Climate News Live

Blogger Richard Campbell has done an analysis of the Economist's article "Sour Times - The sea is becoming more acidic. That is not good news if you live in it."

As any grade school child will willingly tell you, water covers almost three-quarters of the surface of the Earth.  But as vast and deep as the world's oceans are, we cannot continue to think of the sea's capacity to swallow our wastes as limitless.  And while we tend to think of carbon dioxide as airborne gas causing global warming, we must also now recognize that these same carbon emissions are changing the very chemistry of the oceans... 

Click on the headline for the full text and a link to the article.

Submitted by R. Campbell

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While the House has reiterated its desire to pass a renewable energy tax credit package, the legislation faces a tough battle in both the Senate and with the Administration who oppose the offsets included within.  Democratic leaders in the Senate remain hopeful an agreement can be reached.

The House on Wednesday approved a bill to extend more than $17 billion in tax credits and other incentives to encourage the production of energy from solar, wind and other renewable sources, and to promote energy conservation. The bill would be financed by ending tax incentives for oil and natural gas producers.  Democratic leaders in the House hailed the legislation as a step toward energy independence and a moral victory for protecting the environment, by encouraging production of clean alternative fuels. But the White House threatened to veto the bill, saying it would be a mistake to increase the tax burden on American oil companies.

The New York Times, February 28, 2008

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Alstrom and We Energies have partnered up to start the first domestic carbon capture project on a coal-fired power plant.

At the Wisconsin plant, Alstom has built a 90-foot-high addition criss-crossed by huge pipes and heat exchangers to capture the carbon, using a process called chilled ammonia. After coal is burned in a boiler, ammonium carbonate absorbs about 90% of the resulting CO2 to form ammonium bicarbonate, a solid and liquid. The carbon will then be separated under high pressure and released into the air as a gas.

Although this project will only capture 3% of carbon emissions and then immediately release them into the air, it is still a big start towards full carbon capture and sequestration considering last month's cancellation of FutureGen.

Deutch says only the federal government can oversee the challenging task of burying carbon in rock formations. Researchers must ensure that the carbon doesn't contaminate water supplies, and officials must determine who is liable if the CO2 leaks to neighboring properties, he says.

Hilton, the head of business development for Alstom's global environmental business, thinks Deutch is underestimating private efforts. "Sometimes government programs prolong a product coming to market," he says.

USA Today; February 27, 2008

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In recognition of an emerging market, Lexington Insurance is offering protection for homeowners from risks associated with generation of alternative energy sources.  Will the establishment of similar products help encourage more homeowners to take green initiatives?

Lexington Insurance Co., an American International Group company, today announced LexElite Eco-Homeowner, insurance for homeowners generating their own power using geothermal, solar or wind systems.

LexElite Eco-Homeowner also provides industry-leading coverage for eco-landscaping, plantings used to provide shade or influence wind movement to reduce heating and cooling expenses. LexElite Eco-Homeowner, available as an endorsement to the LexElite homeowner policy, responds to risks faced by homeowners who generate their own power and feed surplus energy back into the local power grid. If a homeowner's alternative-energy system has a covered outage, LexElite Eco-Homeowner will protect the homeowner against lost income generated from selling surplus energy back to the local energy company and will cover the extra expenses incurred to purchase replacement electricity.

Insurance Journal, February 26, 2008

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Richard Branson's Virgin Atlantic Airways, along with Boeing and GE, just tested a jumbo jet that had one engine using 25% biofuel made from coconut oil and babassu nuts.

"This pioneering flight will enable those of us who are serious about reducing our carbon emissions to go on developing the fuels of the future, fuels which will power our aircraft in the years ahead through sustainable next-generation oils, such as algae,” he said.

“Two years ago, people said that was impossible. They said it would freeze at 30,000 feet,” Mr. Branson said in an interview.

This is the first commercial airliner, albeit passenger-less, to fly using biofuels.

New York Times, February 25, 2008

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Senior Church of England leaders are advocating to parishioners to reduce their carbon footprint for Lent, reflecting an emerging trend of religious organizations embracing climate change mitigation.

Increasingly, religious leaders are coming around to the green way of thinking: The Presbyterian Church asked its members to become carbon-neutral in 2006; the Vatican hosted a climate change conference last year; the Church of England initiated "Shrinking the Footprint," a plan to reduce its carbon usage by 60 percent. And Call to Action, a group founded last year, seeks to make global warming a top political issue for evangelicals; its leaders include the Rev. Joel C. Hunter, president of the Christian Coalition of America, and the Rev. Richard Cizik, vice president for government relations of the National Association of Evangelicals. Some political analysts speculate that "eco-evangelicals" could be a crucial voting bloc in this fall's elections.

Rev. Hunter has publicly admitted that evangelicals are late to embrace climate change. Rev. Cizik is considered responsible for coining the term, "Creation Care," and explaining that tackling climate change is a moral imperative.

The Washington Post, February 24, 2008

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What do we call the newest energy find in Texas?  That's right, Texas has now surpassed California in wind energy.

After breakneck growth the last three years, Texas has reached the point that more than 3 percent of its electricity, enough to supply power to one million homes, comes from wind turbines.  Texans are even turning tapped-out oil fields into wind farms.

This is great news for alternative energy proponents - you know they do everything bigger down in Texas.

The New York Times, February 23, 2008

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FACT: The only thing more scary than climate change is snakes. According to estimates, climate change could cause an explosive population growth of snakes not native to sovereign U.S. soil.

As climate change warms the nation, giant Burmese pythons could colonize one-third of the USA, from San Francisco across the Southwest, Texas and the South and up north along the Virginia coast, according to U.S. Geological Survey maps released Wednesday.

Two federal agencies — the USGS and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service — are investigating the range of nine invasive snakes in Florida, concerned about the danger they now pose to endangered species. The agencies are collecting data to aid in the control of these populations.

These snakes can grow up to 20 feet long and 250 lbs. Invasive snake species should be labeled as terrorists and dealt with accordingly.

USA Today, February 21, 2008

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With the projected energy demands in 2050 roughly double of today's consumption, Royal Dutch Shell CEO Jeroen van der Veer outlined his company's plan for the future. Petroleum consumption remained at the top of the list.

"Renewables are still too expensive. They will come, I'm not self-serving, I'm not defensive but it will take a very long time" either to achieve the technological breakthroughs required or to build many more nuclear power stations, van der Veer said.

After a year in which oil companies earned record profits and their indication that the future holds slow progress, it presents an opportunity for Americans to lead the international community in developing technologies in the area of  renewable energy research and development.

Reuters; February 21, 2008

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A major Japanese business coalition with powerful influence over public policy has just dropped its opposition to a cap-and-trade program, removing a major hurdle in Japan's move towards major climate change legislation.

Acquiescence from the Japan Business Federation, which has argued that quotas would be unfairly distributed and hurt growth, could allow Tokyo to push through a trading scheme as it seeks to become a global leader in tackling climate change.

Currently, it relies on voluntary pledges to cut emissions, but Japan's resistance to forcing stricter standards on its firms is leaving it increasingly isolated internationally.

Japan has been consistently behind on enacting Kyoto protocol reforms, but since they have assumed leadership of the G8 they have begun preparations for major climate change discussions when the Group meets in July.

Reuters; February 21, 2008

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The new head of BP has accepted the inevitability of $100 per barrel petroleum, and now plans on downgrading the conglomerate's green future envisioned by the former chief executive.

BP appears to be dropping a central plank of Browne's strategy, the green promise to go "beyond petroleum", in favour of going back to petroleum - a move which many believe has riled the former boss. In what some saw as a thinly veiled criticism, Browne argued at a recent conference that some energy groups were "in denial" over the need to clean up their carbon output.

The move into tar sands through a deal with Husky Energy has been condemned by Greenpeace as "a climate crime" because three times as much carbon is produced extracting the crude from the ground compared with ordinary oil operations. Steam or hot water is used to separate the oil from the sand and then more power must be used to turn it into useable fuel. Hayward has also upset green groups by downgrading the company's alternative energy portfolio and dropping plans for an innovative carbon capture and storage (CCS) experiment at Peterhead, Scotland.

Its no surprise that environmental groups and some of the visionary senior executives at BP are grumbling that this happened. The former head of exploration for new oil reserves is now in control of the company.

The Guardian; February 21, 2008

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Duke Energy is giving its customers the option to purchase carbon offsets from their electricity generation processes.

Duke would turn that money over to green projects, such as planting trees or building wind farms. The offsets would be designed to balance carbon dioxide produced from day-to-day living and special events, such as taking a flight.

Charlotte Observer; February 19, 2008

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The United Nations on Tuesday announced that climate change will have disastrous displacement effects, similar to the Sudanese conflict over access to water.

"Global warming and extreme weather conditions may have calamitous consequences for the human rights of millions of people," said Kyung-wha Kang, the U.N. deputy high commissioner for human rights.

"Ultimately climate change may affect the very right to life of various individuals," she said, pointing to threats of hunger, malnutrition, exposure to disease and lost livelihoods, particularly in poor rural areas dependent on fertile soil.

Reuters; February 19, 2008

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The crack team of investigative journalists at the Washington Times have uncovered that Sen. John McCain and Sen. Barack Obama are not living up to their pledges to offset their campaign carbon emissions.

Campaign finance records for 2007 show that neither of the two leading presidential candidates has spent money to independently cover his campaign's "carbon footprint" — the amount of carbon emissions emitted by the planes and vehicles the candidates and their staffs use for travel, or by the computers and headquarters needed to run a presidential campaign.

By contrast, Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, Mr. Obama's rival for the Democratic presidential nomination, has made monthly payments to offset her campaign's "carbon footprint."

Washington Times; February 19, 2008

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Oil prices are above $100 a barrel for the first time since January, setting a new record at $100.10.

There was no single driver behind oil's sharp price jump; investors seized on an explosion at a 67,000 barrel per day refinery in Texas, the falling dollar, the possibility that OPEC may cut production next month, and continuing tensions between the U.S. and Venezuela.

Associated Press; February 19, 2008

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The American Bar Association is formally backing the cap-and-trade proposal currently in the Senate.

As long as there is complicated legislation in the hopper, the ABA is pretty much agnostic about the details. It supports a cap-and-trade scheme, or a carbon tax, or emissions trading. It wants “broad coverage of various sectors of the economy,” encompassing fuel economy, renewable energy, clean coal, and more. It wants state programs wrapped into a bigger–and presumably more complicated — federal climate — change agenda.

Wall Street Journal Environmental Capital Roundup; February 15, 2008

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Duke Energy says it won't build coal-fired plants unless the carbon sequestration is facilitated.

Carbon-sequestration is a developing technology that Rogers said could be implemented at coal gasification power plants in the next 15 years but won't work with North Carolina's underground rock formations. He said Duke may seek coal-fired plants in the region if scientists someday develop unforeseen technologies to deal with carbon emissions here.

Rogers said the company considered piping carbon dioxide emissions from coal-fired plants in North Carolina and South Carolina to places like Tennessee and Kentucky, where it could be more easily sequestered underground.

Digtriad.com; February 13, 2008

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World-renowned columnist explains that utilities need a carbon tax to be pushed towards green energy development.

Without pain or a "price signal," being green will always be just fashion, he said. A so-called "green revolution" underway is really just a "green party," he said.

"Have you ever been to a revolution where no one got hurt," he told the crowd of about 1,000 today at the Emerging Issues Forum at N.C. State University. "If there's one thing we could use, it's a little, change or die."

Red Orbit; February 11, 2008

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A wind power and clean coal replacement plan for old coal capacity is not without critics.

Interstate Power and Light said it would cut greenhouse gas emissions by 800,000 tons a year by retiring two coal burning electricity generating units in Lansing and switching a Dubuque power plant from coal to natural gas when it opens the proposed $1.5 billion coal plant in Marshalltown.

Plans to build wind turbines in north central Iowa and implement energy efficiency initiatives to reduce customers' electric usage are expected to reduce emissions by another 2.57 million tons per year, the company said.

Madison Capital Times; February 9, 2008

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New report shows the current push toward alternative energy sources more than a trend.

In a report scheduled for release Tuesday, the firm, Cambridge Energy Research Associates, concludes that multiple factors will continue pushing the world toward greater use of alternative energy sources like sun and wind power, regardless of what happens to oil prices.  "The focus today on clean energy is not a bubble or passing phenomenon,” the report says. “Unconventional clean energy is now poised to cross the divide and move from the fringes of the energy sector to the mainstream.

What makes today different from the 1970s is growing apprehension about global warming as a threat to political security and the environment, according to the report. That is pushing governments to demand, and subsidize, greater use of alternative energy.

New York Times, February 5, 2008

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With more and more interest in clean energy sources, related investment and jobs continue to grow.

"In recent months, the industry has added several thousand jobs in the production of solar energy cells and installation of solar panels on roofs. A spate of investment has also aimed at making solar power more efficient and less costly than natural gas and coal."

California continues to lead the nation in the exploration and commitment to green alternatives, and other states are taking notice.  When pundits are speculating about ecomonic downturns, it's noteworthy that green industries are growing so rapidly.

The New York Times, February 1, 2008.

Submitted by M. Brooks

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