Transportation 2050

In March 2011 the European Commission published a proposed rulemaking for long term transportation standards in Europe titled TRANSPORT 2050. I drafted a similar policy for the US and developed this side by side 2-page presentation.

You may be interested to see the EU's proposed draconian measures against the automobile: Halve the use of gasoline, diesel and LPG fueled cars in cities by 2030 and phase them out in cities by 2050.

While EU's planning for a CO2-free utopia continues unabated, China picks up all the slack: In 2010, China's 18 million vehicle sales far surpassed U.S. light-duty vehicle sales of 12 million, making China the world's largest new car market. From 2003 through 2010, China's vehicle population grew at an annual rate of 18.6%, far faster than even the most ambitious projection.

For Every Green Job, Four Other are Lost

A few posts below you can read my opinion about Wind Energy for Hawaii
http://fixoahu.blogspot.com/2011/04/wind-energy-for-hawaii-great-for.html

Today I was sent this revealing study done at the UK:

Part of the summary in offshoreWIND.biz reads as follows: A study of renewable energy in Scotland shows that for every job created in the alternative energy sector, almost four jobs are lost in the rest of the economy.

Not only has the sun set on the British Empire, but the promise of wind apparently is deserting it as well. A new study called “Worth The Candle?” by the consulting firm Verso Economics confirms the experience of Spain and other countries: The creation of “green” jobs destroys other jobs through the diversion of resources and the denial of abundant sources of fossil fuel energy.

Here is the full report: “Worth The Candle?”

Board of Water Supply: For Crying Out Loud!

In 2009 and 2010 the Board of Water Supply tore up the upper half of Pacific Heights Road to upgrade the water lines and meters. The bumpy condition of the road (in part) cost me $800 in replacing the front suspension bushings of my car at 45,000 miles (normal wear should be 100,000 miles or more.) At the end of 2010 MIRA contractor spent over a month paving the road. They did a decent job.

Four months later the same road is marked to be torn up to fix the sewer lines, by the same Board of Water Supply. It really does not get more costly and disruptive than this…. Heavy machinery… Line up in single stack… Off duty police officers at both ends… Etc.

As can be seen in the photos below, the asphalt is dark black; brand new with a likely service span of 15 to 20 years. Actively being destroyed today.

Huge Combustion Efficiencies Are in the Works

The York Times article Start-Ups Work to Reinvent the Combustion Engine reports that

• Pinnacle Engines is working on an engine that "will be up to 50% more efficient than today's power plants,"
• EcoMotors, "a Detroit area start-up backed by Khosla Ventures(1) and Bill Gates," and
• Achates Power of San Diego

are developing variations on an opposed piston engine...long considered too expensive and unworkable for automobiles. The goal is to reduce the amount of energy "wasted as heat," so as to "to tap more energy to propel a vehicle." Pinnacle says that its current engine is "30% more efficient than current scooter engines." EcoMotors "is also claiming up to a 50% improvement in efficiency for its two-stroke diesel opposed piston engine." Achates Power says that its engine is "15% more efficient than conventional diesel."

In addition I recently read that both the Engine Research Group of University of Wisconsin-Madison is working on dual fuel engines to achieve high efficiencies and low emissions. An example of dual fuel is engine uses 90% gasoline on high load (acceleration), 90% diesel on low load (cruise) and 100% diesel at idle. Fuel efficiency improved 20% to 25% or large engines for trucks and heavy equipment.

At the same time and the Oak Ridge National Lab is conducting similar experiments using 1.9 liter Euro spec GM diesel engines with good results.

These are all positive and telling signs that the "classic" engine and the automobile are nowhere near their "dawn" days.

(1) Vinod Koshla, of Khosla Ventures, a Silicon Valley venture-capital firm. His profile in The Economist is worth reading. I liked this quote of his: “ENVIRONMENTALISTS are fiddling while Rome burns. They get in the way with silly stuff like asking people to walk more, drive less. That is an increment of 1-2% change. We need 1,000% change if billions of people in China and India are to enjoy a Western, energy-rich lifestyle.” Forget today’s green technologies like electric cars, wind turbines, solar cells and smart grids. None meets what Mr Khosla calls the “Chindia price.”

Wind Energy for Hawaii: Great for Profits, Not So Great for Power

Electric power is all about baseload and predictable peaks of usage. Wind is all about unpredictability. Among all major resources for the production of energy, wind is among the least predictable and dependable. Full article published in Hawaii Reporter.

Wind Speed Variability Sample as Reported in a Presentation by Renewable Energy Laboratory:

"Smart Technologies" Could Improve Transportation

The post below is excerpted from the American Society for Engineering Education (ASEE) daily newsletter. It summarizes an attempt of Congress to improve transportation conditions by employing Intelligent Transportation Systems (ITS).

I have been teaching these methods for over a dozen years as part of my CEE 661: Intelligent Transportation Systems graduate course at the UH-Manoa. What is different this time is $1.2 Billion dollars in federal funding over six years for the pilot deployment in six competing cities.

I hope that the bill will go forward and I hope (but do not expect) that Honolulu and State of Hawaii will vie for this ITS initiative. Besides being substantially congested, Honolulu presents an excellent, fully controlled traffic laboratory. By that I mean that 100% of the traffic is local, as opposed to, say, Chicago, that at any time 5% to 15% of its traffic is from neighboring Indiana, Wisconsin and other states, thus its local ITS initiative is diluted by a large number of non-participating vehicles. ===========================================

The Hill (3/30, Laing) reports, "A bipartisan pair of lawmakers on Tuesday announced a bill to create six pilot 'intelligent transportation systems' they say will use technology to ease transit woes in cash-strapped American cities. Reps. Mike Rogers (R-Mich.) and Russ Carnahan (D-Mo.) said their 'Smart Technologies for Communities Act' would make improvements to transportation that federal and state governments could not otherwise afford." Notably, "the bill would create pilot programs in six cities to test whether technologies such as cars with crash sensors, bridges that can sense stress from vehicle weight, electronic toll systems and live updates to commuters improve overall commutes."

The Detroit News (3/30, Shepardson) reports the bill "would provide grants to make 'Intelligent Transportation Systems' a reality." They support "spending $1.2 billion over six years" on the initiative. The News says "the pair will tout their bill along with Intelligent Transportation Society of America CEO Scott Belcher in a press briefing Wednesday." Their bill has the support of "the Alliance of Automobile Manufacturers and its members, including General Motors Co., Ford Motor Co. and Chrysler Group LLC." It would "create a pilot program in up to six communities across the country to serve as model deployment sites for large-scale installation and operation of ITS to improve safety, mobility and the environment on the nation's highways."

Real Energy, Real Jobs

By looking at the title, for a second I thought that I wrote this article and forgot about it, but the Real Energy, Real Jobs article was written by Robert Bradley Jr., CEO and Founder of the Institute for Energy Research and author, Capitalism at Work: Business, Government, and Energy.

Indeed Energy is Big Business and critically important for the US, Hawaii and indeed all civilization. For each location, there is an optimum mix of energy options for abundant, affordable energy, energy jobs and energy profits. There are many sub-optimal mixes that may lead to huge profits, short-term jobs, and unreliably and expensive energy. You can read some of these in Bradley's article.

In addition to the points raised in the article Real Energy, Real Jobs, my own research has revealed that:

• Denmark: 20% of the electricity is from wind, but much of it is exported at no cost to Norway in return for baseload electricity when the wind does not blow!
• Spain: For every 1 green job financed by Spanish taxpayers, 2.2 jobs were lost as an opportunity cost. Since 2000, Spain spent $753,778 per “green job.”
• Germany: Green jobs created by government actions disappear as soon as government subsidies end.
• Texas: After 30 months, countless TV appearances, and $80 million spent on an extravagant PR campaign, T. Boone Pickens has finally admitted the obvious: The wind energy business isn't a very good one. The Dallas-based entrepreneur, who has relentlessly promoted his Pickens Plan since July 4, 2008, announced that he's abandoning the wind business to focus on natural gas. (Wall Street Journal quote.)