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Energy Week #435: 9/9/2021
Minute 0: Introduction
Thursday, September 2
Air pollution (Pixabay, Pexels)
Minute 2
¶ “Air Pollution Is Cutting More Years From People’s Lives Than Smoking, War Or HIV/AIDS” • Air pollution is taking years from billions of people’s lives around the world and is a greater threat to life expectancy than smoking, HIV/AIDS, or war, a report shows. In India, air pollution reduces life expectancy an average of 5.9 years. [CNN]
Wildfire in California (Missvain, USDA, public domain)
Minute 5
¶ “Coming Hours Are Make Or Break For Lake Tahoe Resort City, Fire Officials Say” • Firefighters have been able to make some headway against the Caldor Fire around South Lake Tahoe, and the popular California tourist town may, with luck, be spared from flames, if conditions on Wednesday night remain favorable, a fire official said. [CNN]
Los Angeles (Cameron Venti, Unsplash)
Minute 8
¶ “LA City Council Votes To Have City Transition to 100% Renewable Energy By 2035” • The Los Angeles City Council voted to have the Department of Water and Power, the largest municipal utility in the country, transition to 100% renewable energy by 2035, as well as develop a long-term hiring plan for nearly 10,000 “green” jobs. [MyNewsLA.com]
Friday, September 3
Flood caused by Ida in Pennsylvania (Michael M Stokes, CC-BY-SA 2.0)
Minute 11
¶ “At Least 46 People Have Died After Floodwaters From Ida’s Remnants Swamp Cities From Virginia To New England” • At least 46 people have died in six Eastern states – Connecticut, Maryland, New Jersey, New York, Pennsylvania, and Virginia – after the storm brought unprecedented rainfall to some areas. There are 23 known deaths in New Jersey. [CNN]
Dystopian view of climate change (Pixabay, Pexels)
Minute 13
¶ “Climate Scientist: This Is A Dystopian Moment” • I’m a climate scientist. My colleagues and I have been warning for years that human-induced global warming will bring us a future of faster and more furious extreme weather events. But now the events are coming with such speed and ferocity that the moment can be called dystopian. [CNN]
Solar module costs (US EIA graph)
Minute 16
¶ “Solar Activity Was At Record-High Level In USA In 2020” • In the US, solar PV module shipments rose to 21.8 million peak kW of solar power capacity in 2020, by far their best ever. In fact, that was 5.4 million peak kW above 2019’s total, their previous best. Rooftop solar installations grew, but larger installations grew even more. [CleanTechnica]
Saturday, September 4
NREL’s Flatirons Campus near Boulder (Joshua Bauer, NREL)
Minute 19
¶ “Hybrid Power Plants And Flexibility – The Future Of The Grid” • Imagine an electric grid powered by clean energy. Now imagine that it has all the comfort and convenience consumers expect as well as grid reliability and resiliency services that are similar to or better than conventional plants. That is the promise of the FlexPower project. [CleanTechnica]
Ford Mustang Mach-E (Ford image)
Minute 22
¶ “Ford Mustang Mach-E Sets 3 Guinness World Records In UK” • It is 1,407 km (874 miles) from John O’Groats at the northern tip of Scotland to Lands End, in Cornwall. A Ford Mustang Mach-E set a Guinness World Record for electric cars by averaging over 6.5 miles per kWh for that distance. The previous record, set by a Tesla, was 1.8 miles per kWh. [CleanTechnica]
Solar panels in India (Rsrikanth05, CC-BY-SA 4.0)
Minute 24
¶ “‘India Can Produce 1,000 GW Solar Energy On 0.5% Of Land'” • In a talk to the International Climate Summit 2021, industrialist Mukesh Ambani outlined a roadmap for New Energy business, calling it the “next big value creation engine” for Reliance and India. He said Reliance Industries would “establish and enable” at least 100 GW of solar energy by 2030. [NDTV.com]
Sunday, September 5
Long Island Expressway (Tommy Gao, CC-BY-SA 4.0)
Minute 27
¶ “The Truth New York City Cannot Avoid” • Four days after it hit New Orleans, at least 13 New Yorkers died when Hurricane Ida’s remnants hit the Big Apple, more than 1,300 miles away. So far, New York City has more fatalities reported than all of Louisiana. Climate change is scrambling all our assumptions for weather, resiliency, and emergency preparedness. [CNN]
Siberian Tiger (Dave Pape, released into the public domain)
Minute 30
¶ “Nearly 30% Of 138,000 Assessed Species Face Extinction, Group Warns” • In its annual Red List update, the International Union for the Conservation of Nature warned that 28% of the 138,374 species identified on its “survival watchlist” as under threat have now been moved to the more dangerous “red list,” meaning they are at high risk of extinction. [CNN]
Offshore wind turbines (Reegan Fraser, Unsplash)
Minute 32
¶ “Gone With The Wind: Why UK Firms Could Miss Out On The Offshore Boom” • Boris Johnson set out plans to add 30 GW of offshore wind capacity by 2030. The GMB trade union warned that the UK risks squandering a major economic benefit by allowing many of the components of its offshore wind boom to be made in Asia. [The Guardian]
Monday, September 6
Fossil fuels use (Chris LeBoutillier, Unsplash)
Minute 35
¶ “How To Raise Revenue Quickly: End Fossil Fuel Handouts” • After a century of waste and mismanagement, the House Natural Resources Committee has released a budget proposal that would end a slew of harmful handouts to the fossil fuel industry, protect publicly owned resources, and raise significant new revenues for US taxpayers. [CleanTechnica]
Wind farm in Inner Mongolia (Steven Buss, CC-BY-SA 2.0)
Minute 38
¶ “A Decade Of Wind, Solar, And Nuclear In China Shows Clear Scalability Winners” • China surprised the world in 2020, as it deployed 72 GW of wind energy, a world record for a single country, and 48 GW of solar capacity, over 50% more than the previous year. Meanwhile, exactly zero nuclear reactors were commissioned in 2020. [CleanTechnica]
Joby’s eVTOL aircraft (Joby Aviation image)
Minute 40
¶ “NASA Begins Air Taxi Flight Testing With Joby” • NASA has begun flight testing Joby Aviation’s all-electric vertical takeoff and landing (eVTOL) aircraft at Joby’s Electric Flight Base near Big Sur, California. It is the first time that NASA will test an eVTOL aircraft as part of its Advanced Air Mobility National Campaign. The tests will run to September 10. [CleanTechnica]
Tuesday, September 7
Proposed city (Bjarke Ingels Group and Bucharest studio)
Minute 43
¶ “Plans For $400-Billion New City In The American Desert Unveiled” • The cleanliness of Tokyo, the diversity of New York and the social services of Stockholm: Billionaire Marc Lore has outlined his vision for a 5-million-person “new city in America” and appointed a world-famous architect to design it. All he needs is $400 billion and a place to build it. [CNN]
John Kerry in talks with China (US State Department via AP)
Minute 46
¶ “The US And China Can’t Get Along – Even If The Planet’s Future Is At Stake” • Despite facing a common threat, China and the United States, the world’s biggest greenhouse gas emitters, are still at odds on climate action. US climate officials tried to separate climate issues from differences on other topics. Chinese officials would not allow that. [CNN]
Wildfire (Tim Mossholder, Pexels)
Minute 48
¶ “Climate Change Fight Will Be Six Times More Costly” • A study by an international team of scientists published in the journal Environmental Research Letters, found that the economic damage from climate change could be six times higher by the end of this century than previously estimated. Earlier analysis ignored important risks. [Technology Times]
Wednesday, September 8
Wind farm (Harry Cunningham, Pexels)
Minute 51
¶ “Environmental Groups Ask Congress To Fund Billions Of Dollars In Climate Measures In Reconciliation” • As Democratic lawmakers begin crafting a $3.5 trillion budget reconciliation package, a coalition of prominent environmental groups is asking them to include between $577 billion and $746 billion for key climate provisions. [CNN]
Fire (Thomas Ehling, Unsplash)
Minute 54
¶ “Biden Administration Asks For Billions In ‘Urgent’ Disaster And Refugee Funding In Request To Keep The Government Running” • The Biden administration is asking for billions of dollars for “urgent” extreme weather recovery efforts and the resettlement of Afghan refugees in its proposal to keep the government funded past September 30. [CNN]
Offshore windpower (Carl Raw, Unsplash)
Minute 56
¶ “Invenergy, BW Offshore Unveil ScotWind Plans” • Invenergy and BW Offshore have announced a joint venture to develop up to 5,400 MW of offshore windpower as part of the first ScotWind leasing round. The joint venture will focus on developing both floating and fixed foundation offshore wind projects off the north east coast of Scotland. [reNEWS]
Minute 59: Finis
Notes:
Energy Week #435: 9/9/2021
George Harvey, blogger, author, and journalist for Green Energy Times and CleanTechnica, computer engineer
Tom Finnell, electrical engineer, transmission grid expert, world traveler, philanthropist, and philosopher
Energy, Renewable Energy, Wind Power, Solar, Batteries, Nuclear, Coal, Oil, Gas, Climate Change
Energy Week with George Harvey and Tom Finnell 