Renewable Energy Sources Require Vast Amounts of Natural Resources

The National Center for Policy Analysis expertly summarized Robert Bryce's "The Gas Is Greener" which appeared in the New York Times on June 7.

In April, California Gov. Jerry Brown signed into law an ambitious mandate that requires the state to obtain one-third of its electricity from renewable energy sources by 2020. Twenty-nine states and the District of Columbia now have renewable electricity mandates, and there is also support at the federal level, says Robert Bryce, a senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute.

But while energy sources like sunlight and wind are free and naturally replenished, converting them into large quantities of electricity requires vast amounts of natural resources -- most notably, land.

Consider California's new mandate.

• The state's peak electricity demand is about 52,000 megawatts.
• Meeting the one-third target will require (if you oversimplify a bit) about 17,000 megawatts of renewable energy capacity.

Let's assume that California will get half of that capacity from solar and half from wind. Most of its large-scale solar electricity production will presumably come from projects like the $2 billion Ivanpah solar plant, which is now under construction in the Mojave Desert in southern California. When completed, Ivanpah, which aims to provide 370 megawatts of solar generation capacity, will cover 3,600 acres -- about five and a half square miles.

• The math is simple: to have 8,500 megawatts of solar capacity, California would need at least 23 projects the size of Ivanpah, covering about 129 square miles, an area more than five times as large as Manhattan.
• While there's plenty of land, projects as big as Ivanpah raise environmental concerns.
• In April, the federal Bureau of Land Management ordered a halt to construction on part of the facility out of concern for the desert tortoise, which is protected under the Endangered Species Act.

Wind energy projects require even more land -- the Roscoe wind farm in Texas, which has a capacity of 781.5 megawatts, covers about 154 square miles.

In the rush to do something -- anything -- to deal with the problem of greenhouse gas emissions, environmental groups and policymakers have determined that renewable energy is the answer. But all energy and power systems exact a toll, says Bryce.

Hawaii's renewable energy mandate is among the nation's most ambitious. Hawaii law requires electric utilities to meet a renewable portfolio of 10%, 15%, 25% and 40% by December 31, 2010, 2015, 2020 and 2030, respectively.

The lesson for Hawaii where flat space and any space in general is at a premium is that land-hungry renewable energy options are not likely to be a major part of the solution.

Brookings' Pro-transit Report Gets Slammed by Its Own Data

One thing stuck with me from the X-Files: The Truth Is Out There!

Like the City's EIS which clearly show that after spending $5.5 Billion the transit share will increase from 5.6% now to 6.6% in 2030, and that congestion with rail in 2030 will be far worse than it is now, other transit reports although word-smithed to tell a pro-transit story, actually reveal how poorly transit does, particularly rail transit.

In May 2011, The Brookings' Institution published the pro-transit report Missed Opportunity: Transit and Jobs in Metropolitan America where it made major proclamations like:

• The typical metropolitan resident can reach about 30% jobs in their metropolitan area via transit in 90 minutes.
  

The typical commute in the nation is about 30 minutes and if one has a private vehicle, he or she can reach over two thirds of the jobs in the metropolitan area. But in transit, he or she can reach only an (astounding) 4%, by Brookings' own survey numbers!

Wendell Cox had a good time this study in his Transit: The 4 Percent Solution.

• Among the 29 metropolitan areas with a more than 2,000,000 population, the 45 minute job access average was 5.6 percent, ranging from 12.6 percent in Boston to 1.3 percent in Riverside-San Bernardino.

CATO Institute's Randall O'Toole adds this: Simply putting transit close to jobs, however, doesn't mean people will ride it. The Brookings Institution recently ranked San Jose as the second-most transit-accessible urban area in America, while Chicago was ranked 46th. Yet the Census Bureau says only 3.4% San Jose commuters use transit, compared with 13.2% Chicago.

Finally let's not forget that many transit surveys are biased. They exclude, walk, wait and transfer time losses, much like the City's proclamation that Kapolei to downtown will be about 40 minutes. This excludes the access time to the Kapolei station which by itself is at least 15 minutes from the time one leaves home to the time that the train leaves the station. Add at least 5 to 10 minutes to reach the office and he or she more time commuting to work than by car, has no car to run errands or do other things after work, and has to repeat the long commute on the way home.

All this inconvenience for $5 a day leads to the ultimate result: It's a 4% solution indeed!

Price of Rail Environmental Study Doubled

Hawaii Reporter obtained this major admission from the City: The cost of the EIS doubled from the original $86 Million to $156 Million. This does not include the likely required Supplemental EIS, Preliminary Design and Final Design. All said, soft costs (paperwork, media and other fees and expenses) for the Hannemann/Carlisle boondoggle will reach one half Billion dollars, which is what other cities pay for fully installed light rail systems!

Honolulu rail is now squarely into SCAM territory.

EPA: 946 Pages to Regulate 0.5% of the Problem

The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) recently issued 946 pages of new rules requiring that U.S. power plants sharply reduce their emissions of mercury and other air pollutants.

EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson claims that while the regulations will cost electricity producers $10.9 billion annually, they will save 17,000 lives and generate up to $140 billion in health benefits. There is no factual basis for these assertions, said Willie Soon, a natural scientist at Harvard, and Paul Driessen, a senior policy adviser for the Committee for a Constructive Tomorrow.

America's coal-burning power plants emit an estimated 41-48 tons of mercury per year. U.S. forest fires emit at least 44 tons per year; cremation of human remains discharges 26 tons; Chinese power plants eject 400 tons; and volcanoes, subsea vents, geysers and other sources spew out 9,000-10,000 additional tons per year.

All these emissions enter the global atmospheric system and become part of the U.S. air mass. Since US coal power plants account for less than 0.5% all the mercury in the air, eliminating every milligram of it will do nothing about the other 99.5% our atmosphere.

Source: Willie Soon and Paul Driessen, "The Myth of Killer Mercury," Wall Street Journal, May 25, 2011.

Rail Still Facing Key Hurdles

Construction crews are working on the rail project near Waipahu High School. Many think that construction for the city’s proposed elevated rail project has started but it’s not true. Read my article the Filipino Chronicle (page 8).

Edinburgh Light Rail Halted. The Usual Suspects. The Usual Results.

Edinburgh Light Rail called Edinburgh Trams is the second great example of what’s in store for Honolulu. The first one is Tren Urbano in San Juan Puerto Rico where the system was build at twice the original cost and five years after opening it has failed to reach 50% of its opening year ridership forecast.

The “usual suspect” is present in all three projects. Edinburgh, San Juan and Honolulu have the same consultant who prepared the rail project estimates. Here are the results so far in Edinburgh, Scotland:

• Project originally scheduled to open in July 2011. Rescheduled to 2014 if at all.
• Original cost was $640 million but now it over $1 Billion.
• 72% of the construction work remains to be done but only 38% of the budget is left.

Read full article in Hawaii Reporter.

Renewable Energy in Hawaii: Dr. Takahashi's Take

Retired UH professor Patrick Takahashi was the creator and past director of Hawaii Natural Energy Institute (HNEI) at the UH. His books on energy are fundamental readings. One of his most comprehensive posts about renewable energy for Hawaii is linked below.

Will renewable electricity be limited in Hawaii?

I am glad that he and I agree on

1. the weak potential of wind power ("capacity factor means that a 400 MW wind farm could well only provide 100 MW on average to Oahu")
2. the good potential of biomass
3. the vast potential of geothermal power

for Hawaii.

One part that he has not delved into but holds promise for Hawaii if it develops vast amounts of renewable energy is Ammonia, which holds the key to electricity and transportation fuel and food production. See Ammonia as a Transportation Fuel and Fertilizer.

Renewables and Reliability of Power

After reviewing the 2009 power reliability reports submitted by utilities to the PUC I discovered that:

• Oahu power utilizes less than 2% renewables. It has the highest reliability: HECO SAIF in 2009 was 1.1%,
• Maui power utilizes about 17% renewables (wind and biomass). It has the middle reliability: MECO SAIF in 2009 was 1.6%,
• Hawaii power utilizes about 33% renewables (geothermal, wind, hydro). It has the lowest reliability: HELCO SAIF in 2009 was 3.1%,

where, SAIF is System Average Interruption Frequency (0% is best)

HELCO reported that 20,660 customer interruptions (16% of all interruptions) were related to Independent Power Producer (non-HELCO Generation) sources. In 2009 Hamakua Energy Partners (HEP) and Pakini Nui Windfarm were the non-HELCO generation sources that caused customer interruptions. Geothermal did not have any negative effect on HELCO's SAIF.

The lesson here is that unless the right renewable energy sources are selected, reliability in the provision of power will deteriorate.