#18 OUR GEO-ENGINEERED FUTURE
Heads in the Sand, Minds in the Clouds
Since the early 1900s petroleum companies, and the empires that they’ve supplied, have been meddling around the globe, carving out countries around oil fields without regard for the inhabitant’s rights, languages, religions and traditions. As we near the end of the fossil fuel era, we can look back at our addiction to cheap energy, and the money and power that it brought to those who played their cards right.
It’s now abundantly clear that giant international corporations, and the billionaires who run them, are nearly in full charge of our country. They have bought our congress, our courts, and now our president, to insure unimpeded profits — our children and our planet be damned.
When we didn’t have alternatives, it perhaps made sense for us to ignore the hazards of fossil energy — the millions of lives cut short by pollution, the wars that claimed our children, the political meddling. Even in its death throes, the industry still operates with naked greed in its attempt to insure that money will be made until the last drop is pumped.
Now, with the administration pulling the US out of the battle against climate change, there is little hope of turning the tide of greenhouse gas emissions. Even if the rest of the world does its best, our country is the elephant in a very polluted room, and that likely means that our only hope for a livable planet will be in the nightmarish embrace of geo-engineering.
WHAT IS GEO-ENGINEERING?
The American Heritage Dictionary defines geo-engineering as “Engineering that involves large-scale manipulation of the earth's environment, especially as applied to climate change caused by global warming”. Sounds simple — what could go wrong? But let’s be clear from the start that the purpose of geo-engineering is to allow us to keep using a resource that we are rapidly depleting. And, that we already have technologies that allow us to supply our energy needs without using fossil fuels.
But this is a big subject, and it’s already getting quite depressing, so let’s put off the details for a future newsletter.
LOOK WHAT’S HAPPENING IN BROOKLIN
Our Brooklin Climate Response ETIPP subcommittee has been doing yeoman’s work for nearly a year now, meeting twice monthly, with a lot of data gathering and discussion in between. In consultation with the National Renewable Energy Labs and Maine’s Island Institute, they’ve been crafting a plan to make the electrical grid in town more resilient and ready for a world with vastly reduced fossil fuel pollution. It all gets a bit complicated, but they are finally ready to begin explaining it to their neighbors. Please come and learn about a plan that can make our electrical supply more reliable, and help keep rates affordable.
Come share some good company, music and a meal at the BCRC’s second summer potluck at Carding Brook Farm. If you came last year, you’ll know this shouldn’t be missed! We’ll talk a bit about how buying local helps fight climate change, and promise that mention of volts, watts or wires will be off the table!
THE OUTRAGE & OPTIMISM CORNER
There is so much horrible news every day coming out of our nation’s capital, it can even be hard to enjoy a beautiful summer day on the coast of Maine. Perhaps best to set aside an hour each day to put your personal outrage to productive work. Call your state and federal legislators, write a letter to the local newspaper, see if you can find a way to talk productively with the other side. And talk with your children and grandchildren — many of them are too young to remember the world before Trickle-Down and Citizens United, when we had a country that looked out for working men and women, and let the ultra-wealthy fend for themselves.
GOOD NEWS FROM AROUND THE WORLD
For some optimism, you’ll need to look at the little things that are still progressing on the local front, and the REALLY BIG things that are happening in other countries.
Turkey's clean power growth is bad news for gas market bulls. The fossil gas industry has been drooling over the growing energy demand in Turkey. But rapid expansions to Turkey's clean power supplies may leave them disappointed. Rapid growth in deployment of solar, wind and utility scale batteries is making natural gas look like a bad bet. Rueters
Africa Can ‘Leapfrog’ to 100% Renewables and Save Trillions by 2050. The sun shines in Africa — a lot! The continent, where 600 million people still lack grid electricity, can go straight to renewable distributed resources, and forget about waiting for the grid wires to reach their villages. A new report by Power Shift Africa and the Institute for Sustainable Futures at the University of Technology Sydney, Australia, shows that this is not only possible, but it could save over $8.3 trillion in fuel costs over a 30 year period. EnergyMix
Australia Turns to Solar and Battery Storage. A new report shows that the plunging cost of solar and battery storage has opened up a new frontier in the transition to green energy,, with cities and industries around the world now able to access low cost, 24-hour solar energy. Renew Economy
AND SOME FROM RIGHT HERE IN MAINE
South Portland is home to roughly 100 large oil storage tanks, each with a storage capacity of up to 7 million gallons — that’s 68,000 tons of CO2 ready to be released from each tank! Now a local citizens group has launched a “Toss the Tanks” campaign to encourage Suncor Energy, a tar sands oil operator based in Alberta, to sell its 100-acre tank farm and allow the City to put the Hill Street site to better use. Local resident Tim Honey heads up the effort, and reports that 81% of respondents to a survey of South Portland residents say they support the campaign. A symbolic effort, perhaps, since the 19 tanks are largely unused. But I, for one, am looking forward to a day when most petroleum infrastructure is unused, and the leaking uncapped wells, tanks, and pipelines can be cleaned up for good.
STILL TIME TO GET TAX BREAKS ON EVs, SOLAR & BATTERIES.
The subsidies embodied in the doomed Inflation Reduction Act will still be available for EVs through the end of September. For solar and battery arrays, the end is 12/31/25. If you are interested in renewable energy, don’t wait! Tax incentives will still be available for big corporations — it’s only the little guys who are getting cut out of cheap energy.
The loss of the EV subsidy and the downright penalties being imposed on EVs will likely spell the death of the American auto industry. Detroit is being incentivized to continue its love affair with big inefficient SUVs and pickup trucks, rather than transitioning to the cars of the future. Innovative and much cheaper Chinese EVs are already grabbing the rest of the world market.
Ford CEO Jim Farley recently described Chinese EVs as “far superior to what I see in the West.” He added that if his company loses the EV market to Chinese automakers, “We do not have a future Ford.”
“Do you know how many auctions natural gas has won against renewables? It’s a round number. Zero… Gas can’t compete…”. Australian Federal Energy Minister Chris Bowen speaking about the country's Capacity Investment Scheme bidding process.
"We have to pray for the conversion of many people … who still do not see the urgency of caring for our common home..," Pope Leo