14 January 2016, New York Times, In Climate Move, Obama Halts New Coal Mining Leases on Public Lands. The Obama administration announced on Friday a halt to new coal mining leases on public lands as it considers an overhaul of the program that could lead to increased costs for energy companies and a slowdown in extraction. “Given serious concerns raised about the federal coal program, we’re taking the prudent step to hit pause on approving significant new leases so that decisions about those leases can benefit from the recommendations that come out of the review,” said Interior Secretary Sally Jewell. “During this time, companies can continue production activities on the large reserves of recoverable coal they have under lease, and we’ll make accommodations in the event of emergency circumstances to ensure this pause will have no material impact on the nation’s ability to meet its power generation needs.” The move represents a significant setback for the coal industry, effectively freezing new coal production on federal lands and sending a signal to energy markets that could turn investors away from an already reeling industry. President Obama telegraphed the step in his State of the Union address on Tuesday night when he said “I’m going to push to change the way we manage our oil and coal resources so that they better reflect the costs they impose on taxpayers and our planet.” Read More here
Category Archives: Fossil Fuel Reduction
4 January 2016, New Matilda, Nuclear And Nonsense: An Insider’s Guide On Making Renewables Work. Renewable energy advocate Terry Leach takes up the fight for an inexhaustible power supply. Geoff Russell’s recent New Matilda article ‘Batteries and Bulldust’ makes the argument that renewable energy can’t displace fossil fuels due to the problems of the intermittency of renewable energy and the difficulty of storing electrical energy. Russell compares the stupidity of Germany’s renewable push to France’s wisdom in generating most of their power from nuclear. Obviously, the superior governance, cheaper electricity and lack of inefficient subsidies results in France consistently outperforming Germany economically. Sadly for the French this isn’t true. Germany is the economic powerhouse of Europe. Maybe, just maybe, the Germans aren’t ‘puddle shallow thinkers’. Problems of intermittency and storage of renewable energy are solvable, and the Germans are doing just that. Despite our current government’s opposition, technological development and entrepreneurship means that Australia is well placed to solve those problems here. Intermittent power Firstly, intermittency. Our electricity network is well equipped to cope with intermittency, as it has been built to cope with intermittency of demand. Demand fluctuates on daily, weekly and seasonal bases. We usually have a large proportion of our production capacity sitting idle, waiting for the high demand and price events that justify their economic existence. Like Europe, we have a continental grid, stretching from North Queensland to the West Coast of South Australia. Excess low cost capacity can be sent interstate, which means that demand, and therefore price, is smoothed. Currently we have cheap coal providing our base load capacity. Coal (like nuclear) can’t be ramped up and down quickly and has always needed to be supplemented by ‘dispatchable’ generation. This has historically been provided by gas and hydro. Read More here
3 January 2016, Client Earth, End of business as usual for carbon intensive industry. Scrutiny of carbon intensive companies’ reporting could mean an unprecedented number of complaints to financial regulators from environmental lawyers ClientEarth in 2016. ClientEarth will be poring over annual reports of carbon intensive UK and EU companies and reporting them to the Financial Reporting Council if they are failing to disclose to investors how the post COP21 business outlook could affect their operations. The agreement aims to limit the global temperature rise to 2 degrees Celsius, with an ambition for 1.5 degrees. It will have a huge effect on companies in carbon intensive sectors such as energy, mining and utilities. Dave Cooke, Company and Financial lawyer for ClientEarth, said: “The Paris agreement represents a huge change for the world. We are now in a transition to a low carbon economy. Business as usual is no longer an option for carbon intensive companies. “We will be looking at how those carbon intensive companies disclose the risks that they face and where they’re not disclosing them effectively and appropriately we will submit complaints to the regulator to take action.” The move comes amid growing consensus in the business community that climate change is changing the landscape beyond recognition. Mark Carney, the Governor of the Bank of England, made a major intervention in September, when he identified climate change as one of the biggest risks to economic stability. Read more here
2 January 2016, Climate News Network, China clamps down on coal. A slowing economy and falling energy demand, plus concerns over air pollution, spur Beijing to halt new coal mines and close hundreds of existing operations. China says it will not approve any new coal mines for the next three years. The country’s National Energy Administration(NEA) says more than 1,000 existing mines will also be closed over the coming year, reducing total coal production by 70 million tons. Analysts say this is the first time Beijing has put a ban on the opening of new mines: the move has been prompted both by falling demand for coal as a result of a slowing economy and by increasing public concern about hazardous levels of pollution, which have blanketed many cities across the country over recent months. Beijing, a city of nearly 20 million, issued two red smog alerts – the most serious air pollution warning – in December, causing schools to close and prompting a warning to residents to stay indoors. A 2015 study estimated that air pollution – much of it from the widespread burning of coal – contributed to up to 1.6 million deaths each year in China. The country is by far the world’s largest producer and consumer of coal, the most polluting fossil fuel. Emissions from coal-fired power plants and other industrial concerns in China have made it the world’s largest emitter of greenhouse gases, putting more climate-changing gases into the atmosphere each year than the US and the European Union combined. Coal’s share falling In accordance with an agreement reached with the US in late 2014, and in line with pledges made at the recent Paris summit on climate change, China aims to radically cut back on coal use in future. In 2010, coal generated about 70% of China’s total energy: last year that figuredropped to 64% as more large-scale investments in renewable energy sources came on stream. Read More here