spare_wheel

Leakage from drilling and fracking also releases stored methane into the atmosphere. Recent methane hot spot data from Nasa suggests that we may be dramatically underestimating release of methane associated with petro-chemical production.

The Green Source program has grown enormously and has numerous corporate customers. IMO, the explosive increase in renewable use in the PNW is not a "cream of the crop" phenomena -- it's a changing the crop entirely phenomena. I also personally favor conservation as a first and more effective approach.

I would not have bought the car if I did not have access to PGE green source offsets. I looked into the LCA for the car because I was curious and because others wrongly suggested that the cost of manufacturing would outweigh any CO2e reduction. I've learned that this is not the case and was shocked at how low estimates of CO2e were.

wphamilton

Ok but it begs the question, how much of the extra CO2 that we breath out can be attributed to the mineral fertilizer?

jfowler85

How is an organic certification connected to atmospheric carbon?

Roody

Standard industrial agriculture is heavily dependent on synthetic fertilizer, which is mostly produced from natural gas with the Haber-Bosch process. The carbon in the natural gas is a by-product that is disposed in the form of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere. This is a form of digging up carbon, converting it into a gas, and warming the atmosphere--analogous to burning it in a car engine or electricity generator..

Organic agriculture does not use synthetic fertilizer, but manure. The carbon from manure is accounted for in the biological carbon cycle so there is no net increase in warming gases.

Yes, organic farming does contribute to AGW in other ways, as others posters have pointed out. But the total effect is much less than from standard farming with synthetic fertilizers.

Roody

That's very convoluted.

jfowler85

Well, I had two things in mind when asking that question.

1) Organic certs can be bought.
2) What kind of carbon difference are we talking here?

I'd be interested in an article read on this if you have one.

corrado33

Question, how does this selective energy "choice" work when the wind isn't blowing and the sun isn't shining? I find it hard to believe it's actually 100% renewable. What if too many people choose this choice?

Seems like a premium paid to do little to nothing overall.

If no one were to pay in to this scheme, the renewable energy would be used where it's most needed and can be used the most easily (aka closest to it.) Now that you're paying for it (most likely a large premium) they have to make the effort to get it out to you which means different power lines and a ton of carbon used to install them.

In fact, I'm questioning how they do that. Unless they have separate power lines for each company, it'd be impossible to actually differentiate what "house" gets what "power. Seems like an awfully stupid system. (I'm guessing it's all a scam to get you to pay more for your electricity so you can feel smug.)

enigmaT120

I didn't realize there was such a big difference in metabolic rates between driving and bicycling. It sounds like your bicycling is more around my running rates, though. I rarely bike really fast. B.Carfree pointed out, though, that if you were driving your electric car, you would have to do some other caloric-burning activity to maintain health, so you should subtract that requirement from your transportation CO2 emissions.

Like Roody said on a different question though: convoluted.

enigmaT120

By signing up for the green energy type programs, the electric companies are saying they will develop and operate enough renewable energy units to supply the demand for renewable energy. Electricity is even more fungible than money, and it all comes in over the same wire. The "large premium" is a couple of cents per kWH. It's not that much. I use a version in my area, and so does the big food processing plant where I work, called Blue Skies. There are other variants as well.

wphamilton

Yes, but necessary to compare the carbon footprint of vehicles to the respiration from cycling.

You might estimate based on the net energy balance of bio-fuels such as ethanol. With some additional chemistry for carbon production.

But to stay on focus, by keeping in mind the carbon cycle we've moved the bar from CO2 from all that extra breathing while riding, to some fraction of it.

corrado33

Sorry, this is absolutely bull****. There is NO WAY that in less than a decade electricity production will be 70-80% non-hydrocarbon. I work in the energy field, renewable resources are not there yet.


This is a graph of the energy used to produced the electricity consumed by the US. (Data straight from the energy information agency (EIA)) As you can see, wind is very small. It hasn't really grown (in terms of percentage) since 2013 either. Nuclear is not growing (and is, in fact, shrinking) because people are afraid of nuclear. What IS growing is natural gas and technologies designed to use it.

The US has HUNDREDS OF YEARS of "technically recoverable" coal and natural gas and (less so) oil. The US is also the top producer of natural gas and coal (in the top 5 for oil.) This is all from memory, so I don't guarantee 100% correctness, but it's close. There isn't a desire here yet to invest that much into alternative energy technologies. (I wish there were.)

You mean you're paying them to develop the renewable resources they're already going develop? Most energy companies are developing alternative energy plants, even if only just to look good.

Again, I think this program is a way to get more money out of people looking to be as "green" as possible.

Lastly, the wind doesn't always blow. When it does, they're going to use it if they need it. Paying them to supply it is... well... dumb, as it'd be dumb for them not to use it anyway. It doesn't matter if the energy comes from wind, if it's not needed at that moment, it goes to waste. That's one of the main problems with alternative energy. You cannot depend on it. There MUST ALWAYS be traditional fossil fuel burning plants to back them up when the wind stops blowing. Even if the wind almost never stops blowing, losing power even for a few minutes makes people angry, and loses the company money. (Not to mention any electronics damaged by it.) The main energy usage for most people is in the morning when you wake up and in the evening when you get home. If the wind isn't blowing then well, it's probably going to waste. Coal fired plants can only be turned down so much. Yes, coastlines are a great place for wind, but eventually you will run out of space. People don't like windmills in their back yard. The fact is, wind power is very EXPENSIVE and takes up a TON of space (and is loud, unsightly, blah blah blah.)

I still think this is a (legit) scam honestly. You'd be better off donating to a company that's building the windmills. At least then you can claim it on your tax returns.

I suspect that wind will grow like hydroelectric, then flatten off when the profitable places to stick windmills start to disappear.

rockmom

Well, PGE had the happy starting point of a sizeable hydro capacity and a large nuclear capacity to boot, so they have been less reliant on coal/gas from a starting point. I believe they are already at greater than 50% non hydrocarbon. They rest of the United States in not that fortunate. In my neck of the woods, nearly 75% of the electricity is produced by coal and gas.

An fun site to plug in your zip code and find out about car emissions and electricity production:
Alternative Fuels Data Center: Emissions from Hybrid and Plug-In Electric Vehicles

I also wonder if a demand for 'green' electricity while the overall demand for electricity grows will only mean that renewable sources are added at a greater rate while coal continues to grow, just at a slower rate. That scenario would increase the percentage or electricity from renewables while emission would continue to climb, though at a slower rate.

On the biking and calorie front, do people actually start eating less when they stop exercising? I just gain weight. I would guess from national trends in BMI that I am not alone. I rather prefer to put those calories to use rather than store them temporarily on my hips.

I'm not against EV cars. They most certainly have a place, but it is not a simple swap. There are larger patterns of supply, demand, and usage of energy that need to be addressed on a societal level.

wphamilton

The problem I have with including the energy cost/carbon footprint of food in with the activity is, where do you draw the line?

In the past we've seen the same type of calculations regarding bio-fuels, so it's not exactly new ground. The fertilizers, manufacturing and utilizing the tractors and other farm equipment, processing and distribution of the food. But when you go down that road it doesn't stop there. It gets to the point where everything in the modern life-style is touched.

You have to build the roads first, manufacture and operate the trains and trucks to transport it, and then there are the grocery stores. We have to build the stores, and power them, and that represents part of the carbon footprint. We can get into everything that enables to have modern supermarkets - the utilities industry itself, communications, information technology. All of it plays a part in packaged prepared meal.

There are additional considerations. Does utility cycling represent enough additional demand to move the needle on food production for example? If the comparison only makes sense if some large percentage of personal transport were by bike, is that really meaningful in the reality of 0.6% mode share? How could we be confident that the production and distribution would be similar to that now, if we did achieve a 20% mode share, or 50% or whatever? I don't think we can be confident of that, and it renders the calculations less meaningful.

As a software engineer involved in providing big data analysis, and having a Math degree/background, I'm kind of intrigued with the idea that it's actually possible to figure all of that out with current technology. In theory. But it's not feasible, and that's not where I'm going with this. If we're going to compare apples to apples, I think that it's most logical to distinguish between the energy cost and carbon footprint of in general supporting our way of life and what is specifically utilized in the particular activity. In other words, it is more valid to compare simply the direct effects of biological emissions to burning hydrocarbons than to try to chase up the chain of production.

Roody

Well, it might take a bit of studying because it's a very complex issue.

At this time, the price gap between coal power and the more sustainable alternatives has narrowed considerably. Another point is that, like money, electric power is considered to be fungible. But the process is certainly verifiable. The production capacities are all public info. Each plant--whether conventional or "greener"--is crtified and on the public record.

Roody

You guys aren't looking at the carbon footprint. You're looking at the carbon little toe-print, and getting all excited about very incremental factors. The fact is, the lion's share of AGW is from industrial activity and a smaller but significant share from consumer behavior. Biological sources are negligible--really just a distraction to keep attention away from the uncomfortableness of discussing the real culprits.

ETA: After reading your subsequent post, I realize that I addressed this post to the wrong person. Sorry!

wphamilton

That's pretty much what I was trying to get across Roody. The carbon footprint of supporting our modern lifestyle is one thing, and the individual differences we make with cycling, recycling and so on is another. When comparing cycling to driving - gas guzzler or EV - it's logical to keep those two things separated.

Roody

Yes, this is pretty much what I've been trying to say also. The bigger,more effective changes can be made in how we produce energy. Downstream changes in the use of energy--while important to a certain extent--are going to be both more painful and less effective.

And if we ignore basic science (like the carbon cycle), we are truly going to waste a lot of time and money on trivial questions like how much we breathe when riding a bicycle.

spare_wheel

stop with that strawman. no one is ignoring the climate cycle. for example, legume consumption has among the lowest CO2e because little fertilizer is used and shipping is efficient.

i also don't think the question is trivial in that there has been quite a bit of negative press about e-vehicles and i was curious to see how they stack up against my favorite form of transport (albiet in a somewhat artificial ideal case). i knew that e-cars are, in general, a good choice relative to ICE cars but i was very surprised that the cost of manufacture had a minor impact on CO2e.

spare_wheel

I very strongly disagree with this. Conservation is the most effective and cheapest way to reduce CO2e from generation and industrial activity.

spare_wheel

Food production is one of the biggest industrial activities on this planet. And food production and food choices have a huge impact on CO2e:

One-third of our greenhouse gas emissions come from agriculture : Nature News & Comment

Roody

To set the record straight, I agree that electric cars are a good choice compared to ICE cars. Furthermore, bikes are even much better yet.

If you think objectively, the finding that manufacturing contributes only a little to the carbon impact of cars should not surprise you. It takes a few hours to build a car "from scratch" but the car itself will be operated for a few years. During those years, a great deal of carbon will be emitted, even from an electric car. Another big problem is the disposal of the car after it is no longer operable. Does your analysis cover the carbon costs of disposal? Does it cost more to dispose of a bicycle or a car?

Roody

As I mentioned many times, industrial activities associated with agriculture, such as Haber-Bosch and fossil fuels used in the production and transport of crops, cause large net increases in carbon emissions. This would be a very good place to cut emissions on a large scae at the production level--rather than relatively small changes at the consumption level, as reflected in the difference between electric cars and bicycles.

I-Like-To-Bike

Starvation, mandatory birth control and euthanasia are tried and true solutions to the problem of too much demand for food. Also helps on those high cost requirements of health care for the sickly and elderly that you previously addressed, eh?

Ekdog

I realise you are doing your utmost to be clever, but such an insulting comment is really uncalled for.

wolfchild

Humans have had negative impact on environment for at least the past 100 000 years. I highly doubt that caveman was an environmentally friendly individual.