Climate and energy

Weather. Ick. But in Arizona I bet the sun is shining – that’s a big chunk of how the state just attracted what will be one of the world’s largest solar thermal power plants (AZ Republic). Important to note: The facility will be built and operated by Spanish company Abengoa Solar and Arizona will reap 1,500 construction jobs; at 280 megawatts the plant will power at least 70,000 households; the state will use the power to meet their Renewable Portfolio Standard (requiring that utilities get 15 percent of their electricity from renewable sources by 2025); and the plant will be able to offset peak demand reliance on natural gas and will also be able to store heat for power generation for at least six hours after dark.

Whoa, wait. Intermittent power, per kilowatt hour costs, blah blah – is this plant still financially feasible? Quotable:

APS will pay about 14 cents per kilowatt-hour, compared with about 10 cents per kilowatt-hour from natural-gas plants at peak demand.

The premium is worth it because coal and natural-gas prices are unpredictable, and emissions from those plants likely someday will be taxed for their contributions to global climate change, Brandt said. That makes predictable solar prices attractive.

In general, the overhead costs for power plant construction and even basic operation are going up (IHS.com) – coal, gas, wind and nuclear (each generation type is after all built from many of the same materials, and they all involve turbines).

If you are at all the investor type, listen up to how we know this, because it’s cool: IHS and Cambridge Energy Research Associates (CERA) have developed a new Power Capital Costs Index (PCCI). The index “shows the cost of new power plant construction in North America increased 27 percent in 12 months and 19 percent in the most recent six months, reaching a level 130 percent higher than in 2000.”

Anyone else entertained/ mystified/ *headdesk* over how China kept coming up in the House and Senate debates over what Kansas should do about its own concerns re coal-fired generation? To add this to the mix (not that I really want anything to do with that mix) – China has a Renewable Portfolio Standard (RPS) that requires renewables to make up 15 percent of China’s primary energy consumption by 2020, up from 7 percent currently (CERA). For an additional/ another perspective on China going green, see the WSJournal Environmental Capital blog.

The whole logic in comparing Kansas coal consumption to China coal consumption entirely escaped me. Just because they pollute, we should too…? I am 100% percent certain that if I had gone to my parents when I was around age 15 and said, hey! I’m going to go out and have premarital sex and that’s okay because other kids are doing more of it, so there – they would have locked me up for the next thirty years.

Bad logic is bad logic, whatever your fact pattern is.

OK, quit laughing. Climate and energy news is very serious stuff, so don’t you dare enjoy it. Let’s see… oh yes. How could I forget? Coal. Lest a day go by without us mentioning the Sunflower Electric/ Holcomb plant expansion. (Plus, everyone else is mentioning it!)

Salina Journal’s Duane Schrag has really been on top of the algae reactor story – here is the latest installment. To work, the proposed Holcomb algae site might have to cover as much as 60,000 acres. Eek. Also, the Kansas City Star editorial board excoriated many of the Johnson and Wyandotte County legislators for voting for the coal plants.

EDIT: note for Spike, who emailed me! “Excoriated” means “ripped to shreds,” “burned,” and/or “really said harsh things to.” From the online free dictionary: “to censure strongly, to denounce.”

There are also other slang ways to put that – but, I won’t.

— Maril Hazlett, www.climateandenergy.org