Climate Change: Hydroelectricity's Impact and Potential

HONR 229L: Climate Change: Science, Economics, and Governance Hydro, Geo &Wind Your name here 17 October 2019

As always, I suggest consideration of working the admission ticket questions into the presentation. You could begin with the AT questions associated with hydroelectricity. Q1: Hydroelectricity is currently the world’s most used renewable energy source for the production of electricity. According to Olah et al.: a) what was the percentage share of hydroelectricity for world electricity production in 2005? b) what percentage of the overall potential of world hydroelectricity was being tapped in 2005? c) based on these numbers, if the world's governments decided to fully exploit the available potential to generate electricity via hydroelectric plants, approximately how much of the world electricity demand could be met?

As always, I suggest consideration of working the admission ticket questions into the presentation. You could begin with the AT questions associated with hydroelectricity. Q1: Hydroelectricity is currently the world’s most used renewable energy source for the production of electricity. According to Olah et al.: a) what was the percentage share of hydroelectricity for world electricity production in 2005? b) what percentage of the overall potential of world hydroelectricity was being tapped in 2005? c) based on these numbers, if the world's governments decided to fully exploit the available potential to generate electricity via hydroelectric plants, approximately how much of the world electricity demand could be met? After this is covered, you are welcome to provide an update about what has happened since 2005 (i.e., not much change in the % share due to hydro since 2005) using the next four slides

World Electricity Supply, 2017 In 2017, the world obtained 38.5% of its electricity from coal and 24.5% from renewables. Hydro was by far the largest source of world electricity from renewables Electricity constitutes ~25% of global GHG emissions (see next slide) https://webstore.iea.org/download/direct/2260?fileName=Renewables_Information_2018_Overview.pdf https://www.epa.gov/ghgemissions/global-greenhouse-gas-emissions-data

Global GHG Emissions by Sector, 2015 In 2017, the world obtained 38.5% of its electricity from coal and 24.5% from renewables. Hydro was by far the largest source of world electricity from renewables Electricity constitutes ~25% of global GHG emissions https://www.epa.gov/ghgemissions/global-greenhouse-gas-emissions-data

U.S. Electricity Supply: percentage share of energy provided https://www.c2es.org/content/regulating-power-sector-carbon-emissions/ If you show this slide, please highlight that in 2016, production of electricity in the US due to natural gas first exceeded production due to the combustion of coal

U.S. Electricity Supply: percentage share of energy provided https://www.eia.gov/energyexplained/hydropower If you show this slide, please highlight that in 1950, the U.S. once got 30% (wow!!!) of our electricity from hydro, but um times have a changed.

World Electricity Generating Capacity:Power Geothermal Solar Wind Biomass

If you’d like to work in data for the United States and Md, you are welcome to use the next two slides *or* you can, should you have time and desire, pull in other slides you can find on the web. Fine either way: i.e. using, not using, or using an alternate form 

U.S. Electricity Supply: 2016 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coal_power_in_the_United_States United States obtains ~64% of its electricity from fossil fuels, 20% from nuclear & ~16% from hydro, wind, biomass, and solar

MD Electricity Supply: 2017 Hydro: 5.6% Solar: 3.1% Bio: 1.6% Wind: 0.6% https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Maryland_Electricity_Generation_Sources_Pie_Chart.svg Maryland obtains ~46% of its electricity from fossil fuels, 43 % from nuclear & ~11% from hydro, wind, biomass, and solar

Should you so desire, you could poll the class and see if they know the top 3 states for generation of electricity from hydro? The answer for 2018, according to https://www.eia.gov/kids/energy-sources/hydropower is Washington, Oregon, and New York. I’d be surprised if anyone were to answer this correctly. If so, can ask students to name sates #4 & #5. This website http://www.eia.doe.gov/kids/energy.cfm?page=hydropower_home-basics-k.cfm has fantastic info (i.e. hydro is at https://www.eia.gov/kids/energy-sources/hydropower that you can explore for great graphics. Also, FYI, the Grand Coulee Dam in Washington is presently the largest source of hydro in our nation. Fine to explore this topic as much, or as little, as you’d like. https://www.eia.gov/energyexplained/images/charts/hydropower-use-map-large.gif

At some point, should cover this AT question: • What would be some of the criticisms, both socially and environmentally, to a decision by the world’s governments to fully exploit the available potential to generate electricity via hydroelectric plants? • Note: the reading covers this in detail; I suggest starting with material from the reading, perhaps • supplementing with your own brief research.

Typical coal plant: 550 MW Large coal plant: 800 MW Typical nuclear plant: 1000 MW Hydro • Largest Capacities: • Itaipú, Paraná River, South America: 14,000 MW • Built 1975 to 1991 • Volume of iron and steel: enough to build 380 Eiffel Towers • Volume of concrete :15 × that of Channel Tunnel between France and England You are also welcome too make use of this slide, which I grabbed from the other class I teach. If you use, please conduct your own mini-research on both of these projects and please ask the students to guess what percentage of China’s electricity needs are provided by Three Gorges Dam. Of course you’ll need a second slide with the answer. Will be interesting to see if anyone can come close to the correct answer. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Itaipu_Dam

Typical coal plant: 550 MW Large coal plant: 800 MW Typical nuclear plant: 1000 MW Hydro • Largest Capacities: • Itaipú, Paraná River, South America: 14,000 MW • Built 1975 to 1991 • Volume of iron and steel: enough to build 380 Eiffel Towers • Volume of concrete :15 × that of Channel Tunnel between France and England • Three Gorges Dam, Yangtze River, China: 22,500 MW •  Fully operational in 2012 •  Cost: $22.5 billion or 1 million $ / MW •  Largest construction project in China since Great Wall • 1 million people displaced •  Provides 3.0% of China’s electricity needs • Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Three_Gorges_Dam Now second https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Itaipu_Dam

Typical coal plant: 550 MW Large coal plant: 800 MW Typical nuclear plant: 1000 MW Hydro • Largest Capacities: • Itaipú, Paraná River, South America: 14,000 MW • Built 1975 to 1991 • Volume of iron and steel: enough to build 380 Eiffel Towers • Volume of concrete :15 × that of Channel Tunnel between France and England • Three Gorges Dam, Yangtze River, China: 22,500 MW •  Fully operational in 2012 •  Cost: $22.5 billion or 1 million $ / MW •  Largest construction project in China since Great Wall • 1 million people displaced •  Provides 3.0% of China’s electricity needs • Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Three_Gorges_Dam Here is some more info you can convey, in your own words: In 2012, the Three Gorges Dam in China took over the #1 spot of the largest hydroelectric dam (in electricity production), replacing the Itaipú hydroelectric power plant in Brazil and Paraguay. Three Gorges Dam has a generating capacity of 22,500 megawatts (MW) compared to 14,000 MW for the Itaipú Dam. But, over a year-long period, both dams generate about the same amount of electricity because seasonal variations in water availability on the Yangtze River in China limit power generation at Three Gorges Dam for a number of months during the year. Now second https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Itaipu_Dam Answer is ~1.7% Originally, they had thought 3%, but demand for electricity has sky rocketed

Geothermal I sometimes ask an AT question about what aspect of Earth’s geology was crucial for the economic viability of obtaining electricity from Geothermal. Of course I was referring to the temperature of accessible water. Might want to being by asking this question, and pulling info from either: http://www.our-energy.com/geothermal_energy.html or http://energy.gov/eere/geothermal/geothermal-maps of any other web resource you’d like, to inform students that there are some places better for situating a geothermal electricity plant than other places There are also nice global maps you might want to try to find.

Geothermal • Here is the AT for Geothermal, which might be worth reviewing, since I doubt most of the class realized this form of “renewable” energy also releases CO2 • a) What gas constitutes 90% of the effluent of a geothermal plant? • b) What is the ratio of the release of this gas from a geothermal plant compared to the amount generated by a typical fossil fuel power station? • c) What can be done about the release of this gas to the atmosphere from geothermal plants? • d) Are you surprised to learn about this nuance of geothermal plants?

Geothermal I think you have enough here (should you follow these suggetions) that you do not need to contrast low earth geothermal for heating & cooing with the generation of electricity via geothermal. Your call. If you decide not to present on low earth geothermal for heating & cooling, might want to still spend a brief amount of time researching this topic, in case the issue arises in discussion 

Wind Could lead with the wind related AT question, which reads: According to Olah et al., electricity from wind is the fastest-growing energy source in the world. a) What is the ratio of installed wind capacity at the end of 2007 compared to 1992, and where has most of this growth occurred? b) According to the reading, what are some of the challenges that must be overcome, if the world is to more fully realize the promising future for electricity generation via wind?

Wind: US Can pull map shown at: https://kompulsa.com/wp/wp-content/uploads/2011/08/United-States-Wind-Resource-Map-Obtained-from-NREL.jpg to highlight places were wind energy would be attractive in Maryland. • Might want to emphasize that: • Wind power varies as [Wind Velocity]3http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Betz%27_law • Installation benefits from accurate knowledge of wind fields • Some sites are simply much better than others for wind

Wind: MD Would be great to budget for maybe a 10 min discussion of wind energy for Md, including a summary of the Maryland Offshore Wind Energy Act Here are some useful links from which you can pull information. Feel free to use other links https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wind_power_in_Maryland (overview) https://offshorewindhub.org/states/maryland (politics) http://www.elp.com/articles/2016/10/pjm-to-connect-500-mw-in-maryland-offshore-wind-power.html (connection to the grid!) As well as the three URLs given under primary reading: https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/md-politics/marylands-slow-going-offshore-wind-project-advances/2019/07/23/9df6a208-ad7d-11e9-a0c9-6d2d7818f3da_story.html https://www.avenuenews.com/news/local/offshore-wind-energy-promises-new-manufacturing-opportunities-at-sparrows-point/article_ce2541f0-e241-547b-a7e8-1c3a6de7497d.html https://www.marylandmatters.org/blog/group-urges-lawmakers-to-pressure-harris-on-offshore-wind/ Here, might want to note who is opposing off shore wind for MD (author of first bill on second website listed above; his name appears in other articles) and how ironic from a jobs perspective, for the area he represents, that he is taking this position.

Wind: Scotland If you think there will be time, can pull together a slide or two outlining the great activities with regards to wind energy taking place in Scotland, using these two URLs under primary reading: https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-scotland-49125399 https://www.imeche.org/news/news-article/algae-and-wind-power-will-power-scottish-bioreactors-and-feed-salmon These URLs tell a great story and have lots of nice imagery.

This template should allow the 45 mins to be filled with interesting discussion. Fine to stick to the template and also fine to diverge in a major manner … your call how to use the time and in what direction to take the discussion! Good luck! Figures from Olah et al. reading to follow … am including them all, even though I doubt all (or even most) will be used.

Here are the figures from the reading: No need to use any of these but you’re welcome to use whichever you think would be helpful. Can also find lots of images on the web.

Here are the figures from the reading:

Climate Change: Hydroelectricity's Impact and Potential