Ice on Fire – a second reprise

Note, the following post was written four years ago and reposted two years ago, but still serves as a reminder of the progress we have made and need to make to address our climate change problem. Since I mentioned this documentary in a comment on my last post, I thought I would repeat it here.

I encourage people to watch the excellent HBO documentary called “Ice on Fire” on concerns over climate change and remedial actions underway that should and can be leveraged. The documentary is produced and narrated by Leonardo DiCaprio, but the most impactful voices are the scientists, inventors and trendsetters who are seeing dividends from their actions and investments.

To sum up, we have two major problems facing us – too much carbon in the air along with a growing concern over methane as it is released from beneath melting ice caps and frozen tundra, on top of the venting from natural gas sites. The title comes from researchers lighting methane leaks on fire as it is released from melting ice covered waters. The scientists note with data that it is quite clear man is causing the hastened uptick in temperatures as we leave our carbon fingerprints in the atmosphere.

These are major concerns, but we are not sitting still. Significant efforts are underway. They can be categorized as putting less carbon in the air and capturing more carbon from the air. To avoid a novel, I will touch on some of the ideas, but please do deeper dives and watch the documentary airing now.

Stop putting carbon in the air

We must hasten the move to renewable energy. The costs are more on par and less, in some cases, than fossil fuel energy production. Wind and solar energy are growing at accelerated rates. One CEO noted, the technology is here to make this happen even more than it already is. Here in the US, California gets 25% of its electricity from solar and Texas gets 16% of its electricity from wind energy.

Yet, a very promising start-up off Scotland is tapping tidal energy. There is a company producing electricity today with an offshore platform with two turbines turned by the tides to generate electricity. I have written before about this group as they use existing technologies to harness the sea. Their success is gaining notoriety around the world, as it appears to be replicable.

Two other ideas also help with both recapture and restricting release. The first is reusing depleting biowaste (such as dying trees, plants and compost) in the soils to grow crops and future trees and foliage. The biowaste holds water better, maintains top soil and is straight out of nature’s guidebook.

The other is growing more kelp offshore as it captures carbon like sequoia trees and can also be used as a food source for livestock. Feeding cattle kelp is not a new approach. Feeding cattle is important as it greatly reduces the gases released by animals and preserves more carbon capturing grassland.

Capture more carbon from the air

The documentary spells out several natural ways to capture carbon and a few technological ways. On the former, here are a few ideas:

Maintain forests, especially those with large sequoias, which are huge carbon eaters. There are several places that are nurturing huge forests, but they note we need more of these efforts. We need to be mindful to replace what we cut, but keep some protected forests off limits to cutting.

Another example is to replenish mangroves that offer buffers to oceans. In addition to offering protection against storms, they also are natural born carbon eaters.

Another effort is to grow more urban farms. These farms are usually more organic, but in addition to absorbing carbon in urban areas, they perpetuate a farm to table concept that reduces transportation fumes. Reducing auto fumes is a huge concern of cities around the globe.

The next idea is more compex, but it requires the growing of more shells in the ocean. The dusts off the shells creates “ocean snow” that settles to the bottom and absorbs carbon. The idea is to spread a very small amount of iron in the ocean to cause more shells to grow.

The more technological solutions are designed to pull carbon out of the air. There are two approaches – one is to extract carbon and store it safely underground. The other is to pull it out and reuse it through artificial photosynthesis. Both of these options need more description than I am giving them. I prefer the more natural ways, but all of the above, is a necessary strategy at this late hour.

The scientists have concerns, but they do offer hope. The uncertainty of the ice-covered methane release gives them pause. They did note the methane release from accidental leaks from fossil fuel is visible from space and reduceable with some effort.

Another concern is the well-funded activity behind climate change deniers. A Wyoming rancher scientist standing in front of a visible, leaky methane cap said it plainly – they know this stuffs hurts kids more than adults. If someone came into my home to hurt my kids, it would be over my dead body. So, why is it OK to allow this?

Another scientist was less colorful, but equally plainspoken. He said fossil fuel executives perpetuating climate change denial should be tried in The Hague for crimes against humanity. Yet, as the costs have declined, the profit of creating carbon is becoming less palatable than the profit of reducing carbon in the air. People need to know these market forces exist today and not stand for future unhealthy energy creation.

Finally, if you cannot convince a climate change denier that we have a problem, ask them a simple question – if costs were not an issue, would you rather your children and grandchildren breathe methane from vented natural gas or drink coal ash polluted water or have carbon and methane neutral solar, wind or tidal energy? Guess what – costs are not much of an issue anymore and, in an increasing number of cases, less for renewables.

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Pipelines breach and it is not rare when they do

In article on NBC News written by Dennis Romero called “In Kansas, crews contain largest-yet breach of Keystone Pipeline,” it tells of better news in stopping a large oil spill in Kansas. Yet, the story goes deeper as it shows the breaches are not uncommon. The last time I paid attention to this story, there had been fourteen breaches. Now we are up to twenty-two.

The full article is below. The following summarizes a few paragraphs. Just focus on the highlighted pieces for a quick thumbnail sketch.

“The operator of the Keystone Pipeline System, which carries a form of crude oil from Canada to multiple states for refining, said over the weekend that its largest breach yet has been contained for now.

The pipeline failure 3 miles east of Washington, Kansas, on Wednesday caused an estimated 14,000 barrels of crude, or 588,000 gallons of a form of crude known as tar sands oil, to spill into Mill Creek, a natural waterway, according to the Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration of the U.S. Transportation Department….

In the last five years, there have been at least three significant spills along the original Keystone Pipeline System, Wednesday’s being the most voluminous, according to the Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration.

The pipeline regulators also noted accidents and breaches in the Keystone system in 2011, 2016 and 2020. The affected section is part of the 288-mile Cushing Extension, completed in 2011, which takes crude from Steele City, Nebraska, to Cushing, Oklahoma, regulators said.

Environmentalists have argued that the incidents come with such a pipeline and that they’re not worth the convenience of more direct transportation for fossil fuel in a world coming to terms with global warming caused largely by burning it.

The Sierra Club said it was the 22nd time the pipeline it calls Keystone 1 has been the site of a spill, breach or accident.

‘There is no such thing as a safe tar sands pipeline and this is another disaster that continues to prove we must put our climate and our communities first,’ Catherine Collentine of the Sierra Club said in a statement.”

Oil transported by ship, derrick, train, truck or pipeline will breach at some point. And, the spills usually are disastrous. On the flip side, when an offshore windmill breaches, it causes a different result – a splash. When a solar panel breaches it causes a small outage.

Interestingly, Kansas is one of only two states that gets 40% or more of its energy from wind energy behind Iowa (see second article below). Ironically, the largest wind energy producer by volume in the US is the oil rich state of Texas. And, very quietly, Texas developed infrastructure to harness the electricity from these distributed windmills.

Let me close with the words I heard uttered by oil tycoon T. Boone Pickens on “60 Minutes” about ten years ago before he passed away. He said natural gas will buy us some time, but the future of energy in America is wind energy. It is not a surprise that the windy plains states of America are leading the way.

https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/kansas-crews-contain-largest-yet-breach-keystone-pipeline-rcna61196

Kansas continues to lead in wind energy

Desalination of sea water using renewable energy marries two issues

An important article on two of the planet’s major issues called “Egypt to build 21 desalination plants in phase 1 of scheme -sovereign fund” by Aidan Lewis appeared in Reuters this week. A few paragraphs are noted below with a link to the full article at the end of the post.

“CAIRO, Dec 1 (Reuters) – Egypt plans to award deals next year to build 21 water desalination plants in the first $3 billion phase of a programme that will draw on cheap renewable energy, the CEO of the country’s sovereign fund said on Thursday.

Egypt, which recently hosted the COP27 U.N. climate talks and is trying to boost lagging investment in renewables, also aims to start production at a series of proposed green hydrogen projects in 2025-2026, Ayman Soliman told the Reuters NEXT conference.

Egypt depends almost entirely on the Nile for fresh water, and faces rising water scarcity for its population of 104 million. The desalination programme aims to generate 3.3 million cubic metres of water daily in the first phase, and eventually reach 8.8 million cubic metres daily at a cost of $8 billion.

So-called green or clean hydrogen is produced using electrolysers powered by renewable energy to split water from oxygen. It is seen as a potential future power source that could reduce emissions, though to date it is largely limited to experimental projects. Analysts say challenges facing its growth include high costs and energy inputs, as well as safety concerns.”

This fund is set to pump money into two needed concerns – the worsening water crisis and the needed use of renewable energy to power the effort. The global water crisis matches climate change in terms of risk to our planet and has for several years. Climate change actually makes the water crisis worse through evaporation. Duke Energy noted in a report that its projections of water evaporation from its water sources to power the Charlotte metropolitan area will be 11% worse with climate change. When water levels get to low, Duke has to cut power production or use more water from the river sources which exacerbates the water crisis.

Marrying these two crises, we have too much salt water and too little fresh water. Efforts to use the former to replace the latter may start out as more expensive, which is why it has not been used as much before, but has to be part of our equation to help our planet and people. As with other efforts, over time the process will get more cost effective.

https://www.reuters.com/markets/commodities/egypt-build-21-desalination-plants-phase-1-scheme-sovereign-fund-2022-12-01/

Coal ash in the bottom of a lake

In an article yesterday in The Charlotte Observer by Sara Coello called “Researchers detect coal ash beneath five NC lakes, including a Charlotte water source” a troubling study result indicates that coal ash has been invasive over time. It is the gift that keeps on giving long after its use and not in a good way.

Here are the first few paragraphs from the article, with a link to the full piece below:

“Scientists have detected coal ash in sediment at the bottom of five North Carolina lakes, evidence that it can reach bodies of water in previously unknown ways. Sediments beneath Mountain Island Lake, a drinking water source in and near Charlotte, was one spot where ash was detected. The study did not conclude that the waste is a risk to people or wildlife, but recommends more research.

Experts had thought that coal ash polluted ground and surface waters primarily by leaking from pits and ponds where power companies traditionally stashed it. Duke Energy is excavating 80 millions tons of coal ash across the state to reduce that threat, with 5.4 million tons once stored close to Mountain Island Lake already removed.

But researchers from Duke and Appalachian State universities found that airborne ash particles fell directly into lake waters over the past 40 to 70 years, especially before pollution controls were installed. And that ash particles that dropped to the ground also washed into the lakes, especially during extreme weather.

‘We thought that the majority of the coal ash is restricted to coal ash ponds and landfills,’ said Avner Vengosh, a professor at Duke’s Nicholas School of the Environment. ‘Now we see it’s already in the open environment.’”

One of the many costs of burning coal that is usually underestimated is the long-term impact of trying to keep coal ash corralled long after the coal has been burned. The Dan River spill from a few years back was from coal ash from a closed down plant. This is why we must continue to move (and have moved away from) coal burning to create electricity. The tail on its maintenance is very long and costly.

This is also why I have long been critical of leaders from coal mining states. They have known this for years and instead of helping workers to transition to newer cleaner energy solutions, they clinged to the past. The last time I looked the sun shines, the water flows and the wind blows in Kentucky, West Virginia, Ohio, Pennsylvania and Virginia.

US Solar jobs dwarf coal jobs today, but that is not news and was highly predictable several years ago. Oil tycoon T. Boone Pickens said about ten years ago on “60 Minutes” the future of energy in the US is with wind energy. Natural gas will buy time, but the wind blows across the plains and offshore.

Solar and wind energy are now on par with or better than fossil fuel production costs. But, when you factor in all of the other costs related to acquisition, transport, healthcare, maintenance and litigation, eg. the costs for renewables beat the pants off coal and even natural gas. And, when a wind mill offshore “spills” the only thing that happens is a splash.

Read more at: https://www.charlotteobserver.com/news/local/article266613326.html#storylink=cpy

Sucking the oxygen out of the room

I have written often about relevant issues not getting discussed as certain politicians and sloppy reporters and opinion people would rather discuss sensationalized and exaggerated issues, which may not be that big of a deal to begin with. Or, worse, the party complaining the most chose not to act to leave an issue open to blame the other side for its failure to address it. This last step is happening too often for my tastes. It truly sucks the oxygen out of the room.

When Donald Trump used “build that wall” as his bumper sticker theme in 2016, immigration was a problem, but down on the list of issues causing disenfranchisement in people in run-down areas. The two main culprits of companies chasing cheaper labor and technological advancements would not fit on a bumper sticker. Plus, it is hard to fear a robot like you can an illegal alien brought in as cheap labor in some industries. But, it should be noted when his bluff was called on his number one issue and Senators Dick Durbin and Lindsey Graham got him to agree on a wall funding for DACA being made law, he reneged on his promise in a matter of a few hours as not solving immigration was better as a campaign issue.

Right now instead of discussing more our US and global water crisis, our poverty and hunger problems, the threats to our civil rights and democracy, the need to further stabilize health care costs and access, the continuing threats to inflation and climate change, etc., we spend far too much time speaking about things that are not really problems based on some variation of “fear the other” as a threat. When I see “fear the other” issues being bandied about, I just move on as these are purposeful wedge issues to garner votes.

We just passed a good, but imperfect Inflation Reduction Act that included elements to reduce the deficit with increased taxes on the wealthy, help with renewable energy investment and stabilizing health care premiums continuing what happened with the pandemic funding. Although Republican led states will benefit from this, no Republican voted for it. If a party is going to complain about inflation, why did no one vote for it? No legislation is perfect, but no one, even when your state benefits?

Democrats have just done a similar ploy delaying a vote of the marriage equality act until after the election. It is arguable that it could not have passed, but the Democrats feel some lame duck moderate Republicans will be more inclined to vote in favor after the mid-terms. Yet, the bill had support and some momentum. Some Republicans in tough campaigns wanted to vote for it.

Politics has become a new sport with a zero-sum mindset – I must win and you must lose. We even have folks who taunt the other side. In this construct, the people who lose are the voters and citizens of our country and other countries. When the US fails to be a responsible global partner and citizen, then the rest of the world thinks less of us. Botching our pandemic response showed that the US cannot effectively deal with a major issue. The January 6 insurrection showed that even the US can look like a Banana Republic. The unproven bogus election fraud claims planned and touted by the losing former president, made us look like an autocratic country pretending to look like a democracy.

We must strive toward our better angels and civilly discuss our problems truthfully and factually. If any leader from any party cannot do this, then he or she needs to resign. And, we certainly do not need them running for office. Full stop.

Oil companies’ internal documents confirm gaslighting the public

An article in The Guardian yesterday by Oliver Milman called “Criticism intensifies after big oil admits ‘gaslighting’ public over green aims” does not paint the fossil fuel industry in a good light. Here are a few paragraphs, but I encourage you to link the article below.

“Criticism in the US of the oil industry’s obfuscation over the climate crisis is intensifying after internal documents showed companies attempted to distance themselves from agreed climate goals, admitted ‘gaslighting’ the public over purported efforts to go green, and even wished critical activists be infested by bedbugs.

The communications were unveiled as part of a congressional hearing held in Washington DC, where an investigation into the role of fossil fuels in driving the climate crisis produced documents obtained from the oil giants ExxonMobil, Chevron, Shell and BP…

The new documents are ‘the latest evidence that oil giants keep lying about their commitments to help solve the climate crisis and should never be trusted by policymakers,’ said Richard Wiles, president of the Center for Climate Integrity.

‘If there is one thing consistent about the oil and gas majors’ position on climate, it’s their utter inability to tell the truth,’ Wiles added.

Ro Khanna, co-chair of the committee, said the new documents are ‘explosive’ and show a ‘culture of intense disrespect’ to climate activists. The oil giants’ ‘climate pledges rely on unproven technology, accounting gimmicks and misleading language to hide the reality,’ he added. ‘Big oil executives are laughing at the people trying to protect our planet while they knowingly work to destroy it.'”

These revelations are not surprising but are alarming. It should be noted shareholders of Exxon Mobil voted to require management to inform them on the progress toward fighting climate change, the vote occurring the day before the former president pulled the US out of the Paris Climate Change Accord. The proof though is in the pudding. To me it is a culture of window dressing – making it look like management is doing something but really not as much as it seems.

Yet, for those who simply cannot believe Big Oil would do this, let me remind that eight CEOs of the tobacco industry sat in a panel in front of a Congressional Committee and lied to a direct question. The lie they covered up is they all knew nicotine was addictive dating back thirty years. Let me remind that per the movie “Dark Waters,” Dupont knew that making Teflon was harmful to people, including their own workers, and hid that fact. And, after losing a data-centric arbitration case, they reneged on paying restitution to people. They then lost successive lawsuits to individuals for multiple millions of dollars before settling all the cases.

It amazes me that leadership of these (and other) organizations are so protective of their brand, they avoid doing the right thing. They would rather hide it and hope their secret is never discovered. In the end, they are more harmful to their brand than coming out and admitting the truth. Compare what these companies did to what Johnson and Johnson did when someone was poisoning Tylenol capsules in the grocery stores. They admitted their own failure and acted quickly to make protective seals, setting off a larger trend in industry.

Gaslighting is not a flattering word. When we see these feel good commercials on TV put forth by the oil companies, we need to take them with a large grain of salt. They may just what it seems – window dressing.

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2022/sep/17/oil-companies-exxonmobil-chevron-shell-bp-climate-crisis

A four-year old post showed clean energy progress is happening

The passage of the Inflation Reduction Act which includes very significant renewable energy funding is a huge step forward. Even Republican legislators who were told not to vote for it, are silently celebrating the needed investment in their states that will be forthcoming.

Four years ago, I wrote the following post which sheds progress at the same time the former president was pulling the US away from the adult table on fighting climate change. President Joe Biden has gotten us back to that table and helped pass the Inflation Reduction Act. Please note the invasion of Ukraine by Russia has caused some hiccups to the progress with Russia punishing its critics with fossil-fuel restrictions, but the progress continues.

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“Global citizens are rightfully concerned the US President Donald Trump is pulling the US out of the Paris Climate Change Accord, but progress continues as “we are passed the tipping point on renewable energy.” Even the US pullout cannot stop the train, as states, cities, businesses and other countries continue the push. It just means the President and his team will not be at the adult table on this issue and may not be invited at all.

Here are a few miscellaneous energy tidbits that should offer encouragement.

Per the UK Based organization Carbon Tracker, here are a few highlights from the past year:

• more than 1/2 of the US coal plants in existence in 2010 have been closed;
• more than 1/2 of the remaining coal plants in Europe are losing money;
• the UK has slashed electricity from coal usage from 40% to 2% in the last five years; and
• there have been big strides in China and Australia on reducing coal usage.

Per the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, the five member, Republican dominated agency denied the request by Department of Energy Secretary Rick Perry to fund the building of more coal-fired and nuclear plants. This was a surprise move given the make-up of the committee. I would call this decision as not wanting to throw good money after bad.

It should be noted, it is not just coal that is giving the FERC commissioners pause. The US division of Westinghouse Electric Company had to declare bankruptcy for cost overruns on a new nuclear power plant for SCANA, the South Carolina utility. As a result, the new plant is being shuttered and SCANA is being sold to Dominion Resources, so as not to overburden SC citizens with the cost of the lost investment.

The International Energy Agency in their 2017 Energy Outlook notes the cost of new solar photovoltaic electricity has declined by 70% and wind energy has fallen 25% since 2010. It should be noted the IEA has tended to favor fossil fuel energy in past releases. China, the new country leader in the climate change fight, will be investing US$360 billion more in renewable energy by 2020. Plus, the price of solar has fallen so much in places like Zambia, Saudi Arabia and Mexico, it has won bidding contests against fossil fuel energy sources for projects.

Finally, any discussion on future energy cannot exclude the declining cost and increasing capacity in battery storage. Per Bloomberg New Energy Financials, energy storage will double six times between 2016 and 2030. Elon Musk just helped southern Australia go live with a major battery installation and 21 states in the US have planned projects on energy storage.

All of the above stories are important because it has always been a financial argument to combat the environmental concerns, whose long term costs have been undervalued. Now, the financials are favoring the renewable energy engine, so market forces will continue to force the ultimate demise of coal-fired energy, which started with the lower cost of natural gas. If a company can find a clean energy source which is cheaper and more predictable long term, that is easily the better path forward. If you don’t believe me, just ask companies like Google, Facebook, Walmart and IKEA to name only a few.”

Rural Virginia pivots from coal to green jobs

An article by Nina Lakhani in The Guardian this weekend called “‘This is the future’: rural Virginia pivots from coal to green jobs,” is a must read, especially for those who still want to cling to a declining industry. The article can be linked to below. Here are a few salient paragraphs that will give you the gist.

“When Mason Taylor enrolled at the local vocational school with dreams of becoming an electrician like his dad, it was assumed that the ninth-grader would eventually end up moving away from Wise county, Virginia, to find a decent job.

Now 19, Taylor just bought a truck after a summer apprenticing with a crew of electricians installing rooftop solar systems at public schools in the county. He was among a dozen or so rookies paid $17 an hour, plus tools and a travel stipend, as part of the state’s first solar energy youth apprenticeship scheme.…

The region’s long-awaited energy and economic transition will be substantially boosted by America’s first climate legislation, the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA).

It’s far from a panacea, but Joe Biden’s legislation provides $369bn for the transition to electric vehicles and renewable energy – a historic investment that scientists estimate will reduce greenhouse gases by 40% below 2005 levels by 2030 and ​​create an estimated 1.5m new jobs.

Decent well-paid jobs are desperately needed. In Virginia, coal production has declined by 70% since its peak in 1990, and much of what’s left is semi-automated. Those old jobs are largely gone and are not coming back.

The IRA provides ring-fenced money for training, innovation and manufacturing, as well as an array of tax breaks and other financial incentives to help consumers and businesses transition away from fossil fuels. And Joe Manchin, the conservative Democrat senator from West Virginia played a pivotal role in watering down – and then reviving – the legislation, directing billions of dollars to the economic revival of depressed coal towns.

‘It’s a game changer for rural and coal communities,’ said Autumn Long, a project manager for solar financing and manufacturing workforce development at the non-profit Appalachian Voices. ‘Renewables are a way to honour the region’s energy-producing legacy and be part of the 21st-century global energy transition. The IRA is a turning point.‘”

In my view, these efforts are about ten years overdue. I have been writing for several years now of the demise in coal jobs in our country as contrasted to the uptick in solar and wind jobs. If I knew of the demise, the elected officials in these coal states have had to have known. This would include the Senate Minority leader who hails from Kentucky, one of those coal states. The sun has always shined and the wind has always blown in those states.

Yet, they did nothing. They were paid campaign funds by coal manufacturers to do nothing and perpetuate the status quo. Whether people like him or not, the only 2016 presidential candidate who told coal miners the truth – in person – was Senator Bernie Sanders, who said your jobs are going away, but here is what I plan to do about it.

Now, at long last, more is being done about it. Solar and wind energy are now on par or better in production costs with coal energy. And, when you factor in the environmental, maintenance, trucking, and litigation costs, the two renewables beat the pants off coal. It makes little sense to build a new coal plant which will become obsolete before it is finished.

So, this new law is good news and we should give credit to this Congress and President for getting it done. It is better late than never, but let’s hope it is not too late.

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2022/sep/08/rural-virginia-pivots-from-coal-solar-green-jobs

Water is the new oil – a reprise from 2013

The following post was written nine years ago, but with the severe water shortages occurring in the western United States and in Italy, Germany, England, etc., this issue is coming to head. Some of the observations made then are now coming home to roost in more than a few places.

Let’s get down to basics. Our planet has two vital resources  – air and water. We cannot live without them, but we continue to be pretty poor stewards of both. With the advent of man-influenced global warming, one of the key outcomes is we will have more severe droughts in drought-stricken areas. The models are showing global warming is occurring at a faster pace than predicted several years ago. Yet, even without global warming, we must be better stewards with our resources, water in particular. In the book “Water: The Epic Struggle for Wealth, Power, and Civilization” by Steven Solomon, he devotes an entire chapter looking to the future. The chapter is called “Water: The New Oil.”

First, some context. This book is one of the best history books I have ever read. Solomon discusses how civilizations came into power and then fell by their ability or inability to manager water resources. Water serves several purposes besides drinking water – farming, sewage maintenance, transport and energy. Getting water into cities and out of them with sewage are vital to their health and wealth.  The latter can be equally important due to the bouts of cholera and dysentery that occur when sewage intermixes with the drinking water supply.

A few examples might help. There are three things that occurred in US history which significantly aided our rise to power in the world. The first was the Erie Canal which connected New York with the Great Lakes. The second is the Panama Canal which gave the US control over two oceans. The third is the numerous dams and water shed protections which gave us energy as well as secured drinking and farming water. Teddy Roosevelt’s greatest contribution is he was the most prolific water oriented US president in our history.

Yet, we have a major problem. We are not protecting our water supply like we need to. There are an increasing number of fights over water, where people downstream argue with people diverting more gallons to their communities upstream. Also, with the worsening droughts, there is insufficient rain to replenish the water. This problem is not restricted to the US. Saudi Arabia is rich with oil, but very poor with water. Its water sheds are in danger of drying out in the reasonably near future. In the US, Texas has numerous cities where the water aquifers are dried out. Water has to be trucked in from elsewhere. The national and international agencies that measure the impact of global warming, say the extreme droughts in Texas are exacerbated by man-influenced global warming.

Water is more critical now than ever before. Water is the new oil. We straighten out rivers allowing water to run off too quickly. We let run off occur from developments that increase silt in the water by washing the sand, dirt and clay into the water. With the rising seas, we let seawater run into fresh water lagoons that were used for farming. We Americans over water our lawns to make them green, when the indigenous grass and shrubs would be OK with a healthy brown color. We cut down on the water flow downstream by damming up a river upstream. We get energy, but there needs to be a more judicious way to let the water flow and still provide the energy.

And, we use water for energy purposes besides the hydro-powered electricity the dams create. In some energy solutions, the water can flow back into the water supply as tepid water, but not all of it as some gets lost in the process. For example, with coal-fired, nuclear powered, and natural gas-powered plants, the water is used to create steam from the heated source. The steam turns the turbine which causes the electromagnetic generator to turn and create the power. Once the water re-forms from the steam, it can be released back into its source. Yes, there are other environmental impacts, but the leftover water can flow back to the source.

Fracking to get the natural gas is a totally different matter. The major concern I have over fracking is not just the chemically laden water, the mercury, arsenic and methane that leaks into the air, the earthquakes that are causally linked to deep ground water disposal and the environmental infrastructure defamation, it is the water cannot and must not be reused. There are two problems. You cannot let the chemically laden water to get back into the water supply. It is harmful to humans and animals. Yet, water finds a way and it poisons the water sources. In the movie “Gasland” there is story of a woman who freezes and saves all the dead animals she finds near rivers and streams adjacent to fracking sites. She has hundreds of them.

The bigger concern is the use of the water in the first place. As noted, we cannot reuse the water. Yet, to frack a well, it is estimated by industry that it takes 4 to 6 million gallons per frack. The average well is fracked ten to twelve times, but let’s use ten for ease of the math. So, the average well is fracked with 40 to 60 million gallons of water. In Utah, they built 2,000 wells in close proximity. If you multiply this out, that is 80 to 120 billion gallons of water. In my home state of NC, they are talking about fracking 10,000 wells. That translates into 400 to 600 billion gallons of water. Using an unscientific term, that is a bucketload of water.

My question is this where you want to use your water? Given the above problems that fracking causes, is this where you want to use your water? You may say I am blowing smoke, but farmers and frackers fought over water in Kansas and Colorado this summer. I would add that Texas is a leader in fracking and they have an extreme drought issue with some cities out of water. I am not linking the two causally as I don’t know for sure, but that is one hell of a correlation, meaning one occurrence happens at the same time as another.

Is this where you want to use your water? I don’t. Fracking is bad enough news without this issue. But, this makes it a slam dunk. The developer makes money, gives a stipend to the landowner and then leaves the clean up to the state. The state residents are the ones who will suffer from the water shortage and other issues.

Water is one of our two dearest resources. Water is the new oil. We cannot soil it and then immediately drink it. We cannot flush it away and not reuse it. We must find ways to conserve it, distribute it equitably and be judicious with its use. We need to innovate on ideas like the flushless toilet competition that is underway. In desert areas, find inventive ways to get rid of sewage. In a major county in California, they are significantly filtering sewage run off water to make new drinking water. And, I mean signficantly filtering it with multiple steps. We need to use more indigenous plants. We need to conserve our water use.

And, we need to use renewable energy sources that do not demand the use of water. Solar and wind energy processes continue to get more scalable, but we need to factor the overall cost of eco-energy versus fossil fuel energy, which must include the cost on the environment, health of our people, and use of water. Fossil fuel produced energy may be cheaper without these other factors, but we need to move away from them in a concerted way.* Our lives depend on it.

*Note: Nine years later, producing wind and solar is as or more cost effective than coal energy production even without factoring in the other environmental, litigation and transportation costs.

Senior Shell safety consultant resigns over double-talk on climate change

In an article in Newshub by Rachel Sadler called “‘Completely failing’: Shell consultant quits over firm’s ‘extreme harms’ to the environment,” it is reported a senior safety consultant to Shell has visibly resigned to make a statement about Shell’s lack of action on climate change. Here are the first few paragraphs with a link to the article below:

“A senior safety consultant has quit working with Shell after 11 years, accusing the company of causing ‘extreme harms’ to the environment and having a ‘disregard for climate change risks’.

Caroline Dennett announced her resignation as a contracted consultant in an open letter sent to Shell executives and 1400 employees. In an accompanying video posted to LinkedIn, she said she had quit because of the fossil fuel producer’s ‘double-talk on climate’

Dennett accused Shell of ‘ignoring all the alarms’ of climate change and ‘not putting environmental safety before production’.

‘Shell’s stated safety ambition is to ‘do no harm’ – ‘Goal Zero’, they call it – and it sounds honourable but they are completely failing on it,’ she said.

‘They know that continued oil and gas extraction causes extreme harms, to our climate, to our environment and to people. And whatever they say, Shell is simply not winding down on fossil fuels'”

It should be noted, as of this writing, some activists are protesting Shell’s climate change strategy at a shareholder meeting and a bloc of shareholders have offered a more carbon reducing strategy to be voted on as well. It will be interesting to see how this plays out, but regardless of strategy, what Dennett is saying, Shell management needs to be at least doing what they say they will.

It should be noted back in the 1990s, Shell produced an educational video on their scientists’ concern over global warming. If you look for it, you may still be able to find it if access has not been scrubbed. Not ironically, Exxon scientists used to speak at meetings about their concerns over global warming authoring papers dating back to the 1980s. This practice was ceased when Exxon hired a PR firm to help them promote climate change denial beginning in the late 1990s, the same PR firm that sold us that nicotine was not addictive for the tobacco industry.

On a positive note, change is happening with renewable energy becoming more mainstream and building market share. And, it was very pleasing to see climate change be a factor on Australian voters minds as they swept out a fossil-fuel friendly conservative party from power after nine years.

https://www.msn.com/en-nz/news/national/completely-failing-shell-consultant-quits-over-firms-extreme-harms-to-the-environment/ar-AAXDUoy?ocid=uxbndlbing