World Renewable Energy Forum Steven Chu And Santiago Seage

"Dan Arvizu (I should mention that Arvizu talked two days ago on solar, but the Denver Post hardly mentioned the renewables, focusing instead on his message that shale gas cannot be the solution to our energy problems") introduced Santiago Seage, CEO of Abengoa Solar, who provided a cautious presentation, expressing certain concerns. For one, he indicated that it is possible that natural gas* could be worse than coal in causing climate change, that from shale in particular. Clean coal? Not worthy of his mention. Fukushima? Basically, we can't count on nuclear into the future. Sure, we need the best of all the above as the bridge to a clean future, but the ultimate solution has to be cheap, sustainable and local energy.

"The free market will not solve the problem, energy prices will be volatile, we need something like a carbon tax now, government needs to spend more on R">

Dr. Steven Chu is an American physicist and U.S. Secretary of Energy who was born and educated in the U.S. While at Bell Labs he won a Nobel Prize in Physics in 1997. He is on leave from the University of California, Berkeley. Previously, he was at Stanford University, where he advocated renewable and nuclear energy as necessary to combat global warming. At Berkeley, his research speculated that a global "glucose economy" could replace fossil fuels, for he had already shifted to biological physics while at Stanford.

"If I heard correctly, Chu is the first U.S. Secretary of Energy to ever appear at this major annual solar gathering (41st meeting"). He said, the climate is changing, but science cannot explain the plateau from 1930 to 1980, and during the past decade. Our sea level is actually rising faster and there have been more major storms than calculated. In geologic time, our warmed Earth resulted in sea level rise exceeding 60 feet. It is appearing that the wet spots are getting wetter and dry spots dryer.

The good news is that we can do something about this, and the cost factors are decreasing. Wind is close to coal at 7 cents/kWh, but the best solar remains 14 cents/kWh and higher. To quote:

"THE SUNSHOT VISION STUDY REPORTS THAT THE LEVELIZED COST OF ENERGY (LCOE) FOR A UTILITY-SCALE CONCENTRATING SOLAR POWER PLANT IN THE SOUTHWESTERN UNITED STATES WAS IN THE 0.12-0.18/KWH RANGE WITH A 30% INVESTMENT TAX CREDIT IN 2010."

Note that this price includes the 30% federal incentive and is for lower cost utility scale projects. Thus, if you live in a less sunny region, for a residential system, without tax incentives, the real cost of producing electricity could far exceed 20 cents/kW and could well approach 50 cents/kWh.

"Chu said that much of Europe sells electricity at or higher** than Hawaii (33 cents/kWh--he said it was 26 cents/kWh and we use diesel, both incorrect, so he needs to upgrade his act"), so solar is already competitive at these sites. The Sunshot Initiative will aid in reducing the cost of solar so that by 2020 much of the developed world should be able to justify solar electricity. Life cycle costs, however, argue that installation can begin now ("he did not say this, but that makes sense to me"). Here is a nice link to a solar glossary.

"Conservation has worked, for refrigerators today use only 25% the electricity compared to older ones. Air conditioners are also rapidly becoming more efficient. The cost of these appliances are, surprisingly, also dropping some. If you got a pool, you might want to convert it into a koi pond, if you don't need to aerate it (he did not way this, I did, looking at the above").

Chu indicated there is no reason why we can't have our energy: cleaner and maybe even cheaper. Solutions are rapidly advancing. Yes, we need federal subsidies today, and might want to continue it for a decade and more, but someday, the renewables will be competitive. He got a standing ovation.

*An interesting point about natural gas made by Dr. Chu was that it is not like oil, having a long established world-wide shipment system, which does not exist today for natural gas. Thus, the price can be as low as 2.50/thousand cubic feet or million BTU ("they are about same") where the gas is drawn, but up to 20/MBTU in parts of Europe.

**But "WIKIPEDIA" indicates for late 201 electricity costs of 40 cents/kW in Denmark and 36 cents/kW in Germany.

My OTEC dinner ("where I had a glass of Chardonnay and a small bag of potato chips") last night became lunch today. Luis Vega ("University of Hawaii)" took Desikan Bharathan ("National Renewable Energy Laboratory") and me to a Peruvian restaurant, Los Cabos II, the top rated of its type in Denver. While not up to the excellence of Astrid Y Gaston and Malabar in Lima, Luis really nevertheless enjoyed his lunch. With the buffet, which Luis said was very authentic, we had a Peruvian beer. I also added a Pisco sour. Bharathan ("left") and Vega ("right") are two of the three foremost OTEC researchers in the world:

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