Climate Progress

What happens when your utility is 68% dependent on coal?

American Electric Power said Thursday it must raise electricity rates 45 percent for its nearly 1.5 million customers in Ohio over the next three years, to cover soaring coal prices and the cost of modernizing its systems to keep them reliable….

AEP executives acknowledge that the increases will be tough on consumers already facing high gas and food prices during a slumping economy.

“The fact is that coal has doubled in cost in the last year alone, dramatically affecting AEP Ohio’s costs,” Joe Hamrock, AEP Ohio president and chief operating officer, said in a statement. “The tools given to us by the State’s new energy plan allow us to phase in those fuel price increases over time so that unlike the spikes Ohioans see in so many products, AEP Ohio’s rate increases are spread out to be made more affordable.”

Note to AEP Ohio — Other than gasoline, what are the “so many products” that Ohio consumers ever see rise 45% in three years? Answer — not bloody many.

Now it is inescapable that under McCain’s energy and climate plans, the entire country’s electricity rates and bills will soar for several reasons:

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Here is a very good article on “Parsing Opinion Polls … and Politics … In Covering Offshore Drilling Campaign Issue.” And I’m not just saying that because the author, environmental journalist John Whibey, cites this blog in his analysis, although I suppose that has influenced my decision to repost this article in its entirety. On the blogosphere, as in life, flattery will get you most everywhere. The piece was published on the Yale Forum on Climate Change & the Media:

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Science has just published, “Atmospheric Warming and the Amplification of Precipitation Extremes” (subs. req’d). It concludes:

Here, we use satellite observations and model simulations to examine the response of tropical precipitation events to naturally driven changes in surface temperature and atmospheric moisture content. These observations reveal a distinct link between rainfall extremes and temperature, with heavy rain events increasing during warm periods and decreasing during cold periods. Furthermore, the observed amplification of rainfall extremes is found to be larger than predicted by models, implying that projections of future changes in rainfall extremes due to anthropogenic global warming may be underestimated.

In short, global warming is going to make extreme weather even more extreme than scientists have thought. And this conclusion is based largely on observational evidence:

The study team analyzed satellite images of rainfall over tropical oceans over nearly two decades, from 1988 to 2004….

This is something that climate models had predicted,” [coauthor Richard] Allan said. “But getting the data from observations is very important”….

For every 1.8 degree Fahrenheit (1 degree Celsius) rise in global temperature, heavy rain showers became more common, with most intense category jumping 60 percent.

Remember that on our current emissions path, we are headed towards 5°C warming in this century alone (see “Is 450 ppm politically possible? Part 0: The alternative is humanity’s self-destruction“), which suggests we are headed for a staggering increase in intense rainfall. This has huge implications for both agriculture and human health:

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The answer is perhaps as high as a hundred billion dollars.

First some background. I testified in front of the Senate Environment and Public Works committee in July. In my testimony, “The High Cost of Nuclear Power,” I pointed out the obvious — that nuclear is a mature source of power that has benefited disproportionately from government support to date:

From 1948 to today, nuclear energy research and development exceeded $70 billion, whereas research and development for renewables was about $10 billion. From 2002 to 2007, fossil fuels received almost $14 billion in electricity-related tax subsides, whereas renewables received under $3 billion.

The Price-Anderson Nuclear Industries Indemnity Act caps the liability for claims arising from nuclear incidents. It reduces the insurance nuclear power plants need to buy and requires taxpayers to cover all claims in excess of the cap. The benefit of this indirect subsidy has been estimated at between $237 million and $3.5 billion a year, which suggests that it has been worth many billions of dollars to the industry. It could be argued that the value is considerably larger than that, since the industry might not have existed at all without it: “At the time of the Act’s passing, it was considered necessary as an incentive for the private production of nuclear power … because investors were unwilling to accept the then-unquantified risks of nuclear energy without some limitation on their liability.

One can make a case that such insurance was reasonable for a new, almost completely unknown technology in 1957. Extending it through 2025 is harder to justify. If investors aren’t willing to accept the risks of nuclear energy now, without taxpayers liable for any major catastrophe, perhaps the technology no longer deserves government support.

A certain senior member of the minority known for climate denial just submitted two (silly) written questions to me for the record on this:

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Baseload geothermal power gets all the attention because it has such enormous potential for delivering low-carbon 24/7 power (see “Hot rocks are a rockin’ hot climate solution“).

But geothermal heat pumps (GHPs) are every bit as deserving of attention because they are the most energy efficient form of heating and cooling a building over much of this country [click on figure to enlarge]. And if you power GHPs with a renewable source of electricity, they are probably the best way to eliminate the need for natural gas heating in the winter while at the same time slashing peak demand in the summer.

The U.S. Energy Information Administration released their “Survey of Geothermal Heat Pump Shipments, 2006” last month. It found “that manufacturers shipped 63,682 geothermal heat pumps (GHP) in 2006, a 33 percent increase over the 2005 total of 47,830.”

Here is some background on the technology.

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[This blog focuses on climate and energy issues from the perspective of science, solutions, and politics. Nothing will be more important to the future of climate and energy policy than the 2008 presidential election. And rhetorical strategy is one of my favorite subjects. So very occasionally I will focus more on rhetoric than the policy. I’ll keep the content below the jump. Nonetheless, this post does have direct relevance to the climate debate.]

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With the Olympics almost upon us, Science magazine has a cover story on “China’s Environmental Challenges” (subs. req’d). Since Science has been a leader in drawing attention to the threat posed to humanity by accelerating greenhouse gas emissions, you’d think that one of those challenges would be China’s newly achieved leadership in carbon dioxide emissions, how China can developesustainably, and what are the alternatives to their rapacious use of coal.

You would be wrong. Here are the four articles that comprise the magazine’s news focus on China’s environment:

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New nuclear power plants aren’t cheap. Neither is storing their waste. E&E News (subs. req’d) reports on at Yucca Mountain:

DOE has spent $13.5 billion since 1983, and figures to spend $54.8 billion on construction, operation and decommissioning of the repository; $19.5 billion for transporting the waste — including building the canisters for holding waste; and $8.4 billion for other program activities.

The report notes that the expenses were based on a repository opening date of 2017 — a best possible opening date that Sproat has already said is no longer possible due to budget constraints, which have pushed it to 2020. The lifecycle estimate also does not include the at least $11 billion in liability expenses DOE expects for breaking its contract with utilities to begin taking away the spent nuclear fuel in 1998.

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Sen. Obama responds to the shameless Republican mockery of energy efficiency.

It’s good to see a progressive presidential nominee stand up for the most important energy strategy we have.

You can’t criticize awarding the Olympic Games to China just because their rapacious coal-building policy has now made them the world’s largest emitter of greenhouse gas emissions (see “The immorality of China’s coal policy is breathtaking (literally).” By that standard, America should never have been awarded the games.

But awarding the games to a city that is one of the most polluted in the world — let alone in a country that has such a shameful record on human rights — is simply unconscionable. And quite unfair to the athletes. Consider this literally staggering story from the Newshour:

ADAM CRAIG, USA Cycling: I’ve never had any experience even remotely close to what I had in Beijing last fall.

BETTY ANN BOWSER: Last September, he was in the Chinese capital to compete in a series of pre-Olympic warm-up races.

ADAM CRAIG: It’s like — it’s a weird bronchial spasm thing that I was getting, that just like — whenever you tried to take enough breath to give your muscles that fuel of oxygen they need, your bronchioles just start spasming and you just like physically can’t do it.

And it’s like akin to drowning, or something, just not being able to take that full breath. And, you know, having your body really require that oxygen and not being able to get it is a pretty unique and pretty terrifying situation, I think.

[Kudos to the International Olympic Committee, its U.S. corporate sponsors — General Electric, Coca-Cola, Visa, McDonald’s, Kodak, and Johnson & Johnson — and the Chinese for turning outdoor endurance sports into torture — almost literally re-creating the experience of water boarding. I guess it is appropriate that President Bush is attending the games after all.]

BETTY ANN BOWSER: Just 30 minutes after the starting gun of the race, Craig had to quit, but he had lots of world-class company.

ADAM CRAIG: The current world champion and the current Olympic champion, Julien Absalon, same deal, about the same point in the race, 20 or 30 minutes in, actually was sick to his stomach, and threw up, and was hacking, and wheezing, and had to pull out.

And, yes, I think there were 46 starters and eight finishers. So that’s a pretty high attrition rate for a two-hour mountain bike race around a fairly easy course.

China’s much-vaunted air pollution index presents a bizarrely rosy picture of the dirty reality. As the Post noted:

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