LowCarbonMenu WP 2011 Web

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The Low Carbon Menu

Doug Houseman, Enernex

OCTOBER 2011WHITEPAPER


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2Copyright 2011 Enernex. All Rights Reserved

I. IntroductIon1

Its useul to compare reducing greenhouse gases in the atmosphere, especially carbon,

to the ood business. Every major personality, interest or industry group has a avorite

recipe or a low carbon dish, but very little attention has been paid to developing a

complete and convenient low carbon menu.

Having read and rejected Hot, Flat and Crowded,2 Ive been asked by many people i I

really believe that we can get to a low carbon uture. This article is my answer to that

question. I believe we can do it, but not i we try to prepare and serve only one dish at

a time. Rather, I believe we need to develop a broad menu to achieve and sustain a low

carbon society going orward. Water, gas, electricity, transportation, and agriculture

must all be addressed as part o that menu. Dealing with any one o these in isolation

could mean shortchanging the rest.

Lets start with a set o goals that many o us would want a low carbon menu to meet.

A suitable plan would entail:

1. No reduction in irst-world standards o living; or developing countries, an

improvement in standard o living. In the developed world, there will be an overall

reduction in energy consumption, but no drastic changes in liestyle.

2. For the individual, no dramatic change in habits orced by laws or regulation. Rather,

the low carbon menu will provide the individual with a set o choices, allowing

people to move in the direction they want to move. Think o it as a really good

Chinese restaurant with a wide menu o choices and multiple available courses.

3. Enough water available to supply everyone with clean, sae drinking water.

4. Enough ood to supply everyone with adequate calories and a healthy range o

choices, including ood grown halway around the world, at reasonable prices as

a proportion o income.

5. Enough energy to provide hot water, summer cooling, winter heating, cooking

and other needs, again at reasonable prices as a proportion o income.

6. Freedom to live in the location that best suits each amily or individual.

7. Convenient and aordable transportation options that allow people to work, shop

and pay social visits using a variety o modes o conveyance as deemed appropriate

to the purpose and distance traveled.

1. This paper uses references and numbers that are U.S.-centric. That is not intended to downplay the global

scale of the issue; rather it is done to limit the reference work in the document. Almost everything in The

Low Carbon Menu applies globally. It is the authors hope that no one will be offended by the U.S.-centric

nature of the examples and data. Also please forgive the use of English rather than metric units of measure.

The phrase The Low Carbon Menu is copyright Doug Houseman, all rights reserved.

2. Thomas Friedman


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Many environmentalists and writers claim that the seven goals listed above cannot be

sustained in the long term. They say the planet cant handle it, that something has to

give. Others argue that their preerred solution (think o it as a single entree on the

menu) is the only answer needed, and urther, that i their one solution doesnt provideit, we as a society dont really need it.

Both groups are wrong. There is no one answer. There is no Graperuit Diet that

will take us painlessly to the promised land o Green Energy. As a society, we will all

have to shit and change how we do many things in order to meet these goals, but

it is possible to meet them, i we approach the whole problem creatively and with

a sense o urgency. This article will outline some o the major areas that must be

addressed and propose solutions, some radically high-tech and some using existing

or even low technology approaches, that can and should be used hand-in-hand.

Almost all o the solutions proposed exist today in some orm. Even so, many people

will still dismiss this article out o hand.

A Mae Sa

Some simple changes to existing and new buildings could greatly reduce our

consumption o energy. All o these items could be incorporated into the update to the

U.S. building code proposed or 2014 and into the next iterations o updates to building

codes around the world. I governments really wanted to encourage conservation o

energy and reduction in the use o ossil uel, this would be an excellent place to start.

Additionally, making all easible changes to existing buildings would put many people

to work quickly. The recommended changes include:

1. Eegy Sveys. The U.S. government should use 2010 Census data to develop

a plan or a complete energy consumption survey o every unit o housing

in the country. Google and other high-tech companies can help by creating

augmented reality maps o residential neighborhoods using satellite images

to gure out who has a hot roo in the wintertime and who has a cold roo in

the summertime. The survey should ocus on the ability o the housing unit to

maintain a comortable internal environment and to use energy eciently or

lighting, cooking, communication, entertainment and other tasks. Houses with

the greatest need or upgrades or changes to their HVAC systems, windows, doors,

and insulation could then be identied.

2. cash calkes. Lets put government money and unemployed people to workto repair and improve housing units. Using the energy survey, x the housing units

in the bottom 5% or energy eciency, and then repeat the process o xing the

bottom 5% every year or the next decade. At the end o this process, the housing

stock will be in much better shape, quality o lie will be improved or many and

energy consumption would have allen signicantly. Tens o thousands o people

would have access to these newly developed jobs. Many o these jobs would have

to be at minimum wage in order or the improvements to save money overall, but this

program would provide income or semi-skilled workers perorming useul labor.


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3. Sla Heaig. Most champions o green energy want to use roos or photovoltaic

systems, which make electricity rom sunlight. A ar better choice or most

residences would be to use photo-thermal systems to provide hot water and

heating or the home. In the 1970s, the rst generation o solar water heaterswas deployed. Soon aterwards, the industry crashed, leaving many ormerly

enthusiastic customers with rotting rst-generation installations leaking all over

their roos. Most o these early solar rootop hot water systems were poorly

designed and built rom materials that were not suitable or the temperature

extremes o that environment. Ater almost 40 years o tinkering and some

advances in materials science, the solar-thermal devices available today are much

improved. They work reliably in the winter, even in extreme climate areas like

Montana, though there are some locations where they are not eective enough

to save money or energy. Solar hot water heaters should be on the roos o most

homes in the world. I you dont believe me, check out what China has done: they

are a decade ahead o the rest o the world.

The south-acing wall o a home is also a good source o heat that can be exploited

using a dierent set o heaters: solar air heaters. These are tall, shallow boxes with

large sheets o glass (or another transparent material) and fat black backgrounds.

These boxes can provide a reasonable amount o heat even on the coldest day.

Backing them with an insulated wall o rocks, bricks or concrete provides enough

heat storage capacity to let them warm (or help to warm) the house all night long.

In the summertime, the solar air heaters or the entire south wall can be covered

with a white tarp to refect the suns heat and reduce the need or cooling.

4. Gehemal clig. In most o the world, the issue with summer comort is not

the heat, but rather the humidity. Removing the humidity while only slightly

cooling the air is enough, in many areas, to provide a reasonably comortable

working, sleeping and living environment. Running air over a set o cool pipes in

which groundwater is circulating condenses a large amount o the humidity out o

the air. There is no reason that air conditioning or interior climate control should

not move in the direction o simple, old-ashioned geothermal cooling or heating

systems. These systems require no rerigerant, no chemicals not even a heat

pump. Instead, they need only a small pump with a closed underground loop ull

o water, a heat exchanger and a an. Another advantage o this type o cooling

is that it generates resh water. With the proper selection o materials and proper

upkeep to maintain cleanliness, such a system can even generate drinking water.

5. themal Mass. Every new building should be built to include a signicant amount

o internal thermal mass. This could be achieved using old concrete pieces rom

roads, sand, or rocks the source matters very little. Thermal mass moderates the

speed o temperature change in the home. In other words, i you warm it during

the day in the winter, the house stays warm at night; i you cool it at night, the

house stays cooler or a sustained period o time. Thermal mass can be readily

retrotted along with the other changes discussed previously.


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The problem with these proposed changes to buildings and HVAC systems is that they

are all low-technology answers. They are not sexy; many industry observers laugh

at them and downplay their potential impact. There are ew incentives in place to

encourage the implementation o these long-payback changes, even though manyo these methods dont require quite as much capital investment as more glamorous

projects like biodiesel and photovoltaic arrays. But when taken together, they oer a

signicant reduction in heating and cooling costs and energy use.

rehikig Exisig Eegy-Efiey raig Pgams

Two examples o programs that oered hope or a more energy-rugal uture are

Energy Star and LEED. Both are programs that have changed the way people think

about energy use. Those yellow energy consumption tags giving the annual cost to

operate this appliance and comparing that cost to similar but competing appliances are

now a common sight in stores. Both architects and buildings proudly display their LEEDcertication credentials. Both o these programs have brought ar more value to society

than they cost to implement. They have orced changes that have gone ar beyond the

hopes o the teams that originally developed these programs. But they could be better.

Energy Star II (Energy Superstar)

The U.S. ederal government has promoted the development and sale o energy-

ecient appliances or more than 20 years. The Energy Star program has signicantly

reduced the energy use per unit o size or domestic and commercial appliances such as

washing machines, dryers, rerigerators, computers, etc. The problem is that once those

Energy Star standards are set, they remain static or as long as a decade beore they

are updated. In many cases, appliances such as TVs, computer monitors, rerigerators,etc., have gotten larger over that same time period. While these bigger and better

appliances are oten more ecient on a per-unit basis than they used to be, the total

energy savings or the society as a whole is not as signicant as it might be.

Its time to blow up the Energy Star program and start again. There are provisions in

the proposed Climate Change Bill to develop an Energy Superstar program that will

identiy the top ten percent o appliances and orce a reresh o the program standards.

However, at this juncture, no one knows i the Climate Change Bill will pass and i this

program will remain in the nal version o the bill.

The new Energy Superstar program needs to make energy eciency a moving target

or all o these categories o appliances, HVAC systems, and personal electronics. Over

the next 20 years, each category o appliance would be required to meet our successive

target levels o eciency levels that are adjusted every ve years. That means that

manuacturers will need to maintain ongoing R&D eorts in order to keep their products

on track to meet the next target. While the program works i the series o targets

are xed, it is even more eective i the Target 2 step (i.e., 10 years away) is adjusted

based on the best available technology when each new target becomes eective. In

other words, at ve years into the program, i the manuacturers in the top tier o


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My suggestion is to develop a 100-point scale or buildings whereby the higher the score,

the greater energy eciency the building has. The score needs to have two components

that address the building itsel and the building as occupied. The envelope o the building

windows, insulation, construction, and other materials normally remain in thebuilding when ownership changes hands. This structure score should be based on those

items that are not likely to change when the owner or tenant changes. The as-occupied

score should include lighting xtures, controls and bulbs, appliances, equipment and

other items that could move i the building changed tenants or ownership. This two-

score solution provides owners with a great deal o very important inormation. The

rst score helps them understand the quality o the buildings underlying structure and

where they should concentrate any energy eciency spending to improve the structure

score. The second looks at the choices that that owner or operator makes in terms o

equipment and should help them ocus on the value o changes to those investments

as well. In the near term, it is easier or a typical owner to ocus on the occupied score;

longer term, as maintenance and rehabilitation is needed, guidance on how to improvea buildings energy eciency rating would come rom the structure scale.

Building inspectors and others should be oered the training necessary to accurately score

new construction projects, so that as they perorm construction inspections or structure,

insulation, wiring, ducts and other aspects o the construction project, the inspector

should also be able to score each step in the process or its eects on the energy eciency

level o the building. With existing structures, the cost o an energy eciency inspection

should be tax-deductible or an existing owner and required as part o the supporting

documentation or the transaction each time a building changes hands.

Commercial and Industrial

Both Energy SuperStar and Energy Eciency Ratings programs need to be expanded

beyond their current ocus on consumer and residential issues to include equivalent

ratings or commercial and industrial equipment and sites. I will not go into extensive

detail about these programs here; that topic alone merits another entire essay. It is

very important to adjust these programs to allow them to be applicable to existing

businesses and buildings as soon as possible.


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tig Wase I Ips

Forty years ago, most o the outputs rom a power plant were waste ash, clinkers,

sulur, and more. Today, the power generation industry has learned to capture sulurand send it to chemical plants as an input or creating complex, useul chemicals.

Technologies have been developed to prevent the emission o most compounds o

nitrogen and oxygen (NOx). Mercury is also captured rom the stack gasses and sent

to actories producing light bulbs, switches and other useul products. Ash and clinkers

are now used in concrete and asphalt, respectively. A well-planned power plant now

produces very little waste that nds its way into a landll. Since the electrical power

industry has or the most part solved the problems that society previously associated

with the waste products o power generation, its time to tackle the more recently

identied issue o greenhouse gas emissions.

Carbon Dioxide

Power plants that burn uel any uel create CO2. This happens because burning

is the process o combining carbon compounds rom the uel with oxygen rom the

air to release heat. A distinction being made by many green energy analysts is that

some sources o CO2 emissions should be considered acceptable, while others should

not. For example, according to this theory, i you burn wood chips, sawdust pellets or

other biomass that has recently been alive, the CO2 created will not negatively impact

the global climate. However, CO2 rom ossil uels such as coal, oil, and natural gas are

decidedly more harmul and thereore are not acceptable. Releasing this ossil carbon

into the atmosphere is what is believed to be the cause o climate change, which is also

called anthropogenic global warming or AGW.

Some have argued that we should shut down all ossil-ueled plants as soon as possible,

no matter the cost or disruption to the economy. Others suggest that we can protect both

the environment and the economy by injecting the CO2 created by burning ossil uels

back underground the area rom which most o the uel came. There is, however, a third

option or dealing with CO2, at a likely lower cost than ground sequestration or replacing

all ossil uel power plants an option which is also o ar greater value to society.

The local ood movement is predicated on the belie that we should change our ood

systems to grow as much ood as possible in close proximity to the people who eat it.

To do this, we would need to create many local controlled environments to enable at

least some ood to be grown locally year-round. Being able to obtain the maximum

sustainable yield per unit o area is also required to enable urban dwellers to convert to

locavores. By using hoop houses and green houses, a large number o commercial crops

can eectively be grown year-round in most areas o the country.

A dirty little secret o the ood production industry is that commercial greenhouses

oten burn natural gas specically to create CO2, which is then circulated throughout

the greenhouse. This CO2 is absorbed by the plants in the greenhouse, allowing the

greenhouses very high concentration o plants to grow larger, aster. This lets the


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greenhouse produce more ood and more prot per unit o area in a given period o

time. Since plants use sunlight to convert CO2, water and minerals to oxygen (which is

released into the atmosphere) and carbohydrates or plant growth, its possible to use

the scrubbed CO2 rom electrical power plants to support accelerated plant growth ingreenhouses. This would mean that ossil uels, including natural gas, could continue to

be used to produce electricity, but the power plants would emit ar ewer greenhouse

gasses than they do now. Using this approach, the majority o those greenhouse gasses

can be captured by the plants in a greenhouse!

In addition, the arm industry has moved toward using what are called high tunnels to

produce some crops, keeping more heat around the plants so that they have more energy

to grow. With some modication, these high tunnels could be used to produce large

amounts o ood crops on a limited amount o land. Depending on how consumers are

encouraged to view the use o concentrated CO2 to enhance plant growth, ood could

even be grown in greenhouses using well-understood organic methods in addition to thesupplemental CO2. Organic oods are generally more valuable in the market and have a

higher prot margin. However, the organic nature o ood grown in such greenhouses

will depend on the label the USDA assigns to CO2 rom power generation sources.

This creative re-use o an industrial waste product could be useul or a broad swath

o society. It is up to us to decide whether we will accept this use, but a wise society

would strongly consider this approach. This technique or capturing greenhouse gas

emissions could be retrotted into existing acilities in almost any location. There

are several integrated power plant/greenhouse combinations already in operation

in the Netherlands. These acilities generate EU carbon credits, ood and fowers or

commercial sale, as well as electric power. The carbon credits, which can be sold via a

regulated market or cash, make these particular power generation plants among the

most protable in the EU.

Waste Heat

Many industrial acilities and power plants produce waste heat. Waste in this

sense means heat which is not useul or the plants primary purpose. This waste

heat is probably more accurately labeled as low-value heat rather than as true waste.

Depending on the location and season, the uses or low-value heat could vary widely.

With a little creativity, there are many ways this heat can be used. I the actory runs its

scrubbed exhaust through a greenhouse or high tunnel as just described, waste actory

heat can be used to extend both the growing season and the range o crops that canbe raised in these acilities. Very low pressure steam can be used as an input to create

distilled drinking water ater most o the energy rom the steam has been captured.

For waste heat, local needs will drive local uses and these applications will require a

range o solutions, which should potentially vary with the seasons. It may be helpul

or designers to consider every industrial acility with a steam plant as a combined heat

and power system. The specic solution or a given plant could either be retrotted into

existing acilities or used to design new acilities.


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In addition, where waste heat is ound in proximity to residential or commercial

neighborhoods, it can be used to heat (or pre-heat) water or domestic use, as well as to

heat the buildings. How to use this waste heat in the summer time, when most people

to be want cooler rather than warmer, is a challenge we need to work on urther. Wherethere is heat, there is energy. We only need to work out how to exploit that energy

to the ullest extent possible. Today, much o our low-level heat is allowed to go to

waste. To be better stewards o this planet, we need to nd ways to make use o this

potentially valuable waste heat.

Limited Synergy

There are many virtuous cycles that can be developed when we consider the waste

products or byproducts o one process as potential inputs to another process. Using the

idea o CO2 and low-value heat, lets look at a potential application near a liqueed

natural gas (LNG) import acility.

Most LNG import acilities have to burn some gas in order to raise the temperature o the

LNG enough that it can be transported via gas pipeline to industrial and residential users.

A novel idea is to use the low-value heat rom a nearby power plant to both raise the

temperature o LNG and to create vessels lled with pressurized CO2 rom the power plant

exhaust. The pressurized CO2 vessels would act as a heat exchanger or LNG, transerring

the cold rom the LNG into the CO2 and creating dry ice in the process. The sealed vessels

ull o dry ice could be shipped to energy-ecient oce buildings where water rom

the chillers would be pumped through them, cooling the building. The vessel could then

be returned or re-chilling and then continue to be recycled in this ashion throughout

the cooling season. While this would consume and/or contain only a raction o the CO2

generated by the power plant, the synergy among the various acilities would reduce theamount o LNG that would have to be burned to raise the temperature and reduce the

amount o electricity and water required to cool the buildings.

While this scenario may sound aretched, there is one LNG acility that is serious about

implementing at least part o the cycle. Several variations on these themes are also

possible. I it turns out to be impractical to absorb the rest o the CO2 rom the power

plant in a greenhouse, the cold rom the LNG acility could also be used to produce dry

ice (solid CO2) as a product. This plan only reduces greenhouse gas emissions by the

amount attributable to the LNG that isnt burned and the power that is not required to

compress and cool the CO2 into dry ice. However, it still utilizes a waste product rom

one operation in a commercially benecial way.


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Wae, Wae Eveywhee a n a dp tha is dikable

Water and energy are strongly linked in our society: we pump, clean, pump, treat, pump,

use, pump, recycle, and pump water over and over again. Water is heavy and requiresa large amount o energy to move. Some cities use as much as 35 percent o their total

public sector energy consumption on water.

Water is also becoming harder to get at the level o quality that is required or it to be sae

to drink. Requirements or processing water to be sae and sanitary are increasing, which

in turn increases the energy required. Even worse, there are areas where the expanding

demand or water is outpacing the available supply o water. In many areas around the

globe, the most serious constraint on economic growth is the lack o suitable water.

Drinking Water

Throughout much o the world, the prospect o turning sea water into drinking wateris an ever-expanding requirement. However, most desalinization processes demand

electricity and other expensive inputs to transorm salt water to drinking water. In some

cases, suitable locations near both a source o sea water and the users o the processed

water are easy to come by, but more oten, a desalinization plant must be located some

distance rom either the coast or the customers it is intended to serve, signicantly

raising the energy costs o transporting the water. Still, coastal areas are some o the

most productive zones or wind energy. Today, almost all wind energy is turned directly

into electricity and ed into the grid. In may be more ecient in some locations to

use the wind energy more directly to make drinking water. The use o wind-driven

mechanical pumps, as used to be common on arms throughout the Great Plains region

o the United States, may be more ecient in this process than creating electricity in anyorm and using it to power the pumps.

Reverse osmosis (RO) desalinization processes require pressurized water on one side o

a lter. Using a wind-driven mechanical pump to move water to a storage tank or water

tower could provide constant pressure, allowing an intermittently available resource to

provide a steady input into the drinking water creation process.

In a completely dierent approach, low-value or waste heat rom other industrial

processes could be used to distill resh water out o seawater or process waste water.

Solar heat could also be concentrated and used to convert water. Today, solar energy

is widely used to evaporate water rom which sea salts are harvested; adjusting this

process to capture the evaporated water or drinking or agriculture would mean thatless processing would be required than when starting directly rom salt water. The good

news is that all o this technology can be purchased o the shel.


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Ground Water

Scientists tell us that the level o aquiers (ground water) has dropped signicantly in

most o the world. Over the past several decades, communities around the world haveincreasingly drawn on this ancient water source to irrigate crops and provide drinking

water or expanding cities. It may be that some o the ice melt expected to cause a

rise in sea level could be redirected, desalinated and used to rell these ground water

reservoirs. This would require a major research project and construction o several

large pipelines wherever it was undertaken, but this approach could turn out to be

more cost-eective than relocating entire populations or building sea walls around

coastal areas throughout the world.

One estimate suggests that the Great Plains water table needs to add 30 or more eet o

ground water to return it to its pre-industrial level. Both Texas and Caliornia need more

ground water in order to support their growing populations. Given the area involved,

returning enough water to raise the water table would probably require only a ew

inches o ocean rise, but a ew inches might be all that is required to preserve most

coastlines. It would be useul or a group o scientists to calculate how much water

it would take to restore the various water tables on each continent to their earliest

recorded levels and what proportion this volume is o the total expected ice melt over

the next 100 years. The research and labor needed to achieve this would dwar most o

the projects that humans have undertaken to date, but would reverse changes we have

made to the planet while reducing the potential damage rom rising ocean levels.

A project to rell our aquiers using this approach would require at least three things:

1. Desalinization o seawater to provide resh water to put into the ground

2. Capture o major icebergs as they calve and the routing o that water into the aquier

3. Capturing food waters and redirecting this water, as well

Each o these three eorts is large in size and scope and requires major investment

and signicant engineering. Each could be tackled as a separate project working to

the same ends. At some point in the uture, massive plastic tents might cover square

miles o ocean water, concentrating sunlight and causing water to evaporate aster, the

vapor condensing on the plastic and running to collection lines that would take new

resh water to areas that require aquier restoration. These solar tents would reduce

the amount o other energy that would have to be added to produce the resh water.

There is a current test o resh-water collection using solar tents in the San Francisco

Bay Area. The tents are spread over the remaining Bay Area salt ponds to accelerate the

evaporation o water without the use o any ossil uels.


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Waste Water Recycling

In many areas, waste water contains very little waste and lots o water that could be

reused. This means huge volumes o water must be processed in order to make any oit suitable or re-use. In other areas, gray water containing relatively low amounts o

waste and so-called black water (water with high concentrations o waste, including

human or animal eces) have already been segregated to simpliy processing. Minimally

or un-processed gray water is useul or irrigation, particularly o non-ood crops. Black

water must be processed to remove solids, kill germs, and, in some cases, reduce the

concentration o certain chemicals beore the water can be re-used in any orm. The

amount o processing required will depend on both the nature and amount o waste

the water originally contained and the intended use o the processing plant output.

In most o the U.S., storm water drainage (rain and melting snow) is now collected

separately rom sewage and treated separately or let untreated and allowed to enter

natural waterways. In some cases, storm water can become contaminated in the process

o being collected. This contamination results rom ertilizers, pesticides, ice melters, oil,

tire particles and other materials that it carries along as it fows over roads, parking lots

and open ground. In other areas, the concentration o storm water runo due to large

amounts o impermeable suraces in an area causes serious erosion when the storm

water is nally discharged into a creek, stream or lake. However, a signicant part o

this contamination and erosion can be prevented with eective use o landscaping to

capture storm water. In addition, ground water supplies in an area can be renewed by

building unlined retention ponds with a sand lter bottom. Retention ponds require

less o the storm water to run o or be treated beore being pumped into rivers.

One growing problem is the contamination o both resh water supplies and wastewater with medicines. Many drugs pass through the body with ew changes; others are

broken down into dierent, but still signicant chemical compounds. The widespread

use o pharmaceuticals, both prescription and over-the-counter, means that both gray

and black water have measurable amounts o medical drugs in them by the time they get

to the water treatment plant. Treatment plants are unable to remove these drugs rom

the water, and so drugs and their by-products are accumulating in the environment.

To make the most o both gray and black water, new treatment methods or removing

drugs rom the water must be developed.

Black water oers a way to produce additional biomass rapidly, since it contains a lot o

energy and many o the nutrients needed or plant growth. With minimal processingto remove non-biodegradable materials, black water used on biomass crops will lead

to accelerated growth and reduced sewage treatment costs. In Arica, there are a

number o villages with biological water treatment acilities that take advantage o

specic plants to remove specic contaminants rom the treated water. The plants are

then harvested to provide biomass or uel or composted to improve the yields o ood

crops. Processing water or re-use in multipurpose acilities o this type may become an

important aspect o solving both energy and water supply issues in many locations.


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Irrigation

In many elds today, irrigation is overdone and more water is lost to evaporation than

the plants can actually use. Historically, irrigation was carried out in this way becauseit is easy and cheap. This is not all bad; cheap growing methods mean aordable

ood. However, water is ast becoming the limiting actor in the productivity o some

croplands, and the cost o water plus the cost o the energy needed to pump it is

rising almost everywhere in the world.

Israel and other countries with little available water have proven they can grow crops with

as little as 15 percent o what is used on some elds in the U.S. Water rights are a contentious

issue in the Western states and the use o water is embedded not just in the laws o many

states but also in the constitutions o those states. Changing irrigation methods to conserve

water will be tough, since more water-ecient methods are also more expensive than the

current methods. Again, research may be able to nd much better and cheaper ways to

water and also to develop crops requiring less water to fourish.

No matter which approach is used, solving water problems will take energy which will

have to come rom someplace. Reducing the amount o water needed each day reduces

the amount o energy required to process, transport, retrieve and clean the water.

Flood Water

When a food occurs, the excess water has to go somewhere. Today, in many cases, a

river will food the towns and cities it runs through, or runs trapped between levees

built along the river banks. Levees are expensive to build and maintain and they limit

the use o rivers or shing, recreation and transportation. Another solution is to build

dams to control fooding, but dams have limits. The reservoirs and lakes they create use

land. Dams are even more expensive than levees to build and maintain. Some people say

dams wreak havoc on river ecosystems and cause serious reduction in sh populations.

Maybe it is time or a dierent kind o food engineering one that will help put water

back into the ground. For example, consider a scenario in which someone purchases a

piece o land next to a river and instead o building it up, builds it down, so to speak.

The new owner creates a spillway alongside the river, the rim o which is just below the

rivers food stage. When the water rises, it spills down into the basin. Now we have

captured excess water, leaving less water available to fow down the river and damage

bridges and banks downstream. What can be done with that excess water? One answer

is to rell the aquier, replacing lost ground water by installing buried drip lines andallowing it to sink gradually into the ground. Another answer, which will lead to some

o the same benets, is to use that water or irrigation. A third might be to release it

into the river when the water level is low, as would be done with a dam.


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The most salient benet o this kind o food control is that it has no impact at all on

the river itsel until the river reaches a pre-determined food level that is considered

dangerous downstream. To eliminate almost all fooding, these spillway structures

would rival some o the largest man-made structures built to date. The Mississippior the Amazon would require spillways even larger than the Hoover Dam or Three

Gorges Dam, but these massive projects would provide a completely dierent level

o impact on the environment.

taspai

O the raw energy that is used around the globe each year, roughly one-third is used or

transportation and moving people and goods rom one location to another. From a raw

eciency standpoint, ships are more ecient per ton-mile than trains, and trains are

more ecient than trucks. From a convenience standpoint, trucks and cars are preerred

to trains, and trains are preerred to ships. Short o banning the lowest-eciencytransportation methods, shiting people and goods to other modes o transportation

will require re-thinking the transportation inrastructure. In the 1880s, trains ruled.

Ater World War II, the Interstate Highway system accelerated the move rom trains

to trucks. Only in the 1980s, as uel costs began to rise, did the two industries work

together to create multi-modal transportation and the whole container inrastructure.

Trains

The width o train rails is the same as the typical two-wheel carriage in the 1700s. This

has limited the use o trains and will continue to limit trains in the uture. Highways

were transormed by the Interstate and the idea o limited access highways and wider

lanes and rights o way. Trains have not undergone that same transormation. We canwonder what trains would look like i the distance between the rails was given the

same innovative thinking that led to the development o the modern highway system.

Would we return to the same gauge, or might the gauge change to be much wider?

Today, trains load ront-to-back and loads are carried parallel to the direction o the

train, limiting the size o loads and the ease o loading or unloading quickly. Derailments

happen in many cases because the narrow trains have a much higher center o gravity

than the carts, the track widths are based on. What would change i reight trains

were wide enough to take loads stacked the other way, allowing the loads to be

pulled o the train to the side and making short turnarounds at stops much easier? For

passengers, wider trains might rival cruise liners or going rom point A to point B. Suchvehicles might include drive on/drive o stations, where the station concourse is level

with the train cars. How about staterooms with desks, beds and ull connectivity? Or

even shopping centers? Think about it: electrically powered trains 50 eet wide, running

at 200 miles per hour and competing not just with highways, but with airplanes, as well.

Thinking outside the box when it comes to trains and truly re-examining what the next

generation train should look like should precede widespread investment in high-speed rail.


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Solid Fuel Cars

Converting corn and other biomass to liquid uel is a process that is replete with energy

losses and inputs. Indeed, many observers have questioned whether the ethanol weuse today in cars is all that useul on a net energy basis. In other words, does making

ethanol take more energy than it provides? Studies show a small net positive eect,

but one study suggested that it takes 16 gallons o ethanol to equal one gallon o oil in

terms o the net energy provided. However, i society really wants to ocus on energy

eciency, does transportation uel have to be liquid?

The Department o Energy has developed standards or high eciency pellet urnaces

or homes. I urnaces can use pellets, why cant cars? Steam-powered cars were

produced until World War II. The internal combustion engine won the war, but with

increasing demand to move away rom ossil uel, it may be time to revisit this area o

technology. It turns out that steam engines are better suited to how people drive than

are internal combustion engines, but whereas the internal combustion engine could be

built and repaired in the backyard by anyone, a steam car required special tools. Today,

all cars require special tools and the days o the shade tree mechanic are limited when

it comes to engines and transmissions.

In 2009, the British Steam Car Challenge set new speed records with hand-built, steam-

powered cars. Volkswagen and SAAB have both revisited steam-powered cars in recent history.

Today, billions o dollars in government unds are being spent on electric cars, it may

be that a small amount o money should be allocated to revisit this technology and

determine i it is truly a dead issue, or could useul in the uture, given the changes to

the uel mix that most would like to see. One o the most benecial aspects o solid uelis that it would be easy to handle and sell in pellet orm and probably could be made

rom biomass, making storage and handling straightorward, as well. Just think: all

those lea piles could be converted to uel or your vehicles. First you rake them, then

the kids jump in them, then you pelletize them, then you drive with them. For the rst

time, teens will actually want to nish the raking.

Goals for Aircraft

How ecient is an airplane? What kind o mileage does it get? We know that or cars,

and the rail industry advertises their eciency. But, what about airplanes? No airline

oers up gures such as miles per gallon per passenger. Airline tickets are not sold with

an Energy Star label. One o the two major aircrat manuacturers is located in theU.S. and is oering up a more ecient airplane. Why shouldnt energy eciency be a

buying criteria or airline tickets and aircrat? Should there be an MPG or airplanes,

like we have or cars? With more and more reight moving by air, and passenger trac

returning to the air, should policymakers put orth eciency standards or aircrat?

There is no question that the engines on airliners have gotten much more ecient

since the 1970s and continue to do so. One recent report indicated that the dierence


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in energy required or moving a passenger via airplane versus train may only be 20

percent. Trains are more ecient in moving people than cars are on a per-mile basis.

How about instituting a requirement or each airline to improve the eciency o theirfeet by 2 percent a year or the next 15 years or passenger seat-miles fown? We could

give the standard three years to kick in so the airlines can make their own decisions on

how best to achieve this. It might mean that the insides o airplanes are re-congured

to hold more seats, or it might mean that better engines or lighter airplanes or other

technologies need to be developed. Setting the goal and getting out o the way should

lead to innovation that benets everyone. Technically, the 747 is large enough to have

two ull decks o passengers, but because cargo has been an important part o the

equation, it does not. It will take the eorts o smart people to determine how to set

and measure these goals and smarter people at the airlines and aircrat companies

to nd ways to meet the goals.

Pickup Trucks

One o the loopholes in current mileage standards has been pickup trucks. Today,

pickups are massive high-power vehicles that out-mass a typical car by a actor o more

than two. Is it time to re-think the pickup?

Pickups are very important to workers and armers to move loads in elds and job sites.

They move plywood, hay and other materials or many small businesses. They should

not lose that capability, but they should be able to be downsized in terms o the overall

size o the vehicle without downsizing the hauling capability. Ford just redesigned

the Explorer, reducing the weight o the vehicle signicantly and improving mileage

without sacricing utility. In the 1970s, the El Camino was a car-like truck with a largeenough bed to haul plywood. Maybe it is time to revisit the El Camino concept. Holden

in Australia (a Ford subsidiary) has a vehicle very much like the El Camino that is highly

popular with carpenters and other maintenance and construction workers.

Other Delivery Vehicles

Ford has proven with a vehicle known as the Transit Connect that it is possible to

rethink and downsize delivery vehicles. What should we do to encourage more

thinking along these lines?

Subways and Trams

Subways are expensive to build, but once in place, they seem to be able to hold their

own in major metropolitan areas. Trams, on street trains, seem to be much cheaper

to build, but dont seem to hold the same ability to get people on board. Both are

needed in our major metropolitan areas as we attempt to create a more energy-

ecient society. The question is how to do it without major long-term subsidies rom

the government. BART in San Francisco and the Metro in Washington, D.C. have both

won ans, not only among local residents, but also among tourists who nd the system

easy to use. In both cases, the system is now connected to at least one airport in the


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area. For tourists, having a connection to the airport is very useul and banishes the

long-held belie that a rental car is required to get around an unamiliar city. Any new

systems should start with that in mind.

The patterns o housing pricing in Washington, D.C. and the growth o new housing

and businesses in the area can be mapped as a set o rings centered on each o the

Metro Stations. Like the Beltway o the 1960s, which changed the growth pattern or

Washington, D.C., the Metro too changed the pattern o construction and land value in

the region. Even some o the most dilapidated and crime-ridden neighborhoods in the

D.C. area in the 1970s have been elevated in value by the placement o a Metro station

in close proximity. Ridership is sucient to ensure that the system is able to provide

excellent security and clean trains, both o which are needed to encourage people to

begin using the system and to continue to do so. The lack o new road construction in

the District has helped push people to the Metro over the last 30 years.

Electric Bicycles

Many companies are coming to the market with electric bicycles. Pedal-bicycle riders sneer

at the idea o an electric or an electric-assist bicycle, but there is a strong probability that

i the downtown inrastructure in large cities is redesigned with bicycles (both electric

and non-electric) in mind and that enough transportation or housing exists close to jobs

that both actors will serve to begin displacing less uel-ecient modes o transportation.

Forcing the Change

I we want to orce the change, there is an eective means by which to do so. While

no one likes new taxes, raising the taxes on ossil transportation uels in the autumn

every year or the next decade will speed the changes that many want to see. Why the

all? Because the cost o transportation uel normally drops during that time, so it has

the smallest impact on people in the short term, but still exerts a signicant long-term

eect. Adding between 10 cents and 20 cents a gallon to the price o transportation

uel each year in taxes with a clear long-term policy would help people plan or the

uture and make better choices about vehicles and transportation. Re-routing some o

that money into roads, since vehicles will have a higher mileage (hence a lower tax per

mile driven), some to alternative transportation, and some to research would help drive

the uture economy, maintain inrastructure and und innovation.


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Pwe he Peple

Most o the world considers electricity to be the answer to clean energy. The assumption

is that all electricity can be created in a renewable ashion. This means a change in theway the industry operates. For the last century, the power industry has been a load

serving industry in short, running according to the maxim, You turn on a switch

and we will make more. In the uture, that basic paradigm has to change i we want

to support the maximum amount o renewable energy. The new paradigm has to be a

supply-ollowing industry, i.e., I you make more, we will nd a place to use it. Even

i we are successul at changing the industry, will consumes accept the new ways that

power will need to be made in their backyards? Will they accept the inrastructure

required to move the power rom where it is made to where it needs to be used? These

are questions that industry and society will have to tackle and answer together.

Some have no issues with windmills that are 300 eet tall being planted in close proximity

to their communities and backyards. For others, any viewable windmills pose a problem,

even i they are miles away. A more energy-ecient uture may include such eatures

as a horizon dominated by concentrating solar plants with acres o mirrors and towers

that are each a hundred eet tall and are as bright as the sun i you look at them rom

the wrong angle; elds o photovoltaic panels (solar cells) that refect the slightest light

at night and can provide the same level o refectivity as a well-polished car and that ll

the elds that used to grow corn; rivers that have dams and river turbines that generate

power either around the clock or on demand and that may change the fow o the river

water and store water or times when more power is needed.

How do we balance the demand or electricity with the idea that nature should be

preserved? This is an issue that needs to be discussed and or which suitable answersneed to be ound. Today, much o the discussion is happening at the two extremes

o public opinion and the people in the middle are sitting on the sidelines. The nal

decision on these issues may determine i we can even aord electricity in the uture. A

measure o balance needs to be struck between the demand or energy and the ability

to make it. It may end up that some regions o the country that reject new generation

may end up paying much higher prices or energy that is imported rom other regions

and that power may become so scarce at times that people are without power or

hours or even days at a time. Caliornia already experienced some o this with rolling

blackouts in the last decade.


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Distributed Generation

Human-scale generation that is close to the locations where power is used has been a

goal or the last 30 years. Distributed generation comes in many orms, ranging romdiesel and gasoline generators to windmills and solar cells. Not all o this power is

created equally and not all o it is especially well-liked by the public. A diesel generator

humming away at 3 in the morning right ater a hurricane is very acceptable to the

neighbors, especially i the owner is willing to share the generated power. However,

a diesel generator that hums away every night and requires a weekly visit rom a uel

truck is rowned upon by most neighbors. In many cases, it is considered to be a sign

o ailed inrastructure similar to the situation that existed in Baghdad in 2005. Solar

cells are almost always acceptable, unless their installation requires removing trees to

allow the sun to shine directly on the panels. The desire to have generation in close

proximity to the communities where it will be used is strongly held until the actual

implementation starts and residents realize that it will change their neighborhoodand environment. Again, there is going to have to be a wide-ranging discussion that

includes a broad spectrum o people to set rules that are reasonable.

Distributed Renewables

Run-o-the-river hydro, solar cells, and small wind are all distributed generation

methods that people accept as renewable and to some extent are willing to support

in their community and even in their own neighborhood. Run-o-the-river hydro uses

slow-turning river-bottom turbines that look like old style ship propellers. Because they

turn slowly, very little lie in the river is disturbed. They can be installed in local creeks

and rivers, even i the water is not always present. There is no impoundment o water,

so there is little disturbance o the actual fow o the river. Another version o run-o-the-river technology is using small wateralls in mountainous regions that may be

seasonal in nature. These acilities seek to capture the water beore it alls and return

it to the area where it would all. The presence o piping and turbines are the only sign

that anything has changed.

Neither type o run-o-the-river hydro is without drawbacks, but both seem better than

conventional dams rom an environmental standpoint. Most people understand solar

cells and what they entail or installation. Small wind comes in an array o choices, rom

vertical windmills that look like upside-down egg beaters or pop cans with the sides cut

open, to old-style arm windmills, to modern-looking propellers in the air. Each has its

own advantages and drawbacks.

Then there is biogas rom landlls or animal arms or sewage treatment plants and

biomass plants that burn wood or biological waste. These technologies have already

run into strong opposition because o stack gases that are produced in the process.

They are renewable but they are renewables that are not widely accepted today.

The question is, can we aord to continue to discourage them and still meet the

requirements or a low carbon uture?


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Distributed Non-renewable

Combined heat and power plants that burn natural gas or uel oil to produce

electricity, hot water and space heating can be as much as 98 percent ecient. Thisis a leading technology in the Netherlands and Denmark. Likewise, diesels have been

around orever and are the basis or most o the demand response in the major East

Coast electricity markets. Instead o turning o the use o energy, most businesses

that participate in demand response programs can make enough money to make it

worthwhile to run the diesel instead when the power price is high enough. Non-

renewables oer something that most o the renewables dont: namely, the ability to

schedule generation when you want power.

dG reewable n-reewable

Schedulable

Conventional hydro Diesels

Biomass Combined Heat & PowerBiogas

Non-SchedulableSolar

Process gasWind

I you want electricity on demand, then you need schedulable resources, since it is

today impractical to store electricity as electricity. The more generation in an area that

is pushed into the non-schedulable boxes, the more the use o electricity has to be

driven by the available generation techniques. In an extreme case, this will mean that

in one minute, enough power exists to wash the clothes, while in the next, there is not

sucient power to complete the task. Potentially, this could necessitate a complete

redesign o equipment to use fywheels to ride through the loss o generation. This hasalready been done by many people who have built houses o the grid.

Figuring out how to coordinate generation with demand is the subject o a large number

o ongoing research projects, many o which are ocused around smart homes.

Smart Homes

Not only are homes going to get smart in the near uture, but so are businesses

and appliances. Developing technology to allow homes, appliances and businesses to

communicate about energy needs, prices and schedules is an important step in changing

the industry paradigm. I these devices can understand the amount o power that is

available without the intervention o the homeowner and the home or business ownercan set priorities or energy use, the systems can largely manage themselves.


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Some are earul o having appliances and homes that are intelligent, and they oten

point to old science ction lms as the reason why. Ater all, who wants a HAL9000

running their lives? Others are very worried about privacy and the loss o it. Getting to

the iPod o smart homes that homeowners are comortable with will take time andresearch into how people want to interact with their energy equipment. This is not a

single-step process, but rather a journey that may take a decade or more to perect a

rst-generation technology that large numbers o people are willing to adopt.

Smart Grid

Beyond the home is the inrastructure that connects the homes and businesses to the

electrical generation equipment. This set o poles, wire and transormers will be even

more critical in the uture as people attempt to balance a system that has even more

variability than the system they are used to today. Oering surplus power to a neighbor

or a neighboring state in return or electricity rom them when you are running

short will be a minute-by-minute or hour-by-hour process. The more connected people

are and the more ecient the connection system is, the better chance there is o using

more renewables as a source o energy in the uture. The smart grid is a complex topic

that encompasses literally hundreds o technologies.

nlea Pwe

Many regard nuclear power as evil or dangerous and i used incorrectly, it is

both. Over the last 35 years, since the United States last broke ground on a new nuclear

power plant, opponents o nuclear power have added regulations that make building

plants many times more expensive than they could be without compromising the saety

o the plant. China is building nuclear power plants today that are cheaper than plantsnished in the U.S. in the 1980s.

Nuclear power is not a panacea, but i carbon reduction is desired, it has to be part o

the overall electricity mix. Short o guring out how to create massive storage acilities

or electricity, there is no other way to even out the fow o electricity over a 24-hour

period. Electric cars have the potential to double the demand or electricity, but building

enough windmills to cover the 24-hour clock would require the construction o more

than 1 million new windmills (today, global production o large windmills is just over

20,000 units a year). On the other hand, a single nuclear power plant could provide as

much power as 2,400 large windmills. Ultimately, they both are needed or a secure mix

o power or the uture that is ree rom ossil uels.

Today, coal provides just over hal o the total electricity in the United States and nuclear

power provides more than twenty percent. Having to replace both at the same time

would orce grueling changes in the average persons liestyle and would drive even

more jobs oshore. I the goals are to reduce carbon emissions and reduce dependence

on oreign oil, nuclear energy production has to be sustained.


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Fixing Regulations

The rst set o regulations that need to be replaced are the ones that prevent the

reprocessing o nuclear uel rods. France has the technology to reprocess uel rods ina cost-eective manner and minimize the amount o waste rom reprocessing. Given

the number o uel rods stored at power plants today, reprocessing could minimize

the amount o new uel required or the next decade. Most o the waste products

can be burned in the Canadian-designed Candu reactor, and Canada has accepted

this type o material as uel on an experimental basis. In this way, even the waste

could be reused and reduced.

Right now, the regulations are so strict we cannot give the spent uel rods to France to

reprocess. So we are building up unsustainable pools o uel rods that will eventually

choke the lie out o the nuclear industry. At the same time, this practice drives up the

cost o operation, as well as the risk involved in operating a nuclear power plant. This

regulatory insanity needs to be xed.

The next set o regulations that merit reconsideration involve so-called low-level waste.

Facilities such as hospitals, dentist oces and other locations produce low-level waste.

Rightly so, this waste has to be segregated and handled separately. In France, it is put

in glass blocks that are stable or thousands o years. In the U.S., it goes into steel

drums and concrete caskets. Allowing the French glassication processes to be used

or low-level waste in the U.S. would mean that the cost o handling and managing

these discarded gloves and clothing would be much lower. Furthermore, the risk that

a ruptured drum would leech radioactive material into the environment would be

signicantly lower than it is today.

In both cases, sensible regulation would reduce the cost and risk o operating

nuclear power plants.

Location and Quantity

New designs in nuclear power plants make it possible to create more power or longer

periods o time with less in the way o nuclear materials. It makes sense to recycle the

old sites or nuclear power plants and put new reactors on site. The inrastructure to

support a new reactor is already in place. I we undertake a one-or-one replacement

o the existing plants, then the total available power rom nuclear power would

rise by a actor o more than 2. Many o the old reactors were designed as 600- and

1000-megawatt plants; todays plants are designed to be 1200- and 2000-megawattacilities with similar ootprints to the old designs not a bad improvement or an out-

o-avor technology. I we go so ar as to recycle and re-use the existing locations, we

could provide a signicant portion o our energy needs or the next 30 years which

will provide the breathing room we need to deploy more renewables.


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Sage

Storage is a complex topic that encompasses a broad array o dierent elements. Storage

comes in many orms: thermal, kinetic, and chemical are three categorical distinctionsthat can be used to take the topic o storage apart or discussion. Thermal storage

houses heat and cold (think Thermos bottles and ice chests on a massive scale). The term

kinetic is a bit o a misnomer, since it includes both true kinetic and potential kinetic,

so fywheels and dams that store water can be said to store kinetic energy. Chemical

storage technology is better known as batteries to many people.

The hot trend in storage today is batteries: batteries or cars, batteries or tools,

batteries or everything. The Nissan Lea can travel approximately 100 miles on its

battery, which comprises roughly hal o the cost o the vehicle, or about $16,000. For a

typical Midwestern suburban home, a Lea battery is about two-thirds the size required

to support a days energy consumption so long as it is not a summer day during which

air conditioning will be used extensively. (In that case, you might need as many as three

Lea batteries to supply the average homes electricity needs.)

So with current car battery technology, you might be able to get o the grid without air

conditioning or only about $25,000 or batteries and $100,000 or solar cells, using the

most advanced technology that is now available. More low-tech solutions are typically

cheaper and less fexible. Until the costs o batteries and solar cells come down more,

the lower-tech answers may be the right answers or many people.

Thermal Storage

The simplest thermal storage is a heavy concrete chimney around a replace. The concrete

over time absorbs the heat rom the replace and radiates it into the room. When the

re is extinguished, the chimney still remains warm or several hours. Our ancestors

knew this and overbuilt many replaces to help keep their homes warm. Modern

materials have allowed us to provide cheap, quick-to-install, low-mass replacements.

Old buildings have high ceilings and thick walls; they are slow to warm in the summer

and slow to cool in the winter. This type o thermal mass is a very useul step in our

thinking about home design. Finding a place in a home or a large box (think room-

size) o rocks and sand could help moderate the temperature in the house signicantly.

Converting electricity at night to hot water in large tanks or storing ice in those same

tanks could reduce the need or electricity at peak times.

Better still, thermal storage does not require electricity rom ossil uels to recharge.Heat can be collected rom solar air heaters or solar hot water heaters and stored.

This means that in very cold regions, the overall need or outside energy could be

signicantly reduced and the loss o electricity rom a storm would have less o an

impact on the saety o lie, since the thermal storage would help residents stay warm

or a period o time without electricity.


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Ice oers an interesting opportunity in warm regions, since ice holds cold well and

making ice in the coolest part o the day would take less energy than it would during

the warm part o the day. Water is mostly non-toxic, so using it in close proximity to

homes to store cold should not pose a signicant hazard. Large-scale ice usage can helpdata centers and actories reduce their peak demand or energy.

In general, thermal storage is a well-understood and low-cost way to moderate an

enclosed environment. Simple changes to building codes could strongly encourage

the use o thermal storage. However, the use o thermal storage does not remove

the need or good insulation.

Kinetic Storage

The use o fywheels to store energy dates back to the Middle Ages, when they were

used to even out the speed o machinery. When the initial internal combustion engines

were developed, fywheels were required to even out the rotation o the machinery, aswell. Over time, as the engines and motors became more sophisticated, fywheels were

gradually phased out. The relatively small amount o power that a fywheel had to store

and the losses rom riction served to usher out the era o the fywheel. Materials just

could not keep up with the demand to store greater amounts o energy.

Modern fywheels are being designed to rotate thousands o times per minute (RPM).

They are made o state-o-the-art materials and use special bearings to reduce the

riction; all o these advances have made it possible or fywheels to make a return.

Pumped water storage is a technology that involves using a dam to hold water. When

power is needed, the water is released and electricity is generated. The typical cycle

involves lling the reservoir at night and on the weekends and then using the stored

energy during the daytime. Pumped storage requires close proximity to a water source

and an area that can be dammed. These requirements limit the number o locations

that are available to use pumped water storage.

Compressed air storage is a dierent story. The idea behind this technology is to

pump air into a cave (natural or manmade) and then release the air when energy

is needed to generate power. The U.S. Geological Service has estimated that about

80 percent o the United States sits over rock ormations that could be used or

compressed air storage. With current technology, compressed air storage has lower

losses than pumped water storage. Compressed air storage has another advantage,

as well: ailure o the containment structure releases a jet o high pressure air, ratherthan a potentially deadly wall o water.


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Kinetic storage technologies have the capability to react very rapidly to changes in

the system. The process o switching rom storing power to providing power can be

completed almost instantaneously. That means that these technologies can be used to

even out changes in both generation and demand. In general, kinetic storage is cheaperthan chemical storage. One benet o kinetic storage is that there is no memory

eect as there is with many types o batteries. In other words, i a kinetic storage device

is capable o retaining 100 megawatt-hours o storage today, it will likely still be able to

hold 100 megawatt-hours in several decades.

Chemical Storage

Chemical storage is a general name or batteries, hydrogen and other molecular level

storage mechanisms. The hydrogen economy that everyone was so enthused about

in 2005 is really a chemical storage method or energy. It is not a source o energy, but

rather a storage mechanism. Wood, coal, oil, and natural gas are all chemical storage, as

well. The lithium-ion batteries that power portable tools and electric cars are chemical

storage, too. What this section will ocus on is batteries and hydrogen.

Hydrogen

Breaking water down to its basic elements is something almost every high school

chemistry student gets to do. This can be accomplished by putting electricity into water,

which separates the hydrogen and oxygen. Put these two gases in a balloon and ignite

it and you get a big bang.

Hydrogen needs to take in more energy than it gives out. This substance also likes

to migrate through things like steel tank walls, eventually making the materials very

brittle. In short, there are a lot o issues to solve beore hydrogen becomes a uel that

can be used widely. However, i we can gure out two-way uel cells that are highly

ecient, then splitting water during low-demand periods and then combining it

back into water oers a way to have localized storage or a transportation uel.

Scaling up hydrogen production is a process that will probably take 20 years or more

only a crash program would make it go aster. However, the question remains

whether a crash program in hydrogen production and storage would make the best

economic sense or the world.

Batteries

Batteries have been around longer than the electric grid. Physical constraints have limitedthe density o energy stored in the batteries. Today, more than 27 dierent ormulas are

being explored as scientists continue the search or the ideal battery. However, the reality

is that there is no ideal battery. There are a lot o dierent ways to use batteries and we

should instead work to develop batteries to be used or a specic purpose. For example,

the ideal battery or requency support is very dierent than one that provides long-term

power or a neighborhood that has been disconnected rom the grid.


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There are a number o locations on the grid where batteries make sense, in applications

ranging rom cars and tools at one end to generation plant support at the other

end. There are also a number o dierent ways to use batteries. Ultimately, there are

probably 30 or 40 dierent congurations o batteries that will be needed to make thegrid more reliable. Indeed, it may come to pass that all o the chemistries that are being

experimented with in the lab today will someday nd a niche in the grid.

Batteries have made small incremental improvements in power density since the mid-

1980s when I rst began to ocus on battery research and development. On the other

hand, the cost and scale o battery systems have denitely improved during the same

period. There are a number o projects underway to improve the power density o

batteries, but the likelihood that battery power density will go up by an order o

magnitude in the next decade is low.

Flow batteries large liquid batteries that can store enough energy to support a large

wind arm are massive in scale. For one type o fow battery, it has been estimated

that a working model would require 5 million gallons o liquids. Clearly, this is not your

typical AA batteries that go in the digital camera.

Research

All o the storage options on the table today could benet rom research support.

The United States and other countries have underspent on R&D with regards to

all types o storage. There are real opportunities here to improve the way we use

energy, not just electricity. ARPA-E took the rst step in 2009 with their unding o

a number o R&D projects. However, more R&D unding is needed. China right now

is the largest under o storage R&D.

Sma Gi

The smart grid is a complex subject unto itsel. In the case o the low carbon menu, it is

the central nervous system that will help keep all the pieces working together. However,

the ultimate realization o the smart grid will not be the grid as posited by a number o

people in the electricity industry, because the real smart grid will have to transcend that

industry. Though the steps that are being taken in the utility industry are necessary and

constitute a strong oundation or the smart grid, the concept will have to coordinate

transportation, water, sewage, and other services in the long term.

Hundreds o books have been published on topics pertaining to the smart grid; mostocus on the technical aspects o the issue. However, in my view, the most important

aspect o the topic is why people should care about the smart grid. I keeping the lights

on, keeping the cost o energy down and reducing the dependency on oreign oil or

ossil uels is important, then the smart grid is important.

Having a system that can monitor, report, orecast and control utility services will be

useul and perhaps even important in maximizing our uture potential. Knowing that

the wind will be blowing orceully in 15 minutes or an hours time means that a


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washing machine can be queued to turn on, that a car might be queued to take a top-

up charge at the oce and that a storage system may be queued to store energy or

the cold night ahead. The ability to be inormed and warned o possible shortages or

surpluses will make our lives a little bit easier than i the washer suddenly stops in themiddle o a load or the car is not charged in the morning or worse yet, i the lights

go o and dont come back on again.

Seiy a Pivay

Regardless o what we do to ameliorate energy shortages in the uture, we need to

maintain the privacy and security o the individual. Security in this context means

saety, comort and happiness, as well as income and standard o living.

Electronic Security

This is not a trivial challenge, especially since many o the devices that we use today thatare dumb, manual and blind, metaphorically speaking, will over time become smarter

and more connected than our cell phones. Our stoves, rerigerators, washers and dryers

will all talk to each other, as well as to our mobile phones and our home control systems.

Our homes and oces will eventually be able to talk to a control center that will either

provide pricing or some orm o messaging that will indicate it is an advantageous or

disadvantageous time to consume energy, water, and other resources. Our consumption

will be tracked at a level that could be used to determine whether we are at home, at

work or on vacation. In short, protecting these types o inrastructure, communication

streams and data fows will not be easy.

Not only do we need to keep these data private, but we also need to keep othersrom gaining access to our appliances and other devices and using them or nearious

purposes. In a relatively benign example, imagine that the child down the street is

coming over or dinner and does not want to eat broccoli and thereore commands

your stove to disable itsel or the next two hours. Ater all, peanut butter and jelly

is better than broccoli, right? The idea that remote controls can be hacked not

only in the home, but also on the grid, in the water system, and in trac control

systems is keeping a large number o smart proessionals busy developing a better

way to secure these control systems.

While no system will be perect, i the systems deployed are capable o being upgraded and

monitored, they should be able to be secured and re-secured as needed to keep services

fowing even under exigent circumstances, minimizing the chaos that hackers could create.

Privacy

Maintaining privacy means limiting who can see what and how it is associated to

particular individuals. Policies addressing issues such as these have been implemented

by the provincial government o British Columbia, Canada and represent a positive start

to the issue o maintaining privacy on the smart grid. In this context, privacy is ar more

about policy than it is about technology.


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Reliability

Beyond the control systems and communications, it will be important to maintain the

systems that actually deliver services, so that they deliver water, electricity and otherservices with minimal losses and interruptions. In many cases, a single path runs rom

the source to a user. As we move orward, we may need to spend resources to build

redundant paths to users. Barring that, it may be that some orm o local storage is

required to support the continuation o service. In the case o water, simple gravity-

ed water tanks like those our ancestors used on their arms make sense. Water towers

also work to minimize the number o people who are orced to live without water. For

electricity, the answer is more complex and will be covered in the storage section below.

Heat and cold are also energy resources that can and should be stored.

Eai pgams

Most o us take energy or granted; we pay our bills and otherwise dont worry about

the issue. When the price o gasoline goes up, we complain, but still ll up the tank

and drive. When the price o electricity goes up, we are unhappy, but seldom do these

price increases result in a major change in our habits. We are used to being able to buy

energy at any time o the day or night or a fat price. Changing that mindset will be

dicult. Generally speaking, most o us do not want to change long-ingrained habits.

Dont believe me? Try this experiment: place the orks and spoons on the wrong side

o the dinner plates tonight and see how your guests and amily members react. Do it

again tomorrow, and again and again in the ollowing days and weeks. See how long

it takes beore your dinner companions get used to the idea that the right place is in

the opposite place. Habits are very hard to break.

Education and training to change habits and expectations will have to be extensive

and comprehensive, with dierent programs targeting groups rom preschoolers to the

elderly. Some olks will call it brainwashing, and some will try to have their children

opt out o such training in the public school system. It will not be pretty when we

get started. To be successully, such a process will have to start at the highest levels o

government and industry. We will need the help o celebrities and other infuencers.

And the olks who are spokespeople or this education eort are going to have to

visibly change their liestyles.

Not only will consumers need training, but many proessions will, too.


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ABCD

ABCD is shorthand or architects, builders, contractors and developers. These are the

proessionals who will be tasked with designing and creating the next generation ointerior environments. They will also upgrade and retool existing environments or us.

What they do today is much better than it was 30 years ago, but it is not good enough

or what we need to be doing in the uture. Residential structures can easily last or

100 years or more. Knocking down what we have today is just not going to happen. So

not only do we need to change the way ABCD proessionals think about new buildings,

but we also need to change the way they think about updating old buildings. The LEED

organization has initiated a program or LEED-certied architects, but the organization

has not yet addressed the training and certication o the BCD portion o this group.

I this eort is going to work, all o the members o this team need to think and work

dierently. While the architect can seal all o the air leaks and tape over all the staples

in the Tyvek covering on a dwelling, the builder may regard this process as excessively

time-consuming and skip this step, which in turn can lead to the energy eciency o

the dwelling being much lower than expected. Yes, it demands time and eort, but the

long-term payo o doing it right can make a big dierence.

Regulators and Inspectors

When it comes to the construction and upkeep o structures, these proessionals decide

what the rules are and then determine i the rules have been ollowed. Most o them

are busy and intelligent people. A vitally important step o the education process is

presenting eective model rules to the regulators so they can determine i they make

sense as written and, i so, can act to put them into eect. Inspectors have training andexperience. The problem is that when you change the rules, much o their accumulated

experience may go against the new rules and the prior training may not help. Again,

this will be a complicated process o updating the rules, updating the inspection

requirements, then updating the training and recertiying the inspectors.

Building Owners and Operators

Those who own, operate, and/or manage large structures will ace many changes in the

years ahead. It is not a trivial challenge to change the way that lighting, heat and other

services in the building work. Not only do the control systems need to work dierently, but

the people who program, operate and maintain them will have to change their practices,

as well. Again, a great deal o eort will need to be expended in developing the rightway to run buildings and then training the people who are responsible or these tasks.

Overall Assessment

Marketing, training and education will be one o the largest cost components o rolling

out a low carbon uture. There is a segment o the population that will not want to

be bothered and another that does not believe that there is anything that needs to be

done. Both o these contingents will drag their eet and resist any change. Most people


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will resist some o the changes that need to happen just because they will require a

dierent mode o living. Again, habits are very hard to break. Right now, very ew

people are thinking about a comprehensive training program or even thinking about

how best to train the trainers who will train the teachers who will teach us all. Withoutxing this one aspect o the process, the rest o the work will be or naught.

reseah a develpme

Many o the technologies we need or a low carbon menu exist, but they may not be

commercially viable today. That is, given a nancial choice, another technology would

likely have a lower overall cost at the current juncture

LowCarbonMenu WP 2011 Web

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