Global News: Japan Adopts National Feed-in Tariff for Solar, Wind, Geothermal; China May Leave CDM in 2015
"Global News: Japan Adopts National Feed-in Tariff for Solar, Wind, Geothermal; China May Leave CDM in 2015"
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Wind turbines at a wind farm in Kamisu City, Japan.
Japan Spurs Solar, Wind Energy by Approving Subsidies for Renewable Power
Japan approved a bill today to subsidize electricity from renewable sources, joining European nations in shifting away from nuclear power after the Fukushima reactor meltdowns in March.
The renewable-energy bill was passed by the upper house following approval by the lower chamber on Aug. 23 and was one of the last acts of Prime Minister Naoto Kan, whose support sagged over his handling of Japan’s worst postwar disaster. He said today he’s resigning after parliament passed the legislation.
The bill allows for incentives that guarantee above-market rates for wind, solar and geothermal energy. The so-called feed- in tariff created a race to install solar panels when implemented in Germany and Spain.
In Japan, it may help Chinese companies such as Suntech Power Holdings Co. and Canadian Solar Inc. (CSIQ) to gain a foothold.
Japan gets about 9 percent of its electricity from low- carbon sources. Kan has called for that level to increase and for the country to phase out atomic energy after the March 11 earthquake and tsunami crippled Tokyo Electric Power Co.’s Fukushima nuclear complex. Before the crisis, atomic plants supplied about 30 percent of the country’s electricity….
The legislation will become effective on July 1, 2012, and require utilities to buy electricity generated by renewable sources including solar, wind and geothermal at above-market rates. The trade and industry minister will decide rates and periods after consulting with experts and other ministers.
“As an intensive measure to expand the use of renewable energy, the minister will give special consideration to the profit power suppliers receive,” according to the clean-energy law’s supplementary provisions.
Critics of the measures included Keidanren, Japan’s largest business lobby, which counts power utilities among its members. Lawmakers agreed to revise the legislation to grant a discount of at least 80 percent on the feed-in tariffs that are passed on in electricity bills to heavy power users.
Rates for renewable energy except solar will be as much as 20 yen (26 cents) a kilowatt-hour for about 15 years, Trade and Industry Minister Banri Kaieda said in parliament on July 14.
The rate for solar may be higher, in light of a plan introduced in 2009 to buy excess solar power. Currently the tariff for surplus solar power generated by homes is 42 yen a kilowatt-hour, while electricity produced by businesses and schools is 40 yen.
That compares with the grid electricity price of 13.77 yen a kilowatt-hour for commercial users, according to data from Japan’s Agency for Natural Resources and Energy.
China Might Stop UN CO2 Credit Supply in 2015, Barclays Says
China, the biggest supplier of carbon credits, might withdraw from the United Nations-overseen Clean Development Mechanism around 2015, boosting offset prices in the five years through 2020, said Barclays Plc. (BARC)
Post-2012 letters of approval from China’s National Development and Reform Commission, the nation’s regulator, are specifying volume limits that might suggest a halt in supply around 2015, Barclays Capital analysts including Trevor Sikorski in London said today in an e-mailed research note, citing discussions with project developers.
China might be expecting to keep its emission reductions for itself to meet its own greenhouse gas targets, rather than export them, the analysts said. The 1997 Kyoto Protocol places targets only on some developed nations through 2012. The U.S. has argued that fast-developing nations including China need targets too. China is the biggest seller of credits under the UN’s Clean Development Mechanism to factories and power stations in Europe, for instance, according to UN data.
South Africa: Nation Urged to Rally Behind Climate Awareness
With less than three months before the international climate summit in Durban, government has called on all sectors of society to help intensify the country’s communication on climate change and its impact on the developing world.
“Cabinet has called for unified messaging, where all communication must be aligned to the theme, ‘working together, saving tomorrow today’,” Cabinet spokesperson Jimmy Manyi said on Thursday.
South Africa is this year’s host of the Conference of the Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change and the country hopes to follow on the relative progress made at last year’s negotiations in Cancun, Mexico. It is expected that approximately 20 000 people will attend the COP 17 event.
In preparation for the conference, Water Affairs Minister Edna Molewa and her International Relations counterpart Maite Nkoana Mashabane are to attend a ministerial meeting on climate change in Brazil this weekend, where discussions are expected to be held on the response to climate change by Brazil, China, India and South Africa.
Manyi said the group, which is also referred to as the BASIC countries, has been increasingly playing an important role in the climate change negotiations since the 2009 talks in Copenhagen. Amongst the issues to be considered by the bloc will be an exchange of views on what can be done to ensure a fair global regime for emission reduction and finance for a global climate change response.
Suriname addresses climate threat with new agency
Low-lying and heavily forested Suriname, which counts itself among the five nations most vulnerable to the effects of climate change, has created the country’s first climate-compatible development agency, aimed at bringing together the country’s ministries to deal with climate challenges.
“We owe it to our children to prepare ourselves for the effects climate change will have on our country,” President Desi Bouterse said earlier this month at a ceremony marking the launch of the agency.
According to Suriname’s government, sea level rise is expected to bring worsening erosion, large-scale inundation, loss of farmland, a reduction in available freshwater, more drought and extreme rainfall and worsening health challenges to the coastal South American nation.
The new agency aims to coordinate the country’s policies on climate change mitigation and adaptation and forest conservation, and help Suriname win international funding to help it deal with climate impacts and adopt a lower carbon development strategy.
It will also lead the country’s Climate Change Fund, charged with managing funds secured for climate adaptation, and support a Climate Compatible Knowledge Institute, which will give scientific support to climate efforts.
New Toyota afforestation project for China
Toyota Motor (China) Investment Co., Ltd. (TMCI), Toyota’s Chinese subsidiary, held a signing ceremony on 26 August marking its agreement to carry out the Toyota Green Greater Beijing Economic Zone Fengning Afforestation Project.
The afforestation project is to be carried out over three years, starting in 2011, by TMCI in collaboration with the Hebei Province Forestry Bureau and the Fengning Manchu Autonomous County Forestry Bureau.
The aim of the project is to plant trees in a 150-hectare area over three years in the Nanshakouzi region in the northern part of Hebei Province (including Fengning County) and to thus reduce the area of desertification in the Nanshakouzi region (approximately 550 hectares of severe desertification) to the same level as Xiaobazi Township (approximately 460 hectares of severe desertification). The 10-year project in Xiaobazi Township began in 2001.
The Nanshakouzi area serves as a water source for Beijing and Tianjin, but is experiencing particularly severe desertification that has caused sandstorms affecting those two cities. The project also seeks to encourage the development of greening activities that establish economic independence for local residents via earnings from the afforested areas.
China to Sue ConocoPhillips Over Oil Spills
The Chinese maritime authority is preparing to sue ConocoPhillips, the American oil company, over two oil spills in June that engulfed large swaths of Bohai Bay in north China, according to a report by Xinhua, the state news agency.
The report, which appeared on Wednesday, said the State Oceanic Administration was aiming to set up a team of lawyers by the end of the month to sue for compensation. It cited an agency spokesman as saying that 49 Chinese law firms had applied to provide legal assistance.
The two spills, involving 3,200 barrels of oil and drilling fluids, occurred in the country’s largest offshore oilfield, called Penglai 19-3, and spread over at least 324 square miles in Bohai Bay. The Penglai field was co-developed by China National Offshore Oil Corporation, commonly known as Cnooc, and ConocoPhillips China operates it.
As with a vast spill last year from a PetroChina port facility in the city of Dalian, which lies on the edge of the Bohai Sea, environmental advocates and residents of the affected areas have expressed anger with the government over delays in getting news or accurate reports of the spills. But this time, even more fury is directed at ConocoPhillips. That complicates the response of the Chinese government, because it is in the process of luring American companies to China to drill for oil and gas in shale fields.
The Xinhua report said the oil spills had spread to beaches in the provinces of Hebei and Liaoning and were being blamed for a slowdown in local tourism and for economic damage to aquatic farming industries. The report also said “nine new oil spill sources” had been found in the bay as of Aug. 20. John Roper, a spokesman for ConocoPhillips, based in Houston, said Thursday in an e-mail message that the company had not received any notice of litigation.
FRONT
But of course nuclear derived electircity is low carbon, so Japan currently obtains almost 40% from low carbon sources, counting them all.
And while some Euorpean nations are moving away from nuclear, many continue to rely on nuclear derived power, with plans to increase the proportion in Britian and some central Euorpean countries, I think.
Accuracy in reporting, please.
Mind boggling –
http://www.kltv.com/story/15338876/when-will-it-end
Irene’s power outages so far:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/08/27/hurricane-irene-power-outages_n_939143.html?1314478899
“Full restoration could take one to three weeks.”
The S. African strategy will flop like strategies based on information theory always do. Giving people information (called ‘messaging’ today) does not change attitudes or behaviour and people do not communicate in a vacuum.
People respond to and communicate about concrete proposals and events.
The Australian experience again confirms this – once the govt. announced we were to have a price on carbon, all hell broke loose. Talk about communicate! It’s being slugged out through every available medium and around every centre including kitchen tables.
If you want communication, give people something to communicate about, ME
“The aim of the project is to plant trees in a 150-hectare area over three years in the Nanshakouzi region…”
Shouldn’t that read 150 million hectares or something similer? 150 hectares is about the size of a small farm.
Considering that this is the worst nuclear disaster in 30 years and there has yet to be a single casualty from radiation, nuclear’s safety record is still unparalleled in current base load generation methods – and even beats safety in most clean energy.
The problems in Japan would not have even occurred were it not for incompetence in several layers of safety and oversight. I fear the Japanese government and anti nuclear activists wish to hide that fact by vaguely blaming the technology.
Now, facing what we do thats unforgivable. We dont have time for anti science nonsense. We need facts and figures, not fear and innuendo.
Also partial commitment to renewables is a commitment to NG. Unless limits are placed on fossil carbon and with a drop in clean nuclear capacity after the EQ this will probably ultimately mean more emissions while placating groups perceived as being “environmental”.
Really in Japan, with respect to Fukushima things are moving forward.
Evacuees visit homes within 3 km of N-plant ( http://www.yomiuri.co.jp/dy/national/T110826005906.htm )
Also it takes over 3000 wind turbines to replace one nuclear plant. So seriously assuming what, realistically about 30 operational nuclear plants in Japan, we would be talking about over 90,000 larger windmills.
Come on – is that even doable in any sense?
John Tucker — I don’t know how variable wind is in northeastern Japan. If similar to here in the Pacific Northwest, wind actually does not replace thermal generation units such as NPPs, but rather lowers their capacity factor (which increases the average cost of electricity generated from the thermal units).
The only saving grace is that wind power is low-carbon while the backup natgas burners are not. I currently see no economic benefit of any sort in supplimenting NPPs via wind power.
lol NPP = Nuclear power plants!
See thats what I dont get – if you replace a clean energy source with one that requires FFs – how is that preferable?
You need two or three factors or you are advocating more fossil fuel use, perhaps less if its replacing coal – but certainly a long term commitment to FF at least.
Subsidies for energy are just the beginning – Alone they could even make things worse –
in my thinking so far:
To produce clean energy:
1. You need to install a capacity at or very close to the base load you are replacing (which is around or at least 3 times nameplate for solar and wind).
2. You need to have a procedure and a grid system that supports intense load balancing including access to other regions.
3. You need a mandate against FF use to motivationally keep it up and running efficiently.
And without all three you are wasting time and resources and probably making things worse.
Correct?
Nuke is dead…costs too much.
Following World Nuclear News will demonstrate that NPPs are doing fine world-wide. Indeed, new NPPs are cost effective solutions in some parts of the United States.
So what is the cost to build a GW of NPP, 6? 8? 10 billion? And how many years will it take to get that online? 8 to 10 years? Even as heavily subsidized as it is it is a bad financial risk.
Really, what would that be specifically and what is the cost of just replacing all capacity in japan – then also what about moving forward on clean energy.
John Tucker — Yes, NPP = nuclear power plant.
The obtained capacity factor for wind around here is close to 27%. So to obtain an average 1 GW through a year requires installing 1/0.27 = 3.7 GW [nameplate] of wind turbines.
But when the wind doesn’t blow [enough] somtime has to be available to provide the power instead. Here we have quite a bit of hydro for that backup, but most regions do not. So installing wind turbines leads to building combined cycle gas turbines (CCGTs) to provide the power when there is insufficient wind. That is now happening in this region as well.
All power grids support various forms of load balancing. However, most people overestimate the capability of power grids to wheel power very far; don’t count on it without doing the actual costing for just how very much you’ll have to pay.
If you completely avoid fossil fuels, including natgas, then you are left with hydro (where available) and NPPs to dispatch against the on-demand load; wind is not a dispatchable resource since the wind may not be blowing.
Malcreado — Capital cost is not the only issue, but of course it is much higher than for an equivalent (average) amount of wind turbines.
As examples, the South Koreans are building, right now, four of their AP-1400 units (I assume that means nameplate 1.4 GW each) in the United Arab Emirates for US$3800/kW. The Westinghouse AP-1000 units (nameplate around 1.1 GW) seems to have a guaranteed load for quite close to US$3900/kW; site preparation is underway with official construction start in December or January. [All large NPPs require about 50 months to construct.]
All of the above you could learn by simply following World Nuclear News; probably better than hanging on to misconceptions picked up somewhere.
Combining everything into the standard cost calculator, these NPPs are competative with natgas solutions. [In particular, note that the UAE is sitting on vary large natgas reserves.] This is not just my opinion; others studying the matter [and with much at stake] come to highly similar conclusions.
John Tucker @ August 27, 2011 at 11:19 pm — I don’t understnad what you are asking, so you’ll have to try again. I need to leave now so won’t be back until tomorrow.
However, I leave yu with the thought that Japan spends quite a large sum imported LNG to burn to make electricity. Wind power can benifically be used to reduce the amount of LNG consumed.
I agree. I was speaking where wind would replace nuclear. Deployed properly its a plus. As a replacement for FFs its a plus.
As a replacement for nuclear its not.
BTW:
RWE Says German CO2 Emissions to Rise, Westfalen-Blatt Reports
It will take 10 years until Germany has the same amount of power plants that don’t emit carbon dioxide as it had before the phase-out, Lambertz said, according to the German newspaper. ( http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-08-26/rwe-says-german-co2-emissions-to-rise-westfalen-blatt-reports.html )
“The problems in Japan would not have even occurred were it not for incompetence in several layers of safety and oversight.”
Yep, nuclear power would be a good source of energy if only people were perfect and never made errors (and if only there were no terrorists in the world).
But it is the worst source of energy in a world where people sometimes do make errors and where there are terrorists.
The history of nuclear power plants’ safety is not relevant, because accidents are rare but could have an immense impact. We have had a couple of significant accidents. Keep building nuclear, and it is just a matter of time before we have an immense accident with effects that last for thousands of years.
And what are the casualties so far from radiation? In this – a worst case scenario where infrastructure was heavily damaged inside and outside the plant, compounded with humna error.
For comparison – JUST from air pollution in the US from coal, assuming about 160 days since the incident.
5600 casualties.
So thats 5600 casualties. And from radiation we have none yet.
For long term effects in statistically noticeable ranges we have :
81 personnel have received 100–150 mSv, 14 have received 150–200 mSv, 2 have received 200–250 mSv, and 6 have received above 250 mSv ( http://www.jaif.or.jp/english/news_images/pdf/ENGNEWS01_1313815727P.pdf )
Here is a study on long term cancer rates in atomic bomb survivors ( http://www.rerf.or.jp/radefx/late_e/cancrisk.html ).
Overall I think survival rates (total recovery) for cancer are 60 to 70 percent.
So perhaps 10 worst case.
In 30 years 390000 casualties would occur in the US ALONE from coal with modern pollution controls.
Yes. Japan has ambitious plans to go for Renewables after the Fukushima reactor meltdowns in March.These National Feed – in Tariff will boost up use of Renewables as was the case in Germany ,Spain and others.
Dr.A.Jagadeesh Nellore(AP),India
Wind Energy Expert
E-mail: anumakonda.jagadeesh@gmail.com