The Climate Ground War Grinds On
Here’s the publisher promo for James Lawrence Powell’s new book, The Inquisition of Climate Science:
Modern science is under the greatest and most successful attack in recent history. An industry of denial, abetted by news media and “info-tainment” broadcasters more interested in selling controversy than presenting facts, has duped half the American public into rejecting the facts of climate science””an overwhelming body of rigorously vetted scientific evidence showing that human-caused, carbon-based emissions are linked to warming the Earth. The industry of climate science denial is succeeding: public acceptance has declined even as the scientific evidence for global warming has increased. It is vital that the public understand how anti-science ideologues, pseudo-scientists, and non-scientists have bamboozled them. We cannot afford to get global warming wrong””yet we are, thanks to deniers and their method.
Gary, one of the scholars at Ecological Sociology, explains why the “anti-denier crusade” is itself in denial over the deficit model’s failure. (Hello, Al Gore?) Moreover, Gary observes:
Powell’s rhetoric, like that of many other scientists pushing the deficit model, preaches to the choir of believers. It has little to offer in terms of the real task, engaging in active dialogue with the deniers.
That’s obviously true. But was that ever an objective? Powell’s book and, to cite another well known example, Joe Romm’s blog, have no interest in engaging with “the deniers.” Their efforts are part of a ground war. Their battle strategy is simple: crush the enemy.
Others, who share the same larger goals of AGW proponents (taking action on global warming), see this tactic as self-defeating and suggest that neutralizing climate skeptics via other means would provide better results.
Alas, as Gary notes in his post, a typical feature of the “anti-denier crusade” is
a general lack of self-reflection, particularly as it relates to the use of rhetoric.
<i>Their battle strategy is simple: crush the enemy.</i>
Wars of annihilation are foolish.
Your enemy has no choice but to ‘fight to the death’ which simply raises your own casualties and costs.
There are only 3 ways to end a war.
1) Annihilation
2) Assimilation
3) Accommodation
I agree with 1/2 of James Lawrence point – namely that science has shown that the Earth has warmed.
While there is a correlation with increased CO2 – I think there is still a significant debate over how much of the increase in temperature is caused by increasing CO2 levels, and how much is caused by other things, such as natural variability, land-use changes, cosmic ray cloud changes, solar activity changes, etc.
The jury is still out on these questions.
If it turns out that only 10% of the warming is due to human carbon emissions (really anything less than 50% is a problem) – and the rest is due to natural variability, or other non-human reasons, the AGW war machine will have done itself great damage.
That is the danger the AGW side is taking by going out in advance of the actual evidence. What if they are wrong?
We know the models are terrible. They all over estimate the warming.
None of them projected this 15 year break in warming, or the drop in ocean sea level.
These are all reasons to be skeptical that we have nailed the climate to the point we can really predict what it will be in 10 years, let alone 100.
Methinks it’s the lack of warming, rather than climate denial industry, that has created controversy about global warming among people. You know, the common people, who were told that snow will be a thing of the past and who have been freezing their asses off and shoveling the endless snow for a couple of years now….
RickA,
@2
You ask the question, what if the overwhelming majority of climate scientists, who support he IPCC AR4, or even believe it understates the problem are wrong? The answer is that the world will have developed alternative enegy sources to fossil fuels somewhat prematurely, before they have actually run out or become prohibitively expensive. The other effect will be that there will have been some overkill in the mitigation of floods, and too much conservatism built into the use of water sources located in areas that are drought prone. None of this is a catastrophe for mankind. This will amount to some unnecessary costs. The estimates are that over the long haul it will not be unaffordable.
One should also ask the question, what if they are right, and the world ignores the warning. There will be environmental refugees due to abandonment of areas that are uninhabitable due to inundation or desertification. The world’s food supply may prove to be inadequate as a result of extreme drought and flooding. In addition there will be mass extinction of many species.
Regarding your requirement that climate models make accurate predictions of the near future, this is not a necessity for taking action. If the models are right about 30 year trends, which are generally less affected by internal variation such as ENSO, and volcanoes, which are not yet well predicted by climate models, that is all that is needed to understand what we need to do.
jarmo, @3,
Sure the public’s opinion is affected by yesterday’s and today’s weather, however, but that is not what is driving the denialism. In fact we have had an all time record heat wave and drought in the Southwest, in Perry’s home state of Texas. In fact, Texas may never recover as a source of beef cattle as a result, but it hasn’t affected his opinion on climate change at all, despite the fact that drought in the southwest is predicted by climate modeling as an outcome of global warming.
Both alarmists and deniers alike find the weather to mirror quite well their opinions about global warming.
Keith,
You say,
“Others, who share the same larger goals of AGW proponents (taking action on global warming), see this tactic as self-defeating and suggest that neutralizing climate skeptics via other means would provide better results.”
Looking back at your link, the other means seems to be based on making energy security arguments. There may be a few people who are persuaded that this is a good idea, however it doesn’t appear calculated to help much with the emissions that are the cause of the climate change. It is more likely to result in rapid exploitation of tar sands, Monatana coal, and Arctic oil sources, which are cheaper than solar, and wind. The clean energy sources are more expensive and rely on government subsidies which are opposed by climate change deniers. The motivation for climate change denial is opposition to government regulation or subsidies for anything except the oil industry.
Eric Adler Says:
September 26th, 2011 at 1:12 pm Keith,
You say,
“There may be a few people who are persuaded that this is a good idea, however it doesn’t appear calculated to help much with the emissions that are the cause of the climate change”
Let’s see…the Watts crowd is almost all pro-nuclear on energy security grounds, Rush Limbaugh is pro-nuclear on energy security grounds, James Inhofe is pro-nuclear on energy security grounds.
Is their a ‘denier’ with a bigger microphone then Rush Limbaugh? Is there a denier with more legislative power then James Inhofe? Is there a denier blog with a larger readership then WattsUpWithThat?
Meanwhile actual climate observations stubbornly refuse to cooperate with IPCC model predictions. Time to admit there are some big pieces missing from our AGW puzzle.
http://rankexploits.com/musings/wp-content/uploads/2011/09/AllThree-500×500.png
Oh Harry, there you go suggesting they care about emissions instead of politics. How would it look if the “pro-science crowd” had to admit that they were wrong about nuclear energy for 40 years? What if everyone noticed that their claims about nukes were actually psuedo-science bunk? What if the electorate- people who vote! – realized that we’ve known since James Hansen first squeaked about warming that the only solution was nukes and that windmills and solar were, in Hansen’s words, tantamount to belief in the Tooth Fairy? What if people added up the number of coal-fired power plants built over the past 40 years that greens have been busy shutting down the only viable alternatives to coal?
What if every time KK claimed that President Obama is “pro-nuke” it was pointed out that not a single nuke has been approved by the administration (or the Clinton Gore one? What if they noted that the very moment we discover “energy security” in the shale of the United States the Democratic Party’s reflexive response is to kill, kill, kill it?
Priorities, Harry. Priorities.
Their ground war is rooted in a Maginot Line defending against a supposed enemy that is only peripherally interested in climate change, and only to the extent that it gives them a weapon against U.S. Democrats. They adopted a view of their ‘enemy’ as the same shape and size as those defending tobacco.
It is that mistaken assumption about the nature of their opponent that has led to their repeated shellacking in actual confrontations. The people who are kicking their tails are not the right wing think tanks. They are McIntyre, the good Bishop and Anthony Watts.
And now they want bigger bunkers.
@8
But Limbaugh is also pro-coal so he’s a bit of a wash no?
#5
Among common people, the predictions that did not come true mean a lot.
Eric @ 4
When the price of corn went up worldwide as corn was diverted to fuel, from food, it is not unfair to say that this was a real hardship for people who could no longer afford corn based food (or could afford less of it).
Similarly, to the extent the world diverts resources to do things which may turn out to be unnecessary, such as unnecessary mitigation or adaptation expenses, that will no doubt have negative consequences for people. Some number of people may actually die because of the unnecessary expense.
If we have a carbon tax, and some people cannot afford it, for example, some people may not be able to heat their homes.
After all, there are people right now who cannot afford to heat their home – before the price of heating oil, electricity, etc. is raised.
We are talking about raising the costs of fuel, food, transportation and power generation – and these expenses will be born by the taxpayers of the world.
Those incremental costs – to the people – related to mitigation or adaptation – which turn out not to be necessary – will hurt people.
So, I am not sure that just saying – oh well – we are doing stuff early that we were going to have to do later anyway, is necessarily correct.
The other factor for me is the cost benefit. Say the scientists are right and we are causing the Earth to warm with our extra CO2 emissions. What if the cost of fixing the problem is 1 trillion dollars over 10 years – but the benefit is only .01 degrees C reduction in the trend to 2100? How do you balance that, especially as that 1 Trillion dollars is going to be born by the taxpayers of the world?
I think 1 trillion just for the USA is a not unreasonable estimate – as the cost of 300 nuclear power plants to move to non-carbon baseload power generation would easily cost $1 trillion.
In other words, the scientists can be right, and it may cost more to fix the problem than is worth it for the benefit derived.
We cannot really analyze this because we have no real idea how much of the warming is human caused versus non-human caused, or what the actual effect of implementing policies will have on future temperature trends. Without that knowledge, we are just guessing.
I do agree that if the scientists are right that early action is warranted – and if our actions will actually be more beneficial than the costs, that we should take action.
But I don’t think anybody knows the correct answer to my last statement (are they right and are the proposals more beneficial than the costs?).
Eric @4
By the way – I just want to say that if we can generate power that is non-carbon based, for cheaper than the cost of carbon based power – I am all for that.
The problem is that we cannot do that yet. As far as I know, there is no working technology that we could go out and buy today that will allow us to generate electricity cheaper than the carbon based kind (I am ignoring hydro and nuclear as we have built up all the hydro we can in the USA [I think] and nuclear is still more expensive than coal or natural gas [I think]).
If we invested research dollars to make non-carbon based power generation cheaper than coal or natural gas, the market would automatically move to that technology [in my opinion].
Nobody has invented it yet.
That is part of the problem – there is no solution to the generation of non-carbon based baseload power – except to just charge way more for the more expensive alternatives, many of which are not baseload power solutions.
Funny. If one wants to talk about Inquisition, just look at how anyone who dared to question the AGW orthodoxy has been treated… until recently. (Climategate was the turning point.)
This is truly hilarious:
“An industry of denial, abetted by news media and “info-tainment” broadcasters more interested in selling controversy than presenting facts, has duped half the American public into rejecting the facts of climate science”
Considering that almost ALL of the mainstream media has been pumping the AGW scare story full tilt – again, until recently – this is simply false.
And what “facts” have the poor dumb people allegedly been duped into rejecting?
This author is a great example of everything wrong with the AGW sales campaign. More fiction wrapped in fearmongering, topped off by false certainty and an eagerness to dismiss the intelligence of the ‘little people.’
Yet, as they say, you don’t need a meteorologist to know when it is raining, especially ones that try to tell you it is sunny when it is raining.
All this wolf crying has had its inevitable effect. The wolf is a poodle.
#16,
“nuclear is still more expensive than coal or natural gas [I think]).”
As far as coal it is really dependent on how far one is from the the massive pile of cheap coal in Wyoming.(Coal transport is expensive).
The cheapest plant of all is the one that doesn’t need to be built.
But if you have to build something, in some areas of the country, particularly the US Southeast Nuclear is cost competitive.
Construction of Vogtle #3 and Vogtle #4 in Georgia and VC Summer #2 and #3 is proceeding.
So far VC Summer #2 and #3 appear to be on budget at $4.3 billion/unit in constant 2007 dollars.
http://www.scana.com/NR/rdonlyres/A830A131-9425-46F1-B948-C8424530EE49/0/2011Q2BLRAReport.pdf
DOE has some levelized cost projections for 2016
http://205.254.135.24/oiaf/aeo/electricity_generation.html
The regional variation in the US for levelized costs for ‘new coal’ varies from $85/MWh to $110/MWh. The variation for ‘new nuclear’ is is from $109/MWh to $121/MWh.
Natural Gas looks financially most attractive at the moment but natural gas prices have a long history of being volatile and I doubt any utility would commit to a 100% natural gas generation solution.
It has little to offer in terms of the real task, engaging in active dialogue with the deniers.
By definition, deniers can’t be reached. They have their heads buried in the ideological sands too far (a look at some of their typical blog posts is a clear indicator). No point in actively continuing to engage with anyone who doesn’t have any honest desire to improve their understanding of anything, where their conclusions are pre-determined, and their concern first and foremost is growing their cult while consisting dismissing the huge body of inconvenient scientific evidence. They’ve only earned ridicule, not a seat at the table, and simply asserting that there’s a substantial minority of people who engage in denialism (also a majority of Republicans) doesn’t change that.
Since KK thinks Bill Clinton should be a spokesperson (see “Why Clinton (and not Gore) should lead on climate”), it’s worth pointing out part of his broad strategy:
If you’re an American, the best thing you can do is to make it politically unacceptable for people to engage in denial
Of course, it’s open to interpretation on how you get there. No silver bullet solutions.
On a different topic,
jeffn: What if every time KK claimed that President Obama is “pro-nuke” it was pointed out that not a single nuke has been approved by the administration
Not that this is the only thing wrong with your post…
WASHINGTON “” President Obama, speaking to an enthusiastic audience of union officials in Lanham, Md., on Tuesday, underscored his embrace of nuclear power as a clean energy source, announcing that the Energy Department had approved financial help for the construction of two nuclear reactors in Georgia
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/17/business/energy-environment/17nukes.html
On what causes denial, there exists no single scapegoat. Some single out fossil fuel interests. Others right-wing organizations like Heartland or CEI. Others assign blame to right-wing and mainstream press or denial blogs. All well-deserving and a big part of the problem. By in large, though, denialist propaganda isn’t believed unless the target audience wants to believe it, which former skeptic and libertarian Jon Abrams eludes to. Most folks don’t attend a Monckton conference, read a Montford book, or digest WUWT material religiously unless they are looking for information (factual not a required attribute) that re-affirms pre-existing beliefs.
http://oped.ca/National-Post/jonathan-abrams-why-i-am-no-longer-a-skeptic-on-climate-change/
From Harry’s (#18) link, wind (onshore) is the most cost competitive in the U.S. at the moment, at least through the projected 2016 period.
I questions why some on the conservative side of the aisle (science deniers or not) are so set on nuclear power. I think it has a lot to do with history, and the sour grapes around some environmentalists successfully halting nuclear production in the 1970’s, combined with a little pro-Reagan partisanship and support for arms buildup. But this isn’t the 1970’s anymore, when renewables were much more expensive and nukes were “da bomb”. Eli has a related post:
http://rabett.blogspot.com/2011/09/french-nuclear-power-pricing-and-solar.html
@20
No J,
People like nukes because they are proven technology that can power cities. They are able to replace baseline coal plants. There is no known technology to do this with wind/solar that makes engineering or economic sense. (Romm/Rabett fantasies not withstanding)
NewYorkJ Says:
September 26th, 2011 at 7:41 pm
From Harry’s (#18) link, wind (onshore) is the most cost competitive in the U.S. at the moment, at least through the projected 2016 period
Wind has high regional variability. Wyoming has the best wind in the country and the cheapest coal. The quality of the onshore wind east of the Mississippi isn’t all that great.
National wind resource map –
http://www.nrel.gov/wind/images/photo_windpower_map.jpg
Wind also doesn’t have any ‘time of use’ value. I’m in Washington State and we have windmills all over the place as well as the hydro to ‘theoretically’ load balance them. When it’s hot or cold ‘old smokey’ ends up running full bore.
So we’ve spent on windmills(with help from Federal Tax Payers), now we have to spend a few hundred million on upgrades to old smokey because everyone thought we wouldn’t need it once the windmills were built . (We don’t have much hydro in August and January and we don’t get much wind either, unfortunately the citizenry objects to sweating like pigs or freezing to death) Then we are going to spend again to replace old smokey with a natural gas plant as soon as we are done paying for the upgrades to old smokey.
Long story short…there isn’t a ‘universal cheapest’ energy solution. It really depends on the availability and costs of various resources where you live.
In the US Southeast Nuclear compares very favorably against other options.
Ivp0 @21
What is holding up the construction of nuclear power is cost, risk and opposition to siting by the public. This is so despite the massive government subsidies and insurance against loss. There is no private investment in this technology now. The costs are too high and the construction and approval periods take too long.
http://www.time.com/time/health/article/0,8599,1812540,00.html
Thorium reactors could be a long term replacement for conventional nuclear power. China recognizes that it must get away from coal, and is investing heavily in solar and is working to develop thorium reactors. The US is going to be left in the dust as the rest of the world recognizes that it needs to get away from fossil fuels.
Ed G,
@17
The chief deniers were not treated badly. Fred Singer has a good job, as does Sallie Baliunas, Willie Soon, and Pat Michaels. There are many others also employed by right wing think tanks and universities. It hasn’t hurt their careers one bit to be global warming deniers.
What really separates renewables and nuclear from the pack are external costs of fossil fuels. Economically, it’s no contest.
http://www.skepticalscience.com/true-cost-of-coal-power.html
Try selling me global warming like you are personally trying to have me hand over money from my wallet to you, right now, one on one (which is effectively what is being asked).
I think the sales technique would be a bit different than hammering me with denier and anti-science labels, or pinning me to the ground and forcibly taking my money because you know it what is good for “us”.
The sooner the realization hits advocates that they actually need Republican votes to get any traction on their objectives, the sooner they will engage skeptics, compromise to meet their goals (ahem…nuclear power), and generally stop the abusive behavior. Time for plan B, people. Plan A has failed.
@19 NYJ
So how’s that not engaging with the opposition working for you so far? Are results everything you hoped they would be?
How effective do you find this technique when arguing with your wife / significant other? Do you find using the term “irrational bee-yotch” in an argument helps to resolve communications issues with your spouse?
You vented. Opposition alienated. Nothing accomplished. Repeat. I wouldn’t hold out much hope this technique will work any better tomorrow than it has today.
It’s worse than that, Tom. NewyorkJ also engages in that time honored tactic of stating a half-truth in hopes that it will end the discussion. Take nyj’s “takedown” of me above. I note the president is pro-nuke in the the sense that he’s approved no nukes? Nyj gives a link to a ny times story about Obama “approving” a nuke plant. Slam dunk right? Except the article was written in February 2010 and noted that the Feds haven’t approved the plant. Here it is 18 months later and still no approval. So, this is their idea of urgency and they wonder why we have no urgency.
@26
NYJ,
If you want to be taken seriously you will have to find sources that are less driven by political agenda than SKS. Honest scientific analysis and political agenda are mutually exclusive.
Tom Scharf,
Remarkably, every family member, friend, and acquaintance I know is more rational and open-minded to science than the usual global warming deniers that pervade cyberspace. Engaging with them is often fruitful. Engaging with deniers is usually not. Case in point, ivp0 (#30).
Ultimately, no amount of refined communication is going to move hardcore deniers. They need to take the first step, shedding their political blinders, as Craig Good and others have done (oh, and he likes SkepticalScience).
http://skeptoid.com/blog/2011/06/15/i-global-warming-skeptic/
@31
Well J,
Since I believe that increased man made GHGs are absolutely warming the earth your keen assessment once again misses the mark. Sadly SKS has become a bit of a scientific joke lately but simple minds still find it comforting. Carry on.
ivp0 (#32),
The assessment of deniers is worthless. I’ve noticed that they seem to be becoming increasingly threatened by SkepticalScience as of late, which is a good thing.
NewYorkJ @33
First label, then ignore.
It must be nice to only pay attention to material you agree with.
some food for thought:
“Alexander defends his Leaf as the right choice for a freedom-seeking American:
RickA (#34),
On the contrary, sites like SkepticalScience pay attention to denier material on a regular basis, taking a critical look at it. That’s part of the purpose of their site. I’ve found that deniers hate to be challenged, though.
I’ve found that deniers hate to be challenged, though.
Evidence? Not sure who exactly you call deniers but I wonder how many people you know who had their comments deleted on CA (for example) or any other “denier” site of your disliking.
BTW, are you familiar with “moderation” policies of Joe Romm and RC?
“..It is vital that the public understand how anti-science ideologues, pseudo-scientists, and non-scientists have bamboozled them..”
LoL..He is talking about the greens with their anti GM food and nuclear power stance, among others, is he not ? 🙂
@23
“Long story short”¦there isn’t a “˜universal cheapest’ energy solution. It really depends on the availability and costs of various resources where you live.”
+1 for some nuance
OTOH, it would be even better if you qualified ‘cheapest’ by including some notion of full cost accounting to address the externalities that arise with all but a handful of power generation technologies…
Sashka: I wonder how many people you know who had their comments deleted on CA (for example) or any other “denier” site of your disliking.
On CA:
Susann: I was first off the post when it came to comments, and after charging that Steve did not in fact prove his case and overstepped the Nature editorial, he moderated me and deleted not only my posts in the moderation queue but also other posts that went through before I was placed in moderation.
http://metaclimate.org/2009/12/29/in-the-penalty-box/
In McIntyre’s relative defense, Watts is far worse in that regard, as many have indicated they’ve been banned from posting there, but I’m limited to one link (example) per post on this blog. There’s also the usual hypocrisy (common to deniers) about criticizing moderation policies of other blogs while engaging in frivolous moderation.
So, there is no evidence other than one example on CA + allegedly Watts?
You are pretty good at ignoring the inconvenient part of the question.
There’s also the usual hypocrisy (common to deniers)
Once again: where is evidence of the commonality?
Sashka,
http://tamino.wordpress.com/2011/05/09/favorite-denier-tricks-or-how-to-hide-the-incline/#comment-50676
Is it that hard to take a critical look at your leaders?
Sashka –
What NYJ and Keith Kloor have in common is an adversion to citing any actual data to buttress their arguments. NYJ says that all his friends are more scientifically literate than the “deniers”. This is supposed to carry more weight than a study out of Yale that showed that the more scientifically literate one is the more likely one is to be skeptical of AGW claims.
http://www.culturalcognition.net/browse-papers/the-tragedy-of-the-risk-perception-commons-culture-conflict.html
Likewise, Keith puts up dozens of posts about how the “anti-science” position of Republicans, exemplified by common sense comments from Rick Perry, is going to cost them the election. Absent is anything resembling evidence: polls, interviews with Republican leaders, voters, clarifications from Perry, etc. Like NYJ’s “friends” Keith’s fellow journalists said so, so it must be true.
Tom C: What NYJ and Keith Kloor have in common is an adversion to citing any actual data to buttress their arguments.
Sure…like #11, #12, #22, #27, #28, #30, #32, etc.
Tom C: NYJ says that all his friends are more scientifically literate than the “deniers”.
What Tom C and deniers have in common is the ability to create strawman arguments in hopes of supporting a dubious argument, while occasionally and inadvertently making someone else’s point. Case in point, presuming Tom is referring to my post #31, where I say:
Remarkably, every family member, friend, and acquaintance I know is more rational and open-minded to science than the usual global warming deniers that pervade cyberspace. Engaging with them is often fruitful. Engaging with deniers is usually not.
So Tom C twists this to say I’m claiming my “friends are more scientifically literate…” when I’m in fact saying that family, friends, and acquaintances are both more rational, and “open-minded to science” which does not imply any level of scientific literacy or expertise, just that they are not dismissive. “Scientific literacy” is defined by Tom’s study as being able to answer correctly questions like “Does the Earth go around the Sun, or does the Sun go around the Earth?”, which really indicates little about the ability to assess climate science, a point I make here:
http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/2011/07/06/why-the-climate-debate-is-a-culture-war/#comment-67814
Moreover, Tom makes my point in #19 by citing a study that states:
respondents predisposed by their values to dismiss climate change evidence became more dismissive
NYJ –
You write:
So Tom C twists this to say I’m claiming my “friends are more scientifically literate”¦” when I’m in fact saying that family, friends, and acquaintances are both more rational, and “open-minded to science” which does not imply any level of scientific literacy or expertise, just that they are not dismissive. “Scientific literacy” is defined by Tom’s study as being able to answer correctly questions like “Does the Earth go around the Sun, or does the Sun go around the Earth?”, which really indicates little about the ability to assess climate science, a point I make here:
Wow. So being “rational and open minded to science” leads one to the right conclusions, while being literate about science does not? Moreover, someone who thinks the sun goes around the earth could have very nuanced views about climate science.
No, this proves that scientific illiterates are credulous.
Tom C: So being “rational and open minded to science” leads one to the right conclusions, while being literate about science does not?
Strawman #2. Being able to correctly identify simple things like the Earth revolving around the Sun isn’t a particularly good indicator of one’s ability to assess climate science, any more than 1+1=2. Something slightly more relevant, like being able to identify the layers of the Earth’s atmosphere, might be more useful, but given how nearly meaningless the study’s questions are to predicting climate science acceptance, it’s not surprising that ideological factors play a much greater role. At any rate, your study makes my point for me. Thanks.
Marlowe Johnson Says:
September 27th, 2011 at 1:49 pm
OTOH, it would be even better if you qualified “˜cheapest’ by including some notion of full cost accounting to address the externalities
Externalities are enormously difficult to calculate. I’m pretty sure that for a $50,000 grant I can find a Phd somewhere that will calculate whatever externality I want.
IMHO It is easier to find a common ground leaving out externalities by working the ‘location,location,location’ angle.
I.E. Big coal likes to trot out how cheap electricity is in Wyoming as a reason why someone in New York or Miami should like coal. They don’t mention that the coal in Wyoming won’t be cheap once it gets shipped overland to New York or Miami.
Florida advertises itself as the ‘Sunshine State’. But a quick look at the Solar Resource map shows that is a myth too. http://www.nrel.gov/gis/images/map_pv_national_thumb.jpg
Wars are fought because one or both sides believes the costs of ‘accommodation/surrender’ is too high, those beliefs are generally bolstered by a false mythology.
If use a back of the envelope case for Wyoming.
Just some rough numbers
Coal fired fuel costs are about 1 cent/KWh
Natural Gas fired fuel costs in a modern gas fired plant will be about 3 cents/KWh.(Wyoming is also has plenty of cheap natural gas)
A well placed windmill in Wyoming will have a capacity factor of 40%.
So if I put up a $1 billion windfarm backed up by a $1 billion natural gas plant in Wyoming I would have an average fuel cost of 60% of 3 cents = 1.8 cents and would have spent $2 billion total.
A new similarly size coal plant with all the pollution controls costs about $3 billion.
What approach would you use at a town hall meeting Wyoming that they should stop burning coal?
A) All the externalities of coal.
B) A combined natural gas/wind solution will save them $1 billion in upfront costs and cost less then 1 cent/KWh more in ‘locally produced’ fuel costs and the crazy Californian Nimby’s are prepared to pay a ‘premium’ for it if we export it.
Here is an actual proposal for a 2-3GW wind farm in Wyoming. I can’t find the word ‘climate’ or the phrase ‘dirty coal’ anywhere in it. The only ‘externality’ it talks about is how much tax revenue the local government will receive.
http://legisweb.state.wy.us/WindEnergy/Power%20Company%20of%20Wyoming%20Position%20Paper.pdf
Underground coal mining has calculable health effects but so does unemployment.
Nice try at changing the subject, NYJ.
Harry,
An interesting proposal – a bit salesish, you have to admit.
I’m wondering (perhaps I missed it). Is this a 10-0% private venture, or is there a government subsidy involved.
ooops…
10-0% should be 100%
kdk33 Says:
September 27th, 2011 at 9:13 pm
An interesting proposal ““ a bit salesish, you have to admit.
The proposal pretty much just dovetails into the Wyoming mindset that ‘natural resources’, whether they be coal,oil,natural gas or wind should be exploited at a profit where ever possible.
A point I was trying to make, if you want to sell something the reason you use is the reason the person buying it feels is important.
California as well as Colorado have a renewable energy standard. So with out or without tax credits(Tax credits are probably involved) there is potential money to be made selling Californian’s ‘clean’ energy. The California law doesn’t specify that the clean energy has to be produced locally.
Wyoming’s wind resource are considerably better then California’s. in California a 30% Capacity factor is considered ‘good’. Wyoming has sites that should produce a 48% capacity factor as well as excellent ‘time of day’ correlation…I.E. The wind blows best during the afternoon. (Seasonal correlation problems still exist)
Figure 1a and 1b in this report – http://www.wyia.org/wci/faq.html
Here’s another report of relative costs of wind by Western state.
http://legisweb.state.wy.us/2010/WyomingWindModel_7_01_2010.pdf