Ecological Economics

The Air Car?

Until a few days ago I had no idea that people were playing with the idea of using compressed air to power vehicles. Now it looks like we may see some within the next few years. Add in a hybrid gas engine to compress more air and compressed air vehicles might go further than just city driving.

But even if just for the city, and particularly if power sources come increasingly from solar and wind, the idea just might be a life saver not only for those living in very polluted cityscapes, but also for the rest of us as air pollution is a global problem.

And the idea isn't limited to cars. The video below highlights both a rather conventional but all-aluminum piston engine from France, and a much smaller rotary engine design from Australia. The latter shows much promise for small vehicles, but also for recreation vehicles, lawnmowers, golf carts and much more. Take a look:

Compressed Air Vehicles

Hat tip: Barry Ritholtz at The Big Picture

See also: Compressed-Air Car at Wikipedia

OK.. Now that I've got some all hyped up, let's let the naysayers have a say. I just did a bit of after-the-postup Googling and found that Celsius blog ran this thing about a year ago. In Nov, Celsius reader Mark offered this up:

November 9th, 2007
This car is for the naive. The energy density of compressed air at 300 Bar, the pressure at which it is advertised for the MDI car, is 4 MJ/Kg. The energy density of gasoline is 47 MJ/Kg, almost 12 times greater than compressed air.

On the only published test they did, the car got only 4.5 miles on a full tank of air. In order to get the range of a normal car, the air tanks in such a car would have to be the size of a moving truck. Even then, the filling up process will take hours, which, like electric cars, means that they will not be practical solutions for transportation. As for heating the car, well I’m not sure how you heat a car with compressed air, but if you can, you will need to drain the energy from the tanks to do it. With fossil fuel cars, heat is a waste product so no energy penalty is required to heat the vehicle. This is a significant, perhaps fundamental, stumbling block to all-electric or all-air cars in cold climates, range and power aside.

This is no breakthrough.

And earlier:

Eric says:
April 4th, 2007
I first read about this car in about 1995. It was then due to go into production “within a year”. It still is. I don’t see any sign of progress whatsover. You may even note that the FAQ on the website of www.theaircar.com hasn’t even been udpated since 2005! (Where as usual it indicates that the car is just around the corner!). I remember when this car was called the ZEV, when it was called Air Car, when it became the CAT.. I’m sorry. But I just don’t believe in it any more.
ps. I’m an engineer and I know that technically it works.

But other Celsius readers are more hopeful

John Gauthier says:
May 30th, 2007
I’m an engineer, and a skeptic. I pulled out my thermodynamics textbook and checked the math. I confirmed that they can produce the energy that they advertised (about 41 MJoules per 300 liter tank).

While it sounds too good to be true, you have to consider what they have working for them. Yes, the energy density is a lot lower than that of gasoline, but their tank is about four times as large as the average gasoline tank and the energy efficiency of the engine is a lot higher than a combustion engine, which discards an incredible amount of energy as heat.

As far as the naysayers that continue to discredit the idea of using power from the electric grid to charge the car with a compressor, it’s a lot better alternative than personally pumping hundreds of pounds of CO2 into the atmosphere every year. Besides, you can take advantage of power sources that don’t produce CO2 that are only practical on a large scale, like nuclear power.

Hope springs eternal! Where does reality lie?

China's CO2 Emissions Staged to Get Even Worse

Via Brad DeLong who says, "This is, I think, very good work--and the worst news about the human future I have learned in months." :

Forecasting the Path of China's CO2 Emissions Using Province Level Information, Maximilian Auffhammer and Richard T. Carson (2008)

ABSTRACT: Our results suggest that the anticipated path of China's Carbon Dioxide (CO2) emissions has dramatically increased over the last five years. The magnitude of the projected increase in Chinese emissions out to 2015 is several times larger than reductions embodied in the Kyoto Protocol. Our estimates are based on a unique provincial level panel data set from the Chinese Environmental Protection Agency. This dataset contains considerably more information relevant to the path of likely Chinese greenhouse gas emissions than national level time series models currently in use. Model selection criteria clearly reject the popular static environmental Kuznets curve specification in favor of a class of dynamic models with spatial dependence.

'The Story of Stuff'

Tired of being told to "go shopping" whenever a national or international crisis occurs?

Tired of hearing that "recycling" will save us?
  Note: Recycling is a very good idea, just "not enough."

Want to know how our so-called Consumer Society was manufactured?

Want to know why the linear "produce, manufacture, CONSUME" model is so deeply flawed?

Ever wonder how stuff can be so damned cheap? And wonder who is really paying "the freight"?

Want to know more about the pathway to sustainability?

Then you'll be glad to see/hear how Annie Leonard exposes the dark underbelly of our Consumer Society in a little 20 minute educational video titled The Story of Stuff.

Here is a trailer:

More at storyofstuff.com.

PS.. If I'm the last person on the block (the Planet?) to hear about The Story of Stuff—having heard about it over coffee just yesterday—chalk it up to the fact that I'm an old, retired economist living in Utah, just a small step on the far side of nowhere. But damned good scenery!

Exclusively Renewable Energy by 2050: Germany Says Yes!

Can you envision a country that plans to rid itself of both Coal and Nuclear Energy source-dependence? Germany is on track to do so:

Germany's Plan on video (8 minutes)

Germany is looking to integrate wind, solar, and biofuel natural gas to supply 100% of its power generation needs by 2050 (40% by 2020). Germany plans to phase out both Nuclear and Coal-fired power generation.

Hat Tip: Brad Ewing, Environmental Economics & Sustainable Development

Global Forest & 'Env. Justice' Groups Condemn Bali Carbon Trading Schemes

Today, the Global Forest Coalition and the Global Justice Ecology Project strongly condemn—on both human rights and environmental accounts—recent carbon trade announcements/resolutions at the UN Bali Glogal Climate Change Conference. "They are going to use the failed model of carbon trading to supposedly protect forests, but just like agrofuels, the Forest Carbon Partnership Facility [3] is going to exacerbate deforestation at a faster rate, worsen human rights abuses and do nothing for the climate but make it less inhabitable", Dr. Miguel Lovera, Chairperson for the Global Forest Coalition.

14 December 2007
What's missing from the climate talks? Justice!

Bali Forest Outcomes Trample Indigenous Peoples' & Local Communities' Rights
False "Solutions" to Climate Change Condemned at the UNFCCC

Nusa Dua, Bali, Indonesia-As the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change ends, Global Forest Coalition expresses great concern that market-based mechanisms promoted here do not give enough guarantees to indigenous peoples and forest dependent peoples to ensure their rights.

Global Forest Coalition's Managing Coordinator, Simone Lovera stated, "The outcomes of the forest negotiations here in Bali do not include any guarantee that the rights of Indigenous Peoples and local communities regarding their forests, which have been enshrined in the UN Declaration on the rights of Indigenous Peoples, will be respected. Instead, this entire process is dominated by the corporate interests of logging, soy and palmoil companies that have started to demand compensation for every tree they don't cut down. Carbon offset projects financing such compensation schemes do not contribute anything to mitigating climate change, they are no more than a convenient lie to subsidize some of the most destructive industries on earth. Considering the crisis we are in, carbon offsets are unacceptable: We desperately need both forest conservation AND policies that cut emissions at source."

"Indigenous peoples and women are the traditional caretakers of the forest," said Anne Petermann, Co-director of Global Justice Ecology Project. "The fact that they are being ignored and excluded in this process is typifying for the way in which we are moving in the wrong direction."

The International Forum of Indigenous Peoples on Climate Change, expressed their profound concern in a statement [1] read inside the UNFCCC about Reducing Emissions from Deforestation in Developing Countries (REDD):

REDD will not benefit Indigenous Peoples, but in fact, will result in more violations of Indigenous Peoples' Rights. It will increase the violation of our Human Rights, our rights to our lands, territories and resources, steal our land, cause forced evictions, prevent access and threaten indigenous agriculture practices, destroy biodiversity and culture diversity and cause social conflicts. Under REDD, States and Carbon Traders will take more control over our forests.

Victoria Tauli-Corpuz, Chair of the UN Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues added, "It is countries in the North that have caused the climate problem and now they are promoting projects like agrofuels [2] to supposedly address this problem, the impacts of which will be shouldered by the countries and indigenous peoples of the South."

To worsen matters, World Bank President Robert Zoellick announced their latest scheme called the Forest Carbon Partnership Facility, stated Dr. Miguel Lovera, Chairperson for the Global Forest Coalition. They are going to use the failed model of carbon trading to supposedly protect forests, but just like agrofuels, the Forest Carbon Partnership Facility [3] is going to exacerbate deforestation at a faster rate, worsen human rights abuses and do nothing for the climate but make it less inhabitable," he said. [Iverson: Notes edited lightly]

---

notes:

[1] Statement from the International Forum of Indigenous Peoples on Climate Change (IFIPCC) at the 13th Session of Conference of the Parties to the UNFCCC--SBSTA 27, concerning agenda item 5/REDD. See www.globalforestcoalition.org [Iverson: Specifically see this news release.]

[2] The term 'agrofuels' is a more accurate label for the production of fuel from industrially produced agricultural crops (and is also used by the FAO). The term 'biofuels' gives a false impression that these fuels are environmentally friendly, when they are in fact environmentally and socially destructive.

[3] The Forest Carbon Partnership Facility is the World Bank folding the carbon
storage potential of forests into their carbon trading scheme as another way to
avoid emissions reductions from polluter countries. ["notes" lightly edited]

See also:

1. Biofuels: Another False Solution to Global Warming, from Global Justice Ecology Project

2. Advance copy of a major new report from Global Forest Coalition and Global Justice Ecology Project that reveals the social and ecological impacts of large-scale production of agrofuels. The True Cost of Agrofuels: Food, Forests and the Climate [specifically details the threats on forests and forest-dependent people that are resulting or are predicted to result from the production of agrofuels from food, oil and cellulose crops.] The report is available online (English version [PDF: 74 pp.])
http://www.globalforestcoalition.org/img/userpics/File/publications/Therealcostofagrofuels.pdf
and (Spanish [PDF: 80 pp.])
http://www.globalforestcoalition.org/img/userpics/File/Spanish/Elverdadocostodelosagrocombustibles.pdf

Bloomberg Blasts Carbon Trading at UN Bali Conference

Bloomberg: Carbon tax should replace carbon trading, CHARLES J. HANLEY, AP Special Correspondent, Newsday.com, Dec. 13: … "[Cap and trade is] a very inefficient way to accomplish the same thing that a carbon tax accomplishes," [NY Mayor Michael Bloomberg] said. "It leaves itself open to special interests, corruption, inefficiencies." …

Japan Set to Buy Carbon Credits on the Cheap

Folks at Globalization and the Environment provide evidence as to why I've been so skeptical about the Carbon Trading game. Japan is staging up to buy its way out of Koyoto commitments with no pain — buying from willing Eastern European sellers who find themselves with a surplus of credits. To their blog:

Nov 23: Today's FT reports that Japan is looking to hoover up shed loads of carbon credits on the cheap to meet its Kyoto agreements.

Such a move, whilst entirely legal is not entirely politically desirable. This article explains why.

This issue of course is that Japan promised to reduce its emissions 6% below its 1990 figure and it is now 8% above. The problem with buying carbon credits is that it does not necessarily reduce emissions by a single tonne of CO2. What then is the point exactly?

The collapse in eastern European heavy industry means they have an excess of credits to sell (and is one reason why Russia signed up in the first place despite dragging its heals for many years). …

US Congressional Budget Office Favors Carbon Tax

At a Nov. 16 Congressional Budget Office "Director's Conference on Climate Change", CBO Director Peter Orszag argued in favor of a carbon tax relative to an at-least-for-now inferior alternative of a cap-and-trade policy [Issues in Climate Change, Statement of CBO Director - PDF]. Here is a snip:

… Any effort to limit CO2 emissions would have two principal effects: It would produce long-term economic benefits by avoiding some future climate-related damage, and it would impose immediate economic costs by reducing the use of fossil fuels. Employing incentive-based policies to reduce emissions would help minimize the cost of reducing emissions by any given amount because they would use the power of markets to identify the least expensive sources of emission reductions. Thus, they can better accommodate technological advances, differences between industries or companies in their ability to make low-cost emission reductions, and changes in market conditions.

Two alternative incentive-based approaches for reducing CO2 emissions are to tax them or to establish a cap-and-trade system for them. Either a tax or a cap would be most efficient (that is, would best balance expected benefits and costs) if it was designed to gradually become more stringent over time—meaning the tax would gradually rise or the cap would become tighter. Such an approach would best reflect the present value of avoided future damage (the benefit of reducing a ton of emissions), which would take on greater weight as larger potential damage became closer in time. Further, such an approach would allow a smooth transition to a less carbon-intensive economy, allowing firms and households time to gradually replace capital equipment with alternatives that are more efficient, use less carbon intensive fossil fuels (such as natural gas rather than coal) or use renewable energy sources (such as wind or solar).

Efficiency Advantages of a Tax on CO2 Emissions
Although both types of incentive-based approaches are significantly more efficient than command-and-control policies, studies typically find that over the next several decades, a well-designed and appropriately set tax would yield higher net benefits than a corresponding cap-and-trade approach. A tax creates relative certainty about the cost of emission reductions each year, because firms will undertake such reductions until the cost of decreasing emissions by another ton just equals the tax on an additional ton of emissions. A cap-and-trade program, by contrast, creates relative certainty about the total quantity of emission reductions each year, because the cap limits total annual emissions. In terms of the impact on the climate, however, it does not matter greatly whether a given cut in emissions occurs in one year or the next.

From that perspective, a tax has an important advantage: It allows more emission reductions to take place in years when they are relatively cheap. Various factors can affect the cost of emission reductions from year to year, including the weather, the level of economic activity, and the availability of new low-carbon technologies (such as improvements in wind-power technology). By shifting emission reduction efforts into years when they are relatively less expensive, a tax can yield a given quantity of emission reductions at a lower cost than can a cap-and-trade program with specified annual emission levels. In addition, by avoiding the potential volatility of allowance prices that might result from a rigid annual cap, a tax could be less disruptive for affected companies. Provided that the tax was set at a level that reflected the expected benefit of reducing an additional ton of CO2 emissions, the tax would provide a motivation for firms and households to reduce emissions up to the point at which the cost of doing so was equal to the resulting expected benefits.

The relative advantages of a tax and a cap-and-trade program could change over time as new information became available. For example, because a cap creates relative certainty about the level of emissions, it could become more efficient than a tax if scientists determined that additional emissions were likely to trigger a sharp increase in damage, or if new technologies offered the opportunity to make extremely large cuts in emissions at a low and fairly constant cost. Analysts who have tried to define more precisely the conditions under which a cap would be more efficient than a tax have found those conditions to be quite narrow and not likely to be relevant in the near term. Specifically, scientists would need to have fairly precise knowledge about the level of an emissions threshold—beyond which additional emissions would trigger a sharp increase in total global damage—and such a threshold would have to be sufficiently close that policymakers would want to make very large cuts in emissions each year to avoid crossing it. In the absence of those conditions, a tax offers a more efficient approach for reaching a multiyear emission-reduction target.

Although a tax is generally a more efficient policy, the efficiency of a cap-and-trade approach can be enhanced by various design features. In addition, some participants in the policy discussion believe that analytical comparisons of a tax and a cap-and-trade system ignore the idea that policymakers may be more inclined to set a tight cap than a correspondingly high tax. … [footnotes omitted]

HT: Greg Mankiw

US Forest Service and Carbon Offsets: Perspective

Writing in High Country News, Rick Craig suggests that the US Forest Service's entry into the carbon offsets game is ill-advised. Here's a snip:

Salvaging the Atmosphere: The Forest Service Joins the Carbon Offsets Game, Rick Craig, High Country News, Oct 15: … On July 25, Forest Service Chief Gail Kimbell announced the launch of the Carbon Capital Fund, which will sell carbon offsets to fund tree planting on national forests. … The idea sounds logical enough. In fact, the theory that forests can suck up excess carbon and cool the planet helps drive a market that doubled its revenues last year to $110 million. But the Forest Service's entry into the carbon offsets game comes as doubts about tree planting mount. Scientists are skeptical about its benefits, and the honesty of the unregulated market has been questioned in congressional hearings. Worst of all, critics feel, is the tacit permission offsets give buyers to continue their carbon-emitting lifestyles.

Visit the Web site of the National Forest Foundation, the Forest Service's nonprofit arm, and its Carbon Footprint Calculator can tell you how many metric tons of CO2 emissions you are responsible for. If the result leaves you feeling guilty, don't worry. For just $6, the fund lets you offset 1 ton of carbon by supporting tree-planting projects on the national forests. The transaction is based on the theory that forests act as "carbon sinks," soaking up the greenhouse gas from the atmosphere.

But in temperate forests, the concept has not held up well to scientific analysis. Forests do take carbon out of the atmosphere temporarily, but they don’t remove it from the active carbon pool, because their carbon is released when they rot or burn. Cambridge botanist Oliver Rackham, author of a history of Britain's forests, has said that telling people to plant trees to stop global warming is like telling them to drink more water to keep down rising sea levels. …

For an agency with increasingly stretched budgets, however, selling that commodity makes a difference. … And with the agency's million-acre reforestation backlog, there's no shortage of places for consumers to relieve their carbon guilt. [NFF hypertlink added]

See also:

Privatization by Many Means: Carbon Offsets Edition, Forest Policy …, Aug 27
Carbon Offsets: Modern Day 'Indulgences'?, Ecological Economics, Feb 20

Cross-posted from Forest Policy …

Tom Friedman Jumps on the Gas Tax Bandwagon

In the NY Times, Tom Friedman wonders aloud why politicans are so afraid of the "T-word" when it comes to what he considers very good rationales for imposing a gas tax sooner rather than later — with sooner being sometime, say, prior to 9/11/01.