Vertical Farming & Climate Change

There was an interesting program on BBC radio this morning about technological solutions to the problem of feeding a growing world population. Among other things, it dealt with vertical farming. The idea is to grow crops – and even small animals and ultimately maybe cultured meat – in high rise urban buildings. A quick Google found this site which is well worth a look: http://www.verticalfarm.com/.

Of course, efficient land use is the main objective, but some of the of the other advantages of vertical farming listed on the site may surprise. For example, the absence of pests would make organic farming the norm. More obviously, it brings the food production closer to the market, saving transport costs and making urban living even more eco-friendly than it already is. By drastically reducing the competition for land it might even make bio-fuels a viable solution to our transportation needs.

Taken at its most basic, our energy problem – of which producing food is just a special case – is how to convert enough of the energy arriving from the sun into forms we can use with zero net emissions of greenhouse gases. Skyscrapers growing plants for food and fuel might just be the way to go.

Setbacks in UK

Britain suffered two blows to its climate change credentials today. It looks as if the proposed acquisition of British Energy by the French government-controlled EDF will not go through, leaving a hole in the UK government’s energy plans. British Energy operates eight nuclear power stations in the UK, providing about 20% of the country’s electricity, but several of these need decommissioning over the next few years. The sites of most of these reactors are also on the shortlist for new nuclear power stations, so EDF’s experience (France produces over 70% of its electricity from nuclear sources) would have been very useful in modernizing the UK’s nuclear energy industry.

Meanwhile the government has also got some not entirely warranted bad press concerning its progress on greenhouse gas emissions. It claims a 13% reduction in emission relative to 1990 levels, which puts it well on track to satisfy its Kyoto commitments, but a report by York University suggest that in fact emissions have increased by 13% if the effects of aviation, shipping, and imports are included. Aviation and shipping were excluded from the Kyoto agreement for a number of reasons, while emissions from manufacturing accrue to the manufacturing country rather than the consuming one. Globalization has moved a lot of manufacturing to developing countries, and the associated emissions move with it, thereby making the developed world’s progress seem better than it is. (In addition, industry in the developing world is often less efficient, while transporting these goods around the world adds still more emissions.)

In the UK government’s defense it should I think be pointed out that they are no different from other developed countries in this regard, and that they are merely reporting progress against the yardstick agreed in Kyoto. This progress is I believe better than that of most other developed countries. The government also points out that the report was in fact commissioned by them to point out the problem with that yardstick. Hopefully, 2012 will see a better replacement for Kyoto.

New Ads from We Campaign

Al Gore’s “we” campaign plans to run new ads in major newspapers this week, suggesting that three current problems – high gas prices, soft economy, and what they call the “climate crisis” – can best be solved if they are tackled together. Here's a link to the PDF of the ad.

They are also promoting a “remix” of Al Gore's challenge to America and in the last week, and say that over 100,000 people have already watched it. Watch it here.

F1 Goes Green

Formula 1 cars are not known for economy, but the major teams met yesterday at Ferrari headquarters to discuss new rules for the 2010 season. The intention is to limit the amount of fuel which can be used in a race, instead of limiting the capacity of the engines, putting the emphasis on fuel efficiency and encouraging innovation relevant to today’s world. This follows changes for 2009 to allow regenerative braking.

Nissan's Electric Car Plans

Carlos Ghosn, CEO of Nissan, reaffirmed the company’s commitment to pure electric vehicles rather than hybrids in a recent speech marking the opening of Nissan’s new factory in Tennessee. He said he expected to have these on the market by 2010 and that he expected them to be price-competitive and profitable from the outset. I think this is the way to go, because adding a range-extending gasoline motor adds weight, cost, and complication.

It is also a bold move given the current state of battery technology, because the range is likely to be somewhat restrictive. Ghosn said that vehicles would be tailored to individual countries’ needs. He stopped short of saying that the cars would be available in the US, saying only that any car sold in the US would have to have a range of at least 100 miles. He thought some European markets might accept shorter ranges. It seems to me that this is at best acceptable only in a second car. But that would be a good start, and battery technology will surely improve over the next few years.

No doubt sister-company Renault’s deal with the Israeli government to provide the infrastructure to allow quick battery changes at a network of “filling stations” will help provide the volume necessary to be profitable from the outset.

Gores' Speech

Al Gore’s much-awaited speech yesterday proposed making US electricity generation entirely carbon-free in ten years. He is right to focus on electricity generation rather than on cars and other transport, if only because the most promising alternatives to gasoline pre-suppose a clean supply of electricity. But one has to doubt the feasibility of making this change so rapidly, especially as he seems to eschew nuclear power as part of the solution.

Gore is also right in saying we need to act now, but that does not mean that we could or should change a whole industry in ten years. Already, most of the new coal fired plants planned in the past few years are on hold and these are unlikely ever to be built. Gore seems to favor clean coal power station, using sequestration, but this is hardly proven technology. We can and should press ahead with wind and solar power, but we still need to solve the problems of storing electricity produced when the sun shines or the wind blows, and of transporting it to where it is needed. Without this, these renewable sources cannot be relied upon for a base load.

In contrast, nuclear energy is a proven technology which can be relied upon to provide clean energy when and where needed. It should be a major part of the solution in the short term, while other technologies are still in the development stages. Meanwhile, the lowest-hanging fruit is energy efficiency, where big improvements could be made very quickly.

A carbon tax or cap-and-trade system is the best way for government to promote all of these efforts: efficiency; nuclear power for base-load power; solar and wind power; and research into sequestration and into new storage and transmission technologies.

Perhaps most importantly, doing more to help the developing nations, especially China, to build clean power stations would be more cost-effective than replacing existing power stations in developed countries like the US. Ratifying Kyoto might be a good start!

Ghost Flights

Various UK media report that British Midland, Britain’s third largest airline, plans to fly empty or near- empty planes during next winter in order to retain valuable slots at Heathrow airport. This is just an extreme example of what all airlines expect to be doing; namely not reducing flight schedules in the face of the anticipated reduction in demand. (Some airlines may cancel individual flights, which would be a major inconvenience to the few passengers booked on such flights. And there is a limit to how much they can do this, because a flight must operate at least 80% of the time in order to retain the slot.)

This situation is crazy, both on economic and environmental grounds, but it is difficult to know what to do about it. Some advocate requiring a certain average percentage of seats to be filled, but when this was tried at the much smaller Norwich airport at least one airline responded by hiring actors to fill the seats.

Another suggestion is to change the way airport taxes are charged. Currently, they are charged per passenger, whereas a charge per seat (regardless of whether it is occupied) or per plane, would provide an additional disincentive to flying empty planes. It is not at all clear that this would work, however, as there is already a substantial financial cost to flying empty planes. Indeed it seems doomed to failure; if an airline is prepared to pay an actor to fill an empty seat, and to pay the tax for that actor, it would save money if it were able just to pay the tax on the empty seat.

The real problem is the use-it-or-lose-it policy on slots. This might make sense when slots are at a premium, but if flights are leaving empty in order to retain slots, that is clearly not the case and the policy should be suspended while demand is reduced. Better still, the policy should be abandoned altogether and slots auctioned afresh each year.