Ocean Acidification: The Other CO2 Problem

Increased carbon dioxide is changing the chemistry of the earth’s oceans, threatening marine life

Earth’s atmosphere isn’t the only victim of burning fossil fuels. About a quarter of all carbon dioxide emissions are absorbed by the earth’s oceans, where they’re having an impact that’s just starting to be understood.

Over the last decade, scientists have discovered that this excess CO2 is actually changing the chemistry of the sea and proving harmful for many forms of marine life. This process is known as ocean acidification. A more acidic ocean could wipe out species, disrupt the food web and impact fishing, tourism and any other human endeavor that relies on the sea. The change is happening fast -- and it will take fast action to slow or stop it. Over the last 250 years, oceans have absorbed 530 billion tons of CO2, triggering a 30 percent increase in ocean acidity.

Before people started burning coal and oil, ocean pH had been relatively stable for the previous 20 million years. But researchers predict that if carbon emissions continue at their current rate, ocean acidity will more than double by 2100. The polar regions will be the first to experience changes. Projections show that the Southern Ocean around Antarctica will actually become corrosive by 2050.

The new chemical composition of our oceans is expected to harm a wide range of ocean life -- particularly creatures with shells. The resulting disruption to the ocean ecosystem could have a widespread ripple effect and further deplete already struggling fisheries worldwide.

Increased acidity reduces carbonate -- the mineral used to form the shells and skeletons of many shellfish and corals. The effect is similar to osteoporosis, slowing growth and making shells weaker. If pH levels drop enough, the shells will literally dissolve.

This process will not only harm some of our favorite seafood, such as lobster and mussels, but will also injure some species of smaller marine organisms -- things such as pteropods and coccolithophores. You’ve probably never heard of them, but they form a vital part of the food web. If those smaller organisms are wiped out, the larger animals that feed on them could suffer, as well.

Disappearing Coral Reefs

Delicate corals may face an even greater risk than shellfish because they require very high levels of carbonate to build their skeletons. Acidity slows reef-building, which could lower the resiliency of corals and lead to their erosion and eventual extinction. The “tipping point” for coral reefs could happen as soon as 2050. Coral reefs serve as the home for many other forms of ocean life. Their disappearance would be akin to rainforests being wiped out worldwide. Such losses would reverberate throughout the marine environment and have profound social impacts, as well -- especially on the fishing and tourism industries. The loss of coral reefs would also reduce the protection that they offer coastal communities against storms surges and hurricanes -- which might become more severe with warmer air and sea surface temperatures due to global warming.

What Can We Do About It?

Combating acidification requires reducing CO2 emissions and improving the health of the oceans. Creating marine protected areas (essentially national parks for the sea) and stopping destructive fishing practices would increase the resiliency of marine ecosystems and help them withstand acidification. Evidence suggests that coral reefs in protected ocean reserves are less affected by global threats such as global warming and ocean acidification, demonstrating the power of ecosystem protection. Ultimately, though, reducing the amount of carbon dioxide absorbed into the oceans may be the only way to halt acidification. The same strategies needed to fight global warming on land can also help in the seas. The acidification of our oceans is the hidden side of the world’s carbon crisis, says Lisa Suatoni, an NRDC ocean scientist, and only reinforces that we need to make changes in how we fuel our world -- and we need to do it quickly.

Article by National Resources Defense Council 

http://www.nrdc.org/oceans/acidification/

Global Warming Bringing More Extreme Heat Waves: NWF

Temperatures are breaking records along eastern and southern portions of the U.S. and more extremely hot summer days are in store for every part of the country if global warming continues unabated says National Wildlife Federation, which just issued an update to its heat waves report. The analysis comes days after the U.S. Senate’s leadership shelved comprehensive climate and energy legislation this summer.

In 2010, New Jersey, Delaware, and North Carolina had their hottest June on record, while Maryland, Virginia, South Carolina, Florida, and Louisiana had their second hottest June. Eight other states had Junes that ranked in the top-five hottest.
The hot conditions continued with July 2010 being among top five hottest on record for many states. As a result, more than 70 million Americans experienced extreme heat during these two months. Hundreds of daily temperature records were broken were broken across the country.
“2010 is a sample of what’s to come because global warming is bringing more frequent and severe heat waves which will seriously impact vulnerable populations,” said Dr. Amanda Staudt, climate scientist, National Wildlife Federation.

RISKS TO PEOPLE
That means air pollution in urban areas could get worse, bringing increased risk of heart attacks, strokes and asthma attacks. Children, the elderly, poor, and people of color are especially vulnerable to these effects. Public health experts are especially alarmed.
“The science confirms that the frequency and duration of heat waves has increased significantly over the last 50 years. In the United States, heat waves already kill more people during a typical year than floods, tornadoes and earthquakes combined. Given these worsening trends, taking decisive action to stop global warming becomes a medical necessity.” said Peter Wilk, MD, executive director, Physicians for Social Responsibility.
"Global warming is one of the most massive health emergencies facing humanity. Its effects are already life-threatening for people with asthma and allergies,” said Mike Tringale, vice president of the Asthma and Allergy Foundation of America.
Top U.S. government experts have confirmed that the earth is warming NASA scientists recently stated that the average global temperature was higher over the past 12 months than during any other 12-month period in history. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration has released data showing that March to June of this year have each individually been the hottest on record as well.

MULTIPLE PROBLEMS FROM HEAT
To explain the bigger picture and provide recommendations for how to cope with projected changes and how to avoid the worst impacts of global warming the 2009 report, More Extreme Heat Waves: Global Warming’s Wake-Up Call details how:
•Global warming will bring more extreme heat waves
•Urban air pollution could be exacerbated by more extreme heat
•Heat waves disproportionately impact people who are poor, elderly, children, or have asthma or heart disease, or live in big cities
•Natural habitats and agriculture are also vulnerable to heat waves
•We can reduce the severity of heat waves and their impacts on vulnerable people

ACTION NEEDED
From New York to Los Angeles the report details 30 large U.S. cities where major risk factors associated with heat-related mortality make residents especially vulnerable to heat waves.
“We need to take these trends toward more extreme heat waves into account when designing urban areas and public health programs,” said Dr. Staudt. “We can no longer plan based on the climate we used to have.”
Important steps to reduce the risks include curbing global warming pollution to minimize future extreme heat waves, making cities cooler and greener, implementing public health measures that reduce the impact of extreme heat waves, and safeguarding wildlife, fish and habitats from extreme heat.

National Wildlife Federation 8-11-2010

Help Consumers Save Money by Saving Energy: ENN

At a time when families are struggling to pay their energy bills, leaders in the House are pushing to roll back common sense standards for residential lighting that save families money by saving energy. It’s important to remember that these standards were passed just a few years ago with overwhelming bipartisan support from 86 Senators and 314 members of the House. They were championed and co-sponsored by the former Speaker of the House, Dennis Hastert, and signed into law by President Bush.

Also, the standards do NOT ban incandescent bulbs. You’ll still be able to buy energy-saving halogen incandescent bulbs that look exactly the same as the ones you’re used to, and more than pay for themselves over the life of the 100 watt replacement bulb.The only difference is that your electric bills will be lower.

To save even more money, there are a wide range of new options like CFLs and LEDs. These options are 75 or 80 percent more efficient than traditional lighting, and they’ll last 10 or 25 times longer. In some cases, you might never have to replace them.

In a typical house, replacing 15 traditional bulbs with energy saving bulbs will save about $50 a year. That’s enough to run two 50 inch Energy Star plasma TVs — five hours a day, all year long. The savings get even bigger if you use only the most efficient bulbs.

From: The White House Blog, Clean Techies

Published July 13, 2011 12:46 PM

Carbon dating technique to aid energy from waste

A new use for carbon dating will aid the production of energy from wood and waste, said a bio-energy group on Thursday after British regulatory approval of the new test.

Carbon dating is commonly used to estimate the age of ancient artifacts, exploiting the fact that a particular type of carbon disappears, or decays, at a fixed rate, so that the amount left behind clocks how much time has passed.
A recently adapted technique, developed by the Energy Research Center of the Netherlands, takes monthly samples of the carbon-14 in the smokestack of power plants.
It tallies that with the energy produced to estimate how much carbon dioxide in the flue gas came from burning ancient fossil fuels and how much from greener, younger fuels such as wood, crop waste and other so-called biomass.
The practice of co-firing biomass with coal is increasing as power plants try to pare carbon costs and earn green energy incentives.
"(This) is enabling easy and accurate differentiation between CO2 emissions created from fossil and biogenic, renewable fuels," said the UK's National Center for Biorenewable Energy, Fuels and Materials (NNFCC), a lobby group.
The technology is already used in Belgium and the Netherlands, the NNFCC said.
It may be a simpler way of disentangling green from coal-fired power than the alternative, which is to measure the amount of biomass and coal fuel fed into a furnace.
"Independent reports concluded that the 14C technique is based on mature and well understood technology," said Britain's energy watchdog Ofgem last Friday, explaining its approval.
"The reports also concluded that results from this technique would be at least as accurate as the existing sampling methods used."
From 2013 all fossil fuel power plants in western Europe will have to pay for every tonne of carbon dioxide emissions, under the European Union's emissions trading scheme.

Science News Daily: By Greard Wynn (July 14, 2011)

Loss of Large Predators Has Caused Widespread Disruption of Ecosystems

The decline of large predators and other "apex consumers" at the top of the food chain has disrupted ecosystems all over the planet, according to a review of recent findings conducted by an international team of scientists and published in the July 15 issue of Science. The study looked at research on a wide range of terrestrial, freshwater, and marine ecosystems and concluded that "the loss of apex consumers is arguably humankind's most pervasive influence on the natural world."

According to first author James Estes, a professor of ecology and evolutionary biology at the University of California, Santa Cruz, large animals were once ubiquitous across the globe, and they shaped the structure and dynamics of ecosystems. Their decline, largely caused by humans through hunting and habitat fragmentation, has had far-reaching and often surprising consequences, including changes in vegetation, wildfire frequency, infectious diseases, invasive species, water quality, and nutrient cycles.

The decline of apex consumers has been most pronounced among the big predators, such as wolves and lions on land, whales and sharks in the oceans, and large fish in freshwater ecosystems. But there have also been dramatic declines in populations of many large herbivores, such as elephants and bison. The loss of apex consumers from an ecosystem triggers an ecological phenomenon known as a "trophic cascade," a chain of effects moving down through lower levels of the food chain.

"The top-down effects of apex consumers in an ecosystem are fundamentally important, but it is a complicated phenomenon," Estes said. "They have diverse and powerful effects on the ways ecosystems work, and the loss of these large animals has widespread implications."

Estes and his coauthors cite a wide range of examples in their review, including the following:

•The extirpation of wolves in Yellowstone National Park led to over-browsing of aspen and willows by elk, and restoration of wolves has allowed the vegetation to recover.

•The reduction of lions and leopards in parts of Africa has led to population outbreaks and changes in behavior of olive baboons, increasing their contact with people and causing higher rates of intestinal parasites in both people and baboons.

•A rinderpest epidemic decimated the populations of wildebeest and other ungulates in the Serengeti, resulting in more woody vegetation and increased extent and frequency of wildfires prior to rinderpest eradication in the 1960s.

•Dramatic changes in coastal ecosystems have followed the collapse and recovery of sea otter populations; sea otters maintain coastal kelp forests by controlling populations of kelp-grazing sea urchins.

•The decimation of sharks in an estuarine ecosystem caused an outbreak of cow-nosed rays and the collapse of shellfish populations.

Despite these and other well-known examples, the extent to which ecosystems are shaped by such interactions has not been widely appreciated. "There's been a tendency to see it as idiosyncratic and specific to particular species and ecosystems," Estes said.

One reason for this is that the top-down effects of apex predators are difficult to observe and study. "These interactions are invisible unless there is some perturbation that reveals them," Estes said. "With these large animals, it's impossible to do the kinds of experiments that would be needed to show their effects, so the evidence has been acquired as a result of natural changes and long-term records."

Estes has been studying coastal ecosystems in the North Pacific for several decades, doing pioneering work on the ecological roles of sea otters and killer whales. In 2008, he and coauthor John Terborgh of Duke University organized a conference on trophic cascades, which brought together scientists studying a wide range of ecosystems. The recognition that similar top-down effects have been observed in many different systems was a catalyst for the new paper.

The study's findings have profound implications for conservation. "To the extent that conservation aims toward restoring functional ecosystems, the reestablishment of large animals and their ecological effects is fundamental," Estes said. "This has huge implications for the scale at which conservation can be done. You can't restore large apex consumers on an acre of land. These animals roam over large areas, so it's going to require large-scale approaches."

The paper's coauthors include 24 scientists from various institutions in six countries. Support for the study was provided by the Institute for Ocean Conservation Science, Defenders of Wildlife, White Oak Plantation, U.S. National Science Foundation, NSERC Canada, and NordForsk.

Science Daily (July 14, 2011)

Japan Goes Solar

A $286 Billion Dollar Solar Pay Day
The anti-nuclear movement got a real boost following the Fukushima crisis. There's no doubt about that. And as a result, renewable energy was once again paraded around as one of the many forms of clean energy that could be used to displace any nuclear power that would be phased out in Japan...Especially solar.

A few months ago, Prime Minister Naoto Kan announced a plan that would put solar panels on about 10 million roofs by 2030. Of course, he gave little details on how such a plan would be funded. But since the announcement, a number of high-level government officials have called for a solar feed-in tariff similar to that of Germany's.

University of Tokyo professor Ryoichi Komiyama recently offered his analysis of the effects of such a tariff, and noted that in a scenario where the country would seek 30 gigawatts of solar, a $261 billion market for solar panel production and installation would be created.

In the case of utility-scale solar, Komiyama added that developers would potentially have to spend an additional $25 billion for about 8 gigawatts of batteries.

As you know, we've long been bullish on utility-scale batteries, particularly in the case of solar. I would even argue that if Japan were to go full force on a solar feed-in tariff, it would be the utility-scale battery players providing the biggest pay day for investors.

You see, of the top five solar panel producers in Japan, only one is a pure play. And that's Suntech Power (NYSE: STP), which is actually the world's largest solar panel producer. If Japan were to implement this feed-in tariff, Suntech would get a huge boost.

Also benefiting from the tariff will be Sharp (PINK SHEETS: SHCAY), Kyocera (NYSE: KYO), Panasonic Corp (NYSE: PC), and Mitsubishi Electric Corp (PINK SHEETS: MIELY).

A Solar Market on Steroids

If Japan were to implement this feed-in tariff, we'll also see an even quicker drop in production costs. As my colleague Nick Hodge pointed out last week, for every doubling of solar manufacturing capacity, production costs fall about 20 percent.

With a Japanese feed-in tariff implemented, you can be sure that solar manufacturing would kick into overdrive with a serious shot of steroids. And consider Japan's energy demands as the world's third largest economy. They're talking about 30 gigawatts of installed solar, or 75 percent of what the entire world installed from 2000 to 2010. This is a very big deal.

To take it one step further, Japan's environment ministry indicated the potential for commercial solar projects could theoretically reach 150 gigawatts. That's about ten times the capacity of Germany, currently the world's largest solar market.

Of course, it all comes down to how aggressive the Japanese want to be. While there have been dozens of polls showing Japanese consumers want to transition to cleaner forms of power generation, the question is, Will they be willing to pay for it?

I can't imagine Japan's total installed solar reaching 150 gigawatts anytime within the next 20 to 30 years. I just don't think there would be enough political support for it. And I'm pretty sure no matter how much the Japanese despise nuclear right now, they're probably not going to be too willing to pony up any significant increases in their utility bills in order to pay for the integration of 150 gigawatts of solar...

That being said, a temporary feed-in tariff used to get 30 gigawatts installed over the course of 20 years is not out of the question. And if there's any indication that this tariff will actually get approved, you would be wise to load up on a few solar and utility-scale battery stocks. We saw what Germany's aggressive feed-in tariff did for solar investors. It essentially launched a solar bull market. The impact of a similar feed-in tariff in Japan would do the same — but on a much bigger level. To a new way of life, and a new generation of wealth...

Article by Jeff Siegel June 27, 2011

Climate Change Reducing Ocean's Carbon Dioxide Uptake, New Analysis Shows: ENN

As one of the planet's largest single carbon absorbers, the ocean takes up roughly one-third of all human carbon emissions, reducing atmospheric carbon dioxide and its associated global changes.

But whether the ocean can continue mopping up human-produced carbon at the same rate is still up in the air. Previous studies on the topic have yielded conflicting results, says University of Wisconsin-Madison assistant professor Galen McKinley.
In a new analysis published online July 10 in Nature Geoscience, McKinley and her colleagues identify a likely source of many of those inconsistencies and provide some of the first observational evidence that climate change is negatively impacting the ocean carbon sink.

"The ocean is taking up less carbon because of the warming caused by the carbon in the atmosphere," says McKinley, an assistant professor of atmospheric and oceanic sciences and a member of the Center for Climatic Research in the Nelson Institute for Environmental Studies.

The analysis differs from previous studies in its scope across both time and space. One of the biggest challenges in asking how climate is affecting the ocean is simply a lack of data, McKinley says, with available information clustered along shipping lanes and other areas where scientists can take advantage of existing boat traffic. With a dearth of other sampling sites, many studies have simply extrapolated trends from limited areas to broader swaths of the ocean.

McKinley and colleagues at UW-Madison, the Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory at Columbia University, and the Universite Pierre et Marie Curie in Paris expanded their analysis by combining existing data from a range of years (1981-2009), methodologies, and locations spanning most of the North Atlantic into a single time series for each of three large regions called gyres, defined by distinct physical and biological characteristics.

They found a high degree of natural variability that often masked longer-term patterns of change and could explain why previous conclusions have disagreed. They discovered that apparent trends in ocean carbon uptake are highly dependent on exactly when and where you look -- on the 10- to 15-year time scale, even overlapping time intervals sometimes suggested opposite effects.

"Because the ocean is so variable, we need at least 25 years' worth of data to really see the effect of carbon accumulation in the atmosphere," she says. "This is a big issue in many branches of climate science -- what is natural variability, and what is climate change?"

Working with nearly three decades of data, the researchers were able to cut through the variability and identify underlying trends in the surface CO2 throughout the North Atlantic.

During the past three decades, increases in atmospheric carbon dioxide have largely been matched by corresponding increases in dissolved carbon dioxide in the seawater. The gases equilibrate across the air-water interface, influenced by how much carbon is in the atmosphere and the ocean and how much carbon dioxide the water is able to hold as determined by its water chemistry.

But the researchers found that rising temperatures are slowing the carbon absorption across a large portion of the subtropical North Atlantic. Warmer water cannot hold as much carbon dioxide, so the ocean's carbon capacity is decreasing as it warms.

In watching for effects of increasing atmospheric carbon on the ocean's uptake, many people have looked for indications that the carbon content of the ocean is rising faster than that of the atmosphere, McKinley says. However, their new results show that the ocean sink could be weakening even without that visible sign.

"More likely what we're going to see is that the ocean will keep its equilibration but it doesn't have to take up as much carbon to do it because it's getting warmer at the same time," she says. "We are already seeing this in the North Atlantic subtropical gyre, and this is some of the first evidence for climate damping the ocean's ability to take up carbon from the atmosphere."

She stresses the need to improve available datasets and expand this type of analysis to other oceans, which are relatively less-studied than the North Atlantic, to continue to refine carbon uptake trends in different ocean regions. This information will be critical for decision-making, since any decrease in ocean uptake may require greater human efforts to control carbon dioxide levels in the atmosphere.

McKinley's work on the project was supported by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration.

Pursuing Plant Power

In a quest to build a better solar cell, North Carolina State University chemical engineer Orlin Velev is borrowing from nature’s experts in collecting the sun’s energy: leaves. Starting with the natural pigments that help plants harvest solar rays, Velev and his team have crafted a flexible, nontoxic photovoltaic device that he hopes could eventually generate clean electricity far more cheaply than today’s silicon-based solar panels.

Velev’s one-square-inch proto­types consist of light-sensitive molecules—including the photosynthesis powerhouse chlorophyll—embedded in a water-based gel sandwiched between copper and plastic electrodes. Unlike traditional solar cells, many of which contain toxic elements such as cadmium, the biologically derived materials in Velev’s device can be safely released into the environment after use. The cell’s flexibility could make it an ideal choice for covering irregular surfaces; large pieces could even be rolled up or folded for easy transportation.

“This is a totally different way of thinking compared to a semiconductor cell, which is solid and expensive,” Velev says. In the next stage of development, he aims to boost the efficiency of the design, which is currently less than one percent of that achieved by top-performing silicon solar cells.

Article by Victoria Tang: Discover Magazine

Power Generation from Renewables Surpasses Nuclear: ENN

The latest issue of the Monthly Energy Review published by the US Energy Information Administration, electric power generation from renewable sources has surpassed production from nuclear sources, and is now "closing in on oil," says Ken Bossong Executive Director of the Sun Day Campaign.

In the first quarter of 2011 renewable energy sources accounted for 11.73 percent of US domestic energy production. Renewable sources include solar, wind, geothermal, hydro, biomass/biofuel. As of the first quarter of 2011, energy production from these sources was 5.65 percent more than production from nuclear.

As Bossing further explains from the report, renewable sources are closing the gap with generation from oil-fired sources, with renewable source equal to 77.15 percent of total oil based generation.

For all sectors, including transportation, thermal, and electrical generation, renewable energy production grew just over 15 percent in the first quarter of 2011 compared to the first quarter of 2010, and fully 25 percent over first quarter 2009. In a break-down of renewable sources, biomass/biofuel accounted for a bit more than 48 percent, hydro for 35.41 percent, wind for nearly 13 percent, geothermal 2.45 percent, and solar at 1.16 percent.

Looking at just the electrical generation sector, renewable sources, including hydro, accounted for nearly 13 percent of net US electrical generation in the first quarter of 2011, up from 10.31 percent for the same quarter last year. Non-hydro renewable sources accounted for 4.74 percent of net US production.

CSR With Hotel Soap and "Clean the World": Environmental News Network

Have you ever given much thought to what happens to those little bars of soap that you come across in hotel rooms? What happens when you open one of those neatly packaged bars and use it? Perhaps you don’t even finish it and leave it there and assume housekeeping will throw it away. According to Clean the World, hotels discard millions of pounds of soap and shampoo in the U.S. These products often end up in already overflowing landfills and contaminate fragile groundwater systems.

Clean the World is a non-profit organization that distributes recycled soap products, along with appropriate educational materials to impoverished communities and to domestic homeless shelters. According to them, each year more than five million lives are lost to severe respiratory diseases with the majority of deaths being among children less than five years old. Studies have shown that simple hand washing substantially reduces the spread of these diseases. Unfortunately, the essential items for proper hand washing are unobtainable for millions of people worldwide.

They have developed a process to sanitize used hotel soap and leftover shampoo. They reform the soap into new bars and then send it to parts of the world that can use it. They have also partnered with a number of hotel chains to collect all the little bars of used soap. Many hotels have also partnered with Clean the World as part of their CSR initiatives to ensure that soap is recycled effectively. In just two years of operation, the NGO has distributed more than 8 million bars of soap to children and families in the U.S and more than 40 countries including Haiti, Japan, Zimbabwe, Uganda, India, Honduras, Mexico and Albania.

Vital Climate Change Warnings Are Being Ignored, Says Expert

ScienceDaily — Canada's inland waters, the countless lakes and reservoirs across the country, are important "sentinels" for climate change and Ottawa and the provinces are ignoring the warnings.
That's the message from University of Alberta biologist David Schindler and colleagues in a paper in the journal, Science.
Schindler is a co-author of Sentinels of Change, which reviewed papers addressing the effects of climate change revealed in numerous long-term studies presented at a conference last September.
In his paper, Schindler highlighted studies that have shown that Canada and the United States will have to rethink plans to use the Laurentian Great Lakes as an emergency water supply if a dramatic shortage befalls North America in the future. Data collected by researchers indicate the water balance is the Laurentian Great Lakes is precarious because it is only renewing itself at the rate of less than one per cent a year.
Schindler and his co-authors also analyze a study involving carbon emissions. "Recent studies show that lakes release very high releases of greenhouse gases to the atmosphere, in many cases higher than the surrounding forests in the same watersheds. This has been missed in climate modeling to date."
Schindler says more inland water studies are needed in Canada because they provide valuable data on water levels, carbon cycles, acid rain and the frequency of forest fires. There are three long-term inland water studies in Canada, all of them in Ontario. Schindler is calling for more funding and expansion of the research program.

Pros and cons of nuclear power: Timeforchange.org

As a result of the current discussion how further global warming could be prevented or at least mitigated, the revival of nuclear power seems to be in everybody's - or at least in many politician's - mind. It it interesting to see that in many suggestions to mitigate global warming, the focus is put on the advantages of nuclear power generation, its disadvantages are rarely mentioned.
Hopefully, the following summary of arguments for and against nuclear power can fill this gap:

Advantages of nuclear power generation:
Nuclear power generation does emit relatively low amounts of carbon dioxide (CO2). The emissions of green house gases and therefore the contribution of nuclear power plants to global warming is therefore relatively little.
This technology is readily available, it does not have to be developed first.
It is possible to generate a high amount of electrical energy in one single plant.

Disadvantages of nuclear power generation:
The problem of radioactive waste is still an unsolved one. The waste from nuclear energy is extremely dangerous and it has to be carefully looked after for several thousand years (10'000 years according to United States Environmental Protection Agency standards).
High risks: Despite a generally high security standard, accidents can still happen. It is technically impossible to build a plant with 100% security. A small probability of failure will always last. The consequences of an accident would be absolutely devastating both for human being as for the nature. The more nuclear power plants (and nuclear waste storage shelters) are built, the higher is the probability of a disastrous failure like the recent catastrophe in Japan.
Nuclear power plants as well as nuclear waste could be preferred targets for terrorist attacks. No atomic energy plant in the world could withstand an attack similar to 9/11 in Yew York. Such a terrorist act would have catastrophic effects for the whole world.
During the operation of nuclear power plants, radioactive waste is produced, which in turn can be used for the production of nuclear weapons. In addition, the same know-how used to design nuclear power plants can to a certain extent be used to build nuclear weapons (nuclear proliferation).
The energy source for nuclear energy is Uranium. Uranium is a scarce resource, its supply is estimated to last only for the next 30 to 60 years depending on the actual demand.
The time frame needed for formalities, planning and building of a new nuclear power generation plant is in the range of 20 to 30 years in the western democracies. In other words: It is an illusion to build new nuclear power plants in a short time.

Sustainability: Is nuclear energy sustainable?
For several reasons, nuclear power is neither «green» nor sustainable:
Both the nuclear waste as well as retired nuclear plants are a life-threatening legacy for hundreds of future generations. It flagrantly contradicts with the thoughts of sustainability if future generations have to deal with dangerous waste generated from preceding generations.
Uranium, the source of energy for nuclear power, is available on earth only in limited quantities. Uranium is being «consumed» (i.e. converted) during the operation of the nuclear power plant so it won't be available any more for future generations. This again contradicts the principle of sustainability.

Is nuclear power renewable energy?
Nuclear energy uses Uranium as fuel, which is a scarce resource. The supply of Uranium is expected to last only for the next 30 to 60 years (depending on the actual demand). Therefore nuclear energy is NOT a renewable energy.

The Oxymoron Of Political Leadership: Analysis by Stephen Leahy (vienna) Wednesday, June 29, 2011

Political will is all that's needed to bring electricity to the 2.5 billion people with no or unreliable access to power, or to feed the one billion who go hungry every day, or to finally begin to slash carbon emissions to avoid dangerous climate change, or just about any other global problem.
Humanity has the technology, resources and even the money to solve these problems, agree scientists, corporate business leaders, heads of civil society organisations and United Nations agencies and government ministers. 'All that is lacking is political will,' they almost always declare at the dozens of international conferences, summits and forums this reporter has attended for the past five years. And then everyone goes home.
What is this magical 'political will' that can solve any problem?
It seems it is as simple as deciding to do something and then making sure it happens no matter what. You decide to take a train somewhere. You plan the time and route, book the ticket, pay for it and arrange your life to make sure you get on that train. Every day, we make decisions and carry them out.
'Political will is really about priorities,' says Anders Wijkman, former member of the European Parliament and current vice chair of the Tällberg Foundation, a Swedish NGO.
The priority for Europe and many countries is the current economic crisis and all else is secondary right now, said Wijkman, who has fought to put many important environmental and development issues at the top of the agenda in Europe.
Everyone in the world could have electricity or be fed properly if it were the most important thing for world leaders to do. However, not only are other issues clamouring for attention, there are enormous barriers to doing anything different such as bringing light to the billion people who are left in the dark when the sun goes down.
'You have to remember politicians are more interested in incremental change than transformational change,' Wijkman told IPS at the 2011 Vienna Energy Forum last week.
Some 1,200 delegates from 100 countries attended along with 40 government ministers to discuss how to bring clean, efficient, reliable and affordable energy services for the long-term prosperity of all people. The need for 'political will' was frequently cited.
Political leadership is in fact an oxymoron. It doesn't mean what everyone thinks it does. In off-the-record conversations with retired politicians, they have candidly admitted their first priority as ministers was to ensure their party was re-elected. Taking a leadership role on anything else was viewed as risky and politically dangerous.
'It is up to the public to demand change,' they often told IPS. Unfortunately, the public listens to what politicians say and pays too little attention to what they do.
There are also powerful barriers to changing priorities in the form of special interest groups such as the corporate sector. Renewable energy was and is still strongly opposed by big power utilities, says Wijkman.
Renewable energy is generally small-scale and decentralised, and utilities like big and centralised. Utilities have made their investments in big power generation facilities. 'Extending the operational life of big power plants, be it coal or nuclear, means huge profits at very little cost,' he says. Even in progressive Europe, the fight to shift to renewable energy was difficult. Tough legislation and rich feed-in tariffs are the main reason Europe has been able to reduce its carbon emissions through alternative energy generation even though overall energy demand has risen. And because publicly subsidised coal or oil still does not pay the full costs of their pollution - smog and carbon - renewables are more expensive to install.
'There is an ideology in industry that renewables cannot meet their needs and the only way is with big centralised power,' Wijkman says. However, that is not the case when wind and sun energy is coupled with smart grids, energy storage using water (pumping water uphill when energy demand is low) and intelligent design.
There is an unwillingness to move away from business as usual and there is even fear amongst politicians and the public that change will mean giving up what we are used to and that is why we are not proactive, Wijkman concluded.
The reality is that business as usual cannot be sustained from either an environmental or development point of view, said economist Nebojsa Nakicenovic, deputy director of the International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis located near Vienna.
'A transformation of the global energy system is needed,' Nakicenovic says.
That transformation can bring a wide range of benefits, including cleaner air, better health, more productive societies, a reduction in conflicts, and getting the world on a path to keeping global warming below two degrees C. The triple goals set out at the Vienna Forum of energy for all, energy intensity reduction of 40 percent and generate 30 percent of the world's electricity with renewables would bring those benefits and is doable, he says.
'It is doable only if there is early and sustained investments,' he warns, and only if there are no further investments in coal power plants, and energy gobbling buildings and other infrastructure. But the window of opportunity is already closing. 'If we wait too long it will be too late,' he adds.
The fear is that political leaders will not heed this warning and the necessary energy transformation will not become a top priority until it is too late. It seems that only if the public exerts its will can this outcome be altered.
© Inter Press Service (2011) — All Rights Reserved

Inkjet Printing Could Change the Face of Solar Energy Industry

Inkjet printers, a low-cost technology that in recent decades has revolutionized home and small office printing, may soon offer similar benefits for the future of solar energy.
Engineers at Oregon State University have discovered a way for the first time to create successful "CIGS" solar devices with inkjet printing, in work that reduces raw material waste by 90 percent and will significantly lower the cost of producing solar energy cells with some very promising compounds.
High performing, rapidly produced, ultra-low cost, thin film solar electronics should be possible, scientists said.
The findings have been published in Solar Energy Materials and Solar Cells, a professional journal, and a patent applied for on the discovery. Further research is needed to increase the efficiency of the cell, but the work could lead to a whole new generation of solar energy technology, researchers say.
"This is very promising and could be an important new technology to add to the solar energy field," said Chih-hung Chang, an OSU professor in the School of Chemical, Biological and Environmental Engineering. "Until now no one had been able to create working CIGS solar devices with inkjet technology."
Part of the advantage of this approach, Chang said, is a dramatic reduction in wasted material. Instead of depositing chemical compounds on a substrate with a more expensive vapor phase deposition -- wasting most of the material in the process -- inkjet technology could be used to create precise patterning with very low waste.
"Some of the materials we want to work with for the most advanced solar cells, such as indium, are relatively expensive," Chang said. "If that's what you're using you can't really afford to waste it, and the inkjet approach almost eliminates the waste."
One of the most promising compounds and the focus of the current study is called chalcopyrite, or "CIGS" for the copper, indium, gallium and selenium elements of which it's composed. CIGS has extraordinary solar efficiency -- a layer of chalcopyrite one or two microns thick has the ability to capture the energy from photons about as efficiently as a 50-micron-thick layer made with silicon.
In the new findings, researchers were able to create an ink that could print chalcopyrite onto substrates with an inkjet approach, with a power conversion efficiency of about 5 percent. The OSU researchers say that with continued research they should be able to achieve an efficiency of about 12 percent, which would make a commercially viable solar cell.
In related work, being done in collaboration with Greg Herman, an OSU associate professor of chemical engineering, the engineers are studying other compounds that might also be used with inkjet technology, and cost even less.
Some approaches to producing solar cells are time consuming, or require expensive vacuum systems or toxic chemicals. OSU experts are working to eliminate some of those roadblocks and create much less costly solar technology that is also more environmentally friendly. New jobs and industries in the Pacific Northwest could evolve from such initiatives, they say.
If costs can be reduced enough and other hurdles breached, it might even be possible to create solar cells that could be built directly into roofing materials, scientists say, opening a huge new potential for solar energy.
"In summary, a simple, fast, and direct-write, solution-based deposition process is developed for the fabrication of high quality CIGS solar cells," the researchers wrote in their conclusion. "Safe, cheap, and air-stable inks can be prepared easily by controlling the composition of low-cost metal salt precursors at a molecular level."
This work was supported by the Daegu Gyeongbuk Institute of Science and Technology, the U.S. Department of Energy and OSU's University Venture Development Fund, which helps donors receive tax benefits while sponsoring projects that will bring new technology, jobs and economic growth to Oregon.

Economic Indicators Point Toward Growth in Renewable Energy

While scanning the horizon in sea of mostly grim economic news, I found three gems - - - news reports or economic indicators, if you will, that point to solid and profitable growth in the renewable energy sector of the economy in the near, 3-5 year term.
These indicators point toward a shift in the financing, production, consumption and distribution of alternative energy, predicated on advances in technology that will bring the productions costs down to a competitive plateau with conventional fossil fuels. I suspect the time it takes from "innovation in the laboratory" to diffuse into the commercial market place has to be reduced from years to months or less, in order for this to work. When investors like General Electric, Google, and MIT, direct research and investment on this scale - - - it just might tip the balance.
The cost benefit ratio of "coal fired" electricity vs "solar" will equalize or fall in favor of solar. In a recent report from Bloomberg news, Mr. Mark M. Little, the global research director for General Electric Co., predicts that solar power may be cheaper than electricity generated by fossil fuels within 3-5 years. A combination of rising energy prices with lower production cost and higher efficiency will make solar cost competitive with conventional coal fired electric generation. General Electric (GE) plans to invest in "advanced" solar panel manufacturing and expects to open a plant in 2013, employing over 400 people and make enough solar panels to power 80,000 homes. If this business plan unfolds as predicted, watch for explosive growth on all fronts the Solar industry.
Major advance in battery technology will change the automotive playing field. The "energy density" ratio of stored battery power vs liquid fossil fuel will get closer giving the battery powered automobile the range you'd expect from a tank of gas - - - with much faster re - charging time. In a press release from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology dated June 6, 2011, researchers announced they have devised a radical new approach to battery construction that provide an inexpensive, smaller, and lighter, alternative to existing battery technology. This is the "breakthrough" technology needed to make electric vehicles affordable and practical. To see the technical details and read full press release go to; http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2011/flow-batteries-0606.html
Google recently announced a $280 million partnership with California installer, Solar City, (www.solarcity.com) to set up a financing model that offers residents a roof top solar system for no money down. In exchange, customers agree to pay a set price for the power produced by the panels. This is largest solar initiative of its kind in US that will facilitate cost competitive utility scale power generation and distribution to thousands of homes.
To date, GOOGLE has invested over $680 million in renewable energy projects, with the goal of making the company a "net zero" user of electric power. This corporate philosophy is based on the bottom line premise that solar will cost the consumer less than conventional fossil or nuclear. We will all be watching this project to see how it plays out, both in KWh generated and return on investment. If this investment model works for GOOGLE, then maybe, other corporate investors will follow. See full press release; http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20110614/ap_on_hi_te/us_google_solar

GOP Attacks White House for Politicizing Oil Spill

Republicans lashed out at the Obama administration yesterday for using the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico for political purposes, signaling sharpening partisanship during a crucial period in which Democrats hope to build support for climate legislation.
That effort was clouded yesterday as the White House threatened to veto Sen. Lisa Murkowski's (R-Alaska) resolution blocking U.S. EPA from regulating thousands of businesses that release carbon dioxide. Critics charge that the EPA rules will shock companies with new costs.
The White House punctuated its opposition to the resolution, to be considered by the Senate tomorrow, by claiming Murkowski's effort would weaken the government's ability to address environmental catastrophes, like the "ongoing BP oil spill."
A peeved Murkowski argued that the administration's "leap of logic," along with environmental groups' attacks linking her resolution with oiled wildlife, obscures her intent: to prevent a massive inflation of agency power that would drown jobs and hike energy prices.
"To have made this connection here that this resolution is all about the oil industry or the energy industry is just absolutely flawed," Murkowski said. "But what I think is happening is the administration and those who oppose me on this are looking to, I think, confuse the issue. I think they're doing a pretty good job of that."
"Stunning," she added of the president's veto threat, suggesting it was manufactured to exploit the spill. "What would he have said if the oil spill had not happened? So I don't know how they made that connect."
The White House Statement of Administration Policy issued yesterday leaned in part on the spill to make its case against Murkowski's "disapproval resolution." The White House document also asserts that stripping EPA of its obligations to address greenhouse gas emissions under the Clean Air Act would roll back new fuel efficiency standards for vehicles, which could save motorists $3,000 in fuel costs over the lifetime of future cars.
The resolution would also "undermine the Administration's efforts to reduce the negative impacts of pollution and the risks associated with environmental catastrophes, like the ongoing BP oil spill," the administration document adds. "As seen in the Gulf of Mexico, environmental disasters harm families, destroy jobs, and pollute the Nation's air, land and water."

Dolphin and Sea Turtle deaths only the tip of the iceberg: By The National Wildlife Federation

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration have confirmed at least one dead dolphin and one dead sea turtle have visible signs of oil damage. So far, 29 dead dolphins and 227 dead sea turtles have been collected within the BP oil spill area, but the vast majority have not been tested for oil.

As NWF senior scientist Dr. Doug Inkley explains, these numbers tell only part of the story: “The deaths of dolphins and sea turtles are particularly tragic, because we know we are only seeing the tip of the iceberg with those that have been washed up onshore and tested.”

Researchers have reported at least two massive underwater plumes of oil, each hundreds of feet deep and stretching for miles. The effect of these plumes on marine life remains hidden beneath the ocean’s surface, making it impossible to capture the full scope of the oil spill’s impact.

To better understand what is happening below the surface, members of the National Wildlife Federation along with Dr. Kevin Boswell of Louisiana State University recently lowered a remote operated vehicle 200 feet down into waters off the Gulf shore. You can watch a video of what they found here.

As officials warn that oil from the spill could keep spewing until August, the National Wildlife Federation continues to work around the clock to be the voice of wildlife during this crisis.

Obama administration needs to step up role in BP oil spill: By Letters to the Editor/The Star-Ledger May 28, 2010

Government must step in
It’s been more than a month since the oil rig Deepwater Horizon began leaking thousands of barrels of crude oil into the Gulf of Mexico, threatening to destroy centuries-old fishing and oyster industries and to contaminate the food supply of fish and mammal populations. Despite its efforts to stem the leak, BP has only been moderately successful.
In reaction, all the Obama administration has managed to do is put Secretary of the Interior Ken Salazar in front of the cameras and have him wag his finger at BP. While Salazar is busy assigning blame to a company that has clearly acknowledged it’s at fault, the oil keeps leaking into the environment.

Who Cares About Carbon Emissions?

Carbon emissions are created all the time, all around the world. So what? Carbon dioxide creates the largest man-made contribution to the greenhouse effect, which is what is slowly, yet persistently, warming our globe. That makes it the most important greenhouse gas out there. It's currently responsible for about 25% of the greenhouse effect. Methane and ozone, the next two on the list, incidentally, don't crack the double digits, so carbon emissions are in the lead, in a bad way, when it comes to greenhouse gas emissions.
We live not only in a carbon-based world, but a carbon emission-based society, and the scope of activities that produce carbon emissions is just huge. Anything involving petroleum, coal, natural gas has a carbon emission ticket attached; that includes all cars and most transportation, the vast majority of our nations' electricity production (about half comes from coal alone), and a whole lot of home heating systems, just as a small snapshot. So if you don't care, you should start to care.

Maritime Group Seeks Cleaner Fuel for Ships

Oceangoing ships are not the cleanest form of transportation. Their fuels usually have high sulfur content, which leads to high particulate emissions. And air that is high in particulates has been linked to health problems like asthma, heart attacks and lung cancer, particularly among people who live in coastal areas.
As a result, the International Maritime Organization has adopted policies calling for reducing the sulfur content of marine fuels, from an average of about 3 percent currently to 0.5 percent by 2020. A few areas have been created, notably in the Baltic and North seas, that will require use of fuel with even less sulfur.
A study in the journal Environmental Science and Technology suggests that such reductions, if enforced, would cut the number of potential premature deaths due to ship emissions in half in some cases.
James J. Winebrake of the Rochester Institute of Technology and colleagues modeled the impact of reducing sulfur content globally, and within 200 miles of coastal areas, versus maintaining the status quo. They found that by 2012, with no reduction in sulfur content, about 87,000 premature deaths annually could be attributed to ship emissions.
Reducing sulfur content to half of one percent worldwide would cut that number by about 41,000, they said.