McCain:Willing to START a War to Win Election! EPA tag SRP emissions, Star Trek's Chekov's best DVD
Stafford Williamson
August 19, 2008
"FEDERAL GOVERNMENT ANNOUNCES SETTLEMENT WITH COAL-FIRED POWER PLANT"
"First Settlement in Western U.S. Requiring State-of-the-Art Nitrogen Oxide Retrofit"
"The Salt River Project Agricultural Improvement and Power District (SRP) has agreed to install pollution controls at an estimated cost of $400 million to reduce harmful emissions and pay a $950,000 civil penalty…"
So where's the good news? Considering that SRP is a "political subdivision of the State of Arizona," it basically amounts to the Federal Government imposing a fine and significant expenses on the State Government. So that ain't it. That's gotta be the bad news, because I'll be paying the costs in higher taxes and or higher utility rates.
Frankly the good news is that the pollution controls will result in less acid rain. Oxides of nitrogen and oxides of sulfur, both form acids when exposed to moisture in the atmosphere, and the result is acid rain. Both of these oxides are also blamed, in part, for the rise in childhood asthma symptoms. The accords call for reductions in particulate matter being released from the smokestacks too.
I hope, however that if it really is going to be as costly as has been reported that this is because they are thinking ahead, and as good corporate citizens SRP will be implementing a gasification (CTG or CTL) type operation. I have difficulty seeing how it could ever be economic to spend that kind of money purely on retrofitting scubbers, but on the basis of "we've got to do it anyway," they may be foresighted enough to be applying this "bad situation" resolution to develop greater expertise with CTL or CTG solutions.
What was the bad news? No mention was made about carbon dioxide release reduction. This would certainly be an ideal time, when implementing scrubbers anyway, to divert carbon dioxide from the flue gases to some form of sequestration. You know by now that my favorite "sequestration" is not really sequestration at all, but cultivation of algae. Since algae also require substantial amounts of nitrogen, it seems logical that both of these pollutant gases could be directed, in some measure, toward growing algae, which could itself be used as biomass, along with the coal being burned to produce the electricity. Theoretically at least, if the algae was cultivated in sufficient quantity and put through either a biomass-to-liquid fuel (BTL) process or processes the quantity of algae could gradually increase to the point where the coal was unnecessary. Imagine that, a process in which there is no cost for coal, no cost for transportation of coal to the generating plant site, no handling of coal, just grow-your-own and combust-on-site from biomass-to-gas process. I would love to see them implement a quick-fix of the scrubbers for a few million, and devote the rest of the money to developing the algae cultivation and gasification capability.
Having given that advice, I expect that no one will ever give it any credence, whatsoever, because most businesses feel that advice is worth what you pay for it, and having just gotten it for free, they will very likely consider it worthless, and usesless.
Oh, yes, the other good news is that SRP has promised to do $4,000,000 in "community service" (or it´s corporate equivalent), by adding pollution controls on Phoenix school district diesel powered buses, and to do at least 4 installations of significant photo-voltaic solar panel displays on 2 schools in the St. Johns, area, and 2 in the Phoenix district. Incidentally I was amazed that it might cost $400,000,000 to retrofit scrubbers on these coal-fired generating facilities, but my call to the EPA confirmed that this was not a typographical error. (If SRP has other numbers, to share, I´m easy to find, but it is remarkable that such expenses did not kill the plants altogether.)
As I listen to the broadcasters and all of their favorite pundits on matters political, I keep hearing that Senator McCain is favored by most people on issues of national security, national defense and international relations. Although I was impressed, myself, with Senator Obama's whirlwind tour through the Middle East and Europe, and his confidence and success in establishing the beginnings of relationships with the various leaders and heads of state, it seems to have had little effect on the general population or at least not to the extent that it has affected the polling results, yet. So if all the hoopla and exultations over Senator Obama's appearance in front of 200,000 audience members in Germany (notice, not "Germans", the audience was more cosmopolitan than that) went largely un-noticed I am going to have to count myself in a minority when it comes to the connections, apparent and implied (or inferred) between John McCain and the Republic of Georgia.
Let's start with an acknowledgment that war is a political tool at the best of times (that tends to make the best of times into the worst of times). From that point of view, I want to express my sympathies for those affected by this mere skirmish over rebellious Georgian provinces. So-called "rights" to self-determination and self-governance, it seems to me, are as often as not a political power grab by "locals", whether we are talking about the American Revolution or "the troubles" in Ireland. But before I get off into the weeds in a discussion of war in general and religious differences as an excuse for war, can we just agree that war is a bad thing, and avoiding it, or anything resembling it, is a good thing. Given that as our premise, how is it that the shooting got started in Georgia recently?
Local political tensions were already high. Indeed, Russian troops had been sent in to South Ossetia despite the fact that it was a province of Georgia in order to keep the peace. (Citizens of both South and North Ossetia mostly still carry C.C.C.P. passports, those of the old U.S.S.R. in the English alphabet.) Whether or not Georgia was "happy" about foreign soldiers doing peacekeeping duties within its borders, any gunfire was limited, mainly, to potshots between the rowdier elements and the Russian peacekeepers. Then something happened.
Exactly what happened has not come to me in any clear and concise description yet, nor am I likely to pursue it in any great detail, because as my old shrink back in Los Angeles used to say, "If you want to see what something was 'for', look at the results that it produced." Sadly those results included fairly significant numbers of innocent civilians as well as combatants dead and buried. Both rebellious provinces, South Ossetia and Abkhazia, became strongholds of Russian forces, and bombs and tanks were seen just beyond the outskirts of the Georgian capital city of Tbilisi. On western television news channels, Georgian President Saakashvili has appeared numerous times. His speeches, in English you may have noticed, were certainly aimed at western audiences whether condemning Russia's "aggression" or calling for support from Europe and America. In one speech president Saakashvili specifically made reference to a remark by an American presidential candidate: John McCain.
How does it happen that the president of former Soviet Socialist Republic invokes as a call to action this name of one (not both you'll notice) of the American presidential candidates? Not the president, but a political candidate, is the one he notes. Nor is it some vague reference, but it is in direct response to Senator McCain's own attempt to associate himself with President Kennedy's famous, "I am a Berliner," speech at the Brandenburg Gate (where they didn't allow Senator Obama to speak mere days before) as Senator McCain declared that in light of the long, not even 20 years yet, and close relationship of the Georgian and American people's that he was sure he spoke for everyone in saying, "We're all Georgians tonight."
Not to make light of the tragedy that has befallen thousands of Georgians, but Senator McCain statement seems so contrived to sound more "important" and contrived, especially by calling to mind President Kennedy's triumphant moment in Berlin, that in contrast to the rousing reception Senator Obama received in Germany, and elsewhere, all over Europe, it seems so pitiful that it would bring tears to the eyes of an Irish potato.
(That's a joke for my Canadian friends, who know "McCain's" as the most famous brand of packaged potatoes. Not that Republicans have had a hard time spelling potato, or anything.)
But was President Saakashvili just an astute observer of American politics or might there have been more here than meets the eye. If you are a regular or frequent reader of my column you probably have heard in the news that Senator McCain's top foreign policy adviser works for a lobbying firm that has been paid hundreds of thousands of dollars by none other than the government of the Republic of Georgia to lobby in Washington on its behalf.
Did you hear the Russian side of the story or was that buried under all those resurrected Cold War suspicions of Russia's "ambitions" for exerting control over the former Soviet Satellite States? The Russians claim that the Georgian provoked this "response". Sadly clear and unambiguous details are not available on that story at this time.
What is known is that Senator McCain also acknowledges having met President Saakashvili several times. Russian President Medvedev quickly agreed to a ceasefire but the actual terms are muddied by the fact that Russia's troop positions are "fluid", to say the least, and withdrawal to pre-hostilities positions has not taken place. Former Russian President Putin was attending the Olympic Games opening ceremonies as the fighting began. Considering how firm a guiding hand he still has on Russia's government, it seems unlikely that such a major event would be "planned" while he was out of the country.
I expect it would not surprise you that I once heard diplomacy described as, "reading tea leaves in the other guy's teacup from across the room." There may very well be many more "leaves" to read in the next few days but taking only those we have, the situation looks suspiciously like this.
From the Georgian perspective they have recognized the advantages of having a rich uncle (Uncle Sam) as compared to an overburdened mother (Mother Russia) who, like the old lady in the nursery rhyme, " had so many children, she did know what to do." They may have also recognized the ironic underlying truth in, "The Mouse That Roared," that economic and military aid flow like milk and honey when the United States takes you under their wing. At minimum, again looking at results to determine underlying intent, it seems this will likely hasten Georgia's entry into NATO.
From the observer´s seat it certainly looks like too cozy of an arrangement between the McCain for President Campaign and the foreign leader. Yes, it could have been better timed. October might have been ideal. Yet just because you poke your opponent doesn't necessarily mean he will respond immediately. History will bear out that fact, since it took the mighty forces of the USA months and months each time to take on the puny forces of the Iraqi military. Could it be that a foreign policy advisor and lobbyist advised both his clients on this matter?
I received word of the following news clip on YouTube.com via an email written in German. My "Deutsche" is weak, but I understood enough to think it was worth following up on it, so after I got a translation, I went to look at the video. The email, by the way, said (in German) that "We are against propaganda in German media! We are not media puppets. We wanted the TRUTH! We are the people! Spread this message like a wildfire!" They also claimed that YouTube was manipulating the view count on this clip. It was not. This clip only got about 5,000 views, but another version (of the same Fox news segment) got just short of 1 million views.
(Just in case the forgoing "embed" command didn't work, you might want to look at
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H8XI2Chc6uQ
They are only tea leaves after all, but I do like tea. English Breakfast Tea by Twinning´s is my favorite flavor, though I still need one lump of sugar to take the edge off the bitter qualities.
Energy policy is already and will likely continue to be one of the most important features of this political season. My (large D) democratic leanings are fairly obvious. I even gave up my Independent voter registration status to be permitted to cast my ballot for Senator Clinton. It will be predictable, but necessary to point out that in my opinion Senator McCain has such a lame energy policy as to have none at all. He speaks favorably (now) of nuclear power development at the same time that you opposes the haulling of spent nuclear fuels even through (never mind into) his home state of Arizona to get to the Yucca Mt., Nevada disposal site. His gas tax holiday proposal for these summer months (amounting to an estimated $42.00 for family) was discredited as a campaign ploy (and hardly a energy "policy" for an incoming president in any case). His recent conversion to take the favorable stance on opening additional leases for offshore drilling is, as has been said many times "a mere drop in the bucket" which will have no effect on oil prices for it leased 7 to 12 years and then only a few cents per gallon at the most; the total available reserves being so small. Do you think Senator McCain could use a new energy policy adviser?
Would you recommend T. Boone Pickens for the job? Though I have long been an admirer of his many spectacular accomplishments, I could not. Mr. Pickens has been a wild-man, wildcatter in the oil and gas industry for nearly half a century. His maverick mode matches to Senator McCain very well. He has an innovative and somewhat revolutionary energy plan. All of it, it appears, will help Mr. Pickens get even richer than h e already is. He wants to replace all liquid transportation fuels with compressed natural gas while replacing as much as possible of the oil and gas and coal-fired electric generation industry with wind power. Mr. Pickens has a vast plan to erect wind generators all over West Texas; about $10,000,000,000 worth of them, of which he has already invested about $1,000,000,000. There's not a lot of chance Mr. Pickens will go broke any time soon, however. The State of Texas has committed another $1,000,000,000 for transmission lines to carry a Boone´s power from West Texas to the cities in the Southeast of Texas. This truly is a good first step in the direction of a serious overhaul of the National Power grid. As commentator James Burke said in the opening episode of his incredible series Connections, "We live at the bottom of a technology well," by which he meant, at least in part, that we are so heavily dependent on large power plants and their interconnections that supply our national grid that if one fails the whole grid can collapse, as we saw with the famous of New York City blackout, and more recently the brownouts in California. If they all fail, we're left to freeze in the dark. Distributed power generation and "smart" power distribution are the coming trends of the future.
Now if I were to suggest to you that you should dash out to the corner "power store" to pick up a single family residence type wind turbine generator for a "mere" $15,000 to $20,000 you would likely tell me I was crazy.
Even if it would save you a $1000 a year (or more) for the next 40 years you probably don't have $20,000 in spare change in your other pocketbook or in your other pair of pants. But think about $20,000 as a small portion of your next house purchase. A mere "average" house in many parts of the country now costs in the neighborhood of $200,000. From that point of view wouldn't you really rather have a $220,000 house that had $0.00 energy costs forever. So how about a government Energy Policy that grants a personal tax credit of $5000 to each home buyer who purchases a zero energy consumption home? That happens to be very close to the provisions of the recent stimulus package passed by Congress (which contains a tax credit for "first time" home buyers) and even closer to Senator Obama's plan to revitalize the housing market.
Senator Obama has proposed putting one million of the new plug-in type hybrid cars on the road in the next few years and possibly offering up to $7000 tax credit to purchasers. In my opinion a mere 1,000,000 new plug-in hybrids is far too modest a goal that lacks both vision and commitment on the part of the government. Why not a million cars a year for 10 years with declining subsidies as the program ages, or transitioning subsidies starting with high hybrid subsidy amount but lowering them as we increase subsidies towards the more and more efficient all-electric vehicles?
Did I mention, I think I did not, that oil and GAS man T. Boone Pickens picked compressed natural gas as THE fuel for the future because the assets he and his friends still own in the oil and gas world are mostly natural gas, naturally. Mr. Pickens gets rich on both sides of his policy. And his friends are happy too.
Getting back to my imaginative, imaginary, comprehensive energy policy strategy as we transitioned out of subsidies aimed at conventionally-fueled, plug-in hybrids; an alternative or interim step on the way to all-electric vehicles that could be implemented quickly would be CNG plug-in hybrids. And when we do make it to all-electric vehicles, that have enough battery power to avoid needing a recharger engine, if we have managed to implement widespread building of energy self-sufficient homes, we can have "free electric transport" powered from our home generators. Detroit should be delighted with the new, ongoing and transitional status of each generation of vehicles as additional incentives to purchase new models each year as has been their marketing strategy for all of these decades.
(By that time I most sincerely hope we have left "roadways" behind and can expect Detroit to be concentrating on personal flying vehicles.)
For the rest of us there is the prospect of zero-fossil-derived-carbon fuels. Both petro diesel and gasoline can be replaced by biomass sourced fuels. We have no shortage of biomass, certainly not yet. We also need to stop swallowing all that nonsense about fuel taking food out of the mouths of starving children (which is just plain NOT TRUE!). Nor are we likely to experience any shortages in the next several hundred years, especially since microalgae are not only the most-likely, best source of biomass, but they are also the fastest growing species on the planet.
Sometimes one gets to delight in an overlooked gem of a film. We saw a trailer for this one a long time ago, and then could find no reference to it at all. Charlie Bartlett seemed to have disappeared off the face of the entertainment world for a time, but I am delighted to report that we were delighted with the film when it finally arrived on DVD. Anton Yelchin playing leading character Charlie Bartlett is just stunningly charming. His character shines through the role in much the same way that his co-star, Robert Downey Jr. often does in his roles. And indeed the roles rather mirror one another in the storyline too, though Downey's character is darker, with deeper demons as he portrays the "villain" of the piece, a high school principal and father of Charlie's girlfriend, though the two of them join in an uplifting redemption as the film closes. Kat Dennings is an off-beat but alluring teen lady, just right for the quirky Charlie character's love interest. She's had a recurring role on the television series E.R. a few years ago, but has 4 new films in production or post production at this time, so expect to see more of her. Oh, yes, Anton Yelchin is also reportedly in 4 upcoming pictures, which include the role of "Pavel Chekov" in the next Star Trek movie due for release in 2009, which is described as, "A chronicle of the early days of James T. Kirk and his fellow USS Enterprise crew members."
With that happy thought, I will leave you for another week, with:
Love and warm wishes,
Stafford "Doc" Williamson
energy.psyrk.us
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