20 years to carbon free energy
I selected a 20 year example based on estimates of a tipping point between 10 and 20 years. Even though this would be a hurry up crash program, it appears doable. The ’wise men’ would certainly come up with something else. It likely would be more than 20 years, probably not a straight line reduction, and maybe end with some residual CO2 that mother nature could deal with.
Year 1.
Developing plans, most companies should have already done this.
Years 2 through 5
These years will be mainly developing and initiating plans - conservation holds energy use in check. U.S. oil production holds steadr with new discoveries and enhanced recovery. Oil imports began to drop. Biomass use peaks.
Years 6 through 15
These are the years of big change Companies wil have completely retooled to
produce efficient energy products - wind and solar energy increase dramatically and other non carbon energies also increase. Conservation has peaked and become part of normal behavior. Oil imports continue to drop until reaching near zero. Biomass use peaks. Total energy use begins to increase by year.
Cleaning up the difficult carbon emissions mainly from home heating and transportation. Electrical energy including battery, hydrogen use, maybe fuel cells, as well as and dilute carbon removal, all contribute to reach zero carbon emissions.
The table below give some idea of the average assessment returned to each tax return. Joint returnes and dependents would be taken into consideration. This is not a tax, but rather a reward to ourselves for being energy conscious.
| Energy | 5% | %Energy | Assess | Assess | |
| Value | Increase | Carbon | -ment | -ment | |
| Year | Billions | /year | Based | Billions | /filer |
| 1 | $600 | 5% | 70% | 21 | 190 |
| 2 | $600 | 10% | 67% | 40 | 363 |
| 3 | $600 | !5% | 63% | 57 | 518 |
| 4 | $600 | 20% | 60% | 71 | 645 |
| 5 | $600 | 25% | 56% | 84 | 763 |
| 6 | $600 | 30% | 53% | 95 | 863 |
| 7 | $600 | 35% | 49% | 103 | 936 |
| 8 | $600 | 40% | 46% | 109 | 990 |
| 9 | $600 | 45% | 42% | 113 | 1027 |
| 10 | $600 | 50% | 39% | 116 | 1054 |
| 11 | $600 | 55% | 35% | 116 | 1954 |
| 12 | $600 | 60% | 32% | 113 | 1027 |
| 13 | $600 | 65% | 28% | 109 | 990 |
| 14 | $600 | 70% | 25% | 103 | 936 |
| 15 | $600 | 75% | 21% | 95 | 863 |
| 16 | $600 | 80% | 18% | 84 | 763 |
| 17 | $600 | 85% | 15% | 71 | 645 |
| 18 | $600 | 90% | 11% | 57 | 518 |
| 19 | $600 | 95% | 8% | 40 | 363 |
| 20 | $600 | 100% | 4% | 21 | 190 |
Carbon trading Carbon trading is mandatory in Europe, however will be insufficient to make enough of an impact on greenhouse gases. There will be failures in expensive accounting and dubious science in calculating carbon sequestered. An assessment at the point of fossil carbon mining would be much less inexpensive to collect and police. While carbon trading is not mandatory in the U.S., you can buy carbon credits to offset greenhouse emission you release. Supposedly, you become carbon neutral. While this may make some people feel good, it also involves expensive accounting, dubious science and because few people will voluntarily subscribe, it isn’t going to make much difference.
More on bio-energy and food
Energy is the most important need in our society. Some would argue food is more basic. While that may be correct, abundant energy could go a long way to increase food production. Food calories should not be used to replace fuel calories. It requires expensive subsidies, competes with other human and animal land needs, results in more expensive food, pollutes and is not sustainable. 2000 Calories, approximately one persons daily intake, converts to about 8,000 BTUs. One gallon of gasoline contains about 112,000 BTUs. If your car gets 20 mpg, you could dive your car 20 miles or provide calories for 14 people for one day, actually closer to 25 people, since it takes almost 224,000 calories to produce the 112,000 corn ethanol calories. This is why ethanol requires a big subsidy. . In addition, good corn producing land has increased greatly in value over the past few years to roughly $5000 per acre. This subsidized distortion of land value makes it impossible for young farmers to get a start in farming Nor should you expect ethanol production to have any effect on oil prices, since world wide, bio ethanol and diesel amounts to a small fraction of 1% fossil oil production. . Increased corn yields have been very spectacular. Prior to hybrid corn, yields of open pollinated corn in the 1930‘s was about 35 bushels per acre. Today’s hybrids yield close to a 150 bushel per acre farm average. Seed companies and breeders like to take the credit, but the fact is today’s corn acres are on the more fertile land with much of this land irrigated or tiled. In addition, there is much better equipment resulting in more timely and better plant spacing to name a few examples of better equipment. There is also much better fertility management, weed and insect control. The photosynthetic process is the same in open pollinated varieties as in modern hybrids. Some of the traits modern hybrids have that increase yield are smaller tassel, upright leaves, reduced bareness so that plant populations can be increased, and ability to withstand drought stress. Much of todays corn yield increase is due to better environment, some of it due to genetics and some of it due to environment-genetic interactions. Some people like to extend the relatively straight-line yield increase from the 1940s to the present and suggest we will see 300 - 400 bushel per acre yields in the future. The problem is once you eliminated all the weeds or insects, have tiled or irrigated all the land that was possible, you have reached an upper plateau. The same is true for the genetics or the interaction. Once you have reduced the tassel size or increase population to about as high as you can go, you again reach a plateau. Some recent studies suggest that contest winner yields have ceased to go up over the past 25 years. Contest winner would be under ideal conditions, excellent fertility, no weed or insect problems and no moisture stress. Average farm yields have continued to go up at about the same rate except in Iowa, where the rate has fallen according to one study. This is not so surprising, however, as I seldom see weedy fields and in the area I’m at with heavy soils have always and still see considerable tiling. We have a little room for better management and should see some breeding for better yields under stress. However, I believe we are close to reaching a plateau in all areas of corn improvement and believe we may never see a 200-bushel average farm yield. It may take considerable breeding effort just to hold on to yield gains. Soil erosion reduces fertility, weeds and insects develop to get around chemical control and presumably GM hybrids. In many species we have made a big jump in yield by shorter straw allowing for increased nitrogen fertilizer. More upright leaves to better utilize light has been useful in some species or breeding for a higher yield index which means more grain and less fodder or straw. It is interesting to look at species where nitrogen fertilizer dies not help, no tassel reduction or upright leaves possible, increase in plant population not possible or when the entire crop growth is harvested. With these forage species little to no yield gains have been made.
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