Archives de catégorie : energy and fields

better to know...?, energy and fields

How Wind And Solar Sent Energy Prices Sky-High in ‘Green’ Countries

by B. Lomborg, May 8, 2025 in ClimateChangeDispatch 

Ask families in Germany and the UK what happens when more and more supposedly “cheap” solar and wind power is added to the national power mix, and they can tell you by looking at their utility bills: It gets far more expensive. [emphasis, links added]

The idea that power should get cheaper as we get more green energy is only true if we exclusively use electricity when the sun is shining and the wind is blowing.

But modern societies need power around the clock. When there is no sun and wind, green energy needs plenty of backup, often powered by fossil fuels. What this means is that we pay for not one but two power systems.

And as the backup fossil fuel power sources are used less, they need to earn their capital costs back in fewer hours, leading to even more expensive power.

This means the real energy costs of solar and wind are far higher.

One study looking at China showed that the real cost of solar power on average turns out to be twice as high as coal, while a peer-reviewed study of Germany and Texas shows solar and wind are many times more expensive than fossil fuels.

Germany and the UK now have so much “low-cost” solar and wind that their electricity costs have become among the world’s most expensive.

The latest data from the International Energy Agency make it clear that there is a strong and clear correlation between more solar and wind and much higher average energy prices for households and industries.

In a country with little or no solar and wind, the average electricity cost is a bit over 11¢ per kilowatt-hour.

For every 10 percentage points of solar and wind, the cost increases by more than 4¢. The results are nearly similar for 2019, before any impacts of COVID and the Ukraine war.

Look at Germany, where 34¢ per kWh is more than twice the US cost and nearly four times the Chinese price.

Countries that use a higher percentage of solar and wind power tend to have higher energy prices per household. Mike Guillen/NY Post Design

Germany has installed so much solar and wind that, at full capacity, it could produce two times Germany’s electricity demand.

…

energy and fields

Have The Intermittent Energy Blackouts Begun?

by F. Menton, May 1, 2025 in WUWT

Today there have been widespread electricity blackouts across Europe, beginning in Spain and Portugal in the early afternoon (local time), and then spreading to other countries including France, Andorra, Belgium and the Netherlands. Is this related to the increasing penetration of intermittent generation from wind and solar facilities?

For years, many in the climate skeptic community have warned that expansion of intermittent renewable electricity generation on the grid will, sooner or later, lead to frequent blackouts. The reason for the warning is easy to understand: The grid has some rather exacting operational requirements that the intermittent renewable generation technologies cannot fulfill. Primary among these requirements are, first, minute-by-minute matching of electricity supply with electricity demand and, second, grid-wide synchronization of the frequency of the alternating current. When wind and solar provided relatively small portions of the electricity consumed, other generation sources, particularly thermal (fossil fuel) and hydro, would fulfill these requirements. But as wind and solar come to dominate generation, the problems become much more difficult to solve.

Here at Manhattan Contrarian, I have mostly steered clear of covering this topic. Although I think I understand the main issues, I am certainly not a grid engineer. And there are many smart people who are engineers and who have the job of “balancing” the grid to keep it consistently up and running in the face of the challenges of intermittent wind and solar generation. Maybe they can succeed. I doubt it. But I definitely have wanted to avoid “crying wolf,” predicting over and over that frequent blackouts are imminent, only to find that the engineers have come up with solutions that seem to work reasonably well.

…

energy and fields

China Breaks Pledge To Stop Building Coal Power Plants Abroad

by I. Slav, Apr 30, 2025 in ClimateChangeDispatch 

China is still building new coal-powered generation capacity abroad despite a pledge made in 2021 to stop it and focus on transition technology.

According to a new report by climate think tank Global Energy Monitor, China is involved in 88% of new coal power capacity projects in the new BRICS members. [emphasis, links added]

“Chinese firms are backing 7.7 GW of new coal, virtually all found in Indonesia, despite President Xi’s pledge to end support for overseas coal projects,” Global Energy Monitor said.

Yet China is also backing a lot of transition capacity, accounting for about half of the solar power capacity under construction, or 947 MW, as well as close to 90% of wind power capacity, or 601 MW.

The new BRICS members are Indonesia, Belarus, Bolivia, Kazakhstan, Cuba, Malaysia, Thailand, Uganda, Uzbekistan, and Nigeria.

New power generation projects across the new BRICS members are mostly hydrocarbon forms of capacity, the climate think tank also reported, noting that the total oil, gas, and coal capacity under construction across the 10 new members amounts to 25 GW.

Wind and solar capacity under construction, on the other hand, stands at a measly 2.3 GW.

Close to two-thirds of all the new capacity under construction in the new BRICS members, hydrocarbon and alternative, features Chinese state-owned companies, Global Energy Monitor also reported.

“There’s a real risk of sending these countries down the wrong path by investing in coal, gas, and oil,” Global Energy Monitor’s project manager for the think tank’s Global Integrated Power Tracker told Reuter

energy and fields

‘Electric Vehicles: The Good, The Bad And The Ugly’ Exposes The Dark Side Of EVs

by L. Elder, Apr 24, 2025 in ClimateChangeDispatch

 

A new documentary challenges the claimed environmental benefits of EVs over gas-powered cars.

Electric Vehicles: The Good, The Bad And The Ugly movie
Are electric vehicles better for the planet than gasoline-powered vehicles? This is the question we explore in my new documentary “Electric Vehicles: The Good, the Bad and the Ugly.”

Whether one agrees with former President Joe Biden, who calls climate change “an existential threat,” or whether one agrees with the late physicist Freeman Dyson, who dismissed Al Gore and his “An Inconvenient Truth” as “lousy science,” this question remains: are electric vehicles better for planet Earth than “gas guzzlers”? [emphasis, links added]

After all, fossil-fuel-generated energy is required to manufacture an electric vehicle and then to transport it to the dealership. The electricity required to charge it comes mostly from fossil-fuel-generated power.

Electric vehicles are a triumph of technology, with incredible features. They are quiet, fast, and fun to drive. The self-driving feature, while not foolproof, will likely save lives because human driving errors are more common. (There are some gas-powered cars with a similar feature.)

There are concerns about the driving range, as well as the availability of charging stations for long drives.

Right now, an EV compared to a gas-powered car of similar size may be more expensive. There are still tax incentives available, but they may be reduced, if not phased out at some point.

With the more expensive purchase price, mandates to buy an EV or to restrict the sale of gas cars stand to hurt those less well off.

Then there is the China factor. The computer chips required for the EV disproportionately come from China.

The minerals in the batteries — lithium, nickel, cobalt, and manganese — are mined, processed, and manufactured in China or places under China’s control, such as the Democratic Republic of the Congo.

Take cobalt in the Congo.

Two years ago, NPR wrote “How ‘modern-day slavery’ in the Congo powers the rechargeable battery economy.” It featured the work of Siddharth Kara, author of the book “Cobalt Red.” Kara said:

“People (including children) are working in subhuman, grinding, degrading conditions. They use pickaxes, shovels, stretches of rebar to hack and scrounge at the earth in trenches and pits and tunnels to gather cobalt and feed it up the formal supply chain. … Cobalt is toxic to touch and breathe — and there are hundreds of thousands of poor Congolese (workers) touching and breathing it day in and day out. Young mothers with babies strapped to their backs, all breathing in this toxic cobalt dust. … There’s complete cross-contamination between industrial excavator-derived cobalt and cobalt dug by women and children with their bare hands (for $1 or $2 a day).”

…

energy and fields

Wake Physics: Large Wind Farms Are Making Downstream Turbines Unprofitable

by P. Gosselin, Apr 20, 2025 in NoTricksZone 

A virtual wake-up call for the wind power industry. Two companies are sounding the alarm as they risk losing a lot of money.

Although they are not making losses yet, they are earning less. It’s about the the wake effect on wind farms by other wind farms.

Windmesse.de

The expansion of offshore wind energy in the North Sea is a central component of the European energy transition. However, two of the biggest players in the industry are now warning of negative effects: Ørsted and Equinor have jointly calculated that the planned 1.5 gigawatt wind farm ‘Outer Dowsing’ could cause significant so-called wake losses. These are yield losses that occur when the wind is weakened by upstream wind farms, causing downstream turbines to produce less electricity.

The two companies estimate that their existing wind farm projects in the British part of the North Sea could lose up to 361 million pounds – the equivalent of around 422 million euros – in the long term as a result of the new wind farm. The wind farms already in operation, which are dependent on constant wind conditions in order to achieve their planned output and ensure profitability, will be particularly affected.”

The phenomenon is called the wake effect and it is by no means new, as you can see in the Sciencemediacenter, an article from 2012:

The existence of wind turbine wakes has been known for decades. For smaller wind turbines and onshore wind farms, it for a long time was not considered to be so important. With the increasing size of individual wind turbines (multi-MW turbines) and larger wind farms in recent years, the size and length of the wakes are increasing and becoming increasingly relevant. I pointed this out back in 2010 and developed a simple model that can be used to estimate the length of wind farm wakes. This model shows the dependence of the length of wakes on subsurface roughness and thermal stratification of the air. Wakes of tens of kilometers in length can be predicted for offshore wind farms with stable stratification. Ms. Lundquist’s working group already presented simulation results with the WRF flow model in 2012, some of which show even longer wakes.“

…

better to know...?, energy and fields

“Solar Madness In Germany”: Gigawatt-Hours Of Subsidized Electricity Gets Dumped Abroad For Free”

by  P. Gosselin, Apr 16, 2025 in NoTricksZone

Blackout News here reports on how Germany’s uncontrolled solar production without appropriate storage and consumption models is putting a huge burden on the domestic market and consumers.

At the same time, neighboring countries are benefiting from all the free electricity Germany uncontrollably overproduces and consumers just don’t need!

Image generated by Grok AI

Experts are warning of the collapse of an over-regulated energy system that is increasingly moving away from reality. Germany has significantly expanded its solar PV capacity in recent years. According to the Federal Network Agency (Bundesnetzagentur), the total installed solar PV capacity in Germany reached 99.3 GW at the end of December 2024.

…

better to know...?, energy and fields

Geothermal electricity generation

by C. Morris, Apr 12, 2025 in WUWT

Geothermal power stations are mature technology with proven performance, reliable operation and ideal for baseload generation. The units are synchronous, so they support the grid.  The production from them is considered by most to be renewable. They do not use fossil fuels to provide the heat. It is not “carbon free”, but no generation truly is. It has a relatively small footprint, environment harm is low, and it can coexist with farming or industrial development. Most developments have a cheaper energy cost than onshore wind, using published accounts for analysis. For countries or areas where the resource is there, geothermal generation is very viable.

The resource

Geothermal power stations are very much a niche generation source (only about 15GW worldwide,  from 673 units at 198 fields according to Google), totally dependent on locality. They are mainly associated with plate boundaries, particularly the Pacific Ring of Fire. Compare the plate boundaries and volcanic activity in Figure 1 with station locations in Figure  2

Associated with the plate boundaries and other weak points in the earth’s crust, the deep underlying heat in the mantle can find its way to the surface easier. “Bubbles” of magma can push up to relatively shallow depths. These may force their way to the actual surface as volcanoes with their lava. With the distortion and earth movement from this activity, the crust’s rock formations are deformed and cracked – earthquakes.  Groundwater can enter all the fault cracking in the rocks. This will be heated up by the hot magma, even if that has solidified.

Geothermal resources exploited for power production are the plumes of hot water formed from the heating of this deep groundwater. In geologic terms, such convection systems are short lived – generally lasting between 200 and 450 thousand years. They end because the heat source has gone or the cracking has been filled by precipitated minerals from the circulating water as it cools. The world is full of solidified magma (granite) and prehistoric geothermal systems. Many of the latter are now mined for gold and other precious materials.

…

energy and fields

Is Coal Dead? Surging Demand, Trump’s Recent Push, and China’s Dominance Say Otherwise

by T. Doshi, Mar 31, 2025 in ClimateChangeDispatch

coal freight china
The death of coal, held to be the eldest and ugliest of the three fossil fuel siblings, has long been exaggerated Mark Twain-style. [emphasis, links added]

While oil and natural gas needed to be tolerated for some time in the “energy transition”, dirty coal — responsible for soot, smog, and respiratory disease — was already beyond the pale for many decades in most Western developed countries.

The latest twist in this tale of a death exaggerated starts with a Guardian story on Monday last week. In his trip to China — the world’s largest coal consumer by far, and with no letup in sight — the UK Secretary of State for Energy Security and Net Zero Ed Miliband “is hoping to shape a new global axis in favour of climate action along with China and developing countries, to counter Donald Trump’s abandonment of green policies in the US.”

Then, on Saturday, the Daily Mail reported that Miliband “admits his solar panels bought for English schools and hospitals are Chinese and may be made using coal.”

The hubris and the irony leap out.

The birthplace of coal and the industrial revolution and which once “ruled the waves” of 70% of the globe, Great Britain closed its last coal plant last year. It is number 22 on the list of the world’s largest CO2 emitters, accounting for a puny 0.8% of global emissions.

This pales in comparison to China at number one, spewing out 34% of the world’s emissions, and to the US, the next largest emitter, at 12%.

Apparently, “Mad Ed”, with his folly of climate leadership, still believes that the sheer illustrative example of a net-zero ‘green’ UK will lead the world into ditching fossil fuels.

As my colleague Ben Pile said pithily of Mr. Miliband’s China visit, “Don’t make me laugh.” In an oft-cited statistic, China builds an average of two coal power plants a week.

…

better to know...?, energy and fields

Tech Giants quietly drop renewables and sign pledge to triple Nuclear Power

by Jo Nova, Mar 14, 2025

Renewables are so over

Just like that — the renewables bubble went phht.

After twenty years of hailing wind and solar, suddenly the world’s tech giants are cheering for nuclear power. Worse —  they don’t even mention the words carbon, low emissions or CO2. The new buzzwords are “safe, clean and firm“. They talk about needing energy “round the clock”, and they talk about “energy resilience” — but they don’t saynuclear is “low emissions”. It’s like they want everyone to forget their activism. Did someone say something about climate change?

Meta, Amazon, and Google have flipped like a school of barracuda. Five minutes ago, life on Earth depended on achieving Net-Zero with fleets of wind farms in the sunset, now, they just want energy and lots of it. The big tech fish and their friends have signed a Large Energy Users Pledge admitting that the demand for energy is rising rapidly, that nuclear should triple by 2050 and that large energy users depend on the availability of abundant cheap energy (Small energy users too,  Mr Bezos-Zuckerburg-Pichai.) The closest they come to hinting at the ghost of renewables is when they say they want energy that’s not dependent on “the weather, the season, or the geographical location”.

There’s no “Sorry we got it wrong”. There’s no apology for hectoring us, censoring us, or wasting billions of dollars. It’s just Mr Don’t-Look-Over-Here telling us what most engineers knew for 30 years. This is the billionaire club asking the taxpayers to build them more nuclear plants.

Signatories include Siemens Energy, which suffered a 36% share price fall 18 months ago when it admitted it was losing billions trying to maintain wind turbines.

…

 

better to know...?, energy and fields

CERAWEEK IEA chief sees need for investments in existing oil, gas fields

by T. Gardner, Mar 10, 2025 in Reuters

HOUSTON, March 10 (Reuters) – Fatih Birol, the director of the Paris-based International Energy Agency, said on Monday there is a need for investment in oil and gas fields to support global energy security.
The comment puts the energy watchdog for industrialized nations more in line with President Donald Trump’s pro-drilling agenda, after it came under pressure from fossil fuel advocates years ago for proposing an end to new oil and gas projects.
“I want to make it clear … there would be a need for investment, especially to address the decline in the existing fields,” he said at the CERAWeek energy conference in Houston. “There is a need for oil and gas upstream investments, full stop,” he said.
Birol has been under pressure from Trump’s administration and from the president’s fellow Republicans in Congress for the IEA’s shift in recent years toward a focus on clean energy policy.
In 2021, the IEA said companies should not invest, opens new tab in new coal, oil and gas projects if the international community wants to reach net zero emissions by mid-century to fight climate change. Countering global warming was a key priority for the administration of former President Joe Biden.
…
better to know...?, energy and fields

Peer-Reviewed Study Confirms Wind And Solar Are Far Costlier Than Coal, Natural Gas

by J. Taylor, Mar 4, 2025 in ClimateChangeDispatch

Renewable power advocates often claim wind and solar are less expensive energy sources than coal, natural gas, and nuclear power. [emphasis, links added]

Such a claim begs the question of why the heavily subsidized Ivanpah solar power facility is going out of business, following a long line of other renewable energy project bankruptcies.

Also, why would most of the world continue to build coal power plants if it is more expensive than wind and solar? The answer is wind and solar are expensive, financial losers. A recent peer-reviewed analysis proves that point.

A recent study, published in the peer-reviewed journal Energy, reports on the full-system levelized cost of electricity generation. The term “full system” is key.

Many entities have assessed what it costs utilities to purchase or produce electricity from existing sources and deliver it to customers.

These cost assessments, however, ignore the intermittency of wind and solar and how intermittency adds substantial costs to the entire electric grid.

The cost assessments also fail to account for how wind and solar projects cannot be built just anywhere and often require new, long, expensive, and inefficient transformation lines to deliver power from the generation locations to consumers. This also adds substantial costs to the overall electric grid.

The peer-reviewed Energy study analyzes these factors and presents an apples-to-apples cost comparison of the full-system cost of wind, solar, coal, natural gas, and nuclear power.

The verdict is devastating to wind and solar power and explains why most of the world prefers to build coal and natural gas power plants.

…

better to know...?, energy and fields, minerals and ores

The rising tide of sand mining: A growing threat to marine life

by Michigan State University, Feb 21, 2025 in ScienceDaily

In the delicate balancing act between human development and protecting the fragile natural world, sand is weighing down the scales on the human side.

A group of international scientists in this week’s journal One Earth are calling for balancing those scales to better identify the significant damage sand extraction across the world heaps upon marine biodiversity. The first step: acknowledging sand and gravel (discussed as sand in this publication) — the world’s most extracted solid materials by mass — are a threat hiding in plain sight.

“Sand is a critical resource that shapes the built and natural worlds,” said senior author Jianguo “Jack” Liu, Michigan State University Rachel Carson Chair in Sustainability. “Extracting sand is a complex global challenge. Systems approaches such as the metacoupling framework are essential to untangle the complexity. They can help reveal the hidden cascading impacts not only on the sand extraction sites but also other places such as sand transport routes and sites using sand for construction.”

Sand is the literal foundation of human development across the globe, a key ingredient of concrete, asphalt, glass, and electronics. It is relatively cheap and easily extracted.

…

…

energy and fields

China Still Building Coal Power Plants

by P. Homewood, Feb 14, 2025 in NotaLotofPeopleKnowThat

China last year began construction on projects with the greatest combined coal power capacity since 2015, jeopardising the country’s goal to peak carbon emissions by 2030, according to a report published Thursday.

The world’s second-largest economy is the biggest emitter of the greenhouse gases that drive climate change, but also a renewable energy powerhouse. It plans to reach net zero by 2060.

While coal has been a pivotal energy source in China for decades, explosive growth in wind and solar installations in recent years has raised hopes that the country can wean itself off the dirty fossil fuel.

But according to a report from the Finland-based Centre for Research on Energy and Clean Air (CREA) and Global Energy Monitor (GEM) in the United States, China began construction on 94.5 gigawatts of coal power projects in 2024 — 93 percent of the global total.

Although the country also added a record 356 gigawatts of wind and solar capacity — 4.5 times the European Union’s additions — the uptick in coal power risks solidifying its role in China’s energy mix, the report said.

“China’s rapid expansion of renewable energy has the potential to reshape its power system, but this opportunity is being undermined by the simultaneous large-scale expansion of coal power,” said Qi Qin, lead author of the report and China analyst at CREA.

The rise comes despite a pledge by Chinese President Xi Jinping in 2021 to “strictly control” coal power projects and increases in coal consumption before “phasing it down” between 2026 and 2030.

Coal production has risen steadily in recent years, from 3.9 billion tons in 2020 to 4.8 billion tons in 2024.

“Without urgent policy shifts, China risks reinforcing a pattern of energy addition rather than transition, limiting the full potential of its clean energy boom,” the report said.

https://uk.finance.yahoo.com/news/chinas-2024-coal-projects-threaten-000005109.html

energy and fields

Equinor Cut Green Investment In Half

by P. Homewood, Feb 6, 2025 in NotaLotofPeopleKnowThat

Norwegian energy giant Equinor is halving investment in renewable energy over the next two years while increasing oil and gas production.

Chief executive Anders Opedal said that the transition to lower carbon energy was moving slower than expected, costs had increased, and customers were reluctant to commit to long term contracts.

Mr Opedal told the BBC he was confident that Rosebank – a giant new oil field in the North Sea – would go ahead, despite a recent court ruling that consent had been awarded unlawfully.

He also warned that gas prices could rise next winter as European gas storage levels were lower now than this time last year.

“We are scaling down our investments in renewables and low carbon solutions because we don’t see the necessary profitability in the future,” Mr Opedal said.

It will cut investments in renewables to $5bn over the next two years, down from about $10bn.

It will also drop a target to spend half of its fixed assets budget on renewables and low carbon products by 2030.

By contrast, Equinor will be increasing oil and gas production by 10% over the next two years.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c1jg7k1kjwyo

This is of course part of a much wider trend, as we saw today with Orsted’s decision to call a halt to offshore wind development. Renewable energy is wholly dependent on govt subsidy, which as President has shown is illusionary.

Incredibly the far-left BBC still believe that “Rosebank is not straightforward”

What could not be more straightforward than a British oil field which could supply ultra cheap oil and gas to the country, sustain thousands of well paid jobs, send millions in tax revenues to the govt, provide an element of energy security and actually reduce emissions in comparison with importing the stuff.

Only the British hating BBC could object to that!

BTW

I cannot help but be reminded what the Xi’s useful idiot, Ambrose Evans-Pritchard said last week, when he said that the world’s investors were chasing green energy because that was where the money was!

Dream on, Ambrose!!!!!!!!!!!!!

better to know...?, climate-debate, energy and fields

IEA Report: Global Coal Demand To Hit Record High In 2024, Defying Predictions Of Decline

by  R. Bryce , Dec 18, 2024 in ClimateChangeDispatch

The International Energy Agency has been consistent — and consistently wrong — about global coal demand. [emphasis, links added]

In 2015, the Paris-based agency declared, “The golden age of coal in China seems to be over.” That year, it predicted global coal demand would fall to 5.5 billion tons by 2020.

In its 2017 World Energy Outlook, the IEA said, “China remains a towering presence in coal markets, but our projections suggest that coal use peaked in 2013 and is set to decline by almost 15% over the period to 2040.”

In 2020, the agency said, “Looking ahead to 2025, coal demand is expected to flatten.” It continued,

“Unless there are unforeseen developments that significantly boost coal demand in emerging Asian economies and China, it is likely that global coal demand peaked in 2013 at just over 8B tons.”

Wrong. Wrong. And wrong again.

Today, the IEA released its Coal 2024 report, which says global coal use will grow by another 1% this year to an all-time high of 8.77 billion tons.

The agency also reports that:

“coal demand, production, coal-fired generation, and international coal trade will surpass records reached in 2023 to set new all-time records.”

And here’s the key line:

“The power sector has been the main driver of coal demand growth, with electricity generation from coal set to reach an all-time high of 10,700 terawatt-hours (TWh) in 2024.”

Why does this matter? Electricity is the form of energy we crave more than any other. Electricity drives modernity and economic growth.

Primary trade flows in the thermal coal market in 2022 and 2023. Note that most of the arrows point to China and India. Source IEA Coal 2024.
…
climate-debate, energy and fields

Germany Urged To Return To Nuclear As Wind And Solar Fail, Prices Soar

by P. Gosselin, Nov 25, 2024 in ClimateChangeDispatch

german nuclear plant
Germany phased out its entire fleet of nuclear reactors over the past years and hoped to rely on renewable energies, claiming they were cheaper and cleaner. [emphasis, links added]

However, the transition has not gone smoothly as grid revamping has not kept up and prices for wind and solar power have made German electricity among the most expensive worldwide.

At the UN Climate Change Conference in Baku, Rafael Grossi, head of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), has warned that: “Germany can no longer turn its back on nuclear power and that a reorientation of energy policy is necessary. The government must reopen the debate on nuclear power.”

“Countries that have nuclear energy want more of it. And many that don’t have any want it,”  said Grossi.

“The timing of his comments is no coincidence. Germany’s economy is suffering from energy problems while the government is consumed with internal disputes,” comments Blackout News.

“The political focus has recently been on the disputes within the coalition government, while the electricity market has continued to show new weaknesses.”

Blackout News describes how the prices of electricity “exploded” in early November during a period of calm winds and no sunshine.

This forced Germany to fall back on gas and coal (energy sources that the government is currently working to phase out as well).

“Fossil fuels supplied 71% of Germany’s electricity at the beginning of November – a figure that has not been reached for over a decade.”

Read the entire article here (German).

energy and fields

Florida’s Fossil Fuel Renaissance: Why the Sunshine State is Laughing Off Climate Hysteria

by C. Rotter, Aug 24, 2024 in WUWT

Maguire’s article, which is as much a lament as it is a piece of journalism, paints Florida as the villain in a story where the rest of the country is the hero, gallantly marching toward a green utopia. But here’s the kicker: Florida’s doing just fine, and the people who live there know it. Let’s break down the absurdity of the climate scolds and see why Florida’s energy strategy is not only sensible but downright smart.

Fossil Fuels: The Workhorse of Florida’s Energy Grid

According to Maguire, Florida’s reliance on fossil fuels—gasp—has actually increased in 2024, a move that he seems to think is tantamount to environmental heresy. “Florida reverses energy transition by cranking fossil fuel use,” his headline wails, as if the state had suddenly decided to reverse gravity. But let’s get real: fossil fuels, particularly natural gas, are the backbone of Florida’s energy grid for a very simple reason—they work. When the summer sun is beating down, and everyone’s cranking up the AC, no one wants to hear that their power has been cut because the wind isn’t blowing or a cloud passed over a solar farm.

Maguire points out that over 80% of Florida’s electricity has come from fossil fuels since the beginning of June, the highest share in over three years. He compares this to the national average of 62.4% and Texas’s 62%, as if this somehow proves Florida is an outlier in the worst way. But let’s be honest: these are numbers that should make Floridians proud. While the rest of the country toys with unreliable renewables, Florida is ensuring that its citizens have a reliable, affordable energy supply.

The Reality of Renewable Energy

Renewables sound great on paper, don’t they? Free energy from the sun and wind—what’s not to love? But here’s where the rubber meets the road: renewables aren’t ready for prime time, especially not in a state like Florida, where reliability isn’t just a luxury, it’s a necessity. Imagine the chaos if millions of Floridians were left in the sweltering heat because the sun decided to take a day off. Florida’s summer is no joke, and neither is the demand for electricity. The state’s grid needs to be as robust as a linebacker, not as fragile as a flower.

And it’s not like Florida has completely ignored renewable energy. Florida Power & Light (FPL), the largest utility in the state, is leading a solar charge, aiming to install 30 million solar panels by 2030. But here’s the kicker—Florida’s leaders know that solar is a supplement, not a substitute. That’s why they haven’t thrown the baby out with the bathwater and abandoned fossil fuels.

…

better to know...?, energy and fields

Yet More Reasons Why Green Hydrogen Is Going Nowhere

by F. Menton, Aug 28, 2024 in WUWT

In the fantasy of the zero-emissions electricity future, there will either be regular devastating blackouts, or something must back up the intermittent wind and solar generation. In New York we call that imaginary something the “DEFR” (Dispatchable Emissions Free Resource). But what is it? Nuclear has been blocked for decades, especially in the blue jurisdictions that are most aggressively pursuing the wind/solar future. Batteries are technologically not up to the job, and also wildly too expensive. That leaves hydrogen. Anybody with another idea, kindly speak up.

I’ve had several posts discussing the question of whether hydrogen could do this job, for example this one on February 14, 2024, and this one on July 20. Those posts focused on the initial cost of making hydrogen by electrolysis from water. That cost turns out to be a multiple of the cost of producing natural gas by drilling into rock (for comparable energy content). From time to time I have alluded to other potential problems with having hydrogen replace natural gas in the electricity system — things like leaks, explosions, and the need for an entire new infrastructure of pipelines and trucks to carry the stuff and power plants to burn it. But until now I haven’t found a detailed study on just how bad these additional problems might be.

Now comes along an August 18 article in a peer-reviewed journal called Energy Science & Engineering, with the title “A review of challenges with using the natural gas system for hydrogen.” The article was linked on August 23 by Paul Homewood at the Not a Lot of People Know That site, and then further linked by Watts Up With That on August 24.

The lead author is a guy named Paul Martin. Unusually for an article in such a journal, no academic affiliation is given for Mr. Martin. Looking him up on LinkedIn, I find that he is not an academic, but rather identifies himself as a “chemical process development expert” who has spent “years in industry,” and is currently with Spitfire Research, Inc., which in turn states that it specializes in “consulting for a decarbonized future.” Mr. Martin then identifies several of his co-authors on the paper as a “team of people at the Environmental Defense Fund.” That information may well color your perception of what Martin, et al., have to say in their paper.

…

better to know...?, energy and fields

Natural Gas Industry’s Smear of Coal Is False and Self-Defeating

by G. Wrightstone, July 22, 2024 in RealClearEnergy

Smearing coal has become a marketing strategy of a natural gas industry that embraces pseudoscientific views of coal combustion as being hazardous.

In so doing, gas supporters give credence to a fallacious regulatory regime of the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), which erroneously classifies carbon dioxide as a pollutant and assigns health effects to low-level pollution without scientific proof. To boot, a false representation of coal, oil and natural gas as environmental bogeymen is perpetuated.

Perhaps the most enthusiastic user of this foolish ploy is Toby Rice, CEO of Pittsburgh-based EQT Corp., who introduced two years ago a global plan to replace coal with liquefied natural gas. Promoting his product as a “decarbonizing force” in June at a RealClearEnergy conference, the head of the country’s largest gas producer (check the video link above to see his part), said:

“What we would like to do at EQT … is focus people on a really practical solution that will allow us to provide energy security for the world and address people’s concerns over global emissions. And that path is very simple: transition the world from coal to gas.”

Although natural gas emits less carbon dioxide than coal when burned, the underlying premise of Rice’s pitch rests on the popular myth that CO2 emissions will overheat the planet. The organization we lead, the CO2 Coalition, has overwhelming evidence from top scientists showing that increasing atmospheric carbon dioxide not only poses no danger but is beneficial to plant growth and crop production.

…

better to know...?, energy and fields

The world is using more oil, coal and gas than ever before and will use more. Net Zero is dead

by P. Homewood, June 14, NotaLotofPeopleKnowThat

A recent flurry of forecasts offers us a range of different views on what’s happening to the global demand for, and use of, crude oil. One thing seems to be clear, however: the chances of net zero carbon emissions in the near term – ie, by 2050 – are basically zero.

The year so far has been a bit of a rollercoaster ride in this realm of uncertainty, with projections and forecasts more volatile than the market itself. Crude prices have remained relatively strong despite various occurrences across Europe and the Middle East that would have resulted in major upsets in decades past.

One major point of consensus related to global oil demand growth is the expectation that it will continue to be robust, driven by a combination of factors including economic recovery, increased travel, and surging industrial activity in non-OECD nations.

The only major body not seeing continued, massive growth is the International Energy Agency (IEA), which revised its numbers this week to predict that crude demand will rise by just 1 million barrels per day (bpd) next year and will (at last!) peak “towards the end of this decade” at 106 million bpd, up from 102 million at the moment. The IEA expects this growth to be led by non-OECD countries, particularly China and India. The IEA and others have highlighted the importance of these regions in driving global oil demand.

The IEA, which is funded by 31 industrialized nations through a dues structure, says that it believes growth in demand from India, China and elsewhere will be gradually outweighed by the expected rollout of electric vehicles and other green technologies. However, one should note that the agency has been shifting for a long time from being an analytical organisation to being essentially a green campaigning one, and its forecasts nowadays are as much attempts to influence markets as to genuinely predict them.

In contrast to the IEA, the US Energy Information Administration (EIA) raised its 2024 global oil demand growth forecast to 1.1 million barrels per day, up from its previous estimate of 900,000 bpd. This revision is based on expectations for travel and tourism in the second half of the year. EIA projects even stronger demand growth for 2025 of 1.5 mbpd, again clashing with the IEA which sees just 1 mbpd that year, with non-OECD countries accounting for most of the growth. The US federal agency also raised its projection for crude prices to rise to an average of $87/barrel in Q4 2024 based on the rising demand.

…

energy and fields

Old King Coal at COP28: Uninvited Guest or Star of the Show?

by T. Coclanis, Dec 23, 2023 in WUWT

Last Friday, just two days after the Dubai COP28 meeting ended, a report published by the International Energy Agency (IEA) stated that global coal demand will set another new record this year. Although coal use in the West is falling, demand in developing economies “remains very strong, increasing by 8% in India and by 5% in China in 2023 due to rising demand for electricity and weak hydropower output.”

Perhaps the best preamble to COP28 was delivered by India’s Power Minister, R. K. Singh. On November 6th, he stated “There is going to be pressure on nations at COP-28 to reduce coal usage. We are not going to do this… we are not going to compromise on availability of power for our growth, even if it requires that we add coal-based capacity”. India plans an additional 30 gigawatts (GW) of coal-fueled power generating capacity in addition to the existing 50 GW and plants already under construction. It is also set to increase coal production by 60% by 2030, from its current level of 1 billion tons, to ensure ample supply for its thermal power plants.

…

…

energy and fields

Natural H2 Emissions in Colombian Ophiolites: First Findings

by A. Carillo Ramirez et al., Dec 2023 in MDPI/Springer

Abstract

The exploration of natural H2 or white hydrogen has started in various geological settings. Ophiolitic nappes are already recognized as one of the promising contexts. In South America, the only data available so far concerns the Archean iron-rich rocks of the Mina Gerais in Brazil or the subduction context of Bolivia. In Colombia, despite government efforts to promote white hydrogen, data remain limited. This article introduces the initial dataset obtained through soil gas sampling within the Cauca-Patia Valley and Western Cordillera, where the underlying geology comprises accreted oceanic lithosphere. In this valley, promising areas with H2 potential were identified using remote sensing tools, in particular vegetation anomalies. The Atmospherically Resistant Vegetation Index (ARVI) appears to be well adapted for this context and the field data collection confirmed the presence of H2 in the soil in all pre-selected structures. The valley undergoes extensive cultivation, mainly for sugar cane production. While H2emissions lead to alterations in vegetation, unlike reports from other countries, they do not result in its complete disappearance. Soil gas measurements along the thrusts bordering the Cauca Valley also show high H2 content in the fault zones. In the valley, the presence of sedimentary cover above the ophiolites which are presumably the H2generating rocks, which addresses the possible presence of reservoirs and seals to define potential plays. Drawing parallels with the Malian case, it could be that the intrusive element could serve as seals.
…
better to know...?, energy and fields

More coal burned on Earth in 2023 than ever before in human history

by Jo Nova, Dec19, 2023 in JoNova

The best kept secret in the world is that humans are using more coal than ever

So much for the “stranded dead asset”. In 2022 the world set a new all-time record for coal use — reaching 8.4 billion tons. In 2023, despite all the Net Zero billions in spending, despite the boom in windmills and solar panels, global demand for coal will top 8.54 billion tons.

The IEA is the “International Energy Agency” — supposedly, the impartial servant of 31 nations worth of taxpayers. Yet they decided to ignore the world record and instead tell us how coal is set to decline. It’s what they think the taxpayers need to hear.  Their press release:

Global coal demand expected to decline in coming years

…

better to know...?, energy and fields

Evolution of the world fuel intensities

by S. Furfari, Dec 15, 2023 in ScienceClimatEnergie

A benchmark that explains why green NGOs want to promote energy sobriety

The fashion for saving energy, which assumes that human behaviour can compensate for the inelasticity of energy demand, is not new. Only the name is. In 1924, when US President Calvin Coolidge proposed saving oil because he had been told that reserves would soon be exhausted, he devised a strategy called energy conservation. Though compassionate and generous, these methods failed to reverse the continuing growth in energy demand. Energy consumption, and oil consumption in particular, continues to rise as the world’s population grows and more people need to eat and work, i.e. consume energy. It is the task of industry and engineers to make processes and products more efficient. It has always been an ongoing quest. The Romans used massive stones to build their bridges, creating amazing monuments. Today, a similar function is performed with much lighter materials. Efficiency is normal behaviour in human activities, including the production, conversion and consumption of energy.

…

better to know...?, energy and fields

Global CO2 emissions rise through 2050 in most IEO2023 cases

by EIA_ Today in Energy, Nov 30, 2023

We project that global energy-related CO2 emissions from consumption of coal, liquid fuels, and natural gas will increase over the next 30 years across most of the cases we analyzed in our International Energy Outlook 2023(IEO2023).

By 2050, energy-related CO2 emissions vary between a 2% decrease and a 34% increase compared with 2022 in all cases we modeled. Growing populations and incomes increase fossil fuel consumption and emissions, particularly in the industrial and electric power sectors. These trends offset emissions reductions from improved energy efficiency, lower carbon intensity of fuel mix, and growth in non-fossil fuel energy.

IEO2023 analyzes long-term world energy markets in 16 regions through 2050. We studied seven cases that explore differing assumptions of economic growth, crude oil prices, and technology costs. These cases consider only the international laws and regulations adopted through March 2023 and rely on the U.S. projections published in the Annual Energy Outlook 2023 (AEO2023), which assumed U.S. laws and regulations as of November 2022.

Coal
Across sectors, the highest growth in global coal consumption through 2050 occurs in the electric power sector. Although zero-carbon technologies account for the most growth in electricity capacity and generation, we expect coal-fired generators to continue to operate. Across all cases, China and India account for about two-thirds of the world’s coal consumption between 2022 and 2050. Although China is currently the largest coal consumer, we project its coal consumption to decline by 18% between 2022 and 2050. Coal consumption in India nearly doubles over the same projection period.

Liquid fuels
We project global consumption of liquid fuels—which include gasoline, diesel, and biofuels—will increase through 2050. Across all sectors, the largest share and the fastest growth in liquid fuels consumption is in industrial applications, such as chemical production. Increased liquid fuels consumption in the industrial sector is partially offset by declining liquid fuels consumption in the transportation sector as adoption of electric vehicles (EV) grows. Regionally, we project the United States, China, and Western Europe to remain the top liquid fuels consumers, even though fuel consumption in these regions either declines or plateaus by the mid-2030s due to government policies and growing EV adoption. India has the fastest projected growth in liquid fuels consumption, more than doubling across all cases.

Natural gas
We project natural gas consumption will increase in the electric power and industrial sectors through 2050. In the cases we modeled, the electric power sector continues to rely on existing natural gas-fired plants despite growth in zero-carbon electricity generation. In the industrial sector, increased production of basic chemicals in countries such as the United States propels an increase in natural gas consumption, both as fuel and petrochemical feedstock. Natural gas demand also grows in the Middle East because of the fuel’s role in producing and processing natural gas and oil for export. The United States is projected to remain the world’s top natural gas consumer throughout the projection horizon, but the Middle East shows significant growth during that timeframe and approaches U.S. consumption by 2050, ranging from a 29% to 54% growth rate from 2022 to 2050 in the IEO2023 cases.

Principal contributors: Kevin Nakolan, Michelle Bowman