Welcome to Forge the Future, your weekly guide to all things climate. This week has seen Trump officially withdrawing from the Paris Agreement, whilst here in the UK, the High Court ruled that a ban on Extinction Rebellion’s protests in October was unlawful. Like much to do with the climate - there’s some good news, and some not so good news.
I mentioned the Twitter political advertising ban last week - there have been numerous updates since then, as Emily Atkin of HEATED pointed out that whilst ‘issue’ ads were banned, many of Exxon Mobil’s ads were not labeled as such. The debate has been picked up by Elizabeth Warren, and is now garnering serious attention from Twitter. It’s not settled by any means, and goes to show that not only is nothing black and white, but also that raising issues can effect change!
State of the Climate
CO2 levels this week: 409.90 ppm
This time last year: 406.99 ppm
Just as California is managing to not be on fire quite as much, Australia has caught light. Huge fires in New South Wales have caused Australia to declare a state of emergency (for the first time since 2013), as enormous fires have destroyed hundreds of properties and killed several people. The word ‘unprecedented’ is being thrown around a lot, and with good reason - things are escalating year by year - the Copernicus program has now confirmed October as the hottest October on record.
Here in the UK, floods have hit the north of England, and many residents are frustrated by slow or no response from authorities. As is often the case, the floods have hit people who are already struggling financially. Many now cannot afford insurance, but equally are unable or unwilling to move elsewhere.
New studies also suggest that several aspects of climate change could be worse than expected. Sea level rise is likely to continue until at least 2300 even if all countries meet their climate goals (most are way off track), and emissions from rainforest damage and deforestation may’ve been underestimated by over 600%. A bevy of new extreme storms have been popping up in oceans across the world - the new pattern seems to be for storms to escalate faster to higher levels. Fortunately most of the current batch look like they won’t cause major human impact, but it’s a worrying trend.
Visualisation of the Week
This week’s visualisation comes from the IEA Offshore Wind 2019 report, which highlights in particular the huge potential of offshore wind power, particularly in Europe.
Fitful Fluctuations
This week I wanted to focus on renewable energy, particularly on intermittency. Much has been made of the intermittent nature of renewables, and it seems obvious - solar only works during the day, and wind only produces energy when it’s… well, windy. That sounds like a fairly sizeable downside versus fossil fuels or nuclear, which simply produce power constantly, for as long as we need it. However, like everything in this world, nothing is quite as simple as it seems.
Firstly, energy demand isn’t constant. It fluctuates as different users turn on or off loads, from air conditioning in summer, to the (in the UK at least) clichéd example of people turning on the kettle during half time of a football game. Because the supply has to keep up with demand, that means suppliers have to be ramping up and down all of the time to match this fluctuation. However, there is generally a certain amount of demand that’s always there - so called ‘base load’ power. Generally, the argument is that you can’t push renewables above a certain percentage of supply, or they’ll eat into this base load, and when the wind stops blowing, suddenly you have people without power.
However, even if you set this threshold really low, most countries in the world are far short of this level - we could add Terawatts of power before coming close to these limits - Carbon Tracker recently branded this the ‘trillion dollar energy windfall’. And once we do reach the heady state of needing to consider intermittency, we already have some solutions - many renewables projects are coming with battery storage, which can smooth out spikes in supply by storing energy for minutes to hours. Australia has even started combining wind, solar and battery storage in a single facility - a pattern that’s being repeated across the world, as each technology can often help offset the shortcomings of the others and provide much more consistent power.
There are also other solutions, including shifting demand. We’ve become used to using electricity whenever it’s convenient, but increasingly we should start looking at shifting demand. If price followed supply, then there would be a reward for consumers to shift loads to cheaper times. This could involve anything from running the washing machine overnight, to shifting compute loads to cheaper times of the day.
I’ve massively simplified a very complex topic here, but it will undoubtedly be interesting to see how the electricity market shifts as renewables reach increasing levels of coverage.
News Highlights
US vs the Climate
The US central bank has put the cost of climate and weather-related events in the US as $500bn over the last five years.
The EPA is trying to limit the types of research that can be used to back public health regulations. Whilst nominally about ‘open science’, the policy prevents the use of confidential medical data, and is retroactive, not only preventing most future air- and water-pollution regulation, but potentially allowing the EPA to roll back current legislation.
The Trump administration is removing protections on dredging sand from protected ecosystems. The law allows sand to be dredged to shore up beaches to protect expensive coastal homes, continuing the US trend of protecting the wealthy whilst leaving the poor to fend for themselves.
The wildfires in California are making it harder for the state to hit its own emissions targets - the Kincade wildfire alone emitted CO2 equivalent to 320,000 cars.
Honolulu and Maui are planning to sue many major fossil fuel companies for the money they will have to spend combating climate change. This comes on top of the various suits the companies are facing across the US and the world, as the tide turns against the industry, and people wake up to the costs of climate change.
Other News
New Zealand has passed a massive net-zero commitment. It binds the country to zero emissions by 2050, although agriculture (nearly half of Kiwi emissions) is not covered, and only has to reduce by half.
Airlines are under fire after an investigation into ‘tankering’, where aircraft are deliberately overfueled to avoid paying higher fuel costs in destination airports. One estimate put the resulting extra emissions at over 900,000 tonnes of CO2 per year.
The COP25 Climate Summit has been moved to Madrid, after Chile pulled out of hosting due to protests in the country. The Summit has already moved once, after Brazil pulled out last year.
Budapest’s new mayor has declared a climate emergency. This comes in contrast to the country as a whole, which is one of the last holdouts on a EU-wide net-zero agreement, which is hoped will be finally agreed in December.
Oslo wants to be the world’s first zero emissions port - it plans to cut emissions of CO2, nitrogen oxide, sulphur dioxide and particulates by 70% by 2030, and eventually to zero. Their plan includes refitting port equipment, but also electrifying ferries, which produce much of the pollution in the port.
A major hydroelectric project in the Amazon, already under fire for corruption, and economic and environmental flaws, has a major structural defect, made worse by low water levels. The project is massively damaging the entire ecosystem downstream, and may not even be economically viable.
Australia’s main electricity grid hit 50% renewables for the first time this week.
Long Reads
The US is washing its hands of its nuclear testing in the Marshall Islands, which after decades of deception, is finally learning of the true nature of what went on, just as climate change threatens to undo the minimal cleanup conducted.
Flint, Michigan, has become synonymous with water problems. Those problems have hit hardest in the schools, where under-funded state schools struggle to cope with children plagued by behavioural issues likely induced by high lead levels.
An analysis of ten of the most significant ways to use CO2, and how they compare, from how long the CO2 is sequestered, to how expensive they would be.
The End Times
That’s all I have for you this week. As always, thank you for reading, and give yourself a pat on the back if you made it all the way to the end! If you’ve any feedback or suggestions for me, I’d love to hear them, and if you feel like sharing this, I’d massively appreciate it! See you next week,
Oli