Transcript Grand Overview

Grand Overview
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Over consumption will lead to resource scarcity
eventually
Resource scarcity changes traditional economi
models and puts us in new territority
That time is near for fossil fuels as our energy
foundation
New solutions do exist – implementation takes
leadership and the ability to think big
What has changed in the last Year
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The Obama Unit is now established –
insufficient Federal funding for alternative
energy infrastructure.
Optimistic discovery potential of new NG
reserves keeps on BAU pathway
Despite a massive corporate oil spill in the
Gulf BAU continues unabated
Congress has now proved ineptness at
large scale budget issues
Resource Scarcity Depression
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At any given time, humanity always thinks
its doomed – yet we survive
Don’t be depressed – be angry and be
proactive
Consume less; Subversive messaging
works; convince your peer network to
consume less.
Rediscover the Sacred
Consumption is the sole end and
purpose of all production
Adam Smith – right up there
with Aristotle!
1942 Lecture
• I do not think we will ever escape from the
appalling squirrel-cage of economic confusion in
which we have been madly turning for the last
three centuries – the cage in which we landed
ourselves by acquiescing in a social system based
upon Envy and Avarice. A society in which
consumption has to be artificially stimulated in
order to keep production going is a society
founded on trash and waste and such a society is
a house built upon sand.
Consumption with a Conscience
The traditional Economic Argument
Does Not Scale!
And Now we are at an Interesting
Point ($50-150 for crude oil) 
worldwide economic volatility
The Business As Usual Future –
what’s the point – its time to grow
up now
JUST
SAY
NO TO
THIS
PATH
Continued Climate Change
What Are the BAU
Options?
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LNG development
“Clean Coal”
Fast Breeder
Reactors
Unconventional Oil
sources (shale oil
and tar sands)
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Fastest gateway to
energy economy
Leads to Growth of
GDP
Accelerates Global
CO2 Deposition
Reinforces BAU –
mine the planet
Breaking out of BAU
 Consume less
 Requires some
 Drive less
component of
morality based
decision making
 Requires leadership
 Requires world
cooperation
 Plan ahead
 Invest in Renewable
Energy infrastructure
 Have long term
governmental goals
Is this just too Damn Hard to Do? So we
run away from it?
But Many Options Now Exist
Solar PV
 Solar CSP; Solar Thermal Electric
 Wind (ON shore and Off Shore)
 Alternative Fuels (biodiesel, ethanol (grain
and celluolistic, hydrogen, hybrids)
 Biomass Co-Generation
 OTEC; Gulf Current
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Barriers to Renewables
High capital cost; long payback times
 Lack of any vision or out of the box
thinking on truly large scale projects
 NIMBY reactions to anything and
everything makes implementation difficult
 Technology uncertainty
 Electrical Grid limitations
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Solar Pros and Cons
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Pros
Resource is
available
CSP technology
rapidly improving
Many small scale
applications
Thermal Electric is
dispatchable
Can co-locate with
Fossil Plan
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Cons
Large $/Watt
installation costs
Large Scale (1000
MW or greater)
facilities difficult
Requires Significant
Energy storage for
24x7
Wind Pros and Cons
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Pros
Low levelized costs
Small footprint on
the Land
Applicable on both
large and small
scale
Some wind
resources is usually
always present
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Cons
Visual Pollution
Resource is erratic
in nature and
therefore requires
energy storage
Transmission line
expense for remote
wind farms is large
Transportation Changes
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Pros
Single biggest lever
arm for energy
conservation
Single biggest lever
to mitigate climate
change
Single biggest
influence on
development
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Cons
Our whole
economic structure
is based on private
vehicles
Vast amounts of
jobs are associated
with our current
structure
OTEC; Gulf Current
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Pros
Has enough
capacity to sustain
world for centuries
In situ Hydrogen
Production for
transport economy
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Cons
Gigantic up front
costs
Engineering
challenge
Requires world
cooperation
Evaluation Rubric For All forms of
Renewables
1. MW output per surface area (MW/KM2)
2. MW output per material use (MW/Ton)
3. MW output per job created (Jobs/MW)
4. MW output versus production time scale
to bring on line (months/MW)
5. Capital cost per MW ($/Watt)
6. Realistic Levelized Cost (cents per
KWH)
To Evaluate Electricity Generating
Technologies
 Develop an internally consistent indexing
system for the 6 attributes listed previously
(the dow jones is an index)
 Use real world data and real world physics to
best determine the values
 Weight the indexes appropriately (real world
cares about $/Watt and Jobs Created)
 Choose Baseline – we will use Solar in the
following exercise
Indexing - Solar
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~20 (averaged over 24 hour day) = 1
~3 tons per kw = 1
~3 jobs per MW
~10 MW per month
~3$ per watt real facility cost
10 cents per KWH
Index Solar
Wind
Waves Biomass
1
1
10
2
.2
2
1
3
.5
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3
1
1
1
5
4
1
3
.5
.5
5
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2
.75
.5
6
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3
.5
1
Cumulative Index = 1+2+(1.5)3+4+1.25(5)+1.25(6)
Relative Ranking
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Solar = 7
Waves =7.5
Biomass =11 (because of jobs created)
Wind = 24 (because of excellent material
ratio and low Levelized costs)
Thinking Big -Solar
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Sonoran Desert Project:
300,000 square km @
2% coverage yields
100,000 MW
Thinking Big - Wind
Lake Michigan Wind
project down North South
Axis: Populate 400 x 30 km
box with 30 legs each
containing 1200 5 MW
turbines: 180,000 MW
Thinking Real Big - Wind
Great Prairie Wind Farm with 100
MW vertical Wind Turbines:
Construct 10,000 of these (Space
Needle Size) and each per 125
square km. This produces 1TW of
electricity and effectively replaces
all other forms of electricity
generation in the US.
Be Optimistic
• Change can occur – this class is part of this process
• Individual attitudes matter and multiply – this is
where informed peers matter!
• Technology is rapidly improving but investment
needs to be sustained
• Nanotech is important, very important.
• Wisdom can be re-acquired
• We ain’t dead yet!