Monthly Archives: May 2012

Global CCS Institute

MIT study refines estimate of CO2 storage capacity of US saline aquifers | GCCSI

Deep, saline aquifers in the US have sufficient capacity to sequester a century’s worth of CO2emissions from the nation’s coal-fired power plants, according to a research team at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology who published their findings in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences on April 3.

The findings substantially refine estimates of the storage capacity of these reservoirs, which the Global CCS Institute recognizes as having the most promising potential of any geological storage option. Previous measures of their capacity in the US spanned from a few years’ of CO2 emissions, to tens of thousands of years’ worth.

Earlier assessments tended to oversimplify the problem, leading to the wide range. “We felt that there was such a big disparity in numbers out there that CCS deserved a closer look,” team leader Ruben Juanes, MIT’s ARCO Associate Professor in Energy Studies in the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, told The New York Times.

MIT researchers improved the accuracy of these estimates by building a more detailed mathematical model. Previous models were “missing some of the nuances of the physics,” said Christopher MacMinn, a doctoral researcher and co-author of the study, via a press release.

Image: MIT

The MIT team modeled micron-scale fluid dynamics to better understand how liquefied CO2 is trapped in deep saline aquifers. Including some 20 parameters, the team designed the mathematical model to be flexible enough to evaluate the potential of saline aquifer formations at the scale of hundreds of miles, and in different regions of the US.

“The key is capturing the essential physics of the problem,” said Michael Szulczewski, a doctoral researcher and co-author of the study, “but simplifying it enough so it could be applied to the entire country.”

Using glass beads to simulate the way liquefied CO2 would percolate through the tiny poor spaces of deep rock formations, the approach helped the MIT team to better understand rates of injection and how the CO2 is sequestered through the dynamics of capillary trapping and solubility trapping. Of key concern was estimating the pressure and rates of CO2 injection necessary to prevent fracturing of the reservoir or its over-capping structures.

The study “demonstrates that the rate of injection of CO2 into a reservoir is a critical parameter in making storage estimates,” said Howard Herzog, a senior research engineer with the MIT Energy Initiative and another co-author of the PNAS paper, in a release.

While this study is focused on the saline aquifers in the US, the method can be extended to similar geologies around the world, MacMinn added.

The abstract for the paper, Lifetime of carbon capture and storage as a climate-change mitigation technology is published at PNAS.

Also, below is a video where Juanes and his team members explain their work. The first half-minute or so is a basic overview of carbon storage. Stick with it; starting around 0:45 Szulczewski goes into greater detail of the model’s approach to the subsurface dynamics of CO2 injection.

Global CCS Institute

Project update: In Canada, partners pull the plug on CA$1.4billion TransAlta CCS project | GCCSI

A group of energy companies abandoned a project to capture, use and store 1 million tons of CO2 per year from the flues of an Alberta coal-fired power plant.

Pointing to weak project economics, TransAlta, Canada’s largest investor-owned electricity generator announced on 26 April that its partners Capital Power and Enbridge would halt the CA$1.4billion project after completing initial engineering and design studies. Construction was due to start this year.

According to TransAlta’s first quarter results, the partners “determined that although the technology works and capital costs are in line with expectations, the revenue from carbon sales and the price of emissions reductions are insufficient…”. The Pioneer plant aimed to sell CO2 for enhanced oil recovery, but found no firm buyers.

“What’s really needed, of course, is a regulatory framework on CO2 that puts a value on that CO2 – a significant value,” Don Wharton, vice-president of policy and sustainability at TransAlta, told The Globe and Mail. Wharton added that: “If [a price on carbon is] done properly, then CCS projects, as well as other emissions-reducing projects, would be more encouraged to go ahead.”

The province of Alberta currently charges certain industrial emitters CA$15 per ton of CO2 beyond a pre-determined level. That price doesn’t support the cost of the project, and there’s “little certainty on future revenue”, Cheryl Wilson, carbon capture and storage analyst at Bloomberg New Energy Finance told Bloomberg News. “Pioneer had too many factors working against it.”

Located about 70 kilometers west of Edmonton, the project was slated to capture 1 million tons of CO2 from the exhaust of TransAlta’s Keephills 3 facility, a 450-megawatt coal-fired power plant that went on line in September 2011 at a cost of roughly CA$2 billion.

A portion of the captured CO2 was to be sold to oil and gas drillers operating in the nearby Pembina oil fields, to enhance the recovery of oil from mature wells. Another share of CO2 was to be permanently sequestered in deep saline formations nearby, as well.

The Pioneer project was granted public funding in October 2009. The lion’s share, CA$436 million, was committed by the province of Alberta, and another CA$343 million was pledged by the Canadian Government. The Global CCS Institute also put up AU$5 million.

According to TransAlta, the company and its partners had spent just CA$30 million on the project to date, with CA$20million of that coming from government.

Speaking to Thomson Reuters News, Chris Severson-Baker, managing director of the Pembina Institute, an Alberta-based environmental think tank, said: “Within Alberta, this was the one coal-plant application of CCS and it was the most important application. There are significant emissions from coal operations… and there are few other options to mitigate greenhouse gas emissions from those types of operations without CCS.”

Meanwhile, the province has funded three other CCUS projects which will reach critical decision points in the next year or so. These are:

Global CCS Institute

Mapping a continent’s potential: North American Carbon Storage Atlas released | GCCSI

If a picture is worth a thousand words, as the saying goes, then perhaps the new atlas of North American Carbon Storage, might be worth a gigaton or two?

In a first-of-its-kind assessment of continent-wide storage potential, the North American Carbon Storage Atlas was released on 1 May 2011 at the 11th Annual Conference on Carbon Capture Utilization and Sequestration (CCUS) in Pittsburgh.

NACSA synthesizes data from Mexico, the United States and Canada to map out known geological storage reserves as well as the location of some 2,250 large stationary CO2 sources.

Tallying up all of the reserves, the report estimates the continent has at least 500 years worth of CO2 storage capacity, and as much as 5,000 years, based on current emission rates. The 500-year case estimates potential capacity of 136 billion metric tons for oil and gas fields, 65 billion metric tons for coal fields, and 1,738 billion metric tons for saline reservoirs.

“This new atlas provides the kind of fundamental information that, combined with technology innovation, can help fossil-fuelled facilities continue their essential energy role while reducing carbon pollution,” said Steven Chu, United States Secretary of Energy, in a statement.

“This initiative can also help identify opportunities for enhanced oil recovery projects that can further increase domestic oil production, enhance American energy security and support economic growth in states across the country,” Chu added.

Also being launched alongside the printed-copy of the atlas were the NACSA website and online viewer. In addition to maps of CO2 stationary sources and storage resources, the website also presents methodologies for estimating storage resources along with links to additional information.

Intended for a broad range of users, the online viewer also provides interactive access to the map layers and data used to construct the atlas.

The carbon storage atlas project has been produced under the auspices of the bilateral Canada-US Clean Energy Dialogue as well as a trilateral program under the North American Leaders’ Summit.

GreenBiz

Recyclebank’s iPhone app aims to ease London traffic congestion | GreenBiz

Recyclebank's iPhone app aims to ease London traffic congestion

In an era of rising congestion and shrinking budgets, big cities face a major challenge making the most out of aging transportation networks. Some, such as London and Singapore, have opted to use a stick: congestion fees to nudge commuters out of their cars, onto subways, buses, bikes or even their feet. Yet congestion fees can be politically unpopular. Similar efforts in New York City have failed.

But what if city planners could use a carrot, instead, to induce different commuting behaviors? That’s the vision behind re:route, a new program being rolled out by Transport for London (TfL) and developed by New York-based Recyclebank, a pioneer in the field of using incentives to spur greener behaviors.

Announced this week, re:route is an iPhone-based app that encourages Londoners to walk and cycle more by awarding points for each trip they re-route away from conventional alternatives. The credits can be redeemed for valuable rewards, from food perks to products, at participating retailers.

For London, the goal is to reward switches that improve public health, reduce pollution and ease congestion. “By virtue of human nature, people tend to respond more immediately to a positive signal than they do to a negative one based on penalties,” said Ian Yolles, chief sustainability officer at Recyclebank, in a phone interview last week.

Part of a broader effort by TfL known as Get Ahead of the Games, the launch of re:route is timed in advance of the summer Olympics. (Read more about the greening of the Games here.) With 350,000 visitors inbound, TfL hopes to lure Londoners out of the city’s overtaxed subways and taxis and onto bicycles and footpaths. Last week, the city’s taxi organization announced that 40 percent of drivers would quit the streets during the Olympics in anticipation of potentially paralyzing gridlock. Many city streets will be closed for official use only.

TfL’s goals with re:route reach past the Olympics though. As part of a multidecadal, city-wide effort to lower greenhouse gas emissions and improve public health, TfL has set out a long-term goal of boosting cycling by 400 percent by 2025, compared with 2000. TfL also wants to boost the share of trips done on foot above its 24 percent share.

For Recyclebank, re:route is a first step into the urban transportation market, a bid to help cities devise new solutions to help ease the large and growing problem of congestion, spur the use of public transport and enhance public health.

Recyclebank iPhone appBy marrying available technology — mobile phones, apps, GPS, transport schedules and online maps — “we can create greater efficiencies in cities, catalyze citizen engagement and drive behavior change for public benefit,” Yolles said. “We’re launching this in London, but it would be easy to reskin the front end to use in New York, Chicago, Washington or San Francisco.”

Here’s how re:route works: After downloading the free iPhone app and signing up for a free Recyclebank account, a user enters a starting point and destination. The app will show different options, including walking, cycling (using either one’s own bike or a bike share) and public transportation. Upon arrival, re:route uses GPS to sense the end of the commute and rewards the user with five Recyclebank points. Users also see the calories they’ve burned, and CO2 they’ve saved compared to other transport modes.

One of the appealing features of the program is that it encourages small-scale incremental shifts. Rather than substitute an entire subway commute with a bike ride, for instance, re:route is built to exploit “switchpoints”: spots along a regular commute where a user could exit and switch modes. “So perhaps you exit the tube a stop or two early and walk or bike the remainder,” Yolles said. This increases exercise, reduces congestion and can shake up force-of-habit commuting behaviors.

Recyclebank worked hard to simplify what the user sees. Recyclebank teamed up with R/GA, a digital advertising agency with deep experience in building mobile interactive media. R/GA helped Nike develop their Nike+ GPS running app, which tracks, shares and rewards runners’ efforts. “We thought that was interesting because it’s also focused on behavior change,” Yolles said.

Behind the scenes, the complexity is much greater. The app relies on information provided by TfL’s journey planner, which serves up relevant data about location, travel distance and trip time, and helps calculate travel options. “TfL’s choice to develop and open that data to developers has made all of this possible,” explained Yolles. TfL hopes to use the data to guide future plans. As users and trips multiply, the resulting database can help TfL refine or augment existing transportation infrastructure.

Back on the London’s streets, users will find the program is geared to generate meaningful rewards quickly. By joining, participants earn 75 points. For each trip that is rerouted to a greener option, five points are added. A back of the envelope calculation shows that if a participant modifies each commute, five days a week, 50 weeks a year, the annual tally will hit 2,500 points, though it would be easy to boost that figure significantly with addition trips during the day.

At this rate, the rewards initially offered under the program are easily achievable, and include both useful and mildly indulgent offers. A quick sampling: For 75 points, participants can get £5 off a £25 tab for food, wine or booze at Marks & Spencer. For 100 points, they can score half off a Champneys Town & City Spas treatment, or get a free bar of soap at LushFree. Recyclebank predicts participants will be able to earn up to £250 worth of credits per year using re:route.

To tap users’ competitive impulses, the app awards achievement badges for accumulated savings, and makes it easy to share results through Facebook and email.

It remains to be seen just how much re:route can influence the tide of London’s commuting crowds. With a population of 7.6 million, plus another million commuting to and from the city each day, Recyclebank hopes to attract more than 100,000 users near term, with the ultimate goal of “motivating and tracking” half a million journeys per week.

Bikeworldtravel / Shutterstock.com

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Visit the original article here at  Recyclebank’s iPhone app aims to ease London traffic congestion | GreenBiz.com.

GreenBiz

Seven lessons learned from driving 24 million EV miles | GreenBiz

In the world of electric vehicles, nothing attracts as much speculation or disagreement as the debate over exactly how EV drivers behave. Do they need 100 miles of range or will 30 miles do? How many public recharge stations do they need? Do energy prices influence charging? And so on.

The answers to these questions could have huge implications for the success of EVs. If drivers are satisfied with lower-range cars, fewer recharge points and overnight recharging, then the overall challenge of electrifying the nation’s fleet could be resolved at lower costs and more quickly — with greater economic and environmental benefits.

The best way to answer these questions, of course, is to watch EV drivers and to learn what they’re actually doing.  To assist in that process, the Department of Energy commissioned an industry collaboration — involving a wide range of carmakers, utilities, retailers, government entities and technology providers — to help identify current and potential barriers to EV adoption.

Dubbed the EV Project, the program began in late 2010; gathering data from EV drivers willing to share that information. And last week, the EV Project announced it had amassed an unprecedented volume of behavioral data drawn from more than 24 million miles of EV driving.

The DOE awarded management of the project to ECOtality, which manufactures EV charging units and related software. Chevrolet Volt and the Nissan LEAF are project partners, too. Qualifying Volt and LEAF drivers also receive a residential charger and installation at little or no cost to themselves.

“We’re beginning to really see how people are using chargers,” said Colin Read, vice president of corporate development for ECOtality. I spoke with Read while he was in New York City.

So far, the EV Project is tracking some 4,600 vehicles. And including public sites the EV Project is also monitoring 6,200 charging stations, made up mostly of the Type II chargers that operate at 240 volts.

Geographically, the project is tracking EV behavior in 18 markets, including the “Birkenstock Belt”— those eco-conscious parts of West Coast: Washington, Oregon and California — plus sites in Arizona, Texas, as well as Tennessee, where Nissan builds the LEAF. “We picked regions with very little in common on purpose. We’re seeking a diversity of driver experience,” Read said.

The EV Project is also buying EVs from dealer lots, much like regular consumers do, to understand the overall buying experience. “We call it the ‘Noah’s Ark of EV programs,’ because we buy a pair of every EV on the market,” Read joked. The project does make some exceptions, however, with the most costly models, where just one car is enough.

So, what are some of the project’s early lessons?

  1. The current EV driving distance is modest. According to a pool of EV drivers, made up most of LEAF drivers, average daily mileage is running at 27.7 miles. That distance is very much in line with the overall, rule-of-thumb estimates that most Americans drive less than 40 miles per day.
  2. There’s range anxiety, but not the sort most expected. Project data is showing a curious quirk. There’s been a collective worry that ‘range anxiety’ stifles demand for EV. But data from a small but growing pool of Volt drivers reveals that its drivers work hard to stay in all-battery mode — rather than routinely taking advantage of the extended range provided by the Volt’s gas engine. To stay within the Volt’s 40-mile battery range and not use any gasoline, “[Volt drivers] are being very disciplined,” Read said. “They want to drive all-electric, so we’re seeing them plug in more frequently than LEAF drivers.”
  3. Recharge times are fairly short. Given these relatively low daily-driving distances, the amount of time EVs are actively drawing power to recharge is averaging about 1.5 hours. The average amount of time the car is plugged in (although not necessarily drawing power) is 8.5 hours. And the bulk of cars are reportedly plugged in during a window that spans 8pm to 8am. The upshot? “Drivers don’t need to recharge continuously overnight,” Read said. This data suggests the transmission grid may be better prepared to handle large volumes of EVs than originally thought.
  4. Price signals work. The EV Project looked at San Diego, where utility San Diego Gas & Electric runs one of the nation’s most sophisticated time-of-day consumer pricing programs. And according to the Project, there’s a strong demand there for low-cost, late-night power. SDG&E sells power at four tiers: full price, half price, one-quarter price and, from midnight till early morning, one-sixth of the full price. “We see almost no charging until midnight, when prices fall to their lowest,” Read said. This has implications for grid use: “The knock that the grid will need more capacity to handle a lot of EVs isn’t true; if we can shift charging to night, it will actually balance out the grid.”
  5. Topping off is habitual, but maybe not necessary. The EV Project data shows that daytime charging rises from 9am to 4pm. “People plug in when they’re at work, regardless of whether they need the charge,” Read said. At the moment, because the daytime chargers are free, this behavior may not be reflecting real-world conditions. “People recharge more out of convenience than out of fear,” Read notes. “If the charger is available and free, they’ll plug in.” But higher prices for daytime pricing are inevitable, he adds, and that change will likely drive down demand for daytime plug time.
  6. Installation costs must fall. ECOtality is also tracking installation costs and procedures in its test markets. The costs to permit and install a home charger vary widely and must come down, Read said. Installation costs can run as high as $1,400, and “this has made us rethink the design of the installation process and charging device,” he said. Earlier chargers had to be hard-wired into the wall — but now they can be plugged into a heavy-duty 240V wall plug, like those used for clothes dryers or ovens.
  7. It’s too early to judge true demand. Read’s final point: criticism of EVs in some industry and political circles is premature and unjustified. Critics have been pointing out that the LEAF and Volt fell short of sales targets in 2011, with a total volume of just over 17,000 vehicles. But Read points out that Toyota’s Prius sold just 5,000 units in 2000 – the year when first-generation hybrid cars such as the Prius and the Honda Insight were first sold. “We’re about to see a more real-world test of demand,” he said, with the arrival of Toyota’s plug-in Prius hybrid and the debut of Ford’s battery-powered Focus EV.

Keep an eye on the EV Project’s progress at http://www.theevproject.com/documents.php.

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Image of concept alternative electric vehicle by AlexRoz via Shutterstock. 

Check out the original article here: http://www.greenbiz.com/blog/2012/04/30/how-evs-are-changing-driver-behavior-7-lessons-24-million-miles