Consumption & Demand

Pump Up the Storage

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If we adopt solar and wind as major components of our energy infrastructure as we are weaned from fossil fuels, we have to solve the energy storage problem in a big way. An earlier post demonstrated that we do not likely possess enough materials in the world to simply build giant lead-acid (or nickel-based or lithium-based) batteries to do the job. Comments frequently pointed to pumped hydro storage as a far more sensible answer. Indeed, pumped storage is currently the dominant—and nearly only—grid-scale storage solution out there. Here, we will take a peek at pumped hydro and evaluate what it can do for us.

Aristotle’s Secret

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In an epoch when going to extremes has become one of the most popular habits in American culture, the very idea that a middle ground might be a more sensible place to stand is about as popular as garlic aioli at a vampire convention. Still, the obsession with binary thinking that’s done so much to back America and the industrial world into its present corner is unlikely to get us back out of it. With the help of a Greek philosopher, an Austrian mystic, and two famous California cities, the Archdruid explores some of the alternative territory.

Commentary: The 2011 ASPO-USA Conference: Truth in Energy, Truth in Community

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Media types are fond of saying that if an event doesn’t get covered, it didn’t happen. But this conference definitely happened. And what is created was a general assembly of a community, one that shows tremendous promise as a model for cross-sector collaboration. This kind of collaboration is desperately needed if we are to have anything resembling a soft landing as we head down the fossil carbon mountain.

Das Blut der Welt (The Blood of the World)

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(In German) Stefan Aust and Claus Richter have created a two part documentary on the history of oil starting with whale oil and the move from conventional oil to unconventional oil. Includes analysis on depletion and geopolitical implications.

Includes interviews with: Colin Campbell, ASPO; Fatih Birol, IEA; Matthias Bichsel, Shell, Alexander Medwedew, Deputy CEO Gazprom; Christof Rühl, Chief Economist BP; Gerhard Schröder former German Chancellor; Martin Winterkorn CEO Volkswagen Group; Dieter Zetsche, CEO Daimler AG.

World headed for irreversible climate change — IEA

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The world is likely to build so many fossil-fuelled power stations, energy-guzzling factories and inefficient buildings in the next five years that it will become impossible to hold global warming to safe levels, and the last chance of combating dangerous climate change will be “lost for ever”, according to the most thorough analysis yet of world energy infrastructure.

There’s no place like here: Liberty Tool

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Located in the middle of the state of Maine, the Liberty Tool store carries everything from teddy bears, containers of random “stuff”— screws and whatever else can fit into the mason-sized jars — to old tennis rackets, books, and records. But it is the first floor, dedicated to tools that span the length of the industrial revolution, that is the main attraction. “We’ve got tools that date from the earliest days of the revolution to just yesterday,” owner H.G. “Skip” Brack told us.

Brack’s main focus is to help support a sustainable local economy. By salvaging up to 1 ½ tons of tools each week from around New England and reselling at affordable prices, he’s able to do just that. “I price things intuitively, but I do it so people can afford it. People around here aren’t rich, and I’m conscious of that.”

(Wonderful short video – it’ll make your day!)

The biofuel grind

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When we enter the decline phase of conventional oil—likely before 2020—we will scramble to fill the gap with alternative liquid fuels. The Hirsch Report of 2005, commissioned by the U.S. Department of Energy, took a hard look at alternatives that could respond to the scale of the problem in time to have an impact. Not one of the approaches deemed to be currently viable in the report departs from fossil fuels. But what about biofuels? To what extent can they solve our problem? We’ll dip our toes into the math and see where a first-cut analysis leaves us.