enviro articles for reading and possibly for AP#4

The following two articles are merely for you to reference, in hopes of increasing your knowledge about the current global warming debate and environmental crisis. These articles also may be used as your source for your ARTICLE PAPER #4, due Wed. 11/25.



Two New Visions for America's Energy Future
By Matt Kallman
Published: 07-22-2008
Source: http://earthtrends.wri.org/updates/node/323


Speaking before an enthusiastic crowd at a sold-out DAR Constitution Hall in Washington, D.C., former Vice President Al Gore issued a challenge to "repower America." Gore's challenge is undoubtedly ambitious: he wants the entire U.S. electricity sector to shift to zero-carbon sources like wind, solar, and geothermal in the next 10 years.

While many energy experts reacted to his challenge with skepticism, Gore believes that he has set an "achievable, affordable and transformative" goal. He noted that whereas the price of fossil fuels like oil, coal and natural gas rise as demand increases, the price of wind, solar and geothermal will decrease as renewable energy demand expands. Currently, fossil fuels provide more than 90 percent of electricity in the United States (see Figure 1).

Figure 1. U.S. electricity generation by source, 2007.

Oil, coal, and natural gas provide more than 90 percent of the United States' electricity.

As for as the short time horizon he has established, Gore remarked that "ten years is about the maximum time that we as a nation can hold a steady aim and hit our target." He then referenced the Apollo space program, which put a man on the moon only eight years after President Kennedy set his own ten-year goal.

Many observers also noticed a slight if apparent shift in Gore's thinking. While he had until recently focused on climate change as the single defining "planetary emergency" of our time, his new talking points underscore that most solutions to the climate crisis overlap with solutions to our energy security, fossil-fuel dependence, and economic recession. He now highlights the "common thread" between these our economic, environmental, and national security problems, saying, "We're borrowing money from China to buy oil from the Persian Gulf to burn it in ways that destroy the planet."

Gore emphasized that one of the prerequisites for his vision of a clean energy future is a massive overhaul and expansion of the United States' electricity transmission infrastructure. The majority of the country's renewable resources are located far from most large cities. Winds blow strongly through the flatlands of the Midwest, and the sun shines brightly in the deserts of the Southwest, but both areas are home to few electricity demand centers.

Another recent "energy challenge" also emphasizes the important of renewing America's transmission infrastructure, but comes from an unlikely source. T. Boone Pickens, a well-known Texas oilman and prospector, made a fortune in fossil fuels but is now a leading advocate for wind power. Wary of transferring $700 billion annually to oil-exporting nations, Pickens is primarily motivated by security concerns. He has repeatedly said that he is not an environmentalist, but is out to make money, and sees a bright future for zero-emission electricity generation. His new plan calls for producing all of the country's electricity from wind power, and shifting natural gas reserves for use in automobiles. Mesa Power, his energy company, has already begun development of a multibillion-dollar, 4 MW wind farm in Texas.

Neither challenge will be easy to meet. The political and economic barriers to widespread adoption of carbon-free electricity generation are great. Solar and wind, which experiencing rapid growth in the past few years, are nonetheless growing from minuscule base when compared with fossil fuels.

Yet some see a shifting paradigm. Ever-higher oil prices are pushing up natural gas prices, and even cheap and dirty coal has seen some price rises. Legislation imposing a price on carbon went to the floor of the U.S. Senate for the first time this year, and may become law when a new administration enters office in January. These factors, when coupled with an economy in recession, may provoke the needed investment in clean sources of electricity – and, perhaps more importantly, may bring political will in line for a "repowered" American future.




The Climate for Change
By Al Gore
Published: 11-9-2008
Source: The New York Times, http://www.nytimes.com/2008/11/09/opinion/09gore.html?partner=permalink&exprod=permalink


The inspiring and transformative choice by the American people to elect Barack Obama as our 44th president lays the foundation for another fateful choice that he -- and we -- must make this January to begin an emergency rescue of human civilization from the imminent and rapidly growing threat posed by the climate crisis.

The electrifying redemption of America's revolutionary declaration that all human beings are born equal sets the stage for the renewal of United States leadership in a world that desperately needs to protect its primary endowment: the integrity and livability of the planet.

The world authority on the climate crisis, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, after 20 years of detailed study and four unanimous reports, now says that the evidence is "unequivocal." To those who are still tempted to dismiss the increasingly urgent alarms from scientists around the world, ignore the melting of the north polar ice cap and all of the other apocalyptic warnings from the planet itself, and who roll their eyes at the very mention of this existential threat to the future of the human species, please wake up. Our children and grandchildren need you to hear and recognize the truth of our situation, before it is too late.

Here is the good news: the bold steps that are needed to solve the climate crisis are exactly the same steps that ought to be taken in order to solve the economic crisis and the energy security crisis.

Economists across the spectrum -- including Martin Feldstein and Lawrence Summers -- agree that large and rapid investments in a jobs-intensive infrastructure initiative is the best way to revive our economy in a quick and sustainable way. Many also agree that our economy will fall behind if we continue spending hundreds of billions of dollars on foreign oil every year. Moreover, national security experts in both parties agree that we face a dangerous strategic vulnerability if the world suddenly loses access to Middle Eastern oil.

As Abraham Lincoln said during America's darkest hour, "The occasion is piled high with difficulty, and we must rise with the occasion. As our case is new, so we must think anew, and act anew." In our present case, thinking anew requires discarding an outdated and fatally flawed definition of the problem we face.

Thirty-five years ago this past week, President Richard Nixon created Project Independence, which set a national goal that, within seven years, the United States would develop "the potential to meet our own energy needs without depending on any foreign energy sources." His statement came three weeks after the Arab oil embargo had sent prices skyrocketing and woke America to the dangers of dependence on foreign oil. And -- not coincidentally -- it came only three years after United States domestic oil production had peaked.

At the time, the United States imported less than a third of its oil from foreign countries. Yet today, after all six of the presidents succeeding Nixon repeated some version of his goal, our dependence has doubled from one-third to nearly two-thirds -- and many feel that global oil production is at or near its peak.

Some still see this as a problem of domestic production. If we could only increase oil and coal production at home, they argue, then we wouldn't have to rely on imports from the Middle East. Some have come up with even dirtier and more expensive new ways to extract the same old fuels, like coal liquids, oil shale, tar sands and "clean coal" technology.

But in every case, the resources in question are much too expensive or polluting, or, in the case of "clean coal," too imaginary to make a difference in protecting either our national security or the global climate. Indeed, those who spend hundreds of millions promoting "clean coal" technology consistently omit the fact that there is little investment and not a single large-scale demonstration project in the United States for capturing and safely burying all of this pollution. If the coal industry can make good on this promise, then I'm all for it. But until that day comes, we simply cannot any longer base the strategy for human survival on a cynical and self-interested illusion.

Here's what we can do -- now: we can make an immediate and large strategic investment to put people to work replacing 19th-century energy technologies that depend on dangerous and expensive carbon-based fuels with 21st-century technologies that use fuel that is free forever: the sun, the wind and the natural heat of the earth.

What follows is a five-part plan to repower America with a commitment to producing 100 percent of our electricity from carbon-free sources within 10 years. It is a plan that would simultaneously move us toward solutions to the climate crisis and the economic crisis -- and create millions of new jobs that cannot be outsourced.

First, the new president and the new Congress should offer large-scale investment in incentives for the construction of concentrated solar thermal plants in the Southwestern deserts, wind farms in the corridor stretching from Texas to the Dakotas and advanced plants in geothermal hot spots that could produce large amounts of electricity.

Second, we should begin the planning and construction of a unified national smart grid for the transport of renewable electricity from the rural places where it is mostly generated to the cities where it is mostly used. New high-voltage, low-loss underground lines can be designed with "smart" features that provide consumers with sophisticated information and easy-to-use tools for conserving electricity, eliminating inefficiency and reducing their energy bills. The cost of this modern grid -- $400 billion over 10 years -- pales in comparison with the annual loss to American business of $120 billion due to the cascading failures that are endemic to our current balkanized and antiquated electricity lines.

Third, we should help America's automobile industry (not only the Big Three but the innovative new startup companies as well) to convert quickly to plug-in hybrids that can run on the renewable electricity that will be available as the rest of this plan matures. In combination with the unified grid, a nationwide fleet of plug-in hybrids would also help to solve the problem of electricity storage. Think about it: with this sort of grid, cars could be charged during off-peak energy-use hours; during peak hours, when fewer cars are on the road, they could contribute their electricity back into the national grid.

Fourth, we should embark on a nationwide effort to retrofit buildings with better insulation and energy-efficient windows and lighting. Approximately 40 percent of carbon dioxide emissions in the United States come from buildings -- and stopping that pollution saves money for homeowners and businesses. This initiative should be coupled with the proposal in Congress to help Americans who are burdened by mortgages that exceed the value of their homes.

Fifth, the United States should lead the way by putting a price on carbon here at home, and by leading the world's efforts to replace the Kyoto treaty next year in Copenhagen with a more effective treaty that caps global carbon dioxide emissions and encourages nations to invest together in efficient ways to reduce global warming pollution quickly, including by sharply reducing deforestation.

Of course, the best way -- indeed the only way -- to secure a global agreement to safeguard our future is by re-establishing the United States as the country with the moral and political authority to lead the world toward a solution.