The Bullroarer - Saturday 16 February 2008

John Quiggin - One percenters underbid by McKinsey

I’ve put up quite a few posts supporting the conclusion of the Stern review that large cuts in C02 emissions could be achieved at very modest economic cost. Mostly, the analysis has focused on policies aimed at reducing developed country emissions by 30 per cent by 2020 and 60 per cent by 2050, and the typical conclusion is that the cost would be around 1 per cent of national income. For Australia, at current income levels that would be about $10 billion per year. Today’s news reports a study by McKinsey estimating a much smaller cost, around $3 billion per year. I haven’t seen the report yet but a quick Google found a similar study for the US.

I suspect the report is over-optimistic in the sense that it estimates the cost of doing the job in the most technically efficient fashion, whereas any feasible policy to induce adoption of the necessary measures will have higher costs. But it’s easy to show that the order of magnitude estimate must be approximately right. You can see this by looking at an absolute upper bound assuming we just replace all energy generation by expensive but feasible sources like solar (given the costs of generation, the extra cost required for large grids and pumped storage to smooth out supply variability is a rounding error here). That cost is no more than 10 per cent of income. Taking account of the obvious adjustment responses such reduced consumption in response to higher energy prices implies an even tighter bound, maybe 5 per cent of income.

The most important criticism to be made here is that it is increasingly evident that a 60 per cent reduction in emissions by 2050 may well not be enough.

SMH - Going green for cost of a phone call



SMH - This way, please, to the sardine squeeze

THIS is the future of train travel in Sydney - a system becoming so crowded that RailCorp is trialling the use of marshals on platforms at Town Hall, Wynyard and Central stations to get people on and off trains faster. The troubled rail system had to squeeze in more than 200,000 extra passengers a week last year - a sign of the congestion at the root of the city's transport chaos.

The director-general of the Ministry of Transport, Jim Glasson, said yesterday that a surge in demand for public transport last year was the core of the problem. "In the last year overall patronage on rail has gone up by 3.7 per cent," he said yesterday. "That is close to 200,000 additional passenger journeys a week, or over 10 million over a 12-month period, [and] that is substantial. Congestion is at the core of the transport challenge right now … "Similarly on bus networks we've got bus corridors now running at growth rates of 20 per cent compound."

ABC - Petrol tax cuts the road to ruin

Press.co.nz - Low lakes pose risk of power cuts

The security of the electricity supply is on a knife-edge and power cuts are possible this winter. Energy Minister David Parker yesterday admitted the supply situation was becoming dire, although he still believed the country would get through winter without blackouts. Earlier yesterday, however, Meridian Energy chief executive Keith Turner told a select committee at Parliament that New Zealand would avoid cold showers and brown-outs only if nothing else went wrong. "It is a very fine margin, finer than I have seen it in my career," Turner said. He has spent the past 39 years in the electricity industry. "There is no question that New Zealand ... has under-invested in the (electricity) grid for 20 years," he said.

NZ Herald - Garth George: People in power need to address supply problems

Stuff.co.nz - Power station to stay shut despite fears of blackouts

Not even the threat of impending power cuts this winter will bring New Plymouth's power station back into service. Contact Energy yesterday told the Taranaki Daily News there was no suggestion they would consider re-opening the power station, despite the looming prospect of power shortages in New Zealand. The New Plymouth station was closed last year following the discovery of asbestos in pipe lagging. On Thursday, Energy Minister David Parker said the country's electricity supply situation wasbecoming dire.

ABC - Drought killing wildlife: 'never dry as this'

Years of very low rainfall in the northern Flinders Ranges of South Australia are being blamed for the death of wildlife and hundreds of trees. Experts say river red gums can for live for 1,000 years in dry conditions. But Phil Barron, from Greening Australia, says hundreds of the mighty trees in the Flinders are dead or dying.

Public Opinion - The Australian: water politics

Water politics brings out some strange views doesn't it? Here is an editorial in The Australian: ... "Politicians like to hide behind climate change, but the root cause of the water crisis in Australian cities has been the failure of successive governments to build dams" ...

How this applies to southern Australia is beyond me. There have been no rains and the dams in the Murray Darling Basin are at very low levels. On the Australian's account the lack of water in southern Australia has little to do with rain or the over-allocation of the water that is available to subsidize irrigated agriculture.

This little snippet indicates that The Australian, in continuing to advocate conservative politics will run with the most dubious views---politicians hide behind climate change (a smokescreen) to cover their inaction over building more dams. Dam-building is what is needed to drought proof the country. It sounds like the 1950s voice of the irrigated agriculture doesn't it; one that has updated itself to speak as a climate change denialist.

The Age - Global warming could invite sharks to Antarctica: biologists

Brisbane Times - Mass evacuation from Mackay

STCW - 15 February 2008 Newsletter

Michael Lardelli (Online Opnion) - To save the world we may have to waste it

“The only thing worse than peak oil now is peak oil in 20 years time.”

I first heard this comment in 2004 not long after finding out about the imminent peak in the world’s oil production rate (“peak oil”). Now in 2008 it seems we passed the peak of conventionally-mined oil more than a year ago. When I start to feel depressed about the implications of the decline in world oil production this comment helps me to deal with it. Let me explain:

Nothing happens without energy and oil is the master facilitating resource of our civilisation. Oil provides the majority of the world’s energy, and almost all of its transport energy - in a highly concentrated form that is easy to store and carry. It is also the source of plastics that are part of almost every aspect of modern life.

With oil driving the Green Revolution we have increased our population to nearly seven billion and our current consumption patterns are destroying the world’s ecosystems - our life support mechanism.

The ecological foot print of the human race is currently 1.25 planet Earths and rising. The abundant energy of oil allows us to exceed the sustainable carrying capacity of our world for a short period but with irreparable environmental consequences. The longer we continue on this path the more damage we do and the more severe the ultimate ecological penalty to be payed.

Peak Energy - Peak Oil - A "Class Zero" Catastrophe ?

SMH - Fears that NSW electricity deal may fizzle

The Age - Long and winding road nearly ready to roll

The Age - AGL sees light in sector power play

Asia Business News - KUTh Energy Initiates Network Connection Strategy

Peak Energy - Agri Energy: Another One Bites The Dust

Peak Energy - Vietnam May Phase Out Coal Exports

Peak Energy - Massive Oil And Gas Find Off Aceh ?

Peak Energy - Farming carbon as a cash crop

It's unfortunate I suppose but anti-doomer arguments are easily criticised. Thus;

economic academics - who mostly never saw PO and GW coming and now say it's small beer

conservative newspapers - reassure their readers that physical laws don't matter

geothermal prospectors - looking for electrical connections before they even have electricity to connect

rural lobby - want money or financial breaks
whether they farm the soil or not.

Well - in this case John Quiggin is saying much the same thing I do - there are practical alternatives to coal fired power that could be put in place. At the present time, without a tax on carbon, this would result in higher electricity prices - but there are a lot of side benefits.

It certainly doesn't imply the end of the world is coming and cannot be avoided.

As for the Tasmanian geothermal guys - I think they're prospecting for investors, and the press releases are just a way of generating interest in the company. I remain enthusiastic about the possibility of large scale geothermal generation at some point.

I don't have anything to defend The Australian with though...

They seem a rather clueless lot.

"Going green for the cost of a phone call" - 80 cents is a local phone call? Maybe on your mobile, but not on your landline or public phone.

Rather than marshals to direct the human traffic, why not... more trains? If I get more customers in my restaurant, do I get the maitre'd to shuffle people in and out more quickly, or do I just put in more tables? They have a strange business sense.

And the dams... oy vey. Saying that if only we had more dams we could have more water is like me saying that if only I had more bank accounts I could have more money.

The 'more dams' argument of today is the equivalent of the 'rains following the plough' of yesteryear.

I'm staggered at how often that line gets argued - don't they realise that rainfall (in the southern half of the country) is declining while demand is rising ?

I wouldn't mind if people argued that with large scale water recycling programs put in place there will be plenty of water for our needs (in the cities at least)...

You usually find that the ones saying we should build more dams and all will be well are violently against water recycling for human consumption, and are a bit iffy about it for industrial and agricultural use, too.

A few years back I was told by a mate that Victoria will never use recycled water for human consumption. By this I knew it was inevitable; he's a sort of anti-prophet, he said that the invasion of Iraq would go alright and within a few years they'd have a peaceful democracy, that Sheriff Johnny would win the Nov 2007 election or at the very least keep his own seat, etc.

Bring on the recycled piss, I say.

Nothing wrong with drinking recycled water - so long as you don't mind growing man-boobs due to all the hormones in it of course :-)

Many years ago I was living in London (with all expenses paid courtesy of my employer at the time) and along with my co-workers developed mild paranoia about (a) lead piping, and (b) recycled water (there is a widespread belief that on average London drinking water has passed through 7 other people before it gets to you) - as a result we used Perrier for almost everything - including cooking rice and pasta (but not showering).

On a serious note, I'd also add that rainwater tanks should be made mandatory for all new buildings - this would also do an immense amount for making our existing dam water supplies stretch a lot further.

Do you not see the irony in decrying new dams, then with the next breath advocating rainwater tanks? Why is one device for retaining rainfall bad, and the other good? Forestalling the obvious rejoinder, note that new-dam advocates are not saying they should be in already-tapped catchments: http://blogs.news.com.au/heraldsun/andrewbolt/index.php/heraldsun/commen...

Do you not see the irony in decrying new dams, then with the next breath advocating rainwater tanks? Why is one device for retaining rainfall bad, and the other good?

The issue here is one of scale and circumstance.
Placing a (large) dam in the catchment (if there are available sites) removes that water from use further downstream. This is one of the issues regarding environmental flows... eg the Snowy River. Secondly, what is the point of said large dam if it doesn't rain OR if the climate changes rendering that investment moot?

RE Rainwater tanks.
Given that 80 - 90 % of Australians are urbanites and mostly located in the big capitals... rain falling in our cities by and large just goes straight down the drain and out to sea. Streams and rivers receiving stormwater run-off are degraded from the flashy flows. The rain caught in tanks in urban environments can serve a dual purpose. Relieving stress on the drinking water supply by using rainwater for the garden and toilet (if you don't feel like drinking it) and potentially leading to partial rehabilitation of urban streams by catching a portion of the runoff thus reducing the intensity of flash flows (which also periodically drown people).

All the paving and hard surfaces in cities has changed the local hydrology. In Melbourne the extensive dry period has led to drying of soils (which receive less infiltration from rain) which has led to cracking of walls.

You usually find that the ones saying we should build more dams and all will be well are violently against water recycling for human consumption

And here I was believing I was the only one to think that generalisation ;-)

If we can't remove "all those hormones" with a little activated carbon...

My "argument" when confronted with anti recyled water rants is to point out where the source water for most Australians comes from (ie rivers and lakes) and to simply make the observation that insects, fish and birds all piss and shit. And if you live inland on any of the major tributaries of the Murray, you are already drinking recycled water... where do you think that treated effluent goes?