Renaissance in Environmentalism?
Frequent commenter Arlene does not share the guarded optimism I expressed in my recent piece in which I predict a renaissance in environmentalism. She writes:
The political landscape is terrible, in that the progressives are playing defense on so many subjects that sustainability and new energy economies are in last place. If we get an administration change, well you can wave goodbye to just about everything on the environmental and stewardship slate. …
The most disheartening reality for me is that climate change necessitates execution on a global scale. Anything else is a no-op, practically speaking.
I’m not sure about the results of an administration change. I know the rhetoric of the Republicans, as continuously expressed all through the primaries, has suggested the dismantling of the progress we’ve made in environmental regulation, but I have a hard time imagining that actually taking place. I know there is a huge bloc of voters, including the rank and file of the tea party, that has come to place the blame for every problem on the federal government; this is remarkable, but it appears to be a fact. Yet fortunately, we still place some value on the respect we’re accorded by the rest of the world, and I can’t picture our government, regardless of who’s in charge, deciding to amp up the rate at which we’re destroying our planet, in the face of the rancor that would be incurred from the other 200+ sovereign nations of Earth. As I often say, “We’re stupid, but we’re not that stupid.”
Regarding your point that dealing with climate change necessitates execution on a global scale, that is absolutely correct. I’m not suggesting that this will be easy. But if it is to happen at all, it begins with a ground-up awareness of the severity of the situation in which we find ourselves. That, of course, is why I write this stuff every day of my life. And I thank you, Arlene, for being among the many millions of people really trying to make a difference here.
As a result of turning away from nuclear power, Germany is already burning more coal and plans to burn still more coal:
“Merkel’s Green Shift Forces Germany to Burn More Coal: Energy”
Here is a quotation from the article:
“Germany’s largest utilities RWE and EON AG (EOAN) are shunning cleaner-burning natural gas because it’s more costly, while the collapsing cost of carbon permits means there’s little penalty for burning coal. Wind and solar projects, central to Germany’s plans to reduce nuclear energy and cut the release of heat- trapping gases, can’t produce electricity around the clock.”
Here is a link to the complete article:
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-08-19/merkel-s-green-shift-forces-germany-to-burn-more-coal-energy.html
According to another article, the power grid in Germany has become unstable as the result of increased reliance on renewable energy sources. The resulting brief fluctuations in power have caused some industrial processes to be shut down for varying intervals resulting in considerable losses. As a result, some German companies are installing back-up power systems, some of which use batteries to ensure that power will be continuous when there are brief interruptions. Other companies are installing their own generators. Thus, the shift away from nuclear power is already greatly increasing CO2 emissions, and emissions are almost certain to increase since Germany is already building more coal burning power plants.
I also found an article on the consequences that Japan is already experiencing as a result of shutting down its nuclear plants. The incidence of heat stroke has dramatically risen as the result of cutting back on air conditioning. In offices, thermostats have been set to 81F to reduce the power used by air conditioning. Japan is also importing more coal to make up for the loss of nuclear power.
http://yaleglobal.yale.edu/content/japan-sweats-it-out-it-wages-war-air-conditioning
Of course this does not prove that in the long run abandoning nuclear power will exacerbate global warming, but it certainly looks as though that will be the long run result. Compared with the consequences of global warming, the risks of even our present nuclear technology seem trivial.
As I see it, to limit the consequences of global warming, we have little choice but to expand our present bad nuclear technology until a better nuclear technology can be implemented. A better, safer, and more economical nuclear technology could be implemented, but we are allocating grossly insufficient resources to do it. The resulting consequences are almost certain to be catastrophic.