Economics – Page 98 – a sibilant intake of breath

Monbiot now conditionally supporting nuclear

In his book Heat, George Monbiot rejects nuclear fission as a low-carbon source of electricity: arguing that it is unacceptably dangerous, and that we could make do without it. In a recent column on his website, he makes it clear that he has joined the ranks of those willing to reluctantly consider nuclear, on the simple grounds that he is so deeply concerned about climate change.

He does, however, have some conditions:

Its total emissions – from mine to dump – are taken into account
We know exactly how and where the waste is to be buried
We know how much this will cost and who will pay
There is a legal guarantee that no civil nuclear materials will be diverted for military purposes.

The first of these is important, but a fairly low hurdle. If there wasn’t good evidence that the life cycle emissions of nuclear are low (though they are not zero), it wouldn’t be getting the kind of attention it has been. The second matter is mostly a matter of not-in-my-backyard (NIMBY) syndrome. Nobody wants a nuclear waste dump in their area, though everyone knows that a safe dump will basically resemble: a deep and well-sealed hole in some very geologically stable rock. The fourth requirement may be a reasonable bar for states with pre-existing nuclear weapons capability, but it is a bit much to expect from states that lack that capacity and face threatening neighbours. In all likelihood, more civilian nuclear power will mean more states with nuclear weapons, a few decades out.

The third issue is the most uncertain: the cost of nuclear power. Regrettably, no government out there actually has the spine to make polluters pay the true cost of their carbon dioxide emissions. Likewise, no government seems to be willing to forego the political opportunities involved in subsidizing technologies like nuclear fission and carbon capture and storage. In all probability, more nuclear will result in taxpayers and electricity consumers subsidizing the mistakes of governments and energy utilities. It may also produce a clunky, dangerous, and expensive infrastructure that was slower to come online and less effective than focusing on conservation, efficiency, and renewables would have been. All that being said, the inevitable costs may be justified as a precaution. If it does become brilliantly clear to the public that climate change requires urgent action – to the extent that people are willing to accept the rapid decommissioning of coal plants – having nuclear as an option might be an important way to facilitate the route forward. Given the risks of climate change, its low-carbon status may also be worth the inevitable accidents and contamination.

I admit that this is an issue where my thoughts remain divided. That being said, barring some big unforeseen change, I think we can definitely expect to see Canada’s nuclear reactors replaced with new ones, during the next few decades, at the very least. The post later today will provide some further thinking on the issue.

Free lectures from top American schools online

As described in this Slate article, a new site called Academic Earth has brought together a large numbers of lecture videos and made them available online for free. Right now, it includes lecturers from Berkeley, Harvard, MIT, Princeton, Stanford, and Yale.

There is a six lecture series on Understanding the Financial Crisis.

Canadian content requirements for the internet?

Apparently, the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC) is considering Canadian content requirements for the internet. While I do support the existence of public broadcasters, I have never felt the same way about Canadian content rules for television or the radio. To me, they seem parochial and unnecessary; why does it matter whether people want to watch shows or listen to music that originated elsewhere?

Of course, the internet idea is even more dubious. Unlike radio and television, where you get to choose between channels but have no input into what each one is putting out, the internet lets you choose each film or song individually. As such, enforcing Canadian content requirements is both more intrusive and less practically feasible.

I remember when there were high hopes that the internet would be free from this sort of petty governmental manipulation. Unfortunately, with all the censorship, dubious monitoring, and other governmental shenanigans happening now, it isn’t surprising that yet another government agency wants to assert its regulatory influence over what happens online.

Hearings begin on Tuesday, with the aim of reviewing the current policy of not regulating content on cell phones and the internet.

Public education about antibiotic resistance ‘footprints’

This report from the Canadian Press suggests that greenhouse gas emissions are, in the minds of some, becoming the common yardstick for all sorts of negative externalities. It argues that one mechanism for reducing the emergence of antibiotic resistance is to educate members of the public about how the misuse and overuse of the drugs helps the resistant genes to spread. It argues further that this idea can best be conveyed as an ‘antibiotic footprint’ – akin to one’s environmental or carbon footprint.

The suggestion is certainly indicative of the degree to which personal environmental indicators have gained prominence.

On haggling

Apparently, while the economy remains in the doldrums, haggling is on the up-and-up. The Economist reports that the proportion of American consumers who have used the tactic during the past four months is at 72%, compared with 56% last year. Key places to haggle include hotels, clothing stores, and electronics shops.

On XUP’s blog, an introductory guide to haggling was recently posted. It’s something I could probably make use of myself, given the very limited extent to which I engage in the practice. The only recent occurrence I can think of was when I negotiated a modest discount on a package of photo gear, purchased at Henry’s.

New economic times bring with them the need for different skills. The fact that haggling is increasingly among them is an indication of the continuing level of financial uncertainty in the world.

If any readers have haggling stories or tips, they would be appreciated. Have any house or flat renters been able to talk down their monthy payments, on the basis of falling housing prices and rents across the economy as a whole?

A responsible position on carbon capture

People reading this blog might get the mistaken impression that I am fiercely opposed to carbon capture and storage (CCS) technology. That is definitely untrue. There are few things that would be more helpful than safe, cheap, and effective CCS. It would ease the transition to a zero-carbon global economy, and it would allow for the actual removal of CO2 from the atmosphere, through the growing and burning of biomass.

All that said, it is deeply inappropriate for planners to count emissions reductions from anticipated future CCS in their plans, as the government of Alberta has done to an extreme extent. The technology is in its infancy. Indications to date suggest that it will not be as cheap as its biggest boosters hope. It may not be able to store carbon permanently or safely. Carbon capture certainly cannot do anything to mitigate emissions from mobile sources, making fossil fuel operations that generate fuels for them problematic.

On the basis of these concerns, I suggest that the following elements are important in any responsible consideration of CCS, from a public policy standpoint:

Emissions reductions from CCS should not be estimated until information on the costs and effectiveness of commercial operations are known.
It should not be assumed that CCS will allow high carbon activities such as burning coal or harvesting the oil sands to continue.
While some public funding for CCS may be justifiable (especially investigations into using it with biomass fuels), industry groups that are predicting heavy usage of the technology should bear most of the development and implementation costs.
CCS doesn’t make coal ‘clean.’ Even if it reduces CO2 emissions by 80-90%, coal will still be a climatically unsustainable technology. There are also a large number of environmental hazards associated with coal mining, coal ash, and so forth. Coal will probably never be clean, and will certainly never be clean just because it has CCS bolted on.
Likewise, CCS cannot redeem the oil sands.
We must develop alternative plans, in case CCS proves to be ineffective, unsafe, or unacceptably expensive.

As I have said before, we are in the Wright Brothers era of CCS technology, and it is far too soon to project whether it will be an important stabilization wedge or an expensive flop. It is definitely too early to be estimating the specific quantities of emissions that will be averted by as-yet-nonexistent technologies at unknown future dates.

If emissions are going to peak and descend to safe levels, we are going to need a lot of stabilization wedges: efficiency, protected and enhanced forests, zero-carbon electricity and fuels, and more. If we want to have a strategy that can survive the failure of a few major initiatives, that means we need extra wedges for contingency. As such, we probably can’t reject technologies like CCS and the increased use of nuclear fission out of hand.

Visualizing power usage

Of late, Google has certainly committed itself to some novel and ambitious energy projects. Their PowerMeter project probably scores fairly low on the scale of ambition, but it could nonetheless be very useful. The idea is to take in data from smart electrical meters on homes and process it into a form, accessible online, that is useful for the people who live in them. It looks like it will resemble the Google Analytics system for website statistics tracking, but it will be concerned with energy usage instead. Ideally, it will be able to isolate electricity usage associated with different activities and appliances, allowing consumers to better understand how they are using power and adjust their behaviour to do so more economically and sustainably.

Particularly when paired with differing electricity prices at different times (in order to smooth out variations between times of peak demand and times of minimal demand), such a system could encourage efficiency, help to balance the grid, and reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

I certainly hope it is eventually made compatible with the smart meters Ottawa Hydro has installing. I have contacted them to ask, but am still waiting for a response.

The oil sands, coal, and new regulations

The sheer determination of Canada’s current government to protect the oil sands by undermining Obama’s climate policy is considerable. Most recently, they have been arguing that oil sands extraction operations should be treated in the same way as American coal plants, and thus partially or fully protected from expensive new regulations.

For one thing, an ideal climate policy would drive the rapid replacement of existing coal plants with renewable sources of energy. For another, coal plants that were given free credits in some kind of ‘grandfathering’ system would be pre-existing facilities, built before climate concerns were as acute as they are now. A decent climate policy absolutely needs to prevent the construction of new coal power plants. If someone demonstrates safe, effective, and economical carbon capture and storage, that requirement may relax somewhat but, for the moment, we cannot assume that coal has a place in our next-generation energy mix.

Given the ambitious plans for expansion, the oil sands are much more like new coal plants than like old ones. As such, they should face the same tough rules as new facilities. Special exemptions may serve the short-term interests of some individuals and companies, but allowing the oil sands to develop along their present course is very much against the long-term interests of Canadians.

Troubled bike rental scheme in Paris

In a previous post, I mentioned the bicycle rental schemes that have already been deployed in some cities and which are being contemplated elsewhere. The theory is certainly an appealing one: making a fleet of bikes available for visitors and residents to rent at reasonable prices, encouraging sustainable transport, exercise, and an appealing urban character.

Unfortunately, the scheme in Paris has run into significant difficulties with theft and damage. Over half of the original fleet of bicycles has been stolen, and 1,500 a day require repairs due to abuse or vandalism. The company running the scheme has told the city that, since the theft and damage costs are so much higher than expected, the original financing agreement based around free advertising space is not adequate.

The outstanding question is how such abuses can be curbed without undermining the value of the whole scheme. For instance, credit card holders could be required to make a deposit equivalent to a bit more than the value of the bikes (about 400 Euros each), which would be refunded when the bicycles are returned. That would, however, exclude anybody who didn’t have access to that kind of credit. It also wouldn’t necessarily deal with the problem of vandalism. Strong public pressure to treat the bikes well might help protect them, but it is a difficult thing to encourage – especially since the kind of people likely to enjoy abusing bicycles are also the kind of people more mild-mannered citizens are unlikely to publicly challenge.

Stop-start cars

A recent Tech.view column described how stop-start engines could help increase automobile efficiency at a relatively low cost. The idea with such vehicles is that they “automatically switch off the engine when the car is slowing below 5 mph, and re-start it the instant the driver’s foot comes off the brake pedal.” Incorporating the technology into vehicles requires modifying their transmission, as well as beefing up their batteries and starter motors.

The column indicates that there are still issues to be overcome with the technology, but that it has the promise of producing significant improvements at far more modest cost than going to a hybrid vehicle. It seems like a demonstration of the fact that automakers do have low-cost options at their disposal for meeting new fuel efficiency standards. While this technology certainly isn’t transformational, it is the kind of low-cost temporary measure that can help us achieve a global peak in greenhouse gas emissions in the relatively near term, before beginning the difficult descent to carbon neutrality.