December 2012 Climate Change Summary Report

December 2012 Climate Change Summary Report

 

 

“U.S. oil fields could store decades of carbon emissions”

December 21, 2012: Bloomberg reports: “Depleted North American oil fields could hold billions more tons of carbon dioxide than previously estimated, providing a way to both curb greenhouse gas emissions and boost production of domestic fuels. In a report released yesterday, the U.S. Department of Energy said the underground capacity of oil fields in the U.S. and Canada is 225 billion metric tons, or about 60 percent greater than estimates from two years ago. That’s the equivalent of more than a century of U.S. power-plant emissions at current levels. ‘These numbers are jaw-dropping,’ Kurt Waltzer, coordinator for carbon capture at the Clean Air Task Force, said in an interview. ‘The more we learn about enhanced-oil recovery the better it looks as a technology.’”

“Matt Ridley: Cooling Down the Fears of Climate Change”

December 19, 2012: An op-ed in The Wall Street Journal by Matt Ridley, columnist in The Wall Street Journal and climate change writer, states: “Mr. Lewis is an expert reviewer of the recently leaked draft of the IPCC’s WG1 Scientific Report. The IPCC forbids him to quote from it, but he is privy to all the observational best estimates and uncertainty ranges the draft report gives. What he has told me is dynamite. Given what we know now, there is almost no way that the feared large temperature rise is going to happen. Mr. Lewis comments: ‘Taking the IPCC scenario that assumes a doubling of CO2, plus the equivalent of another 30% rise from other greenhouse gases by 2100, we are likely to experience a further rise of no more than 1°C.’ A cumulative change of less than 2°C by the end of this century will do no net harm. It will actually do net good—that much the IPCC scientists have already agreed upon in the last IPCC report. Rainfall will increase slightly, growing seasons will lengthen, Greenland’s ice cap will melt only very slowly, and so on.”

“EDITORIAL: Chilling climate-change news”

December 19, 2012: An editorial in The Washington Times states: “When politicians want evidence to back up their belief that mankind is heating up the planet, they turn to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). The Nobel Prize-winning organization was responsible for the famous hockey-stick graph used to demonstrate the purported warming effect of man-made carbon dioxide. IPCC’s notoriety has turned out to be a two-edged sword, as leaks continue to undermine the group’s core message. In a statement Friday, IPCC officials confirmed the authenticity of a leaked draft of the forthcoming Fifth Assessment Report on climate. Skeptics seized upon a chart within the document that compares past IPCC predictions with actual temperature readings. …Even though the official charts show no significant warming trend in the past 15 years, the planet may be even cooler than the IPCC figures suggest.”

“Coal demand up everywhere but in U.S.”

December 19, 2012: Greenwire reports: “The demand for coal will increase in every region of the world through 2017 except in the United States, where low-cost natural gas will continue providing tough competition, the Paris-based International Energy Agency said this morning. The IEA’s ‘Medium-Term Coal Market Report’ predicts that coal will come close to overtaking oil as the world’s top energy source within the next five years. Analysts said countries, mostly in the developing world, will burn about 1.2 billion more metric tons of coal per year by 2017 than they are today. In the United States, however, coal demand is expected to fall from 697 million metric tons of coal equivalent (mtce) to 600 mtce, and production will be down from 771 mtce to 697 mtce by 2017, the IEA projected.”

“Energy Efficiency Gains and Low-carbon Fuels Could Ease US GHG Emissions”

December 19, 2012: AOL Energy reports: “U.S. greenhouse gas emissions from the energy sector are going to stay below their 2005 peak for the foreseeable future, thanks to more efficient energy usage and increased use of lower-carbon energy sources, says the Energy Information Administration (EIA). The projection is in EIA’s preliminary outlook to 2040, the first agency analysis to project beyond 2035. The US emitted about 6 billion metric tons (MT) of carbon in 2005, EIA Administrator Adam Sieminski, releasing the outlook in Washington, DC, earlier this month, but emissions dropped markedly in the recession. While economic recovery is projected, particularly after 2014, carbon emissions are expected to stay relatively flat.”

“Keystone XL critics now calling for more in-depth climate change study”

December 17, 2012: Fox News reports: “With President Obama poised to decide whether to allow construction of the Keystone XL Pipeline — based on a second, more environmentally-sensitive path — critics now appear focused on derailing the project over a climate change study. TransCanada Corp. submitted a revised application after the president rejected the first one in January because it took the 1,700-mile-long pipeline across an aquifer in Nebraska. …Supporters argue the project would help the United State lessen its dependency on foreign oil, create thousands of construction jobs and that it has already passed the environmental test. “After four years, the Keystone XL pipeline is perhaps the most exhaustively reviewed projects of its kind ever and already includes a climate review,’ Don Canton, spokesman for North Dakota Republican Sen. John Hoeven, said Sunday. ‘This recent tactic by opponents is just another attempt to slow or kill (the) project.’”

“Exxonmobil Sees Gas Displacing Coal As World’s No. 2 Energy Source”

December 17, 2012: Oil & Gas Journal reports: “Natural gas appears likely to supplant coal as the world’s second biggest energy source—after crude oil—by 2025, ExxonMobil Corp. said as it released its 2013 Energy Outlook. Demand for gas will grow by about 65% through 2040, with 20% of worldwide production occurring in North America, supported by growing supplies from shale and other unconventional sources, it said.”

“Rise in renewable energy will require more use of fossil fuels”

December 17, 2012: Los Angeles Times reports: “On the horizon, across an industrial shipping channel on the Sacramento-San Joaquin River Delta, scores of wind turbines stood dead still. The air was too calm to turn their blades — or many others across the state that day. Wind provided just 33 megawatts of power statewide in the midafternoon, less than 1 percent of the potential from wind farms capable of producing 4,000 megawatts of electricity. As is true on many days in California when multibillion-dollar investments in wind and solar energy plants are thwarted by the weather, the void was filled by gas-fired plants like the Delta Energy Center. One of hidden costs of solar and wind power — and a problem the state is not yet prepared to meet — is that wind and solar energy must be backed up by other sources, typically gas-fired generators. …‘The public hears solar is free, wind is free,’ said Mitchell Weinberg, director of strategic development for Calpine Corp., which owns the Delta Energy Center. ‘But it is a lot more complicated than that.’ Wind and solar energy are called intermittent sources, because the power they produce can suddenly disappear when a cloud bank moves across the Mojave Desert or wind stops blowing through the Tehachapi Mountains, for example. In just half an hour, a thousand megawatts of electricity — the output of a nuclear reactor — can disappear and threaten stability of the grid.’”

“‘Energy independence’ on the outs”

December 14, 2012: Fuel Fix reports: “Forget ‘energy independence.’ Now the new catchphrase in the nation’s capital is ‘energy security.’ The term has replaced ‘energy independence’ as government officials and industry leaders tout new predictions that the U.S. is on track to soon become a net exporter of oil and gas. For instance, when Exxon Mobil rolled out its 2013 energy outlook earlier this week, the company deliberately avoided any talk of ‘independence.’ That was ‘by design,’ said Kenneth Cohen, the company’s vice president of public and government affairs. ‘We think in terms of energy security,’ he added. By contrast, ‘the term ‘independence’ implies isolationism, protectionism and is self-defeating.’ Officials with the government’s Energy Information Administration also steered clear of the phrase early this month, when the agency revealed its own predictions that the United States could produce more natural gas than it needs as soon as 2016.”

“Cellulosic Biofuel to Surge in 2013 as First Plants Open”

December 12, 2012: Bloomberg reports: “Cellulosic biofuel companies will boost production almost 20-fold in 2013 as the first high-volume refineries go into operation, signaling a shift from an experimental fuel into a commercially viable industry. Production of the fuel made from crop waste, wood chips, household trash and other non-food organic sources will reach 9.6 million gallons (36 million liters) in 2013, up from less than 500,000 gallons this year, according to data compiled by the U.S. Energy Information Administration and obtained by Bloomberg News. That gain will leave the industry short of the government’s target for 1 billion gallons that gasoline and diesel producers are expected to blend into their products next year under a federal energy regulation. The industry may not meet those targets for another five years, and companies from Kior Inc. (KIOR) to Abengoa SA (ABG) are closing the gap.”

“DRIESSEN: Government eyes crippling climate-control measures”

December 11, 2012: An op-ed in The Washington Times by Paul Driessen, author and senior policy adviser for the Committee for a Constructive Tomorrow, states: “Even if Congress legislates carbon taxes, nothing suggests that EPA Administrator Lisa P. Jackson will refrain from imposing EPA’s anti-hydrocarbon rules on top of them or that the White House and Senate will reject any new U.N. treaty. There is no hint that the Interior Department will cease using the Endangered Species Act and other laws to shut down oil and gas drilling while ignoring the growing slaughter of eagles and whooping cranes by wind turbines. The Energy and Defense departments, the EPA and Congress are unlikely to stop spending more in borrowed funds to subsidize corn ethanol and Navy biofuel schemes. These anti-hydrocarbon policies also mean the U.S. Treasury will be deprived of hundreds of billions of dollars in lease bonuses, royalties, taxes and other revenues that it would realize from the development of our nation’s vast oil, natural gas and coal deposits. Instead, the United States will be forced to pay billions more for imported oil, often from unethical, environmentally reckless countries.”

“EU Council backs 2030 emissions targets”

December 7, 2012: UPI reports: “The official debate over setting European greenhouse gas-reduction targets after 2020 began this week when EU energy ministers called for a new framework. The EU Energy Council issued a set of ‘conclusions’ Monday in Brussels. The conclusions outlined member nations’ priorities in the energy field, including a call for the European Commission to ‘continue the momentum’ it has built while working to achieve current 2020 reduction targets out further to 2030. Extending the mandates are seen as essential by renewable energy companies and environmentalists, who argue investors need long-term guarantees that European markets for wind and solar energy will remain stable for decades.”

“U.S. forecasts rising energy independence”

December 6, 2012: USA Today reports: “The United States will become increasingly energy independent in the next three decades as it boosts its production of oil, natural gas and renewable power such as solar and wind, the U.S. government forecast today. Crude oil production will increase 20% in the coming decade, reaching a peak of 7.5 million barrels per day in 2019, according to the 2013 forecast by the U.S. Energy Information Administration, the analytical arm of the Department of Energy. Most of the surge is due to tight oil that’s forced from shale rock.  Natural gas will see its boom, also due mostly to extraction from shale deposits, continue even longer — though 2040. It will account for 27% of total U.S. energy produced by 2020 and 30% in 2040, up from 16% in 2000 and 24% in 2010, the forecast says. At its current rate, it will outpace domestic usage by 2020, prompting the United States to become a net exporter of total natural gas that year.”

“U.S. Oil Output Hits Nearly 15-Year High”

December 4, 2012: The Wall Street Journal reports: “U.S. crude-oil production reached its highest level in nearly 15 years in September, thanks in large part to the drilling method known as hydraulic fracturing, the U.S. Energy Information Administration said Tuesday. Daily production averaged nearly 6.5 million barrels, the EIA said, an increase of 16%, or about 900,000 barrels, over September 2011. The statistics reflect the growing role of the U.S. as a dominant energy producer. Last month, the International Energy Agency said the U.S. could overtake Saudi Arabia and Russia to become the world’s largest oil producer by 2020. The EIA is slated to come out this week with an early draft of its annual report, which includes an assessment of U.S. production trends. The last time monthly U.S. production reached 6.5 million barrels a day was January 1998. The EIA said the states with the largest increases were Texas, with its Eagle Ford formation, and North Dakota, at the center of the Bakken Shale region. For decades, North Dakota produced fewer than 150,000 barrels a day, but that figure started surging in 2007 and reached 728,000 barrels a day in September.”