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Forget global warming - it's Cycle 25 we need to worry about (and if NASA scientists are right the Thames will be freezing over again)

MAIL Online by David Rose

View Original Article HERE

The supposed ‘consensus’ on man-made global warming is facing an inconvenient challenge after the release of new temperature data showing the planet has not warmed for the past 15 years.

The figures suggest that we could even be heading for a mini ice age to rival the 70-year temperature drop that saw frost fairs held on the Thames in the 17th Century.

Based on readings from more than 30,000 measuring stations, the data was issued last week without fanfare by the Met Office and the University of East Anglia Climatic Research Unit. It confirms that the rising trend in world temperatures ended in 1997.

A painting, dated 1684, by Abraham Hondius depicts one of many frost fairs on the River Thames during the mini ice age

Meanwhile, leading climate scientists yesterday told The Mail on Sunday that, after emitting unusually high levels of energy throughout the 20th Century, the sun is now heading towards a ‘grand minimum’ in its output, threatening cold summers, bitter winters and a shortening of the season available for growing food.

Solar output goes through 11-year cycles, with high numbers of sunspots seen at their peak.

We are now at what should be the peak of what scientists call ‘Cycle 24’ – which is why last week’s solar storm resulted in sightings of the aurora borealis further south than usual. But sunspot numbers are running at less than half those seen during cycle peaks in the 20th Century.

Analysis by experts at NASA and the University of Arizona – derived from magnetic-field measurements 120,000 miles beneath the sun’s surface – suggest that Cycle 25, whose peak is due in 2022, will be a great deal weaker still.

According to a paper issued last week by the Met Office, there is a 92 per cent chance that both Cycle 25 and those taking place in the following decades will be as weak as, or weaker than, the ‘Dalton minimum’ of 1790 to 1830. In this period, named after the meteorologist John Dalton, average temperatures in parts of Europe fell by 2C.

However, it is also possible that the new solar energy slump could be as deep as the ‘Maunder minimum’ (after astronomer Edward Maunder), between 1645 and 1715 in the coldest part of the ‘Little Ice Age’ when, as well as the Thames frost fairs, the canals of Holland froze solid.

Yet, in its paper, the Met Office claimed that the consequences now would be negligible – because the impact of the sun on climate is far less than man-made carbon dioxide. Although the sun’s output is likely to decrease until 2100, ‘This would only cause a reduction in global temperatures of 0.08C.’ Peter Stott, one of the authors, said: ‘Our findings suggest a reduction of solar activity to levels not seen in hundreds of years would be insufficient to offset the dominant influence of greenhouse gases.’

These findings are fiercely disputed by other solar experts.

‘World temperatures may end up a lot cooler than now for 50 years or more,’ said Henrik Svensmark, director of the Center for Sun-Climate Research at Denmark’s National Space Institute. ‘It will take a long battle to convince some climate scientists that the sun is important. It may well be that the sun is going to demonstrate this on its own, without the need for their help.’

He pointed out that, in claiming the effect of the solar minimum would be small, the Met Office was relying on the same computer models that are being undermined by the current pause in global-warming.

CO2 levels have continued to rise without interruption and, in 2007, the Met Office claimed that global warming was about to ‘come roaring back’. It said that between 2004 and 2014 there would be an overall increase of 0.3C. In 2009, it predicted that at least three of the years 2009 to 2014 would break the previous temperature record set in 1998.

So far there is no sign of any of this happening. But yesterday a Met Office spokesman insisted its models were still valid.

‘The ten-year projection remains groundbreaking science. The period for the original projection is not over yet,’ he said.

Dr Nicola Scafetta, of Duke University in North Carolina, is the author of several papers that argue the Met Office climate models show there should have been ‘steady warming from 2000 until now’.

‘If temperatures continue to stay flat or start to cool again, the divergence between the models and recorded data will eventually become so great that the whole scientific community will question the current theories,’ he said.

He believes that as the Met Office model attaches much greater significance to CO2 than to the sun, it was bound to conclude that there would not be cooling. ‘The real issue is whether the model itself is accurate,’ Dr Scafetta said. Meanwhile, one of America’s most eminent climate experts, Professor Judith Curry of the Georgia Institute of Technology, said she found the Met Office’s confident prediction of a ‘negligible’ impact difficult to understand.

‘The responsible thing to do would be to accept the fact that the models may have severe shortcomings when it comes to the influence of the sun,’ said Professor Curry. As for the warming pause, she said that many scientists ‘are not surprised’.

She argued it is becoming evident that factors other than CO2 play an important role in rising or falling warmth, such as the 60-year water temperature cycles in the Pacific and Atlantic oceans.

‘They have insufficiently been appreciated in terms of global climate,’ said Prof Curry. When both oceans were cold in the past, such as from 1940 to 1970, the climate cooled. The Pacific cycle ‘flipped’ back from warm to cold mode in 2008 and the Atlantic is also thought likely to flip in the next few years .

Pal Brekke, senior adviser at the Norwegian Space Centre, said some scientists found the importance of water cycles difficult to accept, because doing so means admitting that the oceans – not CO2 – caused much of the global warming between 1970 and 1997.

The same goes for the impact of the sun – which was highly active for much of the 20th Century.

‘Nature is about to carry out a very interesting experiment,’ he said. ‘Ten or 15 years from now, we will be able to determine much better whether the warming of the late 20th Century really was caused by man-made CO2, or by natural variability.’

Meanwhile, since the end of last year, world temperatures have fallen by more than half a degree, as the cold ‘La Nina’ effect has re-emerged in the South Pacific.

‘We’re now well into the second decade of the pause,’ said Benny Peiser, director of the Global Warming Policy Foundation. ‘If we don’t see convincing evidence of global warming by 2015, it will start to become clear whether the models are bunk. And, if they are, the implications for some scientists could be very serious.’

After TMDL process, Bay Program finds itself at a crossroads

Bay Journal by Karl Blankenship

View Original Article HERE

This article explains a lot that formerly seemed inexplicable. Now we see that DNREC has been cutting deals with the environmental officials of other states without consulting with the people of Delaware.

This article describes an event in 2000 where DNREC promised other states to create buffers, even though they had no authority in Delaware law to do so. This resulted in Delaware citizens being forced to sue and spend close to $100,000 to defend their rights.

It is time for the department to stop cutting secret deals (or deals that 99.99% will never find out about) with people who are not from Delaware. DNREC must represent the people of Delaware.

How is it possible that DNREC can make these kind of commitments for us without any kind of public hearing or input from us in advance? It's time for the General Assembly to change the implementing legislation so that it can never happen again.

Standing inside a tent while rain drizzled outside, regional leaders gathered in June 2000 to outline a bright future for the Bay and its watershed. It was a future in which sprawl development would be reined in, oyster populations rebuilt and Bay water quality restored.

"This new agreement is historic, without a doubt," proclaimed then-EPA Administrator Carol Browner, as she and other Bay leaders signed the Chesapeake 2000 agreement.

Some of the agreement's 102 commitments have been achieved or exceeded, such as permanently protecting 20 percent of the watershed from development, establishing more than 500 miles of water trails, and opening more than 1,357 miles of river to migratory fish.

Others, such as a tenfold increase in oyster population and restoring 25,000 acres of wetlands, fell far short.

One was a spectacular misfire: States couldn't even agree how to measure the goal to slow the rate of "harmful sprawl" by 30 percent.

But the region's failure to restore Bay water quality by 2010 dwarfed the other accomplishments and disappointments. As a result, EPA officials at the end of December announced another "historic" Bay initiative: a highly regulatory program, known as a total maximum daily load, which requires states to hit pollution targets or risk punitive consequences.

Largely unnoticed in the noise surrounding the new TMDL, was that most of the remaining Chesapeake 2000 commitments - many still unmet - quietly expired on Dec. 31.

Today, the state-federal Bay Program, which was started as a voluntary partnership between states and the federal government in 1983, is at a crossroads.

Most agree that the TMDL dramatically changed the partnership, at least as it pertains to water quality issues. Instead of negotiating among equals, the TMDL is an EPA requirement, and the agency has the power to impose a variety of sanctions against states that fail to keep pace with nutrient reduction programs. Further, EPA actions during the TMDL development process, including its imposition of tight deadlines for writing state cleanup plans, were seen as heavy-handed, and left the state-federal relationship strained.

"The implementation of the TMDL has, I believe, fundamentally altered the nature of the program," said Peyton Robertson, director of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's Chesapeake Bay Office. "You can't reasonably argue that it is a voluntary approach anymore."

That has ramifications. He and others are worried that the TMDL will make it more difficult to forge agreements with states on other Bay issues, such as those that deal with land protection or habitat restoration.

There's good reason for that worry. The EPA has said that if states don't make enough progress implementing Bay cleanup plans, it may force greater nutrient reductions for wastewater treatment plants - something that would have a huge price tag. In the eyes of state agencies, that threat clearly elevates water quality issues over other Bay priorities.

"That is our primary focus," said John Hines, executive deputy secretary for programs with the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection. "While we recognize that there are a number of broader commitments within the agreements, our number one priority has to be improvement of water quality."

That point has been echoed by many other state officials at recent meetings.

But it raises a fundamental question: Is the Bay Program about more than just water quality?

More than water quality?

The Bay Program was formed as a voluntary partnership to implement coordinated plans to improve and protect both the water quality and living resources of the Bay.

It's overseen by the Executive Council, which includes the EPA administrator; the governors of Maryland, Virginia and Pennsylvania; the mayor of the District of Columbia; and the chair of the Chesapeake Bay Commission, which represents the legislatures of the three states.

The original, one-page 1983 agreement that launched the program was replaced by a more expansive seven-page agreement in 1987 that said the Bay's significance transcended regional boundaries and committed the partners to managing the Bay "as an integrated ecosystem." It established broad goals that have guided the Bay Program for years: to reduce pollution; restore populations of fish, underwater grasses and other living resources; protect the watershed from the impacts of growth; improve public access; and promote public understanding and stewardship. Committees were created to address key areas and address dozens of individual actions.

The Chesapeake 2000 agreement built on the 1987 agreement. It outlined scores of actions, many with specific due dates, intended to better drive coordinated actions. In addition, the Executive Council has adopted numerous directives to address specific policies over the years, such as environmental education, fish passages and forest conservation.

Nutrient reductions have always been a cornerstone of the Bay Program since its 1987 agreement, which called for a 40 percent nutrient reduction by the year 2000, a goal that was missed.

But many say the Bay's restoration has to be about more than water quality. For example, for resources such as fish and crabs, healthy habitats such as reefs and natural shorelines can be more important than water quality. And the introduction of invasive species can fundamentally alter the Bay ecosystem.

And engaging the public in the restoration remains an important challenge.

"One of the greatest problems we have in restoring the Chesapeake Bay is being able to explain to people how the health of the Bay and the waters draining to it is relative to their lives," said Frank Dawson, assistant secretary for aquatic resources with the Maryland Department of Natural Resources. "We haven't been able to do that to the level that people would want to invest as they may need to do to restore the Bay."

Programs that engage citizens - such as efforts to improve fish and waterfowl populations, create more public access and conserve land - are critical, he said.

"The vision forward should be to look at the Chesapeake Bay as an ecosystem," Robertson said. "It is a nationally significant multi-state ecosystem that demands some level of coordination."

But incorporating other issues into Bay Program planning has become difficult. Development of the TMDL and the watershed implementation plans, which detail how states plan to meet the nutrient reduction goals, has dominated most high-level Bay Program meetings over the last two years. That's likely to continue this year as states have to develop a new round of watershed plans showing, at a more local level, how nutrient reduction goals will be met.

A new era of federal leadership?

To some extent, reaching any agreement on a common path forward has also been muddied by the Obama administration's attempt to demonstrate a "new era of federal leadership" though an executive order issued by the president in May 2009. That order required federal agencies to develop a federal plan for Bay restoration, which was completed last May.

The federal strategy followed in the footsteps of past agreements. It called for habitat protection and restoration, coordinated fisheries management, open space conservation and citizen stewardship. But hefty price tags come with some of the specifics, such as restoring oyster populations in 20 tributaries and protecting 2 million additional acres of open space by 2025.

Efforts to align the federal strategy within the Bay Program have met with little enthusiasm from many state officials who, after dealing with TMDL-related mandates and deadlines, are reluctant to adopt new, potentially costly, goals set by federal agencies.

"How the federal partners respond, and how they step up to the plate in doing this executive order plan is very much on their shoulders," Hines said.

"It doesn't affect the states at all," agreed Anthony Moore, assistant Virginia secretary of natural resources for Chesapeake Bay restoration. "I don't think we should align with the executive order to work with federal goals."

The goals in the federal strategy were set after consultations with the states. Jim Edward, acting director of the EPA Bay Program Office, said federal agencies recognized they could not reach goals by themselves, so the strategy was intended to reflect the direction where they felt the partnership was going.

"We tried to think ahead, recognizing that without the full engagement of the partners, we couldn't get there," Edward said. "We tried to set up a framework that would allow that to happen down the line. It hasn't quite worked out that way."

Complicating matters, the administrations in both Virginia and Pennsylvania have changed since most of the federal strategy was drafted. The federal strategy was also written with the intent of bringing more federal money to help achieve far-reaching goals. Instead, changes in Congress after the 2010 elections have put the emphasis on cutting federal spending - not new programs.

Now, instead of asking states to help meet federal commitments, Moore said the U.S. government should use its limited resources to help states meet federally imposed water quality goals. "Funding and getting these programs done for the TMDL is going to be a big concern for the states," he said. "The federal government needs to help us with our goals."

In the short term, the job of figuring out how to knit together historic Bay Program priorities with state and federal initiatives is likely to fall on a series of committees - dubbed Goal Implementation Teams - which deal with specific Bay issues. Those teams include representatives from state and federal agencies, nonprofit organizations, academia and others.

Ultimately, Edward said, a new Bay agreement was needed. But he said, that wasn't likely until agencies recover from "TMDL exhaustion."

"Even on our end, we've been overwhelmed with the TMDL and the watershed implementation plans and everything else," he said. "It's been difficult. But you've also got to have a long-term vision."

Edward said that after new watershed plans are finalized early next year it may be easier to move onto other issues, such as a potential new Bay agreement. But past agreements have taken a year or more to negotiate and write. That means a new agreement might not be finalized until 2012 or 2013.

A lukewarm reception

So far, the idea of writing a new agreement has gotten, at best, a lukewarm reception. "It comes down to, 'do we constantly want to keep setting new goals, do we want to perpetually plan, or do we actually want to see systematic changes and get something done?'" Hines said.

Indeed, the TMDL resulted precisely because of the perception that too little progress was being made under previous, voluntary agreements.

While some commitments have fallen short, past efforts to coordinate regional action through various Bay Program agreements have yielded successes, others contend. The Bay Program was responsible for the first regional effort in the nation to promote the planting of forested riparian buffers, an initiative that mobilized legions of volunteers over the years. An initial goal of planting 2,010 miles of forest buffers by 2010 was met in 2002.

"Whole programs and whole organizations were created around the forest buffer goal," said Carin Bisland, associate director for ecosystem management with the EPA Bay Program Office. "So I do think that paradigm of setting the goals works when the partners all feel there is an added value to achieve them."

While much of any new agreement may be voluntary, Edward said he expected state and federal agencies alike to use more regulatory muscle where appropriate. For instance, he noted fishing regulations, such as those for blue crabs, have been getting tougher to help resources recover.

Still, any new agreement will have to weigh water quality issues and other Bay priorities. That puts the EPA in a difficult spot. The agency is charged with enforcing the regulatory TMDL program on one hand, and coordinating the traditional voluntary partnership on the other.

"EPA has to continue to play an active and leadership role in the Bay Program," said DNR's Dawson. "But I think there is a difference in making sure that your part of the job gets done, and making sure the whole job gets done."

If the Bay Program can't more effectively deal with issues not related to water quality, he and others suggest other forums may be needed to deal with them. For example, most of the recent efforts that led to increased protections for blue crabs and are credited with helping the stock rebound from near-record lows happened outside the formal Bay Program partnership.

Others worry that without an overarching agreement, opportunities for coordination will be lost. The stream buffer initiative thrived in part because local organizations, state agencies and others could see the benefit to both local streams' health and broader Bay goals.

Ann Swanson, executive director of the Chesapeake Bay Commission, and one of the prime authors of the Chesapeake 2000 agreement, said writing a new agreement would be "really difficult" if efforts to implement the TMDL do not go smoothly.

But she said agreements negotiated among all Bay partners are essential to provide the "blanket of policy" that has driven goals such as land preservation. Virginia, for instance, specifically adopted a 400,000-acre land preservation goal during the Tim Kaine administration to meet the Chesapeake 2000 goal. Current Gov. Bob McDonnell has vowed to protect a similar amount.

"But I think it is going to take all of the intelligence, all of the political savvy, and all of the tolerance of the people in the Bay Program to negotiate that new agreement," Swanson said. "And if we do it, it will be groundbreaking, as every agreement before it has been."

Bay Restoration Highlights

1983

• A Congressionally mandated EPA study is released highlighting excess nutrients, loss of underwater grass beds, toxic chemicals and the overharvest of fisheries as the main problems facing the Bay.
• In response to the EPA study, the states of Maryland, Pennsylvania, Virginia; the District of Columbia; the Chesapeake Bay Commission; and the EPA sign the 1983 Chesapeake Bay Agreement creating the Chesapeake Bay Program as a voluntary partnership to address Bay issues.

1984

• The Maryland legislature passes the Chesapeake Bay Critical Areas Protection Act, a plan to control development along the shores of the Bay and its tidal rivers.

1985

• Maryland places a moratorium on fishing for striped bass.
• A phosphate detergent ban is enacted in Maryland. Washington, DC, follows in 1986, Virginia in 1988 and Pennsylvania in 1990.

1987

• The 1987 Chesapeake Bay Agreement is signed. It outlines numerous goals to control pollution, restore living resource populations and improve stewardship. It sets a goal to reduce nutrient pollution entering the Bay 40 percent by 2000.

1988

• Virginia adopts the Chesapeake Bay Preservation Act to provide land use guidance to local governments near the Bay.

1989

• Virginia places a moratorium on fishing for striped bass.

1992

• The Bay Program assigns nutrient reduction goals to individual rivers, leading to the development of the first tributary strategy plans to guide nutrient reduction efforts.

1995

• Striped bass are declared restored by the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission.

1996

• A Bay Program Riparian Forest Buffer Initiative calls for planting 2,010 miles of forest buffers along streams and shorelines by the year 2010. That goal is reached in 2002.
• The largest wastewater treatment facility in the Chesapeake Bay region, the Blue Plains Wastewater Treatment Plant in the District of Columbia, begins biological nutrient removal for half of its flow capacity.

1999

• The settlement of a lawsuit against the EPA requires the development of a total maximum daily load for the Chesapeake by May 2011 unless the Bay is cleaned up first.

2000

• Chesapeake 2000 is signed, establishing 102 commitments to restore the health of the Bay and its living resources, including a goal to restore Bay water quality by 2010.

2008

• Based on new figures that show dramatic declines in the Chesapeake Bay blue crab population, Maryland and Virginia implement emergency harvest regulations.
• For the first time, the federal Farm Bill contains targeted funding for agricultural conservation practices in the Chesapeake Bay region.

2009

• President Barack Obama signs an executive order calling on the federal government to lead the effort to control pollution and protect wildlife habitats in the Chesapeake Bay region.

2010

• The EPA releases a total maximum daily load for the Bay.

Federal Chesapeake Bay Strategy Highlights

The federal Chesapeake Bay strategy completed in May 2010 established broad goals in four policy areas with several measurable outcomes for each goal.

Restore Clean Water Goal

Reduce nutrients, sediment and other pollutants to meet Bay water quality goals for dissolved oxygen, clarity, chlorophyll a and toxic contaminants.

• Water Quality Outcome: Implement 100 percent of pollution reduction actions for nitrogen, phosphorus and sediment no later than 2025, with 60 percent of Bay segments attaining standards by 2025.
• Stream Restoration Outcome: Improve the health of streams so that 70 percent of sampled streams throughout the watershed are in fair, good or excellent condition by 2025.
• Agricultural Restoration Outcome: Apply new conservation practices on 4 million acres of agricultural working lands in high-priority watersheds by 2025.

Recover Habitat Goal

Restore a network of land and water habitats to support priority species and to afford other public benefits, including water quality, recreational uses and scenic value across the watershed.

• Wetlands Outcome: Restore 30,000 acres of tidal and nontidal wetlands and enhance the function of an additional 150,000 acres of degraded wetlands by 2025.
• Forest Buffer Outcome: Restore riparian forest buffers to 63 percent, or 181,440 miles, of the total riparian miles by 2025.
• Fish Passage Outcome: Restore historical fish migratory routes by opening 1,000 additional stream miles by 2025.

Sustain Fish & Wildlife Goal

Sustain healthy populations of fish and wildlife that contribute to a resilient ecosystem and vibrant economy.

• Oyster Outcome: Restore native oyster habitat and populations in 20 tributaries by 2025.
• Blue Crab Outcome: Maintain a sustainable blue crab interim rebuilding target of 200 million adults in 2011 and develop a new population target for 2012 through 2025.
• Brook Trout Outcome: Restore naturally reproducing brook trout populations in headwater streams by improving 58 subwatersheds from the 'reduced' classification to 'healthy' by 2025.
• Black duck Outcome: Restore the capacity of the Bay watershed to support 100,000 wintering American black ducks by 2025.

Conserve Land & Increase Public Access Goal

Conserve landscapes treasured by citizens to maintain water quality and habitat; sustain working forests, farms and maritime communities; and conserve lands of cultural, indigenous and community value. Expand public access to the Bay and its tributaries through existing and new local, state and federal parks, refuges, reserves, trails and partner sites.

• Land Conservation Outcome: Protect an additional 2 million acres of lands throughout the watershed currently identified as high conservation priorities at the federal, state or local level by 2025.
• Public Access Outcome: Increase public access to the Bay and its tributaries by adding 300 public access sites by 2025.

Chesapeake 2000: How Some Goals Fared

The Chesapeake 2000 agreement contained 102 commitments, although many were for the completion of reports or development of policies.

Here's a look at how some of the more notable commitments fared:

• Correct nutrient- and sediment-related water quality problems in the Chesapeake by 2010. Not achieved
• Achieve a tenfold increase in native oysters by 2010, measured from a 1994 baseline. Not achieved; little change in oyster population
• Achieve a no-net-loss of existing wetlands and their functions within regulatory programs. Achieved
• Restore 25,000 acres of wetlands by 2010. Not achieved; about 54 percent complete
• Eliminate the input of toxic pollutants from all controllable sources to levels that result in no toxic impact to living resources or human health. Not achieved
• Expand the number of waste pump-out facilities for recreational boats 50 percent by 2010. Not achieved
• Install at least 60 innovative stormwater management demonstration projects by 2006 that seek to achieve no net increase in pollution loads as well as maintain pre-development hydrology. Achieved
• Permanently preserve 20 percent of watershed from development by 2010. Achieved
• Reduce the rate of harmful sprawl 30 percent by 2010, measured from a 1992–97 baseline. Not achieved; no agreement reached on definition of harmful sprawl
• Expand the number of public access points to the Bay and its tributaries 30 percent by 2010. Not achieved; about 95 percent complete
• Increase the number of designated water trails within the watershed by 500 miles by 2010. Achieved
• Beginning with the class of 2005, provide a meaningful Bay or stream outdoor experience for every school student in the watershed before graduation. Not achieved; about 80 percent complete

What the Dover Sun Park Will Really Cost You

Caesar Rodney Institute
by David T. Stevenson, Director
Read Original Article Here

It is astonishing you are not allowed to know what the Dover Sun Park is costing you. The total added cost of the Sun Park compared to using conventional power over the twenty year contract will be $93 million or almost $5 million a year! The total generation cost for power will average about three and a half times the cost of conventional power or thirty six and a half cents a kilowatt-hour. But, you say, won’t the savings in greenhouse gas generation be worth it? Using the current value of carbon dioxide emission permits in the regional cap and trade market the Dover Sun Park carbon offsets are worth less than $25 thousand a year. Calpine switched from coal to natural gas at the Edge Moor electric generating plant saving money and a years’ worth of sun park carbon emissions every five days.
The City of Dover refuses to release the price they will pay for power from the park citing confidentiality agreement restrictions. Comments made a year ago about the added average net cost to a consumer allowed us to estimate the City of Dover will pay about eighteen cents a kilowatt-hour. For comparison, generation now costs ten cents a kilowatt-hour from conventional sources.
The city also gets to use 15% of the Solar Renewable Energy Credits (SREC) generated by the park to offset the cost of purchasing SREC’s. When the contract was signed SREC value was about $270 for every one thousand kilowatt-hours of power produced which would have offset about half the solar price premium. However, the current spot market value is only about $100 and is expected to drop further. These SREC’s only have value because the state requires power companies to buy them. The cost is passed on to each of us in our electric bills.
The city also assumed the cost of conventional power would increase dramatically but the U.S. Energy Information Agency now expects electric prices to be stable. The city will pay about $20 million extra for power over the twenty years.
Delmarva Power and the Delaware Municipal Electric Cooperative will buy the rest of the SREC’s at a cost of $50 million. Delmarva Power contracted to buy 70% of the SREC’s at $216.70 each and will wind up paying a $28 million premium over the spot market SREC price.
In addition, White Oak Solar Energy, LLC, who owns the park, will receive a $13.5 million federal tax credit paid for with deficit spending. This will add another $9.5 million in interest (at 3%) over the twenty years. We pay for the credit and the interest in our tax bills. White Oak will make a 14% a year return on their investment. The only risk to White Oak was the risk of falling SREC value. The risk was shifted to residential and small commercial customers through long term utility contracts.
Press releases praised the creation of 200 “green” constructions jobs to complete the second largest solar park east of the Mississippi. Also released were the actual hours worked. Those hours convert to each person working about seven weeks or the annualized equivalent of 28 jobs. Those very temporary 28 jobs will cost us $3.3 million each over the next twenty years.
David T. Stevenson, Director

How to Rebuild Delaware’s Electric Generation Capacity: You Decide

Caesar Rodney Institute
DATE : 1/12/12 David T. Stevenson, Director, Center for Energy Competitiveness
View PDF of Article HERE


Delaware imports 60% of its electric power. We get penalized with higher electric rates for causing grid congestion. This is a major reason our manufacturers pay 50% more for electricity than the average state and why residential customers pay an extra $400 a year.
For over 100 years the primary focus of electric generation has been to provide reliable power at the lowest possible cost. That mission was accomplished very well and power generation was an engine of economic growth. More recently we also expect power production to reduce air pollution and green house gases.
Assume, dear reader, you have $2 billion to re-build Delaware’s electric generating infrastructure. Use the table below to chose the best path forward to meet our electric demand. Here is some additional information. We currently pay about 9 cents a kilowatt-hour for the electric portion of our electric bills because of pricing rules from PJM Interconnection, the regional grid manager. Most of the country pays 6 cents. To avoid pricing penalties we need to build 75% of our generating needs including reserve capacity. You should consider cost, reliability, job creation potential, air pollution reduction, and green house gas reduction. The jobs impact includes the impact of higher or lower electric prices.
In regard to reliability, base load power is available all the time, intermittent power is available only part time and the hours of availability cannot be predicted. The chart below gives comparative properties of different generating resources. You decide the best solution!

Comparison of Investing $2 Billion in Various Energy Generation Technologies
Advanced Natural Gas		Onshore Wind		Fuel Cell		Offshore Wind		Solar
Electric Price, Cents/kilowatt-hour	6		10		22		24		21
Reliability	Base Load		Intermittent		Base Load		Intermittent		Intermittent
% of Delaware Electricity Needs	83%		18%		10%		7%		8%
Air Pollution Reduction, mm lbs/year	212		45		26		18		20
CO2 Reduction, mm tons/yr	8.1		2.7		0.9		1.1		1.2
Delaware job impact x-construction	2758		-162		-1190		-930		-839

See CRI website for sources and calculations

Advanced Natural Gas generation looks like a winner as it actually lowers our cost of power while maintaining reliability and doing the most by far to reduce pollution and greenhouse gas emission. Delaware energy policy favors the more expensive renewable options and ignores natural gas

Scientists want climate change in young minds

The Washington Times by Ben Wolfgang
View Original Article Here

Teachings to point to human causes

Climate change subscribers say the fight against global warming will require younger soldiers.
On Monday, the National Center for Science Education, a nonprofit group that denounces intelligent design and supports an evolution-only curriculum in the classroom, will expand its mission. The organization of scientists, anthropologists and others is turning its attention to climate change, and it will mount an aggressive effort to teach the nation’s schoolchildren that climate change is real and is being driven by human activity.
“For 20 years, we’ve helped teachers cope with what we can only describe as societal or political problems in teaching evolution. They’re running into the same opposition in teaching climate change,” NCSE Executive Director Eugenie Scott said. “We worry, because of our experience with evolution, that basic science is going to be compromised as a result of this political and ideological opposition. Good science needs to be taught.”
Critics point out important distinctions between the defense of evolution and the promotion of climate change, since the latter carries more obvious and immediate policy implications. Alarmists call for broad federal policies to combat climate change, such as President Obama’s proposed “cap-and-trade” legislation, which is designed to limit carbon emissions. Although that measure is on hold, a law imposed by the European Union requires all airline companies to pay for their carbon emissions during flights in and out of Europe. Officials at the United Nations have even called for a global tax on carbon dioxide emissions.
Ms. Scott maintains that the NCSE won’t advocate for teachers to push liberal policy solutions to climate change, but others fear that students will be targets of political indoctrination.
“If you say it’s man-made, you must be implying some solutions. [Climate change] is taught to promote a particular political point of view, and that’s the problem,” said Kathleen Porter-Magee, senior director of the High Quality Standards Program at the Thomas B. Fordham Institute, a Washington-based conservative education think tank.
“It’s very different than the evolution debate. The whole evolution versus intelligent design debate very much relates to the issues of separation of church and state. Climate change is different because it doesn’t touch on that at all. It comes from an environmentalist perspective.”
Ms. Porter-Magee said such efforts essentially amount to “the politicization of curriculum.”
Even if schools don’t explicitly call for cap-and-trade or similar measures, she said, students could bombarded with strong subliminal messages to take action against climate change.
Textbooks and other materials geared toward the youngest students already are peddled to school leaders.
The University of California at Berkeley operates the website globalwarmingkids.net, a subsection of its climatechangeeducation.org initiative. On the website, instructors can order “Global Warming for Young Minds,” a handbook aimed at 6- to 10-year-olds. It also offers “Let’s Stop Climate Change” DVDs, in which a hippopotamus named Simon encourages children to take action against global warming.
Despite those efforts, principals, superintendents and school boards retain the final say about what their students are taught. Unlike the fights between evolution and intelligent design, the curriculum has no legal backing.
After a school board in Dover, Pa., voted in 2004 to require that biology classes teach creationism alongside evolution, the issue eventually ended up before a federal judge in a closely watched case with national implications. Judge John E. Jones III ultimately ruled that intelligent design, by its nature, is a religious theory and its teaching in classrooms violated the First Amendment.
“There is no comparable provision for climate change. It’s not unconstitutional to teach bad science,” Ms. Scott said. “I don’t see any legal recourse, as we have with the First Amendment for [the teaching of] evolution.”
With no legal defense, the NCSE and other groups instead will launch a public relations effort. If it is successful, climate change skeptics could become a small minority and might be derided for their beliefs.

Some already have faced persecution. Last week, Reuters news service reported that actor and conservative economist Ben Stein filed a $300,000 lawsuit against Japanese manufacturer Kyocera after, he said, the company booted him from an advertising campaign when it learned he doesn’t subscribe to the theory that humans are responsible for climate change.

Wind Turbine Ban Proposed in Virginia

Heartlander by Kenneth Artz

View Original Article Here

Floyd County, Virginia is considering banning structures taller than 40 feet on ridges within the county. Although the ordinance would apply to most structures, with several narrow exceptions, the proposed ban has been drafted in response to local concerns about potential siting of wind farms.

Residents Oppose Wind Farms
Nestled among the Blue Ridge Mountains in southwestern Virginia, Floyd County has several scenic ridges that wind power companies argue would make good locations for industrial wind farms. During county supervisor meetings, local residents have expressed strong opposition to any such wind farms.

Wayne Booth, a cattle farmer whose land provides breathtaking views of Willis Ridge, has collected more than 600 signatures from local residents opposing potential wind turbine placement on the ridge.

Lauren Yoder, a newly elected county supervisor, is struggling with the issue.

“I’m kind of a personal property rights guy,” Yoder told the Roanoke Times. “I’m leaning away from the ordinance right now.”

The proposed ordinance presents a dilemma for many property rights advocates. Very few wind farms would exist without market-disruptive subsidies and renewable power mandates. Nevertheless, the Floyd County ordinance would restrict private property rights.

Adding yet another twist, opposing the ordinance would thwart environmental opposition to wind farms after similar interests and groups have severely restricted much more economical conventional energy production.

Alarming Bird Deaths
Conservation groups worry about wind farms doing more than just despoiling scenic vistas. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service reports wind turbines kill 440,000 birds each year, including many protected and endangered species. The wind turbines also kill prodigious numbers of bats, which are important for insect control and plant pollination.

Ramping up the number of wind farms will similarly increase the number of bird and bat deaths above current kill numbers.

“Ironically, [wind farm] proponents often overlook the impact wind turbines have on the environment. Advocates of public policy that subsidizes or mandates the increased use of renewable energy and, in this case, wind energy, seem to have a ‘renewable energy at any cost attitude,’ ” said Todd Wynn, director of the Energy, Environment, and Agriculture Task Force at the American Legislative Exchange Council.

‘Free Pass’ to Kill
H. Sterling Burnett, a senior fellow at the National Center for Policy Analysis, agrees, noting wind turbines are known as "the Cuisinarts of the air.”

“If coal-fired, nuclear, or natural gas power plants killed federally protected golden eagles, they would be shut down. If you or I killed a federally protected species, we’d be thrown in jail. Yet for some reason, wind farms are given a free pass. This has been going on for more than 20 years now,” Burnett said.

HawkWatch International warns a single proposed wind farm project in Wyoming will cause 700 raptor deaths each year, including 200 golden eagle kills annually. With only 30,000 golden eagles in the entire United States, HawkWatch says wind power projects are rendering populations of the birds unsustainable.

A newly released U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service field report stated nearly 500 bird carcasses were discovered in a mere two-week span at the Laurel Mountain wind farm in West Virginia.

Wildlife groups point out carcasses found at the foot of wind turbines represent merely a fraction of the birds that killed by the machines. Other victims of turbine strikes aren’t killed immediately but die shortly after the birds have flown away to other locations.

Mice, Rats Safe to Thrive
In addition to the avian deaths, wind turbines create a safety zone for rodent breeding because birds of prey cannot patrol wind turbine areas. Communities in the vicinity of wind farms report disturbing spikes in the mouse and rat populations.

“They may figure out a way someday to prevent the wind turbines from killing birds, but the real problem is where you build the farms. In order for wind power to make sense, you have to build the turbines in areas where there is a lot of wind, and this just happens to be in the flight paths of migratory birds, which don’t just flap their wings to get where they’re going, they ride the thermal wind currents,” said Burnett.

Kenneth Artz (iamkenartz@hotmail.com) writes from Dallas, Texas.

Oil Production Keeps Recession at Bay in North Dakota

HEARTLANDER
by Kenneth Artz
VIEW ORIGINAL ARTICLE HERE

Oil production in the Bakken shale formation is making unemployment virtually nonexistent in North Dakota. With 200 rigs pumping 440,000 barrels of oil per day, the state’s unemployment rate is holding at 3.5 percent. Many of the jobs pay exceptionally well, with high school graduates making more than $100,000 per year.

Jobs Looking for Workers

“We have 18,000 jobs looking for people,” North Dakota Rep. Rich Berg (R) told the Hill, noting, “if our country’s GDP grew at 7 percent, as it does in [my] state, most of our problems would be over in two years.”

“The regulatory environment was already low in North Dakota, certainly better than California’s and some other oil-producing states,” said Brett Narloch, executive director of the North Dakota Policy Council. “As we move forward with oil production, I expect the business environment to get better."

New Challenges, Opportunities

Oil production in North Dakota now rivals that of OPEC member Ecuador, which produces 485,000 barrels per day. As production keeps increasing, more workers are needed.

The North Dakota legislature is using some of the state's oil revenue to fund $1.2 billion in infrastructure improvements, including building roads and schools to accommodate the many people bringing their families when they move to the state to work.

"The state is reaping huge rewards from the oil industry, and as a result they are paying up front with cash for everything,” Narloch observed.

State Spending Increasing

One of the primary beneficiaries of this oil boom has been public schools. The state legislature has directed $340 million in oil-related revenues to public schools during the next two years. Other oil revenues will be fund a disaster relief fund and enable a reduction in property taxes.

“North Dakota has seen a 25 percent to 30 percent increase in the state budget. This is twice the rate of growth as the federal government,” said Narloch.

To preserve oil-related funds, the state legislature has directed 30 percent of the funds from the state’s 6.5 percent oil extraction tax be sent to the state’s Legacy Fund. The Legacy Fund cannot be touched until 2017, when accrued interest will become available for spending measures. Principal can be spent only if two-thirds of the legislature agrees to do so, and no more than 15 percent of the principal can be spent in any biennium.

Will EPA Pull the Plug?

Most of the Bakken shale production is occurring on private land, but analysts and state legislators fear the federal the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) may nevertheless seek to shut it down. EPA is currently investigating hydraulic fracturing (fracking) production techniques, which are utilized in shale oil production.

“If EPA decides to ban fracking, that shuts down the entire industry since so many of the wells operate by that procedure. It would kill this once-in-a-lifetime opportunity,” Narloch explained.

Dirty Deeds

Heartlander
By Maureen Martin
View Original Article HERE

A Maryland man now has a criminal record for connecting a sewer line discharging from a backed-up sewer pipe inside a military retirement home in Washington, DC to an outside storm drain.

The home’s manager said staff there had understood the storm drain discharged to the local sewage treatment plant, and it had been their practice for decades to make such connections. About 30 percent of the storm drains in the DC area are connected to the treatment plant. But the storm drain involved is not; instead it goes to Rock Creek.

Most criminal laws include an element of intent, but the Clean Water Act does not. It’s a “strict liability” statute, so the act of connecting the pipe from the retirement home to the storm drain amounts to guilt. Though the crime is a misdemeanor--less serious than a felony--the consequences “can be quite grave,” said one law professor, with impacts on job applications, loans, licenses, international travel, and joining the military. The man pled guilty to the misdemeanor and was sentenced to probation.

The man is bitter over his treatment and quit his job. He eventually found two others. His lowest point came when he was fingerprinted and had his mug shot snapped. “I was treated like everybody else, like I was a hardened criminal,” he said. “Imagine what I looked like. ‘What you in for? Backed up toilets.’

Ben Stein Sues: Ad Agency Replaced Me Over My Global-Warming Position

The Wrap by Kurt Orzeck
View Original Article Here

Ben Stein claims he's a victim of political discrimination.

The conservative pundit and actor -- and former Nixon speechwriter -- alleges that his position on climate change had him kicked off a $300,000 acting gig, only to be replaced by a lookalike.

Stein filed a discrimination suit against Japanese company Kyocera Corporation and New York ad agency Seiter & Miller Advertising, in Los Angeles Superior Court on Wednesday.

He is claiming breach of contract, wrongful discharge and emotional distress, among other charges.

Also read: 'WS2' Reviewed: It's More Like 'Ferris Bueller's Day on Wall Street'

In the suit, which was obtained by TheWrap, Stein says Kyocera reneged on the deal and replaced him after the company found out that he isn't sure humans are responsible for climate change.

The deal would have had Stein -- who has previously been featured in advertisements for Comcast, Clear Eyes and Hewlett-Packard -- acting in commercials for Kyocera and appearing at a company event.

(Read the whole filing here.)

Stein says that in December 2010 Kyocera and Seiter & Miller's Grace Jao approached his agent, Innovative Artists' Marcia Hurwitz, saying the company "wanted someone with an economics qualification in the public mind, and [Stein] came to mind at once," according to the complaint. "Hurwitz asked [Jao] if this was an offer. Jao said it was."

Over the course of five weeks, an agreement was worked out, with all the material deal points in place.

"The only points still under discussion -- but not in dispute -- were what kind of tea and other snacks [Stein] would have on the set," the suit claims. "There were no outstanding deal points."

In February, Jao called Hurwitz and said "questions had been raised by defendant Kyocera about whether [Stein's] views on global warming and on the environment were sufficiently conventional and politically correct for Kyocera," according to the suit.

Stein then told Kyocera and Seiter & Miller that he was extremely concerned about the environment but unsure whether humans are responsible for global warming.

"He also told Hurwitz to inform defendants that, as a matter of religious belief, he believed that God, and not man, controlled the weather," the suit claims.

That same month, Seiter & Miller President Livingston Miller emailed Hurwitz, telling her the agency had decided to withdraw its offer.

Miller said decision was made due to Stein's "official positions on various policy issues that appear on the web of which we have only lately become aware," according to the suit.

Kyocera then tapped a University of Maryland economics professor to appear in the commercials as a Stein look-alike.

"In an astonishingly brazen misappropriation of [Stein's] persona, [they] dressed him up as Stein often appeared in commercials (bow tie, glasses, sports jacket)."

The suit claims that Stein has been described as "the most famous economics teacher in the world" for his iconic role in "Ferris Bueller's Day Off."

Stein is seeing $300,000 for the work he agreed to do, along with attorney fees, court costs and punitive damages.

A representative for Seiter & Miller did not respond to TheWrap's request for comment.

A Fine for Not Using a Biofuel That Doesn’t Exist

NYTimes.com by Matthew Wald
VIEW ORIGINAL ARTICLE HERE

WASHINGTON — When the companies that supply motor fuel close the books on 2011, they will pay about $6.8 million in penalties to the Treasury because they failed to mix a special type of biofuel into their gasoline and diesel as required by law.

But there was none to be had. Outside a handful of laboratories and workshops, the ingredient, cellulosic biofuel, does not exist.
In 2012, the oil companies expect to pay even higher penalties for failing to blend in the fuel, which is made from wood chips or the inedible parts of plants like corncobs. Refiners were required to blend 6.6 million gallons into gasoline and diesel in 2011 and face a quota of 8.65 million gallons this year.
“It belies logic,” Charles T. Drevna, the president of the National Petrochemicals and Refiners Association, said of the 2011 quota. And raising the quota for 2012 when there is no production makes even less sense, he said.
Penalizing the fuel suppliers demonstrates what happens when the federal government really, really wants something that technology is not ready to provide. In fact, while it may seem harsh that the Environmental Protection Agency is penalizing them for failing to do the impossible, the agency is being lenient by the standards of the law, the 2007 Energy Independence and Security Act.
The law, aimed at reducing the nation’s greenhouse gas emissions, its reliance on oil imported from hostile places and the export of dollars to pay for it, includes provisions to increase the efficiency of vehicles as well as incorporate renewable energy sources into gasoline and diesel.
It requires the use of three alternative fuels: car and truck fuel made from cellulose, diesel fuel made from biomass and fuel made from biological materials but with a 50 percent reduction in greenhouse gases. Only the cellulosic fuel is commercially unavailable. As for meeting the quotas in the other categories, the refiners will not close their books until February and are not sure what will happen.
The goal set by the law for vehicle fuel from cellulose was 250 million gallons for 2011 and 500 million gallons for 2012. (These are small numbers relative to the American fuel market; the E.P.A. estimates that gasoline sales in 2012 will amount to about 135 billion gallons, and highway diesel, about 51 billion gallons.)
Even advocates of renewable fuel acknowledge that the refiners are at least partly correct in complaining about the penalties.
“From a taxpayer/consumer standpoint, it doesn’t seem to make a lot of sense that we would require blenders to pay fines or fees or whatever for stuff that literally isn’t available,” said Dennis V. McGinn, a retired vice admiral who serves on the American Council on Renewable Energy.
The standards for cellulosic fuel are part of an overall goal of having 36 billion gallons of biofuels incorporated annually by 2022. But substantial technical progress would be needed to meet that — and lately it has been hard to come by.
Michael J. McAdams, executive director of the Advanced Biofuels Association, said the state of the technology for turning biological material like wood chips or nonfood plants straight into hydrocarbons — instead of relying on conversion by nature over millions of years, which is how crude oil originates — was advancing but was not yet ready for commercial introduction.
Of the technologies that are being tried out, he added, “There are some that are closer to the beaker and some that are closer to the barrel.”
The Texas renewable fuels company KiOR, for example, has broken ground on a plant in Columbus, Miss., that plans to start turning Southern yellow pine chips into gasoline and diesel components in the fourth quarter of 2012 at an annual rate of 11 million gallons, although Matthew Hargarten, a spokesman, said the quantity to be produced this year might be adjusted.
Mr. McGinn of the council on renewable energy, defends the overall energy statute. Even if the standards for 2011 and 2012 are not met, he said, “I am absolutely convinced from a national security perspective and an economic perspective that the renewable fuel standard, writ large, is the right thing to do.” With oil insecurity and climate change related to greenhouse gas emissions as worrisome as ever, advocates say, there is strong reason to press forward.
The oil industry does not agree.
Mr. Drevna of the refiners association argued that in contrast to 2007, when Congress passed the law, “all of a sudden we’re starting to find tremendous resources of our own, oil and natural gas, here in the United States, because of fracking,” referring to a drilling process that involves injecting chemicals and water into underground rock to release gas and oil.
What is more, the industry expects the 1,700-mile Keystone Pipeline, which would run from oil sands deposits in Canada to the Gulf Coast, to provide more fuel for refineries, he said.
But Cathy Milbourn, an E.P.A. spokeswoman, said that her agency still believed that the 8.65-million-gallon quota for cellulosic ethanol for 2012 was “reasonably attainable.” By setting a quota, she added, “we avoid a situation where real cellulosic biofuel production exceeds the mandated volume,” which would weaken demand.
The underlying problem is that Congress legislated changes that laboratories and factories have not succeeded in producing. This is not for want of trying, and efforts continue.
One possible early source is the energy company Poet, a large producer of ethanol from corn kernels. The company is doing early work now on a site in Emmetsburg, Iowa, that is supposed to produce up to 25 million gallons a year of fuel alcohol beginning in 2013 from corn cobs.
And Mascoma, a company partly owned by General Motors, announced last month that it would get up to $80 million from the Energy Department to help build a plant in Kinross, Mich., that is supposed to make fuel alcohol from wood waste. Valero Energy, the oil company, and the State of Michigan are also providing funds.
Yet other cellulosic fuel efforts have faltered. A year ago, after it was offered more than $150 million in government grants, Range Fuels closed a commercial factory in Soperton, Ga., where pine chips were to be turned into fuel alcohols, because it ran into technological problems.
Airlines have had marginally more success with renewable fuels, but mostly because they have been willing to pay huge sums for sample quantities. Alaska Airlines said recently it had paid $17 a gallon. Lufthansa plans to fly a Boeing 747 from Frankfurt to Dulles International Airport near Washington using 40 tons of a biofuel mix.