The Guardian has an article by comedian Robert Newman on the topic "It's capitalism or a habitable planet - you can't have both" which makes the case that dealing with peak oil and global warming is impossible in a capitalist society.

There is no meaningful response to climate change without massive social change. A cap on this and a quota on the other won't do it. Tinker at the edges as we may, we cannot sustain earth's life-support systems within the present economic system.

Capitalism is not sustainable by its very nature. It is predicated on infinitely expanding markets, faster consumption and bigger production in a finite planet. And yet this ideological model remains the central organising principle of our lives, and as long as it continues to be so it will automatically undo (with its invisible hand) every single green initiative anybody cares to come up with.

Much discussion of energy, with never a word about power, leads to the fallacy of a low-impact, green capitalism somehow put at the service of environmentalism. In reality, power concentrates around wealth. Private ownership of trade and industry means that the decisive political force in the world is private power. The corporation will outflank every puny law and regulation that seeks to constrain its profitability. It therefore stands in the way of the functioning democracy needed to tackle climate change. Only by breaking up corporate power and bringing it under social control will we be able to overcome the global environmental crisis.

...

We are caught between the Scylla and Charybdis of climate change and peak oil. Once we pass the planetary oil production spike (when oil begins rapidly to deplete and demand outstrips supply), there will be less and less net energy available to humankind. Petroleum geologists reckon we will pass the world oil spike sometime between 2006 and 2010. It will take, argues peak-oil expert Richard Heinberg, a second world war effort if many of us are to come through this epoch. Not least because modern agribusiness puts hundreds of calories of fossil-fuel energy into the fields for each calorie of food energy produced.

Catch-22, of course, is that the very worst fate that could befall our species is the discovery of huge new reserves of oil, or even the burning into the sky of all the oil that's already known about, because the climate chaos that would unleash would make the mere collapse of industrial society a sideshow bagatelle. Therefore, since we've got to make the switch from oil anyway, why not do it now?

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If we are all still in denial about the radical changes coming - and all of us still are - there are sound geological reasons for our denial. We have lived in an era of cheap, abundant energy. There never has and never will again be consumption like we have known. The petroleum interval, this one-off historical blip, this freakish bonanza, has led us to believe that the impossible is possible, that people in northern industrial cities can have suntans in winter and eat apples in summer. But much as the petroleum bubble has got us out of the habit of accepting the existence of zero-sum physical realities, it's wise to remember that they never went away. You can either have capitalism or a habitable planet. One or the other, not both.

Bart at Energy Bulletin notes:

On the one hand, capitalism has been a flexible, durable system that has re-invented itself many times over the centuries. On the other hand, the current unresponsiveness and denial lead one to believe that Robert Newman may be right.

I tend to think blaming capitalism (and even continuous economic growth) for the state of the environment is a little misguided and is somewhat beside the point when it comes to the mitigation of peak oil and global warming (plus I've yet to see a meaningful alternative proposed - its not like the communist model was any better at avoiding environmental destruction, other than it generally didn't grow as fast - but it compensated for that "positive" by being less able to adapt once the consequences of various rapid industrialisation programs became apparent).

There is a fairly simple solution to the problems of global warming and peak oil that doesn't involve discarding capitalism entirely - introducing carbon taxes and steadily increasing them.

It is true (and unfortunate) that fossil fuel related industries do currently dominate the political systems in the anglo saxon world, which is largely the cause of our refusal to do anything about global warming or peak oil, and that this does tend to make the process of introducing carbon taxes a bit difficult. Its worth reading Joel Bakan's "The Corporation" to get some ideas about how the systme could be adjusted in order to stop this sort of thing happening.

However, these industries aren't the only ones that exist in capitalist societies and at some point all the other industries are going to realise that their profits and ability to survive are being compromised by the effects of global warming and ever increasing energy costs as a result of peak oil. So we can probably expect to see some sort of shift as these problems become obvious to everyone, with political parties that propose dealing with the problems getting more funding from those who don't have an interest in continuing the fossil fuel economy.

The Viridian idea is that you can have capitalism and a sustainable, workable world at the same time - it just requires a restructuring of the way things are done.

Part of this is basically marketing (if you make green / sustainable ideas and products "cool" then the market will shift towards providing them) and partly by adopting processes like the ones described in Bill McDonough and Michael Braungart's book "Cradle to Cradle".

I won't try to describe the whole book (click on the link and read their description) but in summary the book describes a second iteration of the industrial revolution that concentrates on "eco-effectiveness" rather than the traditional industrial system of converting natural resources into waste, or slightly greener ideas of "eco-efficiency", which slow down the process but basically just try to reduce the amount of damage rather than rethinking the process.

Eco-effectiveness involves creating prodcuts in such a way that they can be fully recycled once they are no longer required (and this means recycled into the same quality of product, not "downcycled" like paper waste is for example). The book discusses closed cycles for "biological and technical nutrients" - keeping organic materials that can be returned to the natural environment seperate from synthetic or mineral materials that can be fed back into the industrial cycle.

This involves a lot of changes to the design process in particular but results in an industrial economy which is no longer as subject to the limits to growth, as it tends to be able to reuse a lot of the materials it needs.

Of course, this doesn't apply in the case of non-recyclable resources, such as oil. There is a section that talks about energy called "Brute force" which I'll quote below:

If the first Industrial Revolution had a motto, we like to joke, it would be "If rute force doesn't work, you're not using enough of it". The attempt to impose universal design solutions on an infinite number of local conditions and customs is one manifestation of this principle and its underlying assumption, that nature should be overwhelmed; so is the application of the chemical brute force and fossil fuel energy necessary to make such solutions "fit".

All of nature's industry relies on energy from the sun, which can be viewed as a form of current, constantly renewing income. Humans, by contrast, extract and burn fossil fuels such as coal and petrochemicals that have been deposited deep below the Earth's surface, supplementing them with energy produced through waste incineration processes and nuclear reactors that create additional problems. They do this with little or no attention to harnessing local natural energy flows. The standard operating instruction seems to be "If too hot or too cold, just add more fossil fuels".

You are probably familiar with the threat of global warming brought about by the buildup of heat-trapping gases (such as carbon dioxide) in the atmosphere due to human activities. Increasing global temperatures result in global climate change and shifts of existing climates. Most models predict more severe wqeather: hotter hots, colder colds, and more intense storms, as global thermal contrasts grow more extreme. A warmer atmosphere draws more water from oceans, resulting in bigger, wetter, more frequent storms, rises in sea level, shifts in seasons, and a chain of other climatic events.

The reality of global warming has gained currency not only among environmentalists but among industry leaders. But global warming is not the sole reason to rethink our reliance on the "brute force" approach to energy. Incinerating fossil fuels contributes particulates - microscopic particles of soot - to the environment, where they are known to cause respiratory and other health problems. Regulations for airborne pollutants known to threaten health are growing more severe. As new regulations, based on mounting research about the health threats of airborne toxins resulting from incinerating fossil fuels, are implemented, industries invested solely in continuing the current system will be at a serious disadvantage.

Even beyond these important issues, brute force energy doesn't make good sense as a dominant strategy over the long term. You wouldn't want to depend on savings for all your daily expenditures, so why rely on savings to meet all of humanity's energy needs ? Clearly, over the years petrochemicals will become harder (and more expensive) to get, and drilling in pristine places for a few million more drums of oil isn't going to solve that problem.

In a sense, finite sources of energy, such as petrochemicals derived from fossil fuels, can be seen as a nest egg, something to be preserved for emergencies, then used sparingly - in certain medical situations, for example. For the majority of our simple energy needs, humans should be accruing a great deal of current solar income, of which there is plenty: thousands of times the amount of energy needed to fuel human activities hits the surface of the planet every day in the form of sunlight.

One novel aspect of the book is that is made using a special type of plastic - this is described on the book's website:

In addition to describing the hopeful, nature-inspired design principles that are making industry both prosperous and sustainable, the book itself is a physical symbol of the changes to come. It is printed on a synthetic 'paper,' made from plastic resins and inorganic fillers, designed to look and feel like top quality paper while also being waterproof and rugged. And the book can be easily recycled in localities with systems to collect polypropylene, like that in yogurt containers. This 'treeless' book points the way toward the day when synthetic books, like many other products, can be used, recycled, and used again without losing any material quality—in cradle-to-cradle cycles.

As a result of this approach, the book is a little unusual - it looks and feels great, but is heavier than it looks. The plastic pages themselves feel a little different to paper but on the whole its a high quality look and feel.

The common (or garden) paperback book has a number of natural enemies in the wild, such as the sun (which can make books discolour or curl up), water (by and large very destructive), small children (which tend to chew on the corners, bend the covers and rip out pages) and your more extreme type of conservative individual (who may want to ban or burn the book).

Once I finished reading it I decided to see how well it stood up to some of these tests of endurance. As I don't tend to hang out with book burners (and I doubt it would survive that sort of treatment), the book avoided trial by fire. However I did give it to a small child, who has a bad track record when it comes to book destruction, and the book survived completely unscathed, in spite of repeated tests.

The sun wasn't quite as easily dealt with, with the front cover curling a bit after some exposure. The book did handle water well though - I took it into the ocean for a while and made sure it got thoroughly soaked. The plastic pages really don't absorb water - though they did get a bit salty and sandy, and I eventually had to wipe each page individually to get rid off all the excess moisture and grit. Once this was done the book was as good as new again. I'm not quite sure if it can actually be recycled into another book and I think I'd prefer to keep it on my bookshelf for now in any case.



Moving onto other news, Mitsubishi Heavy Industries is reported to be increasing solar cell production by 500% in the coming year.

Mitsubishi Heavy Industries Ltd plans to hike its output of solar cells five-fold to the power equivalent of 50,000 kilowatts (kW) a year, the Nihon Keizai Shimbun reported, citing a company statement.

The report said the company will invest 10 bln yen to build a new factory in Isahaya, Nagasaki Prefecture that will have the capacity to make 270,000 solar cells a year, or the power equivalent of 40,000 kW. The factory will begin operations in April of 2007.

Mitsubishi Heavy expects global demand for solar cells to grow at a pace of 30 pct a year and hopes to generate sales of 15 bln yen in this market in fiscal 2008.

German company SolarWorld has acquired Shell's solar business.

One of the most significant reshufflings in the global solar photovoltaic (PV) market in years occurred this week with Germany's SolarWorld announcing they would acquire all of Royal Dutch Shell's solar crystalline operations. Approximately 80 MW of solar PV module production will be shifted over to SolarWorld, a move the company says will make it the largest producer of PV in the U.S.

News of the deal comes just one a day after President George W. Bush announced a modest, yet broad package of energy initiatives which includes a proposal for the largest increase in Department of Energy (DOE) funding for solar photovoltaic technologies in the department's history. It also follows the narrow passage weeks ago of a massive solar rebate plan in California that is expected to stabilize a fertile solar business climate in the important California market.

With this additional 80 MW of capacity, SolarWorld says this will make them the largest producer of solar modules in the US.

The sale and purchase agreement signed by both parties results in the transfer of the following Shell locations: Vancouver, Washington and Camarillo, California, which manufacture solar silicon crystals, wafers, cells and modules, Gelsenkirchen, Germany, which produces solar cells, as well as the sales companies in Munich, Germany, Singapore and South Africa and the research and development team focusing on silicon technology based in Munich, Germany.

In Camarillo, California the Shell Group operates an integrated wafer, cell and module production facility that will in future be run by SolarWorld AG under the name SolarWorld Industries. In Vancouver/Washington, in the Northwest of the USA, there is an additional production facility for mono-crystalline solar silicon ingots.

"We assume that capacity utilization in the new factories will go up continuously and that by the end of the relative raw material scarcity in 2008 the majority of the employment contracts will be secure," Asbeck said. "Since our establishment in the year 1998 we have consistently added new staff. We want to keep it that way."

Citing the tight global market solar solar-grade silicon raw material, Asbeck expects lower overall production at the U.S. facilities in the short term with full capacity not coming online until 2007/2008.

US company Daystar has announced a schedule to become a gigawatt producer of solar cells.

Daystar Technologies announced plans to establish a profitable manufacturing platform, expandable to Gigawatt scale (1,000 MW), by 2008. They said that they are positioned to become the premier low-cost, high-volume producer of solar-electric photovoltaic (PV) cells in the world. The announcement states that the company will accomplish this by being the first to successfully implement a proprietary, high-throughput, manufacturing methodology for the production of Si-free, Copper Indium Gallium Selenide (CIGS)-based solar cells, thus enabling PV to compete with traditional power generation in the growing global electricity marketplace. They claimed that their products are lighter, more robust, and have comparable performance to the current industry standard, crystalline Silicon (Si) solar cells.

The Energy Blog also has a post on a new type of ultracapacitor (one of those missing links in creating smart grids fueled by renewable energy).

Clean Break has an interesting post, much of what I have copied verbatim, on a new ultracapacitor made by start-up company EEStor of Austin TX. I thought the technology was potentially so important that a record of it was needed on the Energy Blog. The company is very wary of publicity and the following, which Tyler meticulously chased down, is about all that is known about their technology:

* It is a parallel plate capacitor with barium titanate as the dielectric.
* It claims that it can make a battery at half the cost per kilowatt-hour and one-tenth the weight of lead-acid batteries.
* As of last year selling price would start at $3,200 and fall to $2,100 in high-volume production
* The product weighs 400 pounds and delivers 52 kilowatt-hours.
* The batteries fully charge in minutes as opposed to hours.
* The EEStor technology has been tested up to a million cycles with no material degradation compared to lead acid batteries that optimistically have 500 to 700 recharge cycles,
* Because it's a solid state battery rather than a chemical battery, such being the case for lithium ion technology, there would be no overheating and thus safety concerns with using it in a vehicle.
* With volume manufacturing it's expected to be cost-competitive with lead-acid technology.
* As of last year, EEStor planned to build its own assembly line to prove the battery can work and then license the technology to manufacturers for volume production
* EEStor's technology could be used in more than low-speed electric vehicles. The company envisions using it for full-speed pure electric vehicles, hybrid-electrics (including plug-ins), military applications, backup power and even large-scale utility storage for intermittent renewable power sources such as wind and solar.
* They have an exclusive agreement with Feel Good Cars, a Canadian manufacturer of the ZENN, a low speed electric car, to to purchase high-power-density ceramic ultra capacitors called Electrical Storage Units (ESU). FGC's exclusive worldwide right is for all personal transportation uses under 15 KW drive systems (equivalent to 100 peak horse power) and for vehicles with a curb weight of under 1200 kilograms not including batteries.

Peugeot has unveiled an 83 mpg diesel hybrid.

Peugeot, the French car manufacturer and one of the leaders in the manufacture of diesel-powered cars, has unveiled two diesel-hybrid prototypes that go 80 mpg. Based on existing midsize Peugeot and Citroen models, they combine the two most efficient technologies available today to improve fuel efficiency and show a promising way forward.

Note that the existing diesel versions of the 2 cars already have an excellent mileage of 60 mpg, as do many other diesel cars manufactured in Europe, with low particule emissions thanks to stringent European fuel standards and particule filters.

Cleantech has created the Cleantech Index - a new index comprised of companies engaged in the clean technology industry.

The Cleantech Index is comprised of 75 companies with a combined market capitalization in excess of $100 billion. Companies in the Cleantech Index have at least 50 percent of their sales obtained from cleantech products and services. According to the group, calculations from back-testing of the Cleantech Index suggest the past five and three years significantly outperformed the S&P 500 and NASDAQ indices.

The wave energy device company Ocean Power Technologies is doing a project with the US Department of Homeland Security to provide ocean-based power for monitoring vessel movements (renewable energy applications aren't just limited to powering your home or car).

This initial contract is for the "design, analysis and planning related to ocean-based systems for the detection and tracking of sea-going vessels." These systems will be designed to include a network of passive acoustic sensors and communications equipment, all powered by OPT's PowerBuoy technology.

OPT's wave energy converter consists of a vertically oriented column or cylinder that absorbs the rising and falling motion of ocean waves to cause the buoy mechanics to move freely up and down. This movement in turn drives an electric generator that creates usable on-site power or power that can be cabled away to a nearby mainland location.

Finally, Renewable Energy Access takes a look at the pros and cons of buying a solar system now or later:

I have been getting numerous inquiries on breakthroughs on photovoltaics and whether consumers should 'hold off and wait'. When I ran the Solar Energy Industries Association for 15 years, I had heard the same questions as I have had from my clients these past five years. I can honestly say that even if photovoltaic modules become 20 percent more efficient in 2006 (which I think is extremely unlikely), the consumer would not see such efficiencies reflected in the price of a photovoltaics system for many years to come. First, the time to buy solar thermal or electric systems is in 2006 and 2007 when there are 30 percent federal investment tax credits and numerous grants, tax credits and tax waivers at the State and local government level. Second, any breakthroughs in efficiency take many years to become integrated into a product and scaled-up in automated manufacturing plants, at the yearly output levels of 25 - 100 MW scale that we are seeing today. Third, hefty increases in the cost of silicon, aluminum, and glass -- all materials incorporated in solar modules - are going up in price steeply and they appear to be on the rise in the future, as well. And fourth, solar photovoltiacs modules or panels, are only part of a photovoltaics system - which may include inverters, charge controllers, disconnects, battery banks, and roof or ground mounting frames, wires and electric conduits and boxes - which generally are rising in cost, though we do see some downward trend in the cost of inverters.

What I suggest to residential homeowners who are considering solar is to first look at solar water or solar pool heating - very cost effective solar options. Second, select a photovoltaics system that meets some critial functions and is designed to be expanded. Start on the garage roof or a subroof on your house, and dedicate your solar electric power to certain key circuits to run your home office, or kitchen loads (refrigerator, phone, and maybe electric ignition on your natural gas stove), or maybe the sump pumps in your basement or the television and stereo units in your den, where clean power quality is important not to burn out expensive equipment. I followed this advise in my own home where I have 1.2 kW of polycrystalline photovoltaics (Solarex) and I added 0.5 kW of UniSolar's 'peal and stick' modules for the metal-seamed roof I added on my front porch, in addition to my solar water heating system. On my office building in Virginia, I have 1 kW of UniSolar's photovotaics roofing shingles, in additon to a small Southwest Windpower turbine tied into the first 'plug and play' smart battery bank offerd by GridPoint, and I also added a 5 kW Plug Power fuel cell back-up system. And on the roof of my Washington, DC office are 1.2 kW of photovoltaics from an assortment of photovoltaics manufacturers IsoFoton (Spain), Shell Solar (CA), Schott Solar (MA), Spire (MA), and UniSolar (MI) tied to a Xantrex SW Inverter.

In each case, I am assured of pristine power quality protecting my appliances and electronics against the surges and swells of my local electric grid, back-up electricity from the many outages we have had in this region, offsets to steadily increasing electricity rates, and a tangible sense of doing my part both personally and professionally to reduce pollution in an area that receives most of its electricity from coal. I have no regrets that I didn't wait another ten years for better technology. And with my recent purchase of a Toyota Prius, I have no regrets in achieving 50 mpg even though a more fuel efficient car may come along shortly.

Posted by Big Gav on Sunday, February 05, 2006 at 12:10 AM | Permalink