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Bulletin 287: Nov 5 demonstration and workshops; NM greenhouse gas emissions have risen by about half under the current administration; legislative testimony on plutonium pit production November 22, 2021 Permalink for this bulletin. Please forward! Previously: Bulletin 286: (10/28/21) xDemonstration and workshops Nov. 5 in Santa Fe; LANL estimates $18 billion in pit costs this decade, =$80 million/pit This Bulletin:
Next time:
Dear friends -- 1. Nov. 5 demonstration and workshops: "Reclaim resources, build resilient communities -- not more nuclear warheads"! Our November 5 demonstration and workshops, held in the warm sun at the State Capitol, were lovely. Unique, life-giving truths came forth from our speakers, the fruit of decades of training, research, insight, and engagement. Inspiring music was performed. It was also wonderful to see many of you, especially after many months of covid-induced semi-isolation. To those who spoke, played, or organized others to come, or who made this event possible in other ways, or traveled considerable distances to some, and to everybody who took time from other important pursuits to attend: thank you. This was not the usual rally or demonstration -- to wit: gather, hold signs, invite people to "preach to the choir" saying things everybody knows already, and then go home. What was said merits, and requires, some reflection. It wasn't what you usually hear. You can find lightly-edited videos from the event here, along with some background and links to much more. We especially hope you will carefully listen to Ugo Bardi, Antonio Turiel, and David Spratt. (That same link will also take you a wealth of related work by these gentlemen.) From our last Bulletin: Our [New Mexico climate and energy policy] concerns were [recently] magnified by our attendance at a climate conference organized by the Speaker of the (New Mexico) House, our Governor, and others. It was the worst conference Trish and I had ever attended, in intellectual content (very shallow), atmosphere (sycophantic, ideological, partisan), and process (no questions whatsoever allowed). There were a few candles in the gloom, in the form of advocates for the poor, who were offered the usual vague policy promises and potential small grants to address their huge challenges, with partisan loyalty-strings attached.... On the 5th, Ugo Bardi spoke of collapse. Bardi teaches physical chemistry at the University of Florence when he is not writing about energy, materials, and related issues. He used deceptively simple terms borrowed from systems analysis and thermodynamics and emphasized the key role of energy in ordering our economy and so our society. "Collapse is not a bug, it's a feature [of the present system]....It's happening." Bardi singled out localization as key to surviving this transition. "Produce energy, go local, don't expect too much, live happy." He decried attempts to "change without changing:" "As long as you have the system in place, nothing changes...In a certain way, if you want to progress, you must collapse...People will try to replace fossil fuels with blue hydrogen, green hydrogen, rainbow hydrogen, gray, pink, yellow, whatever....You need a little collapse to change things." He quoted Seneca, "There is no success that does not have its origin in a previous collapse." His work lies in a long tradition, with roots here in the U.S. decades ago. This organization has been nourished from the outset by those same waters. Antonio Turiel took up the question of hydrogen as an energy vector, first as a physicist at the Spanish National Research Council and then as a working political analyst with a keen grasp of the dangers of energy colonialism. After discussing the extreme inefficiencies of "green" hydrogen, which arise from fundamental physical causes not subject to "breakthroughs," he observed that these inefficiencies would inevitably result in massive social and geographic inequality, were large-scale "green" hydrogen ever implemented. A "hydrogen economy" would translate those inefficiencies into deprivation for those in the producing regions. Only a tiny minority could benefit, if anyone. The rest would live in abject misery. "Blue" hydrogen, for its part, is a net energy sink and greenhouse gas source, assuming the carbon capture it requires could be made to work at all. You can see more details from a recent article of his here. Turiel's parting words: ...We are now in a situation in which some sort of collapse cannot be avoided. But what you can choose is the way in which you are collapsing. You can collapse in a more democratic manner, or you can collapse in a more authoritarian manner. This is the actual truth of the thing. Please see Bardi's and Turiel's various blogs for much more (go here for the links -- scroll down). ***Discussion*** Before getting to David Spratt and the idiocy of the "net zero by 2050" deception, some fact-based discussion is warranted. In contrast to what these speakers said, and to science (or maybe just arithmetic), New Mexico energy and climate policy:
New Mexico energy and climate policy is mostly a mess, frankly. It ought to be easy to understand that lowering GHG emissions requires curtailing production of the fuels that create GHGs. As of 2018, over half (53%) of New Mexico GHGs were due to oil and gas production (p. 4, summarized by the New Mexico Energy and Minerals Department in Fig. 1 on p. 7 here). As will shortly be clear -- keep reading -- the fraction of emissions caused by oil and gas, as well as total New Mexico GHG emissions, are far higher today than they were 3 years ago. Meanwhile, adding more renewable energy generation does not lower oil and gas production or lower GHG emissions. Of course, renewable energy also causes some GHG emissions in manufacture, transportation, installation, maintenance, and eventual replacement. There are plans to lower emissions, some elements of which are good (we do not review them all here). But lowering emissions hasn't happened. Any GHG reductions achieved thus far by our puny policies are being hugely swamped by New Mexico's rising GHG emissions from oil and gas production, which closely track oil and gas production levels (see p. 23), just as we warned was likely to happen. According to the "New Mexico Climate Strategy 2020 Progress and Recommendations," in 2018 New Mexico GHG emissions were 114 million (M) metric tons (MTs), measured as CO2 equivalent (CO2e). This figure includes combustion products from oil and gas produced and sold (28 MT) as well as fugitive emissions (33 MT) (see here, pp. 12, 19). In 2018 New Mexico emissions worked out to 50 MT per person-year vs. about 20 MT/person-year for the U.S. as a whole, vs. about half that for most European countries and China. "Leadership," in NM's case, means trying to catch up. But we have going in the other direction. Crude oil production in New Mexico has increased eightfold over the past 10 years and is still going up. Of all the major oil-producing states, only NM had rising annual production over the past 2 years. In the past year, in which several states saw modest production recoveries, NM accounted for 59% of U.S. oil production growth, more than twice that of second-place Texas, which was responsible for 24% of production growth over the last year. As of August 2021, NM was responsible for 12% of U.S. oil production, second only to TX at 43%. New Mexico oil production is quite significant to policy-makers on a national and even a global scale. Here's what New Mexico oil production looks like just since January 2017, in thousands of barrels per day.
Meanwhile natural gas production has also shot up. It has more than doubled since January 2017.
Broadly speaking, you can see that "oil and gas production" (the aggregate term used in the State's greenhouse gas inventory, which we are not attempting to split apart in this brief note) has roughly doubled since 2018, the benchmark date. Since oil and gas production creates more than half of New Mexico's GHG emissions, it follows that New Mexico GHG emissions have risen by roughly half in the past three years, other factors being equal or nearly so (see pp. 4, 11). Which they have been. GHG emissions from oil and gas sales and operations are now roughly as great as were emissions from all sources just three years ago. The observed 29% decline in New Mexico coal use over 2017-2020 translates to at most a 3.5 million MT (MMT) decline in GHG emissions from that source, far smaller than the roughly 60 MMT increase from oil and gas production. In fact, entirely eliminating GHG emissions from electricity generation (12 MMT) would balance out only roughly 10% of current emissions from oil and gas production (which are now about 120 MMT using the State's methodology, double the amount on p. 4). It is too soon to credit reductions in fugitive emissions from oil and gas from current plans to do so. It remains to be seen whether these well-intended plans, produced with great fanfare in cooperation with the oil and gas industry, are adequate or will be adequately resourced or enforced. Even if all fugitive emissions from oil and gas were magically eliminated instantly, New Mexico GHG emissions in 2021 would still be greater than they were in 2018, because of the great increase in oil and gas products sold. Including oil and gas policies, present New Mexico energy policies don't help the climate at all -- not this year, not next year, and quite possibly not ever. Many of the promised benefits will not happen either because they are illusory in the first place or because they will be, as we believe, overtaken by events (e.g. cost inflation, fiscal crises, etc.). There's a lot to unpack in that sentence, which we cannot do in this short Bulletin. Contrary to some recent billboards placed by Conservation Voters New Mexico, senior New Mexico Democrats pictured are evidently not "Climate Champions" or "Climate Leaders." Democrats hold majorities in both legislative houses, and we have a Democratic Governor -- yet New Mexico GHG emissions are increasing dramatically. It is quite likely that present climate and energy policies will also harm the poor, who are still an afterthought -- a footnote -- to an overall corporate profit orientation. To take just one example, PNM plans to offer a few million dollars in subsidies for electric car ownership, which will be funded by a surcharge on electric bills -- which is to say, those who cannot afford electric cars (i.e. most people) will be subsidizing those who can. Don't forget, those EVs will continue to be running mostly on coal and natural gas for some years, and they will also incur large costs in GHG emissions in their manufacture, I believe about one-third of their lifetime energy use. As of 2018, transportation accounted for only 14% of New Mexico greenhouse gas emissions. That fraction is less now, about 9%, because of the relative growth of oil and gas production. About half of this (~4.5% of total emissions) is from motor gasoline (p. 8). So with an electric vehicle market penetration of 2% per year (not yet achieved), the GHG emission reductions from this policy will be negligible for the foreseeable future. Magically eliminating all GHG emissions from all New Mexico transportation instantly wouldn't begin to equal the increase in emissions we have seen from oil and gas production. As opposed to building an electric car infrastructure, GHG emissions from cars and trucks could be cut deeply, and immediately, by lowering highway speed limits to 55 mph, which will save roughly 25% of the fuel used at highway speeds. The core change needed to make transportation greener will not be a proliferation of individual electric cars, in any case. This is a big subject which, again, we have to leave here. We also see hardship for the poor implicit in the goal of 100% electrification of buildings. Few will be able to afford this. It will cost a lot of energy and hence GHG emissions and not just in construction, manufacture, and installation either -- in operation as well. Politically, failure to address the problems of the poor and the growing "precariat" means that the slow, inadequate steps being outlined will come to a grinding halt before they reduce emissions very much. As we have said elsewhere, the energy transition will remain unaffordable until massive resources are moved from national defense, which absorbs nearly $8,000 per household per year in this country. And as we have repeatedly warned for many years, there is no possible technological basis for maintaining anything near present levels of consumption in any sustainable fashion. Failing to prioritize the already poor and the precarious in a time of steep economic decline -- which is where we are today -- is a moral catastrophe with existentially dangerous implications for government and society, and of course for climate policy as well. What is so terribly shocking to us at the Study Group is the lack of fact-based public discourse about this in New Mexico. Policies are being made behind closed doors, with hand-picked "stakeholders" only. The media are apparently afraid to make waves, or don't know how. We have been warning about this again and again for years -- see for example Bulletin 253 and the references to prior work it contains. ***Returning now to our Nov. 5 speakers*** David Spratt brought us back to the reality of the climate emergency. Simply put, we don't have any carbon budget left to avoid a 1.5o C rise in global average temperature by 2030, up from the present 1.2o C. We have a chance to avoid 2.0o C, but we have no certainty that even that is possible. Tipping points are being crossed. Spratt quoted the head of the UK Climate Crisis Advisory Group, Sir David King, who states that what we do in the next three to five years will determine the fate of civilization. We must "reduce (emissions), remove (GHGs from the atmosphere), and restore (key geophysical and ecological systems, such as the Arctic ice cap)." The "Net Zero by 2050" refrain we hear so often is, to put bluntly, evil. (What else can you call a plan that would extinguish life on earth?) Spratt had no use for "hope" or "fear," which we think is quite good advice. Both are passive. What is needed, he said, is" courage to speak the truth." To speak it effectively to power, we would add. The sycophancy we saw at the "Speaker's Climate Summit" was nauseating, as are the billboards linked above. If you want to know why our policies are so bad, corruption of our leading non-governmental voices is reason enough. 2. Nov. 12, 2021 testimony to the New Mexico Legislature on plutonium pit production, a useful summary My prepared testimony to the Radioactive and Hazardous Materials Committee (RHMC) is here: "Unprecedented weapons production mission at LANL threatens regional decline, loss of autonomy: what can this committee do?" What I actually said is a bit different. It is in this video if you prefer that format. Together, the slide deck and talk are a useful short summary of the issue for any audience. Some of what I said there will be news to many arms controllers, academics, nuclear "watchdogs," and their funders, most of whom are still promoting LANL as a plutonium pit factory, as they have for years. That promotion has been quite friendly to pork barrel and contractor interests at nuclear labs in New Mexico and California and to the Air Force's desires for a new warhead for its new ground-based missile. It has supported construction of two pit factories, not just one. Let us hope these parties abandon their support for the crash program at LANL in favor of delaying pit production into the 2030s -- by which time, we believe, unfolding events ("the banquet of consequences," expressed economically and then politically) will force very different national security priorities in this country. What we asked of the Committee was simply to find out what the current plans are, in some detail. The Committee and the Legislature as a whole do not know those plans, and we did not detect any burning desire on their part to find out. Rep. Chris Chandler (D-Los Alamos) might be the only one with a real inkling of what is going on. She has also been the main force against transparency thus far, arguing in the Committee last year that no new site-wide environmental impact statement (SWEIS) was needed at LANL, and that any such SWEIS might risk pausing preparations for pit production, heaven forbid. That said, Chris told us last month that she strongly favors more transparency. We believe she has the power to make that happen, if she is willing to use it. The same is true a fortiori for the RHMC as a whole, as we wrote to them. That is all we have time for today. We have an important writing assignment for diplomats meeting at the United Nations, to which we must now turn for the balance of this week. There are a lot of implications we have not drawn out in this Bulletin. Look for another Bulletin after Thanksgiving. Thank you for reading. Greg |
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