[Stoves] CO2 drawdown (Re:Jock)

Traveller miata98 at gmail.com
Mon Feb 13 09:48:26 CST 2017


Ron:

Thank you for reminding me of Eugene Odum. I read the original book Odum
(Eugene's father Howard) and Odum some 30 years ago. I am not sure what
they would have to say about the marketed global environmentalism of today.

But that is another matter.  What you say about "energy debt" of PV has
nothing to do with the financial cost per Wp. What Odum meant is the
"energy input" in the entire chain of production (and perhaps delivery) of
PV panels. That is, the production of energy from such panels will never
amount to the energy input into those cells.

I was never a fan of such "net energy analysis" - an engineers' obsession
of little relevance, like your "fuel efficiency" for biomass stoves of any
kind using any biomass, for day-to-day market decisions. The economic value
of energy input and that of energy output can be different, which is why
such transformations are undertaken in the first place. As relative costs
change, and financing cost or discount rate change, the Net Present Value
of economic benefits changes.

Enough of that. Ecologists, physicists, and economists do not see eye to
eye on such matters, and I don't wish to engage in what I long ago
abandoned as a useless debate. It pops up still in "embedded carbon",
"embedded water" kind of engineering-economic analyses; the science is
weak, and the economics are pathetic.

I happened to find a recent paper claiming that PV is now debt-free. I
don't have the patience for Life Cycle Assessments but see

Solar panels repay their energy 'debt': study
<https://phys.org/news/2016-12-solar-panels-repay-energy-debt.html>, December
6, 2016 by Mariëtte Le Roux and the paper referred to, Re-assessment of net
energy production and greenhouse gas emissions avoidance after 40 years of
photovoltaics development <http://www.nature.com/articles/ncomms13728> (Nature
Communications, Opensource).

*******

More to the point, you may well be correct that BEECS is a lost cause
(whatever the cause is and whose money is being spent) and I was being
facetious when I said biomass stove designers come up with"“storage in
underground reservoirs” because that would surely attract USDOE (even under
Rick Perry). Why, Sam Baldwin may cook up a WBT precisely for that purpose.

Anything that cannot be done at $1 million can be done at $1 billion. Or at
least, will attract  high-level attention. Go for a multi-national biochar
company in cooperation with large charcoal companies. b

For CDR, the good old oil and gas industry may be a good bet. I think a
bulk of industrial CO2 is still made from atmospheric CO2 and used for
Enhanced Oil Recovery (EOR) operations. What would it take to scrub
atmospheric CO2 and put it in the oil and gas domes or salt mines that are
otherwise used for natural gas storage anyway? (This was my son's idea back
in 1990/1. Had I heeded his advice, I might have made a few million dollars
in CDR consulting by now.)

**********

You and I are on the same page about CDM. I once argued for carbon credits
for all avoided emissions from biomass combustion, not just CO2 and
irrespective of fNRB (fraction non-renewable biomass). You know I don't
care for mere CO2 and don't believe in "GHG neutrality" of biomass (Kirk
Smith argument). But later I turned against the whole idea of individuation
of "GHG avoidance". Let CDM go for large-scale projects; there is no point
in wasting time on household-level GHG avoidance from biomass cookstoves. I
have a different take on how to accelerate modern energy transition - just
plain public expenditures and subsidies, and get as much job done as soon
as possible.

Brian Palmer, who wrote that infomercial for MIT cons for the Washington
Post - Clean Cookstoves Draw Support But They May Not Improve Indoor Air
Quality
<https://www.washingtonpost.com/national/health-science/clean-cookstoves-draw-support-but-they-may-not-improve-indoor-air-quality/2012/04/16/gIQAnjCvLT_story.html>
(1
April 2012) is now at NRDC and ready to market women as climate changers - Our
Warming World on Her Shoulders
<https://www.nrdc.org/onearth/our-warming-world-her-shoulders> (1 February
2017). He can be persuaded to put in a good word for biochar TLUD stoves;
WBTs won't be necessary.

Too bad the biochar concept wasn't floated with the Clinton USDA which did
a lot of amazing work on soil carbon; I remember routine Washington
meetings on "carbon offsets" in mid-1990s.

Why don't you draw Christiana Figueres into this? She was a big proponent
of "environmental services" by Costa Rican forests then. Stephen Joseph may
have tried, just that now she is a free bird and can take up some big
idea. See Christiana Figueres is Back: Former Climate Chief Leads Coalition
of 7000 Mayors
<https://dailyplanet.climate-kic.org/christiana-figueres-is-back-former-climate-chief-leads-global-coalition-of-mayors/>
and
Mission 2020 <http://www.mission2020.global/>.

Of course, Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama could pick up biochar, now that
Obama's Washington office is in the World Wildlife Fund building. WWF
Australia had piloted the use of biochar in steel-making, replacing coking
coal - see Corporates want to save the planet – now they’ve got a plan,
thanks to WWF & friends
<http://www.thefifthestate.com.au/articles/corporates-want-to-save-the-planet-now-theyve-got-a-plan-thanks-to-wwf-friends/73502>
(30
April 2015). They had a neat idea -

"Ms Richter pointed out that solid wastes from the urban environment could
be converted to biochar and biodiesel via pyrolisis. The biochar could be
used for making lower-emissions steel and fed back into the built
environment, and airlines such as Qantas and Virgin were looking at ways to
use biodiesel in jet fuels to lower emissions from air travel."


Solve the waste crisis, and get biochar. I am sure that is cheaper than
TLUD stoves for "climate char". (Where char is marketable, as in West
Bengal in Paul's experience, that should present no problem. No point
fighting over equations.)

Good luck,

Nikhil

---------
(India +91) 909 995 2080 <+91%2090999%2052080>


On Tue, Jan 31, 2017 at 10:33 PM, Ronal W. Larson <rongretlarson at comcast.net
> wrote:

> Nikhil, Jock, list and ccs
>
> See inserts.  Handled shallowly below because this is a standard topic on
> the (sister) biochar list.
>
>
>
> On Jan 27, 2017, at 10:54 PM, Traveller <miata98 at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> Jock:
>
> Why should poor people’s stoves have to worry about CO2 drawdown?
>
> *[RWL:  You misunderstand Jock (a good e-mail friend , who like me has
> worked on policy matters in DC).  CO2 drawdown is a responsibility of
> developed countries - especially the USA.  The cheapest way by far is to
> pay (fairly) rural inhabitants of developing countries for producing and
> using biochar..*
>
> The White House just put out a United States Mid-Century Strategy FOR
> DEEP DECARBONIZATION
> <https://unfccc.int/files/focus/long-term_strategies/application/pdf/mid_century_strategy_report-final_red.pdf> (November
> 2016).
>
> I wish the White House all success and note that the document has no
> reference to BIOCHAR, brother Ron's favorite goal. It does, however,
> advocate the development and deployment of BECCS -Carbon-Beneficial Biomass
> Energy plus Carbon Capture and Sequestration: "Any facility that combusts
> biomass for electricity or converts biomass to fuel and captures resulting
> CO2 for utilization (e.g., enhanced oil recovery) or storage in underground
> reservoirs.”
>
> * [RWL:  Mt perception is that the BECCS technology, despite having
> received billions, is a lost cause. The biochar growth rate puts BECCS to
> shame.  Especially in China.*
>
> When biomass stove designers come up with “storage in underground
> reservoirs” rather than just soil, perhaps CDM will grant them the credits
> they deserve.
>
> *[RWL  The odds of that are about the same as the sun coming up tomorrow
> in the West.     *
>


> I am fortunately old enough to remember the late 1970s and early 1980s
> when irrational exuberance led IIASA to advocate uranium ore extraction
> from seawater to keep on fueling a breeder world. Other things that appear
> crazy in retrospect were also advocated.
> *[RWL:  I remember Eugene Odum, world famous ecologist at the University
> of Georgia, saying that PV would never pay off its energy debt, because it
> cost $100/watt  (in mid 70’s).  Now under $1/watt and energy payback time
> under a year I believe. (wind payback now measured in months.*
>
> * To Jock - I agree biochar is only one method of CDR.  Can you name one
> that looks more promising or necessary?*
>
> *Ron*
>
>
>
> The more the world changes...
>
> Nikhil
>
>
> ---------
> (India +91) 909 995 2080 <+91%2090999%2052080>
>
>
> On Sat, Jan 28, 2017 at 12:02 AM, Jock Gill <jock at jockgill.com> wrote:
>
>> A interesting post. It fails, however, to address the issues of the
>> imperative for CO2 drawdown.  The pyrolysis of biomass provides one method
>> of drawdown.
>>
>> Regards,
>>
>> Jock
>>
>> Sent from my iPhone
>>
>>
>
>
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://lists.bioenergylists.org/pipermail/stoves_lists.bioenergylists.org/attachments/20170213/660471d9/attachment.html>


More information about the Stoves mailing list