Energy Security

[david]

A cracking web page. Fair play to the man!

[Simon.D]

Interesting..

[St Disibod]

For those interested in the issue, The Financial Times today has a very good supplement on energy. Unfortunately the link requires subscription to read the whole articles, but the titles are all there, or you could fork out the €1.60 in a newsagent- you get far better bang for your buck than The Irish Times provides.

It details the various economies of various energy options: from coal, through nuclear to eco-friendly renewables. One thing that piqued my interest was a wave generator (illustrated here with snazy cartoons) from Renewable Energy Holdings that not only generates electricity, but can produce desalinated water also. Unfortunately I cannot find out how much electricity or water, but promising stuff nonetheless.

[SPN]

If anything is going to wake the Government up to RE, this article is probably it;

Ill wind for green energy in shortage of turbines

IRELAND's ability to generate more sustainable wind energy supplies is under threat because of rising costs and a shortage of wind turbines worldwide, according to industry sources.

.....

"A number of turbine producers, like Vestas and Bonus Siemens, are virtually sold out for the next few years as demand in the US has grown," Mark Ennis, chief executive of Airtricity Supply, said.

"Many independent wind energy producers are finding it impossible to obtain turbines after spending a lot of effort on getting planning permission and connection to the national grid," he added.

.....

In a trend similar to the aviation industry, large producers of wind power are signing contracts with major manufacturers, which leaves very few turbines for sale to independent producers.

"Many of the large turbine producers just will not deal with orders below a certain size," Mr Ennis warns.

The United States is the largest market in the world for wind energy and, until the tax relief is extended, additional turbine manufacturing capacity will not be undertaken.

[SPN]

End the inertia on energy

Over the last 15 years, successive governments have avoided developing an explicit energy policy.

As a result of such apparent inaction, many foolish decisions were avoided. For example, the Republic avoided the disastrous privatisation that took place in the North in 1992, with its legacy of high prices for consumers.

However, inertia is no longer possible.

The needs of the economy and the environment over the coming 15 years make it essential that a coherent and comprehensive energy policy be developed and implemented over the coming decade.

There are three main reasons why Ireland now needs an energy policy. First, energy prices are higher than at any time since the early 1980s. Secondly, because of the long period of sustained economic growth, the economy needs to make major investments in the energy sector if the lights are to stay on. Finally, the environmental imperative - to do something about global warming - has serious implications for the energy sector.

.....

The share of renewables will rise in the future, not only for environmental reasons, but also because they represent an economic solution to the need for greater fuel diversity. Nuclear power is unlikely to be used, not just because of security and environmental concerns, but because the plants are too large for Ireland.

.....

The problem of global warming worsens by the day. While some forms of renewables are currently economic - in particular wind - we will need a range of other sources of energy in the future.

While it is still too early to invest heavily in such new technologies, it will be important to undertake serious research to establish the most cost-effective solutions.

More households go green as 2,500 apply for Greener Homes grants

OVER 2,500 grant applications have been received under the new Greener Homes Scheme which covers the installation of solar panels, geothermal pumps and wood pellet boilers and stoves.

The scheme, which was announced last March, aims to increase the number of homes that use renewable energy.

Renewable energy target to be doubled

A Green Paper to be submitted to cabinet shortly by Minister for Communications, Marine and Natural Resources, Noel Dempsey, is expected to outline proposals to reduce the country’s dependence on fossil fuels, such as oil and gas.

The current target for the amount of energy to be derived from renewable sources is 13.2 per cent. There is a political consensus that renewable energy will play a more critical role in the country’s future policy as energy prices continue to rise and supplies of oil and gas remain volatile.

.....

The joint committee’s report recommended that excise and Vat receipts taken by the exchequer on the increased price of oil and gas should be ringfenced for renewable energy supplies and research and development. However, Dempsey said the Department of Finance was unlikely to agree to such a proposal, as it had an ‘‘absolute abhorrence of earmarking taxes for special purposes’’.

[david]

[quote=St Disibod][quote="Dr Edward Walsh, founding president of the University of Limerick, in today’s [i]Irish Times[/i]":3enayn48]Compared to other means of energy production nuclear power is safe. Death statistics reveal that energy production by hydroelectric and coal are the most dangerous, gas is safer, but nuclear is the safest of all.[/quote][/quote:3enayn48]

Course it is. If it's in the Irish Times, it must be true. Still, cheer yourself up with the following happy thoughts:

[url="http://transitionculture.org/?p=388"]http://transitionculture.org/?p=388[/url]

[Pax]

Obsession with privatisation is the real cause of the energy struggle

Between 2001 and 2004, ESB operating costs, including the purchase of increasingly expensive oil and natural gas, went up by only 5% a year. Meanwhile, electricity prices increased by over 40%. Since the price increase can't be put down to rising fuel costs or some fantasy 'wage racket', what is going on?

The government wants what the authors want in the name of 'competition' and 'liberalising the market' . . . private sector companies producing electricity. But ESB prices have historically been so low that private companies couldn't turn a profit.

To entice private operators, the government increased energy costs through price rises, stealth taxes and levies. People are paying for an ideological experiment in liberalisation and the eventual privatisation of significant sections of ESB.

.....

It is an economic and environmental imperative that we switch from a fossil-fuel based economy to a renewable energy-based one.

But the article painted a backward-looking landscape of competing private companies wholly owning the generation plants. That was tried in Ireland and failed so completely that the government of the time had to establish ESB.

Back in the 1920s, we had a plethora of private companies in the energy market. They made good profits but couldn't do the thing they were supposed to: provide electricity on a national scale.

An epochal shift from fossil fuels will not be carried out by a fragmented and incoherent market. This is not a statist argument. This development can, and where possible should, take place with a range of partners such as private companies, multi-nationals, local authorities and non-profit organisations.

But we will need a substantial player with decades of experience on a national scale. We will need large-scale industrial planning. We will require considerable investment in research, design and integration, especially in the area of wave and tidal power which has even greater potential than wind.

.....

We need a national vision similar to that being developed in Sweden, which is working for an oil-free economy by 2020. What we don't need are pricing policies and ideological experiments that create obstacles to efficiency and damage business, living standards and our environment.

Interesting excerpts (for the full article link above to work it requires a registration (or use www.bugmenot.com login) to be input on the login page after here then it'll work) I particularly like the bit about the fact deprived round-the-houses statements of Constantin Gurdgiev and Peter Nolan )

THE attempt by Constantin Gurdgiev and Peter Nolan to explain high electricity prices failed to get to grips with the real causes, and made statements that have no basis in fact.

In their article of 7 May 2006, 'Power corrupts, state monopoly power corrupts absolutely', it was argued that the average ESB wage stood at 95,000 or "around" 43 per hour. Where this figure comes from is a mystery.

However the article a few posts up highlights the problem wrt the dearth of honest (not really new or radical) thinking
"report on the energy market, which he commissioned from consultants Deloitte"
Leaving aside the democratic regulation of large private energy corps I posted about on page 2 of this thread, in terms of economies of scale, purchasing (eh) power and lack of wasteful inefficiencies and allocattion of energy resources an ideal situation would be for the state to invest massively in large scale renewable projects.

These investments will translate into economic growth in the future, the overall economy will benefit due to lower renewable energy costs as the output of non-renewable sources increase in price so it'll cost the consumer even less- as opposed to the increase in company share prices representing the loss to consumers back pocket from liberalisation...

Then there's the unforeseen spin-offs because of jump start subsidisation of what are critical new technologies (which it seems we don't do – preferring to rely on fdi while the sun shines...). Couple this with subsidies for micro-renewables , insulation, forestry to reach EU average level, bio-fuels, public transport, spatial development with latter in mind etc..

I mean if it was ok elsewhere for nuclear and for rural electrification here then why not?

Anyway here's an interesting article on the film "The Power of Community – How Cuba Survived Peak Oil"
http://www.globalpublicmedia.com/articles/657
I haven't seen it but its about what we can learn from Cuba's response to it's own artificially enacted peak oil crisis

"Try to image an airplane suddenly losing its engines. It was really a crash"... A crash that put Cuba into a state of shock. There were frequent blackouts in its oil-fed electric power grid, up to 16 hours per day. The average daily caloric intake in Cuba dropped by a third... So Cubans started to grow local organic produce out of necessity, developed bio-pesticides and bio-fertilizers as petrochemical substitutes, and incorporated more fruits and vegetables into their diets. Since they couldn't fuel their aging cars, they walked, biked, rode buses, and carpooled.

[.....]
"We wanted to see if we could capture what it is in the Cuban people and the Cuban culture that allowed them to go through this very difficult time," said Pat Murphy, The Community Solution's executive director. "Cuba has a lot to show the world in how to deal with energy adversity."

[.....]
Scarce petroleum supplies have not only transformed Cuba's agriculture. The nation has also moved toward small-scale renewable energy and developed an energy-saving mass transit system, while maintaining its government-provided health care system whose preventive, locally-based approach to medicine conserves scarce resources.

[.....]
http://www.postcarbon.org/files/Cuba_2641.jpg
Farmers pose with their produce at a farmers' market in downtown Havana. The Cuban government now allows these private markets, which provide year-round fresh local food to the community. (Photo by John Morgan)

[.....]
"The sun was enough to maintain life on earth for millions of years," said Bruno Beres, a director of Cuba Solar. "Only when we [humans] arrived and changed the way we use energy was the sun not enough. So the problem is with our society, not with the world of energy."

[.....]
When Cubans suffered through their version of a peak oil crisis, they maintained their free medical system, one of the major factors that helped them to survive. Cubans repeatedly emphasize how proud they are of their system.

[.....]
Government officials allowed private entrepreneurial farmers and neighborhood organizations to use public land to grow and sell their produce. They pushed decision-making down to the grassroots level and encouraged initiatives in their neighborhoods. They created more provinces. They encouraged migration back to the farms and rural areas and reorganized their provinces to be in-line with agricultural needs.

[.....]
"There is climate change, the price of oil, the crisis of energy …" Beres from Cuba Solar said, listing off the challenges humanity faces. "What we must know is that the world is changing and we must change the way we see the world."

[merle haggard]

Ireland wouldnt have much of a problem over gas supplies if we owned our own substantial oil and gas resources . However the southern establishment have given them away for free to British companies . No royalties even . Britain has secured these substantial reources for its own energy needs thanks to our corrupt politicians and tame media , 35% of which is owned by the OReilly clan , owners of the British company Providence resources. The OReillys also play a major role in determining which politicians get elected and which dont . Not an altogether healthy situation but no doubt many of the chattering classes would consider it rude to actually want our people to own their own resources and put their energy needs ahead of Britains . Perhaps the natural order of things would be disturbed if we looked after our own interests .

[FutureTaoiseach]

Ireland wouldnt have much of a problem over gas supplies if we owned our own substantial oil and gas resources . However the southern establishment have given them away for free to British companies . No royalties even . Britain has secured these substantial reources for its own energy needs thanks to our corrupt politicians and tame media , 35% of which is owned by the OReilly clan , owners of the British company Providence resources. The OReillys also play a major role in determining which politicians get elected and which dont . Not an altogether healthy situation but no doubt many of the chattering classes would consider it rude to actually want our people to own their own resources and put their energy needs ahead of Britains . Perhaps the natural order of things would be disturbed if we looked after our own interests .

It's not completely for free when you consider the oil/gas companies have to pay corporation-tax. It's not as if the State is getting nothing from it. Also Shell has reportedly said that the Corrib gas will not be exported, so the country will benefit from it. I think there is an anti-capitalist clique among some of the anti-Corrib demonstrators. I agree there is a safety question, but leave out the other issues for the time being. Energy security has to come first. I would add that Ireland has few natural resources and we should use the ones we have.

[Jippo]

Ireland wouldnt have much of a problem over gas supplies if we owned our own substantial oil and gas resources . However the southern establishment have given them away for free to British companies . No royalties even . Britain has secured these substantial reources for its own energy needs thanks to our corrupt politicians and tame media , 35% of which is owned by the OReilly clan , owners of the British company Providence resources. The OReillys also play a major role in determining which politicians get elected and which dont . Not an altogether healthy situation but no doubt many of the chattering classes would consider it rude to actually want our people to own their own resources and put their energy needs ahead of Britains . Perhaps the natural order of things would be disturbed if we looked after our own interests .

I wasn't aware that these O'Reilly's controlled my vote.