Here is what the last five years of installations looked like in the two countries:*
As recently as 2005, the United States installed nearly five times more wind capacity than China on an annual basis (2,431 MW vs. 498 MW). In 2009, China installed 31% more capacity than the United States did (13,000 MW vs. 9,922 MW).
Individuals and decision-makers across widely diverse sectors – from agriculture to energy to transportation – increasingly are asking NOAA for information about climate change in order to make the best choices for their families, communities and businesses. To meet the rising tide of these requests, U.S. Commerce Secretary Gary Locke today announced the intent to create a NOAA Climate Service line office dedicated to bringing together the agency’s strong climate science and service delivery capabilities.
More and more, Americans are witnessing the impacts of climate change in their own backyards, including sea-level rise, longer growing seasons, changes in river flows, increases in heavy downpours, earlier snowmelt and extended ice-free seasons in our waters. People are searching for relevant and timely information about these changes to inform decision-making about virtually all aspects of their lives.
Fossil fuels are not safe. They are not safe for our planet, they are not safe for our communities, and they are not safe for the workers inside of their power plants. This is not the first power plant explosion, this will not be the last. It is time for America to commit to a clean and safe energy economy – where our friends and neighbors can work in green jobs that give good wages and safe working environments. My heart and prayers are with the workers at the Kleen Energy Plant and with their families — and with the future of our nation to not face such a tragedy again.
Greenhouse gas emissions aside, here are a few recent environmental problems and public health concerns associated with generating electricity from coal, nuclear and natural gas:
Yesterday — Middletown Power Plant Explosion Caused By Gas Leak, Officials Say: “Early reports were that a natural gas leak could have caused a devastating explosion Sunday morning that killed two and injured as many as a dozen more at a power plant being built south of the city on the Connecticut River.”
Last week — Radiation Levels Spike Near Vt. Nuke Plant; Leak Source Not Yet Found: “Levels of radioactive tritium mushroomed Thursday in a new monitoring well at the Vermont Yankee nuclear reactor, an indication the leak was coming from water that runs through the reactor itself, according to the Department of Health. These are very high concentrations,” said William Irwin, radiological health chief for the Department of Health, who was at the reactor Thursday. “We’re not dealing with a minor system. It’s an important source that needs to be quickly found.”
Last week — The EPA released “engineering assessments of 40 more coal ash impoundments showing they have the ‘high’ or ’significant’ potential to cause loss of human life, environmental damage, or damage to infrastructure.”
9 months ago — 8 Firefighters, 1 Gas Employee Burned In Natural Gas Explosion: “Eight firefighters and a gas company worker were injured in a natural gas explosion at a strip mall in Forestville, Maryland on Thursday afternoon. Despite being caught in the violent explosion, only two of the injured remain hospitalized.”
13 months ago — TVA spilled 5.4 million cubic yards of toxic coal ash in Eastern Tennessee. “A test of river water near the spill showed elevated levels of lead and thallium, which can cause birth defects and nervous and reproductive system disorders”
And here are some recent environmental problems and public health concerns associated with generating electricity from solar, wind and geothermal:
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Actually, there are no environmental problems or public health concerns associated with generating electricity from wind, solar and geothermal sources.
Just something to keep in mind when you hear people talk about ‘cleaner burning natural gas,’ ‘clean coal,’ and ’safe nuclear power.’
Sen. Frank Lautenberg (D-N.J.) said Monday that a fatal explosion at an unfinished natural gas-fired power plant in Connecticut over the weekend underscores safety concerns about a proposed natural gas pipeline in New Jersey.
An explosion Sunday at the Kleen Energy Systems plant in Middletown, Connecticut killed at least five workers.
“This tragic incident reminds us that natural gas, while cleaner burning than other fossil fuels, comes with safety risks. The explosion raises a red flag about the construction of a natural gas line that would run through New Jersey primarily for the benefit of New York,” Lautenberg said in a prepared statement.
The Senate’s 23-17 vote came after a lengthy debate Friday evening about property rights, impacts on oil and gas development and the unknowns surrounding the injection of large amounts of carbon dioxide in voids a half-mile underground.
“The concept of pore space is not going to go away. It’s here and we’re going to have to deal with it,” said Sen. Clint Harden, R-Clovis, the bill’s sponsor.
Legislators hammered Harden with questions for two hours about who would be liable for the pore space once its filled with carbon dioxide.
They also asked what would happen if an oil or natural gas developer drilled through the space, what the outcome would be once carbon dioxide started mixing with deep water aquifers or other underground deposits and how appraisers would go about figuring out how much the space is worth.
Here is the amended version of the bill, as passed by the State Senate:
Rep. Mike Noel, the Legislature’s chief climate-change skeptic, declared Thursday that global warming is a conspiracy to control world population.
The House Natural Resources Committee then approved a resolution that expresses the Utah Legislature’s belief that “climate alarmists’ carbon dioxide-related global warming hypothesis is unable to account for the current downturn in global temperatures.”
The resolution, sent to the House on a 10-1 vote, would urge the Environmental Protection Agency to drop plans to regulate the pollution blamed for climate change “until a full and independent investigation of the climate data conspiracy and global warming science can be substantiated.”
The resolution is a smorgasboard of anti-science rhetoric, coal-industry talking points and nonsensical fearmongering. Here are some lowlights of the claims the resolution makes:
WHEREAS, global temperatures have been level and declining in some areas over the past 12 years
How could global temperatures have declined in some areas? Global temperatures are, by definition, an average of temperatures globally. Temperatures in one particular geographical location tell us absolutely nothing about global temperatures. Either way, the claim is false.
WHEREAS, emails and other communications between climate researchers around the globe, referred to as “Climategate,” indicate a well organized and ongoing effort to manipulate and incorporate “tricks” related to global temperature data in order to produce a global warming outcome;
WHEREAS, there has been a concerted effort by climate change alarmists to marginalize those in the scientific community who are skeptical of global warming by manipulating or pressuring peer-reviewed publications to keep contrary or competing scientific viewpoints and findings on global warming from being reviewed and published;
Imagine that. Scientists responsible for reviewing scientific papers don’t recommend the publication of anti-science and plainly inaccurate papers.
WHEREAS, the climate change “gravy train,” estimated at more than $7 billion annually in federal government grants, may have influenced the climate research focus and findings that have produced a “scientific consensus” at research institutions and universities;
There is far more money to be made in the climate denial industry than there is practicing legitimate climate science. The oil and coal industries pay top dollar to shills willing to lie to promote their agendas. This is extremely well documented.
There is plenty more insanity where those quotes came from. Here is the full resolution, as passed yesterday by the Utah House Natural Resources Committee:
Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), chairman of the Senate’s green jobs subcommittee, today introduced legislation with nine cosponsors to encourage the installation of 10 million solar systems on the rooftops of homes and businesses over the next decade.
“At a time when we spend $350 billion importing oil from Saudi Arabia and other countries every year, the United States must move away from foreign oil to energy independence,” Sanders said. “A dramatic expansion of solar power is a clean and economical way to help break our dependence on foreign oil, reduce greenhouse gas emissions that cause global warming, improve our geopolitical position, and create good-paying green jobs.”
[W]hat should stand out is that most of the world’s population is squished into that broad bottom tier, which includes emerging markets and undeveloped countries. Really, something like 85% of the people living on this planet consume below the world’s average energy use. Either those people need to quit aspiring to developed nation lifestyles, or the world needs to make output far less energy-intensive, or we should all prepare ourselves for a nasty time of things, in geopolitical and environmental terms, as emerging markets continue to develop economically.
The other day I mentioned that the correlation between energy use and GDP is a myth. There are significant gains to be made in terms of energy efficiency, and I agree completely with the assessment that ‘the world needs to make output far less energy-intensive.’ Much of this will take place naturally once a meaningful price is placed on carbon throughout most of the planet. Smart firms will find innovative ways to decrease energy-intensity and will profit by doing so.
There is also huge potential for developing nations to ‘leapfrog’ outdated technologies and move directly to more efficient ones. For example, in India there is not yet a national power grid. Perhaps as they develop the national grid they’ll use smart grid technologies, which will lead to significant gains in energy efficiency.
Such leapfrogging of technologies, and the decreasing energy intensity of developing economies that goes with it, is our only hope for stabilizing atmospheric greenhouse gas emissions while improving global standards of living at the same time. If developing countries don’t learn from the mistakes made by western economies, our energy and environmental crises will be entirely unmanageable in the decades to come.
For decades, the coal industry has supported quality high-paying jobs for American workers, and coal has provided an important domestic source of reliable, affordable energy. At the same time, coal-fired power plants are the largest contributor to U.S. greenhouse gas emissions and coal accounts for 40 percent of global emissions. Charting a path toward clean coal is essential to achieving my Administration’s goals of providing clean energy, supporting American jobs, and reducing emissions of carbon pollution. Rapid commercial development and deployment of clean coal technologies, particularly carbon capture and storage (CCS), will help position the United States as a leader in the global clean energy race.
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To further this work and develop a comprehensive and coordinated Federal strategy to speed the commercial development and deployment of clean coal technologies, I hereby establish an Interagency Task Force on Carbon Capture and Storage (Task Force). You shall each designate a senior official from your respective agency to serve on the Task Force, which shall be Co Chaired by the designees from the Department of Energy and the Environmental Protection Agency.
There is nothing clean about coal. Aside from burning wood or feces, it is literally the most polluting, most dangerous energy source known to man. If the president wanted people to take his fiscal conservatism seriously he wouldn’t pump billions of dollars into the pet project of the coal industry. Further, every dollar spent doing the coal industry’s research into the myth of ‘clean coal’ is a dollar that could have been invested in clean energy research. Obama and his team are making some efforts to speed up the transition to a clean energy economy, while at the same time making other efforts to slow that transition down. It is counterproductive and wasteful, and I’m sure plenty of people in the administration know better. More pandering we can believe in, I guess.
