Energy for Future Presidents


Energy for Future Presidents: The Science Behind the Headlines
by Richard A. Muller

Main Points:
  • The major energy catastrophes like Fukushima-Daichi and BP Oil Spill have not and should not impact world energy markets/decisions. Fukushima resulted in areas affected with 0.1-2 rem (unit for radiation damage). An area with 25 rem has a 1% chance of developing cancer. Hence 2,500 rem-person is the threshold for danger. By these estimates Fukushima will result in 100-1500 deaths caused by radiation, which is less than deaths caused by the tsunami. Additionally, the BP oil spill resulted in light hydrocarbons evaporating, heavy hydrocarbons (tars) sinking and being consumed by bacteria.
  • The Energy Landscape shapes two key problems for the United States and world: (1) energy security - heavy dependence on liquid energy like oil and (2) global warming- caused by heavy reliance on coal. Incentives for utilities to use strategies like "decoupling plus"- offer subsidies to customers to save energy while raising electricity rates result in win-win scenarios. Meanwhile, ideas like increasing public transport or moving to electric vehicles may not make sense if population density is not high enough or battery costs do not decrease.
  • Alternative energy faces grave challenges in cost by natural gas (6.6 ¢/kWh). The best sodium sulfur batteries are $5 per deliverable watt while peak natural gas generator costing $100 million for 100 megawatts delivers $1 per deliverable watt (5x cheaper). Solar in 2011 dropped to below $1/watt, but this is in terms of peak power, but cost of inverters/capital cost could make it comparatively expensive to natural gas.
Publishers' weekly offers a quick review of the book Energy for Future Presidents, and Foreign Affairs also provides their thoughts on the book's development. 

Watch a great lecture by Professor Richard Muller on the Physics for Future Presidents at the Berkeley Lab during the Friends of Science series. 

For an in-depth talk on climate science and the work Richard Muller has done on verifying the IPCC's result through the Berkeley Earth Surface Temperature Project, watch this lecture.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Consider a Spherical Cow

Image
Consider a Spherical Cow: A Course in Environmental Problem Solving by John Harte Main Points: What is the "spherical cow" joke ? The phrase comes from a joke about theoreticians I first heard as a graduate student. Milk production at a dairy farm was low so the farmer wrote to the local university, asking help from academia. A multidisciplinary team of professors was assembled, headed by a theoretical physicist, and two weeks of intensive on-site investigation took place. The scholars then returned to the university, notebooks crammed with data, where the task of writing the report was left to the team leader. Shortly thereafter the farmer received the write-up and opened it to read on the first line: "Consider a spherical cow..." The Approach : The spherical cow approach to problem solving involves the stripping away of unnecessary detail, so that only the essentials remain. Of course, approaching the complex world from the spherical cow perspective
Read more

Should We Risk It?

Image
Should We Risk It? by Daniel M. Kammen & David M. Hassenzahl Main Points: " I began by trying to quantify technical risks, thinking that if they were 'put into perspective' through comparison with familiar risks we could better judge their social acceptability. I am ashamed now of my naivety, although I have the excuse that this was more than 20 years ago, while some people are still doing it today. "- Harry Otway (1992) Background: Daniel Kammen teaches a course at UC Berkeley called "Environmental Classics" where they rotate through key papers/books like Amory Lovins' paper "A Road Not Taken", the Wedges paper. They read the original items- the critiques that came at the time and the critiques that come after. Only Silent Spring  becomes a fixture in the course year after year.  Take a look at Kammen's lab RAEL and BREG  for sustainability tools and what tools we need to alter the dialogue around clean energy or sus
Read more

Read one Book a Week

I once participated in an energy club in grad school. The club was composed mainly of grad students from several departments and disciplines - engineering, business, and law. Our mission was to foster a diverse energy community and enable interdisciplinary collaboration, knowledge exchange, and professional development. Over the course of two years, the club grew in size from 20 to over 100 students, creating its first alumni mentoring program, taking tours of several energy companies, hosting its first energy case competition, installing the largest solar panel array in the local neighborhood, building a vertical axis wind turbine, and collaborating with several organizations around the nation. I loved it. Mainly because of all the great friends who made my time in the club truly memorable. Much of what we were trying to do was to understand the energy environment from those who worked, taught, and preached about it daily. While talks and small group dinners got us interested, I fe
Read more