Nuclear 2.0 Review

The nuclear renaissance is a topic which continues to fascinate and one of the key figures in bigging it up is Mark Lynas, who is now better known for his pro-GMO conversion speech which received a lot of publicity earlier this year.

Mark has just produced an ebook called Nuclear 2.0 which is a distillation of his current thinking and seems to have come about as a result of his involvement with the film Pandora's Promise, the making of which involved filming in such well known holiday locations at Chernobyl and Fukushima. He knows his stuff — it's not an armchair treatise — and he marshalls his facts to present a cogent argument that we should be investing heavily in nuclear power and not just relying on renewables, energy efficiency and carbon capture and storage to build a low carbon energy network fit for purpose. I won't argue with this - in fact, I find myself in total agreement.

My only quibble is to wonder about who this ebook is written for? The vast majority of people I know are either totally disinterested in the whole energy debate, or are already in favour of nuclear power - certainly, they are not afraid of it. But then I don't know many Germans and they seem to have a more universal distaste for all thing nuclear (except of course down at their local radiotherapy treatment centres where cancer victims seem quite relaxed about being bombarded with radiation).

In this country, there remains a solid core of energy activists who have dug their heels in and continue to think that nuclear power is the work of the devil, and that the not-insignificant issues with its roll out (cost, proliferation, decommissioning, waste, terrorism, risk of accidents, to name but seven) are simply insuperable. The news is that they're not.

Actually, this solid core is not that small. There is Greenpeace and Friends of the Earth (although, as Mark points out, neither of these campaigns very strongly against nuclear power these days), there are a handful of leftish/greenish MPs and there are shadowy bodies like the Nuclear Consulting Group which is not really a consulting group at all but a bunch of anti-nuclear academics. Together this consists of a considerable anti-nuclear lobby with some well known names. My guess is that Nuclear 2.0 is written with them in mind, but I also think it's more than likely that none of them will be bothered to read it and, even if they do, they won't be convinced by its arguments.

Which is a shame. Nuclear power may well be expensive to build and difficult to maintain, but it still wins out as one of the less destructive ways of making electricity. The risks are overstated.

Obama's climate speech for beginners

The amazing thing about this speech was that it was made at all. It lasted for nearly 40 minutes, consisting of 6,000 words. The transcript is here. Arguably, it's four years too late, but maybe it's a sign of the times that the excruciating climate wars are coming to and end. Or am I being naive (again)?

• So what does he talk about for 40 minutes?

The speech is strong on the background, strong on the science and strong on pointing out that previous bits of environmental legislation were passed into law with bi-partisan support. 1970's Clean Air Act went through the senate unopposed and then went through the House of Representatives with just one vote against. It was signed into law by a Republican president and strengthened later by another. But then it didn't threaten Big Oil, or at least not directly.

• You are suggesting that the strength doesn't last?

About halfway through, he starts on what an opportunity climate change mitigation can be. Here he begins to sound a bit desperate. Try this. A low-carbon, clean energy economy can be an engine of growth for decades to come. And I want America to build that engine. I want America to build that future -- right here in the United States of America. That’s our task. Stirring stuff, but the moment American politicians start going on about how great America is, I begin to have my doubts.

• And the meat? Where's the meat?

Not good.

1) He fudges on the Keystone pipeline decision. Passes the buck to the State Department which is currently evaluating whether it is in the national interest. I bet it is.

2) He backs fracking. His only caveat is that he calls it a transition fuel.

3) He backs more renewables but says nothing about funding mechanisms.

4) He commits government to buy 20% renewable electricity by 2020 - but doesn't define renewable - so it will probably be biomass, me thinks.

5) Makes vague commitments to encourage energy efficiency, but nothing like a Green Deal, as far as I can see. Maybe that's a good thing in itself!

6) Makes some federal funding for flood defences and water development projects - claiming this is mitigation work.

7) Nuclear power gets just one mention in the whole speech We're building the first nuclear power plants in more than three decades -- in Georgia and South Carolina but doesn't say whether he approves, nor does he show any interest or backing for new nuclear technologies.

8) Stresses that he's involved with international co-operation with China, India and Brazil. Comes up with the unintentionally funny line: my administration will redouble our efforts to engage our international partners in reaching a new global agreement to reduce carbon pollution through concrete action. So good news here for Portland Cement manufacturers!

9) Promotes Gina she’s terrific McCarthy at the EPA, and bewails the fact that she is being blocked at every turn by the Republicans. I like this line: We don’t have time for a meeting of the Flat Earth Society. Sticking your head in the sand might make you feel safer, but it’s not going to protect you from the coming storm.

In truth, these are very weak measures indeed and make our own (hopelessly split) UK government look like the Green Party in comparison. But the significance of all this is that he made this speech at all, that he has put climate change back on the agenda in the USA for the first time since the credit crunch.

It's amazing to reflect that the anti-climate change campaign has been so successful over the past few years that the US President gets saluted as a hero for merely delivering a speech which mentions there might be just a small problem with carbon dioxide, whilst also giving the OK to a pipeline for exporting Canada's tar sands and also bigging-up fracking. No doubt, the Tea Party Republicans will be up in arms at the outrageous interventionist policies Obama is promoting, but secretly they must be delighted that the agenda has moved so far their way that a speech such as this is seen as a milestone.

Every chart tells a story...

Ben Adam-Smith (@BenAdamSmith) alerted me to this chart which he stumbled upon whilst researching the vexed issue of density. Every good chart is designed to tell a story (and back it up with facts and statistics) but that doesn't mean they aren't capable of leading you down the garden path. And this is a good example of one that does.

The chart sets out to show how greedy Americans are when it comes to energy and how the very design of their cities further exaggerates this largesse. 18 cities are compared on the basis of their energy usage per head and this is mapped against their population density. The result? The seven American cities are the seven largest energy hogs and also the largest land hogs. At the other end of the spectrum, the three Asian cities, Tokyo, Hong Kong and Singapore, are not only the three most energy efficient per capita, but also the three most densely populated.

QED? The more densely populated a city, the more energy efficient it is. That, at least is the conclusion we are being drawn to here.

But is it true? Let's dig a little.

First thing that stands out is that the x axis and the y axis are comparing apples with pears. The key metric we are being asked to look at is the energy consumption per head. If we did this and this alone, we would have just a single line populated with 18 different cities, with Houston at No 1 spot with score of 75 and Hong Kong at No 18, with a score well below 10. Now that is already a remarkable observation. People living in Houston consume around ten times more energy per head than people in Hong Kong. This tallies with available national statistics on energy and CO2 emissions, though China no longer has such a low score. I suspect this chart is a few years old now and that Hong Kong's score would now be noticeably higher. But that's not the point.

The chart then adds another axis showing the population densities of each of the 18 cities. Now this too is interesting as it draws us to the conclusion that the American cities are groundhogs and the Asian cities are space efficient, though note that two of the Asian examples chosen, Hong Kong and Singapore, are island city states and neither has that much space to expand so they are almost bound to be space efficient.

My main nitpick is that these two observations which, in themselves, are demonstrably true are not necessarily connected, let alone causally related. They may be, they may not be. But the very fact of graphing them against each other draws us to the conclusion that a connection is there and it's a strong one. Indeed, it draws us to the conclusion that population density is the major factor in determining energy usage. And that dense development patterns are therefore a good thing — inherently sustainable even — and that in future development should take place on this sort of basis. Hong Kong good: Houston bad.

It's an oft held criticism of American cities are that they are so large that they encourage car use — "LA is a great big freeway." In contrast, compact cities are walking cities, and they also make public transport more cost effective because there are more potential passengers within walking distance of each bus or metro stop. All true and good. And therefore transport energy costs are likely to be high in megacities which were developed after the advent of car use and cheap oil. Which is the point the graph is making. But transport costs are not the only energy costs. What about heating? And air conditioning? And manufacturing? And public buildings? Maybe, just maybe, American cities have more of these as well. Not to mention bigger houses. In fact, I'm sure they have all of these features, all much bigger than Asian homelets. I'm pretty sure you could chart energy consumption against average house size, or average incomes, or number of doctors per head of population, and get almost exactly the same looking chart.

This is because Americans are, by and large, rich, certainly when compared to Asians and it's this factor which tends to give rise to space-hungry grid-iron street patterns, high levels of car ownership and heavy energy use per head. Their wealth also developed in a world of cheap energy in which no one gave more than a passing thought to how much energy they used, and a world of cheap land too, so it's hardly surprising that their cities developed as they did.

In conclusion, it's not that this chart isn't accurate or even that it draws false comparisons, but that it's making an observation that tells us about the historical development of cities and dressing it up as lesson for us to learn about tomorrow's cities and developments.

What I'm getting at is that a chart like this gets used as a manifesto to justify high density development when in reality it is just a bit of social history. You could, if you wanted to, create a low density, low energy neighbourhood: think green ribbons stretching across the countryside with everybody having a passivhaus on a one-acre plot and a bus up and down the lane every ten minutes. Or you could create the densest, most energy hungry development imaginable: think of the Candy Brothers' One Hyde Park, 86 apartments in central London in which, apparently, hardly anyone actually lives.

So the moral from all this? Just because cheap energy leads to low density development, it doesn't follow that high density development will result in low energy use.

The strange case of the missing Building Reg

I can distinctly remember sitting in the audience at Ecobuild this year (March 5 - 7) listening to Don Foster, whose is a DCLG minister (official title Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Department for Communities and Local Government) saying "It'll be May at the latest."

What was he talking about? And why didn't it happen?

He was talking about publishing the final version of the energy efficiency regulations for buildings in England, known to all as Part L. Part L has been in existence since 1976. Every few years, it gets uprated to reflect changes in the energy landscape and, to a lesser extent, changes in technology. In 2006, Yvette Cooper, who was then the minister in charge of building regs, announced the Code for Sustainable Homes and, with it, a timetable for future Part L upgrades. These being 2010, 2013 and finally 2016.

2016 was seen as the holy grail of energy efficiency, the zero carbon house. It was assumed at the time that the Code for Sustainable Homes and the building regs would come into alignment at this point. 2010 and 2013 were to be stepping stones along the way. Part L, in particular, was in the hot seat here. Unlike the Code for Sustainable Homes which was mostly voluntary, Part L is mandatory.

Now Part L revisions have always been subject to a fair amount of lobbying. The product manufacturers love the revisions because they get to sell more kit (think insulation) and more expensive kit (think boilers and heat pumps). The housebuilders hate them because they have to pay for all this gear. Part L revisions start life in draft form which is subject to consultation. The final version of Part L is habitually late and this in itself causes lots of niggly problems because no one is up to speed by the time the new regs come into effect.

In order to address these issues, the government has published a timetable showing when the building regs will change. All well and good, and very responsible and grown up. The 2013 Part L is due to come into force on October 1st this year and, by convention, the regulation should be published some months ahead of the enforcement date, for obvious reasons. Hence the question to Don Foster back in March which prompted his response about a May publication date.

So why have we got to June 13th without the new Part L? Final versions of Part L have been late before but never this late. This late is ridiculously late. It's all very well lobbying and carrying out base political manoeuverings, but there must be some one in a position to say "Time gentlemen please." After all, it's only a building regulation. You can argue till the cows come home about whether a wall U value should be 0.18 or 0.17 or 0.16, but the world isn't going to come to an end whatever the outcome.

The strange thing is that the most contentious aspect of this revision (it was in the draft version), the requirement for consequential improvements, was dealt a death blow last year by the Daily Mail's Conservatory Tax campaign. All those in favour of toughening Part L have conceded that this proposal is dead in the water and will not be part of Part L 2013. So it seems unlikely that there is much behind-the-scenes lobbying going on here.

What else could they be arguing about? Well we still don't have a definition of what a zero carbon house should actually consist of. But that is an argument that can wait till the 2016 version of Part L. 2013 was only ever to be a stepping stone.

There has been a debate about adopting Fabric Energy Efficiency Standards or FEES. The draft version made a good case for so doing, if only because they are much easier to understand than the existing metrics for overall energy performance of new builds. But I can't really see this as a reason for holding up publication.

So could it be the Treasury, up to their usual tricks in trying to subvert the green machine? Possibly. Part L is certainly a green leaning regulation, and a tougher Part L would be more expensive to implement, which the Treasury doesn't like. But the added cost is hardly a game changer: it will add, at most, a few hundred pounds to the cost of a new house. Delaying Part L publication will arguably add rather more, because the manufacturers won't be able to tool up in time to produce Part L 2013 compliant kit. On balance, it seems unlikely that the Treasury is that bothered about Part L.

So just what is going on behind the scenes? I have no idea. I can only surmise that Part L's non-appearance is symptomatic of a non-functioning department in the midst of a non-functioning government. The novelty of a coalition government, and the optimism that accompanied it, is now long dead.

Myles Allen and the Mail on Sunday

Good piece here by Joe Romm in response to the Mail on Sunday's latest tirade against climate change policy. It raises some interesting points.

Myles Allen who wrote this piece in the MoS is a respected climate scientist. He is now a professor at Oxford and not just any professor but head of the Climate Dynamics group at the university's Atmospheric, Oceanic and Planetary Physics Department. That's about as respectable as a climate scientist can get. So why is he choosing to appear in the Mail on Sunday, which has been pursuing a relentless and highly effective campaign against the state of climate science?

In order to get Allen on board, the Mail had to make a concession, because no way was Allen going to say that climate change isn't happening at all, or that it won't be harmful. So here, for the first time in yonks, you have what amounts to a retraction by the Mail. They allow Allen to write:

Do I think we’re doomed to disastrous warming? Absolutely not. But do I think we are doomed if we persist in our current approach to climate policy?

I’m afraid the answer is yes. Subsidising wind turbines and cutting down on your own carbon footprint might mean we burn through the vast quantity of carbon contained in the planet’s fossil fuels a little slower. But it won’t make any difference if we burn it in the end.

Now quite what all those loyal Mail readers think of this statement, having been weaned on a diet of Rose, Delingpole and Booker, one can only guess at. But having momentarily spat out their cornflakes, normal service is quickly resumed because Allen then proceeds into a lengthy and mostly non-sensical diatribe about the wonders of carbon capture and storage (CCS), and the demerits of every other mitigation or low carbon generation policy you can think of.

What's bizarre is that Allen denounces the current crop of policies as ruinously expensive and hopelessly ineffective, whilst not presenting any evidence that CCS is any better. My two favourite sentences are:

Frankly, I’d rather pay an engineer in Poland to actually dispose of carbon dioxide than some Brussels eco-yuppie to trade it around.

Why Poland? Aren't we capable of burying our own CO2? Or is Poland being annexed (again) so that we can turn it into a waste dump?

and

If you’re using fossil carbon to drive a car or fly a plane, you just have to pay someone else to bury CO2 for you.

Like who? And where exactly are they going to bury the CO2 coming out of the exhaust of the plane I am flying in? Or is this just code for offsetting, the sort of scam run by your typical Brussells eco-yuppie?

Allen's CCS solution to the climate change problem is worthy of debate, but just because he's a noted climate scientist doesn't make his views on what we should or should not do about CO2 dumping any more important or relevant than any other reasonably informed individual. But if you are going to argue a case for CCS on a major public platform, you would do well to marshall some coherent facts and statistics, not to mention some indication of comparative costs. Now it may be that he has been heavily edited and that what he has to say makes more sense that it appears to in this article, but then again he didn't have to write this piece.

Allen may now struggle to hang onto the respect he has gleaned as a climate scientist. The article shows the dangers inherent when scientists leave their labs and cross over into areas of policy where evidence is sketchy at best. He's managed to get the Mail on Sunday to make an admission that climate change is real and potentially devastating, but in doing so he has made himself look like an idiot.

Should we engineer the climate?

Just been to a fascinating talk given by @hughhunt, an Australian academic based in Cambridge, about geo-engineering. Or climate engineering as he prefers to call it, because everyone thinks that geo-engineering is just groundworks by a fancy name. We are not talking groundworks here, but climate control. Specifically the idea that we may be able to mitigate the effects of climate change by tinkering with the atmosphere.

Hugh Hunt's research project involves the feasibility of floating a series of giant, Wembley Stadium, sized balloons 20km up into the stratosphere, each connected to the Earth's surface by a huge hosepipe, through which we would squirt titanium oxide. Why titanium oxide? It's relatively inert and believed to be fairly harmless, it being a key ingredient in white paint and sunscreen.

In fact sunscreen is an apposite metaphor because it would be the equivalent of coating the entire planet with Factor 30. In theory, it would be possible to reduce global surface temperatures by as much as 2°C using this technique. A similar effect is observed when volcanos emit sulphur dioxide as high levels and the sun gets screened out for a while afterwards. We could do it with SO2, but TiO2 is probably preferable.

That's not to say there wouldn't be issues. Hunt identified a few. The release would have to take place around the Equator because the air in the stratosphere spreads out towards the poles from there. There is no telling it would be as effective at the poles as it might be at the Equator. There might be interaction with the oceans, or with the ozone layer. And there might well be many insuperable technical issues to resolve - like how to handle storms, and what happens if the 20km long hosepipe comes loose.

And there is of course the moral hazard of dealing with the symptoms of CO2 build-up, not the root cause. It's nicely dealt with on Wikipedia.

But the really interesting thing about all this is that the preliminary costings suggest that the total cost for a project like this would be in the low billions, much less than building a single nuke, in fact much less than almost any other carbon reducing projects you might care to think of. In fact a similar amount to how much Sheik Mansour is currently investing in Manchester City. Rather than breaking the back of the cash-strapped governments around the world, it's a project which could conceivably be paid for by a few wealthy individuals or even private equity - insurance companies anyone?