contribute more than his or her fair
share of the emissions," he said. "We should not feel entitled to
that any more than we should feel entitled to enter uninvited to our
neighbors' house and partake of their dinner...This is after all a
basic question of right and wrong."
As the rising economic star, China also should seize the mantle of
world leadership on climate change and not wait for the United
States, Akerlof said. "It's an area where the United States has
abdicated what is right for what is expedient," he said. "So this is
an opportunity for moral authority."
Energy experts said the obvious first step for both nations would not
require new technologies such as radical new solar cells, hydrogen
cars or the capture and underground injection of carbon dioxide but
simply to stop wasting energy.
California pushed new energy standards for buildings and appliances,
plus changes in the electricity markets, that result in 40 percent
less electricity consumption per person than the rest of the nation.
"What this tells me is the opportunity for U.S. efficiency gains is
tremendous," said Daniel Kammen, who teaches energy and public policy
at Berkeley and heads the university's Institute on the
Environment. "We have a huge resource of inefficiency left to mine
and we should mine it."
Efficiency guru Amory Lovins said every major U.S. corporation that
has looked for energy savings has found it and made a profit.
Retooling the auto industry for lighter, tougher cars running more
advanced propulsion systems would take $100 billion but repay $155
billion and create a million jobs in addition to saving a million
jobs that exist now, said Lovins, CEO of the Rocky Mountain
Institute.
Examples of potential efficiency gains can be found in almost every
industrial sector, from refineries to mining to the manufacture of
semiconductors, he said.
Instead, the United States and China are constructing a new
generation of inefficient factories and buildings that will cost both
nations, Lovins said. "These are all machines for destroying
prosperity by wasting energy and money."
Contact Ian Hoffman at ihoffman@angnewspapers.com.
http://www.insidebayarea.com/portlet/article/html/fragments/print_arti
cle.jsp?article=3863140
http://tinyurl.com/g4t32
j2997
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Message 25
From: "janson2997" janson1997@yahoo.com
Date: Thu May 25, 2006 4:29am(PDT)
Subject: Grüne Geldanlage Die neuen Kräfte
Grüne Geldanlage
Die neuen Kräfte
Von Matthias von Arnim
Regenerative Energien ersetzen zunehmend fossile Energieträger - das
ist nicht nur gut für die Umwelt, sondern kann auch Anlegern nützen.
Zertifikate auf Öko-Indizes und -Aktienkörbe haben Konjunktur.
Allerdings lohnt genaues Hinsehen: Nicht jedes Zertfikat hält, was es
verspricht
Die Schweden machen derzeit vor, wohin die Reise geht: Fast ein
Viertel ihres gesamten Energiebedarfs erzeugen die Skandinavier jetzt
schon durch den Einsatz erneuerbarer Energien. Das ist Weltrekord -
und Vorbild für einen Megamarkt.
AFP
Windräder in Schweden: Vorbild für einen Megamarkt
Das Thema Energie ist brandaktuell. Fossile Energieträger wie Öl,
Kohle und Gas werden in absehbarer Zeit knapp und jetzt schon immer
teurer. Durch die neuen, schnell wachsenden Großverbraucher Indien
und China ist die Konkurrenz unter den Käufern härter geworden. Die
Preisspirale dreht sich dadurch schneller. Vorteil für die Umwelt:
Alternative Energien werden konkurrenzfähiger. Vorteil für die
Anleger: Anders als in der Vergangenheit - zum Beispiel zurzeit der
Ölkrise in den siebziger Jahren - ist mittlerweile eine ganze
Industrie gereift, die sich der Erforschung und Produktion
regenerativer Energieträger widmet. Das bedeutet neue lukrative
Anlagealternativen. Das Spektrum reicht dabei von Erdwärme und
Solarenergie über Wasserkraft bis zur Erzeugung von Ethanol durch
Biomasse.
Wer auf solche nachhaltigen Investments setzen will, findet seit ein
paar Jahren eine große Auswahl an spezialisierten Fonds (siehe DER
FONDS 5/2006). Die Zertifikatebranche, ansonsten schnell dabei, neue
Trends aufzugreifen, ist vergleichsweise spät auf den Öko-Zug
aufgesprungen. Das geringe Angebot an Zertifikaten in den vergangenen
sechs Jahren lag unter anderem an der begrenzten Auswahl brauchbarer
Branchenindizes, die als Basiswert hätten dienen können. Alternativ
wurden Baskets zusammengestellt, die sich mehr oder weniger glücklich
entwickelten.
Zertifikate-Auswahl wächst
GEFUNDEN IN...
Der Fonds Juni/2006
Das Know- how- Magazin zur Kapitalanlage
Inhaltsverzeichnis
Aktuelles Heft bestellen
www.derfonds.com
Dieser Text ist Teil drei einer fünfteiligen Serie über "Grünes
Geld". Teil vier und fünf widmen sich den Themen Versicherungen und
Geschlossene Fonds und erscheinen im Juli beziehungsweise August.
Zwei Beispiele dafür liefern die UBS und die WestLB. Die UBS hatte
ein gutes Händchen beim Timing und bei der Auswahl des Europäischen
Wasserbaskets (CH 001 596 664 8), dessen Wert sich seit der Emission
im Mai 2003 fast verdreifacht hat. Pech dagegen hatten Anleger, die
Anfang 2001 in die bereits laufende Börsen-Baisse hinein den New
Energy Active Basket der WestLB (DE 000 696 259 0) kauften. Der Korb
(englisch: Basket), der beim Start seinen Schwerpunkt auf
Windkraftunternehmen legte, verlor zwischendurch fast 95 Prozent an
Wert und notiert heute - trotz des zwischenzeitlichen Öko-Hypes und
der Verlagerung auf die Wachstumsbranche Solarenergie - immer noch
rund 25 Prozent unterhalb seines Ausgabepreises.
Die Zeit der spärlichen Auswahl ist allerdings vorbei. Wer jetzt auf
das Thema Nachhaltigkeit setzen will, findet mittlerweile ein ganzes
Sammelsurium an Zerti?katen vor. In den vergangenen Monaten haben die
Emittenten frische Baskets aufgelegt und zum Teil neue Öko-Indizes
geschaffen. Einige von ihnen konzentrieren sich auf zwei Grundthemen
der Nachhaltigkeit: Wasserversorgung und -aufbereitung sowie
alternative Energieerzeugung. Dazu zählen regenerative Energien wie
Biomasse, Solarenergie, Wasser- und Windkraft, aber auch neue
Techniken zur sparsamen Energiegewinnung, beispielsweise
Brennstoffzellen.
Nachhaltigkeit I: Breit gestreute Zertifikate
Andere Emittenten fassen den Begriff der Nachhaltigkeit deutlich
weiter. Beispiel Hypovereinsbank: Vor kurzem emittierte die Bank das
zweite HVB Expresszertifikat, das sich auf den HVB
Nachhaltigkeitsindex bezieht. Entwickelt wurde dieser Index gemeinsam
mit Oekom Research. Die Münchner Nachhaltigkeits-Rating-Agentur berät
ebenfalls Fondsgesellschaften wie Activest, Kepler-Fonds und SEB-
Invest .
Beim HVB Nachhaltigkeitsindex achtet Oekom Research darauf, dass die
enthaltenen Firmen ethischen, sozialen und ökologischen Aspekten
gerecht werden und dazu hohe Dividendenrenditen aufweisen. Die
Unternehmen können dabei aus allen Branchen stammen. Tatsächlich
findet sich unter den 16 Gesellschaften des Index nur das Unternehmen
Norsk Hydro, das Anteilseigner der norwegischen Naturkraft AS ist und
damit dem Sektor "nachhaltige Energiewirtschaft" zugerechnet werden
kann. Ansonsten tummeln sich im Index Aktien wie ABN Amro, Lloyds
TSB, Nokia, Renault, Swisscom oder die Telecom Italia.
Unter Renditegesichtspunkten ist das Index-Portfolio damit
einigermaßen krisenfest. Die vorzeitige Auszahlung von 107,15 Euro
pro Zertifikat im Februar kommenden Jahres ist nicht
unwahrscheinlich. Das Expresszertifikat läuft maximal bis Februar
2014. Bei einem aktuellen Preis von etwa 102 Euro können Anleger je
nach Laufzeit des Zertifikats mit etwa 5,5 bis 6,5 Prozent Rendite
pro Jahr rechnen. Wer vom Thema Nachhaltigkeit - einem langfristigen
Trend - überzeugt ist, sollte sich allerdings überlegen, ob ein
Expresszertifikat mit sehr beschränkter Laufzeit die richtige Wahl
ist.
Das gilt auch für die beiden Brennstoffzellen-Aktien-Baskets von UBS
und der WestLB. Beide Zertifikate haben eine Restlaufzeit von weniger
als einem Jahr. Für ein Investment in einen Megatrend ist das
ziemlich kurz gesprungen.
Weiche Auswahlkriterien
Index- und Basketzertifikate ohne Laufzeitbegrenzung sind sicherlich
sinnvoller. Allerdings sollten Anleger auch hier trotz zum Teil
wohlklingender Indexnamen auf die Zusammensetzung der Basiswerte
achten. Das im Dezember aufgelegte Indexzertifikat der WestLB auf den
Dow Jones Stoxx Sustainability Index beispielsweise impliziert durch
seinen Namen (Sustainability, englisch für Nachhaltigkeit) ethisch
und ökologisch korrektes Investieren. Die Kriterien für die Aufnahme
in diesen speziellen Stoxx-Index sind allerdings recht weich. Auch
Aktien von Unternehmen wie Royal Dutch, Telefónica, Münchener Rück,
Unilever und Deutsche Börse werden hier gelistet - ein recht buntes
Gemisch.
Nachhaltigkeit II: Spezielle Themen-Zertifikate
Wesentlich konsequenter ist das Konzept von BNP Paribas. Die
französische Bank hat in Zusammenarbeit mit dem Wiener
Börsenbrief "Öko-Invest" das Umwelt-Ethik-24-Zertifikat
herausgebracht. Der Korb umfasst 24 verschiedene Werte der Energie-
und Umweltbranche, die nach strengen ökologischen sowie ethischen
Prinzipien selektiert werden. Die Auswahl wird alle sechs Monate
überprüft und gegebenenfalls angepasst. Die Unternehmen müssen
zumindest die Hälfte ihres Umsatzes in einem Öko-Sektor machen.
Dass bei aller Sorgfalt die Performance nicht zu kurz kommen muss,
beweist ein Blick auf die Wertentwicklung. Seit der Emission im Juni
2003 hat sich der Kurs des Zertifikats verdoppelt. Der Preis für das
gute Gewissen sind eine hohe Kauf-Verkaufs-Spanne (Spread) von einem
Prozent und die mit 1,5 Prozent pro Jahr üppig angesetzten
Managementgebühren.
Auch ABN Amro hat mit seinem Öko-Invest-Zertifikat ein Pferd im
Nachhaltigkeitsrennen. Der ABN-Basket setzt sich zu gleichen Teilen
aus den jeweils acht stärksten Aktien des Umweltaktienindex nx25 und
dem Photovoltaik-Aktienindex PPVX zusammen. "Damit setzen Anleger
mehr auf ökologische Energiegewinnung als auf das Thema Ethik",
erklärt Stefan Gresse von ABN Amro. Die beiden Basisindizes, aus
denen die insgesamt 16 Nachhaltigkeitsaktien stammen, entwickelte Max
Deml, der Chefredakteur von "Öko-Invest".
Zwei Drittel der Aktien im ABN-Basket sind auch im Umwelt-Ethik-24-
Zertifikat enthalten. Allerdings entwickelte sich das Zerti?kat der
Niederländer zuletzt etwas dynamischer. Das führt Gresse darauf
zurück, "dass unser Zertifikat durch seine Zusammensetzung bisher
mehr vom Solar-Boom profitieren konnte".
Starke Gewichtung von Solartiteln
Das ist auch bei einem Zertitifikat der Société Générale der Fall.
Die Bank hat zusammen mit der Schweizer SAM Group und der
Indexagentur Stoxx den European Renewable Energy Index erfunden,
kurz: Erix. Das Erix-Zertifikat enthält die nach Marktkapitalisierung
zehn größten Unternehmen aus den Segmenten Biomasse-, Geothermie-,
Solar-, Wasser- und Windenergie. Die Zusammensetzung wird
vierteljährlich überprüft. Besonderer Vorteil des Zertifikats: Erix
ist ein Performance-Index. Das heißt, dass auch Dividenden in die
Berechnung einfließen. Auffällig: Der Schwerpunkt des Zertifikats
liegt eindeutig auf den beiden Branchen Wind- und Sonnenenergie. "Und
in diesen Bereichen spielt im Moment die Musik", erklärt Peter
Bösenberg, Zertifikate-Entwickler bei Société Générale. "Da bei der
Zusammensetzung des Index die Marktkapitalisierung der Unternehmen
eine ausschlaggebende Rolle spielt, sind Solar- und Windkraft-
Unternehmen stärker gewichtet. Geothermie und die Gewinnung von
Energie aus Biomasse sind an der Börse noch keine großen Themen."
Deshalb, so Bösenberg, gebe es auch keinen Geothermie- oder Biomasse-
Index. "Ein Index mit nur drei Unternehmen ist wenig sinnvoll."
Im Performance-Vergleich mit dem Ethik-24-Zertifikat wird deutlich,
welche Vor- und Nachteile diese starke Konzentration im Basket hat.
Seit seinem Start im Oktober vergangenen Jahres konnte das Erix-
Zertifikat 50 Prozent an Wert zulegen und ließ den Umwelt-Ethik-
Basket damit mehr als 20 Prozentpunkte hinter sich. Anleger bezahlen
die Kurssprünge allerdings mit einer fast dreimal so hohen
Volatilität.
Dazu kommt, dass es keine Garantie dafür gibt, dass insbesondere
Solaraktien weiterhin so rasant an Wert gewinnen wie bisher. Beispiel
Solarworld: Der Kurs der Aktie ist in den vergangenen 24 Monaten um
2.500 Prozent gestiegen. Allein in diesem Jahr hat sich der
Unternehmenswert verdoppelt - und durch die starke Gewichtung der
Aktie im Erix auch den Preis des Zertifikats mit nach oben gezogen.
Dass diese Entwicklung dauerhaft so weitergeht, ist eher
unwahrscheinlich. Mögliche Korrekturen schlagen dann natürlich auch
im Erix voll durch.
Wer trotzdem an eine ungebremste Fortsetzung des Solar-Booms glaubt,
kann auch gleich in ein Zertifikat der Société Générale auf den Solex
(World Solar Energy Index) investieren, das rein auf Sonnenenergie
spezialisiert ist. In dem Index sind die zehn bedeutendsten
Unternehmen der Solar-Branche versammelt.
http://www.spiegel.de/wirtschaft/0,1518,druck-417909,00.html
j2997
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A personal quest to promote the use of wind energy and hydrogen technology in the Great Lakes area of the United States. The Great Lakes area is in a unique position to become an energy exporting region through these and other renewable energy technologies. *Update 2014: Just do it everywhere - Dan*
Friday, May 26, 2006
[fuelcell-energy] Digest Number 1534
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