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This article presents the findings of a study that examined three municipalities in the Lower Mainland of British Columbia, Canada, in order to determine the nature of the socio-cultural and institutional barriers to action on climate change at the local level. The central goals of this paper are: (1) to propose a simple typology of institutional and socio-cultural barriers to action by gathering insights from an inter-disciplinary set of literatures; (2) to explore the ways that these barriers influence the utilization of various forms of capacity to achieve greenhouse gas reduction and resiliency in three case study communities; and (3) to understand the dynamic interactions amongst, and relative importance of,...
Categories: Publication; Types: Citation; Tags: Capacity, Climate change, Policy
This paper discusses risk management, contracting, and bidding for a wind power producer. A majority of the wind power in the United States is sold on long-term power purchase agreements, which hedge the wind power producer against future price risks. However, a significant amount is sold as merchant power and therefore is exposed to fluctuations in future electricity prices (day-ahead and real-time) and potential imbalance penalties. Wind power forecasting can serve as a tool to increase the profit and reduce the risk from participating in the wholesale electricity market. We propose a methodology to derive optimal day-ahead bids for a wind power producer under uncertainty in realized wind power and market prices....
This paper uses the Jobs and Economic Development Impacts (JEDI) model to estimate economic impacts from 1398 MW of wind power development in four counties in west Texas. Project-specific impacts are estimated at the local level (i.e., within a 100-mile radius around the wind farms) and at the state level. The primary economic policy question addressed is how investment in wind energy affects the state and local communities where the wind farms are built. During the four-year construction phase approximately 4100 FTE (full time equivalents) jobs were supported with turbine and supply chain impacts accounting for 58% of all jobs generated. Total lifetime economic activity to the state from the projects equated to...
This paper presents the strategy of the European Union in the field of energy and climate change. At the heart of the package are three commitments to be met by 2020: to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by at least 20%, to ensure that 20% of final energy consumption is met with renewable sources, and to raise energy efficiency by 20%. This strategy is based on the scientific consensus drawn by the International Panel for Climate Change, and implements the EU political strategy to limit the anthropogenic temperature rise to no more than 2 °C. A Directive for the geological storage of CO2 is another integral part of the package. This should enable the development and subsequent deployment of zero emission power plants....
Categories: Publication; Types: Citation; Tags: Climate, Energy, Environment, Policy
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The purpose of this Integrated Natural Resources Plan (INRMP) is to guide and document the manner in which the U.S. Army Yuma Proving Ground (USAYPG or YPG) sutains the military mission on the installation while managing the ecological health of our natural resources area. The INRMP will ensure sound land management, environmental stewardship, and compliance with all relevant laws, regulations, and applicable state and federal management plans, are consider during mission and project planning activities and that no net loss of mission capacity results from meeting our stewardship responsibilities. The INRMP is consistent with military requirements and the Sikes Act and associated amendments. Management of natural...
Hydraulic fracturing is a common method used to improve the productivity of gas-condensate wells. Previous simulation studies have predicted much larger increases in well productivity than observed in the field. This study showed the large effects of non-Darcy flow and condensate accumulation on the productivity of a hydraulically fractured gas-condensate well.
This paper provides a synthesis of current knowledge on the patterns, drivers, and characteristics of historical energy technology transitions. This historical evidence is then compared to the treatment of energy system dynamics in the scenario analysis on climate mitigation. The paper concludes with a discussion of generic implications for clean energy and technology innovation policy.
This paper presents the strategy of the European Union in the field of energy and climate change. At the heart of the package are three commitments to be met by 2020: to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by at least 20%, to ensure that 20% of final energy consumption is met with renewable sources, and to raise energy efficiency by 20%. This strategy is based on the scientific consensus drawn by the International Panel for Climate Change, and implements the EU political strategy to limit the anthropogenic temperature rise to no more than 2 °C. A Directive for the geological storage of CO2 is another integral part of the package. This should enable the development and subsequent deployment of zero emission power plants....
Categories: Publication; Types: Citation; Tags: Climate, Energy, Environment, Policy
A common misperception about oil politics is that it has a uniform, monolithic effect on policy development. This paper argues that in fact the net political effect of oil varies dramatically depending on the nature of the petrostate. It shows that oil income, when combined with revolutionary governments in petrostates, generates strong incentives for foreign policy aggression and international conflict. The aggressiveness of petro-revolutionary states is shown to have consequences in both military and economic spheres of international relations. Militarily, the aggressiveness of this type of state leads to a high rate of armed conflicts. Economically, the aggressiveness of petro-revolutionary states shapes global...
Abstract (from http://www.esajournals.org/doi/abs/10.1890/13-0905.1): Many protected areas may not be adequately safeguarding biodiversity from human activities on surrounding lands and global change. The magnitude of such change agents and the sensitivity of ecosystems to these agents vary among protected areas. Thus, there is a need to assess vulnerability across networks of protected areas to determine those most at risk and to lay the basis for developing effective adaptation strategies. We conducted an assessment of exposure of U.S. National Parks to climate and land use change and consequences for vegetation communities. We first defined park protected-area centered ecosystems (PACEs) based on ecological...
Most natural resource managers, planners and policy makers are now dependent upon spatially explicit environmental suitability and spatial allocation analyses to inform policy and management decisions. However, staff across agencies has been unable to stay current on understanding and applying these new data, tools and analyses. Currently, this information may be underutilized or used inappropriately, which could result in poor decisions. Two training curricula were developed – one for managers and one for GIS analysts – on current best practices for developing and using spatial information to support conservation decision making. The training materials are open-source and widely distributed to California LCC stakeholders.
Policy assessment of energy conservation strategies has tended to emphasize technological and economic costs, problems, and benefits. However, too narrow a focus may fail to delineate all the environmental and social impacts associated with the technology in question. In recognition of the importance of a balanced evaluation, a study was undertaken to identify local-level perceptions about environmental and social problems and opportunities associated with several energy conservation measures. These measures included building performance standards and retrofit; waste heat utilization; modifications in land use configurations and transportation modes; and electric utility demand management, and rate reform initiatives....
Mandatory targets for biofuels have led to their rapid global adoption, but ethical problems with their large-scale production are widely reported. Research is underway to find new biofuel technologies that mitigate climate change and can be produced sustainably and economically. Following an 18-month inquiry, the Nuffield Council on Bioethics has developed an ethical framework for biofuels policy-making. Based on a number of widely held ethical values, six ethical principles are introduced that should be considered in biofuels policy-making. Many current biofuels policies fail this ethical ‘test’. An overarching ethical standard for biofuels is proposed that includes the protection of human rights and the environment,...
The provision of both electrical and mechanical energy services can play a critical role in poverty alleviation for the almost two billion rural users who currently lack access to electricity. Distributed generation using diesel generators remains a common means of electricity provision for rural communities throughout the world. Due to rising fuel costs, the need to address poverty, and consequences of global warming, it is necessary to develop cost efficient means of reducing fossil fuel consumption in isolated diesel microgrids. Based on a case study in Nicaragua, a set of demand and supply side measures are ordered by their annualized costs in order to approximate an energy supply curve. The curve highlights...
Mining communities in different geographic locations may differ widely in terms of culture, environmental characteristics, and collective attitudes towards mineral resource development. The mining industry and a number of communities have realised the need to work together to establish a framework for sustainable equitable partnership that meets the priorities of each side. Risk assessment of a mineral resource development project contains social factors that needs to be addressed as part of due diligence in feasibility studies. The findings of such an analysis can provide key inputs for the identification of issues required to be negotiated as part of an agreed framework, leading to an impact benefits agreement...
There is no shortage of U.S. energy policy studies, analyses and recommendations. Each new U.S. administration' and many state govemments seek to develop their own energy policy approach, and yet over time, it seems as if little progress actually is made toward achieving stated energy policy objectives. As an example, consider the following conclusions from a key report. Throughout this decade, oil will remain the single most important commercial fuel, while such other primary and secondary energy sources as natural gas, coal, nuclear power, electricity, and energy from renewable sources must be relied upon increasingly.
The condition of landscapes and the ecological communities within them is strongly related to levels of human activity. Human-dominated land uses and especially the intensity of the uses can affect adjacent ecological communities through direct, secondary, and cumulative impacts. Using land use data and a development-intensity measure derived from energy use per unit area, an index of Landscape Development Intensity (LDI) can be calculated for watersheds of varying sizes to estimate the potential impacts from human-dominated activities that are experienced by ecological systems within those watersheds. The intended use of the LDI is as an index of the human disturbance gradient (the level of human induced impacts...
Three models for thinking about our responsibilities with respect to climate change are compared and evaluated. One is concerned with maximizing the present discounted value of consumption; the second views climate change through the lens of the tragedy of the commons. Both of these approaches are found to rest on implausible assumptions. A third model, based on the conception of a fiduciary trust is found to be more credible, and not to require overly burdensome policies.
Categories: Publication; Types: Citation; Tags: Climate, Planetary trust, Policy
During the last ten years environmental quality and energy have emerged as important national issues right along with the economy. The central proposition appears to be that environmental concerns are inversely related to concern about energy and the economy. The common assumptions about public perception of the trade-offs between environmental quality, economic growth, and energy production are shown to be invalid. In any event it is unlikely that public policy makers will find themselves strongly pulled by a highly polarized public.
With the ending of the Cold War, the US Department of Energy is responsible for the remediation of radioactive waste and disposal of land no longer needed for nuclear material production or related national security missions. The task of characterizing the hazards and risks from radionuclides is necessary for assuring the protection of health of humans and the environment. This is a particularly daunting task for those sites that had underground testing of nuclear weapons, where the radioactive contamination is currently inaccessible. Herein we report on the development of a Science Plan to characterize the physical and biological marine environment around Amchitka Island in the Aleutian chain of Alaska, where three...
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