Posted on 01/15/2007 1:18:04 PM PST by calcowgirl
Slashing greenhouse gases from California's gasoline in the next 14 years will reformulate not just our fuel but quite possibly our entire notion of the California dream, changing what we drive, how we fuel up and — most likely — how much we pay for the pleasure.
Gov. Arnold Schwarznegger last week proposed a revolutionary measure in his State of the State address: Cut the carbon content of fuels 10 percent by 2020.
It's one of the first concrete steps proposed to meet the state's ambitious greenhouse gas limits, which mandate a reduction of California's greenhouse gas emissions by 2020 to 1990 levels — a roughly 25 percent cut.
Tailpipe emissions account for 43 percent of the state's total greenhouse gas load.
Meeting the governor's yet-to-be-penned automotive fuels standard can only be done one way: Burning less petroleum. Refiners can squeeze more efficiency out of their plants. But the only replacements on the near horizon are ethanol, natural gas, biodiesel and electricity.
Energy companies could hit the governor's target, said Bob Epstein, co-founder of Environmental Entrepreneurs, by dedicating 800,000 acres of farmland in the San Joaquin and Imperial valleys to sugar cane, sugar beets, sorghum grass and other ethanol sources. That could displace 80 percent of the alfalfa grown in California, but it's only 3 percent of the state's 26.4 million acres of farmland.
Meanwhile, cars will be changing. Sometime after 2020, researchers say, a sizeable portion of automobiles on the highway will be next-generation hybrids — cars that plug into an outlet and recharge overnight, bypassing the gasoline station altogether.
At the pump, economists and energy experts predict far more options than the current regular, super and premium unleaded. Imagine, for instance, being able to dial up your level of greenness — though that will come, some warn, with an extra cost at least initially.
This was all little more than a dream a week ago, and it may be yet: Recall the giddiness in environmental circles a decade ago over the state's electric car mandate, long since abandoned.
But an array of thinkers give the governor's order a far better chance of surviving, simply because Schwarzenegger set the target for low-carbon fuel without dictating how it would be met.
"This really says there's a guaranteed market for low-carbon fuels," said Epstein, who champions the economics of environmentalism.
"There's huge amounts of investment capital (for alternative fuels), but you need to know that the market is going to be there."
Indeed, many companies are already on the way to reducing carbon emissions. United Parcel Service, Pacific Gas & Electric Co. and Southern California Edison have been tinkering with different alternative fuels in their fleets. Norcal Waste Systems in San Francisco runs its garbage trucks on liquefied natural gas. And the largest taxi fleet in San Franciscio, Yellow Cab Corp., powers almost a third of its taxis with either gasoline-electric or compressed natural gas engines.
Ethanol has the head start. Boosted by big tax subsidies, the nation's supply has doubled since 2000 to 4.9 billion gallons at the end of 2006 and is set to more than double again in less than 18 months.
But almost all of it is corn ethanol, which in terms of net energy produced and greenhouse gases emitted looks almost as bad as ordinary gasoline. It costs more, too, so many economists suspect the governor's new policy at first will result in higher prices at the pump.
"Would a greenhouse-gas standard raise the price of fuel? I think it's pretty clear the answer is yes," said Richard Newell, a Duke University energy and environmental policy professor and an economist at Resources for the Future.
The real winners of the new policy are likely to include tomorrow's ethanol — made of whole plants — as well as biodiesel, natural gas, hydrogen, electricity and the cars that run on them. When those come into play, prices are likely to come down.
As the fuels market gets bigger, transportation could go the way of telecommunications, where cable, phone and Internet providers compete in a free-for-all.
"There will be lots of winners and lots of losers, and the competition will be on cost and reliability," said Ralph Cavanaugh, a senior attorney and energy expert at the Natural Resources Defense Council in San Francisco.
Electric utilities already are positioning themselves as fuel providers and chafing to take on Big Oil. "If you as a consumer are confronted with a choice — $3 a gallon for gasoline or anywhere between 25 and 50 percent of that in electricity — the choice is clear," said Edward Kjaer, director of electric transportation for Southern California Edison.
The infrastructure is as close as the nearest socket, and electric motors beat gasoline motors handily for efficiency and emissions. Half the power provided by PG&E, for instance, comes from "noncarbon" sources, said Keely Wachs, a utility spokesman: Nuclear, hydropower, wind, solar and geothermal.
Experts estimate the state's power grid has enough excess capacity to charge up 12 million to 15 million plug-in hybrids. "That's upwards of 50 percent of the cars on the road today in California," Kjaer said.
Rather than an extra drain on the electrical grid, plug-in hybrids are being eyed by utilities as assets — millions of mobile batteries that can store energy at night, during off-peak hours, then perhaps help recharge the grid by day to smooth out peak demand.
"We think we're actually getting to a point where the product development is there, and that potentially is creating a game changer where you can store energy on the grid," Kjaer said. "You could be filling up millions of cars at night and then using it during the peaks of days. But that's a long ways away. You'd need hundreds of thousands of vehicles."
The question is whether the governor and his policy's many supporters can make it stick. Some of the same players tried a decade ago with the state's ill-fated zero emissions car mandate. Opposition from automakers and an overly optimistic reliance on advances in batteries killed it.
The new fuels standard is different, not just because it is agnostic on the solutions but because Big Oil and Detroit stand to make money in California's new low-carbon fuel market. After ag giants Archer Daniels Midland and Cargill, some of the biggest investors in biofuels are BP Amoco PLC, Royal Dutch Shell, Chevron and ExxonMobil.
I had always wondered WTF was wrong with California liberals. Now I know, they are consuming gasoline.
Global Warming is just a steaming pant load in a Socialist.
There is a simple way to get rid of 20% of your carbon output, Arnold: Get rid of 20% of your people.
Yes I said relax them!
The current requirements do not allow soot, and soot is nothing more than carbon from fuel that didn't make it on the path to carbon dioxide...
Gov. Arnold Schwarznegger last week proposed a revolutionary measure in his State of the State address: Cut the carbon content of fuels 10 percent by 2020
They should shift to hydrazine/methylhydrazine fuels. Carbon content low [none if no methylhydrazines are there], efficiency high, price ruinous, and poisonous like hell.
Is "low carb" gasoline like Adkins Gas?
"This really says there's a guaranteed market for low-carbon fuels," said Epstein, who champions the economics of environmentalism.
Dictating requirements without knowing how they will be met. "Economics of environmentalism." Legislating "guaranteed markets." I would call these folks a lot of things, but not "thinkers." ("Communist thinkers", maybe.)
Corrosive, don't forget corrosive...
Additive used in the combustible water/hydrocarbon fuel mixture, United States Patent 6379404
Sometime after 2020, researchers say, a sizeable portion of automobiles on the highway will be next-generation hybrids — cars that plug into an outlet and recharge overnight, bypassing the gasoline station altogether.
---
and pray tell, where will that recharging juice come from?
No mention of nuclear power , and these green folks claim to be visionaries.
[Experts estimate the state's power grid has enough excess capacity to charge up 12 million to 15 million plug-in hybrids.]
That's an interesting statement. We had power shortages and brownouts not that many years ago in California, yet we suddenly have excess capacity ?
FWIW, a typical electric vehicle uses between 150 and 300 watt-hours of electricity per mile driven. Split the difference and do the math on the typical 40 miles driven daily per vehicle. That is 9kwh per day for each vehicle, or 270 ADDITIONAL kwh used each month per vehicle. Average electric usage by households in CA is about 600kwh each per month. So we'll have no problem adding a new demand to the grid that is equal to 50% more homes ?
Don't get me wrong. I think battery electric vehicles -- maybe even plug-in hybrids to allow for longer trips -- is the most efficent way to provide personal transportation. But we shouldn't be surprised that we need more electric capacity to achieve it. And we definitely shouldn't shoot ourselves in the foot by creating a shortage that drives up the price of electricity and gives people a reason to call the electric vehicle a failure. Again.
I guess someone invented a method to harness the power of lightning. That magical outlet comes from a power plant, and CA is lacking in those too.
So they'll mooch off of other states, as usual...
Yeah, but it blows the driver into a different time period. (Think "Back to the Future.")
Even if they could, could households afford a 50% increase in electricity usage/cost.
Maybe it will be deemed a "shared responsibility" like Arnold-Care and they can just cover it in increased "fees" on car-dealers or bicycle makers.
I was wondering about that myself. Maybe what this is saying is grid capacity vs. power generation capacity. Saying the grid can distribute the needed power says nothing about the power generation needed to support 12m to 15m hybrids.
Cut the carbon in fuel? Would not that then require more fuel to go the same distance?
Those claims are usually based upon charging vehicles from residences during the night when peak demand is down. Based on that, they are likely correct.
--Gov. Arnold Schwarznegger last week proposed a revolutionary measure in his State of the State address: Cut the carbon content of fuels 10 percent by 2020--
I believe that ethanol, per gallon, has less carbon than gasoline. I would have to do the math but based on energy content that would seem to apply.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.