Smart Grid = Smart Appliances

Posted on September 30, 2009 by Anthony Butler

smart_dryer Yesterday’s New York Times carried an article about appliance maker Whirlpool, who was the recipient of a $20 million grant from the Federal Government to fund product development in the rapidly developing field of smart appliances.

These devices, once connected to a Smart Grid-enabled electricity supply, will be able to receive information from the grid and cycle down their power demands during times of peak energy use (and higher costs per kWh). At the moment, they are anticipating savings of $40 per year for a standard size dryer.

As always, your mileage may vary.

Next in the Smart Grid appliance pipeline, General Electric Co. will soon roll out its first commercial smart appliance, a hybrid electric heat pump water heater. The company said the pump will save consumers $250 a year in energy costs.

Other “demand response” appliances expected within the next year are refrigerators able to delay defrost cycles and dishwashers that delay operation until energy demands and costs decline at night.

The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission estimates smart grid-enhanced home appliances could shave up to 7 percent off U.S. peak demand through 2019. When this is added to the 15% reduction in demand that Smart Grid monitoring devices have been able to achieve in field testing, we have within our grasp the ability to reduce electricity consumption by 20% without making any structural changes within our homes.

DIY Solar Power

Posted on September 29, 2009 by JPierce

Now that winter’s just around the corner, though you might be hard-pressed to believe it with how fickle Mother Nature’ been of late, you’re probably starting to dread the heating bills that accompany it. But just because it’s getting cold doesn’t mean you cannot take advantage of free energy from the sun.

For most of us, it’s probably too late to orient our homes so most windows are on the southern face, or plant deciduous trees on the same side of the house, and evergreens on the windward.¹ But there are still plenty of ways to take advantage of this underused resourced, not the least of which is leaving your curtains open during the day, especially if you have modern, low-emissivity (“low-e”), insulated windows.

Another interesting way to use the sun is through solar thermal technologies. Although these systems typically garner less attention than photovoltaics, they can work quite well at our latitude, either as a space or water heater. Commercial systems such as these solar hot air panels are actually quite economical at approximately $1,500, but it’s also possible to build your own. There are a number of plans available online, of varying complexity, from soda cans & spray paint to sloping window-mounted affairs. With a one-square-yard device you could provide as much heat as an electric baseboard or portable heater.²3

^{1. The deciduous trees shield the windows from intense solar exposure in the summer, but permit light to enter the home once the drop their leaves in fall. The conifers remain bushy year-round, acting as a windbreak and thereby reducing heat loss.}

^{2. Grey body calculation.}

^{3. A simple but imperfect test to determine if a sheet of acrylic will let some of your captured sunshine escape is to see if a remote will work behind it. If the remote does not work, then the sheet blocks infrared, which is what you want.}

Climate Change Ranks Last in US Poll

Posted on September 28, 2009 by LGlick

While the evidence keeps piling up on the already devastating effects of climate change, a recent Bloomberg Poll rates climate change as dead last, with only 2% or respondents ranking climate change as the top issue facing our nation. It is clear that the economy and health care are vitally important issues to address, but the abysmally low ranking of climate change reflects the success of disinformation coming from industry and media that has sown confusion in the public on the science of climate change.

“Which of the following do you see as the most important issue facing the country right now? . . .”
			.
		%
	The economy	46
	Health care	23
	The federal budget deficit	16
	The wars in Iraq and Afghanistan	10
	Climate change	2
	Other (vol.)	1
	Unsure	2

Recent findings highlight that many people feel helpless about Climate Change, which leads to both apathy and inaction, and long term threats are difficult for people to assess. Climate change is an issue not easily understood by the public due to the complexities of the climate, feedback loops, and tipping points. At the current rate of greenhouse gas emissions, the MET Office Report estimates that another 4 degrees Celsius could be in the pipeline by 2060, leading to major droughts, sea level rise, and ecosystem collapse. The original proposal to keep the globe from warming by 2 degrees by the end of the century is now seen as a “lost cause”. With Copenhagen just two months away, it is important for the public to better understand climate science and its impacts.

Scientists Speak out on the Climate Emergency

Posted on September 26, 2009 by LGlick

Warningco2 Dr. Melanie Fitzpatrick, Climate Scientist with the Union of Concerned Scientists, shared sobering data with concerned citizens at a Cambridge City Council special meeting on September 24th, as part of the city’s efforts to better understand the climate change emergency and respond at a scale proportionate to the emergency and consistent with the city’s own Climate Protection goals for 2010. Dr. Fitzpatrick emphasized that climate change is now occurring faster than the worst predictions of the IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change) models and cited evidence including that the melt season is lasting 1 week longer in the arctic, a 9% reduction per year in arctic sea ice, winters warming 4 degrees in the northern hemisphere, and record global sea temperatures for the last three months. Scientists are now estimating that some of the feared tipping points are decades away rather than centuries. If we were to stop emitting greenhouse gasses today, there is at least another 1 degree of warming in the pipeline and we could potentially see an additional 4-7 degrees Fahrenheit by the end of this century without major emission reductions.

While tipping point scenarios are still in the future, Dr. Jill Stein with the Physicians for Social Responsibility testified that there are already 300,000 deaths annually attributed to climate change due to record flooding, droughts, increased storm severity and occurrence, spread of infectious disease, and impacts to food and water supplies. For example, major flood events have increased four-fold in North America and six-fold in China compared to the century average. On a positive note, Dr. Stein related that by addressing climate change we will improve health and quality of life indices. The United States spends $2 trillion per year on medical expenses in which 75% goes to preventable chronic diseases. Investing in more walkable communities with local healthy food sources would reduce greenhouse gas emissions and improve our collective health. Fighting climate change would require our economic and social systems to take a long term view when planning for today.

Just consider that the majority of home owners purchase fire insurance, even though your risk of fire loss is very low– less than 1 percent or 1 fire in every 250 years. Under our current greenhouse gas emission rates, the chance of a catastrophic tipping point occurring like Amazonian desertification, Greenland Ice sheet melt, or the disruption of the Indian Monsoon now has a fifty percent chance of happening which would have devastating effects on the economic and social welfare of millions of people. Dr. Ackerman, Environmental Economist with the Stockholm Environmental Institute at Tufts University pointed out that to delay action would have disastrous socio-economic consequences for civilization. Dr Ackerman summarized four key ways to view long term economic questions:

Your grandchildren are Important! Current economic analysis has a high discount rate for future generations. This would be equivalent to saying that your prodigy is more important than your grand or great grandchildren.
If you insure your home and car for relatively low risk harm, we should invest in higher level risk like climate change.
Some things do not have dollar values. What is the value of a life or an ecosystem? Under the Clinton administration a human life was valued at $6,000 and the Bush administration lowered it to $4,000.
It is better to spend your money on prevention rather than treatment. Climate prevention could be spent on creating green jobs, developing new technology and industry.

Dr. John Sterman, an economist with the Sloan School of Management at MIT concluded that we should not wait to see the major impacts from Climate Change, as the stakes are too high and we will have likely triggered major tipping points. Dr. Sterman and the other panelists agreed that climate change can not be fought primarily with high tech solutions, but must include social participation that finds creative solutions both at the national and local level. Dr. Sterman in collaboration with Sustainability Institute, Ventana Systems, and MIT has developed a climate simulation to help you use a scientifically rigorous model to set a goal for CO₂ in the atmosphere, explore what it will take to reach that goal and to empower you to share those insights with others via graphs and explanation in order to make such actions happen. Discover Climate Interactive, their online community that creates, shares, and uses credible models, accessible simulations, and related media in order to improve the way leaders and citizens around the world think about the climate.

Free tickets for the Museum of Science

Posted on September 24, 2009 by JPierce

CEA has received a number of tickets for free general admission to the Museum of Science, and is making them available to interested parties. They will be available for pick-up from CEA’s offices beginning at noon on Friday 9/25, which should be staffed until 7PM on that date. Note: The tickets expire Wednesday 9/30.

Alas, this windfall comes a little late for you to catch Manufactured landscapes, and too early for Running the Numbers: Portraits of Mass Consumption. However, the museum has a number of other interesting exhibits—including several related to energy—as well as a special showing of the new film Food, Inc. on Wednesday at 2; advanced registration required.

The tickets were donated by The WhizKids Foundation, a Cambridge-based non-profit that works with local schools to improve STEM education.

Let’s Bury It?

Posted on September 23, 2009 by Tara Holmes

In New Haven, West Virginia, the Mountaineer Power Plant is about to embark on the world’s first attempt to capture and bury CO₂ from a coal-fired power plant (NYTimes). As early as this week, fluid CO₂ will be pumped into sandstone 7,800 feet underground and then into dolomite 400 feet below that; the liquid carbon dioxide is 30 to 40 feet high and hundreds of yards in length. The plan is to inject 100,000 tons annually for two to five years with the possibility of capturing 90% if Congress finds the technology economically feasible.

Initially sparked by political pressure to limit the amount of CO₂ released into the atmosphere, these plants are now faced with skeptics, scientists and environmentalists alike, who are concerned about the safety and long-term impact this new process could have. Specifically, CO₂ that’s injected into the Earth can filter into the ground water increasing the levels of carbonic acid. Other skeptics are concerned about the long-term pressure that could build as a result, leading to increased earthquakes. The EPA has discounted the risk. Either way, the bigger picture amounts to our continued dependence on fossil fuels for global energy. Until Congress understands the benefit of renewable energy both as a power source and economic stimulant, we will instead be faced with daunting and frightening “solutions” to climate change—like the one taking place in New Haven, WV—which are anything but.

Cambridge Climate Emergency Hearing: September 24th

Posted on September 23, 2009 by LGlick

The Cambridge City Council is holding a special meeting on the Climate Emergency at City Hall on Thursday, September 24th at 5:30pm and will be broadcast on Cambridge cable TV channel 8. This proceeds the council passing a policy order resolution recognizing the existence of a climate emergency on May 11, 2009. The resolution obligates the city of Cambridge to lead in responding to Climate Change and to direct the appropriate city departments to increase the City’s responses to a scale proportionate to the emergency and consistent with the city’s own Climate Protection goals for 2010 and beyond. A seven minute clip from the Cambridge city council hearing can be viewed on CCTV.

The city of Cambridge has taken a proactive role in addressing climate change and in December 2002 it adopted the Climate Protection Plan with the goal of reducing the emission of greenhouse gases (GHG) city-wide 20% below 1990 levels by 2010. Despite the efforts of City staff and others the City has fallen short of this goal. The Climate Emergency Hearing provides the opportunity for experts to weigh in on the current state of climate change and potential ways the city can address the crisis.

Speakers will include Dr. Melanie Fitzpatrick of the Union of Concerned Scientists, Dr. Jill Stein of Physicians for Social Responsibility, Dr. Frank Ackerman of the Stockholm Environmental Institute at Tufts University and Dr. John Sterman of MIT Sloan School of Management. Scientists will discuss the mounting evidence of climate change exceeding the worst-case IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change) scenario projections and the increasing risk of abrupt or irreversible climatic shifts.

For more information see http://greencambridge.wikispaces.com/Calendar+of+Events

Carbon Release Inventory

Posted on September 23, 2009 by JPierce

After releasing a report on the issue on Monday, yesterday the EPA finalized rules that require the nation’s largest polluters to report on carbon emissions. The program is similar to the established Toxics Release Inventory (TRI) program, which has been an immensely useful tool for researchers and watchdog groups, and also demonstrated to reduce emissions without further regulation. However, the picture is of course not as simple as that, some feel that the regulations have too many loopholes.

Meanwhile, NewScientist recently noted that if we shared more, we’d need less stuff and that this would dramatically decrease our impact on the environment; economies of scale, et cetera.

Results from the Smart Grid

Posted on September 23, 2009 by Anthony Butler

IBM-smart-grid For the last six months, IBM has been running a Smart Grid test in the town of Fayettevile, North Carolina. First results show the average Smart Grid home reduces their energy usage by a surprising 15%.

The reasons offered start with the companies involved (IBM & Consent) who claim; “If it can be measured, it can be managed.” This concept has been around for a number of years, but it needs further detail to understand exactly why they called it the Smart Grid and why it could be the Holy Grail of energy efficiency.

Each house on the Smart Grid gives owners the ability to set daily use profiles, check real-time energy consumption, create monthly bill targets and cycle off appliances during peak load times–all through a standard Internet connection. One of the things the Smart Grid allows you to see–and correct–is the surprising amount of ‘vampire power’ a house consumes. Your computers, air conditioners, HDTVs, and water heater all use energy even when they’re switched off. By either unplugging these devices or cycling down power supply when you are not in the house or asleep, you can immediately cut your electricity use by least 10%.

Of course, you don’t need to wait for your local utility or IBM to put you on the Smart Grid before you start reducing your energy bills and saving money. For the first day of fall, here’s some tips for winterizing your home. And some low/no cost steps you can take for year-round energy efficiency.

The Age of Stupid

Posted on September 20, 2009 by JPierce

DUH

Although the name “The Age of Stupid” brings to mind Gary Larson’s strip “Awkard Age,” or Mike Judge’s “Idiocracy,” the film is a docu-drama about global warming. In it a mid-century man looks back and wonders why did not act more swiftly. Tomorrow is the world premiere, with a simulcast if the festivites and interviews of prominent figures, plus a showing of the film itself. Alas, it does not seem to be entering wide circulation afterwards?! Luckily, there are a number of showings in the area.

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