Energy
In this section it is my intention to provide basic information in the way we utilise energy in our day to day lives and the means by which we as individuals and as communities generatate energy. With you help with your contributions we might examine how we can cut down our energy needs and even generate our own energy independently of the main suppliers.
Electricity
Light: Different forms of lighting require different levels of energy. Incandescent
lighiting involves the use of electricity to heat a fillament which gives off
light. Any means of using electricity to heat is an inefficient use of that
energy. Incandescent lights are the normal globe lights which were almost ubiquitous
in homes and business until the last ten years. Fluorescent lighting is a great
deal more efficient than incandescent lighting especially in the compact forms
now readily available. Fibre optics and LED (Light Emitting Diode) lighting
already common as cycle lights and for camping are likely to be developed for
domestic and commercial use in the near future and are very efficient forms
of lighting. A good link to explain the various forms of lighting can be found
on the side bar.
Airconditioning:The take up and dependence of air conditioning by Australians
over recent years has caused an enormous surge in the use of electric power.
I have heard it said that it has caused the equivalent need of one extra large
coal burning power station just to satisfy that demand alone. As the atmosphere
warms, the apparent need to turn on the air conditioning increases. So costly
is it to supply air conditioning that electricity retailers spread that cost
over all consumers so even those of us who choose to eschew it, pay for it.
A recent Background Briefing on Radio National covered this topic and a link
to that episode is on the side bar.
Heating: Use of electrical energy to produce heat is its least efficient use. Over
the years the industry has strived to produce more efficient heating mechanisms
such as reverse cycle air conditioning where it is used for heating in winter
and cooling in summer. The downside of that is that in use they tend to be
used continuously so that people become "desensitised" to anything
outside of a narrow band of ambient temperatures hence lowering resilience
and increasing dependence on a managed environment.
Another very common form of electical heating used both domestically and for
business is in heating water. Of the total domestic use of electricity, it
is about 28% of all uses. Hence a switch to a solar system will have very large
benefits in both your bill and saving of GHG emissions. I am currently building
a solar hot water booster to my installed electircal system. I will report
on this in community forum.
I will talk about this
more in the ethics section and of course I welcome your input ( including divergent
and opposite viewpoints).
Appliances:
Boy do we have appliances. More and more of them are designed to run in standby
mode. Standby consucmes electricity. How much electricity depends on the
appliance - a computer monitor for instance will consume a great deal more
than a microwave. A report on the power consumption of standbypower of 960
appliances can be reached from the link in the sidebar. Over 10% of your
power bill can be attributed to this factor and that is a powerful incentive
to change a habit. Turn it off! A good debate on this in the community forum
section when it is up and running will be very productive.
Another potent issue with appliances is the cheap throw away mode many are
presented in. I love posing the following question. How much is the cost
of production in China of manufacturing a pop-up toaster. My audience usually
throw around figures betwee $5 and $15. The answer of $0.87 usually leaves
them dumbfounded. These toasters as for so many others are of course throw-away.
In a sense it would be incoherrent to try and fix such a cheap commodity-
-- if it wasn't for a warming planet. However, try and buy a toaster which
is fixable. As the Stern review notes, that waste of energy should have a
carbon price put on it, which in turn might make a repairable appliance more
attractive to the consumer, more jobs for technicians, less damage to our
climate. Win, win!
Electical Energy in Overall CO2 eqiv.
Electriciy production, according to the CSIRO/Sydney Universtity report, Balancing Act (2005) accounted for 130 Megatonnes of CO2 equivalent for both domestic and commercial usage.
The overall industry emmission total was given in the report as 550 Megatonnes.
Transport usage accounted for 80 Megatoones (passenger vehicles 43.5 Mt). But
staggeringly Livestock production accounted for 154 Megatonnes at least. I
will go over this with more detail in the Food page but no doubt this is partly
why Singer in his book, The Ethics of What we Eat, states that one will do
more good for sustainability by changing to a vegan diet than changing ones
car to a Prius.
Current Methods of Energy Production
Dirty Coal: The Prime minister referred to this implying primarily the combustion
of brown coal for energy needs. As I understand it, its lower carbon content
and other impurities require greater energy input to burn it and its exhaust
gases are harder to clean of impurities. But ... it is cheap. China has vast
reserves of this form of coal.
Clean Coal: Clean coal by comparison is the anthrocite coal which is close to
pure carbon, and is more rare. This coal is easier to process for subsequent
geo-sequestration, of which this current Prime Minister is hoping will save his
election promises. The trouble with geo-sequestration ( the burying of exaust
CO2 in underground reservoirs) is still experimental, expensive and its long
term containment problematic.
Gas: Gas and oil are also used for producing electricity, the combustion is
"cleaner" but the equivalent amount of CO2 is still released. Australia has
vast reserves of this and in the shorter term may appeal to politicians as
they can be "seen" to slowing down the use of coal, but in my mind is no solution
at all.
Nuclear: The recent release of the government commissioned Switkawski report
on Nuclear Power has put this in focus at the moment. This report points the
way to Australia's adoptation of this form of energy production. Oponents claim
that its claims to being a low CO2 eqiv producer are false if you look at the
whole of the life cycle of the reactor including the very expensive decommissionong
process and that the time involved in getting a reactor on line (10 to 20 years)
will be too long in making the sort of changes required if we are to avert
the worst end of predicted climate change effects.
Again this should be a fertile field of discussion in the community forum.
Renewable Energy Sources
The main criticism thrown at the renewables is that they are mostly only capable of supplying base load power and not sustaining peak load power. As I understand it, solar and wind in particular provide power when the conditions are favourable, ie. when it is sunny or windy. This is base load. However consumption of power will be required at times when it is neither sunny or windy. Thus peal load at say 7pm of an evening when cooking is occuring, children are being showerd, the television is on full blast and so on, the renewable are unable to meet this demand.
Wind: Many of us have driven past the wind farms in our region - one on the
other side of Blayney and the other near Crookwell on the way to Blayney. In
driving past they appear as a benign feature of the landscape, for a neighbour
though they may be an eyesore or for the nature conserver, their installation
in a national park may not be a good enough reason for violating wilderness
or endagering a particular species.
On the plus side they have a very low CO2 equivalent footprint and have large
scope on a land mass like Australia to increase its usage. Denmark already
has a large installation supplying 25% of its energy needs. China is using
Australian technology to install windfarms too. We, on the other hand appear
to be lagging sadly behind.
Solar: Domestically stand alone solar power installations are common for people
who are love too far from a grid to make installation economically feasible,
or who ethically believe they would like to live more sustainably. Even urban
dwellers have the opportunity and some have already done so, to have the benefits
of both grid connection and a solar photovoltaic connection to the grid, thus
feeding back your energy to the supplier. If this became a widespread practice
the contribution would be significant.
Geothermal: Hot rocks exhist below the surface and in some areas this is more
prevalent in than others and is some cases it is not so far below the surface.
At present it is not a common usage, but has a lot to recommend it and in a
country so large there are bound to be several sites where this apparently
inexaustable supply could be tapped.
Hydro: The use of water under pressure to revolve the blade of a turbine which
in turn rotates a magnet within an massive electical winding to induce a current
has a controversial image in Australia due to the Tasmanian Hydro Power group
aggressively seeking to dam wilderness rivers in Tasmania ( Noteably the Franklin)
for such purposes. However where dams already exist such as in the Snowy project,
hydro power is already harnessed. Domestically where a consistent stream is
running, highly efficient micro-hydro power systems are used. This is more
likely to have application in countries where streams are common than in a
dry and getting dryer continent like Australia.
Tidal: People living in northern lattitudes will be aware of the massive tides
of those regions. The flowing of such large volumes of water can be harnessed
for electrical purposes too.
Biofuels: As we seek more alternative fuel sources, the use of crops and vegetation
for production of oil and ethanol appeals to many. Ethanol production is already
huge in Brazil and the Nationals and sugar farmers would like to make it huge
in Australia too.
One drastic abuse of this alternative is in the Palm Oil story. Palm oil is
readily exploited as a diesel substitute. The EU in embracing the Kyoto protocol,
looks to using increasing amounts of biodiesel. Companies spring up to meet
this demand, chop down rain forest in Malaysia to plant palm oil monocultures.
Incredidibly valuabe biodiversity is lost to make a quick profit on something
which on the surface looked like a "solution".
What Can We Do
Change our Diet:
Efficiencies:
Low Energy Lighting:
Low Energy Appliances:
Turning Things Off:
Insulation:
Solar Passive Design:
Shade Our Walls: