The Iron Law of Electricity, Mark Nelson on the "rot" in Britain, a Golden Eagle
The Iron Law of Electricity is being proven yet again, Mark Nelson talks about Europe's energy crisis, new Power Brief and media hit, and an Aquila chrysaetos near Bismarck
One of the many joys of my job is getting to travel and meet new people. This week I had the great fun of returning to Great Falls, Montana to speak to the Montana Electric Cooperatives’ Association. Montana is one of my favorite places. The landscapes are amazing. There’s plenty of room. And the people are all-day-long friendly. Plus, I enjoy talking to electric cooperatives. Their leaders are hard-working people from small towns or cities. They are ranchers, farmers, bankers, and merchants. They serve on the boards of their coops because they see it as part of their civic duty. Their coops vary in size from a few hundred meters to tens of thousands of meters. Their organizations are trusted parts of the local community and are living remnants of the New Deal. They represent the people and interests of rural America at a time when the urban-rural divide is growing ever larger.
It was a brief trip to Montana. I'm back in Austin for a couple of weeks before my travel schedule picks up again. If you happen to be in Austin next week, I will be participating in a panel discussion next Friday (the 15th) at a symposium sponsored by the Kay Bailey Hutchison Center for Energy, Law, and Business at the University of Texas. The caption for the event: “The Energy Transition – Rhetoric or Reality.” I’m on a panel at 9:45a titled “What’s Different This Time?” You can learn more about the event by clicking here. Four items today:
Mark Nelson on the podcast discussing “the rot” in Britain’s power sector
New Power Brief and a media hit
A Golden Eagle in North Dakota
The photo of the Golden Eagle above was taken in 2012 by Juan Lacruz in La Cañada, Ávila, Spain
After reading dozens of news stories about soaring global demand for coal and oil to meet the surge in electricity demand, I wrote a piece about the Iron Law of Electricity. I published it a few minutes ago on Forbes. I began:
Nearly five years ago while in Kolkata, I interviewed Sanjay Kar Chowdury, a manager at the Calcutta Electric Supply Corporation. When I asked him about the importance of coal to the Indian electric grid, he did not hesitate. Coal, he told me, “is a lifeline. It is a lifeline of all the thermal power stations. Without coal, you cannot survive...It’s not possible to keep the lights on without coal.” Chowdury’s words are as true for India today as they were back in December 2016.
Here’s the nut graf:
This surge in demand for hydrocarbons to produce electricity proves once again, that electricity is the world’s most important and fastest-growing form of energy. It also proves what I call the Iron Law of Electricity, which says “People, businesses, and countries will do whatever they have to do to get the electricity they need,” I’ve also stated it as “when forced to choose between dirty electricity and no electricity, people will choose dirty electricity every time.” (The Iron Law of Electricity, of course, owes its heritage to Roger Pielke Jr.’s Iron Law of Climate, which I have written about many times, including in these pages on August 30.)
I concluded with these three grafs:
There’s no small bit of irony that the Iron Law of Electricity is being spotlighted in advance of the COP 26 climate conference in Glasgow, Scotland, which begins on October 31. Last month, United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres said there is a “high risk of failure” to reach a new climate accord unless politicians agree to slash their respective countries’ emissions. Guterres’ remarks came just a few days after the United Nations issued a report which found that global greenhouse gas emissions are likely to increase by 16% by 2030 compared to 2010 levels.
A key reason, of course, for the ongoing increase in greenhouse gases is the surge in emissions from the electricity sector, which is the largest emitter of carbon dioxide emissions.
The bottom line here is obvious: the surge in global electricity demand can only be met in the near term, meaning the next decade or so, by burning more coal, oil, and natural gas. Renewables cannot, will not, be able to scale up to meet that growing demand. The other bottom line is equally obvious, and it’s a point that I, and many others, have been making for more than a decade: if the countries of the world are serious about reducing greenhouse gas emissions and providing more electricity to the billions of people now living in energy poverty, the only way to do it is with nuclear energy and lots of it.
Again, here's a link. Please share it.
Mark Nelson talks about Europe's energy crisis and "the rot" that undermined Britain's grid
I vividly remember the first time I met Mark Nelson. We met at the Breakthrough Dialogue in Sausalito in 2016. He was taking photos and I was admiring his camera. I don’t remember all of the details, but I do recall his intensity and focus. His intelligence was obvious. We talked about several issues and then he mentioned that he was from Oklahoma City. After that, I knew that he and I were going to be friends. That’s a roundabout introduction to this week’s episode of the Power Hungry Podcast, (number 73!) which features Mark for the second time. (His first appearance was on May 4, during which he talked about the closure of the Indian Point nuclear plant.)
Mark is the managing director of the Radiant Energy Fund, which advises non-profits and industry about nuclear energy. I wanted to get Mark on the podcast again because he has spent much of the last two months in Europe, where he had a front-row seat to the early days of the energy crisis that is now hammering the region. Mark said that the continent’s energy crisis is the result of decades of complaisance about energy infrastructure. He explained why Britain is in worse shape than other European countries and how deregulation of the UK’s electric market fueled the disaster. He said that after Margaret Thatcher left office in 1990, Britain deregulated its electricity market, “And that’s when the rot started.” By 1998, most British consumers were able to choose their electricity provider.
But as Nelson says, the deregulated market hobbled the country’s grid because companies quit building power plants and investing in resilience and reliability. His comment made me recall that the deregulation of the Texas electricity market began in 2002. That’s noteworthy because Britain and Texas use about the same amount of electricity and of course, deregulation has come back to haunt both of them this year. The Texas electricity crisis hit in February. Britain’s crisis started last month and will likely continue for months. Mark also talked about why Germany has to preserve its nuclear fleet and why Europe could be grappling with energy shortages and high prices for years to come. One other quote from him was great. He said European countries “thought they were doing decarbonization policy.” Instead, he said, “they were doing de-growth policy.”
Again, here’s a link to the audio. The video of the interview is also available on YouTube.
A Power Brief on the Iron Law and a media hit
On Monday, I posted a three-minute video about coal demand on my YouTube channel. (By the way, the channel now has over 1,00 subscribers. Do me a favor and subscribe today.) The video hits on many of the themes in the Forbes piece I published today. Also, this week I was on the Financial Sense podcast. I talked to Cris Sheridan about the European energy crisis, renewables, nuclear, and other topics. Here’s a link.
A Golden Eagle at Long Lake NWR
Last week, while in Bismarck, I took a few hours off and drove to the Long Lake National Wildlife Refuge. It is a beautiful, isolated, place with lots of water, lots of birds, and when I was there, no other people. I loved it. I saw pheasants, starlings, and wading birds. But off in the distance, maybe a half a mile away, I spotted a very large bird of prey. And by large, I mean the size of a double-wide trailer. Even at a long distance, I could see it had a giant wingspan. I got out of my car and walked down a long gravel road toward the bird, but it kept moving and I never seemed to get much closer to it. After 30 minutes or so, I had to turn around. Dusk was approaching, the wind was raging, and a light rain began to fall. While still at the refuge, I called my pal, and fellow birder, Chris Cauthon, to ask him about identifying the Golden Eagle. As I recall, he said something to the effect of “they are big f***ers and they have a long neck.” With that expert description, as well as a look at Long Lake’s bird list, which lists the bird as an occasional visitor, I’m convinced I saw a Golden Eagle (Aquila chrysaetos).
Size was the deciding factor. Golden Eagles can have wingspans of six or seven feet. Wikipedia says: “Size readily distinguishes this species from most other raptors... Among raptorial birds that share the golden eagle's range, only some Old World vultures and the California condor are distinctly larger.” It also says “this species has been one of the most highly regarded birds used in falconry. Due to its hunting prowess, the golden eagle is regarded with great mystic reverence in some ancient, tribal cultures. It is one of the most extensively studied species of raptor in the world in some parts of its range, such as the Western United States and the Western Palearctic.”
Allaboutbirds.org has this description: “Golden Eagles are one of the largest birds in North America. The wings are broad like a Red-tailed Hawk's, but longer. At distance, the head is relatively small and the tail is long, projecting farther behind than the head sticks out in front.”'
Note: The image above is a snapshot from a page in my 1990s-era Field Guide to the Birds of North America published by National Geographic.
I hope y'all have a lovely three-day weekend.
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