How much nuclear power can we produce with money spend on climate

I was reading the news and saw numbers on how much money spent on climate "research", subsides and other related project.

For the USA only:

Federal anti-climate-change spending is now running at $11 billion a year, plus tax breaks of $20 billion a year.

So I was wondering how much this 31 billion a year could buy in term of clean energy like nuclear.  For sure we need clean energy in developing nation more than in industrialized nations.

Therefore my example, will take China which has become the larger CO2 emitter in the world by a large margins.  According to many report, this will continue until 2030 before leveling off.  India is also growing faster.

CO2 per say is not a big problem, but related emission from those sources can cause pollution problems. 

China is already building a lot of nuclear but is building coal at a fast pace.  Let say we used that 31 billion a year to build more nuclear power....

According to the  world nuclear organization, the "overnight" cost of building 1 kW in Asia is around 2500$. For this quick calculation, I will leave out the other costs which are trivial.

31,000,000,000 / 2,500 = 12,400,000 kW or 12,400 MW every year of clean nuclear power.

That would be enough to displace 3 coal plant of  3,000MW per year.

According to EIA, a coal plant produce 2 pound of CO2 / kWh. So displacing 12,400MW of coal power would save 24,800,000 pound of CO2 per hour or 217,248,000,000 pound per year or 98,542,035 metric ton.  The graph above is expressed in millions (M) of (Thousand metric tons). so 98,542,035 is 98,500 Thousand metric tons.... to get to only 1M, you would need to keep that rate for 10 years. So to get to north American level of emission, you would need 50 years at the rate of replacing 3 coal plant per year with nuclear.

In conclusion, if CO2 was really a major issue, we would not spend that money for nothing but would build nuclear power like crazy.

Remember, those are dollar amount for only the USA climate spending and did a rough calculation just to put some perspective on how much real impact we could have with that amount of money.

Help needed - Education

To all my skeptic friends... I need your help.

I am confronted every day with people who only saw one side of the climate debate. Only the alarmist view, nothing more.

The only thing they know about the skeptics is that we don't believe the climate is changing and we are all paid by some evil industry somewhere!
Anyway, you know what I am talking about.


Here's where I need help... I want to build a library of articles and video where we can point someone willing to see the other side of the issue (skeptic view) and be willing to learn.

But I don't want them to start with something that will turn them off, I want to present things as a learning curve where they will learn first what is CO2 and how is temperature measured, for example... I don't want to present them with the conclusion that most of us know that took decades of following debates and reading everything available made possible.

I want to start them soft, show them slowly some facts that the alarmist side are not showing, something that will slowly help them understand the debate and not turn them off to the other point of view while only dismissing us like we are all crazy people!

So... I would like you to comment below this post and propose articles, podcast and video that can help the general public understand this debate, without turning them off.

Thanks for the help!

Simon

Canada and it's national CO2 target... a joke?

Did you know that Canada signed the Copenhagen Accord in December 2009, thereby committing to reducing its GHG emissions to 17% below 2005 levels by 2020.

What does this means exactly... what will be the impact if Canada manage to do this?

Here's the graph from environment Canada:

Look at the scale on the left side... Wow!  Megatonnes of CO2... that's huge right?

Ok... let's put some perspective on this... 1000 Megatonnes is 1 Gigatonne.. or 1Gt.  So far with me?

According to the IPCC own calculation, you would need 2.12 Gt of CO2 per year to increase the atmospheric content by 1 PPM. 

So the whole of Canada emissions today is around 0.75 Gt, this gives us 0.35 PPM increase per year according to this calculation.  Wow... a big number!  But wait... the target is to reduce by 17% compared to the 2005 level... which is around 621 or 0.621 Gt per year.  Again in PPM this is 0.29 PPM... or a big reduction of 0.06 PPM per year.  The atmosphere today is around 400 PPM... so what is 0.06 PPM difference make?

Let's look at a graph of the CO2 seasonal variation and compare this...

If you zoom in on the seasonal uptake, which is the amount of CO2 the world plants and ocean consume.. it's around 6 PPM in 2014... so nature naturally reduces the CO2 PPM in the atmosphere by a factor of 100 times more every season that what would would achieve if we were to meet the reduction targets.

So this target compared to the amount already in the atmosphere and the natural variability is pretty much in the noise level... right... but how do Canada emissions compared to the world then.

Here's the Global emissions per regions in the world:

The Y axis is in M... this is for each 1M is equal to 1Gt... that's right... 1M is already above the total emissions of the whole of Canada which is 0.75M or 0.75Gt of CO2.

Look at east Asia and pacific region... them alone are emitting 13M or 13Gt... this is like 17 times more that the whole of Canada!

For the whole world, we emit close to 35M or 35Gt of CO2 annually... So Canada is emitting around 2% of global emission... do you think that reducing from 0.75Gt to 0.621Gt per year will make any difference globally?  Probably not! It would actually be a 0.37% reduction per year globally.

Can we calculate the impact on global temperature? Well, according to some theory... we have what is called climate sensitivity numbers... this is how much warming in °C a doubling of CO2 (PPM) will bring to the world...

Here's how this number evolved over the years:

So... the latest studies places this number around or below 2°C... so let us play the alarmist playbook and take the 2°C number for a doubling of CO2...

This is compared to a level of 280 PPM, before the industrial revolution!  Ok... so we have a potential of 2°C of warming for adding 280 PPM.  So for each PPM this is 0.007 °C... and we calculated above that Canada reduction would be by 0.06 PPM... 

Therefore, Canada's efforts to reach this very important target will potentially reduce the global temperature by a whooping... READY!  0.000042 °C per year!  WOW... will we save the world!

But let go a bit further... the world emits 35Gt per year of CO2... so this would be 35/2.12 = 16.5 PPM added every year to the global CO2... if all those numbers are right... right?

But look at the above graph (real measurement data in Hawai)... the red line... here's the section... CO2 is increasing by a bit less than 3 PPM per year... not by 16.5... so where is the 13.5 PPM going?  We see that the earth is capturing around 6 PPM per year... I will leave you think a little about this...

So take all the above number with a grain of salt... meaning that they are probably 2-3 time too much....

In conclusion, if I was the prime minister of Canada... I would not worry too much about all that and for sure would not spend billions on this climate non-sense!

Sommes-nous plus résilients aux changements climatiques?

Comme a mon habitude, quand je vois quelque chose d'intéressant sur Twitter, je le republie... avec ou sans commentaire... dans ce cas-ci avec commentaire... donc voici ce qui a déclenché certaine question, qui je crois mérite des clarifications.

Voici le post que j'ai trouvé intéressant:

More people worldwide are safer from extreme weather events. http://t.co/TcmFRjZNiP #Joaquin pic.twitter.com/9K4n6MvBH3

— HumanProgress.org (@humanprogress) October 3, 2015

Ce graphique montre le nombre de morts, causé par les événements climatiques/météo extrêmes.

Le commentaire fait sur le Re-Tweet est:

The more energy we have the more we are safe from weather events.

Quelque point de clarification... qui est impossible a faire sur Twitter en 140 caractères ou moins... d'où la nécessité  parfois d'expliquer les choses en détail sur un blog post!

Si l'on remonte a la source de l'information, ou trouve que ce graphique est basé sur cette étude.

Dans cette étude, l'on trouve ce graphique avec ces références.  Donc le site human progress s’est basé sur ce graphique.

Les références sont:
15)
EM-DAT: The OFDA/CRED International Disaster Database. Université Catholique de Louvain, Brussels, Belgium. Available at: http://www.em-dat.net. Data downloaded Aug 24, 2009

18)
McEvedy C, Jones R. . New York, N.Y.: Penguin; 1978.

19)World Resources Institute. . Available at: www.wri.org.Accessed Aug 24, 2009

Il est à noter que la figure 1 dans la même étude est aussi très importante pour comprendre le contexte:

Il est intéressant de lire le texte relié à la figure 1... Voici son extrait:

Some advocates of greenhouse gas controls have asserted, without proof, that much of the increases in recent decades could be due to global warming. However, one should expect that even if there were no change in climate or climate variability, the proportion of events recorded in EM-DAT would increase over the decades with (a) the advance of telecommunications, (b) broader news coverage, (c) globalization of international  aid,  and  (d)  an  increased  tendency  by  authorities  to declare natural disaster emergencies for a variety of reasons 

Je suis parfaitement en accord avec ces interprétations des données.

Donc malgré cette "croissance" des catastrophes naturelles... de moins en moins de morts en nombre absolu  "Death per year (in 1000s)" et en nombre relatif a la population "Death rates per yr (per million)" diminue.

Voici quelques pistes d'explication trouvée dans l'étude: (Je recommande de lire l'étude pour plus de détail).  J'ai mis en gras les passages qui supportent mon commentaire ajouté au Re-Tweet.

The remarkable 99.8% drop in annual drought fatalities indicates  that  the  increases  in  available  food  supplies  outstripped even the unprecedented population increases of the 20  century.

The remarkable increase in food supplies occurred for a number of reasons: (a) Greater use of existing technologies (e.g., irrigation and fertilization) and the development of new technologies (e.g., the suite of technologies constituting the Green Revolution) increased crop yields on the farm, and reduced pre-and post-harvest losses and wastage at every stage of the food chain. (b) Expanded commerce allowed food to move rapidly and in unprecedented quantities from surplus  areas  to  deficit  areas.  (c)  Greater  wealth  increased  the purchasing  power  of  consumers  and  governments  in  developing countries, allowing   imports   to   compensate   for   shortfalls   in production.  It  also  allowed  developed  countries  and  charities  to establish food aid programs to help out in both chronically food-short areas and during emergencies. (d) Essential to all of these factors was increased   availability   of   relatively   cheap   electricity   and petroleum-based fuel and other products for transportation, fertilizer, food packaging, refrigeration, and pesticides

The 89.8% decline in annual flood fatalities between 1900–89 and  1990–2008  possibly  reflects  better  control,  prevention,  and management  of  floods  through  construction  of  dams  and  other infrastructure, supplemented by better emergency response measures facilitated   by   improvements   in   transportation   systems,   flood forecasting, and management of water facilities, among other things.

Donc il est clair que toutes ces améliorations sont directement reliées à une plus grande utilisation des énergies de toutes sortes.

Il est aussi important de comprendre que plus de 90% de l'énergie utilisée en 2011 (92%) provient des sources suivantes (par ordre d'importance) : Pétrole, Charbon, Gaz, biomasse. Toutes ces sources dégagent du CO2.  Les prévisions pour 2035 restent au niveau de 87% pour ces sources fossiles.

Il est très clair aussi que les énergies fossiles jouent un roule très important et primordial dans tout ce qui est mis en gras ci-haut.

En conclusion de cette étude, il est intéressant de lire:

Many   environmentalists   and   like-minded   politicians   have proposed   the   expenditure   of   trillions   of   dollars   to   reduce anthropogenic greenhouse gases. One stated rationale is to forestall hypothetical  future  increases  in  mortality  from  global  warming- induced increases in extreme weather events projected by questionable climate models. The result would be to diminish, if not curtail, the economic development and hydrocarbon-fueled technology that has resulted in enormous actual reductions in such mortality. In  contrast,  human  well-being  could  be  greatly  improved  by devoting  much  smaller  sums  to  alleviating  the  health  and  safety problems responsible for most premature mortality (see Table 2).

 Quelques questions qui avaient été posées avec tentatives de réponses:

1. En valeur absolue ou relative?
2. Qu'est-ce qu’on inclut comme étant attribué aux changements climatiques et qu'est-ce qui ne l'est pas? Y a-t-il consensus là-dessus au moins?
3. Est-ce qu'on tient compte des améliorations technologiques de protection contre les catastrophes climatiques?
4. N'est-ce pas un peu comme les accidents mortels d'auto qui diminuent alors que le parc automobile ne cesse d'augmenter...?

Réponses:

1) Le graphique de l'étude montre les deux... relatif à la population mondiale et absolue en millier.

2) Ici il faudrait définir "changement climatique"  Il existe 3 définitions courantes:

1. IPCC:
1. Climate change in IPCC usage refers to a change in the state of the climate that can be identified (e.g. using statistical tests) by changes in the mean and/or the variability of its properties, and that persists for an extended period, typically decades or longer. It refers to any change in climate over time, whether due to natural variability or as a result of human activity
2. United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC)
1. Climate change refers to a change of climate that is attributed directly or indirectly to human activity that alters the composition of the global atmosphere and that is in addition to natural climate variability observed over comparable time periods. 
3. Dictionnaire Oxford:
1. A change in global or regional climate patterns, in particular a change apparent from the mid to late 20th century onwards and attributed largely to the increased levels of atmospheric carbon dioxide produced by the use of fossil fuels.

Il est intéressant ici de noter que la définition de changement climatique est directement reliée à l'homme et que les variations "naturelles" sont par définition mise de côté, sauf dans le cas du IPCC qui le mentionne, mais conclue dans ces rapports que l'homme est responsable en grande partie.

Est-ce qu'il y a consensus?
Le débat est ici, et c'est beaucoup trop long à expliquer, mais je pointerais sur ce site pour s'informer. Il existe clairement deux camps.  Celui des alarmistes qui prétendent que le consensus existe et que l'homme est responsable.  Et l'autre camp qui prouve à coups d'étude et d'explication (comme le site ci-haut explique) que le consensus n'existe pas et que les variations climatiques sont en grande majorité, voire plus naturelle qu'anthropogénique. Mais de quel coté l'on se place dépend beaucoup de notre idéologie philosophique de départ... somme nous humaniste ou anti-humaniste?

3) C'est bien expliquer plus haut

4) Je dirais que oui... malgré (ou causé par) de l'augmentation de la population, nous devenons plus sécuritaire... c'est le propre de l'humanité de s’améliorer grâce au génie humain.

En conclusion: (voir références plus bas)
1) Je crois fermement que les "changements climatiques" sont en grande majorité de sources naturelles.

2) Je crois fermement que l'augmentation de CO2 dans l'atmosphère est positive pour la biosphère.

3) Je crois fermement que le génie humain trouvera des solutions à tout ce qui est devant lui. 

Références: Quelques sources d'informations qui supportent mes conclusions:
1) Mes Tweet
2) Ces livres (pour nommer seulement les derniers que j'ai lus)

• The Moral Case for Fossil Fuels
• The rational optimist
• The Deliberate Corruption of Climate Science

3) Ces sites web: (petits échantillons)

• http://wattsupwiththat.com/
• http://judithcurry.com/
• http://climateaudit.org/

3) Ces vidéos: (les plus intéressants)

• http://climateconference.heartland.org/
• Why You Should Love Fossil Fuel | Alex Epstein and Stefan Molyneux 
• Nobel Laureate Smashes the Global Warming Hoax
• Michael Crichton | States of Fear: Science or Politics?
• George Carlin - Saving the Planet
• Tim Ball - The Deliberate Corruption of Climate Science

Hydrogen from sunlight?

This could be some good news, but...

Artificial leaf harnesses sunlight for efficient fuel production

Generating and storing renewable energy, such as solar or wind power, is a key barrier to a clean-energy economy. 

Basically, you have a cell that with sunlight will produce oxygen and hydrogen.  You can do that today efficiently with many different technology like we see below (source) 

So the question is, can this new technology match what we already can do?

Reading the article in details, you can see that you need those raw components :

• Electrodes
• titanium dioxide
• nickel-molybdenum
• gallium arsenide
• Membrane
• Plastic (oil from fossil fuel)

All those need to be mined, extracted, processed with energy mostly from fossil fuels based technology.

Those cells will only work when the sun is shining. Can only convert 10% of sunlight and works for 40 hours... So, it's costly, inefficient and produce waste.  

Quite typical of "Green" energy I would say.

Will this be able to compete with existing technology to produce hydrogen?  Probably not without large subsidies.

Comments?

Nexen pipeline leak in Alberta

How to report the news!

I was reading those news headlines and was wondering how the news was reported.  This is a good example of ALARM-ISM or how to report the news  in a way to make it appear more emotional and catastrophic.

This spill happened around the week of July 13th 2015, in Alberta near Fort McMurray.

You can read headlines like those on :
CBC.ca :

Nexen pipeline leak in Alberta spills 5 million litres
Nexen Energy spill south of Fort McMurray covers about 16,000 square metres

 Here's the detail of the article with my highlights I want to discuss:

One of the largest leaks in Alberta history has spilled about five million litres of emulsion from a Nexen Energy pipeline at the company's Long Lake oilsands facility south of Fort McMurray.

The leak was discovered Wednesday afternoon.

Nexen said in a statement its emergency response plan has been activated and personnel were onsite. The leak has been stabilized, the company said.

The spill covered an area of about 16,000 square metres, mostly within the pipeline corridor, the company said. Emulsion is a mixture of bitumen, water and sand.

The pipeline that leaked is called a "feeder" and runs from a wellhead to the processing plant.

"All necessary steps and precautions have been taken, and Nexen will continue to utilize all its resources to protect the health and safety of our employees, contractors, the public and the environment, and to contain and clean up the spill," the company said in the statement issued Thursday.

Peter Murchland, public affairs manager for the Alberta Energy Regulator, said officials were notified late Wednesday and had staff onsite Thursday to work with Nexen.

"My understanding is that the pipeline and pad site had been isolated and shut-in earlier today, effectively stopping the source of the release," Murchland said

Nexen has contained the leak and started cleaning up the area, he said. There was no word on how long that might take.

"They go through a cleanup phase in accordance with the regulations set by the AER," he said. "And we'll have our subject-matter experts work alongside the operator, today and going forward, to make sure that safety and environmental requirements are met."

The regulator's staff are there to oversee the company's cleanup efforts. Murchland said there have been no reports about any effect on wildlife. The regulator has ordered the company to implement a wildlife protection plan.
Premiers talks focus on energy, pipelines

Greenpeace issued a statement Thursday condemning Alberta's history of pipeline spills.

"As provincial premiers talk about ways to streamline the approval process for new tar sands pipelines, we have a stark reminder of how dangerous they can be," Greenpeace said in a news release.

Canada's premiers are meeting in St. John's, where a major topic of discussion is a national energy strategy.

"This leak is also a good reminder that Alberta has a long way to go to address its pipeline problems, and that communities have good reasons to fear having more built," said Greenpeace communications officer Peter Louwe. "New pipelines would also facilitate the expansion of the tarsands — Canada's fastest-growing source of carbon emissions — and accelerate the climate crisis even more.

"We need to stop new pipeline projects before they're built and focus on building renewable sources of energy that are sustainable and won't threaten communities, our environment, and the planet."

In April 2011, a Plains Midstream Canada ULC pipeline leaked 4.5 million litres of crude oil near a First Nations community in northwest Alberta.

That leak was the largest in the province in 35 years. It contaminated more than three hectares of beaver ponds and muskeg in a densely forested area.

So let's take the highlights one by one

• largest leaks in Alberta history
• Largest by how much, double, triple?  Just saying largest is a bit misleading. The article talks about the second largest at the end which was for 4.5 million litres instead of "around" 5.  So not a big difference considering you probably estimated the 5 million.  
• five million litres
• There are many ways of measuring volumes.  But if you want to capture the imagination using litres is the way to go!  5 millions, OMG.  5 millions litres is also 5000 cubic meter, less alarming.  Or another way of putting it, it's 8 seconds of the discharge of the nearby Athabaska river.  You can also measure it in barrels of oil, which is around 42 thousand.  For a comparison,  the proposed keystone XL pipeline would carry 830,000 barrels per day (1).  So this would be a spill of less than 2h of this pipeline. Ok enough said on the volume!
• Covered an area of about 16,000 square metres
• Here's another way of using as large a number as you can. What other area measure can you use?  You could have used 0.016 km^2.   Or you could have compared it to the area of Alberta in percentage...  0.0000024% (3) of Alberta was temporarily covered by oil that will be removed soon... Oh sorry, this is not alarming enough!  
• There was no word on how long that might take. 
•  The company web page is keeping the public informed on a daily basis of the progress of the clean-up: http://www.nexencnoocltd.com/en/Operations/OilSands/PipelineFailure.aspx
• no reports about any effect on wildlife.
•  This is a very small area and any animals probably already left.  According to steps taken, there's a lot of monitoring and measures taken to keep the wildlife away.
• As of July 28th: Continued wildlife monitoring, A single deceased mallard was found in the release area. The mallard was heavily decomposed and it is believed that it was deceased prior to the release. Nexen has notified the applicable regulators.
• Greenpeace... how dangerous they can be
•  I don't have great respect for this organization, taking every opportunity to destroy the reputation of companies they don't like.  Did they offer their help to protect the environment?  They have budgets of million of dollar, they could have sent a crew of people to help minimize the spill... nope!
• Pipelines remains the safest way to transport oil 

• We are getting better and better at transporting it (4)

•  "We need to stop new pipeline projects before they're built and focus on building renewable sources of energy that are sustainable and won't threaten communities, our environment, and the planet." 
• Please wake up greenpeace... renewable like wind and solar cannot be used to replace oil in all those services it provides:

1. Finished Motor Gasoline (51.4% – a bit more than the national average)
2. Distillate Fuel Oil (15.3%)
3. Jet Fuel (12.3%)
4. Still Gas (5.4%)
5. Marketable Coke (5.0%)
6. Residual Fuel Oil (3.3%)
7. Liquid Refinery Gas (2.8%)
8. Asphalt and Road Oil (1.7%)
9. Other Refined Products (1.5%)
10. Lubricants (0.9%)

•  Maybe we can use a bit more electric cars, but we are not there yet.  Maybe we can produce all those product by other means, but nothing proven and economically viable exist.

 Conclusions:

1. We need to put things in perspective.
2. This spill is not that important and clean-up is under way
3. We are getting cleaner and cleaner
4. Demand for oil will only grow since we have a growing population that needs it to get out of poverty and since we don't have yet other resources to use instead.
5. We need to concentrate on better detection and automatic valve closure to prevent those inside a few seconds of detection.  This is where we need more R&D and regulations. 

 References:

(1) http://www.todayifoundout.com/index.php/2014/04/large-barrel-oil-measure-way/ 

(2) http://www.nexencnoocltd.com/en/AboutUs/MediaCentre/NewsReleases/News/Release.aspx?year=2015&release_id=B20D782F81434D58889FAE403811D758

(3) http://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=%2816000+square+meters%29++%2F+%28area+of+alberta+canada%29+*+100

(4) http://www.eoearth.org/view/article/161057/