Which Energy Independence Plan is Better — T. Boone Pickens or Google? Part 2

November 04, 2008

If you think it’s odd that a Texas oilman is proposing a plan to build massive wind farms to wean the U.S. from its dependence upon fossil fuels, consider this: He’s got competition from an even more unlikely player — a company that isn’t even in the energy industry. I’m talking about none other than Google, the search engine, online advertising and video giant that is currently angling to take over the software world with its Google Chrome browser and suite of cloud-computing applications.
(Here’s my previous blog on that subject.)

As it turns out, Google does alternative energy, too. Or rather, it wants to, in a big way. In October, the company unveiled its ambitious, multi-trillion dollar plan for weaning the U.S. away from the burning of coal and oil for electrical power and cutting the use of petroleum to power cars and trucks by nearly 40 percent by 2030. Jeffery Greenblatt the Princeton-trained researcher whom Google recently hired as its climate and energy technology manager, explains:

Google's proposal will benefit the US by increasing energy security, protecting the environment, creating new jobs, and helping to create the conditions for long-term prosperity. Some of the necessary funds will be public, but much of it will come from the private sector — a typical approach for infrastructure and high technology investments.

Here’s how Google would have us do it. In contrast with Pickens’ plan, which relies entirely upon wind power and converting vehicles to natural gas, the Internet behemoth would attack the problem from multiple angles.

First, Google advocates a national campaign to improve end-use electrical energy efficiency, with a goal of keeping electrical energy demand at the 2008 level, rather than allowing it to increase 25 percent by 2030, as projections indicate it would. This is an approach similar to the plan advocated by presidential candidate Barack Obama, but on steroids. Google thinks we could save enormous amounts of electricity, for example, simply by redesigning PCs to run on lower voltage. (Here’s an article from Treehugger.com on that.)

Second, Google wants us to shut down our coal-fired electrical plants, which currently provide more than half the nation’s electrical energy needs, and to reduce our use of natural gas for electrical generation by half. Google would replace fossil fuels with renewable energy. More than 50 percent of it would come from wind farms, both on land and offshore. Another 35 percent would come from solar power — both photovoltaic panels and concentrating solar power (CSP), which uses mirrors and tracking systems to capture diffuse sunlight and create a concentrated beam of energy. The remainder would come from geothermal energy, some of it from enhanced geothermal systems (EGS) that would use hydraulics to extract energy continuously from hot rocks beneath the earth’s surface.

Third, Google wants to nearly double fuel-efficiency standards for cars, jacking them up to 45 miles per gallon by 2030. But that measure seems intended mostly to drive the conventional internal combustion engine into obsolescence. By 2030, Google wants gasoline-electric hybrid and plug-in electric vehicles to amount to 42 percent of the nation’s vehicle fleet and 90 percent of new car sales.

OK, so that all sounds great. But how is Google, a company that made its fortune manipulating information rather than by trading in the physical world, actually going to make any of this stuff happen? Well, don’t underestimate the impact of sheer brainpower. Google employs some of the most ingenious scientists and engineers on the planet, and already, they’re turning the company itself into a demonstration project for energy efficiency and self-sufficiency. (One example: Google recently patented a design for a wave-powered floating data center that would use sea water to cool its servers.) Google also has an important renewable resource — the ever-growing mountain of money that its myriad Internet businesses generate. The company already has invested $45 million this year alone in alternative energy projects, including a major geothermal effort in Australia’s Cooper Basin.

From KQED in San Francisco, here’s a TV segment that discusses Google’s plan.

So, what do you think of Google’s plan? Express your opinion below.

Photo: iStock

Comments

[President Obama!]

I think Google's plan makes a lot of sense--in fact, it closely resembles what President-elect Obama has proposed in his energy plan. I'm hopeful now that we can accomplish something like this, now that we finally have a real leader in the White House again.

[UCS]

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
CONTACT: Lisa Nurnberger, 202-331-6959, or Aaron Huertas, 202-331-5458

OBAMA ADMINISTRATION, NEW CONGRESS SHOULD MEAN AGGRESSIVE APPROACH TO GLOBAL WARMING, SCIENCE GROUP SAYS

WASHINGTON (November 5, 2008) - The Union of Concerned Scientists (UCS) is looking forward to quick and decisive action to combat climate change by the new Obama administration and Congress, after eight long years of obstruction by the outgoing administration.

"President-elect Obama has argued that our economic, energy and environmental problems share the same solution," said UCS President Kevin Knobloch. "We are looking to the new president and Congress to work together to build a clean energy economy that will create millions of new jobs here at home, expand capital investment, make our nation less dependent on oil, and prevent the worst consequences of global warming.

"The past eight years of denial and delay are over. Voters largely embraced candidates who support clean energy, green jobs, and a safer climate for our children and grandchildren."

Next year the new administration and Congress can do much to jumpstart a "Green Deal" that would help pull the country out of our economic downturn by investing in clean energy and modernizing the national electricity grid, Knobloch said.

"A critical step for Congress is to pass a strong federal climate bill with a declining cap on global warming emissions," Knobloch said. "Such a cap-and-trade system would generate needed revenues to finance new energy sources and help Americans manage and reduce their energy costs."

Federal lawmakers would be following the example set just last month by six of the 10 Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative states in the Northeast. They raised nearly $39 million in the first U.S. auction of permits to emit carbon dioxide under a regional cap-and-trade regime. If the price of the first auction holds, the auctions would yield more than $500 million each year for investment in energy efficiency initiatives and renewable energy development. That number is modest in comparison to the tens of billions of dollars that a national economywide cap-and-trade program could raise.

President-elect Obama's Web site states that his cap-and-trade policy would require all permits to be auctioned, and the proceeds to go to "investments in a clean energy future, habitat protections, and rebates and other transition relief for families." The new president has called for global warming emissions to be reduced by 80 percent by 2050, a target that is consistent with what leading climate scientists say will be needed to stabilize our climate.

President-elect Obama also has pledged to ensure that 10 percent of the nation's electricity comes from renewable energy sources by 2012 and 25 percent by 2025. Such a national renewable electricity standard would cut global warming emissions, create jobs, save ratepayers money, and encourage private investment in clean technology.

According to a UCS analysis, if Congress required 20 percent of the nation's electricity to come from renewable sources by 2020, for example, it would generate 185,000 new jobs; spur $66.7 billion in private capital investment; provide $25.6 billion to farmers, ranchers and rural landowners for leasing their land for biomass and wind energy production; and generate $2 billion in new local tax revenues by 2020. It would cut consumer electric and natural gas bills $10.5 billion in 2020, and by $31.8 billion in 2030. And it would cut 223 million metric tons of global warming emissions a year in 2020 - the equivalent of taking some 36 million cars off the road.

The Bush administration spent eight years trying to sabotage international progress on climate change. In stark contrast, "President-elect Obama has pledged that United States will lead and inspire other countries to take action," Knobloch said, "and he clearly recognizes that the essential step to restoring our international leadership on global warming is to take bold action here at home." Obama has indicated he will send representatives to the next UN climate meeting, which will take place in Poland next month.

###

The Union of Concerned Scientists is the leading U.S. science-based nonprofit organization working for a healthy environment and a safer world. Founded in 1969, UCS is headquartered in Cambridge, Massachusetts, and also has offices in Berkeley, Chicago and Washington, D.C. For more information, go to www.ucsusa.org.


======================
Aaron Huertas
Press Secretary
Union of Concerned Scientists
1825 K St. NW, Suite 800
Washington, DC 20006
Landline: 202-331-5458
Cell: 202-236-8495
www.ucsusa.org

[Ron Bengtson]

In the Video, one of the speakers kept saying that Google would produce one Gigawatt of electrical power. I believe he should have said one Terawatt (1,000 time more than one Gigawatt). The California electric grid needs more than 50 Gigawatt during peak demand each day.

The USA needs to commit to a national Public Works effort focused on energy independence:
http://www.AmericanEnergyIndependence.com/publicworks.aspx

[Great Googly-Moogly]

Good point. But I wonder if he was talking about a demonstration project, rather than the big enchilada. Generating a Gigawatt would certainly be enough to provide power to Mountain View, where Google is based.

[Mothra]

It sounds like an excellent plan, but I'm wondering whether Google could really pull it off. After all, as you've noted, they don't have much actual experience in the energy field. Also, how would they get everybody else to go along with the plan?

[Mothra]

p.s. .....PRESIDENT OBAMA!!!!!

[Astroboy]

I LIKED IT BETTER WHEN YOU WROTE ABOUT JETBACKS AND BLOWING UP ASTEROIDS AND STUFF LIKE THAT

[Sonny Hill]

I don't care whether Google or Boone Pickens runs the show, but we've got to do something quick about the energy crisis.

[Sharon]

I recently came across your blog and have been reading along. I thought I would leave my first comment. I don't know what to say except that I have enjoyed reading. Nice blog. I will keep visiting this blog very often.

Sharon

http://www.autoloans101.info

[Sharon]

I recently came across your blog and have been reading along. I thought I would leave my first comment. I don't know what to say except that I have enjoyed reading. Nice blog. I will keep visiting this blog very often.

Sharon

http://www.autoloans101.info

[RaneyOnline]

The Pickens Plan is flawed in that Natural Gas is also limited and produces pollution. If we all went to Natural Gas then the price would skyrocket. We need a more diverse plan that can be customized to location. Google's is a better plan.
More talks should be done on Butanol and Dimethyl ether. These are clean burning fuels that can replace gasoline and diesel in our vehicles.

[Patrick Kiger]

> Could you tell us more about these alternative fuels? I don't know anything about them.