Question to NOVA 7/3/08
by Alan C. Page, Ph.D.
Belchertown, MA 01007
As a forest manager I know that CO2 is sequestered by vegetation. Our StepItUp group has found the existence of at least four commercially operating potentially "Carbon-Negative" energy systems and another that has run an extended prototype system with much better control of the quality of the char produced. We are sure that these systems can lock organic carbon in bio-char made from organic wastes, and that bio-char has the property of being a benign soil amendment or a significant soil enhancement - "Terra Preta" - but is not acknowledged in any of the recent scenerios for CCS. Discussing this with geologists who are funded to search for stable carbon storage sites acknowledge that the application of bio-char to soil is likely to be much less costly and energetically less wasteful than any of the other systems. The artificial leaf mentioned in the accompanying spot may be interesting but the urgent need to remove significant amounts of carbon from circulation should be a reason to look into this technology on a global scale immediately and begin to get the myriad small farm and neighborhood situations globally to use their organic wastes in a local proactive manner, rather than funding large conglomerates to move resources with fossil energy for the purpose of making more money.
What are the obstacles that are stopping the consideration of this very simple and locally applicable technology? If you need more information contact me before trying to make up an answer! This question and your answer will be posted on "alansblog" on http://www.vox.com so please be careful in considering this request!
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step it up - Belchertown |
May 22, 2008
Governor Duval Patrick
State House
Boston, MA 02133
Dear Governor Patrick:
re: recent information about climate change
We need to quickly reduce the atmospheric concentration of carbon dioxide! Carbon based fuels currently drive the output of our economy. If we are to accomplish this task we need to harness the capacity of the forests and agriculture of the world to recover atmospheric CO2 and trap it in ways that are described in the attached documents. MA is a good place to start this recovery effort because we have both productive forests and a struggling agricultural base. I have included a recent letter to Dr. William McKibben about a feasible low cost solution to this problem. I believe that we are also facing a much more difficult energy situation than any in the public sector have foreseen, an example of where our fuel prices are headed is enclosed as well as some recent “misinformation” that has recently stymied discussion of the problem in our community. We are working to rectify this problem locally, but it is larger than we can address alone.
This letter is sent through Lieutenant Governor, Timothy Murray because of the urgency associated with this issue. I hope that you can take a few minutes from your busy schedule to review the attached documents and let me know that you have received them.
Enclosed is a copy of a letter recently sent to you describing a public session of the MA Forest Stewardship Committee to facilitate your connection of the content of this letter to the more general observations of the previous letter, which may have gotten lost in the volume of mail you receive. If I do not hear from you within ten days I will call to see if you need more information. Thank you for your attention to this issue.
Sincerely,
Alan C. Page, Ph.D.
Member StepItUp - Belchertown
MA Licensed Forester #184
NH Licensed Forester #218
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125 Blue Meadow Road • Belchertown, MA • 01007 Phone: 413-323-4401 • Fax: 413-323-5193
******************************************************************** Here it is June 21, 2008, and we haven't heard anything although a nice letter concerning the previous letter refered to above and appended below. This letter was handed to Lt. Gov. Murray for hand delivery to the Govenor along with many supporting documents. What is it going to take for folks to wake up to the fact that there is a win-win situation in carbon-negative energy?
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May 10, 2008 Governor Duval Patrick State House Boston, MA 02133
Dear Governor Patrick:
I would like to tell you about a recent MA Forest Stewardship Committee meeting that l attended last week. Several things stood out about the attendees and the committee members: 1. It appeared that few of the committee members are really familiar with how forests grow. As a tree physiologist it is painfully clear to me when people are trying to function in biological territory where they lack basic information. 2. The chairman publicly expressed his (and possibly the whole committee's) inability to understand normal forestry terminology. 3. There was a collective sense of entitlement among the general public (there were about twenty non-foresters), some of the foresters, and many Committee members that they could expect the displacement of all productive activity from their living space whenever they chose to object to it. This is the way in which much of America has achieved the remarkable clean up of our rivers for instance. However, that modus operandi has allowed the impression that the world is a cleaner place and that is far from the truth. 4. Few understood the implications of the atmospheric concentration of CO2 increasing at an increasing rate or the potential of forest biomass use in carbon-negative systems to sequester more carbon than is emitted in local energy production. (This information was not revealed in the <5 minutes I had to speak.) 5. Most problematic, was the universal sense of entitlement to energy for food, heat, travel, and entertainment. The utter lack of any sense of responsibility for the supply or impacts of their use of that energy is going to lead to many problems, if it is not addressed before we get into a very difficult energy situation.
The whole meeting was deeply troubling because of its implications about the ability of the general public to comprehend the things that their life choices mean for the local and global environment. I raised the issue of the massive inefficiency of the current grid based electric power system. A copy of my "Energy Position Paper-2007 is included for background. The connection was made between our demands for heating, lighting, and mobility and the damage done to get the coal and oil that we take for granted. Issue #2 above, how we have cleaned up our back yard by moving polluting activities some where else, was described but it is doubtful if it was understood. The point was made that rather than ceasing to generate the old pollution, more is generally produced where the goods are made and then more is added in long distance transport.
Mr. James Di Maio, your Chief State Forester, has told me privately that you hope to develop nearly a tenth of the current State energy needs from renewable sources with a lot of that coming from biomass. Please review the portion of the enclosure about the effects of using renewable fuels to add power to the grid. This meeting does not bode well for the prospects of biomass use helping to bring that about.
I have several suggestions: 1) Suggest several MA licensed foresters, who have indicated that they would be available to answer questions privately and in a confidential manner, to each Committee member. 2) Provide some non-forester critique group who would help remove the jargon from the summaries that non-foresters are expected to act upon, and make sure that the modified summaries still say what the foresters want it to say. 3) Put in place a system of forest demonstration areas to bring frequent forest treatment for energy and material removal into close proximity with normal public uses so that people can become familiar with what this kind of treatment actually looks like. This will require lots of signage and regular maintenance. It is possible that it might even have to be done on private land for starters because of the issues mentioned above. But I believe that it must happen soon. 4) Be willing to make funding available for some new carbon-negative renewable energy system demonstrations on the above forest demonstration sites. There are several systems in production now that are available for distribution. These new systems can provide a number of benefits including massive carbon sequestration using local biomass on farm sized installations as well as power plant associated units that can clean up stack emissions. The carbon sequestration works by placing the bio char back on the site where the biomass was harvested from. It is most appropriate for the whole system and sequestration to take place on normal farm and forest land. This system is likely to be the least cost and most benign carbon storage system ever devised. Chief Forester DiMaio is familiar with the literature on these systems. I would be willing to discuss any of the above with you if you want more information from me. Sincerely, Alan C. Page, Ph.D. MA Licensed Forester #184 NH Licensed Forester #218
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Energy Position Paper - 2008
By Alan C. Page, Ph. D. – Green Diamond Systems Belchertown, MA
http://www.greendiamondsystems.com
The 2007 Energy Position Paper focused on the inefficiency of the ubiquitous power grid, the effects of various kinds of generation and different fuels, and the need to move to local co-generation to capture the 70% of fuel energy lost at most large generating stations. This serious condition still exists and is getting worse – see details at the website above. This year we face a much more dire condition that requires immediate action. See the glossary for unfamiliar terms.
Two phenomena are likely to dominate the energy arena in the near future. The first involves the apparent peaking of oil supply and a rapid escalation of the price of energy especially in the U.S. This permanent energy shortage will play out as market forces allow, i.e.: until sufficient demand is shed by people and regions not being able to afford the luxury of convenience. The second phenomenon will become known as "carbon-negative energy" (CNE), and details can now be found only in a few academic settings. CNE requires not just reducing carbon dioxide emissions, but actually taking more carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere than is annually released. This condition is already urgent and will exist for the foreseeable future; see http://www.350.org/ for details. CNE requires choices that humanity may not have time to fully understand. There is only one really practical form of implementation for CNE systems. These clean energy systems use agricultural wastes, unrecyclable organic wastes, and the wastes of our natural solar collector array, working forests, to provide collected atmospheric carbon dioxide for local clean energy production and conversion of some of the carbon in these renewable wastes into a stable long-term carbon storage agent. The damaging fossil energy dependence and the current shortage could be partially mitigated by the rapid development and deployment of renewable carbon-negative energy systems and other carbon neutral energy sources, but there will be no substitute for carbon-negative energy systems. See http://carbonnegative.info for detailed study of available information.
The urgent need for carbon-negative energy systems to lower the atmospheric concentration of carbon dioxide has been described by Dr. James Hansen’s very strong language, "…if we wish to preserve a planet similar to that on which civilization developed." In a recent paper in Science magazine, Hansen mentions a number of situations that he describes as climatic tipping points that result from human activity. The recent loss of Arctic sea ice last summer is one of the most visible of this very troubling set of phenomena, see http://www.carbonequity.info. The problem with tipping points is that once one point is tripped there is no way to undo the situation created. Hansen suggests that because there are a number of such tipping points, crossing one will make it much more likely that the next will be crossed more quickly than if the other had not tripped. Thus, immediate action is needed – if nothing begins to happen before 2012; Hansen maintains that it will be too late to contain the onset of uncontrollable climate change.
CARBON-NEGATIVE ENERGY (CNE): A carbon-negative energy system involves producing clean energy (predominantly hydrogen and low carbon fuels like methane, CH4, and carbon monoxide) from a renewable carbon based energy source while also retaining most of the carbon in the fuel as a solid. (The use of depletable / non-renewable energy for this purpose is not carbon-negative since the carbon is already permanently stored and some or all will be released by its use. While these resources will need to be used in the short run, it should be done with the understanding that all related emissions will need to be recaptured via CNE.) A common form of this renewable stable retained carbon is bio-char. If the fuel comes from plant material, as the above mentioned wastes do, then the portion of the plant that is reformed into charcoal – biochar, is made up of carbon that has been removed from the air.
The only way to accomplish this feat in the short run is to harness the natural capacity of plants to use light, water, and the photosynthetic process to convert atmospheric carbon dioxide into solid forms of organic material (wood, straw, sugar cane waste, undigested food, unrecyclable paper, to name a few), and then to use some of the biomass for energy while reforming much of the carbon in the cells of the organic material into bio-char.
There are several manufacturers of carbon-negative energy systems, but few recognize the slender thread by which we now exist. All of these manufacturers need to be fully financed to incorporate the available technology and mass produce their units to fill the 27,000,000 or more global situations where they can be used. These systems can be modified to produce a variety of energy carrier compounds; producer gas, (H2, CH4, and CO), bio-oil, bio-diesel, bio-gasoline, etc. It appears that the primary function of these bio-pyrolysis systems should be the production of the maximum amount of bio-char possible with the characteristics most favorable for microorganism colonization. There are very specific conditions that must be met for production of this active variety of bio-char and must be developed for each unique raw material.
Retention of agricultural land for food production:
The rapid development of food shortages this year suggests that the human population may need to focus the use of all agricultural land for food production. There are good reasons to limit tillable soils to agricultural crops and the function of tillage to the special soil situations that make these activities possible. Tillage and the regular use of energy for production and collection of annual crops are exceedingly disruptive to soil stability and retention of desirable soil qualities. Therefore it appears that CNE from farms must only come from the use of plant wastes and manures for making biochar. There are very beneficial aspects to making bio-char from these wastes because the carbon so collected will remain in the soil in a stable form for hundreds if not thousands of years. U.S.D.A. soil scientist’s figures show that soil health is based on the carbon content of any soil. Non-stable carbon is easily respired and thus lost from the soil in decades or less. Soil carbon acts as a strong adsorption substrate for holding soil nutrients. The enormous bio-char surface area (from the cellular structure of the original plant) provides space for a variety of microorganisms to use in their life processes. The newness of these concepts may justify some extensive testing before wide application where the performance as a soil amendment is important.
Unextracted forest wastes offer a significant untapped resource that can be used without limiting food production. Fortunately biochar also can significantly enhance the capacity of a forest soil to produce biomass. Thus a win-win-win situation exists for small local farm, forest, or neighborhood based energy systems.
Japanese, U.S., and Brazilian research on a variety of soils has shown that food production is enhanced by the increase in soil water holding capacity and increased cation exchange capacity that comes from the stable surfaces of the bio-char. However, this research is still very fragmentary and requires replication and extension. The large nutrient storage capacity of bio-char can be used to filter the effluents of farms, homes, and communities. USDOE research has show that bio-char can be used to scrub power plant emissions using a patented process held by Battelle National Labs at Oak Ridge, TN. A few trials have shown that when this nutrient loaded bio-char is spread on farms and forests, future biomass production may be increased by 150-300% over untreated soils. While any biologically active bio-char will store carbon, it is most appropriate to process the material very near the site where it came from and make sure that the bio-char is returned to the original site. Thus much of our agricultural, food, and paper wastes as well as other problem wastes can be turned into clean energy sources and/or a beneficial carbon sequestration vehicle with very long storage life. It appears that the application of bio-char may become increasingly effective over time as it equilibrates with local soil conditions.
Forest application of bio-char will serve to limit the nutrient losses from these areas because the stable carbon in the bio-char holds the soil nutrients more permanently than the normal forest or farm organic matter. The longevity of the storage sites and the strength of nutrient attraction and retention ensure that the local nutrients will be more likely to cycle close to the site of uptake by the plant rather than being lost through leaching as leaves and plant parts rot. The use of the bio-char by microorganisms allows them to remove nutrients from the storage sites on bio-char carbon as needed and the commensual nature of many of these soil organisms with above ground plants allows for the transfer of needed nutrients and water to the plants without the plants having to grow the entire root network that would be otherwise necessary. This benign relationship between biochar and land productivity suggests that the best mode of implementation of CNE is going to involve globally distributed generation of energy by small farm based systems. We need to approach this as a "GLOBAL Marshall Plan" style sacred trust.
GLOSSARY:
There are several new terms used above that need to be recognized for their special significance in this situation:
Bio-char: the charred organic material left after releasing as much of the energy in the raw material as is desired while retaining some of the carbon in the feed stock as charcoal. This bio-char may have properties that are specially designed for the uses that it can have as a soil amendment and permanent carbon storage medium.
Climatic tipping points: there are many different kinds of environmental, geologic, oceanic, or atmospheric situations that now limit the retention of solar energy as heat within the biosphere of the planet earth. These situations result in one or more of the following happening reliably; 1) light is reflected back into space, 2) carbon is held in semi-permanent storage, 3) light is not converted into sensible heat before being reradiated or reflected, 4) a particular condition is maintained because temperatures are appropriate for systems that currently function adequately [the North Atlantic deep water conveyor is an example of a set of actions that depend on very specific conditions existing in the area of the origin of the deep water connection]. The recent loss of Arctic sea ice is an example of a tipping point sitting right at the point of being tripped. There the ice cover reflects 80% of the incoming light back into space, while open ocean waters (if uncovered) would reverse the reflection absorption ratio converting 80% of the same light into heat. The permafrost that lies just to the south of the Arctic ice has retained much of the dead organic matter produced there over the past 10,000+ years as undecomposed frozen peat. The melting of the ice that frames this organic material frees microbes to work to anaerobically convert this material to methane (methane has a green house gas effect that is 22 times stronger than carbon dioxide). Clathrates are accumulations of methane ice that form along deep coastal shelves in the ocean. This water – methane ice combination is maintained by both low temperatures and high pressure due to the depth at which they form. Occasionally this balance is tripped and some of this slush floats to the surface of the sea where the methane bubbles free of its ice matrix. The volume of this methane storage is enormous. The release of a large volume of this gas would be disastrous. There are many more situations that could be classed as tipping points.
CNE - carbon-negative energy: this kind of energy system is different from common carbon collection and storage (CCS) systems because it involves not just removal of carbon dioxide from the exhaust gases released in the process of energy generation, but rather using raw fuel materials that were made from pre-existing atmospheric carbon dioxide and by purposeful burial in soil and elsewhere the carbon so collected is retained in a stable (2000 years or longer) form. Appropriate additions of bio-char to soil may act to enhance the further collection of carbon dioxide.
Natural solar collector- all vegetated land area: today most people understand that humans can produce devices to change sunlight into electric energy. It is less clear to most that plants have organic molecules that have done this for millions of years. Plants are the basis for all large terrestrial life. It is even less clear that forests as a part of the natural landscape share that capability on a grand scale. We all understand that many forests have been put at risk by human abuses. It is less common for people to understand that all plants should be considered as our (the biosphere’s) natural solar collectors and as such are part of a universal solar array It is essential that we work to foster a new understanding of this natural component.
Preserved forests: there are certainly forests that are at risk and in these cases they should be set aside as preserves for the protection of the habitat that can only exist in that particular forest. However, all life is at risk to the tipping points that Hansen has described. If there are forests that are not at risk that can help reduce the risk to all life then they should play a part.
Working forests: there are significant areas of forest that are not set aside as preserves because they are owned by people who pay taxes and have paid money for the land. To the extend that these forests are expected to pay for their overhead and are available for periodic harvests, they can be described as “working forests.” However, it is very easy for the lay person to lump all forests together and reject any activity in forests as harmful. It is necessary to describe these working forests in a new way that highlights what they actually are able to do, why they have to do it to maintain their forested status, and how they have to function in the near future if humanity is to reverse the current ruinous technological situation that now exists. It is all too common that working forests are seen as little more than speculative reserves of land for future development. This view must change rapidly and we must find ways of making it possible for future generations to justify holding land in this very necessary condition. Working forests must be seen as part of the “natural solar collector array” and be maintained as such.
It is amazing how hard it is to get real time information about Urgent issues:
http://www.carbonequity.info/climatecodered/summary.html
A picture is worth a thousand words. I have included here only the summary and Table of Contents - see the whole publication and the astounding photos of recent melting at this link:
http://www.carbonequity.info/PDFs/arctic.pdf
The big melt
Lessons from the Arctic
summer of 2007
David Spratt
CarbonEquity
With input from
Philip SuttonGreenleap Strategic Institute Inc
."For the last 10,000 years we have been living in a
remarkably stable climate that has allowed the whole
of human development to take place. In all that time,
through the mediaeval warming and the Little Ice Age,
there was only a variation of 1
°C. Now we see thepotential for sudden changes of between 2
°C and 6°C.We just don't know what the world is like at those
temperatures. We are climbing rapidly out of
mankind's safe zone into new territory, and we have
no idea if we can live in it."
Robert Corell, Arctic scientist and IPCC member
“The Guardian” 5 October 2007
The big melt: lessons from the Arctic summer of 2007 2
Contents
3 Introduction
4 Emissions trajectories
6 The accelerating loss of the Arctic ice sheet
8 Stability of the Greenland ice sheet
10 Projected sea-level rise to 2100
12 Beyond the Arctic
13 Climate sensitivity and the missing feedbacks
16 Speed of impact and uncertainty
18 Conclusion
18 Summary
19 Bibliography
Cover:
Melt descending into a moulin, a vertical shaftcarrying water to Greenland ice sheet base.
Photo: Roger Braithwaite, University of Manchester (UK)
Carbon Equity
PO Box 96
Yarraville 3013
Australia
www.carbonequity.info
First published 6 October 2007
Updated 5 November 2007
Available online at
www.carbonequity.info/PDFs/arctic.pdf
The big melt: lessons from the Arctic summer of 2007 3
Introduction
If the climate change world was not turned upside down in September 2007, it was at least jolted off
its axis when new data revealed the Arctic floating sea-ice to be disintegrating at a frightening speed
and "100 years ahead of schedule" in the immortal words of one glaciologist. The Arctic sea-ice may
disappear entirely as early as 2013, and climate scientists are shocked by what they are seeing.
This extraordinary event, in which millions of square kilometres of the north polar ice is literally
melting away before the world’s eyes, demands that we look anew at the impact of global warming,
the speed of change, the role of climate science, and what we must do to return to a safe-climate
world.
Yet those turning to the most recent Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) report for an
up-to-date, authoritive view of global warming, the predictions and the impacts will find no mention
of these dramatic Arctic events or their consequences.
The 2007 IPCC report is the strongest call yet by the IPCC for governments and businesses, nations
and communities to act now and quickly to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. Yet it is not strong
enough. The IPCC’s four-year schedule for producing reports requires a deadline for scientific papers
that is often more than two years prior to the report’s final release. What happens if there is
significant new evidence or events that dramatically changes our understanding of climate science in
the gap between the science reporting deadline and publication? They don’t get a mention, so the
IPCC report is out of date before it hits the presses, and in the rapidy changing world of global
warming that is a serious problem because it is widely viewed as the climate change Bible.
I have been struck by the significance of the Arctic melt and its scientific aftershocks, and how little
they are publicly understood. The Arctic summer of 2007 has important implications for climate
science and our understanding of how close we are to the “tipping points” of dangerous climate
change. It forces us to reconsider what “dangerous” climate change means, and how rapidly we must
reduce carbon emissions.
“The Big Melt” is an overview of some climate science over the last 12 months, with a focus on the
Arctic, ice-sheet stability, sea-rise levels, the role of the IPCC and why what NASA´s James Hansen
calls climate change "scientific reticence" is now an urgent issue. "The Big Melt" is designed to
provide an accessible summary for the purpose of community education and activism. This is part of
CarbonEquity´s role as a climate change education and advocacy non-government organisation
“The Big Melt” contains much science that was not able to be included in the 2007 IPCC report. Many
of the scientific papers referenced are by leading climate scientists who are members of the IPCC, and
it has been read by a number of those scientists both in Australia and the USA who say that the
commentary is built on a firm scientific base.
“The Big Melt” is the first in a series of papers that offers a message of hope. In the last year, there
has been a significant shift in understanding and willingness to act on climate change. Thanks to Al
Gore, there is now great public interest and discussion of these key questions. This paper may be seen
as an update on what the climate science is been telling us since “The inconvenient truth” was
launched in 2006. If you like the paper, please pass it onto friends and family.
A follow-up publication in preparation by Carbon Equity and the Greenleap Strategic Institute will
explore the implications of the Arctic summer of 2007 for climate policy and targets, and why we
need to understand global warming as a global emergency which now demands an emergency
reponse. A response in which we put aside business-as-usual and politics-as-usual to focus our
attention and devote our energy and ideas and innovation, to planning and devote the resources
necessary to re-establish a safe-climate world before it is too late.
I gratefully acknowledge the input and critical support from Philip Sutton in preparing this report.
David Spratt
4 November 2007
This is a collections of emails that discuss the very misleading information being put out by the Oregon Institute of Science and Medicine 2008
promoted by Fred Singer, et al
Dr Robinson says below:
<The inalienable rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness, in a civilization based upon the achievements of science and technology, include the rights to obtain access to life-giving and life-enhancing technology. This is especially true of the right of access to the most basic of all technologies -- the right of access to energy.>
(The comment above – see the full text below) highlights the misconceptions of society that are starting to cause dire problems because the supplies of natural capital, including those providing most of the energy, are getting low. Dr Robinson highlights the achievements of society through the use of technology but ignores the fact that these achievements are based on irreversibly using the limited natural capital, which is consists of many more components than those that provide the energy. Society needs food and water as well!
Denis Frith
Melbourne
Australia
-----------------------------------------
dmathew1 <dmathew1@tampabay.rr.com> wrote:
Hello Everyone,
Oil addiction is a fundamental human right according to the author of
the below editorial. Restricting access to energy or taxation &
regulation of carbon emissions therefore constitutes a violation of
human rights!
Not only that: "The U.S. should, in fact, be a net exporter of energy." All I've got to say is: Wow!
Sincerely,
David Mathews
--------------------------------------- full text below
Human Rights, Science and the Energy Emergency
by Dr. Arthur Robinson (more by this author)
Posted 05/19/2008 ET http://www.humanevents.com/article.php?id=26588&page=1&cp=1#hec247378
Today, we announce that more than 31,000 U.S. scientists -- over 9,000 of whom hold PhD degrees in relevant scientific fields -- have signed a petition to the U.S. government that states:
The people of the United States find themselves in an economic crisis caused, in large part, by energy shortages and rapidly increasing prices for energy.
Yet, the United Nations and other vocal political interests are urging the U.S. to enact new laws that will sharply reduce U.S. energy production and raise energy prices even higher. These interests claim that continued U.S. use of hydrocarbon fuels -- which account for 70% of U.S. energy supplies -- will destroy the Earth's climate and cause many environmental catastrophes.
What should the U.S government do in response to this situation? The answer is provided by science, by economics, and by the basic principles of human rights.
The inalienable rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness, in a civilization based upon the achievements of science and technology, include the rights to obtain access to life-giving and life-enhancing technology. This is especially true of the right of access to the most basic of all technologies -- the right of access to energy. This right, we recognize, means we have the right to purchase energy, though the government does not owe us a supply of it. To the contrary, the government owes us an obligation to remove itself as an obstacle to our access to energy unless there is a reason our nation's security is endangered by it. And there is no such reason.
The so-called "global warming" measures advocated by the UN and others create obstacles, rather than eliminating them.
Our right to access to energy and removal of government obstructions have been significantly abridged. During the past two generations in the U.S., a system of high taxation, extensive regulation, and ubiquitous litigation has arisen that prevents the accumulation of sufficient capital and the exercise of sufficient freedom to build and preserve needed modern technology.
This unfavorable economic environment has caused the transfer of many industries abroad and cessation of growth of many others. Nowhere is this damaging trend more evident than in our energy industries, where lack of industrial progress has left our country dependent upon foreign sources for 30% of the energy required to maintain our current level of prosperity.
Moreover, the transfer of U.S. industries abroad has left U.S. citizens with too few goods and services to trade for the energy that they do not produce. A huge and unsustainable trade deficit and rapidly rising energy prices have been the result.
These difficulties were entirely unnecessary. The hydrocarbon resources -- coal, oil, natural gas, and other hydrocarbon reserves -- and the nuclear energy resources of the United States provide abundant fuel for low-cost energy in the U.S. for many future centuries. Moreover, the necessary hydrocarbon and nuclear energy production technologies have been available to U.S. engineers for many decades. There is absolutely no technical or resource reason for the U.S. to be a net importer of energy. The U.S. should, in fact, be a net exporter of energy.
Now, a new and oppressive further infringement upon our human rights has been proposed. Laws are being considered that would sharply restrict our access to hydrocarbon energy. These proposed new restrictions of our human rights are being justified by the claim that continued hydrocarbon energy production -- with its concomitant carbon dioxide release -- will destroy the climate of the Earth and cause catastrophic disasters throughout the world. These claims are based upon the publications of the United Nations -- an organization whose prestige would be greatly increased by world taxation and regulation of hydrocarbon energy.
The scientific hypothesis known as "human-caused global warming" -- which is the basis of these United Nations claims -- has, however, been discredited and invalidated by unequivocal experimental research data and sound scientific interpretations of that data. This is attested to by the more than 31,000 U.S. scientists who have signed this petition.
It is tragic that the current shortage of low cost energy in the U.S. has been allowed to occur. In order to correct this problem and to assure that it does not recur, the current high level of taxation, regulation, and susceptibility to litigation of U.S. energy industries must be reduced, so that free enterprise -- working with private capital and without tax funds or subsidies -- can build needed new U.S. hydrocarbon and nuclear power capacity as quickly as possible.
It may be that technologies other than hydrocarbon and nuclear are also practical sources of abundant, low-cost energy. This is best determined in the free market. Elimination of all tax subsidies and marked reduction of taxation, regulation, and susceptibility to litigation of all energy-production industries will allow economically healthy competition. This will ease the current energy crisis and provide abundant low-cost energy for future prosperity.
In order to alleviate the current energy emergency in the United States and prevent future such emergencies, it is essential for the governmental restrictions that have caused this emergency to be removed. Fundamental human rights require that U.S. citizens and their industries be free to produce the low cost, abundant energy that is required for their prosperity. Environmental science, as evidenced by the signatories of this petition, favors this freedom.
Dr. Arthur Robinson is President and Research Professor of the Oregon
Institute of Science and Medicine.
This was a special day for people of the Town of Ashfield, MA. Their Town Hall was used as the headquarters of Lt. Governor Tim Murray for a tour of the part of MA west of the CT river, and a chance for him to meet a particular group of folks who make their living in and from the forests of that region. I was luck to get a chance to give him some correspondence that I have attempted with Governor Patrick. So many folks asked for copies of it that I offered to post it here and give links to other parts so that it can be reconstructed if desired. I believe that there may be a chance for the western part of MA to become a significant contributor to amelioration of the pollution eminating from all citizens of this state with the govenor's help. Alan Page
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Step It Up - Belchertown |
May 22, 2008
Governor Duval Patrick
State House
Boston, MA 02133
Dear Governor Patrick:
RE: recent information about climate change
We need to quickly reduce the atmospheric concentration of carbon dioxide! Carbon based fuels currently drive the output of our economy. If we are to accomplish this task we need to harness the capacity of the forests and agriculture of the world to recover atmospheric CO2 and trap it in ways that are described in the attached documents. MA is a good place to start this recovery effort because we have both productive forests and a struggling agricultural base. I have included a recent letter to Dr. William McKibben about a feasible low cost solution to this problem. I believe that we are also facing a much more difficult energy situation than any in the public sector have foreseen, an example of where our fuel prices are headed is enclosed as well as some recent “misinformation” that has recently stymied discussion of the problem in our community. We are working to rectify this problem locally, but it is larger than we can address alone.
This letter is sent through Lieutenant Governor, Timothy Murray because of the urgency associated with this issue. I hope that you can take a few minutes from your busy schedule to review the attached documents and let me know that you have received them.
Enclosed is a copy of a letter recently sent to you describing a public session of the MA Forest Stewardship Committee to facilitate your connection of the content of this letter to the more general observations of the previous letter, which may have gotten lost in the volume of mail you receive. If I do not hear from you within ten days I will call to see if you need more information. Thank you for your attention to this issue.
Sincerely,
Alan C. Page, Ph.D.
MA Licensed Forester #184
NH Licensed Forester #218