From Pete Ashdown Campaign Collaboration Wiki

Utah is already producing clean electricity with wind power for less money than other states are spending on Nuclear power.

Biodiesel fuel can be produced quickly with fast-growing algae (some of which is more than 50% oil), fed by waste water -- cleaning the environment as it grows to replace our fossil fuel dependencies, using a tiny fraction of the land that would be required from soybean oil production.

Diesel-electric hybrids running on biodiesel could take advantage of much of our current fossil fuel infrastructure, provide increased fuel efficiency (100% or more increase over traditional vehicles), and we won't have to wait for bleeding edge technologies to be adopted. Biodiesel fuel doesn't require special engines -- traditional diesel engines can burn biodiesel fuel.

We have viable solutions to our energy crisis. All we need are some champions to get behind them and encourage their adoption.

Dilvie 21:38, 14 September 2005 (MDT)

A comprehensive energy policy needs to address multiple issues, which may not share the same solution.

Contents 1 Nuclear Energy 2 BioDiesel 3 Fusion 3.1 ITER in France 4 Oil Shale 5 Renewable 6 Conservation 7 Energy R & D 8 General Policy Questions 8.1 Short form energy policy

[edit] Nuclear Energy

Nuclear energy addresses, at least in part, the need for a long-term approach to renewable energy. That will be a very important component in a good energy policy. A comprehensive policy also needs to address some shorter-term needs: --garyt

Nuclear energy is a bit too political. The proposed storage site for nuclear waste is still (mostly) collecting dust, 25 years into the debate. It's also more expensive than wind energy. Again, wind in Utah is producing energy more affordably than nuclear in other states. -- Dilvie 18:03, 20 September 2005 (MDT)

The problem with wind, and many other "green" sources, is that they don't produce enough power. A complete solution to our energy problems will require multiple sources. You are certainly correct that nuclear power is very political, but that's exactly why we need to start seriously discussing it now, because we will need it as part of a total enery solution package, and it is going to take a long time to obtain any sort of consensus.--Swillden 08:31, 4 January 2006 (MST)

They don't produce much power primarily because we have invested too little in them. Green energy is abundantly available, and there are a lot of very smart people working out better ways for us to harness it. We need to pay more attention to them. You're right that no single source is going to replace our reliance on fossil fuels, but we don't have to rely on any single source. There are several very promising options to choose from, and we need to invest in them more heavily. Utah is commited to a nuclear-free policy, and, thus far, it appears to be working for us. Dilvie 05:18, 7 January 2006 (MST

Nuclear energy is something that has been demonised by association with the atomic bombs of WWII and Chernobyl. To me, having summed up the record of nuclear power production in the West, it appears safe, clean and economically far more viable than renewable energy at present. --Beachy 08:43, 4 January 2006 (MST)

This seems to be the popular consensus, in some circles, but I haven't seen enough evidence to convince me. Most of the people making these arguments seem to be unaware of recent advancements in renewable energy. Please cite recent studies that make mention of some of the recent applications of renewable energy, for comparison. Utah has a pretty good wind program going that is doing fairly well, producing clean energy for less than other states spend on nuclear. Right now, we're still producing less expensive energy using other means (coal and hydroelectric), but progress is being made, and there are plans to expand the wind program more. Many Utah residents voluntarily pay a little bit more for energy produced from wind power. Similar initiatives might help renewable energy catch on in other states. Dilvie 05:13, 7 January 2006 (MST)

The best policy stance on nuclear energy in my view is to not build new facilities and to aggressively replace capacity provided by older reactors with clean generation facilities. A candidate would be wise to advocate aggressive funding of continuing research on safe nuclear generation and waste disposal in the hopes of bringing this technology to a point where it is safe, sustainable, and does not hand a ecological problem to our ancestors. There are new developments in pebble bed reactors and thorium reactors that may prove viable designs for safe use of nuclear generation. Even if such new leads don't pan out, the potential of the technology to provide power generation is too valuable to abandon. Mbryan

Federal law provides a liability exemption for nuclear power plant operators that exists for no other industry. If you want to prove once and for all that nuclear power is not truly viable, just require it to play on an even filed. There is no insurance company on earth that would issue a policy for one of these plants, and none that could afford the premium even if someone did.

Nuclear waste reprocessing examination.--pashdown 17:00, 23 May 2006 (MDT)

[edit] BioDiesel

Immediate dependence on oil for transportation. This needs to be addressed much sooner than ten years, and it's possible to do, at least in part, immediately and using existing infrastructure and vehicles. Biodiesel can be used as a direct replacement for petroleum diesel fuel in existing, unmodified engines. Ethanol can also be used in many gas engines, though there may be limitations either due to engine design or due to conditions in specific locations and climates. --garyt

Biodiesel, although good for agriculture, worries me because I've heard that it takes more energy to produce than what it offers. Also, biodiesel plants are supposedly terrible polluters. This is unconfirmed by me and I'd be interested in information showing otherwise.--pashdown 16:26, September 19, 2005 (MDT)

One of the better papers I've seen on the subject is at http://www.agecon.uga.edu/~caed/biodieselrpt.pdf. There's also some good data at the EPA web site on biodiesel emissions, which in most categories are lower than petroleum diesel: http://www.epa.gov/otaq/models/biodsl.htm. I haven't seen any reports on pollution from biodiesel plants, though. --garyt 10:55, September 20, 2005 (MDT)

According to the University of New Hampshire <http://www.unh.edu/p2/biodiesel/article_alge.html>, algae biodiesel has a 5:1 - 10:1 efficiency ratio. There is controversial research that shows soybean biodiesel efficiency at 3:1. Soybean is far less efficient in terms of required expense and landmass. -- Dilvie 18:03, 20 September 2005 (MDT)

Another technology that looks interesting is waste-to-oil. There is a bit of information at http://tinyurl.com/dzmej and http://www.res-energy.com/, and apparently there's a running plant in Missouri. The information is pretty sparse at the moment, though. --garyt 15:22 September 21, 2005 (MDT)

Speaking of waste-to-oil, I found this text on Wikipedia's biodiesel article "...independent results have shown that GreenFuel Technologies, a Cambridge, MA company founded by Isaac Berzin, has been successful in producing biodiesel growing algae on flue gas emissions from power plant smokestacks. Using a patented algae bioreactor, GreenFuel utilizes microalgae and a process of photomodulation to reduce emissions: 40 percent less carbon dioxide and 86 percent less nitrous oxide. This oil-rich algae can then be extracted from the system and processed into biodiesel, and the dried remainder further reprocessed to create ethanol. The company is testing their method at the MIT cogeneration facility and at an undisclosed 1000-megawatt power facility in the southwestern U.S." Dilvie 21:17, 28 March 2006 (MST)

That UNH algae study is stunning. Especially the cost of doing it domestically vs. the cost of importing oil (not to mention the foreign policy issues).--pashdown 15:47, September 21, 2005 (MDT)

Please, if you do anything in running for office at least GET THIS PAPER PUBLICIZED - it's been making the circuits in geek circles since it was publishd, but noone on high seems to have noticed it, and continue to dismiss agricultural biodiesel. As of now, biodiesel has been approached either as a limited-scale geek conservation plaything(waste vegetable oil), or as impossibly low yield pork (soybeans). It isn't as easy as the cost estimates in the paper say it is (they use the Salton Sea, a doomed temporary body of water in SoCal), but it's entirely doable, on less than the budget we spend to blow up brown people on the other side of the world for economic or personal political reasons. The energy shortage associated with peak oil is going to hit sometime in the next 30-40 years (some are saying right now), and it's going to hit HARD - the prices you see now are just competition because we can't drill/refine it as fast as we can burn it.

Another study at Argonne National Labs (PDF) finds that ethanol production is energy positive, on the order of 35% (not counting, of course, the free solar energy absorbed by the plants). USDA numbers from 2004 (mentioned in this article) suggest up to 67%. --garyt 15:07 September 22, 2005 (MDT)

[edit] Fusion

[edit] ITER in France

Your position on fusion is a smart one. Lots of smart people think ITER is going to work. We could have had it in the U.S. if we'd been willing to invest in it. Of course, Bush wasn't even trying to bring it here, he wanted to send it to Japan, a country with a long history of "ripping off" the more pure research done in the U.S. Nyarlathotep 18:48, 1 December 2005 (MST)

[edit] Oil Shale

Great editorial in the Denver Post on the viability of oil shale.[1]

Pete, I take it that you think that oil shale is not a viable option. Personally, I don't know enough about the subject to make a comment. However, the editorial made me hungry when Randy Udall and Steve Andrews mentioned Captain Crunch cereal (yummy). Back to the point, not only doesn't the oil shale option seem viable, do we really want the environmental interference of extracting the oil from shale here in Utah? We already have nuclear waste that we don't use.--Anhhung18901 22:11, 19 December 2005 (MST)

[edit] Renewable

is the Enviromission concept of Solar Towers. [2]

These could be built anywhere with open area, and can be used as greenhouses as well as power generators.

Chadlupkes 17:55, 19 December 2005 (MST)

[edit] Conservation

Conservation, at least in the sense of improving fuel efficiency in vehicles, is an important medium-range goal. In the longer term, we would probably prefer vehicles that don't depend on internal combustion technology at all, but until such vehicles are ready for market, there is certainly room for improvement in existing technologies. --garyt

Conservation and Efficiency are a major strategy in reducing energy use. The less energy you need, the less capacity needs to be replaced, and the less usage by-products are created. I think this is issue is WAY undervalued as a means to address energy issues. People want wizbang new tech, alt-fuels, and new generation methods, but sound energy policy starts with encouraging more efficient and less use of resources. A real drive for efficiency looks at the behavior and practices of automakers, building manufactures and designers, industrial good manufacturers, etc, and incentivizes energy savings before the product gets to the end consummer. Too often, we view conservation as personal choices (less use, replacing equipment to capture efficiency gains, etc.). But the real issue is designing an industrial policy that strongly encourages energy efficient innovation, and helps make use of more energy efficient techologies more cost effective.

Mbryan

Room for improvement definitely. However, I don't see why fuel-cell technology is "wait and see" at this point. Honda has a car that is in use right now. Local business, Ceramatec not only develops fuel-cell technology, but high-temperature electrolysis gear too. I want a fuel-cell on everything from my cell-phone to my car. What is holding us back?--pashdown 16:26, September 19, 2005 (MDT)

The concerns I hear most often about fuel cells are safe hydrogen storage, energy cost of producing the hydrogen, and lack of refueling infrastructure. Even if we had good answers to all of those things, though, I'd still guess that it would take ten years before the majority of cars on the road were using fuel cells: there are people who replace their cars every three years, but there's a huge segment of the population that is still driving cars from the late 80's and early 90's today, because they're paid for, and they're expensive to replace. --garyt 10:55, September 20, 2005 (MDT)

Cheap electricity translates to cheap hydrogen. Electrolysis is only expensive because the electricity to produce it is. If we have methods for producing cheap electricity, then the refueling infrastructure can be implemented anywhere. Lawrence Livermore has a storage system which by appearances is safer than a gasoline tank. We need to stop thinking of hydrogen as a fuel but rather as energy storage. A fuel cell lasts longer and is more efficient than a battery. Making our energy distribution as mainly electric rather than mainly tanker truck/ship will lower prices. It will also enable remote areas like the Goshute Reservation to go into energy production rather than waste storage.--pashdown 11:30, September 20, 2005 (MDT)

The UNH page about biodiesel gives a few of the downsides. At this point hydrogen cars are comparable in inferior in performance, mileage/bulk, etc to electric cars. The heavy, somewhat dangerous wet cell is replaced by heavy and bulky somewhat dangerous pressure tanks. While things like carbon fiber can help somewhat with the weight, hydrogen itself just isn't terribly energy-dense - and compression always wastes tons of energy as heat. The catalysts are impossibly expensive, hydrogen leaks out of just about EVERYTHING - including welded steel, distribution isn't in place, performance characteristics are... lacking. And most important of all, the actual thing we're lacking, ENERGY, is not in place. That's the shortage - not fuel oil.

The UNH page is about biodiesel, but you go on to talk about hydrogen. They are two very different things. Dilvie 11:20, 17 March 2006 (MST)

Conservation also remains important in the long term. Replacing incandescent bulbs with more efficient technologies is a good example. I'd love to see something like LED-based lighting become affordable enough to be an economically viable replacement.

[edit] Energy R & D

Does anyone have any idea what the Federal Government's current R & D allocation is? Pete has his ideas, but what is the present situation?--Brett 16:49, 8 May 2006 (MDT)

[edit] General Policy Questions

Moved from Talk:Economy

Some baseline questions:

• Are you familiar with columnist Thomas Friedman's views on making America energy-independent? Which parts of his proposal do you like and which do you dislike?

• Given the choice between running the economy on oil and running it on nuclear power, which would you prefer?

• Would you support legislation that would increase the cost of gasoline by $.50/gallon, with that money going toward financing alternative energy research?

• A big honkin' ($12.3 billion) energy bill just made it through Congress. What do you see as its' most noticeable features, and do you think it was good legislation?

• Should we raise fuel economy standards?

• Are there ways to harness the powers of the Almighty Internet to help save energy? If so, does the government have a role in promoting such technology?

• Why does every discussion about energy policy assume that an automobile culture is an inevitable and necessary part of human existance?

Perhaps because it would be very expensive, difficult, and time consuming to make much progress on this front. Dilvie 16:52, 29 March 2006 (MST)

[edit] Short form energy policy

In a very real sense hydrocarbons are fungible. Thus, power plants are now being built which can switch from oil to coal to natural gas, based on price and availability considerations.

Gas burns cleanest today, making it generally the fuel of choice for electical generation. Who in the heck wants the expense of operating pollution control equipment?

The down side is that we have electic companies buying large portions of the natural gas supply, thus leaving us with both expensive electricity and expensive natural gas. If this gas were, by law, restricted to being made avilable to consumers for home use, in acknowledgement of the massive investment already poured into the infrasturcture for same, people could once again afford to heat their homes with the stuff.

Likewise with oil and its derivative products.Even faced with a product in tight supply, we sill allow it literally to be sent up the smoke stack. If you want to see OPEC face a bump on its freeway to prosperity, just restirct the use of crude oil for purpose like chemical feedstocks, and electric generation. A supply shortage would be turned into a major supply glut in short order.

Coal can do anything that oil and natural gas can do, except fuel cars, and travel through our gas distribution system. Unfortunately, coal use today is still far dirtier than it needs to be. One crash program that would be well rewarded, especially if it facilitates the policy changes addressed above, would be creating clean coal technologies. Until we get the breathing room that alternative energy sources and consvervation will give us, we face nothing but a bunch of bad choices. Trying to use more coal cleanly, and saving our oil and gas for the functions which they can best perform is nowhere near and ideal world, but buying really expensive electricity from American companies beats the hell out of buying really expensive oil from OPEC>