Braid: Major decisions on Kenney critics are looming for the UCP

At the legislature, MLAs understand that any criticism of Premier Jason Kenney or the government will freeze them out of committees and legislature debates or statements.

Author of the article:

Don Braid  •  Calgary Herald

Publishing date:

Dec 03, 2021  •  

Premier Jason Kenney in Edmonton on Monday, Nov. 15, 2021. PHOTO BY DAVID BLOOM /Postmedia

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The usually rambunctious UCP has fallen oddly silent since the recent party convention in Calgary.

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But it doesn’t mean there’s a peace treaty.

At the legislature, MLAs understand that any criticism of Premier Jason Kenney or the government will freeze them out of committees and legislature debates or statements.

The most vocal recent critics, MLAs Leela Aheer from Chestermere-Strathmore and Airdrie-Cochrane member Peter Guthrie, seem to be biding their time, waiting to see what happens in the next few weeks.

Plenty is happening already.

There’s a fierce background battle over the UCP nomination in Fort McMurray-Lac La Biche, where former Wildrose Leader Brian Jean is up against Joshua Gogo, who has no critical word for Kenney.

The riding is open because UCP member Laila Goodridge resigned to run successfully for the federal Conservatives.

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Laila Goodridge. File photo

Jean has said that he’ll return to the legislature to give Kenney’s opponents some spine. He wants the premier to resign.

Kenney says he will endorse Jean “100 per cent” if party members choose him as a candidate.

That’s easy to say, because Kenney’s supporters have no intention of letting Jean win this nomination.

Brian Jean as an official UCP candidate would be a huge symbolic defeat for Kenney. It would imply that UCP members who want him out have a wide base in the province.

There aren’t many Canadian premiers — certainly not this one — who would tolerate a former leadership competitor in their caucus as a declared member of an internal opposition party.

And so, Kenney’s people are striving to short-circuit Jean before he gets started. Some 370 new UCP members were signed up by Gogo’s backers and submitted by the final cutoff date.

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Jean’s campaigners feel they have majority backing based on his long record in federal and provincial politics and based on his support for the community.

This is the setup for tense in-person voting to be held Dec. 11 in Fort McMurray, and the next day in Lac La Biche.

Brian Jean, left, shakes hands with Jason Kenney after it was announced that Kenney was elected leader of the new United Conservative Party, October 28, 2017. PHOTO BY GAVIN YOUNG/POSTMEDIA/FILE

Predictions in a situation like this are a mug’s game. But I would say, based on Kenney’s long record of winning backroom fights, that Jean has a less-than-even chance.

Even before that nomination vote, the party itself has a major decision to make.

Next week, probably on Dec. 6 or 7, the UCP board will rule on the 22 riding resolutions demanding a leadership vote by March 1. The party can’t simply ignore this and doesn’t intend to. Demanding a leadership vote with identical resolutions by 22 or more ridings is guaranteed in the party constitution.

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“If they think they can just push this aside, they’re completely wrong,” said one participant who wants an early vote. “This would be far from over.”

The party has already agreed to a leadership review in early April as part of an annual general meeting advanced by several months.

For many dissidents, a bigger sticking point than the date is the manner of balloting.

They want a provincewide vote of all members that would have to be conducted virtually.

They also demand independent scrutiny of both the voting and the results by an outside accounting firm.

That demand is a legacy of the notorious 2017 UCP leadership contest that saw controversy over contributions, voting and the so-called kamikaze candidacy of Jeff Callaway. Mistrust lies heavy on the party to this day.

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Former UCP leadership candidate Jeff Callaway in 2017. PHOTO BY GAVIN YOUNG /Postmedia

For the party board, accepting the riding resolutions as legitimate appears to be a slam dunk — outright rejection would cause a revolt.

But the board will also say, most likely, that while the ridings can rightfully force a vote, only the elected board can set the date or the rules.

It’s possible the balloting might be moved into March as a concession, but this is no sure thing. The decisions haven’t yet been made.

Best guess of the outcome? Kenney wins a leadership review held with in-person voting and sails on to the next election.

At that point the UCP’s dissidents, with no formal options left, would have a choice: fade away or burst into an uprising that makes all the earlier ones look tame.

Don Braid’s column appears regularly in the Herald

Twitter: @DonBraid

Facebook: Don Braid Politics

Brian Jean preferred as UCP leader over Jason Kenney, Danielle Smith: Leger poll

Brian Jean celebrates the yes vote during the Unity Vote at the Wildrose Special General Meeting in Red Deer Alta, on Saturday July 22, 2017. (Jason Franson/The Canadian Press)


Sean Amato
CTV News Edmonton
Published Dec. 3, 2021 

EDMONTON -

Albertans are more likely to vote for Brian Jean than Jason Kenney or Danielle Smith, a new Leger poll shows.

Jean has support from 18 per cent of Albertans, the premier is preferred by 15 per cent and former Wildrose leader Smith polled at 11 per cent.

A slight majority of Albertans, 51 per cent, said they would not vote for the UCP under any leader.

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"These poll results show that public mood in Alberta has shifted decisively against the United Conservative Party, most likely as a result of the way the governing party has handled the unprecedented COVID-19 crisis," said Remi Courcelles from Solstice Public Affairs, the company that commissioned the poll.

"A change in leadership won’t necessarily solve all of the UCP’s problems. That being said, it would appear that a UCP led by Brian Jean would improve the party’s electoral fortunes."

Regionally, Kenney was preferred in Calgary, he and Jean are tied in Edmonton but Jean was favoured 23 per cent to 15 per cent for Kenney outside of the big cities.

Kenney has struggled in polls throughout the pandemic, with an Angus Reid survey recently pegging his popularity at 22 per cent.

The UCP tossed two MLAs who criticized Kenney, roughly 25 per cent of its constituency associations are demanding an early leadership review and the governing party has finished second in some fundraising races to the NDP.

Jean – who lost a provincial election to Rachel Notley's NDP in 2015 as leader of the Wildrose Party – has publicly asked for Kenney's resignation and said he could do a better job of leading the UCP.

"If he doesn't leave we are going to have an NDP majority," Jean said in November.

"The UCP will not be in competition. It won't be competitive in the next election. That's very concerning to me."

Jean is attempting to win a UCP nomination and a by-election to become the MLA for Fort McMurray-Lac la Biche.

Kenney has publicly questioned Jean's reliability to finish his term and his commitment to the UCP.

Smith has expressed interest in the job as well, but has not launched a campaign.

Kenney will face a UCP leadership review in April 2022, if not sooner.

The online survey was conducted between Nov. 16-29. It had a sample size of 1,000 adult Albertans. The method of polling was a non-probablity sample, so no margin of error can be associated.

SORRY YOU SOLD THE CWB?
Many Saskatchewan farmers unable to fill grain contracts: industry survey

By Connor O’Donovan

Global News
December 2, 2021 

COLLECTIVE / COOPERATIVE HARVESTING 

ON THE PRAIRIES

Combines harvest a canola crop just outside Colonsay, Sask in this supplied photo. 

Grant Sinclair / Supplied

An Agricultural Producers Association of Saskatchewan (APAS) survey is shedding light on just how significant an impact the 2021 drought has had on some farmers.


The optional survey has so far received more than 200 responses, 75 per cent of which reported being unable to fulfil their 2021 grain contracts.

“Some respondents included that they are facing bankruptcy due to drought and contract shortfalls,” reads an APAS news release on the subject.

It says “25% of respondents also said they had trouble contacting the grain buyers resolving issues arising from production shortfalls, and many of the respondents said they will not be working with the same grain company in the future or will not be signing a contract again.”

READ MORE: Crop insurance and drought relief boosting Saskatchewan deficit: finance minister

Speaking to Global News Tuesday, APAS President Todd Lewis acknowledged that the drought meant fulfilling contracts hasn’t been easy for “either side” and added producers will likely be more cautious with their plans moving forward.

“It’s tough on the grain companies as well. They don’t want to be in this position but unfortunately the dry weather has come, the contracts are signed and now it’s time to settle these contracts and it’s not fun for either side,” he said, adding that difficult years are part of the industry and need to be accommodated.

“I think producers are looking for a better contract to sign going into next year. It’s still dry. We’re a long way form being out of this drought.”

READ MORE: Prairie livestock producers facing shortage of feed, water as winter sets in

The APAS release also points out producers with low yields have had to pay “penalties and administrative fees between $20,000 and $300,000 to grain companies.”

“Many of the respondents also said the interest on their unpaid contracts was as high as 19%,” the release continues.

1:47 Contract concerns mount as harvest produces low yields for some – Sep 2, 2021

Western Grain Elevator Association (WGEA) spokesperson Wade Sobkowich, meanwhile, said its the organization’s belief that some farmers “over-contracted” and took on too much risk.

“When a grain company needs to set replacement value to a farmer who doesn’t have enough production, it’s not because the grain company is making money. Grain companies are scrambling to have enough grain to meet their own commitments,” he said.

“Grain companies are buying those tonnes from other farmers at very high prices right now, we know that there are producers in Western Canada who are benefitting from not having taken on so much risk and not having forward contracted as much.”

He added, though, that WGEA members will be “examining their processes” when it comes contracting producers.

“It would be unwise for anybody to come out of an unprecedented situation like we’ve just experienced without trying to learn from it. But it’s a competitive issue,” he said.


READ MORE: Saskatchewan farmers hoping for wet winter after drought-ravaged summer

Saskatchewan Agriculture Minister David Marit said Tuesday his ministry has reached out both to producers and grain buyers to discuss the issue.

“I think you’ll see people looking at the contracts in a little more detail. We have as a ministry reached out to all of the grain companies to have this very discussion about this and did see that they’re trying to work with producers in a number of cases,” he said.

“Some of the owners or CEOs told me they’ve offered deferrals or reduced admin fees.”

1:45 Crop insurance and drought relief boosting Saskatchewan deficit: finance minister

The province announced earlier this week that crop insurance payouts were the highest per acre in 2021 that they’ve ever been.

Asked about mitigating the impact of continued or future droughts, which research has suggested will become more frequent due to climate change, Marit said he thinks Saskatchewan’s existing risk management options are “adequate”.

“The farmers have built up the crop insurance reserve. The farmers have the resources to recover those costs,” he said, adding though that rates may increase depending on how quickly climate change predictions play out.

“That’ll all be reflective in the premiums and the coverage and things like that. That’s something governments as a whole are gonna have to look at both from a federal perspective and a provincial perspective across Canada.”

CWB

The Globe and Mail reports, "Until Ottawa ended its monopoly in 2012, the Canadian Wheat Board was the prairie farmer’s link to food companies around the world. Now the former giant has been taken over by a U.S. agrifood company and an investment fund owned by Saudi Arabia.

Harper sells Wheat Board to US corporation & Saudi ...

canadians.org/analysis/harper-sells-wheat-board-us-corporation-saudi-investment-f…

'An attack on government': Saskatchewan finance minister rebuffs farmers concerns

Mickey Djuric
Publishing date: Dec 02, 2021 • 

REGINA — Recent comments made by Saskatchewan’s finance minister have inflamed farmers who say the government is creating an urban-rural divide that is harmful.

On Monday, Donna Harpauer presented her mid-year financial report showing a record $2.7-billion deficit, which she largely attributed to crop insurance claims brought on by severe drought.

More than $2.4 billion of crop insurance was paid out, the most in Saskatchewan’s history, and $1.8 billion of that had not been budgeted for, which largely contributed to the deficit.

When presenting her report, Harpauer said “without the agriculture support (expense), we’d almost be balanced.”

Ian Boxall, vice-president of the Agricultural Producers Association of Saskatchewan, said Harpauer’s comments are misleading and farmers should not be blamed for the province’s accounting decisions.

“The government is throwing producers under the bus,” Boxall said Wednesday.

“When urban people hear there’s $2 billion payout to farmers through crop insurance, that’s probably worrisome. What they need to understand is we pay the premiums in, and the money is actually there.”

Boxall said he wants to make it clear the money wasn’t a bailout from the government. For years, producers, along with the federal and provincial governments, have been paying into the crop insurance fund to ensure money is there when it’s needed.

“We paid in, and this year we have to pay out,” Boxall said.

Boxall’s group addressed its concerns in a letter to the government. Harpauer called it a disingenuous letter which dismayed her and she accused the group of being misinformed.

“It’s an attack on our government,” Harpauer said in a followup interview.

She co-penned a letter with Agriculture Minister David Marit to respond to the concerns. They accused the producers’ group of having a limited understanding of accounting principles and asked that the letter be retracted.

Asked if farmers should bite their tongues, she said: “Before they speak to us, and get an understanding, and not give out false information, yes.”

Boxall said producers have worked for years to eliminate the division between rural and urban residents and try to get people living in cities to understand the issues farmers face.

“I don’t want to have a bigger divide between rural and urban. We’re a small province, based on population, and we need to have similar goals and outlook of what’s good for the province,” Boxall said.

He said the letter was an attempt to educate the government on that point.

“That’s their concern,” Harpauer retorted. “We all — urban and rural — is well aware there was a … catastrophic, challenging year in agriculture this year. I’m not sure what their issue is.”

Premier Scott Moe weighed in on Thursday. He said the letters from the producers and Harpauer “were both factual.”

He said the letters could have been avoided if Boxall’s group had just picked up the phone.

“If you have questions, make a phone call, and we can have a phone call about how public sector accounting works here,” Moe said before reiterating similar comments made by Harpauer.

“If we could disregard … the support required to pay out to producers because of the program we have in place, Saskatchewan would be very close to having a very balanced budget this year, and I think that’s a positive thing.”

Todd Lewis, president of the producers’ group, followed up Thursday with a second letter to the finance minister.

He wrote that farmers do not want to be blamed for the deficit.

“Having these discussions without being accused of being deceitful, ignorant, or misinformed would be appreciated.”

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Dec. 2, 2021.

Agricultural producers association, Sask. government go back and forth on crop insurance's role in deficit

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Association was concerned with implication that crop

insurance payments caused provincial deficit

CBC News · Posted: Dec 02, 2021 

On Monday, Saskatchewan Finance Minister Donna Harpauer said the province's $2.7-billion projected deficit is largely due to $2.4 billion in crop insurance claims. (Kirk Fraser/CBC News

The Agricultural Producers Association of Saskatchewan (APAS) and the Saskatchewan government have been exchanging public words over how the province characterized the role of crop insurance payments in its recent mid-year budget update.

APAS says that many producers are worried about being considered a burden on the province's finances. 

On Monday, the government projected a $2.7 billion deficit in its mid-year update. Finance Minister Donna Harpauer said the shortfall is mainly because of an expected $2.4 billion in crop insurance claims. 

"If you backed out the expense of crop insurance — that $2.4 billion — as well as the livestock producer support, we would almost be balanced," Harpauer said during a news conference Monday. 

"That's how significant that support was for agriculture producers."

• Sask. announces more insurance supports for farmers battling drought

• Crop insurance claims push Sask. into record $2.7B deficit: mid-year financial report

APAS took exception to the implication that crop insurance payments are causing the provincial deficit.

"In 2020, Saskatchewan Crop Insurance Corporation reported a $2.4-billion surplus accumulated over previous years, plus a sizeable surplus in the reinsurance fund," APAS vice president Ian Boxall was quoted as saying in a news release Wednesday. "It's not fair to blame producers for a provincial deficit in a drought year when that surplus gets used up."

The province responded with its own news release later Wednesday, in the form of an open letter to APAS president Todd Lewis, signed by Agriculture Minister David Marit and Finance Minister Donna Harpauer. 

"I will begin by pointing out that we disagree with the premise of the entire document," the government response said. "To suggest that the provincial government is somehow blaming our agricultural producers for the financial deficit reported in the financial update presented earlier this week is not only false, it is offensive."

The province's letter said Boxall's comments suggest he is unfamiliar with the concept of summary financial reporting. It asked APAS to retract its statement.

"It is disappointing, to say the least, that an organization such as APAS would, through either ignorance or deceit, willingly misinform its members with such callous disregard," the province said.

APAS president Lewis then put out another news release Thursday responding to the province's Wednesday release.

"Although it may not have been the intention of the government to leave that perception, many media reports made that link," Lewis wrote.

"Pointing out that producers are not responsible for a deficit situation when previous year's results are taken into account is our organization's job."

Lewis wrote that he had personally received calls from concerned producers, as had APAS's office and other representatives.

"Producers are concerned that the general public has a perception that farmers are receiving a 'break' or a 'bailout' when they receive a crop insurance cheque," Lewis wrote.

A general lack of understanding of the accounting principles behind crop insurance is the main issue at hand, according to Lewis.

"I stand to be corrected on the operational side of the finance ministry and the use of summary financial statements.," Lewis wrote. "However, having these discussions without being accused of being deceitful, ignorant, or misinformed would be appreciated."

In an interview, Lewis said the purpose of Thursday's letter was to convey that APAS meant no offence to anybody with its initial release. 

He said it was meant to let members of the public know that farmers aren't being bailed out by the government, but rather there is a partnership between the government and producers where they pay for coverage, but only receive payment when they are in a claim position. He said it's like any other insurance program and in some cases producers have paid premiums for decades but never made a claim. 

"We wanted to let the public know and ensure that there's no misconceptions around the funding of crop insurance and tying it to the deficit," he said. 

Premier Scott Moe said that when insurance money is given to the agricultural industry, it has to be recorded as a financial expense, an accounting principle he said all provinces and the federal government follow. 

"I think all of the letters in this case really could have been avoided had a couple of phone calls ultimately been made," he said.

US Energy Department funding experiments to fight methane with plasma, copper

Bloomberg News | December 2, 2021 | 

Credit: International Energy Agency

The Energy Department division that has doled out billions to projects including a squid-skin inspired shirt to regulate body temperature is training its sights on a new target: reducing the emission of a powerful greenhouse gas from the oil, gas and coal industries.


The Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy, which funds experimental energy technology projects and is modeled after a military research arm, is awarding funds under a new program to reduce methane emissions. The chief component of natural gas, methane has more than 80 times the atmosphere-warming power of carbon dioxide in the first two decades after its release.

The funding, $35 million in total, is being awarded to 12 projects. Among them is nearly $3 million to Texas A&M University for a project that would use plasma to reduce the emission of methane from large engines used by pipeline companies. It is also awarding $3.3 million to Lancaster, Pennsylvania-based Advanced Cooling Technologies for a project involving a new 3D printing process to make combustors out of silicone carbine to make gas flares that destroy 99.5% of methane. Other projects include $2 million to the Massachusetts Institute of Technology for a copper-based catalyst that will be used to reduce methane emissions from coal mines.

“We must adopt technologies to dramatically reduce these emissions,”  Secretary of Energy Jennifer M. Granholm said in a statement. “By creating new technologies, we are working to mitigate climate change and minimize the cost of methane abatement.”

Granholm was poised to announce the funding during a visit Thursday to Precision Combustion, Inc., a North Haven, Connecticut-based manufacturer after a tour of the facility with state Governor Ned Lamont. The closely held manufacturer of emissions control equipment was slated to receive $3.7 million for technology designed to eliminate methane associated with coal production.

The funding is part of an assault on methane led by President Joe Biden, who has said reducing emissions of the heat-trapping gas is one of the most important steps that can be taken to curb global warming. The Biden administration last month announced a long-awaited EPA proposal stiffening requirements to plug leaks in oil and gas wells and an effort by the Agriculture Department to harness and sell methane.

(By Ari Natter, with assistance from Jennifer A. Dlouhy)

Landmark Demonstration Shows How Common Wind Turbine Can Provide Fundamental Grid Stability

NREL Uses Advanced Grid Research Environment for First-Ever Example ofType-3 Turbines Using Grid-Forming Controls


Photo by Zach Shahan, CleanTechnica.


ByU.S. Department of Energy

In a milestone for renewable energy integration, the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) and partner General Electric (GE) have operated a common class of wind turbines in grid-forming mode, which is when the generator can set grid voltage and frequency and, if necessary, operate without power from the electric grid.

The demonstration showed that the popular type-3 turbine technology can supply fundamental stability to the bulk power grid. GE’s grid-forming controls allow the turbine to make up for fewer conventional sources of stability on the grid, such as coal or natural-gas-fired generators, while also overcoming a well-known issue with electrical oscillations, in which voltage fluctuations are amplified and occasionally lead to power plant outages.

This real-device demonstration is the first of several in the Department of Energy Wind Energy Technologies Office project “Wind as a Virtual Synchronous Generator (WindVSG),” which aims to research wind and storage inverter controls that electronically imitate the stabilizing features of conventional generators. For the last three years, NREL has been working to achieve that goal by characterizing devices, designing controls, and simulating operation. The laboratory is now proving the grid-forming principles on real devices in a replica power grid environment.

“We have shown that a common variety of wind turbine can serve the same underlying voltage and frequency stability services that are often provided by fossil fuel power plants,” said NREL Chief Engineer Vahan Gevorgian. “This is another example of how inverter-based energy resources like wind and solar can fulfill a wider role in future power systems.”

As renewables make up a larger share of the power supply, they will also need to take a larger share of responsibility as stewards of grid stability. That responsibility includes the capacity to restart power following an outage, to restabilize following a transient electrical event, and to generally “form” the grid as baseline power resources. Large spinning generators have traditionally underpinned a steady grid frequency and voltage. Now, inverter-based resources like wind, solar, and batteries are being primed for that role in multiple DOE projects, including the Grid Forming Inverter Consortium, which will share findings and research objectives among industry and community partners.

In the WindVSG demonstration, an NREL–GE team created controls for a 1.5-MW type-3 wind turbine to provide primary frequency and voltage support and restabilize the surrounding grid by adjusting its power in response to momentary electrical anomalies. Type-3 turbines are an especially complex case for developing grid-forming controls. These turbines use a generator that is directly connected to the grid, with the turbines’ electricity output modulated by power electronics components. To fully understand this complexity, NREL developed a full-detail model of the turbine’s electrodynamics, aided by a custom toolkit developed by the NREL research team.

In grid-forming mode, type-3 turbines can suppress an oscillation mode that has proven detrimental in real power systems. In this simulation, the oscillation, which is caused by interaction with certain transmission lines, begins at 35 seconds and is shown to become unstable in grid-following mode (top), while it is muted in grid-forming mode (bottom).

NREL powered-on the grid-forming turbine using the Advanced Research on Integrated Energy Systems (ARIES) platform, which allows at-scale validation in a replica grid environment. A 5-MW research dynamometer served as prime mover in the mock power system, allowing the researchers to emulate different grid dynamics and observe the turbine’s performance. The team found that under “weak” grid conditions — when few conventional generators such as thermal power plants are present — the turbine is exceptional at adding stability. However, in “strong” grids with a greater number of conventional generators, the grid-forming turbine could develop unstable dynamics of its own. That is generally not the case for grid-following controls, which accompany most non-conventional energy devices like solar plants and battery storage systems and typically produce power that closely follows the grid frequency and voltage of the larger electric system.

“In this work, we have found that the grid-forming turbine serves underlying stability in cases where it’s needed: as a standalone power source in a small system, or in systems with many inverter-based resources and few conventional forms of stability,” Gevorgian said. “The ARIES platform makes this research possible — we are able to adjust the conditions that these turbines will experience on a live system, but within the safety of a controlled environment.”

The researchers also found that the grid-forming controls prevent a certain dangerous electrical oscillation that is severe enough to have caused real system blackouts. Results of this research show that the grid-forming mode effectively reduces that likelihood. This is an important outcome for wind power plants around the world that rely on type-3 turbines for a significant proportion of capacity.

Though a major step ahead for grid-forming renewable resources, this demonstration also indicates new directions for investigation. Within the WindVSG project, the research team will continue to study how the grid-forming turbine interacts with other devices on the power system, whether the grid-forming mode results in greater mechanical stress on the turbine, and how the turbine can ensure stability even in strong-grid scenarios. Further demonstrations will also validate the grid-forming turbine when disconnected from the power grid.

For wind turbine fleets and other resources like solar PV and battery storage, grid-forming controls could open a new market opportunity in the form of grid services; that is, grid stability as another value stream for renewable resources. With this demonstration, NREL has validated one more approach for renewable assets to provide advanced stability. And with the ARIES platform, NREL can help partners prove such renewably sourced stability on their own systems.

Learn more about wind-grid integration research at NREL.

Article courtesy of National Renewable Energy Laboratory.

ENERGY

Fossil Fuel’s Downfall Could Be America’s Too

On Dec 3, 20

The United Nations climate change conference (known as COP26) in Glasgow, Scotland, was billed as historic. By that measure, the conference didn’t deliver. But it nevertheless marks a moment of transition. Glasgow completed the process begun at the 2015 Paris conference, under which nations progressively raised their national commitments to decarbonization. All the major economies of the world are now notionally committed to reaching net-zero emissions between 2050 and 2070. As a result, Glasgow also marked the moment when climate politics began to focus on the energy transition as a matter of industrial policy. It was symptomatic that a prominent commitment to reduce coal burning was included in the final resolution. It was not enough, but it was a significant first. It was also symptomatic that Britain’s conservative government put the emphasis on businesses. That dismayed many activists, but it was a prompt eagerly seized on by U.S. climate envoy John Kerry.

Kerry finished the conference hailing an impending transformation. Firms that were willing to innovate and gamble on the energy transition would be opening up the “greatest economic opportunity since the Industrial Revolution,” he said. In a Financial Times op-ed published in November, Kerry added: “Like the proverbial cavalry, the first movers [in business] are coming. … Companies should seize this opportunity by propelling the shift—rather than being buffeted in its wake.” Meanwhile, in the New York Times, columnist Thomas Friedman chimed in to declare if we are looking to save the world, “we will get there only when Father Profit and risk-taking entrepreneurs produce transformative technologies that enable ordinary people to have extraordinary impacts on our climate without sacrificing much—by just being good consumers of these new technologies. In short: we need a few more Greta Thunbergs and a lot more Elon Musks.”

One can see this vision’s attraction for the likes of Kerry and Friedman. Rather than the subject of contentious politics, climate policy has become a business opportunity. But is this realistic? There is certainly compelling evidence to believe powerful economic and technological imperatives are beginning to drive the energy transition. But it would be naive to imagine this means the politics is settled. Precisely in the United States, the energy transition threatens to trigger a dysfunctional backlash that could leave the champion of the hydrocarbon age stranded in the 20th century.

---

Diesel trucks and cars pass windmills near Banning, California, on Dec. 8, 2009. David McNew/Getty Images

Since the beginning of global climate policy in the 1990s, the United States has been marked by a conflicted position. To explain this, it is easy to point the finger at the Republican Party or former U.S. President Donald Trump’s crude climate denials. But it goes far deeper than that. From the beginning, America’s huge energy consumption made it a target for those demanding immediate action to halt the climate crisis.

It was little wonder Congress resisted any climate agreement that did not enroll the rest of the world on equal footing—and thus rejected the 1997 Kyoto Protocol. Whatever the merits of climate justice arguments, they cut little ice with defenders of the American way of life. Meanwhile, the United States’ energy producers stand firm as a recalcitrant defensive lobby. U.S. oil interests were among the leading sponsors of denial. Since the 1980 Carter Doctrine, U.S. geopolitical power has focused on securing control of the Persian Gulf. It was not for nothing that in the early days of climate policy, the United States featured as the great Satan.

Given this underlying balance of interests, the GOP’s position of denial at least has the merit of consistency. Given the United States’ existential entanglement with fossil fuels, it is easier to strike a patriotic pose if you assume away the climate crisis or trust that technology will deliver the solution by itself. It is Democrats who find themselves in a conflicted position, seeking to square the realities of America’s political economy with the climate threat’s urgency.

The Obama administration midwifed the Paris Agreement while, at the same time, permitting the increased export of U.S. oil and gas. Trump was the first U.S. president to actively deny the reality of the climate problem. For him, all that counted was the country’s “energy dominance” be secured by the export of U.S. liquified natural gas—or “molecules of U.S. freedom.” With U.S. President Joe Biden’s administration, cognitive dissonance returned. Biden supports climate leadership and made a constructive contribution to the Glasgow negotiations while licensing oil and gas development and goading OPEC into increasing its production.

One could simply denounce the hypocrisy, but that misses the point. The root of the incoherence lies in political economy: the United States’ dual role as a huge consumer and producer of fossil fuels as well as the policeman of the world’s oil and gas supplies. It is this that gives real significance to Kerry’s vision of change sketched in Glasgow’s wake. If we take Kerry at face value, we may be about to witness the curtain coming down on America’s fossil fuel century, less as a result of political choice than simply the result of technological and industrial transformation.

But it will take more than billionaire Elon Musk and his ilk to concertedly decarbonize the United States. The question of politics cannot be wished away.

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An Indian security officer poses for media as he walks over rooftops covered in solar panels at the Solar Photovoltaic Power Plant near Amritsar on May 17, 2016. NARINDER NANU/AFP via Getty Images

A sketch map of the forces shaping the new energy landscape was provided in the weeks prior to COP26 by an ambitious paper in Nature Energy. The multi-author team, led by Jean-Francois Mercure, explored how the development of a variety of technologies and underlying cost conditions in the energy sector might change output, investment, and employment in 43 sectors and 61 regions of economic activity around the globe.

To predict key renewable technologies’ development path, the authors assume they will follow the same pattern of diffusion and adoption exhibited by other major technologies over the last century. This traces an S curve. Technologies begin small before hitting a period of rapid and comprehensive adoption followed by saturation. This is the trajectory followed, for instance, by smart phones since 2008. If we make that assumption, then as far as renewable energy technologies are concerned, we are currently at the slower end of the curve and about to experience takeoff.

“Through a positive feedback of learning-by-doing and diffusion dynamics, solar photovoltaics becomes the lowest-cost energy generation technology by 2025-2030,” the study says. “[Electric vehicles] display a similar type of winner-takes-all phenomenon, although at a later period. Heating technologies evolve as the carbon intensity of households gradually declines.”

For energy consumers, this promises huge windfalls. Given the cost curves and existing policies in place, the Nature Energy authors, like Kerry, see an energy transition as something close to an irresistible force. Their work was completed well before COP26. But, as if to confirm their predictions, one of the more dramatic pieces of news from Glasgow was India’s declaration that it would aim for net-zero by 2070. India did this reluctantly. It has long held the position that due to historic responsibility, rich countries should shoulder the burden. But this climate justice position has been increasingly overshadowed by the force of global economic growth. India itself is now the world’s third largest emitter of carbon dioxide. Although India is heavily dependent on coal for power generation—and though as many as 20 million workers depend on coal for their livelihoods—it is foreseeable that renewables’ plunging costs will create a powerful incentive for India to shift. Furthermore, as in China, the threat of pollution adds powerful impetus. To avoid the worst effects of life-threatening smog, hundreds of millions of people in the Ganges Delta are currently under a form of lockdown.

India follows the European Union, China, Japan, South Korea, and Indonesia, which have all committed to net-zero emissions, to be achieved somewhere between 2050 and 2060. That Eurasian shift creates huge economic and technological momentum. In the early 2000s, interaction between Germany’s renewable energy subsidies and the growth of China’s solar industry demonstrated the potential for unintended synergies. In the decades ahead, similar dynamics could unfold on a far vaster scale.

The transition is not a done deal, of course. Along with its commitment to net-zero at COP26, India also demanded $1 trillion in foreign funding over the next decade. That is only reasonable. India is still poor. Its per capita emissions are a fraction of those in the West. A trillion dollars is a lot of money, but it is well within the range that experts assess would be necessary to fund the country’s energy transition. To supercharge the development of renewable energy infrastructure worldwide, between $2.7 trillion and almost $5 trillion per year are needed. The required amount of net new investment is 2 to 3 percent of India’s global GDP per year. By the standards of historic structural change, that is modest. At least for middle- and higher-income countries, which account for 95 percent of world economic activity and emissions, finance should not be a major obstacle. The giant flow of spending is precisely the honey pot Kerry held…

Read More:Fossil Fuel’s Downfall Could Be America’s Too

HYDROCARBON GREENWASHING

Study reveals potential of blue hydrogen to play key role in energy transition 

THE KENNEY UCP PLAN

by University of Aberdeen

Blue hydrogen is produced from natural gas, with the resulting CO2 emissions 

captured and stored permanently underground in a process known as carbon 

capture and storage (CCS). Credit: Shutterstock/Dmitry Kovalchuk

The application of modern carbon capture technologies that limit emissions associated with the production of blue hydrogen can play a crucial role in its success as a 'bridging technology' in the energy transition.

Less expensive than carbon-neutral green hydrogen, and therefore better suited to being used at scale in the short term, blue hydrogen is produced from natural gas, with the resulting CO2 emissions captured and stored permanently underground in a process known as carbon capture and storage (CCS).

Recent studies have questioned the value of blue hydrogen in reducing emissions, chiefly because of inefficiencies in the production process causing CO2 to escape.

However, a newly published international study involving researchers from the University of Aberdeen and led by the Paul Scherrer Institute (PSI) in Switzerland and Heriot-Watt University has identified several key responsible factors in what causes CO2 to escape.

Crucially, the study has also shown that the application of modern carbon capture technologies can play a crucial role in mitigating this risk.

Professor Russell McKenna from the University of Aberdeen's School of Engineering is one of the researchers who have contributed to the study, which has been published in Royal Society of Chemistry's journal Sustainable Energy & Fuels.

He said: "Hydrogen is widely seen as one of the building blocks for a sustainable energy system, and if produced sustainably it represents a highly versatile means of long-term energy storage, with a variety of applications across the economy.

"The ultimate goal is to use green hydrogen, produced from renewable electricity thorough electrolysis, but this is currently prohibitively expensive.

"Blue hydrogen has been identified as a potential bridging technology, until green hydrogen can be scaled up and costs come down, however questions remain over its environmental impact and whether emissions associated with production cancel out any environmental benefit.

"What this study has shown is that the environmental impact of blue hydrogen depends on two key aspects—namely the amount of methane emissions in the natural gas supply chain, for example through gas flaring, and the CO2 capture rate in the plant.

"It identifies that if these parameters are made favorable, for example through the application of technologies that keep methane emissions low and capture rates high, then blue hydrogen can have a favorable environmental impact and offer an attractive bridging technology."'Serious threat' of fugitive emissions with hydrogen plan

More information: Christian Bauer et al, On the climate impacts of blue hydrogen production, Sustainable Energy & Fuels (2021). DOI: 10.1039/D1SE01508G

Provided by University of Aberdeen 

Is hydrogen fuel really the clean energy climate change targets need?

Newly published research shows that blue H2 produces “substantial” emissions even with carbon capture.

December 2, 2021 1 By JULIE CAMPBELL

Since COP26, hydrogen news headline s have been hot topics, but according to recently published research, the form most countries are leaning on as their clean energy future actually produces “substantial” emissions.

Blue H2 uses fossil fuels (other than coal) to power its production, followed by CCS.

Despite the positive attention blue hydrogen fuel has been getting from countries that are releasing their H2 strategies, new research shows that it may not be nearly as clean as all the hype suggests. This form of H2 is produced by processes powered by fossil fuels, most commonly natural gas. If the process stopped there, it would be called gray H2. What makes it blue is the carbon capture and storage (CCS) that is meant to keep the greenhouse gas emissions out of the atmosphere.

Blue H2 has been a major focus in the clean energy strategies of countries and regions around the world such as the United States, Canada, the European Union, Australia, and Japan, among others. However, a paper published in the Applied Energy journal suggests that the CCS technology isn’t as good as most of those countries had hoped. The research determined that “substantial” greenhouse gas emissions occur even when efforts are made to capture the carbon dioxide and store it underground before it can be released into the atmosphere.

Blue hydrogen fuel may not offer nearly the emissions reduction offered by green H2.

“Hydrogen made from natural gas leads to more fugitive emissions — methane that is leaked into the environment during the extraction and processing of natural gas — compared to just burning natural gas directly,” said the peer-reviewed paper’s co-author Fiona Beck of the Australian National University. “Including [carbon capture and storage] in the process actually increases fugitive emissions further, as more natural gas is needed to fuel the process.”

Over 100 countries, including the United States committed to a Global Methane Pledge at COP26, the UN climate summit in Glasgow, Scotland, which took place earlier this month. The commitment was to slash methane emissions by 30 percent by 2030 when compared to levels recorded in 2020. Methane is an exceptionally potent greenhouse gas, making it an important focus in efforts to reduce the impact of emissions on climate change. For many countries, reaching that goal relies on the use of hydrogen fuel instead of fossil fuels.

Hydrogen fuel made with natural gas may still be highly polluting even with carbon capture and storage.

Though green hydrogen fuel, produced using renewable energy such as wind and solar power, is considered cleaner, it comes with substantial hurdles in its way. This process of splitting water comes with a higher price tag and often requires new electricity generation to be constructed from the ground up instead of using fossil fuel-based power already in place. As a result, it is typically associated with considerably higher prices.

The research examining the emissions from blue H2 follows one published in August by Cornell and Stanford University. They found that blue H2 pollutes 20 percent more greenhouse gas than burning gas or coal for heat. In the new study, researchers from Australian National University compared both the financial cost and the emissions resulting from producing hydrogen fuel using fossil fuels with those made with renewable energy.

Recent studies have been looking into the various technologies employed, commonly assuming that high carbon capture rates are in place. That said, those studies have not assessed the impact of fugitive emissions and lower capture rates on the total emissions released and the costs associated with production, said the researchers.


Green hydrogen fuel may be cheaper than blue within the Australian market.

While producing green hydrogen fuel is associated with higher costs because renewable energy sources such as solar and wind are not yet locally established, that could change, said the researchers. They pointed out that if they invest heavily in clean energy, such as solar that would take advantage of the abundant sunshine in Australia, as well as its powerful winds and vast amounts of land available, the cost of clean H2 could rapidly fall once those power sources are in place.

“Our work highlights that large investment in fossil-fuel-based hydrogen with CCS could be risky, locking in a new fossil fuel industry with significant emissions, and one that is likely to be out-competed by renewable technologies in the future,” said Beck.

About Australian National University

The Australian National University is a public research university that boasts seven teaching and research colleges on top of a number of national institutes and academies.

SEE LA REVUE GAUCHE - Left Comment: Search results for CCS (plawiuk.blogspot.com)

Renewables Likely Cost Less Than Previously Thought, Study Finds

 Paige Bennett

Dec. 02, 2021 01:30PM EST

RENEWABLE ENERGY

A wind energy park near Brandenburg, Germany. Patrick Pleul / picture alliance via Getty Images

As renewable energy technologies scale up, their cost can be hard to estimate. A new report from the University of Oxford’s Institute of New Economic Thinking notes that the cost of renewable energies may be less than previously thought.

According to the study, predicted costs for renewables have likely been overestimated, as evidenced by the true costs of these energies, such as solar power, falling short of early pricing model predictions again and again.

The World Economic Forum explains that renewable price forecasts didn’t account for infrastructure cost improvements. For example, early pricing models estimated that solar power prices would fall about 6% per year from 2010 to 2020. In reality, costs dropped 15% each year.

This is important, because the initial investments of renewable energies are often a sticking point for making the switch from fossil fuels. But as the new report shows, renewable energy prices aren’t as high as anticipated. As the technology improves and scales up, the prices will continue to drop, too.

From 2010 to 2019, solar electricity prices decreased from $378 per MWh to $68 per MWh. In the same time frame, onshore wind costs decreased by 40%, and offshore wind costs decreased by 29%. For coal, the most widely used source of electricity globally, prices fell from $111 to $109 during this time.

“More than half of the renewable capacity added in 2019 achieved lower electricity costs than new coal,” the International Renewable Energy Agency said in a separate report. “New solar and wind projects are undercutting the cheapest of existing coal-fired plants.”

The INET report authors note that rapid expansion of renewables is key to the best cost-savings. Through their research methods, they found that a fast transition to renewable energy could lead to a net savings of trillions of dollars compared to fossil fuels. If renewable energy continues to expand at the current rates for the next 10 years, the authors predict we could reach a near-net-zero-emissions energy system in 25 years.

“In response to our opening question, ‘Is there a path forward that can get us there cheaply and quickly?’ our answer is an emphatic ‘Yes!’” the study says. “The key is to maintain the current high growth rates of rapidly progressing clean energy technologies for the next decade. This is required to build up the industrial capabilities and technical know-how necessary to produce, install and operate these technologies at scale as fast as possible so that we can profit from the resulting cost reductions sooner rather than later.”