[Vision2020] Inconvenient Truth -- What WE REALLY HAVE TO DO: " Apollo Project"

Wed Aug 30 15:00:50 PDT 2006

Ted,

Great timing on your response...

First to clear up something, I did not, and will never advocate raising
gasoline taxes to lower gasoline consumption.  If I remember correctly,
that is Donovan's idea.   Such a tax would destroy low and moderate
income families, the economy, and I believe our nation.  The effect on
personal income and spending power is obvious, unfortunately though the
way American's have developed their communities lower/middle income
families tend to live a long way from their job sites, schools and
shopping facilities.  Think of Latah County alone, a good portion of
commuting residents of Potlatch, Viola, Deary, Troy, Bovill, and Genesee
live in those towns because affordable family housing is not available
in Moscow.   The City's zoning codes, building code, and other various
requirements have made it impossible to develop affordable family
housing.  Great neighborhoods such as the Kenneth/Logan street area,
that were developed in the 40's and 50's for working families.  The
homes were modest, lot sizes were small; however when this neighborhood
was developed small stores were within walking distance.  (Unfortunately
those particular homes are now so expensive that a family with modest
means cannot buy into that area).  This was true for most subdivisions
that were built within town until the late 1970's when the large homes
and lots around Mountain View, Vandal Drive, etc. were constructed.
>From that point forward, homes and lots became larger, tighter zoning
eliminated any neighborhood businesses, and neighborhood design was
based entirely on the need for moving automobiles in and out of the
development.   If you look at census data, you will see that in the mid
1980's lower and middle class families began to move to the rural cities
because these homes were cheaper as was the gasoline needed to get you
to work.  I am one of those guilty parties as well; I just could not
find a decent affordable home for my family within the city.   When I
was a student and single living in Moscow, I had no problem finding
housing that fit my needs, heck the first three years I lived in town I
did not own a car.  I was able to get everywhere I needed just by
walking or biking (I did get hit three times while legally walking on
crosswalks and I was run over twice while biking but that is a different
story)   Long and short, if a town like Moscow (and other American
cities) were to work with developers to change the various regulations
to allow for development of affordable housing near businesses then I
suspect you will slowly see a drop in per capita use of motor fuels,
less destruction of greenspace.  (Otherwise known as Smart Growth  -
which is not a tool to prevent development as many who post on V2020
write). 

If local government were to allow the markets to work, I believe they
will.   

WARNING

What follows will bore the heck out of any V2020 readers who could care
less about bio-fuels:

On to bio-fuels, I am working on a team who is tasked with a mission of
trying to reduce native village dependence on subsidized power and fuel
supplies.   I will use the village of Fort Yukon as my example.   Fort
Yukon has a population of 574 of which 247 have electrical power.
During FY 2005 (FY 06 data is not out yet) the State of Alaska and the
Bureau of Indian Affairs paid Gwitchyaa Zhee Utilities (GZU) (the F.Y.
power cooperative) $138,092 to help cover the $398,131 of total fuel
needs.  The rest, roughly $0.196 kWh was paid by residential customers.
GZU in FY05 purchased 185,154 gallons of diesel to produce the 2,858,000
KWh needed within the village.  Without the subsidy, F.Y. residents
would have had to pay $0.3436/kWh hour.   GZU would like to replace this
diesel fuel with a locally developed bio-fuel.  Fort Yukon is in a
forested region of the state with an average of 54 tons per acre of
woody biomass that can be utilized for fuel production.  Using a modest
60% recovery of bio-fuel from the wood would result in 64,000 pounds of
bio-fuel.  The bio-fuel's density is about 9 lb/gallon thus giving 7111
gallons recovered per acre.   When you subtract out the characteristics
of the fuel and the amount of energy needed to derive this fuel, you
will have recovered a diesel fuel equivalent of 3500 gallons/acre (I am
using the older technologies that are currently available); which means
that GZU would harvest and process 53 acres a year to supply the
necessary wood to produce all of the fuel needed for the village.
F.Y., the state, and the BLM clear far more than that each year just to
meet the objectives of the Healthy Forest Initiative, defensible space,
etc.   If that land were replanted in natural willows instead of the
dreaded black spruce, the total harvestable biomass will rise from 54
tons/acre to around 90 ton/acre after 20 years of growth.  Assuming a 25
year harvest cycle, Fort Yukon would need to dedicate 1325 acres to
meeting their fuel needs on a sustainable basis.      I have a hunch
Fort Yukon can easily find 1325 acres to set aside for their fuel needs.
>From the economic development perspective, a bio-fuels facility in Fort
Yukon will save taxpayers $3,452,000 in subsides (that is assuming
diesel is at $2.17/gallon) over 25 years and keep an additional
$6,700,000 over 25 years in Fort Yukon that would normally be pocketed
by the oil companies (that amounts to over $27,000 per customer over 25
years).  

There are about 110 communities within the 183 communities that are
served by the subsidy program that have sufficient biomass to produce
their own fuels; the remaining communities are investing heavily in wind
energy as they are mostly located along the west and northern coast or
on the Aleutians.   

If we carry out our project, 183 communities with a total of 79,178
residents will be entirely self sufficient with regards to energy; $386
million over 25 years no longer needed for subsidies; and $1.5 billion
over 25 years that is kept in the communities and not lost to big oil.
Someone please convince me that bio-fuels are unrealistic!! 

Currently, Greenway is in the process of developing the economic model
for Fairbanks, when the report is in I will share it with you. 

Ted, you may be right on a national scale; heck I would hate to see the
entire Iowa corn crop turned into ethanol, that would be a waste.
However, if each community were to address their energy needs, change
the way they look at community planning, resource use, economic
development, etc. I suspect that we can eliminate a large percentage of
our need for fossil fuels.  

Thanks again,

Chris 

"Think Globally, Act Locally",  Rene Dubos, United Nations Conference on
the Human Environment in 1972.   

________________________________

From: Ted Moffett [mailto:starbliss at gmail.com] 
Sent: Wednesday, August 30, 2006 11:51 AM
To: Chris Storhok
Cc: Tom Hansen; Art Deco; Vision 2020; Nils Peterson; Donovan Arnold
Subject: Re: [Vision2020] Inconvenient Truth -- What WE REALLY HAVE TO
DO: " Apollo Project"

Chris et. al.

I appreciate your enthusiasm for biofuels, and perhaps you are aware
that Iogen is hoping to soon open a large cellulosic biofuel plant in
Southern Idaho using primarily straw from Idaho farms.  And they want US
government loan guarantees for their investors in case the project
fails.  Iogen knows this business, and as the article on biofuels I
reference below from "Nature" mentions, Iogen runs the largest bio
refinery plant in the world near Ottawa, Canada. 

But quickly, to address the taxation approach to lowering gasoline
consumption, if there is no cheaper practical alternative to power
transportation after raising gasoline taxes dramatically (resulting in
7-10 dollar a gallon gas), our economy would be in serious jeopardy with
such an approach, and politically such a move might be suicide, unless
alternatives could be quickly implemented.  Realistic alternative energy
technologies with a widespread infrastructure for implementation are
required to replace fossil fuels, unless we want to sacrifice aspects of
our lifestyle and economy that many will fight tooth and nail to
maintain. 

The most realistic estimates of biofuels potential indicate they should
not be counted on to solve (though they can be part of the solution) the
fossil fuel depletion/global warming crisis, for a number of reasons.
Read this analysis from Nature magazine offered at the link below, where
the optimistic prediction is offered that biofuels can replace 25% of
our current petroleum needs in the USA, which is a huge contribution.
But US consumption of fossil fuel and fossil fuel sourced energy (coal
fired plants are expected to continue to increase consumption of coal
for the cheap electricity this provides, with current US electricity
production 50% from coal, and US coal reserves the largest of any nation
on Earth) continues to increase, so biofuels are playing a game of
catch-up with CO2 emissions, nor are they expected to replace the cheap
electrical energy from coal.  And to expect biofuels to power the huge
emerging industrial economies in India and China with over 2 billion in
population is very problematic, economies that are expected in this
century to consume more fossil fuel than the USA, who is currently the
world's largest consumer.  Read also in the "Nature" article about the
continuing debate among experts regarding the efficiency of biofuel
production, along with other land use/food supply/environmental
problems.  The overall thrust of this analysis is more optimistic than
others I have read.  It seems that some nations are situated rather well
to use biofuel for much of their fuel needs, other nations not: 

http://www.gbev.org/pdf/Nature%20biotech%20biofuels.pdf

What the Bush administration has not done, that is advocated by many
energy experts studying the fossil fuel depletion/global warming crisis,
is push for an "Apollo Project" styled effort to the tune of 100s of
billions of dollars (this can come from the private sector in part, as
it already is) to quickly develop alternative non-CO2 emitting energy
sources, and make practical application widespread.  It is clear that
the marketplace is making so much profit maintaining the current mostly
fossil fuel based economic system that there is limited profit incentive
to make a radical shift away from fossil fuels.  Opening ANWR and
increased off shore oil drilling continues to be pushed in the US
Congress by energy corporations to help solve USA dependence on foreign
oil.  If biofuels were such a practical and economical solution, why the
continuing push to open ANWR and for more offshore drilling?  Given the
limited production and availability of biofuels and biofuel ready
vehicles in the USA, does the oil industry need to worry very much about
biofuels challenging their dominant position in the USA, necessitating
an attempt to put biofuels out of business by dropping gas prices below
2 dollars a gallon, as you suggested they could do? 

http://www.grist.org/news/muck/2006/03/03/griscom-little/

Quote from this article:

His brother would seem to be conflicted as well. Only a month ago,
President Bush declared that the time had come to break America's
addiction to oil
<http://www.grist.org/news/daily/2006/02/01/1/index.html> . Now, Bush
and his buddies are scrounging around for their next fix.
------------------------------

Who can say the Bush administration is really addressing the fossil fuel
depletion/global warming crisis, nor previously the Clinton
Administration, for that matter, while CAFE standards have not been
raised dramatically, though efforts are underway: 

http://obama.senate.gov/press/060719-senators_introduce_legislation_to_r
educe_gasoline_consumption_by_half_a_trillion_gallons/index.html 

-------------------

This "Apollo Project" for new energy technology and widespread roll out
can involve every potential replacement for fossil fuels (or CO2
sequestration technology, which if made practical for coal fired plants,
would allow continuing energy from coal limiting the global warming
impact), from hydrogen to biofuels, wind and solar, nuclear fission and
fusion, fuel cells, and new battery and/or chemical energy storage
technologies.  It goes without saying this effort should be combined
with aggressive energy conservation measures, one of the most important
being to dramatically raise the CAFE standards in the US: 

http://www.royalsoc.ac.uk/news.asp?year=&id=4975

http://www.apolloalliance.org/about_the_alliance/

http://www.apolloalliance.org/jobs/index.cfm

http://rooseveltinstitution.org/policy/38_we_need_an_apollo_proje

---------

Ted Moffett

On 8/24/06, Chris Storhok <cstorhok at co.fairbanks.ak.us> wrote: 

Tom,

I hate to defend the Bush administration on this one but they certainly
have not terminated the bio-diesel program.  The DOE released a call for
proposals for creation of two bio-energy research centers on August 1,
each center will be funded up to $125 million over 5 years (needless to
say the Fairbanks North Star Borough and University of Alaska Fairbanks
are preparing an application).  The DOE/USDA is also supporting a
"Biomass Research and Development Initiative" at $14 million, the
"Commercial Demonstration of an Integrated Biorefinery System for
Production of Liquid Transportation Biofuels, Biobased chemical,
Substitutes for Petroleum-based Feedstocks and Products, and
Biomass-based Heat/Power at $80 million.    I will concede that they
have cut research funding; however that funding has been transferred to
development/implementation projects. 

On the big oil company front, Shell is leading the charge to develop
biofuels.  Their European divisions are actively constructing several
biofuels facilities throughout Germany, the Baltic States, Russia, and
Poland.  BP is ramping up their biofuel efforts in Canada and Great
Britain (provided they don't go broke because of their "minor" problems
on the North Slope).  If big oil truly wanted to kill bio-fuels they
would drop the price of gas and diesel below $2/gallon, the current
price level that bio-fuels programs need just to break even.   

We have three bio-fuels projects that are underway; the first is install
a modest 15 ton/day operation to convert wood waste and paper that is
presently dumped in the landfill into a bio-diesel product that our
local utility will use in its power plants.  Second is a program
designed to wean Alaska bush villages from expensive diesel ($6/gallon
when delivered) using bio-diesel from their local biomass with the
components manufactured assembled and tested here in Fairbanks; and
third is a larger long term program to create bio-fuel from a mix of
locally grown canola, willows, black spruce and so forth to the tune of
around 30 million gallons of B20.  We are working with growers in Delta
Junction, UAF, and the USDA to complete field testing of canola this
year.  A small press will give us enough fuel to test its
characteristics in cold climates 

On a larger front local visionaries have proposed a 50 year program to
completely replace (on a sustainable basis) North Slope crude in the
TAPS system with bio-fuel created through harvesting of large tree farms
planted with local varieties of really fast growing trees.  I planted
one of these seedlings; a variety of Pacific Willow, this spring, the
tree is now just over 12 feet.  (My wife hates the thing now because of
its scrawny size, she was expecting a smaller dense willow).  The thing
has little bulk to it but I have been told that as long as the moose do
not eat it, its girth will increase dramatically in the next few years. 

I am of the firm belief that bio-fuel projects should be local economic
development efforts.  Just imagine if LEDC, the Port of Whitman, UI,
WSU, and others were to team up on such a project.  The intellectual
capacity of the Palouse is remarkable, combine that with abundant
agricultural lands, large forests and local will power, I am very
willing to bet that the Palouse region can produce far more than enough
bio-fuels to completely remove big oil from your local picture.  Imagine
shutting off the leakage of local dollars to big oil and keeping that
money in your community; imagine the job creation potential; farm income
potential; and so forth that such a program would award the region.
Your government leaders will be silly not to embrace such a project.    

Take care, 

Chris

________________________________

From: vision 2020-bounces at moscow.com <mailto:2020-bounces at moscow.com>
[mailto:vision2020-bounces at moscow.com] On Behalf Of Tom Hansen
Sent: Thursday, August 24, 2006 10:55 AM
To: 'Art Deco'; 'Vision 2020'

Subject: Re: [Vision2020] Inconvenient Truth -- What WE REALLY HAVE TO
DO

One good idea would be to re-invest in bio-diesel research.  The program
was promoted and supported under the Clinton administration and
terminated under the Bush administration. 

Simply coming up with an alternate fuel source will not work.  It needs
government support.  

Remember the "Get the Lead Out!" campaign that was mandated by
government policy?  It worked.  If the government mandates that all
vehicles will be fueled with bio-diesel by the year 2012, you can bet
your last gallon of regular gas that Exxon, Standard Oil, etc. etc. will
do their best to get into the bio-diesel market. 

Has anybody got any ideas on how to develop some SERIOUS interest in
alternate fuels, the kind of ideas that will "spark a fire" of major
interest within the George "All for Oil" Bush administration? 

Tom Hansen

Moscow , Idaho

"Life should NOT be a journey to the grave with the intention of
arriving safely in an attractive and well preserved body, but rather to
skid in sideways, chocolate in one hand, a drink in the other, body
thoroughly used up, totally worn out and screaming 'WOO HOO. What a
ride!'" 

________________________________

From: vision 2020-bounces at moscow.com <mailto:2020-bounces at moscow.com>
[mailto:vision2020-bounces at moscow.com] On Behalf Of Art Deco
Sent: Thursday, August 24, 2006 11:41 AM
To: Vision 2020
Subject: Re: [Vision2020] Inconvenient Truth -- What WE REALLY HAVE TO
DO

God (alleged, choose the one that pleases you most) save the Queen!

Donovan and I agree on at least some fundamental outlooks.

1.    There is a limited amount of terrestrial/atmospheric resources.
There are and will be too many people competing for these resources.
Further, overuse of some of these resources creates life/quality of life
threatening environmental problems for all plants and animals including
humankind.  Think about this:  What would happen if at least half of the
world's human population lived at the same standard of resource usage as
the US and western Europe? 

2.    Petroleum resources are not only quite limited, but their uses are
a leading cause of many life/quality of life threatening problems.
Hence, a very high tax on such products may help motivate a search for
much better, kinder to the earth, plants and animals (including
humankind) alternatives, and also decrease their usage and the
associated problems. 

However, I also think the pessimistic outlook of Nils that we lack the
political will to do what needs to be done before it is too late is also
accurate. 

Art Deco (Wayne A. Fox)
deco at moscow.com 

----- Original Message ----- 

From: Donovan Arnold <mailto:donovanjarnold2005 at yahoo.com>  

To: Nils Peterson <mailto:nils_peterson at wsu.edu>  ;
vision2020 at moscow.com ; areaman at moscow.com 

Sent: Thursday, August 24, 2006 9:30 AM 

Subject: Re: [Vision2020] Inconvenient Truth -- What WE REALLY HAVE TO
DO 

Niles writes:

"I doubt we'll find the political will to 

take the scale of actions Donovan suggests."

Niles, if we lack the will to do what it takes to save the Earth,

then the Earth is surly doomed. 

Dan Carscallen writes:

"Hey, you gotta start somewhere."

What's the point of building a catapult to go 1/4 the way

across a canyon we must cross, you are better off staying where you are.
We will

not save the Earth if this generation does not do something drastic

and soon. 

The only reason buses have real ridership is because of economic

necessity of the riders. 

Nobody WANTS to ride a bus. They smell, they are crowded, unsafe,
unclean,

inconvenient, slow, and uncomfortable. People do it mostly because it is
their best

option, not because they are trying to save the Earth.

If you really want to raise bus ridership raise gas prices, make them
clean,

safer, more convenient,

 and much more comfortable. Add cushy seats that have

online access, more buses, more locations, and give them their own lane.

For Moscow, a trolley on the old railroad tracks would work nicely.  

Best,

_DJA

Nils Peterson < nils_peterson at wsu.edu <mailto:nils_peterson at wsu.edu> >
wrote: 

Thanks Dan for sharing information on Valley Transit ridership. I
understand
that they have a new route for commuters from Lewiston to Moscow.
Perhaps we 
need periodic reminders of the data that these systems are growing.

And thanks for pointing out that we can, and need, to start small --
because
without that personal action, I doubt we'll find the political will to
take 
the scale of actions Donovan suggests.

On 8/24/06 8:13 AM, "areaman> wrote:
Donovan says:
"You guys are thinking so small, so tiny. It doesn't help save the earth
even a day to do these tiny things." 

Hey, you gotta start somewhere.

An aside to Joe: Believe you me, my good buddy Tom LaPointe is getting
the word out there as far as Moscow Valley Transit is concerned. Would
he like more people to ride the bus? Heck yes, but I'm here to tell you 
that I've seen charts and graphs and whatnot presented by Tom that shows
nothing but increasing ridership for Moscow Valley Transit. While I'm
not a guy who would normally ride the bus -- various reasons, including 
a short bicycle or motorcycle commute to work -- I'm all in favor of
having that option for people.

DC

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