Heliogenic Climate Change

“Three years ago, automakers’ support was crucial for the passage of the Energy Independence and Security Act which mandated massive increases in ethanol for the Nation’s gasoline . But back then automakers hadn’t gone into the abyss financially and were looking for ways to sell more flex-fuel vehicles while securing government bailouts. Detroit needed the support of Archer Daniels Midland (ADM) and the political support of Big Ethanol .

But how times have changed! A few days ago the auto industry urged the EPA (Environmental Protection Agency) to delay raising the allowable ethanol blend in gasoline from the current 10% to 15% – citing tests which indicate that more ethanol will damage many car engines. EPA signaled last year that it would probably bend to pressure from the ethanol industry and permit the higher blend rates.

Ethanol producers like ADM have been campaigning to reinforce the ethanol mandate by forcing oil companies (and the motoring public) to consume more ethanol. This pressure has been intensified by the introduction of a new association (Growth Energy headed by former general Wesley Clark) combined with existing groups like the National Corn Growers Association, Renewable Fuels Association, American Coalition for Ethanol, Governors’ Coalition for Ethanol, the Ethanol Information and Promotion Council, Corn Refiners Association, National Biodiesel Council and many others — the coalition has practically co-opted “public dialogue” on the subject. Growth Energy alone is reportedly spending more than $2.5 million on an ad campaign hyping ethanol.

As the battle royal shapes up, many drivers of older cars sit helpless on the sidelines. Others are teaming with renegade gas station owners who refuse to convert their storage tanks for ethanol. Signs are emerging along the roadside “No Ethanol in Our Gas!” But it is getting late. If the ethanolics win this round, many cars will be damaged and owners “will be walking, eventually” according to one General Motors executive, C. Coleman Jones, who happens to head GM’s biofuel implementation program. For boat enthusiasts, motorcycle riders and other recreational vehicle owners, the higher ethanol blends could prove disastrous.

Chances of mid-level auto executives blocking the ethanol juggernaut are slim. Never mind that the older cars run fine on so-called “old fashioned (non-ethanol) gas” and those cars may well be the only transport option for many workers who are barely holding on. If EPA folds to ethanol demands this time, the sounds of screeching and clunking will be heard around the world.”  “The Threat of E15“

“President Barack Obama, visiting Missouri’s first ethanol plant Wednesday, … told his audience of plant workers and government officials that he wanted the U.S. to lead in the field of clean energy, and not lose out to China or other nations.

“I want to be first when it comes to biofuels,” he said.”  “On visit to Missouri, Obama says U.S. should be No. 1 in biofuels”

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“Biofuels such as biodiesel from soy beans can create up to four times more climate-warming emissions than standard diesel or petrol, according to an EU document released under freedom of information laws.  …

Biodiesel from North American soybeans has an indirect carbon footprint of 339.9 kilograms of CO2 per gigajoule — four times higher than standard diesel — said the EU document, an annex that was controversially stripped from a report published in December.  …

Biodiesel from European rapeseed has an indirect carbon footprint of 150.3 kg of CO2 per gigajoule, while bioethanol from European sugar beet is calculated at 100.3 kg — both much higher than conventional diesel or gasoline at around 85 kg.”  “Once-hidden EU report reveals damage from biodiesel“

“California has created only 48,000 “green jobs” over the 13 years from 1995 to 2008. Green jobs still make up only 1 percent of California’s economy. Worse, says State Senator Bob Dutton, the high energy taxes needed to create those few green jobs are at the same time killing millions of jobs in all sorts of industries across the state. California’s unemployment has soared from less than 5 percent to more than 12 percent since Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger signed the California Global Warming Solutions Act three years ago.

The governor promised that the global warming tax would “create a whole new industry to pump up our economy, a clean-tech industry that creates jobs, sparks new cutting-edge technology and will be a model for the rest of the nation and the rest of the world.” Instead, the global warming taxes will drive up the prices of all non-renewable energy—as they were intended to do.

California taxpayers will now pay for wind turbines and solar panels made in China, while California has lost more than 600,000 manufacturing jobs. Business relocation specialist Joseph Vranich says he’s working full time to help companies flee California’s rising costs and restrictions. He warns that no one is calling about moving into the Golden State.  …

The Wall Street Journal reports the Southern California Public Power Authority is warning of a 30 percent hike in electric rates. The Los Angeles Department of Water and Power has told business to expect a 21 percent hike this year. LA Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa says the city must raise rates because “the State is breathing down our necks . . . where we could be looking at fines of $300 million [in 2012] and $600 million on top of that.””  “Green jobs or shale gas?  The numbers talk“

“Senate leaders have dropped from a jobs creation bill a U.S. tax credit for biodiesel, creating uncertainty for biodiesel makers, who say they need the incentive to keep running.

A $1-a-gallon tax credit, which expired at the end of 2009, was in the first draft of the bill. But Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid pared back the bill on Thursday, dropping the biodiesel tax credit, among other tax measures.  …

The U.S. Agriculture Department projects 11 percent of U.S. soybean oil will be turned into biodiesel this marketing year.

The American Soybean Association has said biodiesel production has essentially stopped since the tax credit expired at the end of 2009.”  “New Effort To Revive U.S. Biodiesel Credit“

“A top European farm official has suggested that yet-to-be-released studies by the European Commission could be used to “kill” heavily promoted and subsidized biofuels by focusing on their total environmental impact.

The suggestion, written in the margins of internal correspondence seen by The International Herald Tribune, could foreshadow a further retreat from the biofuel-friendly policies that the commission once called crucial in the fight against climate change.

The industry has already been dogged by contentions that the main justification for policies supporting biofuels — that they are greener than fossil-based products — is unsound.”  “Questions About Biofuels’ Environmental Costs Could Alter Europe’s Policies“

“Some headlines are so telling, that you don’t really need to write the story to go with them. So I’ll keep this story short and focus primarily on the facts that were revealed by the Earth Policy Institute last month. The think tank reports that in 2009, US ethanol distilleries consumed 107 million tons of grain. That amounts to more than 25% of total US grain production. That quantity of grain, says Earth Policy, “was enough to feed 330 million people for one year at average world consumption levels.”

I’ll continue quoting from the report, because their findings are both stunning and depressing… :  …

When the growing demand for corn for ethanol helped to push world grain prices to record highs between late 2006 and 2008, people in low-income grain-importing countries were hit the hardest. The unprecedented spike in food prices drove up the number of hungry people in the world to over 1 billion for the first time in 2009.  …

The authors of the report go on to point out that the amount of grain needed to produce enough ethanol to fill the tank of an SUV one time could “feed one person for an entire year.” And their report includes a trio of remarkable graphics which show the rise in US grain diverted to corn ethanol as well as the number of number of undernourished people in the world.  …

That said, note that since 2004, the amount of grain the US has diverted to the ethanol sector has tripled. And during that same time period, the number of people globally who are undernourished has increased by about 150 million.  …

[T]he report from the Earth Policy Institute underscores the immorality of the entire corn ethanol scam. I seldom talk about morals and immorality as those issues are fraught with value judgments. But the immorality of the ethanol scam is obvious: the US is burning food to make motor fuel. And it is doing so at a time when there is growing global demand for inexpensive food and no shortage of motor fuel.

The Earth Policy Institute concludes their report by saying that the continuation of the ethanol mandates “will likely only reinforce the disturbing rise in hunger. By subsidizing the production of ethanol, now to the tune of some $6 billion each year, US taxpayers are in effect subsidizing rising food bills at home and around the world.”

There are lots of stupid federal programs. There are lots of wasteful federal programs. The corn ethanol mandates are immoral.”  “The Latest on the Ethanol Scam: US Ethanol Industry’s Grain Consumption in 2009 Was Enough to Feed 330 Million People“

“The European Commission and some EU member states hope to redefine palm oil plantations as “forests,” according to a leaked document from the EU executive.  …

In the wake of the biofuels boom, there has been a rush to chop down rainforests to make way for palm oil plantations. The UN says that the growth in such plantations is now the main cause of rainforest destruction in Malaysia and Indonesia.

Worse still are the land grabs and human rights abuses resulting from the lucrative business.  …

But in a manoeuvre that has shocked environmental campaigners, a draft commission communication offering guidance to EU member states on the use of biofuels has classified palm oil plantations – the source of one of the most destructive forms of biofuels – as “forests.”

Essentially, the document argues that because palm oil plantations are tall enough and shady enough, they count as forests.  …

“This means, for example, that a change from forest to oil palm plantation would not per se constitute a breach of the [sustainability criteria]. ”

Green groups were outraged by the move. “Palm oil plantations are one of the very worst examples of the problems with biofuels. The spirit of the debate in 2008 was specifically to stop this sort of thing,” Adrian Bebb of Friends of the Earth Europe told this website.”  “Palm oil plantations are now ‘forests,’ says EU“

“It’s hard to believe, but the Obama administration’s energy policies just keep getting further and further removed from reality.  …

[On Wednesday] EPA issued a ruling which claimed corn-based ethanol can provide significant reductions in carbon dioxide when compared with conventional gasoline or diesel fuel. That finding, would be controversial on its own, particularly given the many studies that have been done that show exactly the opposite. But here’s the real whopper: the EPA’s own data shows that using more ethanol-blended gasoline will make air quality worse. For people who have been following this issue, that finding is not surprising. The agency has already admitted that ethanol is bad for air quality.

But on Wednesday, the agency published a statement which said that ethanol-blended gasoline will degrade air quality enough to “lead up to 245 cases of adult premature mortality.”

[The statement] says that emissions of “hydrocarbons, nitrogen oxides (NOx), acetaldehyde and ethanol” are expected to increase … [and] that the emission changes are “projected to lead to increases in population-weighted annual average ambient PM [particulate matter] and ozone concentrations.”

Think about that for a moment. The EPA has just passed a rule on renewable fuels which plainly says that it will make air quality worse.

Thus, the EPA is now enforcing rules on renewable fuels that run directly counter to its stated goals. The agency has declared that “Reducing emissions of NOx is a crucial component of EPA’s strategy for cleaner air.” And the agency’s web site makes it clear why it wants to reduce NOx emissions: NOx can cause ground-level ozone, acid rain, increases in particulate matter, cause water pollution, unleash toxic chemicals, reduce visibility, and cause climate change. The agency also explains in very clear terms that VOCs lead to the creation of ground-level ozone, one of the most dangerous urban pollutants. Ozone is created when NOx and VOCs are mixed in the presence of sunlight.”  “Corn and Coal: The Cornerstones of Obama’s Energy Policies“

“Germany’s solar industry called for countrywide protests against Environment Ministry plans to slash subsidies …

As many as 10,000 workers from factories that make solar- power panels and their control systems will tomorrow protest Environment Minister Norbert Roettgen’s planned cuts, the BSW industry lobby group said.  …

“The 60,000 people working in the growing market for photovoltaic panels demand that the government put a stop to the clear cuts for solar support,” Carsten Koernig, head of the Berlin-based BSW, said in an e-mailed statement.  …

“The situation is really coming to a head,” Christiane Hohmeister, a Solarworld spokeswoman, said today in a phone interview. “All of us in the industry are really hoping the cuts will be delayed and not as steep.”  …

“We need to get this done as quickly as possible, since we have a complete oversupply in the solar sector,” Michael Fuchs, deputy leader in parliament of Merkel’s CDU, said yesterday by phone. “It’s not decided yet — there are people like me who want to have stronger cuts. Others don’t want any cuts at all.””  “German Solar Industry Protests Cuts Amid Merkel Policy Deadlock“

“Wind turbines placed in cities across Minnesota to generate power aren’t working because of the cold temperatures.

The Minnesota Municipal Power Association bought 11 turbines for $300,000 each from a company in Palm Springs, Calif.

Special hydraulic fluid designed for colder temperatures was used in the turbines, but it’s not working, so neither are the turbines.”  “Cold keeps Minn. wind turbines from spinning“  h/t Green Hell Blog

“Reversing course on a policy strongly supported by environmental activists, Oregon Gov. Ted Kulongoski (D) has announced his support for cutting runaway subsidies for wind and solar power projects.  …

Under a law enacted in 2007, Oregon gives solar power projects up to $20 million apiece in tax credits over the life of the project. Wind power projects are given up to $10 million each.  …

When the Kulongoski administration proposed the tax credits in 2006, state officials told the legislature the program would cost roughly $1 million per year over its first five years. The program actually cost the state $23 million per year in 2007-09, with rapidly escalating costs likely to put the program’s total cost at $167 million–an average of $35 million per year–by 2011 when the program reaches five years old.

The out-of-control subsidies have become a primary factor in the state’s growing budget deficit, which has forced the legislature to raise taxes and cut spending on education and other core programs.  …

A 2009 series of investigative reports by the Portland Oregonian uncovered evidence state officials deliberately low-balled the expected cost of the tax credits. Documents obtained by the Oregonian under the state’s public records law showed Kulongoski’s staff had determined the program would cost many times more than the $1 million per year price tag the administration reported to the legislature.

“There have been many exposés showing that the numbers used to sell the program to the legislature were either cooked or inaccurate,” Lunch said.  …

In addition to costing far more than advertised, the subsidies have delivered few benefits. Records show millions of dollars have been given to failed companies that produced little or no renewable power.”  “Oregon Governor Reverse Course on Renewable Power”

Flashback:  Germany cuts the solar dole

“The wind power industry has suffered a setback as U.S. District Judge Roger Titus has ruled wind turbines under construction on a mountain ridge in West Virginia would kill and injure thousands of endangered Indiana bats.

With his December 8 decision Titus brought work on the $300 million wind farm project in picturesque Greenbrier County to a screeching halt.  …

The legal challenge to the wind farm came from two environmental groups–the Washington, DC-based Animal Welfare Institute and the West Virginia-based Mountain Communities for Responsible Energy–and David Cowen, a local spelunker.  …

The proliferation of wind farms and solar energy facilities in previously undeveloped areas has unleashed a backlash within the environmental movement, of which the West Virginia court case is but one example.

“The greens don’t want alternative energy either,” said Robert J. Smith, senior fellow with the National Center for Public Policy Research. “Yes, they love it in theory, or at least promise its acceptance and approval if we will just get rid of the polluting energy sources of the past. But once an actual project is proposed and planning gets underway for a facility large enough to light anything other than a two-room apartment, the greens are up in arms to bring it to a halt.

“There are enough listed species [under the Endangered Species Act] spread across the continent and enough obscure and little-known species that could be listed that almost any type of energy project anywhere could be halted,” Smith added. “In fact, the FWS has already suggested that the Indiana bat is also subject to coal-mining impacts in West Virginia, so the bat trumps energy from the air or from the ground.””  “Judge Halts West Virginia Wind Farm to Save Bats“

“New analysis of 2009 US Department of Agriculture figures suggests biofuel revolution is impacting on world food supplies.

One-quarter of all the maize and other grain crops grown in the US now ends up as biofuel in cars rather than being used to feed people, according to new analysis which suggests that the biofuel revolution launched by former President George Bush in 2007 [NOT!] is impacting on world food supplies.

The 2009 figures from the US Department of Agriculture shows ethanol production rising to record levels driven by … laws which require vehicles to use increasing amounts of biofuels.

“The grain grown to produce fuel in the US [in 2009] was enough to feed 330 million people for one year at average world consumption levels,” said Lester Brown, the director of the Earth Policy Institute, a Washington thinktank ithat conducted the analysis.

Last year 107m tonnes of grain, mostly corn, was grown by US farmers to be blended with petrol. This was nearly twice as much as in 2007 …

According to Brown, the growing demand for US ethanol derived from grains helped to push world grain prices to record highs between late 2006 and 2008. In 2008, the Guardian revealed a secret World Bank report that concluded that the drive for biofuels by American and European governments had pushed up food prices by 75%, in stark contrast to US claims that prices had risen only 2-3% as a result.

Since then, the number of hungry people in the world has increased to over 1 billion people, according to the UN’s World Food programme.

“Continuing to divert more food to fuel, as is now mandated by the US federal government in its renewable fuel standard, will likely only reinforce the disturbing rise in world hunger. By subsidising the production of ethanol to the tune of some $6bn each year, US taxpayers are in effect subsidising rising food bills at home and around the world,” said Brown.  …

“There is a direct link between biofuels and food prices. The needs of the hungry must come before the needs of cars,” said Meredith Alexander, biofuels campaigner at ActionAid in London.”  “One quarter of US grain crops fed to cars – not people, new figures show“

“Wind energy could generate 20 percent of the electricity needed by households and businesses in the eastern half of the United States by 2024, but it would require up to $90 billion in investment, according to a government report released on Wednesday.

For the 20 percent wind scenario to work, billions must be spent on installing wind towers on land and sea and about 22,000 miles of new high-tech power lines to carry the electricity to cities, according to the study from the Energy Department’s National Renewable Energy Laboratory.  …

Reaching the 20 percent threshold for wind by 2024 in the eastern electric grid would require 225,000 megawatts of wind generation capacity in the region, about a 10-fold increase from current levels, the study said.  …

Wind turbines would be scattered throughout the eastern grid, which extends from the Plains states to the Atlantic Coast and south to the Gulf of Mexico.

Most of the big wind farms would be concentrated off the Atlantic Coast in federal waters from Massachusetts to North Carolina and on land in Midwest states from North Dakota to Nebraska and into Kansas.”  “U.S. says wind could power 20 percent of eastern grid“

“Shares in solar firms plummeted after a Reuters report that the German government plans to chop feed-in tariffs — prices utilities pay generators of renewable energy — as early as April, much more deeply and sooner than the market expected.

Analysts agree that the plans, which envisage a one-off cut of 16-17 percent on top of the 10 percent already set out in the German Renewable Act, will deal a major blow to the sector, which the German government thinks is overly subsidized now.  …

The solar industry depends on generous feed-in tariffs …”  “German Tariff Cuts To Spark Solar Sector Bloodbath“

“Gotta love them wind turbines. The moonbat Labour government of Gordon “On the Way Out” Brown is planning to spend GBP 10 billion on wind farms in order to “tackle global warming,” despoiling the British countryside in the process.”  Read more here:  “Bird shredders to blight “one in six beauty spots” in UK“

“Gov. Jim Doyle last week unveiled his marquee energy initiative, the Clean Energy Jobs Act. He says the legislation would create “green jobs,” but it is much more likely to generate pink slips.

The legislation would mandate more green energy, such as wind and solar power. Of course, forcing people to use green energy creates jobs in the green energy industry, but it’s not that simple. Green energy is expensive energy, which is bad news for Wisconsin’s energy-intensive industrial base. Doyle’s mandate might create some jobs in the solar panel installation business, but it’s going to destroy just as many, and probably more, paychecks in the manufacturing business.  …

Government creates jobs by ending ill-advised market manipulations. To stimulate Wisconsin’s economy, Doyle should deregulate the energy industry.”  “Green jobs or pink slips?“

“Imagine driving into a service station. At one pump, conventional gasoline costs $3.25. Right next to it stands a pump with ethanol-blended fuel selling for $5.20. And since you are a savvy fuel buyer you are aware of the fact that numerous studies have shown that the fuel costing $5.20 is worse for the environment — in terms of water quality, water availability, and carbon dioxide emissions — [and far less efficient in miles per gallon] than the fuel costing $3.25.

Given those factors, which fuel would you purchase?

The answer is pretty obvious. And yet thanks to Congressional mandates and subsidies for corn ethanol, the real cost of the ethanol scam has been hidden from taxpayers for years. But a new report by the Baker Institute for Public Policy has underscored some of the more outrageous aspects of the corn ethanol scam. The report, “Fundamentals of a Sustainable US Biofuels Policy,” should be required reading for federal policymakers, particularly given the fact that the Environmental Protection Agency has delayed making a decision regarding the breaking of the “blend wall” a move that could allow gasoline producers to use up to 15% ethanol in their gasoline blends. Current regulations limit the blends to no more than 10% ethanol.”  “Yet More Outrages of the Corn Ethanol Scam“

“It sounded like a good idea: Provide a little government money to convert wood shavings and plant waste into renewable energy.

But as laudable as that goal sounds, it could end up causing more economic damage than good — driving up the price of raw timber, undermining an industry that has long used sawdust and wood shavings to make affordable cabinetry, and highlighting the many challenges involved in decreasing the nation’s dependence on oil by using organic materials to create biofuels.

In a matter of months, the Biomass Crop Assistance Program — a small provision tucked into the 2008 farm bill — has mushroomed into a half-a-billion dollar subsidy that is funneling taxpayer dollars to sawmills and lumber wholesalers, encouraging them to sell their waste to be converted into high-tech biofuels. In doing so, it is shutting off the supply of cheap timber byproducts to the nation’s composite wood manufacturers, who make panels for home entertainment centers and kitchen cabinets.  …

This is bad news for the composite panel industry, which turns these materials into particleboard and medium-density fiberboard, and outranks the U.S. biomass industry in terms of employees and economic impact, with 21,000 employees and annual sales of $7.9 billion, according to 2006 U.S. Census data.

The biomass subsidy program could “wipe us out,” said T.J. Rosengarth, the vice president and chief operating officer of Flakeboard, the largest composite panel producer in North America. “You can say, ‘I’ve made more alternative energy,’ but at what expense?”

The much larger pulp, paper, packaging and wood products industry, which ranks among the top 10 manufacturing employers in 48 states, is just as worried. The American Forest and Paper Association sent a letter to OMB on Oct. 27 warning that the biomass program “could have the unintended consequence of jeopardizing the forest products industry and the many jobs it sustains, as well as the significant quantities of renewable energy it produces.”"  “The unintended ripples from the biomass subsidy program“

“Imagine conditions in the once Great Britain. Ice laden wind turbines sit idle in the still air; solar panels covered in snow; gas reserves down to 8 days; pensioners burning books to keep warm, and a bankrupt government.

This is happening because politicians have been conned by anti-industrial greens to neglect the UK’s reliable and economical coal and nuclear generators, while wasting time and money on pointless climate crusades.

Australia is treading this treacherous path. The Wong energy plan will consume our savings, uglify our headlands with wind turbines, cover our deserts with solar panels and entangle our countryside with a spider-web of costly and poorly used transmission lines. And still we will need coal and gas to deliver power when “the wind don’t blow and the sun don’t shine”.

When this global warming madness passes, future generations will remove this derelict solar/wind infrastructure and return to the only reliable and economical electricity options for Australia – coal, gas, hydro and nuclear.”  “Climate Madness and Electricity Realities“