He takes credit in his latest Straight piece for predicting $120 a barrel oil when no-one else did, so he continues his contrarian ways with the suggestion that economic recession in western countries brought on by the credit crunch will lower demand enough to be reflected in oil prices. Of course, in the longer term they will soon bounce back - and more.

What seems to be missing is any discussion of the instability of many of the places that the world relies on for oil. All it takes is some sabotage in Nigeria or a wave of unrest in some of the former soviet republics and the supply drops rapidly.Similarly, since there is so much dependence on a few very large supplies and a continuing issue with refinery capacity a few hitches - like the damage to Gulf coast installations by Hurricane Katrina - and the present predictions go out of the window.

The rate at which the Chinese and Indians are buying cars will also be a significant replacement for the west finding more efficient ways to get around. I have not worked out the ratio, but I suspect that for every gas guzzler replaced by a Prius or Civic there are several new Chinese cars for households that formerly rode bicycles or scooters. The easing of demand for Chinese products in the US will probably just release capacity for more home consumption or for exports to economies with stronger currencies.

The he returns to the doom and gloom of the impact of climate change - and its effect on political stability in nations at risk. Given that we really ahve not yet tackled the causes of these changes, he is right to do so. There seems still to be a remarkable lack of urgency about effective steps - and the on going saga of BC’s carbon tax seems to be solely about our local issues not the need for tackling the biggest crisis to face mankind.

Sun

Conservatives, Liberals say they’re not concerned about food-based biofuel

“We have energy security and we have the environment and they’re both important priorities,” said Environment Minister John Baird in an interview. “We obviously cannot continue to depend on foreign oil (when) you look at the prices.”

But as Environment Minister you are not supposed to be concerned about those things - that falls to other departments. And this is the same government that was, in the last few days, beating its chest in Washington about the size of our oil reserves. “Second only to Saudi Arabia” said Mr Harper.

If we “depend on foreign oil” it is very silly to import it at higher costs than we can produce it ourselves - isn’t it? Or is it that the shameful environmental record of the tar sands has some resonance in your Ministry? No - that seems unlikely to me.

Note as well the reuse of the current buzz word “simplistic”. There is a shortage of food. Grain prices are at record highs. The US has an increasing requirement of corn for ethanol to the extent that corn for food use is declining in supply, and at the same time farmers are switching away from soy beans and other crops. Yes there are other factors - the greed of speculators being a large influence - but the driving force is the US appetite for motor fuel, and the increasing number of vehicle miles and the huge size of the vehicles they use to drive themselves around. And the way that ethanol is promoted by self interest groups as “green”.

I have no doubt at all that I will start seeing petition and letter writing requests in my inbox within hours.

UPDATE Friday May 2 - two more significant stories to day in the Sun - including this gem

Almost $3 billion in federal and provincial grants, subsidies and incentives is providing the fertilizer.

Those of you following the fortunes of the US and who read Chris Leinberger’s article will find the following somewhat familiar

A new analysis shows that high gas prices are not only implicated in the bursting of the housing bubble, but that the higher cost of commuting has already re-shaped the landscape of real estate value between cities and suburbs. Housing values are falling fastest in distant suburban and exurban neighborhoods where affordability depended directly on cheap gas.

Author Joe Cortright wrote to me “Our contribution is to use some current and very detailed data about real estate markets to flesh out that [Leinberger] story.”

Read the press release here.

Download the full study here.

Download File (PDF 107 KB)

Of course I do not expect that this will have any impact at all on Kevin Falcon - who will just stick his fingers in his ears and start singing the zoom zoom song

Oil $120m a barrel, gas $1.30 a litre - and we are going to widen a freeway and build the SFPR across Burns Bog

Harvey Enchin’s faith in free markets is touching: the invisible hand will sort out every problem for us. As long as we have no governments “interfering”.

He does acknowledge the finite nature of fossil fuels, but I see not one reference to climate change except for a personal attack on Al Gore. Which is not really a very convincing way to make a case. If King Abdullah is really protecting his reserves for future generations, he is a lot smarter than most observers give him credit for. The analysis I have seen has suggested that the reserves have always been a closely protected secret, but the suspicion is that is because there is a lot less there than they say.

Of course the size of the reserves anywhere is very much a function of the price of oil. When exploration found reserves off Newfoundland, a lot of energy economists that I knew were frankly sceptical that it would be worth exploiting, but back then $120 a barrel oil seemed far in the future. It also doesn’t help that we are trying to measure prices in terms of a declining currency. It is a bit like using a tape measure made of elastic.

But Harvey also does not mention that there can be very sound reasons for not developing oil reserves, and in the case of Canada’s west coast, it was not just the First Nations that raised concerns about the fragility of the ecosystem here. Indeed, everyone was affected by the Exxon Valdez - and many still are - and the credibility gap of the oil industry and its claims of being “scientifically sound and environmentally responsible”. Erm, no. Not on the present record they’re not. Denying climate change and funding bogus “scientific papers” supporting their financial benefit over the fate of millions of people is not sound science or responsible.

Yes some government policies are dumb. But what else do you expect when you let some large corporate interests put up a sock puppet for president, rig the election results and then start declaring war on trumped up reasons? Hopefully this will end shortly, and we can return to sanity. And the unwillingness of oil companies to invest in

Kazakhastan, Azerbaijan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan; Bolivia, Venezuela, Columbia and Ecuador; Russia, China, Saudi Arabia, Sudan, Nigeria, Iran, Iraq and Kuwait

is understandable but then the ability of others to exploit these resources is also a distinct possibility. Certainly the Chinese do not lack the financial resources, although I bet now they wish they had diversified out of dollars some time ago.

On the whole I would rather that we leave the BC coast alone. It is going to be hard enough to mitigate the effects of the Deltaport, the loss of wild salmon and much of the migratory bird population and clean up the mess that Atlantic salmon farming will have left after that dumb policy is ended. If there are petroleum resources there, let us hold them against future needs for products that we are going to have a hard time making in future. There are a lot better things to do with oil and gas than burn it!

But mostly let us review the dumb policies and come up with smarter ones, which will make this place a better one to live in for everyone - not just us. A dumb policy is not just one that seems to block private investment. A dumb policy is one that continues to make the same mistakes and expects a different outcome. Reducing the size of our footprint is something we really do not have much choice about if we take a long term, broad view of the future. Now that may look disadvantageous to the fast buck crowd, but that is just tough. They will have to accept that we are entitled to expect more from them - in terms of environmental protection and restoration, and longer term sustainability.

The point of the peak oil argument is not the date - now, last year, next tear, twenty years away. It is inevitable. A dumb policy is to wait until we have absolute certainty that it is too late and then change behaviour. We have to make adjustments - we should have been making adjustments - our competitors have already made adjustments and have sounder economies as a result (the Euro is not getting stronger just on a whim).

And we also only have one planet. As far as we know this is the only planet that can support life as we understand it. We have yet to discover another - and any candidates are currently well beyond our reach. Looking after the one we have and ensuring it can continue to support us is not a dumb policy at all. Dumb is ignoring that reality and concentrating on fast profits and quick returns.

I hope you do not think I am being lazy just passing things along. And irritated because you have already yourself seen them in your own in box because you subscribe to the same email lists I do.

But this is very important and very relevant. I have already slammed Metro for the way it is conducting its consultation for the Sustainable Region Initiative - though how you can have Gateway and sustainability in the same plan beats me. And we have also been talking about how much energy we just throw away “leaving money on the table”.

So here is a press release from EcoJustice that was not on their web page last time I looked but may be by the time you read this. (It was forwarded to the lrc list by Ned Jacobs)

By Jim Boothroyd
Ecojustice (formerly Sierra Legal Defence Fund)

Did you know that city engineers are advancing a plan that would allow the
polluting Iona sewage outfall ­ at the mouth of the Fraser River, and at the
heart of a major environmental lawsuit — to continue spewing toxic sewage
for another 22 years?

Or that your civic authorities are timid about embracing proven technologies
that would allow Vancouver to “harvest sewage” to fuel fleets of buses, heat
whole neighbourhoods and produce profitable sources of fertilizer? (See
example at end of article)

Well, it’s true ­ and now is the time to tell them to look to the future and
clean up their act.

For the first time in five years, Metro Vancouver (the old GVRD) is
reviewing its plans for liquid and solid waste management and is holding a
series of public consultations to hear what you have to say. This is your
best opportunity to ensure that the changes coming down are the best for the
region for the long-term. Please consider taking part.

All meetings run from 6:30pm to 9:00 pm and include time for you to ask
questions of the engineers in charge ­ they’ll even give you coffee and an
oatmeal cookie.

Tues., April 22, North Vancouver (Capilano College);
Wed., April 23, Vancouver (Library Square);
Tuesday April 29 , Coquitlam (Executive Plaza Hotel & Conference Centre);
Wed., April 30, Maple Ridge (Maple Ridge Arts Centre & Theatre (The ACT);
Tues, May 6, Langley (Newlands Golf and Country Club).

For details, go to http://www.georgiastrait.org/?q=node/730

One last thing: if you lived in Stockholm, Sweden, this is what managing
your waste would look like. One of your many sewage treatment plants would
treat both sewage and kitchen waste producing biogas for fifty buses, rising
to two hundred in a few years. The plant would have a Business Development
Manager who sells biogas from her plant, as well as providing cooking fuel
for the nearby community of Hammarby Sjöstad. Energy recovered from sewage
by heat pumps would provide heat and hot water for a total of 80,000 homes.
The energy and material would loop between the plant and the community
mimicking nature’s closed cycles.

An approach to managing waste that is based on integrated resource
management and built on the idea of smaller distributed plants rather than a
few large ones is happening in other communities around the world,
protecting our environment and providing a sustainable source of energy.

The question is whether we¹re ready to bring that thinking here.

For more information on resource recovery from waste:
http://www.georgiastrait.org/?q=node/567

I note that none of the meetings is scheduled for the fourth largest city in BC and the home of both the offending Iona Beach and Lulu Island Sewage Plants

This sign is at Garry Point Park where I have often seen children paddling despite the warning. It is about two miles downstream from the Lulu Island outfall.

You know you are doing something right when you get three emails, within minutes of each other, suggesting things to blog about.

I am going to pass on the suggestion (sorry, Mr Holden) of the Walmart in town story - it is too close to the “even Walmart” comments at Smart Growth and the thing I did on big boxes on Cambie not so long ago. I am also not going to delve into energy corridors in Wyoming which sound dreadful but also dreadfully complicated.

I recently linked to an article in the Atlantic, so someone there suggested I take a peak at “A steamy solution to global warming” by Lisa Margonelli

Economists like to say that rational markets don’t “leave $100 bills on the ground,” but according to McKinsey’s figures, more than $50 billion floats into the air each year, unclaimed by American businesses. What’s more, the technologies required to save that money are, for the most part, not new or unproven or even particularly expensive. By and large, they’ve been around since the 19th century. The question is: Why aren’t we using them?

Because corporate America doesn’t have to think. It has George W and a hot line to some compliant congressmen and lots of really smart lawyers. As long as there no real reason to do so, why would they think outside the box? Much more comfortable to follow the herd, and buy a table at the next Republican fundraiser. The US government is spending trillions of dollars to ensure that Iraqi oil still flows their way, so why worry about energy efficiency?

Back in 1970 a senior plant manager at ICI told me - quite seriously “There is no money in pollution” - but he was paying my organisation lots of money every year to pull out of the river the guck that his plant was dumping in it further up stream. So that craft serving his plant had enough water under their keels to load efficiently. How do you argue with people like that?

I recently pointed out that we do not in general spend a lot on community energy systems here. Although the City of North Van did and the former Mayor of Vancouver owns a steam distribution business in downtown Vancouver. Because we put what little industry we have left way out in the boonies there are not many ways to connect industry waste heat to places that need heating. But I can think of a few. For instance the cement plants in Richmond and Delta (LaFarge and Tilbury) produce loads of waste heat and they are not so far away from greenhouse country. The last refinery here - Chevron in Burnaby - could send heat to SFU. And then there is the thermal generating station near Ioco. It burns gas to heat water to raise steam to turn the turbines and then dumps warm water into the inlet. And the idea of using more efficient combined cycle gas turbines has been rejected there more than once. Gas turbines also have the advantage of being able (like hydro dams) to meet peak loads very quickly indeed. No, I don’t know why they preferred steam. The reason I mention this location is that it is under review for some major redevelopment by that very smart chap who did SFUniverCity - and I bet he could work a community energy system into his development

Photo by Richard Eriksson

Even post industrial Vancouver can get into the heat recycling business. It just requires a change in mind set. For instance what was once BC Hydro could think about selling energy - not just generating electricity. But of course, here it would have to find a P3 partner to skim off the profits first

I am overwhelmed today by the number of potential “bloggable” items coming to my attention.

There is a distinct limit that I need to recognize, to the amount of time I spend at the computer. So I am not going to write at length about any of these issues - even though they are all worthy of a lot of attention.

CONDUCTING MOBILITY is an online exhibition about energy & transportation curated by Claude Willey and Ryan Griffis.

Mother Jones has a very comprehensive special on The Future of Energy - and in particular a long and very thoughtful, even handed piece on nuclear power. It is well worth your time.

And finally sad news from my homeland. Gwyneth Dunwoody, chair of the transport select committee and Parliament’s longest-serving female MP, has died age 77. The link takes you to the tributes. She was one of those very rare politicians, who deal with issues in their own way. She was a great champion of public transport and railways, but she always stood her ground and thought for herself.

Only in the UK you say? Pity

Guardian

We, a family of four, have produced 92% of our electricity usage from the roof of a century-old terraced house in south-east London - laying to rest the idea that Britain is not sunny enough for solar power.

I am fairly sure that I would have noticed if anyone was doing this round here. And, no, it is not only in the UK - the Germans, he says, are doing it even better.

The up front investment seems a bit steep - and why am I not surprised that the government there backed off sharpish once the take up rate showed thay had made it “too attractive”. Britain generates a lot of its electricity from coal and will have to start importing natural gas again as its own supply of North Sea gas is dwindling. So you would have thought that a bunch of householders volunteering to provide some additional green generating capacity would be good news.

It also seems to me to much more popular than anything to do with run of the river hydro, which was supposed to be so much better than big dams but now seems as popular as a root canal.

It has been a while since I toiled in this field, but I do recall an exhibition in Delta where the residents lined up to complain about Delta’s by laws which prevented them from even heating their water with the old fashioned black panel type solar heaters (I had one of those back in Ontario).

I thought the behavioural stuff was interesting too - but then no-one interviewed the family about Dad’s obsession with turning things off. I can just imagine the eye rolling when he talks about hair dryers. (Of course, I do not even own such a thing.)

The weather in London is not greatly different to here - although they get much less rain (it used to average 24″ a year in our school weather station). We are further south (49 not 51 like them) so that might help too. Although I do not recall snow in April in London

This is to help bring out the point Meredith made in a recent comment

These are the graphs he refers to

Source: Energy Watch Group (note: this is a large pdf file)

Sun

Well that is because it is supposed to change the way we do things. There has to be some incentive to change - and that needs both encouragement to do the right thing and a bigger reason to stop doing the wrong thing.

I have little sympathy for the truckers. Because they are putting our lives at risk, and they know that, and yet they want “help from government” to continue to do what they always have done. I have been trying to find a link to a story that was on Global tv last night, but so far with no luck. There was another one of those random crackdowns on trucks in West Vancouver over the weekend. As usual a very high percentage of trucks were found to be unroadworthy due to lack of basic maintenance. I think the figure was 50% of trucks being pulled off the road until they fixed basic things, like brakes.

Photo by Danny Brinkley

The trucking industry has been one of the least responsible of corporate citizens. In recent years the pressure has been put on the drivers, as companies have moved to make them contractors - “owner operators” - rather than employees. This shifts the burden of responsibility on to the shoulders of the driver, who now carries all of the risk, for very little reward. As diesel prices have risen, the rates for truckers have not increased, with inevitable results. I do not see that “throwing money” at this problem will solve it, it will merely perpetuate it.

We also know that the diesel exhaust is a human carcinogen. And that people who live along major truck routes are exposed to much higher levels of diesel particulates. While there has been loud and sustained pressure on transit operators to reduce emissions, I have seen very little activity from the private sector truck industry. Of course not. They work down to a price not up to a standard. And our children have elevated levels of asthma as a result. In my opinion this is not a good trade off.

The carbon tax does not have a big effect yet - it does have one special impact on BC however. Other jurisdictions do not have it - yet. And there is a penalty for being first. If the government is wise, it will start to encourage measures to reduce diesel use by truckers. There is a lot that can be done, just by upgrading the trucks and their maintenance standards. In fact cleaning fuel injectors is the easiest way to stop unburned fuel going up the exhaust stack. That plume of black smoke you see is just money being wasted. The sort of people who cannot be bothered to look at their brakes regularly, are not likely to do something technical and time consuming like engine maintenance. Port officials have been pointing out for a long time the number of empty trips that truckers are forced to make because terminal operators expect them to drop off a container, but not pick up a full one in the same trip. This is not rocket science!

The story talks about biofuels too, but I think there is a lot more that can be done to reduce truck fuel consumption rather than look for alternative fuels. Engine efficiency in European diesels has been much improved because of regulations by the EU: North America listens too much to truck makers and operators who have fought similar legislation here. Trucks in Europe all carry recording equipment, to ensure that truckers stick to the rules - about drivers hours, speeding and a number of other issues. Originally designed to level the competitive playing field, the consequences have been far reaching. Road safety being one major beneficiary. And we share the roads with these things.

I hope that for once Paul Landry does not have the ear of the provincial government. His activities through the Gateway Council have pushed the trucking agenda at our expense, and much of that turns out to have been a misrepresentation. The Gateway program is very bad for this region for a number of reasons, not least of which is the misperception that we “need” to invest in more infrastructure for truck movement, and not look at ways to make our transportation system more efficient and effective. And one of those things is looking at other ways of moving freight that are more energy efficient. Or reducing the amount of truck movement (and idling) by better scheduling. Do you think that those long slow moving line ups of trucks along Deltaport Way shut down their engines while they are waiting?

UPDATE  April 16

VANCOUVER SUN - Drivers caught behind the wheels of poorly maintained or neglected commercial trucks are facing fines of $100 to $1,300 in a two-day inspection blitz by Vancouver police, city and port officials and the Greater Vancouver transit authority.

Drivers are being ticketed for defective brakes, steering, structural defects, bald tires, and broken lights.

At Terminal Avenue and Carolina Street on Tuesday, the group inspected 54 trucks, pulling 24 out of service. It also suspended one driver who was impaired by drugs and issued more than $15,000 in fines.

A slightly better rate than the one reported in the original story, but still disgraceful. And this is not unusual or a recent phenomenon. The trucking industry must clean up its act, and that means taking responsibility for truck maintenance and replacement. The reliance on owner operators is very much against the public interest -a s well as the poor suckers who were persuaded to invest in their own trucks. Essentially, truckers, like taxi drivers, are forced to buy their jobs. This is, quite simply, wrong.