In Blueprint for a Secure Energy Future, released March 30, 2011, President Obama describes his proposed Clean Energy Standard (CES), which would set targets for utilities.

The CES would allow utilities who didn't meet their targets to buy credits from utilities that generated more clean energy than they needed. Utilities could bank credits for their own later use, or sell them to other companies.

Furthermore, clean energy sources included not only renewable energy sources like wind, solar, biomass, and hydropower, but also nuclear power, natural gas and clean coal. In his State of the Union address of January 25, 2011, President Obama already hinted at this, when setting the goal that, by 2035, 80% of America’s electricity will come from clean energy sources. When further describing "clean" energy sources, Obama mentioned not only wind and solar, but also nuclear, clean coal and natural gas.

The danger of this approach is that it would encourage natural gas, "clean" coal and nuclear power, while allowing utilities that remain dirty to buy credits. This would achieve little or no growth in genuinely clean alternatives such as wind and solar power.

Firstly, how clean are natural gas, "clean" coal, nuclear power, diesel and biofuel? Last year, Australia scrapped plans for a $4.3 billion Queensland coal-fired power station with carbon capture and storage capacity, because it isn't commercially viable to make coal clean. Biofuel has been discussed in posts such as What will power your next car?, in Funding of Carbon Air Capture and in comments under this post by Chris W. Nuclear energy should be off the agenda since the disaster in Japan.

Last month, warning bells rang against natural gas: three House Democrats released a worrying report into fracking, a fracking fluid spill occurred at a natural gas well in Pennsylvania, and a Cornell University study concludes that emissions caused by natural gas can be worse than coal and diesel oil, especially when looked at over a relatively short period (image below). 



The fact that natural gas causes huge amounts of methane emissions makes it appropriate to stop supporting natural gas and to instead implement feebate policies that impose fees on sales of natural gas, while using revenues to assist methods that remove methane from the air, as discussed in How would you allocate US$10 million per year to most reduce climate risk?

These study findings question the sense of encouraging utilities to shift to natural gas. They also question the sense of shifting to vehicles driving on natural gas. Right now, the U.S. has only few natural gas fueling stations. In Europe, CNG-equipped vehicles are typically bi-fuel, allowing them to switch between CNG and gasoline. This not only makes things more expensive, the CNG tanks can also take up a lot of space in the trunk.

In the U.K., diesel vehicles get most of the rebates that were introduced two years ago, despite their emission of soot. The importance of targeting diesel has been highlighted by people like Mark Jacobson for years, e.g. in this 2002 study with this 2005 update, and this more recent study. For more background, also see Bidisha Banerjee's discussion, part 1 and part 2, of a recent workshop on black carbon. 

BTW, soot isn't even taken into account in above image. In conclusion, the proposed CES would perpetuate the government's support for fuel, and would do little or nothing to help genuinely clean energy.

To shift to a genuinely clean energy economy, it makes sense to instead implement local feebates, including feebates that impose fees on fossil fuel and use the revenues to help genuinely clean electricity and transport electrification programs.

Imagine that you had a budget of $10 million per year and that you should maximize the amount of climate risk reduction obtainable with that $10 million, what would you allocate it to and why?

Given the scary situation in the Arctic, I would apportion parts of the $10 million to methods that promise immediate results:

1. Testing of SRM such as sulfur aerosols, bright water and marine cloud brightening.
2. Testing ways to ignite or break down methane from the sky, i.e. from airplanes or satellites. Laser beams spring to mind. Short, amplified pulses of light could be focused on hydrogen peroxide or ozone, in efforts to produce hydroxyl and oxidize as much methane as possible.
3. Building on the outcome of 2., equipping small aircraft with such technology, as well as autopilot software, GPS, LiPo batteries and with solar thin film mounted both on top of and underneath the wings.
   
   At first, one such plane could navigate to the north of Canada and Alaska at the start of summer.
   
   In subsequent years, numerous such planes could follow, also going to other parts of the Arctic. At the end of summer, the planes could return home for a check-up and possible upgrade of the technology, to be launched again early summer the next year.
   
   There are many self-financed clubs where members build and fly remote controlled aircraft. Even a small financial incentive would give them a goal, while the publicity would make people more aware of the problems we face in the Arctic.

For background on above, also see:
http://geo-engineering.blogspot.com/2011/04/runaway-global-warming.html
http://groups.google.com/group/geoengineering/browse_thread/thread/5eaf812314dced8c

On March 1st, House Democrats proposed to end oil company tax breaks in order to cut the federal deficit. It was voted down -- not a single Republican voted in favor! Last month, Republicans also voted down (by a 251-174 vote) an amendment that would have recovered up to $53 billion in taxpayer funds from oil companies.

“Republicans once again sided with BP, Exxon and the oil companies, not with the American taxpayer and the poorest Americans most in need of help. This legislation focuses on just the kind of special interest loophole that should be closed before we open attacks on programs for the poorest Americans,” said Rep. Markey. “The biggest oil companies are already getting 100 year-old tax breaks to sell $100 a barrel oil to make $100 billion a year in profits. They don’t need a $53 billion windfall courtesy of American taxpayers and our national deficit.”

“These hugely profitable companies are tapping oil and gas reserves that belong to the American People, selling it back to us, and then reaping a massive profit on the backs of middle-class families,” said Rep. Hinchey.

“But the real kicker is that these oil companies are not paying one red cent to the public for the oil and gas they have extracted from publicly owned resources. They get it for free - and we pick up the $53 billion tab. American taxpayers are getting ripped off.”

“It's too bad the Republican majority has once again decided to protect big oil at the expense of taxpayers,” Rep. Hinchey added.

Meanwhile, the price of crude oil has risen to well over $104 a barrel.

Prices of gasoline at the pump are well over $4 a gallon, with forecasts of well over $5 a gallon in one year time.

Related posts by Sam Carana:
Shooting the messenger
1 million electric vehicles on the road by 2015
America can win the clean energy race