ColorPower - A Decentralized Smart Grid Technology

Hello Readers,

I hope you have been enjoying the on-going Global Sustainability series. This post is not in that series but instead is a weekend treat for the avid followers of this blog. Have no fear, the rest of the series is scheduled to post next week.



I was sitting in the lobby of an environmental non-profit the other week, and I happened to pick up a copy of the Spring 2012 issue of the MIT Energy Initiative's Energy Futures magazine in which I found an article about a new smart grid technology called ColorPower, which may be of particular interest for proponents of renewable energy, energy storage, and electric vehicles. The article, Tomorrow's power grid: Adjusting demand to meet supply (starting on page 11 of the magazine, page 13 of the pdf version), describes a 'smart grid' demand-side management technology that decentralizes the decision making process, giving the appliance users greater control over their electricity use and more privacy with regard to their habits.

I encourage you to read the article for yourself before proceeding any further. Here is the link again, in case you missed it: http://web.mit.edu/mitei/news/energy-futures/Energy_Futures_Spring_2012.pdf

I am particularly excited about this ColorPower technology, which is now being developed by Zome Energy Networks. As the article mentions, it could revolutionize the ability of homeowners to participate in their home energy use - especially with larger appliances. However, I think that it could also be (1) a key mechanism for electric vehicle charging and (2) a supplement and/or tie-in to energy storage devices.

In my dissertation (see the Background section), I specifically sought to avoid discussing energy storage devices that only worked in one direction (e.g. could only use electricity but not send electricity back to the grid), because on the electricity grid demand can be both too high and too low compared to supply. This is especially the case on a utility grid that includes a high percentage of renewable energy sources (such as solar photovoltaic and wind turbine generators). Thus, I was concerned that if I based the premise of my dissertation only on a technology that only had the ability to absorb extra energy when demand was lower than supply, I would be missing half of the equation.

During instances in which the supply is unable to keep up with the demand, the ColorPower systems could be used as envisioned by the system designer and described in the article - i.e. temporarily turning off or cycling down appliances based on the user preferences. In a mathematical sense, reducing demand is similar to sending more electricity onto the grid (the first half of the equation). However, I now believe that with the use of ColorPower or a similar technology much (but not all) of the role of bi-directional energy storage devices could be met with demand response, especially if it is used in combination with electric vehicles and thermal power systems.

If the ColorPower systems included a bi-directional switch, owners could not only elect to use less energy when demand is too high but could also request to use more energy when demand is too low. This may not seem practical when only considering traditional appliances. Instead let's consider non-traditional appliances such as electric vehicles and thermal mass systems (e.g. SmartBricks from Vcharge). In this case, appliance owners could prioritize their energy use so that it jumps (e.g. electric vehicles charge quicker than normal) whenever overall demand is too low and supply is too high .

As a result, if each building had some appliances set up to shutdown when demand is too high and other appliances set up to ramp-up use when demand is too low, each building could function in essentially the same role that energy storage devices filled in my dissertation. This sort of bi-directional demand response could also avoid some of the trouble with V2G systems that require EV batteries to be less than fully charged in order to function.



Well, that is all for now, I hope that I have provide you with enough links to keep you busy for the weekend.

Cheers,

Sean

Global Sustainability - Institutionality

Hello Readers,

In the previous post, I introduced the concept of an 'institution' as it relates to societal survival. In this post in the Global Sustainability series, which I have called Institutionality, I will clarify what I mean by an 'institution'. Also, to ensure complete clarity, I will take a page from political parties, and I will employ the use of a capitalization (i.e. "Institution") when I mean an 'institution of societal survival' rather than just a generic use of a word.

In the Societal Survival post, I discussed Family and Religion (into which I also lumped some forms of patriotism) as Institutions. Further, I suggested that at certain population scales, each of these Institutions become limited in their ability to function as the predominate means of societal survival. But what did I really mean by a 'means of societal survival'?

I actually meant exactly what the term appears implies and a little bit more. As such, I would like to define an Institution as:

An overarching social structure, technological process, or concept in a society that disconnects the need of individuals (and/or groups of individuals) to resolve conflicts from the use of violence, especially when the violence involves killing others in the society, and as a result simultaneously (1) decreases the likelihood that the society will self-destruct and (2) increases the ability of members of the society to work together in order to accomplish tasks that actively improve the chances the society will survive.

The first contingent result in the definition provides a means to avoid self-destruction. The second contingent in the definition provides a means for the society to grow stronger over time. Without meeting both contingents, an institution (note the small "i") does not really function as an Institution even if it provides some of the same Institutional benefits. For example, let us consider professional sports leagues. They exist in many societies, even ancient ones (e.g. the bread and circuses of the Roman Colosseum), and it could easily be argued that they meet the first contingent, because by providing entertainment they can distract participants from their conflicts with others and/or provide a non-murder based venue for rivalries. However, for the most part, professional sports leagues typically do not increase the ability of the individual participants or the society as a whole to accomplish a task beyond simple entertainment or winning the game. Thus, while professional sports leagues possess some Institutional qualities, they are not full fledged Institutions.

Now, before we discuss today's most dominant Institutions, I need to point out the role that perception and purpose play in the definition of an Institution.

To start with the latter, the purpose or perceived purpose of individuals as they participate in the Institution (or the ceremonies or traditions related to the Institution) are not relevant to ability of the Institution to serve its Institutional purposes. That is, for example, the members of a particular religion may be participating in their religious ceremonies for their own reason (e.g. 'to serve God's will' or 'to get into heaven') but as a side effect that religion acts as the Institution of Religion by discouraging murder and violence by listing such acts as sins or proclaiming they are contrary to God's will. Thus, an Institution can function as an Institution regardless of the purpose, intention, or motivation of its participants.

With regard to the former, it is important to note that the definition revolves around likelihood and chance. Thus, even if members of a society perceive an Institution as functioning well in its Institutional capacity (e.g. members of society believe that the institution is working towards the betterment of the society or mankind as a whole), that does not make it so. This is due, in large part, to the fact that is impossible to predict with great accuracy what any factor (or group of factors) may or may not cause a society to ultimately collapse. In fact, the matter is further complicated because the past success of an Institution does not necessarily guarantee its future Institutional utility, because we only have one version of history to observe and the scale of a society's population - and as we will discuss later, the scale of our impact on the environment - is constantly shifting.

Unfortunately, this means attempting to discern the probability that Institutional factors will ensure survival, is a bit like a scientist trying to develop a comprehensive scientific theory of gravity solely based on an observation of just one apple dropping out of one particular tree on one specific planet while the apple is still falling. The scientist may be able to guess that objects will tend to move towards each other, but it is unlikely that the scientist will be able to determine with any certainty the rate at which the apple will accelerate toward the planet or the effect that the mass of the planet plays in the equation, let alone any of the subtle effects such as wind resistance or quantum mechanics.

Finally, before moving on, I want to note that the introduction of a new Institution does not necessitate the undoing of older Institutions nor does it erase the societal complexities created by older Institutions. In fact, to the extent that we can use history as a guide, for newer Institutions to succeed they need to either work within or along side of the framework developed by the older Institutions. For example, even though the introduction of Religion needed to override the desire of families to resolve their conflicts through violence in order to be successful as an Institution, the introduction of Religion did not destroy Family as an Institution. However, it should be likewise noted that older Institutions tend to evolve and change in response to outside pressures (e.g. what Family was 5,000 years ago is not necessarily what Family is today). Furthermore, the degree to which an institution (or a particular version of an Institution) functions Institutionally can shift without necessarily impacting the ability of the institution to exist or serve its other non-Institutional purposes. As a result, the entire Institutional equation must be considered to be in a state of flux.

In the next post, I will briefly discuss the evolution of one of modern society's dominant Institutions: Government.

Cheers,

Sean

Table of Contents for the Global Sustainability series:

1. Introduction
2. Societal Survival
3. Institutionality             <-- you are here
4. Democratic Necessity
5. Economic Disconnect
6. (In)Conclusion

Click Here to go to the Next Post in the Global Sustainability series

Global Sustainability - Societal Survival

Hello Readers,

I have dubbed this post of the Global Sustainability series as Societal Survival, not as a nod to so-called survivalists, but instead to address the question of what allows a society to survive and succeed.

For a possible answer to this question, I turn to a concept from the book Guns, Germs, and Steel by Jared Diamond (no relation), which looks at the reasons why some societies were more successful at surviving than others. The premise of the book as a whole is that the development and success of any particular society was largely based on the specific geography surrounding the society.

But what does that mean in terms of contemporary society, which arguably covers the entire globe, and therefore has access to all of the geography on the planet? For this, I will focus on the author's suggestion about what happens as a society grows in population and population density. The suggestion is that in order for a society to survive for any length of time, it must - first and foremost - ensure that the primary means of conflict resolution is not violence (at least not to the extent of death). If the primary means of conflict resolution is such violence, the society would tend to die off through self-destruction.

As an example, we will start at the smallest scale, a society can be (and in the ancient past often was) only a few people who are related to each other (i.e. a family). In this case, the society would probably be about 2-10 people, which have enough in the way of outside forces to contend with (i.e. nature and neighboring families) in order to survive, so regularly killing each other to resolve conflicts would quickly result in the weakening of the group as a whole, making it less likely to survive. That is, if it did not reduce the group down to just a single individual following a series of conflicts. Thus, at least in the past, societies that for whatever reason honored family/blood/relational ties were more likely to survive.

As population and population density in an area increases, it becomes less possible for an individual family to only resolve conflicts internally. Instead, it becomes necessary for multiple families to interact and resolve conflicts while analogously not killing each other. On the smallest version of this scale, the same institution of 'family' can simply be adapted and expanded through inter-marriage. A society consisting of three or four families can easily have members of each family married to one another. Thus, no new institution needs to be established to allow the society to survive.

But what happens in a case where there are so many families in a society that it is impractical for everyone to be related to one another? The institution of family is no longer sufficient to ensure societal survival, because it is entirely possible for two people to come in conflict who have no familial relation to one another (and therefore no reason not to kill each other). Unfortunately, at this scale, conflicts are never isolated. Brothers, cousins, and other family members are likely to come to the aid of one another during the conflict or in search of revenge if family-ties are the sole institution dissuading the use of violence. Again, the possible result being the weakening or destruction of the society.

In cases, where societies were successfully able to develop beyond this scale of population, the author points to other institutions such as religion and/or forms of patriotism, which gave members of the society some additional motivation to not kill one another. Now, I will not go into the specifics of any particular religion or try to reference any particularly patriotic group. However, as far as I know, one of the factors common to all modern religions that have lasted any amount of time and have any extensive following is that they suggest that it is wrong or evil to kill others (or at least to kill others who also believe in the same religion). Thus, the institution of religion can help a society survive.

Although, just as a society can grow to the extent that the institution of family is not sufficient to ensure the non-destruction of its population, a further increase in population and/or population density often results in a society with multiple religions! What institution comes next?

Extrapolating the line of reasoning and following historical precedent, it seems as though at each scale of population growth a new institution is introduced, developed, created, or at least utilized in order to help with the survival of (and success of) the society. In addition to the institutions of family and religion, two other institutions are readily evident in our contemporary global society and obviously serve the same function: government and the economy.

In the next post, I will take some time to expand upon what I mean by an 'institution of societal survival' before I begin discussing the institutions of government and the economy.

Cheers,

Sean

Table of Contents for the Global Sustainability series:

1. Introduction
2. Societal Survival          <-- you are here
3. Institutionality
   
4. Democratic Necessity
5. Economic Disconnect
6. (In)Conclusion

Click Here to go to the Next Post in the Global Sustainability series

Global Sustainability - Introduction

Hello Readers,

I've had a chance to do some reading recently, and I've been catching up on some 'must read' books from about a decade ago. As a result, I've pulled together some of my own thoughts about what might be necessary for a global society to be sustainable. However, please do not expect that I will describe some 'magic bullet' solution, because (1) I very much dislike that term and (2) the concept of sustainability is not conducive to such solutions.

This is not a concept that can be easily conveyed in a single blog post. Instead, I am going to write out all the posts at once and schedule them to post over the coming weeks, so please stay tuned (or wait until the end of next week and come back to read them all). In the meantime, if you are bored, I would recommend skimming through the book Why We Disagree About Climate Change by Mike Hulme to get into the right mind-set. (I am not going to be discussing what is in his book, but it may help some die-hard environmentalists re-think how they argue about concepts they favor.)

Please do not expect that at the end of this brief series of posts my thoughts will be concluded, because - as you will see - what I am proposing is not a fully formed concept. Furthermore, each of the posts could (and probably does) have an entire book devoted to exploring its concepts. Also, my aim is not to address any particular ill effect of unsustainable practices (e.g. climate change or material waste). Instead, I attempting to redefine the problem, to make an unknown unknown into a known unknown, or at least put some assumptions about sustainability into perspective. My hope is that this will help us ensure our place as the Warmest Generation.

As each of the posts are published, I will add links to the titles below, so it is easy to navigate through the series.

Cheers,

Sean

Table of Contents for the Global Sustainability series:

1. Introduction                 <-- you are here
2. Societal Survival
3. Institutionality
4. Democratic Necessity
5. Economic Disconnect
6. (In)Conclusion

Click Here to go to the Next Post in the Global Sustainability series

Post "Climate-Gate" Attacks

Hello Readers,

I just wanted to point you to an article about the very personal nature of the 'battle' over climate change science in a Post Climate-Gate era.

The article, entitled The Battle Over Climate Science by Tom Clynes was published yesterday on the online version of Popular Science magazine and can be found at: 

http://www.popsci.com/science/article/2012-06/battle-over-climate-change

The article includes interviews with leading climate scientists and the some of the skeptics who are leading the legal and (sometimes violent) personal attacks on those scientists in order to attempt to discredit their research (or at least make it harder for them to perform their research).

Also, within the article, I discovered what appears to be an extremely interesting website (called RealClimate) for climate scientists, climate change activists, and environmental science students. According to the website, Real Climate is:

RealClimate is a commentary site on climate science by working climate scientists for the interested public and journalists. We aim to provide a quick response to developing stories and provide the context sometimes missing in mainstream commentary. The discussion here is restricted to scientific topics and will not get involved in any political or economic implications of the science. All posts are signed by the author(s), except ‘group’ posts which are collective efforts from the whole team. This is a moderated forum.

Please pass this along.

Thanks,

Sean

What happens if we are not the Warmest Generation?

Hello Readers,

I have just finished writing a series of Warmest Generation related blog posts entitled Global Sustainability, which are scheduled to start automatically posting next week. In the meantime, I want to point you to a very concise TED Talk about what it will mean for society if we do not ensure that those of us born in the '80s and '90s are indeed the Warmest Generation.



While you are watching this video, please heed the recommendation of Douglas Adams' Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Don't Panic.

Sincerely,

Sean Diamond

Reserve your Antarctica community garden plot today

Hello Readers,

There has been a lot of focus in the media/blogosphere on the climate change feedback loops associated with a warmer climate in the Arctic circle (see: one of my posts from May, an article from ScienceDaily.com from yesterday, or really just do an internet search for news articles on the subject). Everyone is very focused on melting sea ice, losing the ice on Greenland, or the release of methane from the Arctic permafrost.

However, I have seen very little reporting about the other side of the globe, so I would like to pass along an interesting article from TreeHugger: Antarctica Used to be 20 Degrees Fahrenheit Warmer, with Trees and Vegetation. While this article does not focus the effects of a warmer Antarctica on the rest of the planet, it does point out an alarming observation.

Based on an academic study of sediment core samples from below the Ross Ice Shelf, it is being estimated that "summer temperatures along the Antarctic coast 15 to 20 million years ago were 20 degrees Fahrenheit (11 degrees Celsius) warmer than today, with temperatures reaching as high as 45 degrees Fahrenheit (7 degrees Celsius). Precipitation levels also were found to be several times higher than today."

Importantly, these estimates are associated "with carbon dioxide levels of around 400 to 600 parts per million (ppm)," which are very close to global levels from 2012 (i.e. 393 ppm)! Does this mean that we can expect plants to start sprouting in Antarctica by the end of the century? What does this mean for the rest of the planet?

The full academic article is available through the journal Nature Geoscience; however to access the full text you will need a subscription the journal or will need to buy the article for $32. To find this article on your own, search for:

Feakins, S.J., S. Warny, and J. Lee (2012) Hydrologic cycling over Antarctica during the middle Miocene warming.  Nature Geoscience. doi:10.1038/ngeo1498

Good Luck,

Sean

Weekday Veg TED Talk

Hello Readers,

Here is a good TED talk by Graham Hill, the founder of Treehugger.com, about reducing your consumption of meat by being a vegetarian on weekdays.

I found it interesting, because it reflects an experience that is very similar to my own attempt to be a vegetarian. At the beginning of the year, I started off by trying to dive in and become a complete vegetarian, "cold tofu" if you will. However, by about the end of February, my desire of a good cheese steak or a bacon cheese burger was gnawing on my taste buds. As a result, by April I had already 'slipped up' a couple of times. However, in the mean time I had otherwise maintained a healthy, mostly-fresh-food based vegetarian diet. Rather than feeling guilty about the few times that I really wanted some meat, I decided it would be more environmentally-friendly, healthier, and more personally sustainable to only eat meat roughly one day per month rather than giving up on trying to be a vegetarian all together.

So if you have tried to be a vegetarian or are thinking about making the jump, I strongly encourage you to watch this TED talk about Weekday Veg.

Plant-ly,

Sean

A123: a better battery announcement

Hello Readers,

Today when I turned on my computer, I stumbled upon quite a surprise. One of the top headlines at the New York Times was all about batteries! Upon a quick search, I also found a similar article by Forbes that strips the issue down to the bare bones, no political commentary.

It turns out, the big news in an announcement by A123, which has already developed one of the first - if not only - commercially available utility scale energy storage units on the market, about a new Lithium-Ion battery technology called Nanophosphate EXT.

According to the manufacturer, the main benefit of Nanophosphate EXT will be its ability to operate in a wider temperature range with less control equipment required to maintain the batteries. While this may not sound like much, it could mean a lot for electric vehicle and renewable energy technologies.

For electric vehicles, it will mean a lighter-weight, more durable Li-ion battery. Think of a battery that allows the vehicle to go further and lasts the entire functional life of the average car today.

Click to See Source: A123 Website

Although, it is not mentioned anywhere, this breakthrough could also have a significant impact on the cost, durability, and useful temperature range of remote (non-grid) renewable energy generation systems, such as solar photovoltaic systems that rely on a battery bank. With current battery technologies, system owners need to be especially careful when choosing the size of the battery bank attached to a remote energy system.

With typical lead-acid batteries (such as those normally used in non-electric vehicles and off-grid renewable systems), the characteristics of a battery vary greatly with the temperature. As a result, battery banks typically need to be over-sized to allow for extremely cold temperatures, when batteries have a diminished capacity to store energy. Additionally, typical lead-acid batteries have a limited 'cycle life', i.e. the amount of useful energy that the battery can store quickly decreases based on the number of times the battery is fully discharged and then fully recharged.

By comparison, current Li-ion batteries have a longer cycle life than lead-acid batteries, but they also require a lot of expensive, non-energy storing, control equipment in them to ensure stability (e.g. not catching on fire) and extend the life of the battery. However, according to A123, the new Nanophosphate EXT Li-ion battery, will require less of that equipment (think less expense) to operate safely AND be able to store more energy at lower temperatures AND have a longer cycle life.

So if A123 is able to bring this technology to market, it could be a game changer not only for electronic goods like laptops, but it could also impact energy storage in pretty much every area: regular vehicles, electric vehicles, remote renewable systems, and perhaps even large utility-scale renewable projects (see: the Background section of my Dissertation).

We shall have to wait and see!

Charged-ly,

Sean

Pennsylvania House Climate Change Hearing (June 7)

Hello Readers,

I just wanted to pass along some information I received from 4CP (the "Chester County Climate Protection" group in Pennsylvania) about a legislative hearing on climate change. Please see the details below.

Cheers,

Sean

-------

Dear Friends of 4CP:

We have been asked to forward this message to you.  We are sure that it will be enlightening to folks who would like to learn more about climate change.  The speakers are distinguished in their individual fields.  Many of us from the 4CP Board of Directors will attend.  We hope to see you there.

PA House Climate Change Hearing Set for June 7, 2012

The Pennsylvania House Democratic Policy Committee has scheduled a Climate Change hearing for June 7 in Philadelphia. The hearing will explore the basic science of Climate Change, its regional impacts and policy options for local, state and federal government.

The hearing is being organized by State Representative Greg Vitali in conjunction with House Democratic Policy Committee Chairman Michael Sturla and Host Legislator Mike O’Brien.

Confirmed speakers include:

·        Dr. Richard Alley, Professor of Geosciences at Penn State University;
·         Dr. Christopher Crockett, Philadelphia Water Department Deputy Commissioner;
·         Prof. Jonathan Barnett, University of Pennsylvania Planning Professor;
·         Dr. Danielle Kreeger, Partnership for the Delaware Estuary Science Director;
·         Lauren Wolfe, Campaign Manager for Operation Free;
·         John Hanger, former DEP Secretary;
·         Joseph Cullen, Esq., Center for Climate Strategies.

The hearing will be held from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. Thursday, June 7 at the Independence Seaport Museum www.phillyseaport.org, 211 S. Christopher Columbus Boulevard, Philadelphia, PA.

The public is encouraged to attend. However, public testimony is limited to written comments.

For more information please call Rep Vitali’s district office at 610-789-3900.