Bold

Wow. I hadn't realized that Al Gore gave a speech recently calling on us to move to 100 percent renewable sources of electricity in ten years. That's audacious seemingly to the point of madness. Why focus so exclusively on cleaner electricity generation rather than on a balanced approach that involves efficiency (i.e., using less electricity) and also the transportation, heating, etc. sectors. After all, replacing a conventional car with an electric one -- or a bus with a trolleybus or tram -- reduces emissions regardless of how you get your electricity.

In that sense, it makes way more sense to put some of our existing dirty electricity infrastructure to use in the short-term as a substitute for our currently lamentable transportation infrastructure, while we switch the nature of our electrical infrastructure on a more tempered pace. Of course there's nothing wrong with big ideas to expand the overton window, so I don't think it's terrible to see some folks pushing radical ideas, but on the other hand I do worry about the public becoming polarized between a "holy shit we need to do something crazy and extreme" faction and a "that sounds crazy and extreme so let's do nothing" faction. It's more important to start taking some concrete steps down the path to mitigation than to spend too much time drawing up the outlines of ecotopia.

Comments

There is no strife, no prejudice, no national conflict in outer space as yet. Its hazards are hostile to us all. Its conquest deserves the best of all mankind, and its opportunity for peaceful cooperation many never come again. But why, some say, the moon? Why choose this as our goal? And they may well ask why climb the highest mountain? Why, 35 years ago, fly the Atlantic? Why does Rice play Texas?

We choose to go to the moon. We choose to go to the moon in this decade and do the other things, not because they are easy, but because they are hard, because that goal will serve to organize and measure the best of our energies and skills, because that challenge is one that we are willing to accept, one we are unwilling to postpone, and one which we intend to win, and the others, too.

HOLY SHIT, BATMAN! That JFK, he's FUCKING NUTS!

When Kennedy gave that speech, our space launchers were still blowing up on the launch pad on a regular basis.

Why do Republicans have so little confidence in America?

Posted by calipygian | July 19, 2008 9:29 AM

IIRC, Gore basically said he was making that bold (and simple) a proposal deliberately, to give the next president (read: Obama) a big goal. I was at an event with Rep. Jim Cooper last night (he's not my favorite, but hey) and his take was that it was to create 'political room' to achieve more, meaning that even assuming that it wouldn't happen, any efforts would be more successful than they would have been given more modest and easily achievable goals. And that's quite true-- the analogy they're using is JFK's man-on-the-moon goal, and if he'd only called for sending an unmanned probe every year starting in 1967, things would obviously have been very different.

Posted by latts | July 19, 2008 9:32 AM

I appreciate the boldness, too, but my concern is not so much the potential polarization, but the idea (that seems to be sticking) that Gore's proposal is *so* outlandish that he is batshit crazy and should consequently ignored. How exactly does that advance the cause?

Posted by Dalton | July 19, 2008 9:32 AM

I don't think Al Gore will be designing any particular plans pursued, but I don't see much harm in having an inspirational figure (of sorts) push for a dramatic, difficult, and reaching program from outside any formal bureaucracy, given that I don't actually think the U.S. population consists of frightened villagers who fear the camera will take their soul.

Posted by El Cid | July 19, 2008 9:32 AM

If we solve the electricity problem, we will have made a huge move towards solving the transportation problem. We can with current technology shift to a ground transportation network basically powered only by electric (air and water not so much).

His plan makes sense. Have you unpacked it and considered the whys and hows? This post seems like knee-jerking on your part, as does the Pelosi one above.

I am not a "your blog sucks/blogging sucks" hater. These just seem a bit sloppy and not well thought-through.

Posted by Peter | July 19, 2008 9:52 AM

You can try and create "political room" all you want, but until you can actually generate today's energy needs - we use something like 3.6 terawatts right now. What do you propose that would possibly generate that in the next decade? The only technologies we have right now that can get there are nuclear, fossil (oil, coal, natural gas), and hydro.

Let's see - you don't want any nuclear power. Even if you accepted more dams, the good spots are already taken. You want to get off fossil fuels.

There's simply no way to scale wind or solar to anything close to the required levels, and the land required to even try would make the environmental left gasp anyway. Let Gore explain how he thinks this would work, beyond "and then a miracle occurs". Unless he's willing to accept nuclear, he's just puffing smoke.

And as to moving to an electrical transport infrastructure - I'll let Mixner explain (again) why that's not going to work. I'll simply point out that electricity isn't free - it gets generated. If you started moving wholesale to all electric vehicles, the demand for power generation would go up - way up.

Posted by James Robertson | July 19, 2008 10:12 AM

Gore maybe thinks in James Hansen years. 2016 to the tipping point, at JH's optimistic estimate. Very very bad already. Already too late.

Gore's plan is not that ambitious. It can, should, and must be done. I would prefer American energy to be 100 percent renewable by 2012, no matter what kind of politics or economics would be required.

Posted by bob mcmanus | July 19, 2008 10:34 AM

James Robertson, you look like a pretty smart guy who knows a little about energy.

You just got drafted. You will live in a dorm working 16 hours days at gunpoint for room & board until we are carbonfree. You, and oh, 50 million others.

It can get done.

Posted by bob mcmanus | July 19, 2008 10:40 AM

I am with Peter on this one. The thing that got Matt into trouble on his Water post, wasn't his specific proposals. It's his stance of glib underinformed omniscience. This is, definitely, another case in point.

But that's an epidemic problem with both bloggers and 26 year olds. So really what chance does Matt have?

Posted by AJ | July 19, 2008 10:42 AM

Gore is a worthy man, and I admire him. But assuming - surprise!, surprise - that the Democrats over the next four years turn out to be the same fellows we have gotten to know and love over the last eight, then we must consider how to implement Gore's suggestions ( or something substantially like them ) despite the Democrats and not with them.

One place to look is John Robb's blog, where he is developing the idea of "resilient communities."

Posted by Duncan Kinder | July 19, 2008 10:48 AM

"resilient communities" won't survive the Malthusian crash. They will come and eat you.

We really need to do it by 2012 so we can convert the underdeveloped world by 2016-20. For free, of course.

Posted by bob mcmanus | July 19, 2008 11:03 AM

I thought the most interesting bit of the speech wasn't the crazy part about moving to entirely renewable energy within 10 years, but the promise that in the future energy would be much cheaper. If we suppose that a transition from our current energy sources will occur, but on a much longer timeline, why would we want to waste money (and energy) on reconstructing our cities, as Matt wants to do?

Posted by Thomas | July 19, 2008 11:04 AM

Bob, very funny. It doesn't change the simple fact that wishes aren't facts. We use a high level of energy now, and - regardless of the inner fantasies of the environmental left - that level won't go down. If history is any guide, it will rise, with conservation efforts slowing the rate of increase at best. When Al Gore figures out how to produce 3.6 terawatts of energy with renewables, let me know. Until then, it's all just political hot air - and utterly uninformed hot air at that.

Posted by James Robertson | July 19, 2008 11:07 AM

There's some discussion about the technical feasibility at the

Oil Drum:

The short answer is: while 100% is probably unrealistic, it's not unreasonable to expect to be able to get pretty close to that number (say, in the 50-90% range) in that timeframe, and it is very likely that it makes a LOT of sense economically.

{...Overall, network operators with actual wind experience seem confident that a combination of additional investment, smart grid management, and maintaining available (but not using much) a large gas-fired capacity can make it possible to cope with large amounts of wind power in the system.

While a goal of 100% of carbon-free electricity is probably unrealistic, it therefore seems possible to get pretty close to that, especially if nuclear and hydro are included in the mix. A plan that announced a specific goal of 40-50% of wind-generated electricity by 2020 and 10-20% of solar, with the appropriate feed-in mechanisms, demand guarantees for manufacturers and investment in the grid would therefore be realistic, make economic sense, and fulfill two major strategic goals: reduce carbon emissions, and lower fossil fuel demand.}

Posted by Waingro | July 19, 2008 11:10 AM

James, I do think it can technically be done, although I do grant it involves a certain amount of fantasy and wishful thinking. Like a Manhattan Project, put 10k physicists and 200k technicians and 300 billion dollars on it and hope for the best.

And of course the politics and economics are also crazy, moving to a WWII mobilization & controlled economy with rationing.

But if it doesn't get done fast, like yesterday, we maybe have to move into a Lifeboat mentality. A very vicious cannabalistic int'l politics.

Or just die, which is my plan.

Posted by bob mcmanus | July 19, 2008 11:22 AM

A lot of our energy use gets sucked up in waste (leaving the lights on, cars idling in parking complexes and urban traffic, oversized packing, etc.) that does nothing to raise our quality of life and in fact likely lowers it overall with increased pollution. As Jared Diamond has pointed out, we could cut down our emissions and energy use by a large fraction and maintain our same quality of life by cutting out our waste.

Posted by Reality Man | July 19, 2008 11:25 AM

Thanks, Waingro, for providing some actual evidence on which to base debate.

I should also note that Gore isn't actually proposing to reach this goal, as Robertson seems to imply, without nuclear energy. He's planning to do it without significantly *increasing* our level of reliance on nuclear energy.

But since "increase" is loosely defined, that's a rather soft provision, and one that I suspect he doesn't mean to be zealous about. In fact, the reason for saying it is probably rhetorical -- it's meant to shape emphasis, and hold a coalition together, not define a hard and fast quota.

Posted by Ted | July 19, 2008 11:26 AM

This seems like the sort of proposal that's designed to move the conversation to "the left" (since I guess the whole idea of trying to improve technology and the economy is now an idea of the left) rather than to be a realistic goal.

However, I think that this is also one area where the physical vastness of the country leads one to think that this is a much bigger job than it really is. In a lot of areas where people don't really use that much electricity (a large, large majority of the land area of the United States) it would be fairly easy to move to renewable energy, and the cost, at least in federal budget terms, would be pretty small.

The big hurdle that makes this essentially impossible, of course, is cars, since obviously a lot of the cars on the road today are still going to be on the road in ten years, and most of them still will be burning petroleum-derived gasoline.

Diesel engines, however, including trucks, can already use biodiesel; we just don't produce very much of it.

APS

Posted by Ape Man | July 19, 2008 11:27 AM

This is significant, from the link above:

What has hampered the development of the industry has been the regulatory uncertainty, in particular in the US with the long saga of the timely renewal (or not) of the PTC ("production tax credit", the federal 10-year tax credit equal to 2c/kWh for power from renewable sources), which caused demand to crash and then brutally rebound from one year to the other.

Which translates to: Wind power isn't a viable investment on its own. It needs large scale governmental intervention to be built. If it were actually viable, investors would be going after it independently.

Not to mention the various issues with power loss over the long transmission lines from the remote areas with wind to the populated areas that need the power, or the more local opposition to them (Ted Kennedy, Martin O'Malley) based on them being ugly. I can hardly wait for the environmentalists to go to war with each other over the building of the windmills and transmission lines through various protected areas. Oh wait - it's happening already.

Posted by James Robertson | July 19, 2008 11:29 AM

I'm getting incrementally more pissed off every time someone refers to Gore's plan as "crazy and extreme." At least you were kind enough not to fuck it up and say that Gore wanted to get carbon emissions out of energy, period, and not just electricity.

The problem is that even if we were to magically start generating electricity without carbon emissions today, CO2 output would still increase because of increases in domestic, industrial, and transportation consumption of non-electric power, and we'd quickly return to and eclipse our current CO2 output in the absence of other changes.

Gore's making a shitty political bargain by trading a challenge that'd work (previously, his 90% CO2 emissions reduction) for one that sounds good and simple and, as a bonus, wouldn't increase the price of gasoline! Hooray! The problem is that he's making it sound like, well, if we can meet this challenge, we've got the problem licked! It's as if Kennedy had suggested that, by getting a man to the moon, we'd have the Cold War won. It's not remotely true, and all of Gore's talk about foreign oil in this speech lacks any connection to his emissions-free electricity challenge. Electricity comes from either coal (2/3) or technologies that are already emissions-low or -free (nuclear, hydro). Oil and gas generate maybe 2-3% of electricity, and very little electricity is imported (and what is is from Canada so big fucking deal on energy security there).

Basically, if this is crazy and extreme, we're fucked when it comes to atmospheric CO2 levels. You have to be 2-3 times as crazy/extreme to fix the problem, and you have to convince/compel/coerce the rest of the world into doing exactly what you plan to do as well. Gore's challenge addresses none of this, and barely touches on the urgency required to make a dent in global CO2 emissions. If Obama were smart, he'd throw a meeting with heads of China and India into the mix in his world tour wherein he invites Gore and sit around to has out possible ideas for cooperatively tackling CO2 emissions ... maybe make a C8 group of the most rapidly growing CO2 emitters or something.

Posted by Zach | July 19, 2008 11:29 AM

To coin Burnham: "Make no little plans. They have no magic to stir men's blood and probably will not themselves be realized."

Posted by Anthony Damiani | July 19, 2008 11:30 AM

To coin Burnham: "Make no little plans. They have no magic to stir men's blood and probably will not themselves be realized."

Posted by Anthony Damiani | July 19, 2008 11:34 AM

ApeMan highlights one reason why Gore is focused on electricity generation.

Also, Matt, it's crucial to represent this project as one that is not primarily about restricting consumer choice -- aka "they're trying to convince me to give up my minivan, golldurnit!" aka "them yuppies are allays preaching about them damn curvy latbulbs."

Rather, it's represented as a "moon shot" project -- an opportunity, not a restriction -- something we can take collective pride in without forcing you, sir, to give up your beloved frickin minivan.

That's why he focuses, rhetorically, on electricity generation. It doesn't mean that we can't also work on the transportation projects that are dear to your urban yuppie heart.

Posted by Ted | July 19, 2008 11:35 AM

Bob,

Why do you think there's a crisis? The planet has been warmer than it is now (a lot), and colder than it is now (a lot). There's a natural cycle of warming in process now, as we continue to leave the last glacial epoch. Personally, I look forward to asking all the chicken little types in a decade where the end of civilization is, as I happily drink a mocha.

If you want to worry about something, then read Barbara Tuchman's "The Proud Tower", and note how many parallels there are between the late 19th/early 20th century and today. I'm far, far more worried about an accidental slide into conflict than I am about so called climate change. The latter is a fantasy worry for people with too much time on their hands; the former is a real possibility based on human nature and current historical trends.

Posted by James Robertson | July 19, 2008 11:37 AM

MY - Wow. I hadn't realized that Al Gore gave a speech recently calling on us to move to 100 percent renewable sources of electricity in ten years. That's audacious seemingly to the point of madness.

Pretty much on target. The Goracle was saying it all can be done with just "beautiful" wind, solar, and geothermal. No new nukes, as nuclear power is eeviiill!
Dude is batshit insane.
Quite inspiring, though, if you ignore science, engineering, industrial finance, and affordability issues of his "exotic power sources only!", drivel.

**************
When Kennedy gave that speech, our space launchers were still blowing up on the launch pad on a regular basis.
Why do Republicans have so little confidence in America?
Posted by calipygian

When Kennedy made that speech he knew we already had 90% of the technology proven and ready to be scaled up, cost was no object.

Quite different than the Stalinists who claimed everything else was possible on a 10-year plan.

Or Democrats who believe like Comrade Joe's supporters that if a person in the government says a 10-year plan will cure cancer (1971), achieve energy independence(1973), make black kids perform in school as well as whites or Asians (1979), lead the rest of the world to 100% democracy in ten years(1986), unleash a 1000 points of light to allow blacks to have equal educational attainment (1991), equalize woman's pay with mens (1992), the 10-year plan to unleash cheap solar power (1993) .....

why.....
if the Government said it, AND we sent a 2500 -lb payload to the moons surface, and economics are removed from any considerations, it MUST be doable!

**********************
If we solve the electricity problem, we will have made a huge move towards solving the transportation problem. We can with current technology shift to a ground transportation network basically powered only by electric (air and water not so much).

That leaves only the problem of solar and wind electricity costing the equivalent of 15 to 118 dollars a gallon, not available much of the day or year, and like cheaper and more reliable geothermal - only capable of growing enough in a few decades to supply just the descendents of illegal aliens as we grow our energy users population by 23 million each decade.

**********************
James Robertson - Let's see - you don't want any nuclear power. Even if you accepted more dams, the good spots are already taken. You want to get off fossil fuels.
There's simply no way to scale wind or solar to anything close to the required levels, and the land required to even try would make the environmental left gasp anyway.

It gets even funnier once you get by the activist's hemp smoke:

1. They love to mention we are "already" at 10% renewable energy, so going all or mostly renewable with wind and solar would be "easily achievable".
What they don't say is that 6% of that 10% comes from dams we spent 100 years building that environmentalists want mostly torn down and associated agriculture abandoned so SF lawyers can fly in and kayak on weekends..3% of the total comes from biomass used for fuel mostly by the evil forest products industry, America's only real renewable closed loop industry. Wind is 0.5%, Solar 0.03% of present power.

2. Unlike everything else, Gore-type environmentalists strongly oppose recycling the 98% of nuclear fuel unused in a reactor run. They oppose separating out the longer-lived transuranics they claim are such a long-term storage problem and burning them up in other reactor runs.
They also adamantly oppose making nuclear power a renewable power source with breeder reactors.

3. For good measure, that crowd also opposes fusion, because it depends on evil reactors to make evil tritium and the most efficient fusion plants will likely be the ones that breed fresh fissionable fuel from fast neutrons from the fusion reaction impacting a uranium or thorium absorber layer that also generates steam energy.

4. Nor will any environmentalist dare address the impact of mass immigration on energy demand or unchecked global population growth going from 1 billion in 1900 to 6.4 billion in 2000 to a possible 12 billion in 2050 and stripping away all margins on resources, arable land, and clean water. Because so much of environmentalists power comes from alliances with the moneyed Elites of the hark Left. Making discussion of anything related to energy use by any people but evil white people in America and Europe living "excessively", forbidden, as racist or even genocidal for saying 3rd Worlders have to stop exponential multiplication...(Exempting of course the Aspen and Davos white elites and their jetset, transnational lifestyle and giant carbon footprints because they only live so indulgently and decadently to save the rest of us from ourselves.)

We have a more immediate and urgent threat in oil and the disabling of the oil-based economic infrastructure we spent 110 years building ---over Gore's Global Warming crisis or even the mass species extinction threat global overpopulation poses.
America's priority should be drill our brains out and utilize oil shale and coal liquification as we stop bleeding out 700 billion in wealth to oil exporters each year, substitute nat gas as much as possible in more efficient vehicles to at least address new energy users caused by immigrant-driven population explosion - and begin a 40-year transition away from oil towards an eventual hydrogen-based energy infrastructure.

Posted by chris ford | July 19, 2008 11:47 AM

Matt,

He probably feels it will be easier to achieve change that way- pressure from people will probably work easier on electricity generators than on the auto industry. Then once other industries have started changing over, it will be less easier for the auto industry to hold out until the last minute, because they will look stupid for being so obstinate.

Anyway, it's such a positive goal, calling it "madness" just because you want less cars producing emissions first instead of less power-plants producting emissions first is I think a counter-productive remark. We have to get the political change, and the best way to get the change is the best way to get there, whether or not some other way which is not politically feasible would be a little better environmentally.

Why focus so exclusively on cleaner electricity generation rather than on a balanced approach that involves efficiency (i.e., using less electricity)

Also I think the idea that we will solve energy problems through efficiency is a little bit of a conservative-driven fantasy. We really basically need all the power we are using now. It is not as if every home in America is covered in neon lights that are on 24/7 or anything. If you want to do somethig like outlaw lighted signs outside of retail businesses, it will just create more traffic and inefficiency as people have more trouble finding the businesses they are looking for at night in their cars.

Posted by Swan | July 19, 2008 11:53 AM

Well, to be fair on population growth - in the developed world, there's mostly shrinkage (US growth is mostly immigration fueled, even with the current boomlet).

Having said that, people who move to the US do, in fact, expect to own homes, use AC and heat, drive to work, and buy big screen TVs. If they didn't, they would likely stay where they are - it's not a 3rd world lifestyle they come here looking for.

So in that sense, having open borders leads to larger demands for energy production within the US. As I've said above, wind and solar are impractical on so many levels: the enviros wouldn't allow the requisite land use (for the wind/solar farms themselves, or for the transmission lines they would need) even if they were practical on energy production terms - and in reality, they simply aren't practical.

The only non-carbon emitting power source we have available to us in a practical way is nuclear. We know how to build nuke plants, and we also know how to recycle most of the waste. We have a set of stupid regulations and FUD standing in the way of that, which is why we are talking about utter wastes of time and money like wind. Wind is, at best, a small scale producer at the margins. It requires full backup, because it's intermittant. It's not an answer in and of itself. Solar isn't either, for most of the same reasons.

Posted by James Robertson | July 19, 2008 11:56 AM

Also I think the idea that we will solve energy problems through efficiency is a little bit of a conservative-driven fantasy.

I.e, they want to make the fossil-fuel industry (coal electricity and gasoline cars) last longer just by prompting people to drive less and use less electricity, instead of switching to greener energy sources sooner. Conservation is great, but not in the form of procrastination of accepting the fact that we have to switch away from fossil fuels (and the way switching is going to work the best is if we start figuring out all the details of how best to do it sooner rather than later).

Posted by Swan | July 19, 2008 11:59 AM

I.e, they want to make the fossil-fuel industry (coal electricity and gasoline cars) last longer just by prompting people to drive less and use less electricity, instead of switching to greener energy sources sooner.

Because these industries are tightly connected with Republican politics, for example by being big donors to Republican politics and providing a rationale for a hostile, militaristic foreign policy (which synergistically encourages ties to the weapons industry- also a big promoter/donor for conservative political victories at the ballot box- when some interest group causes conservatives to win electorally, it's a win for the whole damned conservative coalition, whether you or your little conservative special-interest group (be it conservative Christians, anti-abortionists or what have you) are especially interested in weapons or money from oil or not).

Posted by Swan | July 19, 2008 12:10 PM

For the nuclear supporters and wind naysayers, here's your comeuppance:

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2008/7/17/144426/316

Now, if any of you are actually responsible for investing, say, seven figures in energy production, then you might have some ground to stand on in responding. Otherwise, opinions are cheap.

Posted by vorkosigan1 | July 19, 2008 12:53 PM

"Why focus so exclusively on cleaner electricity generation rather than on a balanced approach that involves efficiency (i.e., using less electricity) and also the transportation, heating, etc. sectors. After all, replacing a conventional car with an electric one -- or a bus with a trolleybus or tram -- reduces emissions regardless of how you get your electricity."

Well, that's not necessarily the case. Take a gas-powered, low-emission car like a Honda Civic and replace it with an electric version powered by electricity produced by a coal plant, and you've actually increased emissions.

Posted by cnyexpat | July 19, 2008 12:54 PM

I endorse Chris Ford's use of asterisks in a row, because it quickly alerts me to a comment I can skip.

Posted by El Cid | July 19, 2008 12:56 PM

Re: Nuclear energy; people on both sides of the aisle are generally too far from reality to make any sense.

1. Nuclear energy can be safe if regulators are empowered, independent and trusted. I'm worried about nuclear safety in the absence of solid regulation, too, but other nations have shown that it's utterly possible. Energy companies can be made to accept heavy safety regulations by guaranteeing them against losses should problems occur -- this is more or less what we do now, but the system needs to be strengthened.

2. It's impossible to generate enough electricity from nuclear power alone to fix the CO2 problem. This is simple fact. Nuclear power is a big help if it's politically feasible, but plants are small, we can only build so many and at such a rate, water requirements are an issue, and we can only mine and enrich fissible materials at such a speed... none of these things are scalable to the vast size needed for nuclear power to be the primary American energy source -- electricity, perhaps, but not energy.

Posted by Zach | July 19, 2008 1:20 PM

Zach: Then why is it that China is building so many nuke plants? Is it only impossible here, because the left is afraid of the words?

Replace "nuclear" in your post with "wind" and/or "solar", and you start approaching actual truth. As to the Daily Kos post - well, that's a reprint of the "oil drum" thing, which - as I pointed out above - admits that wind isn't viable without major subsidies.

Posted by James Robertson | July 19, 2008 2:10 PM

Then why is it that China is building so many nuke plants? Is it only impossible here, because the left is afraid of the words?

There is one plant in the world that makes reactor vessels and they can make four a year. It's a Japanese plant and the castings are like the modern version of Samurai swords. The exception is Russia who make their own stuff for domestic consumption, but anyone who has ever dealt with Russia as an importing weapons customer would tell you that you were insane for even thinking about buying from them.

Posted by Ed Marshall | July 19, 2008 2:42 PM

So you think it's just impossible that we could manufacture those parts here - never mind that it's clearly been done here in the past - but you believe that a miracle will occur and Wind and Solar will somehow become feasible?

Just what color is the sky over there?

Posted by James Robertson | July 19, 2008 2:53 PM

Zach - It's impossible to generate enough electricity from nuclear power alone to fix the CO2 problem. This is simple fact.

It is iompossible for ANY energy source to replace all uses of fossil fuels on it's own.
That is a simple fact. Other than that, there is no point to be made from such a fact. Only if the source is scalable on an industrial level, abundant, economic, reasonably safe, and resonably reliable.

Nuclear power is a big help if it's politically feasible, but plants are small

Hardly small. Nuke plants range from 600 to 1400 MW. They operate at 93% full capacity factor. Contrast that with, 6 to 17% full capacity factor for wind, depending on location. In 2008 we had 12,400 MW of installed capacity of wind after two decades of huge tax breaks and construction in some of the most optimum areas (narrow mountain passes, high wind Texas, OK, areas. But while that sounds impressive, it means only 1488 MW full capacity equivalent electricity was generated. Less than the average 2-unit 1000MW nuke plant (1860MW annual full capacity equivalent) that cost 1/10th what the wind investment cost and with a longer operating life (50 years nuke, 25-30 for wind turbines). The solar difference is even worse. It costs 40+ times as much as nuke power, and a "massive solar energy farm covering almost 2 square miles is 4 MW, or 0.8MW full capacity depending on time of day and weather.

The comparisons worsen because nukes are reliable, and like coal plants, can be taken off line in planned outages for mntc repairs, fuel replacement (in nukes), and upgrades. They do not need 100% backup for that reason. Whereas you can lose almost all your solar and wind at any time, and need 100% backup. People saying that a huge new transmission network could reduce that expensive backup, but only mitigate the inherent unreliability.

we can only build so many and at such a rate,

Like anything, if America needs to, and the lawyers and lawsuits are kept at bay, we can restore industrial capacity and build massively, in massive numbers.

water requirements are an issue

Not really. No more than basic thermodynamics also dictates that coal and nat gas and biomass and geothermal electricity needs cooling water. And nukes aren't fussy. They run just fine with seawater cooling in the generator, even sewage water from Paris, Phoenix piped in to the plants.
Sewage and waste water from a Phoenix sized city is capable of supporting 12 1400MW nuke plants. Agricultural runoff water in many agricultural counties is enough to run several nuke plants in each county, with the polluted water cleaned up and dispersed as cooling tower water vapor to fall (most of it) as rain in the US.

and we can only mine and enrich fissible materials at such a speed...

In 5 years, 1942-47 using very primitive methods, we had gone from uranium being a mostly unknown mineral to it being mined and enriched in mass quantity. Now we have global excess mining and enrichment capacity for uranium. Uranium and it's "fertile cousin" thorium are by no means scarce. We have enough in rich reserves currently economical to mine to have several hundred years of uranium, and if we beat the environmentalists and get recycling and breeders - we have a 5,000 to 6,000 year supply. And that doesn't include all the low grade deposits since uranium and thorium are common crustal materials.
India has a several thousand year source in the Deccan Trap basalts if they can bioconcentrate it, Connecticut and New Hampshire have notable granitic deposits...not on the scale of low grade deposits out West or in huge rich reserves Canada, Australia, Niger have - but enough that CT and NH could run on their stuff for centuries if it was able to be extracted economically and the NIMBYs didn't threaten mass suicide.

none of these things are scalable to the vast size needed for nuclear power to be the primary American energy source -- electricity, perhaps, but not energy.

Not true. France scaled up their nukes so that they are making 80% of the electricity and exporting excess to "Greenie" nations now with few nukes and modest results in Algore-ish solutions watching fearfully as the Russians and their politics turn the European energy spigot off and on. France is now thinking hydrogen for fuel cells from electrolysis at near triple-point for water in gas cooled nukes (2 1/2 times more efficient than STD atmosphere temp electrolysis).

In America, as long as you agree the Algores need some thorazine and global warming and global overpopulation are massive, but non-urgent long-term problems, we have time for a planned 40-year transition. No need to scrap perfectly good, new 1200 MW coal plants, no need to issue Fatwas in the name of the Goreacle against getting new sources of oil besides the Nigerians and Saudis.

No one is talking nukes being the 100% solution. Just a huge part of any realistic plan to transition carefully and methodically off excessive hydrocarbon use and to carefully consider the "human carrying capacity" and how to get there - where a certain number can live in modern standard of living enjoyed now by advanced nations, without wrecking ecosystems, water acquifers, and causing mass wildlife extinctions.
Right now, the opinion seems to be saying a number between 2 and 3 billion is what we must drive towards.

Posted by chris ford | July 19, 2008 3:46 PM

Perhaps James Robertson would be interested to note that Texas (yep Texas) is undertaking to expand wind farming in West Texas and investing in the electric grid so that electricity can be brought east to Dallas. I can asure James Robinson that there are also plenty plenty of roofs here in the DFW metroplex with almost no solar collectors on them at all. Subsidies aren't a problem. We already subsidize various ways of producing energy. So the real deal is not so much figuring out a complete solution as figuring ways to work in sets of overlapping solutions to generating energy which then gets moved around a grid as needed.

Oh, and today the sky is here in DFW as a funny sort of brown when you can look into the distance, but bluer where the horizon is cut off and you have to look up.

Query Mr Robertson, what happens geopolitically if say 1 and 1/2 of 1% of the world's population has to up and leave its home place because the waters rise just a meter (and that's only Bangladesh, not Miami)? I'll grant that sea level has been as much as 8-10 meters higher than current sea level in the last 10,000 years. But doesn't that suggests that we are not moving out of a major ice age at the moment, as for example when sea level was some 30 meters below the current level also in the last 10,000 years?

Posted by djeri | July 19, 2008 3:48 PM

Perhaps James Robertson would be interested to note that Texas (yep Texas) is undertaking to expand wind farming in West Texas and investing in the electric grid so that electricity can be brought east to Dallas. I can asure James Robinson that there are also plenty plenty of roofs here in the DFW metroplex with almost no solar collectors on them at all. Subsidies aren't a problem. We already subsidize various ways of producing energy. So the real deal is not so much figuring out a complete solution as figuring ways to work in sets of overlapping solutions to generating energy which then gets moved around a grid as needed.

Oh, and today the sky is here in DFW as a funny sort of brown when you can look into the distance, but bluer where the horizon is cut off and you have to look up.

Query Mr Robertson, what happens geopolitically if say 1 and 1/2 of 1% of the world's population has to up and leave its home place because the waters rise just a meter (and that's only Bangladesh, not Miami)? I'll grant that sea level has been as much as 8-10 meters higher than current sea level in the last 10,000 years. But doesn't that suggests that we are not moving out of a major ice age at the moment, as for example when sea level was some 30 meters below the current level also in the last 10,000 years?

Posted by djeri | July 19, 2008 3:48 PM

- never mind that it's clearly been done here in the past -

What we did in the past is a massive failure. Our nuke plants weren't built for safety or efficiency, they were built for expediency. They are scaled up models of the military versions. That's just pouring money down a rathole. You might find a handful of plants that could make subcomponents and weld them together, but the design we've built here is the most expensive system ever designed to boil water. There is absolutely no point to try and bring any of those models online.

The nuclear tech out there worth devoting energy on is LFTR. Bring that online and I'd say wind and solar is a waste of time. Sink the massive capital costs into light water reactors and you've saddled yourself with a debt that will pay itself off right about the time the world runs out of uranium.

Posted by Ed Marshall | July 19, 2008 4:35 PM

I know about the Texas wind farms. I also know that they are not reliable power sources, and need backing from fossil/Hydro/nuke - unless the people in DFW want to go with AC in July (I'm guessing no).

As to roofs for Solar, sure - that's a small scale answer. You can get some of your own power from that in some parts of the US (the southwest being the best). It's not an answer for everything though - a few panels on the rook aren't going to heat your water and run your AC and power your appliances (and possibly your car) - etc, etc.

If the sea levels rise, they rise - and there's not a thing we can do about it. We can't change the major cycles of climate, regardless of the fantasy theories that Al Gore likes to spout. 30 years ago, Newsweek told me a new ice age was nigh. Now they tell me that the oceans are about to flood Florida.

I rather suspect that neither is the case. Over the next 5-10 years, the big shift is going to be the general public getting less and less patient with the environmental left, as they realize that endless suits against power lines and plants are stopping their AC and turning the 60" TVs off.

Posted by James Robertson | July 19, 2008 5:02 PM

Matt, I appreciate your rational analysis in this blog post. I don't agree with everything Al Gore says either, particularly his idea that everyone should buy a programmable thermostat: http://lowtechtimes.com/2008/02/20/programmable-thermostats-unnecessary-to-help-environment/

Posted by S.P. Gass | July 19, 2008 5:03 PM

I hope Al Gore is nuts because our political system can't do what he is proposing. That said, he has been right before. If the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere rises to high it is possible that feedback mechanisms will be unleashed and then this will all be mute. I don't know if we should be honest about the danger we are in or try to sugar coat it.

Posted by Crig | July 19, 2008 5:08 PM

Matt,

It might be more efficient in the short term, money-wise, to focus more on mass transit, and for people to use less electricity overall than to invest it all in long term solutions like renewable energy. But altering people's behavior isn't just an economic problem. Just getting all the local governments that have authority over the sorts of things that might make a city more transit-friendly on board is a pretty hefty political task, and one that there hasn't been too much success with on the whole. Actually changing individuals' behavior such that they use less energy would be trickier still.

Renewable energy is easy to sell to people, because it requires no real change in one's lifestyle. You don't have to convince anybody to stop driving their car, just to drive a different one, so the only real challenges are the scientific ones. Conservation entails the serious psychological challenge of getting people to think past their immediate problems to their longer term interests, not to mention getting past the free rider problem. Considering that, I think I'm only half-joking when I say that using our resources to pursue cold fusion might be the more attainable goal.

Posted by lackluster | July 19, 2008 5:49 PM

Also a lot of people are claiming that we literally cannot do what Al Gore is proposing. This ignores the fact that for most of human history we didn't produce large amounts of CO2. To achieve Al Gore's vision would require vastly higher energy prices, but it isn't impossible given the necessary political will. I don't think that will exists or will likely exist in the near term, but it is technically possible to use less energy and to generate the eneregy we do use from non-carbon sources.

Posted by Craig | July 19, 2008 8:03 PM

@chris ford

No one is talking nukes being the 100% solution.

Except that I routinely see pro-nuke types on TV saying, "We already have carbon-free energy! It's called nuclear power and the liberals won't let us build it!"

It's not that simple, and despite your claims to the contrary, we need to displace 10-20 terawatts of power in much less than a century to halt the increase of atmospheric CO2 -- the number of reactors you'd need to build to do that is impossible, and despite the availability of uranium to exceed current demand, it ain't there if you want to increase global nuclear generation 100-fold.

Posted by Zach | July 19, 2008 8:40 PM

After all, replacing a conventional car with an electric one -- or a bus with a trolleybus or tram -- reduces emissions regardless of how you get your electricity.

Trolley buses cause less CO2 emissions per passenger-mile of travel compared to the current average passenger car, but they use more energy. Motor buses cause more emissions than passenger cars, and use more energy. Mass transit overall uses the same amount of energy as passenger cars, and produces only slightly less emissions.

The Toyota Prius, by the way, beats them all. It uses less energy per passenger-mile than all forms of mass transit (trolley buses, motor buses, subways, light rail and commuter rail), and produces less emissions than all forms of transit except subways.

Posted by Mixner | July 19, 2008 8:46 PM

Not to mention that the all electric car future some people envision also requires a lot more electrical generation. And to Zach, who noted that most of human history had no significant carbon emissions - it also featured disease, short lifespans, and bad living conditions.

I have news for you - the public won't be going for the hairshirt approach to energy production.

Posted by James Robertson | July 19, 2008 9:58 PM

Zach,

There's no way wind and/or solar will replace fossil fuels - if you believe nuclear is not possible, then please explain what you see the future looking like. If it includes some magical level of un-backed wind/solar, then I will have to accept that you aren't interested in reality, and are dwelling in the land of environmental religion.

Posted by James Robertson | July 19, 2008 10:31 PM

Then why is it that China is building so many nuke plants? Is it only impossible here, because the left is afraid of the words?

There is one plant in the world that makes reactor vessels and they can make four a year. It's a Japanese plant and the castings are like the modern version of Samurai swords.

Well, them and the few shipyards around the world that build them for nuclear submarines.

But I like the idea of the Hitori Honzo Pressure Vessel.

Posted by Sonny C. | July 19, 2008 11:06 PM

unchecked global population growth going from 1 billion in 1900 to 6.4 billion in 2000 to a possible 12 billion in 2050

World population growth is quite checked, and is projected to peak at a little over 9 billion in 2075.

Posted by Sonny C. | July 19, 2008 11:13 PM

vorkosigan1-
Per your 765 kV xmision map. I lived in southwest Va in the early 90's when AEP wanted to build the (red) lines on the map you see there (or maybe some additional similar ones - not sure how new are those that are pictured)

In any case, there was the usual NIMBY opposition, but also very clear left wing environmnental opposition to these new transmission lines.

So, it's great that you all have changed you minds, but somehow I think if this plan becomes anything more than someone's brainstorm, there will be the ususal suspects in opposition. Especially on the scale of what is proposed. (for comparision of the scale, it's like extending a half a dozen new acela lines from coast to coast)

Posted by Sonny C. | July 19, 2008 11:29 PM

lackluster - Renewable energy is easy to sell to people, because it requires no real change in one's lifestyle.

That is what most people would say that have not yet connected the thought that if renewable energy is 10 to 40 times as expensive as coal or nuke power, then the next step is adjusting to the tenfold increase in utility bills and the tripling or quadrupling of food prices and many consumer goods.
Then I imagine you can join in a realistic discussion of what changes in lifestyle renewables would cause.

You don't have to convince anybody to stop driving their car, just to drive a different one, so the only real challenges are the scientific ones.

That is like saying hyperspace wormholes are an alternative, exciting, CO2-free, renewable way to travel point to point on Earth - and the only real challenges are the economic & scientific ones.

********************
It's not that simple, and despite your claims to the contrary, we need to displace 10-20 terawatts of power in much less than a century to halt the increase of atmospheric CO2 -- the number of reactors you'd need to build to do that is impossible, and despite the availability of uranium to exceed current demand, it ain't there if you want to increase global nuclear generation 100-fold.

1. With recycling, and breeder reactors, the uranium is there. And as nat gas has tripled in price, with carbon caps or taxes threatening coal, then the next tier of uranium reserves becomes available in the medium grade 0.1% to 1% Uo2 evel and there are wads and wads of that stuff. And thorium is even more common.

2. I don't care what Gabon or Bangladesh does, I was saying that the US can get most of it's electricity from nukes as France (80%) did with no problem. New plants are designed to be modular and keep a common construction siting and methodology rather than the custom-built ones we used to make, following France's example, so each one will not have to go through the whole lengthly regulatory review process from the NRC and state insurers and utility oversight.

Another promise of nukes being discussed is that high temp gas pebble bed may be capable of replacing just the boiler in many modern coal plants given some pre-existing siting limits (coal plants located in city harbors or along downtown riversides would likely be politically unsuitable). The pebble bed nuke modification (650 Million - 1 billion) would leave the rest of the plant investment intact (besides the coal delivery system and boiler) and be a zero carbon emitter.
Two pebble bed reactors are now in testing in China and S Africa.

High temp gas, breeders, and fusion plants (if they ever emerge as an economic alternative) operate at high enough temps to be efficient at electrolysis of hydrogen, something wind turbines and solar trying to do H2 generation at standard ATM pressure/temp are not.

Posted by chris ford | July 20, 2008 12:46 AM

Hey if 10 years is all you have, 10 years is all you have.

A lot of scientists say if we don't get our act together in 10 ten years then the process reaches an irreversible tipping point with positive feedback etc etc.

Posted by The Fool | July 20, 2008 9:37 PM

Re: That is what most people would say that have not yet connected the thought that if renewable energy is 10 to 40 times as expensive as coal or nuke power, then the next step is adjusting to the tenfold increase in utility bills and the tripling or quadrupling of food prices and many consumer goods.

Today's energy sources are hugely more expensive than the energy source that the Romans or even the Tudors and early Bourbons had available (animals and human muscle and some small amount of water and wind). Yet the world manages just fine, in fact enjoys a much higher standard of living despite the fact that our energy bills are much higher. The reason of course is that people make much money money than their distant ancestors did too. Why is that not possible for the future too?

Re: A lot of scientists say if we don't get our act together in 10 ten years then the process reaches an irreversible tipping point with positive feedback etc etc.

There is no such thing as "irreversible". The Earth has spent four billion years going through climatic ups and downs. Obviously any increase or decrease in average temperature is reversible. Moreover the catastrophists always talk about positive feedback loops while ignoring the negative damping feedback factors. We know that these exist because even the best models predict far more warming to have already occured than we see-- something (probably many things) is slowing down warming.

Posted by JonF | July 20, 2008 10:35 PM