“Instead of treating Amsterdam as complete and starting again elsewhere, the IJburg plan has managed to find more space in a city that thought it had no more left.”
Category: energy
So it was great to get back to New York and be able to report on what is called the“New NY Broadband Program.” It involves a $500 million expenditure to help ensure that New Yorkers across the state have access to current-generation Internet capacity. There’s lots of potential in the plan, targeted at providing every New Yorker with access to 100 megabit per second (Mbps) service (10 Mbps uploads) by the end of 2018. Because New York expects a 1:1 match from the private sector for each grant or loan it makes, that means the state hopes to be deploying at least $1 billion on high-speed Internet access infrastructure.
New York State Governor Cuomo Announces Living Breakwaters Project Launch via bfi.org
Posted in architecture, economics, education, energy, engineering, environmental, governance, government, policy, water | Leave a Comment on New York State Governor Cuomo Announces Living Breakwaters Project Launch via bfi.org
https://vimeo.com/91648619
“Living Breakwaters is a comprehensive design for coastal resiliency along the Northeastern Seaboard of the United States and beyond. This approach to climate change adaptation and flood mitigation includes the deployment of innovative, layered ecologically-engineered breakwaters, the strengthening of biodiversity and coastal habitats through “reef streets”, the nurturing and resuscitation of fisheries and historic livelihoods, and deep community engagement through diverse partnerships and innovative educational programs. The transformative educational dimension amplifies impact to the next generation of shoreline stewards while leveraging the expertise of the members of the SCAPE Architecture team, who are making groundbreaking inroads into state and federal agencies, setting new precedents for multi-layered and systemic approaches to infrastructure planning.”
LINK: Governor Cuomo Announces Living Breakwaters Project Launch
It’s been awhile since the cost of gasoline topped $4 in the U.S. The national average hit $4.11 on July 11, 2008 and came close in May 2011 at $3.96. On New Years Day 2015, I drove through the night from Chicago to Boston. Despite the cold weather, the economics of fuel made it the best day for a road trip in years. I bought gas at a Pilot service station just off the Ohio Turnpike at $1.92/gallon. For me, it seemed like a bargain. Yet, 23 states charge less for gasoline than Ohio.
Now, at the end of May 2015, gas is rebounding from that low. Drivers on Memorial Day weekend faced the highest cost for gasoline of the year so far.
It’s tempting for politicians to advocate using tax breaks to smooth price spikes. With energy often surpassing the expense of food and rent and with so many individuals using fuel to make a living, reducing user fees or taxes during periods of very high fuel cost seems like the humane thing to do.
It seems humane, but it has the opposite effect. In fact, it is deeply punitive! That’s because the cost of gas is not an act of nature, nor even of free market economics. It is a product of cartels, special interests, conflict and FUD (fear, uncertainty and doubt). Offering relief during price spikes sustains demand while doing absolutely nothing to increase supply. This, in turn, exacerbates the spike, creates shortages for critical services and transfers enormous sums of money from consumers to producers. In effect, it is a free gift for producer nations.
In fact, consumers and consuming nations are best served by a raising taxes in lockstep with fuel price increases.
In May 2011, as gas prices were spiking to an all time high, a group calling itself National Taxpayers Union or NTU launched a $1.25 million campaign to fight energy taxes, like the fuel tax added to the cost of gasoline at the pump in most countries.* One of the group’s less controversial public service announcements (or more accurately, a lobbying effort) consist of magazine ads and videos that encourage Americans to write their legislators and demand a roll back of gas taxes whenever market prices spike.
I hate consumption taxes, especially the ones that target individual commodities or categories, such as alcohol, cigarettes, luxury purchases, or any system of import tariffs. They are a form of social engineering and they bastardize free markets. But when an energy consumer nation gives consumers breaks during periods of price spikes, the result counters the social intent. In fact, each time that oil prices rise, the best thing our government can do is to force them higher still! This may sound crazy, but when the supply of a commodity is controlled a few foreign cartels, it is no longer a commodity. Artificially lowering the consumer price by subsidizing the price simply stimulates consumption. It does not expand supply, and so the subsidy goes directly into suppliers’ pockets.
Apparently, I am not the only one who thinks that lower gas prices is a bad idea. Folling the 2011 gas spike (the highest cost gas spike in U.S. history), Motley Fool columnist, Travis Hoium filed an Op-Ed entitled, 3 Reasons the US Should Want Higher Oil Prices. (At the same time, I cautioned against tax relief tied to gasoline price hikes). His analysis and opinion is articulate and adequately supported, but none of his reasons point to the fundamental economic reason that for a country that aspires to energy independence, oil should be taxed higher whenever the market cost of externally sourced oil rises. Let me spell it out…
What happens if we lower the cost of a commodity to consumers in an effort to counteract a higher supply price? It doesn’t take an Economist to analyze. Since the supply is not increased, throwing a subsidy to the buyers “fuels” an even faster rise in prices and hands all that money to the supplier.
Let’s say that C = Amount of fuel needed for critical purposes
…getting to work, heating our home, manufacturing
Let’s say that D = Amount of fuel needed for discretionary purposes
…vacation travel, backyard BBQ, mowing the lawn, etc
Of course, with a limited personal budget, high fuel prices influence a consumer’s decision to classify an activity as ‘critical’ or ‘discretionary’. Additionally, the use of fuel is greatly affected by how efficiently you perform a task (taking a train to work instead of driving, vacationing nearby instead of far away, etc).
Foreign cartels wish to maintain high prices and high revenue, so they limit the foreign supply of oil. For them, it makes more sense to charge a lot of money for less product than to charge less money for a lot of product. If we consider again our classification of consumption into two categories, Critical and Discretionary, the supplier limits leave us with only enough fuel to support this much activity:
100%C + 80%(D)
Now if we counteract their production limits and insulate consumers from the higher cost, the formula doesn’t change. We continue to use just as much fuel.
In a free market, limited supply causes prices to rise and this forces consumers to cut back on discretionary use. Some consumers with less money must cut back on critical needs. That’s because some people can afford the keep buying and of course the cost of fuel rises.
In a free market — at least on our side of the ocean, this normally leads to several things — all of them very good:
• Increase exploration and domestic production (Motley Fool covers this one)
• Develop alternative fuels, especially domestic and environmentally friendly
• Increase conservation:
- Reduce travel
- Turn off unnecessary appliances
- Turn down heat, insulating home or office
• Change modalities:
- Carpool or use public transportation
- Reclassify some “Critical” uses as “Discretionary”
- Buy local (reduces wholesale transportation)
- Switch electric providers to avoid foreign sources
If consumers are suddenly subsidized when the cost of fuel rises, something terrible happens. Instead of producing more domestic energy, we are not at all affecting the supply. We are simply handing the foreign seller more cash — directly from the taxpayer to their pockets. And they didn’t even ask for it! They raise the cost by $1 per gallon and we give them $2 extra. Heck, why not? It makes us feel good.
What happens if we increase taxes when suppliers raise prices? First, we benefit by all the good things listed above.
Second, since some foreign suppliers are not truly constrained in their production (that is, they have plenty of oil), they will keep costs low in order to sustain revenue. There are plenty of places this “cost reduction” tax can be inserted: at point-of-sale, at import, or in the distribution chain.
What do we do with the money that is raised by taxes? That’s easy too. Give it back to consumers or use it to fund the development of energy sources that are domestic, inexpensive and environmentally safe.
This is how supply and demand should work. Of course, the government can still subsidize those in need. But do it in a way that doesn’t bastardize market dynamics. As a society, we provide assistance to the consumers who cannot afford energy for critical needs, and not by handing money to the supplier (effectively, a reward for cutting production). In this way, we reduce consumption, increase domestic production and provide direct assistance to those who are less fortunate. The effect of subsidizing some buyers will force some other buyers to reduce discretionary use. For example, if some of the higher cost went to taxes, it could be used to help ease the consumers who can no longer afford the “critical” fraction of their use.
_____________
* Americans are taxed for automotive fuel at the pump: A federal tax of 18.4¢ plus a state tax that varies between 12~35¢. The average state tax is about 23¢/gal, so the typical American pays about 41½¢ tax on each gallon, or approximately 10%.
Philip Raymond is Co-Chair of The Cryptocurrency Standards Association and CEO of Vanquish Labs.
An earlier draft of this article was published in his Blog.
By Phil McKenna — MIT Technology Review
Seeking to expand its business beyond electric vehicles, Tesla Motors will sell stationary batteries for residential, commercial, and utility use under a new brand, Tesla Energy.
Tesla is launching the home battery business partly because it’s already making vehicle batteries—and as a result it can benefit from the economies of scale that come from making both. Another reason is that the market for storage is expected to grow in concert with the use of solar power. Tesla needs both electric vehicles and solar power to boom if it hopes to fulfill the projected output from a vast $5 billion battery “gigafactory” it’s building in Nevada. Read more
Article: Harnessing “Black Holes”: The Large Hadron Collider – Ultimate Weapon of Mass Destruction
Posted in astronomy, big data, computing, cosmology, energy, engineering, environmental, ethics, existential risks, futurism, general relativity, governance, government, gravity, information science, innovation, internet, journalism, law, life extension, media & arts, military, nuclear energy, nuclear weapons, open source, particle physics, philosophy, physics, policy, posthumanism, quantum physics, science, security, singularity, space, space travel, supercomputing, sustainability, time travel, transhumanism, transparency, treaties | Leave a Comment on Article: Harnessing “Black Holes”: The Large Hadron Collider – Ultimate Weapon of Mass Destruction
Harnessing “Black Holes”: The Large Hadron Collider – Ultimate Weapon of Mass Destruction
Why the LHC must be shut down
CERN-Critics: LHC restart is a sad day for science and humanity!
Posted in astronomy, big data, complex systems, computing, cosmology, energy, engineering, ethics, existential risks, futurism, general relativity, governance, government, gravity, hardware, information science, innovation, internet, journalism, law, life extension, media & arts, military, nuclear energy, nuclear weapons, particle physics, philosophy, physics, policy, quantum physics, science, security, singularity, space, space travel, supercomputing, sustainability, time travel, transhumanism, transparency, treaties | 1 Comment on CERN-Critics: LHC restart is a sad day for science and humanity!
PRESS RELEASE “LHC-KRITIK”/”LHC-CRITIQUE” www.lhc-concern.info
CERN-Critics: LHC restart is a sad day for science and humanity!
These days, CERN has restarted the world’s biggest particle collider, the so-called “Big Bang Machine” LHC at CERN. After a hundreds of Million Euros upgrade of the world’s biggest machine, CERN plans to smash particles at double the energies of before. This poses, one would hope, certain eventually small (?), but fundamentally unpredictable catastrophic risks to planet Earth.
Basically the same group of critics, including Professors and Doctors, that had previously filed a law suit against CERN in the US and Europe, still opposes the restart for basically the same reasons. Dangers of: (“Micro”-)Black Holes, Strangelets, Vacuum Bubbles, etc., etc. are of course and maybe will forever be — still in discussion. No specific improvements concerning the safety assessment of the LHC have been conducted by CERN or anybody meanwhile. There is still no proper and really independent risk assessment (the ‘LSAG-report’ has been done by CERN itself) — and the science of risk research is still not really involved in the issue. This is a scientific and political scandal and that’s why the restart is a sad day for science and humanity.
The scientific network “LHC-Critique” speaks for a stop of any public sponsorship of gigantomanic particle colliders.
Just to demonstrate how speculative this research is: Even CERN has to admit, that the so called “Higgs Boson” was discovered — only “probably”. Very probably, mankind will never find any use for the “Higgs Boson”. Here we are not talking about the use of collider technology in medical concerns. It could be a minor, but very improbable advantage for mankind to comprehend the Big Bang one day. But it would surely be fatal – how the Atomic Age has already demonstrated — to know how to handle this or other extreme phenomena in the universe.
Within the next Billions of years, mankind would have enough problems without CERN.
Sources:
- A new paper by our partner “Heavy Ion Alert” will be published soon: http://www.heavyionalert.org/
- Background documents provided by our partner “LHC Safety Review”: http://www.lhcsafetyreview.org/
- Press release by our partner ”Risk Evaluation Forum” emphasizing on renewed particle collider risk: http://www.risk-evaluation-forum.org/newsbg.pdf
- Study concluding that “Mini Black Holes” could be created at planned LHC energies: http://phys.org/news/2015-03-mini-black-holes-lhc-parallel.html
- New paper by Dr. Thomas B. Kerwick on lacking safety argument by CERN: http://vixra.org/abs/1503.0066
- More info at the LHC-Kritik/LHC-Critique website: www.LHC-concern.info
Best regards:
LHC-Kritik/LHC-Critique
Lewis Dartnell | AEON“Given the dwindling reserves of crude oil left in the world, it could be argued that the most wasteful use for this limited resource is to simply burn it. We should be carefully preserving what’s left for the vital repertoire of valuable organic compounds it offers.” Read more
Clean Disruption of Energy and Transportation:
How Silicon Valley Will Make Oil, Nuclear, Natural Gas, Coal, Electric Utilities and Conventional Cars Obsolete by 2030
By Tony Seba
Book review by Jose Cordeiro
All the armies in the world are not as powerful as an idea whose time has come.
Victor Hugo, 1854
If you find a prediction reasonable, than it is probably wrong, because the future is not reasonable; it is fantastic!
Arthur C. Clarke, 1964
Thirty years from now there will be a huge amount of oil — and no buyers. Oil will be left in the ground. The Stone Age came to an end, not because we had a lack of stones, and the Oil Age will come to an end not because we have a lack of oil.
Sheik Ahmed Yamani, 2000
Most long-range forecasts of what is technically feasible in future time periods dramatically underestimate the power of future developments because they are based on what I call the “intuitive linear” view of history rather than the “historical exponential” view.
Ray Kurzweil, 2005
Tony Seba has been working, teaching and researching about energy issues for years. Since last decade, he has been making energy forecasts which might have looked unreasonable then, but that have already become reality this decade. Now he forecasts that by 2030 all energy generation will be solar (and wind), and all new cars will be autonomous (self-driving) and electric vehicles. Since only about 1% of the global energy production is solar (and wind) today, some might think that the 100% target by 2030 seems impossible. Others might ponder that it is even more incredible to go today from less than 1% electric vehicles and basically 0% self-driving cars (just to give two very rough numbers about the current situation) to 100% electric and 100% autonomous for all the new vehicle production by 2030.
If those predictions were not enough, he also forecasts that the current oil, nuclear, natural gas, coal, biofuels, electric utilities and conventional car industries will be totally “obliterated” through the convergence of solar (and wind) with electric and autonomous vehicles by 2030. Will Tony Seba’s predictions for 2030 be right again? I sincerely hope so, for the benefit of humanity!
Clean Disruption
Clean Disruption of Energy and Transportation is a really disruptive book. More than disruptive, it is a revolutionary book that envisions the evolution of the energy and transportation industries during the next two decades. The economic value of those two sectors is truly immense, the energy industry represents about US$ 8 trillion and the transportation industry about US$ 4 trillion, every year. Thus, we are talking about disrupting US$ 12 trillion, which is a huge number, almost as big as the economy of China, the European Union or the United States.
In his previous book, Solar Trillions, Tony Seba already considered the rapid, even exponential, growth of solar energy. His 2010 forecasts have been surprisingly accurate, particularly since organizations like the International Energy Agency (IEA) and the US Department of Energy (DOE) Energy Information Administration (EIA) have been consistently wrong, always underestimating the growth of the solar industry. While the IEA and EIA have basically used linear projections, Tony Seba has considered exponential increases in production and exponential decreases in costs.
Tony Seba
Tony Seba has had a distinguished career as a Silicon Valley entrepreneur and executive. He got his B.Sc. degree in Computer Science and Engineering from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), where we studied together, and later he received his MBA from Stanford University. He was an early employee in Cisco Systems, and he later cofounded PrintNation.com, where he received several awards. Currently, he is a lecturer at Stanford University, startup mentor, private investor and corporate advisor. His leadership has been recognized in publications like BusinessWeek, his articles have appeared in Forbes, and has written three best-selling books. Tony Seba has been a keynote speaker from Abu Dhabi to Hong Kong, from Auckland to Seoul.
On his new book, Tony Seba describes very well why solar energy is related much more to the new digital industries of Silicon Valley than to the old fossil fuel industries. SolarCity is an example of the new energy companies, while ExxonMobil is an example of the old energy dinosaurs. Similarly, he describes an electric and self-driving car as a computer on wheels, and he explains how far ahead the new cars are from the traditional vehicles manufactured in Detroit, Germany and Japan. Google and Tesla are pushing forward with electric and self-driving cars, while GM and Toyota, for example, seem to have a hard time following these new trends.
Exponential Growth
Exponential growth is the main driver behind the growth of the solar industry, and exponential growth is also behind the growth of the electric and self-driving cars. Even if today there is only 1% of solar energy capacity, and less than 1% of new cars are electric vehicles, it is just seven doublings away before reaching 100%. Both industries seem to be doubling about every two years, more or less, and so there will be 2% in two more years, 4% in four years, 8% in six years, 16% in eight years, 32% in ten years, 64% in twelve years, and 100% in fourteen years, or less. Obviously, it depends on the continuous growth of such industries until market saturation, but the historical trends are very clear. And self-driving cars, which are not yet commercialized, have the potential to grow even faster thanks to network effects. Therefore, thinking exponentially, it is not surprising to move from 1% to 100% in fourteen years if the doubling time is just two years, which has been very close to reality until now. Think of Moore’s Law for solar energy, actually called Swanson’s Law in honor of the Stanford professor who founded SunPower, and also Moore’s Law for electric and self-driving cars, i.e. computers on wheels.
Indeed, a “solar energy tsunami” is fast approaching and it will completely obliterate the fossil fuel companies and the old electric utilities. In parallel, another “electric and self-driving car tsunami” will also disrupt the traditional car companies that do not adapt to the fast new realities. Emerging companies with new Silicon Valley models will completely disrupt the conventional energy and transportation sectors. What is even better, this disruption will be clean, and it will actually improve the human condition. For years, for decades, energy and transportation were two of the dirtiest industries in the world. In the future, they will be cleaner, much cleaner.
How much will it cost?
Is it really possible to transition from the current Oil Age to the future Solar Age? According to the famous Sheik Ahmed Yamani, the answer is certainly affirmative. But will it cost more than the existing status quo? Let’s consider the facts!
According to the World Energy Investment Outlook published by the IEA in 2014, the energy industry will require $48 trillion investments from 2015 to 2035. That huge amount will roughly be distributed as $23 trillion in fossil fuels, $10 trillion in power generation (including only $6 trillion for renewables), $8 trillion in energy efficiency, and $7 trillion in transmission and distribution. On top of that, half a trillion dollars are spent yearly on subsidies for fossil fuels, about $550 billion in 2013. Obviously, the IEA favors fossil fuels since the agency was created by the OECD in 1974 following the 1973 oil crisis to guarantee the oil needs of the industrialized countries. Just like the US DOE was originally created in 1977 as a reaction to the 1973 oil crisis. Thus, both institutions consider mostly fossil fuels in their projections, with much less than 10% solar energy by 2035. However, this linear thinking does not capture the reality of solar capacity growing exponentially, and its costs decreasing exponentially.
Solar costs have been decreasing exponentially from almost $100/W in the 1970s. Today, total costs of solar installations vary from $3/W to $1/W, depending on altitude and longitude, including cities and rural areas, and size, including utility-scale, commercial and residential sites. Continuing with the exponential decrease of costs, combined with the exponential increase of production, it is foreseeable that in the next few years it will cost less than $1/W to install solar power anywhere, including storage costs.
The total power consumed by humanity today is about 15 TW, and this number might increase very little during the next few years, since over half of all the energy produced today is wasted. The worst industry is the transportation sector, where close to 80% of the energy is wasted. Thanks to big improvements in energy efficiency, like it has happened in the last few years, and the great energy savings thanks to electric and self-driving cars. Total power consumption might even remain constant or decline slightly.
Combining the total power consumption of 15 TW and $1/W, it gives $15 trillion in investments to transform the energy matrix from fossil fuels to solar energy, including storage. Even considering a small increase in power consumption, and low capacity factors, the total amount might be $30 trillion, or even $45 trillion, considering three times the production capacity of 15 TW. Therefore, the numbers given by the IEA to sustain the Oil Age are an insult to those who want a cleaner world, and with cheaper energy.
The “Enernet”: clean energy and transportation for all
My friend Robert Metcalf, former MIT professor and inventor of Ethernet, popularized the idea of an Energy Internet or “Enernet”. This Enernet or Energy Network will allow us to connect the whole world and to increase, not reduce, our energy consumption. With the Enernet, energy and power will become abundant and basically free, just like information and bandwidth are today thanks to the Internet. Storage considerations are also important, but new batteries and other advanced technologies will make the Enernet more resilient and create positive network effects. This intelligent Enernet will also help power the new transportation system based on electric and self-driving cars. Humanity will more from
According to Metcalfe, the Enernet will bring fundamental changes in the way we produce and consume energy, from generation to transmission, storage and final utilization. The Enernet should really create a smart energy grid with distributed resources, efficient systems, high redundancy and high storage capacity. The Enernet should also help the transition to clean energy and renewable sources, with new players and entrepreneurs taking the place of traditional “big oil” and utilities, and old monolithic producers giving more control to energy prosumers (producers and consumers). Finally, we will continue the transition from expensive energy to cheap energy in a world where energy will be recognized as an abundant resource.
Global companies like Apple, Facebook, Google, IBM, IKEA, Walmart, among many others, have publicly announced that they want to power all their operations with renewable energy. Additionally, retailers like Walmart also announced that they will install electric car chargers in their stores, so that clients can charge their vehicles for free, just like the Tesla Superchargers, also for free. Why for free? Because electricity is much cheaper than oil, and it will only get cheaper with more and more solar power, at lower and lower installation costs.
Clean Disruption shows the path for abundant and cheap energy for everybody, with economic and efficient transportation on-demand. Poor people around the world will leapfrog the fossil fuel and utility dinosaurs and move directly to intelligent distributed energy systems, just like the poor moved from no phones to mobile phones. In fact, many of those mobile phones are charged today by solar panels in many rural areas. This Clean Disruption will be better for you, better for me, better for humanity, and better for the environment.
José Cordeiro, MBA, PhD
(http://cordeiro.org)
Visiting Research Fellow, IDE – JETRO, Japan
(http://www.ide.go.jp)
Director, Venezuela Node, The Millennium Project
(http://Millennium-Project.org)
Adjunct Professor, Moscow Institute of Physics and Technology, Russia
(http://mipt.ru)
Founding Faculty, Singularity University, NASA Research Park, Silicon Valley, California
(http://SingularityU.org)