About 30 years ago, I had the
unique and very fortunate experience of being involved with the premier program
of Social Ecology Studies. It was held at
Way back then, one of the more contentious issues was what is exactly meant by
"Social Ecology". My guess is that it is still just as
contentious today, because it meant different things to different people, which
has not changed. The definition that I like best is, that it is a
lot like anthropology. In that we are studying human beings and how they
deal with and interact with their environment. But instead of it being of
them in the distant past, it is of them in the present and future that we are
concerned with. My primary interest in Social Ecology at that time,
was specifically for "Alternative Energy".
A couple of weeks ago, I had another unique and very fortunate experience in
being able to have attended the ISES Solar World Congress 2005 which was held
serendipitously here in
In the Executive Summary he
starts by saying;
This White Paper provides a rationale for effective governmental renewable
energy policies worldwide, as well as sufficient information to accelerate
effective governmental policies. It is the thesis of this White Paper that a
worldwide effort to generate the renewable energy transition must emerge at the
top of national and international political agendas, starting now.
In the history of human energy use, the White Paper records that sustainable
resources were the sole world supply, even in nascent industrial development
well into the 1800s, and that the world will necessarily again have to turn to
sustainable resources before the present century is over. The fossil fuel
period is therefore an “era”, not an age, and highly limited in time in
comparison with the evolution, past and future, of civilizations and societies.
Accordingly, it is critical for governments to view what remains of the fossil
fuel era as a transition.
The White Paper reveals that policies now in existence, and economic experience
gained by many countries to date, should be sufficient stimulation for
governments to adopt aggressive long-term actions that can accelerate the
widespread applications of renewable energy, and to get on a firm path toward a
worldwide “renewable energy transition”, so that 20 % of world electric energy
production can come from renewable energy sources by 2020, and 50 % of world
primary energy production by 2050. There can be no guarantee this will happen,
but the White Paper presents compelling arguments that show it is possible,
desirable, and even mandatory.
The window of time during which convenient and affordable fossil energy
resources are available to build the new technologies and devices and to power
a sustained and orderly final great world energy transition is short – an
economic timeline that is far shorter than the time of physical availability of
the “conventional” energy resources. The White Paper argues that the attractive
economic, environmental, security and reliability benefits of the accelerated
use of renewable energy resources should be sufficient to warrant policies that
“pull” the changes necessary, avoiding the “push” of the otherwise negative
consequences of governmental inaction. There is still time left for this.
The White Paper presents three major conditions that are driving public policy toward
a renewable energy transition:
1) newly emerging and better understood environmental constraints;
2) the need to reduce the myriads of risks from easy terrorist targets and from
breakdowns in technologies on which societies depend; and
3) the attractiveness of the economic and environmental opportunities that will
open during the renewable energy transition.
The renewable energy transition will accelerate as governments discover how
much better the renewable energy policies and applications are for economies
than the present time- and resource-limited policies and outmoded and
unreliable centralized systems for power production and distribution.
Today, it is public policy and political leadership, rather than either
technology or economics, that are required to move forward with the widespread
application of the renewable energy technologies and methodologies. The
technologies and economics will all improve with time, but the White Paper
shows that they are sufficiently advanced at present to allow for major
penetrations of renewable energy into the mainstream energy and societal
infrastructures. Firm goals for penetrations of renewable energy into primary
energy and electrical energy production can be set by governments with
confidence for the next 20 years and beyond, without resource limitations.
Specifically, with regard to the renewable energy technologies, the White Paper
shows the following:
Bioenergy: about 11 % of world primary energy use at present is derived from
bioenergy, the only carbon neutral combustible carbon resource, but that is
only 18 % of today’s estimated bioenergy potential. Estimates for world
bioenergy potential in 2050 average about 450 EJ, which is more than the
present total world primary energy demand. Fuel “costs” for the
conventional resources become instead rural economic benefits with bioenergy,
producing hundreds of thousands of new jobs and new industries.
Geothermal Energy: geothermal energy has been used to provide heat for human
comfort for thousands of years, and to produce electricity for the past 90
years. While geothermal energy is limited to those areas with access to this
resource, the size of the resource is huge. Geothermal energy can be a major
renewable energy resource for at least 58 countries: thirty-nine countries
could be 100 % geothermal powered, with four more at 50 %, five more at 20 %,
and eight more at 10 %. Geothermal energy, along with bioenergy, can serve as
stabilizing “baseload” resources in networks with the intermittent renewable energy
resources.
Wind Power: global wind power capacity exceeded 32,000 MW by the end of 2002,
and has been growing at a 32 % rate per year. Utility-scale wind turbines are
now in 45 countries. The price of wind-produced electricity is now competitive
with new coal-fired power plants, and should continue to reduce to where it
will soon be the least expensive of all of the new electricity-producing
resources. A goal of 12 % of the world’s electricity demand from wind by 2020
appears to be within reach. So is a goal of 20 % of
Solar Energy: The energy from the sun can be used directly to heat or light
buildings, and to heat water, in both developed and developing nations. The
sun’s radiant energy can also directly provide very hot water or steam for
industrial processes, heat fluids through concentration to temperatures
sufficient to produce electricity in thermal-electric generators or to run heat
engines directly, and produce electricity through the photo voltaic effect. It
can be used directly to enhance public safety, to bring light and the
refrigeration of food and medicine to the 1.8 billion people of the world
without electricity, and to provide communications to all regions of the world.
It can be used to produce fresh water from the seas, to pump water and power
irrigation systems, and to detoxify contaminated waters, addressing perhaps the
world’s most critical needs for clean water. It can even be used to cook food
with solar box cookers, replacing the constant wood foraging that denudes
ecosystems and contaminates the air in the dwellings of the poor.
Buildings: in the industrial nations, from 35 % to 40 % of total national
primary use of energy is consumed in buildings, a figure which approaches 50 %
when taking into account the energy costs of building materials and the
infrastructure to serve buildings. Letting the sun shine into buildings in the
winter to heat them, and letting
diffused daylight enter the building to displace electric lighting, are both
the most efficient and least costly forms of the direct use of solar energy.
Data are mounting that demonstrate conclusively enhancements of human
performance in day lit buildings, with direct economic and educational benefits
that greatly multiply the energy-
efficiency “paybacks”. The integrated design of “climate-responsive” buildings
through “whole building” design methods enables major cost savings in actual
construction, normally yielding 30 % to 50 % improvement in energy efficiency
of new buildings at an average of less than 2 % added construction cost, and
sometimes at no extra cost.
Solar Energy Technologies: serious long-range goals for the application of
solar domestic water and space heating systems need to be established by all
governments, totaling several hundred million square meters of new solar water
heating systems worldwide by 2010. A worldwide goal of 100,000 MW of installed
concentrating
solar power (CSP) technology by 2025 is also an achievable goal with
potentially great long-term benefits.
Photo voltaic (PV) solar electric technology is growing worldwide at an amazing
pace, more than doubling every two years. The value of sales in 2002 of about
US$ 3.5 billion is projected to grow to more than US$ 27.5 billion by 2012. PV
in developed and developing nations alike can enhance local employment,
strengthen local economies, improve local environments, increase system and
infrastructure reliability, and provide for greater security.
Building-integrated PV systems (BIPV) with modest amounts of storage can
provide for continuity of essential governmental and emergency operations, and
can help to maintain the safety and integrity of the urban infrastructure in
times of crisis. PV applications should be an element of any security planning
for cities and urban centers in the world.
The White Paper stresses the importance of governmental policies that can
enhance the overall economic productivity of the expenditures for energy, and
the great multiplier in the creation of jobs from expenditures for the
renewable energy resources rather than for the conventional energy sources.
Utilities are not in the job producing business, but governments are,
supporting the need for governments to control energy policies and energy
resource decisions.
National policies to accelerate the development of the renewable energy
resources are outlined, emphasizing that mutually supporting policies are
necessary to generate a long-term balanced portfolio of the renewable energy
resources. Beginning with important city examples, the discussion moves to
national policies, such as setting renewable energy standards with firm
percentage goals to be met by definite dates. The specific example of the
successful German “feed-in” laws is used to illustrate many of these points.
Market-based incentives are described in the White Paper, to compare with
legislated goals and standards, and discussed in terms of effectiveness. It is
shown that various voluntary measures, such as paying surcharges for “green
power”, can provide important supplements to funding for renewable energy, but
that they cannot be sufficient to generate reliable, long-term growth in the
renewable energy industries, nor to secure investor confidence. Reliable and
consistent governmental policies and support must be the backbone for the
accelerated growth of the industries.
It is also shown in this White Paper that the energy market is not “free”, that
historical incentives for the conventional energy resources continue even today
to bias markets by burying many of the real societal costs of their use. It
is noted that the very methodologies used for estimating “levelized”
costs for energy resources are flawed, and that they are not consistent with
the more realistic economic methodologies used by modern industries. Taking
into account future fuel supply risk and price volatility in net present
valuations of energy resource alternatives paints a very different picture, one
in which the renewable energy resources are revealed to be competitive or
near-competitive at the present time.
Even though this White Paper emphasizes the readiness of the renewable energy
technologies and markets to advance the penetration of these resources to
significant levels in the world, an important component of any national
renewable energy policy should be support for both fundamental and applied
R&D, along with cooperation with other nations in R&D activities to
enhance the global efficiency of such research. It is both significant and
appropriate that the European Commission has agreed to invest for the next
five-year period in sustainable energy research an amount that is 20 times the
expenditure for the 1997-2001 five-year period.
The White Paper concludes with the presentation of two comprehensive national
energy policies to demonstrate the method of integration of various individual
strategies and incentives into single, long-range policies with great potential
returns. All of those square meters of collectors and hectares of fields
capturing solar energy, blades converting the power of the wind, wells
delivering the Earth’s thermal energy, and waters delivering the energy of
river flows, waves and tides, will displace precious and dwindling fossil fuels
and losses of energy from the worldwide phase-out of nuclear power. Sparing the
use of fossil fuels for higher economic benefits, or using them in fuel-saving
and levelizing “hybrid” relationship with the intermittent renewable energy
resources (sun and wind), will contribute to leaner, stronger, safer societies
and economies. And, in the process, carbon and other emissions into the
atmosphere will be greatly reduced, now as a result of economically attractive
new activities, not as expensive environmental penalties.
And Dr. Aitken concludes by saying;
Governments need to set, assure and achieve goals to accomplish simultaneously
aggressive efficiency and renewable energy objectives. The
implementation mechanisms for achieving these goals must be a packaged set of
mutually supportive and self-consistent policies. The best policy is a
mix of policies, combining long term renewable energy and electricity standards
and goals with direct incentive and energy production payments, loan
assistance, tax credits, development of tradable market instruments, removal of
existing barriers, government leadership by example, and user education.