Category: energy

Hydrogen
Climate Change, energy

From Fossil Fuels to Clean Energy: The Role of Green Hydrogen

As the host of the Climate Confident podcast, I’m thrilled to share with you an exciting episode all about green hydrogen and its role in reducing our climate emissions. In this episode, I sit down with Emily Pontecorvo, a journalist at Grist, to discuss the latest developments in the world of green hydrogen and what it means for our efforts to combat climate change.

For those who may not be familiar, green hydrogen is a type of hydrogen produced using renewable energy sources, such as wind and solar power, instead of fossil fuels. It’s an exciting development in the world of clean energy, as hydrogen has the potential to be a key player in helping us reach our climate goals.

One of the key highlights of this episode is a discussion of the EU Green Hydrogen Rules, which were recently published by the EU. These rules set strict criteria for what constitutes green hydrogen, including additionality (the requirement that new renewable energy must be produced to support the hydrogen production), regionality (the requirement that the renewable energy must be produced in the same region as the hydrogen plant), and time matching (the requirement that hydrogen production must match the times when renewable energy is being produced).

Emily also talks about the potential uses for hydrogen that may not make as much sense from an energy or financial standpoint, but are still on the table. For example, the gas industry is pushing for hydrogen to replace natural gas as the main fuel for heating homes. While this is technically feasible, it would require major changes to the pipelines and appliances, and may not actually reduce emissions significantly. Emily also referenced the Hydrogen Ladder that has been created by Michael Liebreich to highlight where Green Hydrogen is useful, and not.

Throughout the episode, Emily provides valuable insights and in-depth analysis of the current state of green hydrogen, and what it means for our efforts to reduce our climate emissions. Her expertise on the subject is truly impressive, and I learned so much from her during our conversation.

In conclusion, I can’t emphasise enough how important it is to stay informed about developments in the world of green hydrogen. This is a rapidly evolving field with huge implications for our climate, and I highly encourage you to listen to this episode of the Climate Confident podcast to learn more.

And if you like what you hear, don’t forget to follow the podcast and support our efforts to bring you the latest and most relevant information on the fight against climate change. Thank you for joining me on this journey, and I can’t wait to share more exciting episodes with you in the future!

Finally, don’t forget to follow the Climate Confident podcast for weekly inspiring stories and remember, if you value receiving weekly actionable insights on sustainability and climate, you can always sign up to be a Supporter of the podcast for less than the cost of a cup of coffee.

Photo credit Matthew Bodaly on Flickr

energy

IEA Report: Global CO2 Emissions from Electricity Generation to Plateau

The International Energy Agency (IEA) recently released its 2023 Electricity Market Report and it provides an overview of the trends and developments in the global electricity sector in 2022 and the outlook for 2023-2025. It should be noted at this point that historically IEA reports have proven to significantly underestimate the growth of renewables.

The report covers the impacts of the energy crisis triggered by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022, which led to record-high energy prices and a sharp decline in electricity demand in the European Union. It also examines the role of renewables and nuclear energy in meeting the growing electricity demand and reducing the CO2 emissions of power generation. Finally, it discusses the challenges and opportunities for electricity security in a world where both the demand and supply of electricity are becoming increasingly weather-dependent.

The report finds that world electricity demand remained resilient in 2022 amid the global energy crisis, rising by almost 2% compared with the 2.4% average growth rate seen over the period 2015-2019. However, the soaring prices for energy commodities, including natural gas and coal, sharply escalated power generation costs and contributed to a rapid rise in inflation. Economic slowdowns and high electricity prices stifled electricity demand growth in most regions around the world, especially in the European Union, which recorded a 3.5% decline year-on-year in 2022. The report also notes that China’s zero-Covid policy weighed heavily on its economic activity and electricity demand growth in 2022, while India and the United States saw strong increases in demand due to their robust post-pandemic recovery and extreme weather conditions.

The report projects that global electricity demand will grow at a much faster pace of 3% per year over the 2023-2025 period, driven by the electrification of the transport and heating sectors and the economic development of emerging and developing economies. The total increase in global electricity demand of about 2 500 terawatt-hours (TWh) out to 2025 is more than double Japan’s current annual electricity consumption. More than 70% of the growth in global electricity demand is set to come from China, India and Southeast Asia combined, with China’s share of global electricity consumption rising to one-third by 2025.

Global changes in electricity supply 2021-2025

The report also analyses the trends and outlook for global electricity supply, highlighting the dominant role of renewables and nuclear energy in meeting the additional demand. Together, they are expected to account for more than 90% of the growth in global electricity supply over the next three years, with China leading the expansion of renewable generation and India, Japan and Korea contributing to the growth of nuclear generation. The report also notes that the share of renewables in the global power generation mix is forecast to rise from 29% in 2022 to 35% in 2025, while the shares of coal- and gas-fired generation are set to fall. As a result, global CO2 emissions from electricity generation are expected to plateau to 2025 and its CO2 intensity will further decline in the coming years.

The report concludes by discussing the challenges and opportunities for electricity security in a world where both the demand and supply of electricity are becoming increasingly weather-dependent. It points out that the energy crisis has renewed interest in the role of nuclear power in contributing to energy security and reducing the CO2 intensity of power generation, especially in Europe and the United States. It also stresses that the substantial growth of renewables will need to be accompanied by accelerated investments in grids and flexibility for their successful integration into the power systems. Finally, it warns that the world’s power systems will face more risks from extreme weather events, such as droughts, heatwaves, storms and floods, which can affect both the supply and demand of electricity.

So, given how conservative the IEA has traditionally been when it comes to its predictions of the future growth of renewables, I think their prediction of renewables growth to 35% by 2025 is very positive, seeing as that implies will reach 35% well before then!

IEA (2023), Electricity Market Report 2023, IEA, Paris https://www.iea.org/reports/electricity-market-report-2023, License: CC BY 4.0

New Business Models for Utilities
energy

New business models for utilities

Several months before joining SAP, I was asked if I would give a talk (and be on a related panel) at the European Utility Week conference in Barcelona this year on the topic of New Business Models for Utilities.

The event is the premier utilities event annually in Europe with 12,000 attendees, and 600 exhibitors. I was honoured to be asked, and of course accepted, without hesitation.

The talk wasn’t video’d but you can check out the slides I used above. In slides 3-29 I outline why utilities need to adopt new business models (revenues are falling due to factors like falling costs of generation, the rising popularity of renewables, climate change, etc.). In slides 33-40 I discuss some of the evolutionary business models open to utilities. While slides 41-60 outline some of the more revolutionary opportunities open to utilities – many being enabled by the Internet of Things, and utilities digital transformation.

With all the changes occurring, utilities need to disrupt, or they themselves will be disrupted.

Reflection of a wind turbine in an office window
energy

Will the price of oil ever increase again?

What is going on in the oil industry?

Graph of oil price from 2012 to 2016The price of oil has cratered. In 2012 it was over $120 a barrel. Today, 2016, it is at $42 a barrel, and this is an improvement from January and February of this year when it went under $30 a barrel.

Previously, when the price of oil fell, OPEC would meet, they’d agree to cut the output, and the constrained supply would ensure the price would rise once more. Why isn’t that happening now?

Most commentators are putting it down to the fact that Iran, who were under sanctions until very recently, understandably don’t want to cut production, and with Iran not cutting back, Saudi Arabia won’t either.

However, there’s another thesis which I think is more likely, and if true, oil prices will remain low for the foreseeable future. That thesis states that Saudi Arabia has realised that we are at the end of the Oil Age, and that a large percentage of the world’s fossil fuel resources will have to remain in the ground. With this in mind, it makes sense for Saudi Arabia to make sure they can extract, and monetise as much of their fossil fuel resources, as possible, while they still can.

What is the evidence for this?

First off, consider that last Friday 170+ countries signed the Paris Climate Accord whose aim to to limit global warming to 1.5-2C. Now that we have an upper limit on the temperature increase we are willing to accept, we also know how much CO2 we need to put into the atmosphere to achieve this amount of warming. It comes in at 1,100Gt CO2 [PDF] (1Gt = 1 gigaton = 1 billion tons).

On the other hand, the total proven reserves of the fossil fuel companies, and countries comes to 3,300Gt CO2. Notice the problem? 70-80% of the world’s proven reserves of fossil fuels will have to stay in the ground if we are to keep global warming below 2C.

Now Saudi Arabia has known about this issue for quite some time. As far back as the year 2000, Sheikh Yamani famously predicted that

Thirty years from now there will be a huge amount of oil – and no buyers. Oil will be left in the ground. The Stone Age came to an end, not because we had a lack of stones, and the oil age will come to an end not because we have a lack of oil.

In fairness Sheikh Yamani’s reasoning didn’t have to do with climate change, but better drilling and exploration technologies, but still it has come to pass, and in this scenario Saudi Arabia has to race to produce as much oil as it can, no matter what the price, so as little Saudi oil as possible is left in the ground. Consequently Saudi Arabia is now producing somewhere between 10.3m-11m barrels per day – an historic high.

And then at last week’s OPEC meeting in Doha to try to stabilise oil production, Saudi Arabia scuppered the talks, ensuring no freezing of oil outputs. This has the added advantage of squeezing the other producers, few of whom can produce oil at the same low cost as Saudi Arabia.

total-cost-of-producing-oil

On the demand side, the International Energy Agency (IEA) has admitted that for 2016 global demand trends are not as positive as they were. The IEA is counting on demand from developing countries where India recently announced that it is going to install 100GW of solar by 2022 (in large part because solar is now cheaper in India than coal), while China is aiming to increase its installed solar by over 100GW by 2020.

And if news of the 400,000 orders for the Tesla Model 3 are anything to go by, there is no love amongst consumers for fossil fuel spewing vehicles.

Then yesterday comes the announcement that the Saudi cabinet approved a set of reforms aimed at moving the country away from its dependence on oil profits. They have seen the writing on the wall, and so while on the one hand they are going all out to maximise the amount of oil they can extract and sell, they are at the same time setting up a sovereign wealth fund of $2tn to ensure they, in the words of Deputy Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman

can live without oil by 2020

So, with Saudi Arabia diversifying away from oil revenues, and unlikely to reduce output any time soon, there is no obvious reason why oil prices will ever rise again. And Sheikh Yamani’s prediction about a huge amount of oil being left in the ground will come to pass.

energy

Apple puts its environmental initiatives front and centre at its spring event

 

LisaJacksonAppleRenewableEnergyApple held it’s annual spring event yesterday in Palo Alto to make iPhone, iPad, and iOS related announcements (amongst others).

However, this year for a change the first executive invited to address the audience was Apple’s vice president of Environment, Policy and Social Initiatives, former EPA Administrator, Lisa Jackson.

Lisa was greeted by warm applause which became more enthusiastic when she announced that 93% of Apple’s facilities worldwide are now powered by renewable energy. This means Apple is now well on its way to achieving its stated aim of being fully renewably powered globally. And in 23 countries, including the United States and China, Apple is already 100% renewably powered.

In China Jackson explained, Apple has a 40MW solar farm which has a minimal impact on the local environment, and allows for the local Yak farmers to graze their animals and grow hay under the panels (seen above). This solar farm produces more electricity than Apple uses currently in all of China.

Apple’s data centres are also fully renewably powered, and it has a policy of siting new data centres only if the site has access to renewable power. This was one of the reasons behind Apple’s choosing Ireland and Denmark for its two newest data centres last year.

In fact, since hiring Jackson away from the EPA, Apple has made some extremely positive moves in reducing its footprint, and greatly increasing its transparency. This focus on transparency may go some of the way to explaining Apple’s decision last week to move a significant portion of its iCloud storage business away from notoriously opaque Amazon to Google (although, it is as likely to do with diversifying suppliers, moving to a supplier more in line with Apple’s views on data privacy, and possibly easing the transition to eventually self-hosting the data).

Jackson also talked about Apple’s investments in forestry, and how Apple are using paper sourced from sustainably farmed forests for 99% of its packaging now.

Apple is demonstrating tremendous leadership in the energy and sustainability space (as well as the privacy space, but that another story!). Kudos to them, and interestingly Amazon appears to be finally getting around to supplying some of its operations with renewable energy too – though, it still shuns any kind of auditing or reporting on its energy and emissions. Sigh, maybe someday after seeing Apple put their environmental initiatives front and centre, Amazon will also see the value of doing this.

cix, energy, Green, IT@Cork

Reducing your Costs and your Carbon Footprint – presentation

I gave a talk at the it@cork Green IT event yesterday entitled “Reducing your Costs and your Carbon Footprint”.

The talk goes into some detail on how Cork Internet eXchange, the cork-based data centre I am a director of, achieves hyper energy efficiency.

http://static.slideshare.net/swf/ssplayer2.swf?doc=reducing-your-costs-and-your-carbon-footprint-1204720215720098-2

It is also worth noting that tomorrow’s OpenCoffee session is in CIX. Hope to see you there.

carbon neutrality, cix, Climate Change, energy

Reducing your Costs and your Carbon Footprint – A Case Study

I am speaking at the it@cork Green IT breakfast event tomorrow morning (5th March ’08). My presentation is “Reducing your Costs and your Carbon Footprint – A Case Study” and I will be using CIX as a case study on how innovative thinking can lower your carbon footprint and your costs.

The event kicks off at 07:45 in the Cork International Hotel, at Cork Airport and the other speakers are James Governor of RedMonk, whose talk is titled “The Sustainability Imperative: Towards Greener Software” and Mike Hughes of Microsoft Ireland who is going to talk about Windows Vista energy conservation features.

Should be a good event (and you get breakfast!).

carbon neutrality, energy, Global Warming

Shai Agassi's Better Place project explained

In my post about the DLD conference yesterday I showed the video of Shai Agassi’s presentation because I thought it was an amazingly good idea, well explained.

However, when I checked out Shai’s blog I found the following video of kids doing a far better job getting Shai’s idea across (sorry Shai!).

It is a three minute video. Watch it. You’ll be glad you did!

Then head over to Project Better Place, check it out and get involved.

Climate Change, energy

DLD Conference Highlights

I spent the early part of this week in Munich for the DLD Conference in Munich. It was an amazing experience.

The conference itself is a free invite-only event. The speaker list is unbelievable. The speakers included politicians, business people and convicted criminals!

Apart from the usual tech rock stars (Clay Shirky, Marissa Mayer, Matt Cohler, Jimmy Wales, etc.) there were people from the world of biology (Richard Dawkins, J. Craig Venter), literature (Paulo Coelho), extreme sports (Karina Hollekim), politics (Paul Kagame, Viviane Reding), and unclassifiables like Naomi Campbell (super-model and business woman) and David Silverman (the original animator and director of the Simpsons!).

One of the most impressive talks was also one of the shortest. It was the talk given by Shai Agassi, the onetime next CEO at SAP! In this presentation he explains how he is going to get Israel off oil in 10 years. What is most impressive about this plan is that it is completely reproducible for other countries!

Don’t believe me? See it for yourself below:

Link: sevenload.com

Blogging, blogs, carbon neutrality, cix, Climate Change, data centre, energy, Microsoft, Silverlight, social media, video

My interview published on Channel 9

When I was in Barcelona for TechEd last year Charles Torre did a video interview with me. We had a wide ranging chat about data centre energy efficiency strategies, blogs/blogging and the Death Star!

Charles emailed me last night to let me know that the interview has now been published on Channel 9 (Channel 9 is a very high trafficked online forum where videos are posted and discussions on those videos take place).

It has already been viewed over 600 times!

The player is SilverLight and doesn’t appear to work on the Mac for some reason but there is a link to a .wmv version of the video so you can download and watch locally.