Why unconventional fossil fuels are no Panacea

Mention “peak oil” to many people these days, particularly those on the political right and they’ll generally respond by suggesting that this was “solved” by Shale Gas and Shale Oil. Such notions are largely driven by the constant optimistic hype regarding unconventional fossil fuels that are spread by its promoters, not to mention the more ill-informed elements of the media. As I pointed out here, even George Monbiot has been taken in by such propaganda.

Unfortunately, much like the right wing hype of the “warming has stopped and now the world is cooling variety” (a typical example of such silliness can be found here, with a rebuttal from Phil Plait of Slate.com here and the UK Met Office here), the true facts and figures present a somewhat different picture.

David J. Hughes of the Post-Carbon institute  has a report out called “Drill baby Drill” which suggests that while there has been quite substantial growth in Shale gas and tight oil (otherwise known as Shale oil) production recently, there is a limit to how much of America (or indeed the world’s) energy can be derived from such sources. Furthermore, any boost to production from such sources will likely be short lived (as in a few decades at most).

Part of the problem with Shale gas or tight oil production (aside from the environmental problems, which I highlighted before) is the very large quantity of wells that need to be drilled to support production. While a small scale conventional oil field can be supported by just one or two wells, a similar sized Shale oil/gas field needs dozens of them.

Figure 1, Declines in Shale Gas Prospects [Credit: The Oildrum.com and Arc Financial Research (2012)] Note Dr Hughes (2013) reports suggest that decline rates might actually be much higher than illustrated above

To make matters worse there is the very sharp decline rate of such wells. With a typical single pump oil well, you’d expect a good few years or decades before the field “peaks” in output and a decline rate of between 3 – 10% per year afterwards. A fracking operation well can peak within a year and can see decline rates in excess of 20 – 50% (meaning you’ve potentially got a dry hole after just a few years operating!). Naturally beyond a certain tipping point you’re drilling new wells as quickly as you can not to expand production, but to just replace lost production from wells that are spent or in decline.

A further complication is the amount of land such drilling operations take up. Large swades of the American countryside are increasingly being eaten up by such fracking rigs. Furthermore fracking operations, particularly tight oil production (like Tar sands) also needs substantial quantities of water. Both to aid in the production activities but also to “flush” away the various “nasties” that get such operations produce. Of course, as fracking and shale gas have been “found out” by the public (thanks to that film of a few years ago “Gasland”), people are less willing to tolerate such operations on or near their land. This eventually will lead to a major squeeze on such fracking operations. Indeed the ramp up of production from some fields (as Hughes report suggests) is nowhere near as high as supporters would like, suggesting that only one or two of the larger shale fields (both gas and oil) are actually economically viable.

Figure 2, Intensity of Shale Gas wells on the Barnett Shale Field, note that black dots indicate the top 20%, representing multiple wells [Credit: Hughes (2013)]

Of course I find it amusing how one of the complains I hear about wind power from right wing (nuts) is the amount of land that wind farms take up…obviously they’ve never visited a fracking operation! Nor so much as looked at the mess on Google Earth that the tar sands are creating (big enough to be seen from space! I discuss the environmental disaster that is the tar sands here).

Figure 3, Anti-wind farm protests

Given that the best potential well locations (often referred to in the industry as “plays”) were likely drilled first, much like a fruit picker first goes for the juiciest low hanging fruit on the tree, operations have to move on to less promising “plays”. Pretty soon drilling rigs are running 24/7 just to stand still. Obviously beyond a certain tipping point the entire fracking operation in that area enters into a state of terminal decline (i.e. it peaks in production) and no matter how many wells you drill, production will continue to fall, until the whole field is essentially spent.

Hughes report suggests that the day with this finally occurs may not be that far away. While Shale gas supporters claim it’s a boom in production that will last centuries and power the entire United States, the data (drawn from official DOE and EIA figures) suggest a temporary boost to domestic production for a decade or two.

Figure 4, Growth of Shale gas production by field, note plateau after 2011 [Credit: Hughes (2013)]

Already Hughes, notes shale gas production has plateaued. Its current output levels are at around 26 billion cfg/day (about 189 mtoe). That might sound like a lot until you realise that current US gas demand is running at about 25.4 trillion cfg/yr (or about 60-80 billion cfg/day once you account for seasonal variations). This means that shale gas output within the US can only meet about 37 – 32% of current US gas demand. Total US energy consumption is currently hovering around about 2,200 mtoe. So, neglecting conversion losses and cycle efficiencies (which for certain energy pathways from natural gas to vehicles for example would be significant) you would need to increase shale gas production about 12 fold, just to meet current US domestic energy demand.

I choose my words “plateaued” carefully, as it’s not clear yet whether this is a “peak” in shale gas production or merely a pause in the rate of growth. As I reported in a previous post (“is Shale Gas a Fracking Ponzi scheme”) many shale gas “plays” are simply not economic. Its costing more to produce the gas than the company can get selling it on the open market. As Hughes reports, this has resulted in a move away from dry “gas” fracking operation over to operations that extract both oil and gas.

This is also one of the reasons why there is talk of exporting shale gas to Europe or Asia. Not because they are awash with the stuff in America, but because the higher retail gas prices in Europe and Asia is the only way to make Shale gas competitive. Of course the implication of that would be that Americans take all the environmental damage associated with shale gas drilling, have their water supply polluted, Europeans and Asians get the gas and a few mega corps make all the profit. Could someone please point out to me what’s in it that for the average Joe in America?

The factors above probably explain why the EIA has begun to cut its forecasts as to the potential extractable reserves of Shale gas. They’ve pushed such “theoretical reserves” (i.e. not all are proven reserves!) down to 579 trillion cfg, or about 24 years supply at current production rates, a 42% drop on previous estimates. Of course that doesn’t mean all this gas will be produced, nor that we can maintain production at current levels for 24 years. In all probability there might be some future growth, before output peaks and then sharply declines. Indeed the EIA suggests the bulk of these reserves will be consumed in the next two to three decades. Which implies shale gas cannot function as a long term solution to America’s energy needs.

And tight oil? Tight oil (otherwise known as Shale oil and confusingly not to be mixed up with oil shales) production began a bit after shale gas fracking so it’s a little behind the curve. Hughes, again based on DoE and EIA figures predicts production ramping up from a current output of 1.2 milion bbl/day to a maximum of around 2.2 million bbl/day in 2017, before declining sharply.

Figure 5, Past and projected future production of tight oil [Credit: Hughes (2013)]

Again, to a journalist from Fox News who knows absolutely nothing about energy production figures, 2.2 million bbl/day probably sounds like a lot. And indeed it would be more recoverable oil that one is likely to find in the ANWR  (if indeed, as I discussed before if there is recoverable oil in the ANWR). However its small beer next a current US oil demand of around 20 million bbl/day (i.e. if Hughes is to be believed the US can only get 11% of its oil needs from tight oil). By contrast the world’s largest conventional oil field, Ghawar field  in Saudi Arabia, outputs 5 million bbl/day (yes one oil field in the Middle East pumps out twice the tight oil we could hope to get from an entire continent!).

The reality is that unconventional fossil fuels, as experts such as me have been saying for years, simply cannot be ramped up to match the production levels of the major conventional sources of fossil fuels (such as those in the Middle East). Once such sources peak, which it’s likely they will between now and 2030 (or indeed some commentators believe they’ve already peaked, see here and here), the decline rate from such fields cannot be matched by unconventional sources. As I describe here, a modest decline rate of just 3 % per year of global oil supplies would require bringing online some 2-3 million bbl/day worth of production capacity each year (i.e. we’d need to add as much tight oil capacity per year as its going to take the Americans twenty years to develop!).

Unconventional fossil fuels benefit only one group of people, that being the fat cats in charge of the companies behind such operations, who will make a tidy profit out of this small temporary blip in production, leaving the bill for the clean-up to society and the tax payer.

For of course the other major issue with unconventional fossil fuels is the much heavier carbon footprint associated with them. I discussed in previous post how shale gas might actually be worse than coal for carbon emissions. This could mean we could face a scenario in future where despite the fact that fossil fuel output levels are falling significantly (not necessarily by choice either!), the levels of greenhouse gas emissions continue to rise, due to this higher carbon footprint of unconventional fossil fuels.

Figure 6, GHG emissions by oil production method [Credit: Pershing & Kelly (ND), University of Utah]

Indeed a recent study has noted the bulk of the world’s existing fossil fuel reserves are essentially “unburnable” if we want to keep global warming to be below 2 or 3 degrees and any company spending money looking for ways to extract them is wasting their money.

Now many in the cornucopian camp would probably argue that I, and others such as Dr Hughes, are being a little unfair in the above analysis. One possible criticism is that the figures above rely heavily on data from the EIA and DOE. Both have shown to be considerably behind the curve on the topic of Shale Gas. As I mentioned in a prior post, some of the DoE’s long term forecasts for shale gas production (discussed in an article from WTG News here) by 2020 were already close to being outstripped by actual output. I relied on this data for a number of prior posts on Shale gas, and like I said, the current output now outstrips those DoE projections. Could they be wrong again?

I would argue that the reason for this mismatch is because the DOE were banking on Shale gas being a bit of a slow burner, whereas instead its turned into something of a blast and grab raid by the drilling companies. Many of the same people who a few years ago were selling sub-prime mortgages have since moved into speculating on shale gas and this has created a bit of a bubble.

A little elementary maths might help. The total area under our production curves (representing available reserves) is a fixed quantity, but we can change the slope of the curve bounding this area, i.e. produce the gas or oil more quickly (within reason of course! as such a change in slope runs into the problems I mentioned earlier), but of course we can only sustain that production for a shorter time period (as the area under the curve is still the same) and a steep rise in output will generally lead to a steep drop off the other side.

You’ll also note that I’ve been comparing future production to present demand. Of course what I should be doing is comparing future production to future demand. One of the reasons many on the right oppose renewables or taking action on climate change is that they argue that our current economic model requires ever greater levels of economic growth, which requires ever growing levels of energy to feed it. While indeed I would note there is such a link between energy production and economic growth (they are some who’d say the current economic malaise we’re experiencing is due to high oil prices and declining output). I would question how sensible it is to continue this strategy.

As it would imply that the current US energy demand (that 2,200 mtoe I mentioned) would have to increase by 3% per year to double by the mid 2040’s. Chuck in the extra energy demand from China, India and the other BRICS (growing by about 10% per year) and you wind up with a global energy demand in the order of 2-4 times its current level by 2050. You will struggle to find anyone, save a few demented Libertarians, within the energy industry who actually believes that such a feat is possible, even if we ignored the urgent crisis that is climate change, even if we exploited ever available energy source possible to its maximum potential.

The Party’s over

This also serves to vindicate a key point made in the 1970’s by the Club of Rome’s report “the limits to growth”. They point they were trying to make wasn’t that “the worlds going to run out of oil/water/copper by 2035” or something of that nature. Instead they were trying highlight that a finite resource cannot sustain an ever increasingly level of demand indefinitely. And that the time line between exceeding the natural carrying capacity and collapse of supply was likely to be very short.

For example, let’s suppose I throw a party (to celebrate Thatcher’s demise!). I could keep 20 friends and I partying till dawn if I squeezed 200 beers into my fridge (or bought enough kegs to provide the equivalent) assuming we all drank roughly one beer an hour. However, if instead I started off with just one friend and I, and we then both texted and invited another friend each to the party each hour (with everyone else who came doing the same), we would run out of beer after about 6.5 hours (when there would be just shy of 100 revellers at the party). Even if, in anticipation of this I doubled my initial supply to 400 beers (how going to squeeze that many beers in my fridge is another story!….in fact I doubt I could get that 200 in to start with…and what am I going to do with all those empties!) would only sustain the party for a little more than an hour. Indeed if we somehow managed to keep the party going (by perhaps holding it in an off license or something!…hopefully one with a very large fridge and next to a recycling centre!) by the tenth hour the demand for beer would be 1024 beer/hr (i.e. 5 times the starting supply to keep the party going for just a further hour).

In a similar vein, even if by some miracle we could double available fossil fuel production rates via unconventional sources (and as I think I’ve shown, we can’t!), such a move would only offset the inevitable peak in supply by a few years or a decade.

But there is another way. 97 GW’s of Renewable energy capacity was installed in 2011 (as mentioned in the REN 2012 report), a little under half of all electricity generating capacity installed that year. The Germans have demonstrated, that you can grow an economy and cut overall energy consumption, while increasing reliance on renewables. And Germany hasn’t exactly got the world’s best renewable resources (they are at the same latitude as Newfoundland and have significantly poorer wind coverage that countries such as America or the UK). In short, they’ve proven it’s possible to break the energy – economy link I mentioned earlier. And Portugal is doing even better than Germany, getting a good 70% of its electricity from renewables.

Now, as I speculate (here) there is probably some upper limit to how much of renewable energy that can be installed at any one time, but it’s clearly a much more sensible strategy than continued reliance on fossil fuels. Especially once you accept the age of such sources is in its twilight years.

Now while I would accept the argument that the so-called “peak oil pessimists” have perhaps unrated the potential of unconventional oil and gas sources. But given that such sources still cannot rescue us from the inevitable train wreck and given their very heavy environmental and carbon footprint, I would therefore argue in favour of abandoning such extraction and focusing on other resources instead.

Nevermind Germany, Portugal achieves 70% via renewables!

I am frequently told by the nay sayers that getting any more than a tiny fraction of the UK’s energy from renewables is impossible (here’s one typical example of Fox News style research). They’ll present elaborate reports that attempt to prove as much. However I often find that this merely reflects “confirmation bias” on their part.

The spectacular growth rate of renewables in Germany has frequently made them the poster child for renewables roll out. But perhaps we ignore the fact that many other countries are doing a good deal more with renewables. Take Portugal. They have recently reported a 3 month period where they achieved 70% of the electricity generation via renewables, substantially more than the 20% of electricity from renewables frequently quoted for Germany.

Figure 1, Portugal and Renewables, the dawn of a new age? [Credit: RTCC.org]

The Portuguese achieved thanks to some clever management of their grid. 37% of their electricity represents hydroelectricity, a combination of some legacy dam projects and newly installed capacity. Also the Portuguese have begun to use these not just to generate power, but also to store it. Thus if it’s a windy night and their wind farms (27% of total generating capacity, on a per kWh basis) are running but nobody is using, then they simply shunt the power into pumped storage. The next time demand hits peak, they use the hydroelectricity to even out any peaks and troughs.

The ultimate bottom line? Portugal cut its coal consumption by 29% and its gas consumption (for power generation) by 44%. The country was also a net exporter of electricity (by 6%) over this period.

What is perhaps more remarkable is that solar energy, the sort of energy source we’d directly associate with a hot Mediterranean climate, currently does not yet figure hugely in Portugal (currently less than 1% of total per kWh output), although that’s set to change. This is why I suspect they’ll have little difficulty achieving 100% (actually for brief periods  they’ve already done that, but I’m talking over a full year period). Solar energy is useful in hotter countries because when solar energy reaches peak efficiency and output, tends to be when electricity demand is at its highest point (due to air-con demand). So it’s a useful form of “load matching”.

Figure 2, Solar and air conditioning demand, a match made in Heaven!
[Credit: Thinkprogress.com]

And of course Portugal is hardly the only country in the world who gets  by with a majority of its electricity from renewables. Norway gets 99% of its electricity from renewables (mostly hydro). Iceland gets 100% of its electricity and 81% of its entire primary energy consumption from renewables (mostly hydro and geothermal, overall Iceland is arguably a net exporter of renewable electricity once you factor in its use of them for smelting and industrial purposes). Sweden gets 50% from renewables. Both Sweden and Iceland also get much of their winter heat from renewable sources also. Ireland has (for brief periods) achieved 50% of electricity demand from its wind farms alone.

Figure 3, European Renewable intensity on the grid [Source: EUROSTAT (2010)]

In short anyone who speaks to you “with authority” that it is impossible to get much more from renewables is talking through his a….armpit and I would urge the reader to point out as much to this individual. There is no reason why other nations with good renewable resources, such as the UK, cannot achieve the same.

 

But don’t forget the elephants!

Of course, before we start pulling out the victory cigars and congratulating ourselves on a job well done. Let’s not forget that electricity is only a small portion of total energy consumption. According to the IEA about 17% of total final consumption is electricity, the remaining 83% is everything else (heating, transportation fuels, industrial feedstock, fertilizers, etc.).

Figure 4, Shankey Diagram of the UK’s energy consumption [Source: DECC, 2007]

 By way of example, in the UK (full energy consumption stat’s available here), about 20% of consumption is electricity. About 36% is transportation fuel, with a similar amount (37%) going towards heating and cooling. Much of the heat demand is highly seasonal in its consumption, typically peaking in the winter months. This tends to favour an energy source that can be easily “bunkered” and stockpiled over the winter, which is why currently most of this load is met by Natural Gas and fuel oil.

Figure 5, UK gas consumption profile, note the spike in consumption in winter
[Credit: earth.org.uk]

 The Heat is on

I see a few possible solutions, firstly minimisation of the problem. Better insulation of houses can greatly reduce the heating demand. The previous labour government proposed that all future UK homes should be at the very least “Passivhaus” standard  (meaning the house is so well insulated that it need little or no supplementary space heating) or better yet “zero carbon” (with the aid of building integrated renewables the house cancels out its own energy demand). I have tended to favour the former, as I feel it’s more achievable and practical. Either way it shows what can be achieved.

Figure 5,Thermal imaging photo of a Passihaus apartment block
[Credit: Passivhaus Institut (2006)]

The Swedish, Germans, Danes, Iceland and Finland, meet much of their heating needs (which are substantially greater than the UK’s) via CHP (combined heat and power) or district heating systems. Some of these are run on biofuels. Even if run on natural gas however, CHP can produce a significant cut in carbon emissions (by 25-30%), as well as reducing costs by cutting fuel consumption.

Solar thermal is another energy source often underrated in the UK. Some people seem to think it doesn’t work very well here. But it would surprise you how much sun the UK receives (averaged over a year) and the near constant demand for heat in the UK throughout the year for hot water purposes, ensures it won’t go to waste.

Ground and air source heat pumps are another option, although as I mentioned in a prior post, it’s important to realise their limitations.

Moving down the road

Transportation is dominated by oil, 95% of it in the UK, because petrol is such a versatile fuel. I discuss the various future paths (with a bit of the history) of cars here. I would firstly point out that the vast bulk of car journeys are within the range of existing electric vehicles. Longer distance vehicles could be operated via hydrogen, either consumed in a fuel cell, Stirling engine or indeed an ordinary high efficiency IC engine. Of course in the short term the technology isn’t commercially mature and the hydrogen production and distribution infrastructure to support such vehicles doesn’t exist.

Figure 6, VW’s innovate 1L per 100 km’s car…that’s about 280 mpg!
[Source: CNET.au (2010)]

Fortunately vehicles in Europe are getting ever more fugal with their fuel consumption (unfortunately the lassie faire policies of the GOP means this had not translated across the Atlantic….I’m sure they’ll figure it out after oil prices takes another jump tho!). Volkswagen have just announced their latest 1L car  (which they’ve been working on for quite some time now), which they plan to put into limited production, capable of an incredible 0.9 L/100 km’s (about 282 mpg_imp). On an NEDC cycle that yields a carbon footprint of just 22 gCO₂/km ! The car achieves this via a series plugin hybrid drive train. This means it’s essentially an electric vehicle. The difference between it and a pure EV is that it has a small high efficiency diesel engine “range extender” fitted, which tops up the battery when required.

Of course public transport is substantially more energy efficient than even the car above. Improving here would greatly decrease oil consumption.

 

But as I said at the beginning, if there’s one thing to take away from this story it is that there are solutions to our problems. The path to get there will not be short, and I’m not suggesting it will be easy. But it is certainly achievable, it’s merely a matter of a lack of the proper incentives to drive the process on.

Nuclear Realities bite

I came across an interesting article today about the negotiations between EDF energy and the government as regards the proposed two new reactors at Hinckley Point. Predictably a major stumbling block is the defacto subsidy that EDF are demanding for the plant.

Figure 1, Road Block to new nuclear?

They are arguing that they need a guaranteed price of £100 per megawatt hour for 40 years. By contrast for about £65 per MWh (or $98 according to the EIA, see a range of figures here) you can get the same amount of low carbon energy from windfarms, and wind energy producers are often happy to accept a shorter subsidy period (10 to 15 years). Furthermore the NREL quote a figure of as little as $68 or £40 per MWh for onshore wind, with future drops in price predicted in the future. Even offshore wind will likely fall near too or within the above price window for nuclear by the time these plants start producing electricity. And of course the figures we are discussing just include the “front end” subsidy for nuclear. The UK government will still have to pick up the tab for decommissioning and final waste disposal, the costs of which are not small, as I’ve previously discussed here.

Figure 2, The falling costs of wind energy
[Source: Lawrence Berkeley NL and NREL (2012)]

Naturally the concern here is that the government will be essentially signing away a very hefty subsidy cheque to a foreign company for a considerable period of time. The potential long term costs of such a subsidy of nuclear is considerable, enough to easily derail the chancellor’s long term spending plans. Of course I warned that the government’s CfD plan would result in just this scenario quite some time ago .

Of course for the French, this represents something of a risk in itself. The upper bound of costs for nuclear exceed the above £100/MWh figure by some margin. They are therefore gambling that they can keep the costs to within an envelope such that they can break even or make a profit.

This merely highlights what I’ve long argued on this blog, the economics behind nuclear power simply don’t add up. It represents expensive energy (as I discuss here) and no amount of wishful thinking on the part of its supporters will wish this fact away. Indeed, this figure of £100/MWh (or about $145/MWh) is at least double the level that nuclear energy supporters have long quoted (and not far off the NEF (2003) predictions), suggesting they may have been less than forward about nuclear energy’s true costs. But ultimately, if the Tory’s want to take Britain down the nuclear route then they…or more to the point us the electricity users, are going to have to pay for it. There ain’t no such thing as a free lunch!

Before anyone starts mumbling about oh, you can’t rely on wind why what happens when the wind stops blowing…. You might have a point (even then the “back up” costs of wind are often exaggerated) if we were discussing the use of these reactors for load following electricity, but all the indicators are they will be used for baseload (i.e. we’re discussing the overnight baseload costs of wind v’s the same for nuclear). Traditionally nuclear power plants have only been used for baseload electricity. This is for a variety of technical and economic reasons, as I discuss here. While modern reactors aren’t as constrained as reactors in the past, it is still not technically possible to use nuclear for the full range of most countries power load.

Furthermore by doing so, you essentially reduce the capacity factor. As a load following power plant needs to hold back a significant quantity of its power output in reserve (to match rising grid demand) the result is that a plant does not operate at its full capacity for most of its life. This is why Fossil fuel plants that provide load following or peaking power electricity have capacity factors in the order of 60 – 45% (typically, see DUKE report 2012, Chapter 5) although potentially lower than 15% in some cases. Obviously we the energy consumers will only pay for the power we use, not the power that theoretically available.

Figure 3, The Japanese electricity grid demonstrates the traditional role of nuclear power plants in a grid [Source: Info Plaza Japan, 2009]

In other words, you’ve just greatly increased the cost of every kWh out of that nuclear plant, making the gap between nuclear and renewables even greater. So great that the cost of wind power tied into to some form of energy storage option (pumped hydro or that LAES technology I mentioned a while back) begins to look an attractive alternative. As does other forms of renewables which aren’t as unpredictable as wind power (tidal, CSP, geothermal, hydroelectric, etc.).

Don’t say the “N” word!

Of course there are some who will argue in favour of nuclear despite its dire economic outlook on the basis of hedging our energy bets. They see nuclear as a sort of national energy insurance policy. Now while I don’t quite buy into this line of reasoning, I would point out that if you agree with that idea, why pay a private company to build the plant?

Would it not be far more sensible to simply cut out the middleman. The government either directly or via a state owned company builds nuclear power plants, which it (and thus we the taxpayer) then own. It is then at the discretion of future governments to decide how it’s going to subsidize the electricity from these plants. It could opt for the French approach where the government subsidizes the power (providing the country with cheap nationally subsidized electricity) or it could pass such costs onto electricity consumers, or a combination of both. The point is, there’s no need to sign up for a 40 year commitment, future governments can change this policy as needed.

Of course to the Tories what I’ve said is out of the question, as after all it involves use of the dreaded “N” word….nationalisation! (how dare I mention that word in the week of Maggie’s funeral!…oddly enough my spell checker wants me replace this word with “renationalisation” which is of course be technically what we’re discussing). As I’ve previously reported, the chances of the Tory’s nationalising anything, even when it makes perfect economic sense to do so is out of the question.

Of course the bitter irony here is that EDF energy are themselves a nationalised industry owned by the French government, as are Avera, the likely providers of the reactors. So in essence this whole row boils down to is the simple question as to how much the Tory’s are willing to pay the French government to be good little socialists and centrally plan the UK’s nuclear future for them, as it’s essentially against the Tory’s religion to do it themselves!

The Trap

I would however caution those in the anti-nuclear camp that despite all the rhetoric from both sides, I suspect a deal of some kind will still go ahead (whether the reactors will ultimately get built mind you, is an entirely different question). It’s simply a case of who blinks first. The French, with the white elephant that is Olkilouto (now seven years late and massively over budget), face an ever diminishing number of potential suckers….sorry! customers, to sell reactors too. They can’t afford to burn the British.

Equally, the Tory’s have gone to too much trouble clearing the way for their “precious” to leave their nuclear sweetheart at the altar. Also a collapse of this deal, like the collapse of the Horizon deal I discussed awhile ago, would not be a cost free decision. In preparation for this deal in Hinckley many millions of man hour’s worth of work will have already been expended preparing the ground for this deal. Much of that legwork done by British or transnational engineering firms, the sort who will be none too pleased with Cameron if it all comes to nothing.

However, the positive for supporters of renewables will be that the UK government will have set a trap for themselves. Obviously the tory’s plans to kick the ladder out  from under solar and wind power by cut the subsidies to these industries will be out of the question.

There are numerous British, EU and WTO (world trade organisation) competition rules which will now come into play that basically state that if the government offers the above generous subsidy to nuclear, it has to offer the same to other equivalent low carbon energy sources.

And its worth remembering at this point that renewables is no longer the domain of hippies. Its now big business (just read the latest REN 21 report) and those companies have a large workforce to pay, shareholders to look out for and deep pockets, plus allies in many parliaments worldwide (notably in China, Germany, Denmark, etc.) with which to put up a legal fight and force the UK government into a compromise. Indeed I suspect part of why the Tories are reluctant to accede to EDF energy is that they are all too aware of these facts.

Such a generous subsidy package would make a whole host of existing renewable and energy storage options very economically attractive. That 40 year subsidy period could even attract investment into renewable sources that are not yet commercially mature (such as wave and tidal) as it would create a very strong financial incentive for firms to develop these technologies to an appropriate level such that they could cash in on it.

So it’s entirely possible that the Tories (despite their pathological hatred of all things renewable), in their haste to subsidise nuclear, could unlock the sort of funding needed to get the mass roll out of renewables in the UK off the ground. Every cloud has its silver lining!

Bottom Feeders

This week saw two announcements related to extract of resources from the Oceans. Firstly the Japanese announced they had successfully tapped into Methane Clathrates deposits and that they had successfully drawn off some of the trapped methane.

Figure 1 – Fire from Ice! [Credit: ACS.org, 2009]

 For those of you in the dark about it, Methane Clathrates are a mixture of frozen water with trapped bubbles of biogas (also known by the term “fire ice” as its snow that will literally burn!) that forms under conditions of cold and high pressure, often in sediments on the “continental slope” of the world’s oceans. They form as a result of sediment material washed down from the world’s rivers being broken down by bacteria (which produce the methane as a by-product), or the migration of gas up from geological faults. These conditions in the sediments of the deep oceans are such that some of this methane ends up getting trapped in these Clathrate deposits. A similar process under the Artic permafrost also results in methane “entrapment”. The world’s reserves of Methane Clathrate are enormous, in all probability they account for more locked up Carbon than all of the world’s fossil fuel reserves (conventional and unconventional) combined!

Figure 2 – Gas Hydrate deposits worldwide [Credit: Los Almos NL]

 That said opinions differ as to how much of this resource is actually “extractable”. Wikipedia provides some links  to a number of scientific papers that discuss this matter, notably Milkov (2004) which suggests that only a small fraction are likely to be viable. While the Japanese are a little more upbeat (a couple of good links to their project, here  and here). One key question however is the EROI  (energy returned over invested) of Methane Hydrate extraction. It’s possible that the result could be a an EROI of less that 1 (uses more energy to extract methane than you can usefully hope to get back) or less than 3.3 (if we burn the methane in a power station or car at an average efficiency of 30% then effectively we still consume more energy than is usefully returned!).

The second major announcement was that regarding Lockheed Martin’s foray into the business of deep ocean mining. There are large deposits of key minerals at the ocean bed, in particular large “nodules” (lumps of rock rich in various metals such as Cobalt, Nickel) at various points of the ocean floor. There are also concentrations of minerals (notably copper) within sulphide deposits near the “black smokers” along the mid ocean ridge.

Figure 3 – Deep Ocean minerals [Credit: Chinadaily.cn]

Again exact estimates for recoverable reserves are difficult to come by, but there could easily be more of these minerals tied up in such deposits than in all the conventional reserves accessible via surface mining.

Figure 4 – Deep Ocean mining machines at work [Credit: ABC.NET, 2011]

Tickling the Dragon’s tail

These announcements have results in howls of protest from environmental groups,  as well as whoops of joy from the Cornucopian camp. The environmentalists naturally worry about the impact such strip mining or “fracking” will have on the ocean environment. Significant pollution from such mining operations could easily disrupt whole eco-systems, including the one that puts fish on our dinner plates!

The extraction of methane from Clathrate deposits is particularly worrying. Aside from the enormous carbon dioxide levels that would be realised by tapping into them, there is the fact that these deposits exist in a precariously balanced state. Disturbances to them by mining could release very large quantities of methane (an extremely potent greenhouse gas, potentially 21 to 72 times more potent than Carbon Dioxide) not all of which will be captured (a similar problem exists for shale gas, which as I discussed before, may have a carbon footprint worse than coal).

Indeed it is believed that destabilisation and release of Clathrate deposits have played a role in several mass extinctions of the past (the so-called “Clathrate Gun” hypothesis), notably the Permian Extinction event and the Eocene Thermal Maximum event. Thus it is feared by many scientists that our own emissions of Greenhouse gases could heat the planet enough to destabilise these deposits and unleash a runaway greenhouse effect. Consequently, tinkering with Methane Clathrate deposits, as George Monbiot discusses, could be the equivalent of literally playing with fire or tickling the tail of an angry dragon.

Figure 5 – Methane Clathrate

That said, I’m sure those involved in Methane Hydrate extract will argue that if there is a risk of said deposits destabilising in the future, better to mine them now to prevent this. Even if you burnt the gas and released the CO2 straight into the atmosphere (rather than trying to capture it) you’d still yield a net reduction in relative carbon emissions (given the much lower carbon footprint of CO2 v’s methane).

I would counter this argument, by pointing out that A) a more sensible strategy would be to cut carbon emissions now and never have to worry about a “Calthrate Gun” scenario, and that B) the deposits most vulnerable to destabilisation may not be the ones that are economically extractable.

Similarly, mining the ocean for metals has to be weighted up against its costs. While yes a few mega corps might make a tidy wee profit, but consider the impact on the global fishing industry, which is worth many tens of billions of dollars and represents a major source of food to many countries (notably to nations such as Japan). Also the ecosystem of the oceans is a key part of the global carbon cycle and disruptions due to mining could have a catastrophic effect on its ability to balance the carbon cycle.

Scrapping the bottom of the barrel

The cornucopian’s position, that we need never worry about shortages of primary metals or energy as “the magic of the market” will always provide, is also challenged by these announcements. The very fact we’re going after deposits such as the Methane Calthrates, Shale Gas, Tight Oil (not to be confused with Oil Shales), Tar sands and deep ocean Nodules should tell you we’re scraping the bottom of our planet’s resource barrel. All the cheap easy to access resources are gone or already being exploited to the full. This leaves our civilisation with no choice (other than the obvious – cut back, recycle more and use more sustainable alternatives!) but to literally go to the ends of the earth and the bottom of the ocean in the search for such resources.

Figure 6 – Oil in Barrel

And furthermore, one cannot extract such unconventional resources at any arbitrary rate of our choosing. Large reserves do not automatically mean a high rate of extraction. If this were true desert countries with a coastline would never be short of water (nor would wet countries like Britain ever have to worry about droughts!). To give an example, if I were to give a couple of Cornucopians a few spoons and sent them to the shores of a large lake, while I took a foot pump to a small pond, the rate of water extraction I could achieve with the foot pump would always exceed that of them with the spoons, regardless of the size of the water reserves of the lake.

While, Shale Gas is starting to become an important part of America’s Gas production, it still only accounts for a small proportion of American Gas consumption, as I’ve discussed before (in Is Shale gas a Ponzi scheme?). Indeed already Shale gas output seems to be topping out at a level well below that of the propaganda.

While I accept the argument that the peak oil (or peak gas) pessimists have perhaps underestimated the effects of such unconventional resources. But these resources are still not enough to prevent peaking of fossil fuel based energy sometime before the 2050′s (and more likely the 2030′s). And even a delaying of the peak till these dates requires essentially zero growth (in global energy consumption). Now when you consider how rapidly the economies, population and aspirations of the so-called “BRICS” economies are growing, you’ll quickly realise that a no-growth scenario is impossible. And the key point of the “Limits to Growth” report by the Club of Rome is the fact that a finite amount of resources cannot hold out against an exponential growing rate of consumption. Even doubling or tripling the available resources merely delays the inevitable for a few years or a decade at most (given that the rate of consumption will be rising all the time).

Further, unconventional reserves of energy or metals are much more expensive to extract. Hence there extraction can only be sustained if prices are high and remain high. Indeed the very fact that major corporations are investing in them amounts to industry betting that the price of these resources is going to go only one way (up!).While the days of oil may not be over for some time to come (indeed I would gladly take bets that someone somewhere on the planet will be extracting and selling oil for centuries to come), we are certainly well past the era of cheap energy and cheap resources. Obviously sustaining economic growth in already developed economies in the face of ever increasing energy and resource prices counters a key Cornucopian argument.

So in short, both groups are likely to be disappointed. Anyone hoping that peak oil would cause carbon emissions to coast to halt before dangerous climate change occurs is likely to be disappointed. Fossil fuel based energy will still be available for some time to come, although it will get ever dirtier, more carbon intensive and more expensive, before eventually peaking at some future date.

The current “business as usual” model of a throw away carbon intensive society is simply unsustainable in the long term. Like a crack addict whose happened upon a drug dealers stash, resource finds such as Methane Clathrate or Deep sea mining might seem like a lucky break, but they only serve to continue the addiction for a short while longer and are just delaying the inevitable. A policy of better recycling, energy efficiency and increased use of renewables is a more effective strategy in the long term.

Cumbria Waste Dump Falters

Been very busy at work the last few weeks, preventing me from updating this blog.

One of the big energy related stories of the last few weeks was the collapse of the Government’s planned UK nuclear waste repository in Cumbria (or as they prefer to call it the Geological Disposal Facility). A few weeks back Cumbria County Council effectively vetoed the plan. They were worried that had the proposal gone any further they would become subject to “lock in” whereby it would be difficult for them to pull out or object to it.

Figure 1, The proposed UK nuclear Waste Repository [Credit: NDA, 2011]

This decision, which was appealed, has since been upheld, although there are a number of ways the government could force the issue. In short they could opt to essentially riding ruckshot over local politics and imposing the facility on the region. Though the experience in the US, when the Bush Adm tried that tactic with the Yucca Mountain repository, suggests it mightn’t be a good idea.

Figure 2: The UK’s current nuclear waste Inventory [Credit: NDA, 2010]

This decision by CCC throws into disarray the UK government’s plans, both for more nuclear reactors and also for the disposal of the Countries existing inventory of 631,000 cubic metres of nuclear waste, which includes 21,000 m³ of HLW, spent fuel & plutonium.

Figure 3, nuclear Waste distribution and locations across the Country [Credit: NDA & No2nuclear, 2012]

A historical Decision

Ultimately we can trace the UK nuclear industries problems all the way back to a faithful decision taken in the 1940′s as regards the future of the then fledgling UK nuclear industry. I have book on my shelf called “into the atomic age” by H. C. Pincher published in 1947, where he mentions the decision to build (what would become) the UK’s main nuclear energy facility in Cumbria.

Figure 4, Selafield – the early years! [Credit: BBC]

The decision to build in Cumbria boiled down to the fact that the UK government was so “confident” as to the safety of nuclear energy, that they decided to push it as far away from any major metropolitan area in the UK (in particular London) as they could. This boiled down to a decision between the Scottish highlands or the wilds of Cumbria. Strategic (Scottish sites would be vulnerable to surprise attack by enemy bombers), Political (even then there was talk of Scottish independence) and practical considerations (Cumbria was well located near existing MOD facilities in Barrow & Springfield’s and was directly between Durham, Liverpool, Manchester & Glasgow uni’s as well not far from the UK Atomic Engineering’s HQ at Risley) all pointed to Cumbria as the obvious choice.

There also was a desire back then to separate out the UK’s civilian nuclear establishment (at Harwell) from the bomb project, although the lines between the two would eventually becoming increasingly blurred, as detailed in W. C. Petterson’s history of the UK nuclear industry “Going Critical”.

Dead Nuke Storage

Unfortunately, this decision came with one rather big fatal flaw, Selafield’s in the wrong place! For of course, as far as the rest of the country is concerned Cumbria is better known as “the Lake District”. Britain’s favourite and most popular national park (been there twice in the last year myself, likely be going there again at sometime!). Obviously trying to put the countries nuclear waste bin underneath here was never going to be popular. I mean, if I went and proposed a wind farm across Helvellyn I think you can guess the response!

Figure 5 – On Striding Ridge, the Lake District [Credit: me!]

While certainly a good number of people living in the West of Cumbria are dependent on activities in Selafield for their livelihoods, in the rest of the Lake district the main industry is tourism. So inevitably there was always going to be this clash of vested interests, nevermind the opinions of those from further afield. Inevitably those many tourists who flock to the lakes each year would oppose this sort of plan.

Then there’s also the opinion of the Irish government to consider. They’ve never been happy with Selafield being right oppose them across the Irish Sea. To the Irish it looks like the English took their nuclear waste dump and pushed it as far away from London as possible (which as I’ve shown is partially true!), but where its just 80 miles from the West coast of Ireland, home to a large chunk of the population both north and south of the border.

In short what Cumbian County Council seemed to be saying is that the sign on the road into Cumbria say’s “National Park” and not “Dead Nuke Storage”. Entertaining hikers and sightseers is their business, not storing nuclear waste.

Geological Considerations

Of course supporters of the GDF have been quick to point out that they only want to build it in Cumbria, not necessarily under the National Park. My response to that is to note that they are effectively splitting hairs. Whether it is in the National Park or just on the border of it scarcely matters, it’s going to be too close for comfort.

Figure 6, Locations near Selafield are mostly unsuitable for Deep Geological Storage [Credit: BBC & BGS, 2010]

Further, I once sat down with a geologist and geological map of the UK and we went over the possibilities for locating a geological storage facility in the UK. He was very clear that in his opinion the only locations in Cumbria with the correct rock types, were under the national park. He noted also that Cumbria was far from the best location for a repository. Instead he pointed to the Dumfries and Galloway hills as his preferred location (for reasons of both geology but also because they are relatively lightly populated!). Alternatively he pointed to either the Midlands of the UK or salt formations off the South East coast.

Figure 7, A British Geological Survey map of suitable sites for Deep geological storage of Nuclear Waste [Credit: BGS & Nirex, 1987]

Indeed a study by the British Geological Survey and Nirex from the 1980′s  seems to point to a strata of rock between Norwich and Cambridge as the best choice of location for Britain’s nuclear waste…..of course they are talking from a purely geological point of view! I suspect from a political point of view this is a non-starter from day one as you’ll have every NIMBY from Norwich to London coming out of the woodwork to oppose it!

Too Early to Cheer

Of course the environmentalists were soon cheering the decision by Cumbria County Council to can the GDF. However, before they start kicking back and smoking their victory spliffs, consider that the UK still has a sizable inventory of nuclear waste. Even if we stop using nuclear power tomorrow it will still exist. This existing stockpile needs to be disposed of somehow.

I would point to two reports, one from Harvard University (Bunn M. et al, 2003) and the other from MIT (Kazimi et al, 2011) into the potential future of the nuclear fuel cycle.

The Harvard study concludes that reprocessing would be much more expensive than geological storage (even in the best case scenario). While the MIT report also points to the idea that deep geological storage represents the best choice from a point of view of safety (tinkering with the waste risks creating an even bigger mess), costs and long term durability (i.e. the longer we have the waste piled up in interim storage, the greater the chances of an accidental release). Even groups like Greenpeace and FoE seem to agree with this.

Also there is a fallacy in the environmentalists agenda in opposing the GDF. That without the means to dispose of the nuclear waste that the UK’s new nuclear plants will generate, that the powers that be will cancel such plans. That assumes that the UK nuclear industry would do what it has consistently failed to do for the last 60 years – take responsibility! And I don’t see that happening.

Figure 8, If the rest of us behaved like BNFL….

Indeed I would point again to the experience in the US. When the Yucca Mountain project was cancelled, not only did the Obama administration indicate they were carrying on regardless, but the otherwise sensible Steven Chu (US energy secretary at the time) came out with a lot of wishful thinking about Fast Neutron reactors and Fusion power plants (and one assumes photon torpedoes!) being used to “dispose” of waste in the future.

My fear is, the same thing will happen in the UK. The NDA will simply kick the can a little further down the road, make various unrealistic future promises, then they’ll try to build new reactors anyway. It will only be if and when inevitably there’s an accident at Selafield a few decades from now (and a major release of radiation), that the entire nuclear supply chain in the UK will be brought to halt. Leaving the UK, like Japan, with a load of nuclear white elephants it no longer has any use for.

More Nuclear Kool aid please

And of course it wasn’t just the anti-nuclear crowd who were doing cartwheels over this decision. This decision was much to the liking of the true head cases within the UK nuclear lobby, the Fast Reactor cheerleaders. They don’t want the UK’s nuclear waste buried, as its central to their too plans for a too-cheap-meter-thousand-year-nuclear-reich.

Unfortunately, their proposal falls flat for the rather obvious reasons (see my previous article, recently updated “the fast reactor delusion”):

A) They don’t work! 

B) Are an order of magnitude more expensive than conventional nuclear reactors (considerably more expensive than even the worst case scenario’s figures for renewables).

Fast Reactors also have capacity factors that make an indoor wind farm look good! (there’s some debate in Japan as to whether Monju, the world most modern Fast Reactor, has actually had overall negative capacity factor, given that’s its only ever generated an hour’s worth of electricity in 25 years).

Again, both the MIT and Harvard reports mentioned above consider Fast reactors. And both conclude that they would increase the costs (and risks!) yet further and would only be justified if the price of Uranium would have to get extremely high (many times its current market price) to justify such expenditure (assuming we can resolve point A that is!). Indeed the MIT report’s conclusions have been criticised in this regard for if anything, pulling its punches.

Also in order to operate effectively Fast Reactors require reprocessing of spent fuel (as it takes multiple passes through the fast reactor). A good deal of the current mess that the UK nuclear industry is stuck in, notably as regards Selafield, can be traced back to this decision to reprocess commercial reactor fuel. This  again, is dealt with in W. C. Petterson’s book “Going Critical”.

The Union of Concerned Scientists has pointed out that Fast reactors, and the reprocessing needed for them to function effectively, could actually increase the inventory of nuclear waste rather than reduce it, as you’re basically trading a modest reduction in HLW for a massive increase in LLW and ILW.

Figure 9, Estimate of wastes resulting from different disposal options [Credit UCSUSA.org 2011]

Also the Plutonium wastes will need to be converted from an oxide from to metallic form. Leaked e-mails from within the NDA reveal that this will open up all sorts of safety and proliferation related loopholes.

There are proposals for a new type of Gas Cooled Fast Reactor, which might work a little more reliably than fast reactors in the past. However, as I mention in regards to GcFR’s previously, these proposals are unlikely to be any cheaper than deep geological storage, still require reprocessing and of course GcFR technology doesn’t yet exist!

While there might be some case (a dubious one at that) for using one or two Fast Reactors (and I do mean literally “one” or maybe “two” of them) to dispose of the UK’s stockpile of plutonium that’s really about it. Indeed, reading the Harvard & MIT report I get the impression that Vitrification is a better option. But certainly the best solution to the UK’s nuclear waste problem is almost certainly deep geological burial.

Time for Compromise?

Figure 10, An apt analogy of the current status of nuclear power in the UK

It would seem to me that we’re in a bit of a Mexican standoff. Both sides (the Enivornmentalists and the Government) want the waste put away and stored safely. I would propose a pragmatic approach to the situation.

I’d start off by proposing that the location of any future deep geological facility be determined on grounds of public safety and geology, not punch and Judy politics. If that means putting it under the Midlands (as the BGS study from 1980’s above seems to indicate) or off the Surrey coast or indeed under the lake District, then so be it. I would even propose a referendum about the matter to address the democratic deficit that’s always dogged the nuclear industry in the UK.

I would also propose a quid-pro-quo. That the government agree to a mandatory limit (enshrined in law, that referendum would be a good time to do it) as to how many nuclear reactors it can construct and that any subsidy system offered to nuclear has to be offered to equivalent low carbon energy technologies also (such as offshore wind, tidal or solar technologies).

Now while such a proposal might sound like both sides conceding a lot, the reality is it’s more of them writing out a statement of fact and signing it. As I’ve long argued the Tories nuclear ambitions are all but impossible to achieve. Similarly the markets, who by and large have rejected nuclear power, will not accept a situation where one source of energy is given a generous backhander and others are left to live on porridge. Tory backbenchers also need to get over their pathological hatred of all things renewable, as its going to be impossible for the UK to avoid becoming dangerously dependent on Russian gas and Middle Eastern oil, without relying on renewables to some degree.

I would therefore argue that responsible environmentalism and responsible government, requires that a deep geological storage facility be built, if not in Cumbria then somewhere else in the UK.

Crash Test Dummies – the myth of SUV safety

I have long taken a pragmatic approach too transportation. Ideally we’d like to eliminate the motor car, and the heavy carbon footprint associated with them. But in practical terms that’s not going to be easy, as it would difficult in the medium term for many people to get by without cars (i.e. for some in rural area’s a car’s virtually essential), nevermind the social implications of such a draconian policy.

The compromise I have long advocated is a combination of better (and cheaper) public transport, making motorists pay a bit more for the privileges of driving (i.e. eliminating the defacto subsidy often given by government’s to motorists). And rather than trying to completely eliminate the car, focus instead on the promotion of smaller, lighter more fuel efficient cars. Several concept cars and entries in the automotive X-Prize have achieved a fuel economy of +100 mpg using existing technology and IC engines. Using more advanced technologies and alternative fuels (hydrogen, methanol, biofuels, fuel cells, electric drive, stirling engines) even higher levels of fuel economy can be achieved, +200 mpg in the case of some X-Prize entrants (see the Li-ion or Aptera).

Figure 1, A Prototype 100 mpg car by Axon

But one of the core arguments against this idea of the smaller, greener cars is the “perception” that small cars are dangerous and that you’re safer in a larger, heavier older vehicle. SUV drivers, if you inquire of them how often they go off road and is they’re monster a sensible road vehicle (or are they compensating for something very small by driving around in something very big!), they will general retort about trying to keep their kids safe in a crash. But are you’re kids safer in a SUV?

In his book “High and Mighty” Keith Bradsher (2002) pointed out that much of this perceived safety is actually an illusion. If anything the statistics suggest that SUV’s are 6-8% more dangerous (to their occupants) than conventional cars, nevermind the hazard the present to other road users. Europe, where the majority of us drive substantially smaller cars than those in America, has a much lower rate of road deaths than in the US, approximately 2.5 times lower in fact. Now if it were true that large SUV’s (which represent 1:4 American cars v’s 1:20 on EU roads) were actually safer, we’d expect to see the opposite trend (less traffic deaths in the US v’s the EU).

Figure 2, (Left) Mini-Cooper post-crash test and (Right) an F150 SUV post an offset block type crash test, still want to buy an SUV? [Credit: IIHS, 2007]

Perhaps the explanation for the above might be this crash test video I happened to come across the other day of an American Ford F150, one of those preposterously large 4×4 pickup’s so popular in the states. Suffice to say if you’re squeamish I won’t click on this link and watch it. While many Americans who drive such trucks (it is apparently one of the most popular cars in the US) probably feel safe in such a chunky large vehicle, the reality is a little different….as it seems to have a tendency to crumple up like a violin in crash!

Figure 3, Renault Clio Crash Test [Credit, Euro-NCAP, 2005]

By way of comparison, consider the NCAP video for my little run around (a Renault Clio 2007), a Smart City Car (which despite its small size, actually has reasonably good safety record) and of course a Prius. And should you suspect the video for the F150 is a one off, here’s a 2008 Ford Ranger crash test.

The problem with SUV’s, particularly those sold in the US, is that they are often classified as “light trucks” which means they wriggle out of the need for a whole host of rigorous crash safety requirements placed on conventional cars. While some auto manufacturers choose to implement them anyway, particularly if they plan on selling the bulk of their SUV’s as city cars (i.e. as so called Chelsea tractors), they often have to compromise, as some of the essential features of making a car safer in a car crash are incompatible with a vehicle intended to haul heavy loads or go off road.

And it’s not just certain SUV’s that can become death traps in a crash, vans can be a problem also. Particularly “flat fronted” vans such as the VW microbus (so beloved of hippies) or Nissan Hiace. Again, intuition would say that riding high in a heavy vehicle would keep you safe, but that intuition is not borne out by those pesky laws of physics….no more than global warming denial!

I discussed cars and crash safety in a prior post. But just to summarise, counter intuitively you want a car to crumple or deform to some degree in a crash. This crumbling helps to dissipate crash energy away from the passengers. Of course, in order to keep the passengers safe the one bit of the car you don’t want to crumple is the bit where they are sitting (which is exactly what happened to the F150 above, the vehicle essentially invented a crumple zone right where the driver was sitting!). So it’s a balancing act of stiffening up one part of the car, while deliberately weakening the other (but of course if the engineers go too far the crumple zone will be too weak to absorb the impact, while on the other hand too much extra weight of all that steel makes the car heavier and harder to stop).

Figure 4, FEA visualization of a SAAB crash test

Meeting this engineering compromise is always something of a black art. In recent years a computer simulation technique called “Finite Element Analysis” (one of the subjects I teach) has revolutionised crash test safety, by allowing engineers to optimise a vehicles structure to achieve this balancing act.

Figure 5, Accident rates by transportation mode [Credit: UK Department for Transport, 2011]

Of course the best way of avoiding death in a car crash is to not getting involved in a crash in the first place (such as by not driving except where absolutely necessary!). The safety record of public transportation is an order of magnitude better than private motoring.

Smaller cars tend to more manoeuvrable, don’t possess massive blind spots (SUV drivers have a nasty habit of running over small kids and pets), and are both sharper on the brakes and have less mass to slow down in the event of a crash (I recall Jeremy Clarkson, hardly a bastion of anti-motoring sentiment, complaining about the F150 and its “bottle cap” brake pads and 2 tons of weight to stop).

Also by virtue of being higher and lest stable, SUV’s, trucks and mini-vans are more prone to roll over in an accident. One of the worst case scenarios in a crash is for the vehicle to roll over. You’re chances of being killed or suffering serious or permanent disability soar if the vehicle rolls over. While roll overs make up just 2.5% of accidents in the US, they represent 10% of all accident fatalities. And SUV occupants represent a very high proportion of these fatalities (60% of all roll over fatalities in fact), as demonstrated by this video of a Jeep Cherokee failing a moose test (repeatedly!).

Figure 6, Roll over rates for different Vehicle types in the US [Credit NHTSA]

Car v’s car

Of course the SUV driver will respond by saying that surely they if they run into another car (as opposed to a offset concrete block) one is safer in an SUV than in a small car. Is this true?

Up to a point its correct, but recent redesign of cars (to account for the SUV factor) means they are more resistant to impact by SUV’s. This video (a F150 v’s a Honda Civic) demonstrates that. Again remember we want the car bonnet to deform to some degree (to dissipate crash energy). The lack of deformation by the F150 means that the driver will have experienced much higher deceleration forces and would be more likely to suffer injuries such as whip lash, neck or spinal injuries.

Also it’s worth remembering that “head on collisions” represent just 2% of accidents. Side impacts represent about 29% of all crashes (and 20% of all fatalities). SUV drivers tend to come of better here…so long as it’s them being hit by normal cars rather than another SUV mind (in which case they are no better off!). But a very high proportion of car accidents are “single vehicle” incidents with cars going off the road or impacting with things other than vehicles (such as animals, trees or brick walls!). In such situations, with the SUV unable to rely on the “attenuation” of the other car’s crumple zones, its occupants are worse off than the occupants of an ordinary car in the same scenario. And as mentioned, you’re chances of being involved in such an accident are much higher in an SUV than an ordinary car (larger mass, poorer brakes, higher centre of gravity, etc.).

Also, as noted, the engineering of cars has moved on in leaps and bounds in recent years. I mentioned in my prior post  a crash test by the UK programme “Fifth Gear” between a Volvo 2004 estate and a small 2010 Renault Modus. The outcome, had this been an actual crash, was that the Modus driver would have hobbled away as walking wounded, while the Volvo driver would have likely needed to be cut out of the car and stood a much higher probability of suffering serious lower leg injuries (read, spending the rest of his life in a wheelchair!).

Figure 7, A 2009 Chevy v’s a 1959 Bell-Air….still want to drive a classic car? [Credit: IIHS, 2009]

In another match up the IIHS ran a 2009 Chevy into a 1959 Bell-Air. Now most people would assume you’d be safer in the big heavy old gas guzzler. But in reality the driver of the Bell-Air would likely have been killed outright, while the driver of the more modern car would have hobbled away with a sore foot. Like I said, the laws of physics don’t respect old wives tales!

Republicans v’s reality!

I recently completed an article on my energy blog about how one of the key reasons for conservative to engage in climate denial is that accepting climate change would present a serious challenge to their ideology. The author of this movie (a rather unfortunate palaeontologists who lives in Texas) debunks a number of republican myths regarding creationism. Similarly we come across another founding myth of Republicanism, that you’re safer in a big SUV than some small “European” car.

Indeed, it’s interesting to see what the car manufacturers think of SUV drivers. As mentioned in Bradsher’s book marketing data from within the industry suggests that SUV buyers tend to be:

“…..insecure and vain…They often lack confidence in their driving skills. Above all, they are apt to be self-centered and self-absorbed, with little interest in their neighbors and communities…”

“….are very concerned with how other people see them rather than with what’s practical, and they tend to want to control or have control over the people around them….”

Unsafe at any speeds…..until Nader came along!

And who do we have to thank for the current high state of car safety? Ralph Nader!  Yes! The green party presidential candidate has done more for automobile safety than the whole of the Republican party. And he did it not by bowing down to the automobile industry, but by suing them and generally holding their feet too the fire such that they began to improve car safety.

There is no reason why similar tactics couldn’t provide us with smaller, lighter and vastly more fuel efficient cars with lower running costs. And these improvement need not necessarily impact on crash safety. Indeed improvements in electronics (notably the ability of a car to detect an impending accident and activate the brakes) is probably the next logical step in vehicle safety.

Ultimately if there’s something drivers need to accept it’s that if you have to get behind a wheel (again public transport is vastly safer), you’re arguably safer in a smaller vehicle designed both to be less prone to crashing and designed not to kill the driver in the event of a crash, than in a big chunky metal death trap.

Denying Plastic

I made a comment a couple of weeks back on this libertarian site. The post in question was discussing the newly introduced plastic shopping bag tax in Wales and generally the author was trying to claim how it was such a bad idea (because he’s too forgetful to bring bags to the supermarket) and how it will result in more plastic being wasted rather than the other way around (more on that later).

Figure. 1, What to do about the (not-so) humble plastic bag?

I would firstly note that is not quite how things have gone in other regions of the world, where such taxes have been introduced. In Ireland, one of the first countries in Europe to introduce a bag tax, we saw a 90% reduction in plastic bag use within a few weeks of its introduction. By and large the tax is well supported by many, both retailers and the public. Some even go so far as to call it “Europe’s most popular tax”. Indeed, as things stand the Welsh tax is reported to have resulted in a 96% drop in single use plastic bags within a few months.

The reason for the introduction of this tax was very simple, plastic bags are an enormous waste of resources and represent a serious pollution hazard. It takes about 60g’s worth of oil to make just one average sized bag (32.5g weight), resulting in about 2kg’s of carbon emissions for every five plastic bags and globally between 500 Billion and 1 trillion of them are used each year. On average a plastic bag is used for just 12 minutes before being disposed of. Yet a plastic bag lasts for hundreds of years!

But are reusable bags better?

Of course, on of the key questions has to be, are reusable bags better? The answer is, it depends on how you define the question, as discussed in a recent Life Cycle Analysis of shopping bags undertaken by the UK Environment Agency. Certainly on a straight like for like comparison, i.e. one single use bag v’s a more durable “reusable” plastic bag (which is heavier and thus requires more oil and energy to make), then you’d need to reuse the more durable plastic bag 4 times to get back the higher carbon costs. Cotton would require nearly 131 uses, but consider again that if you go shopping say, twice a week, that works out at about a year’s usage. I have cotton bags (which oddly I don’t use much for shopping with) which are at least 6 years old and still in use ( I know that because I got given one at a conference and it has “2006” written on it!).

Figure 2, Carbon footprint of single use bag v’s other options [Credit: BBC 2012, Based on EA data]

The situation looks a little less rosy, if like me, you use shopping bags as bin liners (or better yet recycle them). Nine uses (or about a month’s worth of reuse) still works out as having a lower carbon footprint (contradicting the point our libertarian friend claimed) for the reusable bag (about 2 months worth of usage). Although a cotton bag doesn’t quite work out so well, as it would require about 3 year’s worth of use before it beats the disposal plastic bag (again mine are still in a gain, but I’m assuming most people won’t hang onto a cotton bag for that long).

Figure 3, Carbon footprint of single use bag, accounting for bin liner reuse v’s other options [Credit: BBC 2012, Based on EA data]

Of course I would point out, that the whole point of the tax is to discourage people from discarding such bags needlessly (i.e. if it’s worth something people are unlikely to just throw it away and its thus unlikely wind up working its way into the environment!) and encourage reuse. The 90% reduction rate recorded in Ireland would suggest it works in this regard. I for example use a mix of “bag’s for life” and “single use” bags and I normally opt to take both to the supermarket multiple times before using them as bin liners (or reuse to use the term) or recycle them. And this is largely because the Irish bag tax drilled such behaviour into me!

Furthermore, I would note that the above analysis doesn’t really consider the disposal issues regarding plastic, as here cotton or paper (which are biodegradable) comes out looking alot better compared to plastic which can leach all sort of stuff into water sources for centuries to come.

 Still not convinced?  – The dirty side of plastic

Future generations, centuries from now, will not remember us for our contribution to the Arts and Culture. Nor will they remember us for putting people on the Moon. No, they’ll remember us as those lazy fools who took the worlds greatest treasure, its irreplaceable oil endowment (built up over hundreds of millions of years), and turned it into a couple of billion tons of crap that they are left with the problem of cleaning up.

Figure 4, Plastic bags recovered from a dead Sperm Whales Stomach

Already, large “trash spirals” are forming the middle of the Oceans  (notably the so-called “Great Pacific Garbage Patch”, much of it made up of plastic waste. As this documentary film discusses, this is having very large and quite devastating impact on marine life, in particular endangered species such as whales (that’s the big things in the sea with flippers, not the ones to the West of England   ) are being killed by plastic waste, not to mention the hazard plastics present to fish (some of which we eat!) and birds, if indeed not the entire Ocean ecosystem.

Figure 5, The Pacific Garbage Patch [localphilosophy.com]

And it is perhaps the more immediate short term problems that plastic bags present that has councils introducing these taxes. Plastic bags, along with other non-biodegradable wastes have to be gathered up by local authorities (bin men and road sweepers, etc.), then disposed of, often either through incineration or landfill. The costs of all of these tasks of course comes out of those taxes that libertarians are so incensed at being made to pay. The pollution that results, is literally dumped in taxpayers back yards or into the very air we breathe.

Plastic bags also have a nasty habit of getting flushed into drains and clogging them up. Down the road from my house in Ireland we used to have a problem with the drains, at a low point in the terrain, flooding on a semi regular basis. This was usually due to the drains getting blocked by various debris, with leaves and plastic bags often being the top culprits. One time, a spell of heavy rain led to the whole street being flooded to the point where the road was blocked off and local houses were threatened. The council had to bring in divers from the Police water search unit to unclog the drain! Although on the plus side, the council seemed to get the message after than and began regularly doing work to keep the drains clear.

So it seems to me perfectly reasonable for the state to charge us some small amount of cash for something that we should be encouraged to avoid doing (by bringing bags back to the supermarket) and offset the costs of this “life style choice” against council expenses.

In denial….again!

Of course, as I mentioned in my last post (regarding climate change denial), many on the political right, especially libertarians, have something of a “selective deafness” as regards pesky little facts that contradict they’re politics. The fact that a plastic bag tax shows how there are positive things that governments and local authorities can do to make the world a better place does not sit well with a libertarian philosophy.

Indeed one could argue that the piles of trash floating in the Pacific demonstrates very clearly that the governments aren’t doing enough about this problem and its more rules and taxes we need to solve it, not less. Thus libertarians are forced to either deny the problem exists, or deny that the governments proposed solution can be effective.

But indeed, in a libertarian world, how would they deal with these challenges? Without some form of regulation to limit the impact of plastic waste, the problem would simply build into an ever greater catastrophe until we hit some sort of crucial crisis point. And when that crisis hits, who is going to pay the inevitable costs of the clean-up? The oceans are a global commons (like the atmosphere) that we all need to collectively take responsibility for. Passing the buck onto a couple of fishermen on small (and not terribly wealthy) Pacific Island states, who depend on those waters for their livelihood, hardly seems fair nor a workable solution.

At a more local level, who pays for trash collection/disposal? Into whose back yard do we dispose of the mess? If a drain gets clogged, who pays the costs of it being unclogged? Householders such as myself (I used to live on a hill, safe from flooding and a blocked road would suit me as it reduces traffic in my part of the street!) might refuse to do so, yet those who live in another part of the street, or depend the road it to get to work may have a different opinion. Indeed who pays for the road maintenance to begin with? (anyone have any idea how much councils and the highway’s agency spends annually maintaining roads!)

It is the inability of libertarians to answer these basic questions that forces me to be very sceptical of them.