KS

We are excited to share our latest article on offshore wind's potential to enhance energy security in nations with limited land and fuel resources, such as Japan. If you are interested in energy transition in such countries, please check it out.

iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1...

What is the value of biomass 🥬 in future energy systems 🔌💡💨😎?

TL;DR: it's more important to provide renewable carbon than energy, thus saving on expensive direct air capture

Featuring PyPSA-Eur with biomass extensions and some fun near-optimal analysis!

How Germany outfitted half a million balconies with solar panels The country’s residents installed 200MW of balcony solar during the first half of 2024. It’s becoming an increasingly popular way to take climate action…

Hey y'all: is anyone out there thinking about what enabling policy/regulation it would take to permit balcony solar in the USA? Shouldnt we? (Context www.canarymedia.com/articles/sol...). 🔌💡

The Geographical Journal | RGS Research Journal | Wiley Online Library This paper explores the political economy of the ‘just transition’ to a low carbon economy. The idea of a ‘just transition’ increasingly features in policy and political discourse and appeals to the ....

Our 2013 paper - the Political Economy of the Just Transition - was cited more in 2024 than any prior year.
Here are 213 new papers on #JustTransitions: scholar.google.com/scholar?oi=b...

Link to paper: rgs-ibg.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1...

ただ、例えばバークレーの工学部に来るような学生は、人種を問わず（もちろんアジア系は多いですが）東大の工学部生の数学力と変わらない気がするんですよね（経験談）。アメリカでも、できる子は親が私立に入れたりチューターをつけたりするのかなと想像します。

Synthesis of evidence yields high social cost of carbon due to structural model variation and uncertainties | PNAS Estimating the cost to society from a ton of CO2—termed the social cost of carbon (SCC)—requires connecting a model of the climate system with a re...

Excited to announce a new @pnas.org publication on the Social Cost of Carbon. We integrate evidence from the literature and expert survey to provide an SCC distribution inclusive of both parametric and structural uncertainties. Our mean 2020 value is $283 per ton CO2
www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/...

Wind will account for 4-8% of the generation mix in 2040, according to the same presentation slides. Japan's offshore wind target is 30-45 GW by 2040. These numbers simply do not add up. With the 45 GW offshore wind capacity, wind should account for at least 20% of the generation mix.

2024 Workshop on Low-Carbon Transitions in Chinese State-Owned Enterprises: Key Take-Aways These takeaways represent significant points made during the discussion at the ”Workshop on Low-Carbon Transitions in Chinese SOEs” held at UC San Diego on April 12-13, 2024. They are not consensus ob...

We published our take-aways from the 2024 Workshop on Low-Carbon Transitions in Chinese State-Owned Enterprises, held earlier this year. Here are some of our key observations:
pwrlab.org/2024/12/15/w...

The largest solar power installation in Los Angeles is the US Postal Service’s Processing and Distribution Center. ☀️🔌💡

Today, the Japanese government presented the draft new 2040 generation mix.
40-50% Renewables
20% Nuclear
30-40% Fossil fuel and hydrogen/ammonia
The Japanese government has doubled down on CCS as well as imported hydrogen and ammonia.
www.enecho.meti.go.jp/committee/co...

Signatories COP29 Global Energy Storage & Grids Pledge - Global Renewables Alliance The COP29 Global Energy Storage and Grids Pledge has already gained the support of 58 countries, including major players from all continents like Brazil,

Yesterday, the COP29 Global Energy Storage and Grids Pledge was finalized and endorsed by 58 countries and 48 non-state actors.

The goal is 1.5TW of storage & 25M km (15.5M miles) of grid infrastructure development by 2030. Check it out #energysky: globalrenewablesalliance.org/signatories-...

Batteries providing cheaper accepted offers vs. CCGTs in Oct and Nov in '24

For 95% of October through November, Batteries provided lower-cost offers in the Balancing Mechanism compared to gas-fired generation, reducing carbon emissions and lowering consumer costs.

Three graphs showing the issuance of carbon credits with 84% not achieving emissions reductions, and sectors receiving credits.

Of one-fifth of the carbon credit volume issued to date, almost 1 billion tons of CO2e, less than 16% of the carbon credits issued to the investigated projects were estimated to constitute real emission reductions. 🤡
www.nature.com/articles/s41...

To anyone interested, here is my book, Solar Power: Innovation, Sustainability, and Environmental Justice, University of California Press. ☀️🔌💡 drive.google.com/file/d/1MpQ3...

Defining voltage landscapes for sustainability.

table of techno-ecological synergies, air pollution reduction, land sparing, etc.

New report on the benefits of agrivoltaics, rangevoltaics, and ecovoltaics in California by the Wild Energy Center.
🚜🌾🍇🥬🐂🐑🦊☀️🔌💡
static1.squarespace.com/static/646b9...

How We Got the Lithium-Ion Battery It took decades of research, performed around the world, before a practical lithium-ion battery was possible.

"It’s more appropriate to think of the lithium-ion battery not as a single invention, but as a steady accumulation of many inventions that were needed to both make a battery practical and to unlock its full potential."

This is true of all innovation.
www.construction-physics.com/p/how-we-got...

This platform has grown explosively since the election, but growth has slowed down the past few days. Should we be concerned?

No. A temporary plateau was inevitable given the heterogeneity of social media users. From my point of view Bluesky is already over the hump 1/

Solar capacity additions are continuing to scale up much faster than most people expected ☀️

Our analysis suggest that close to 600GW could be installed globally in 2024.

To put that in perspective, that's 3x the total existing solar capacity in the US in 2023 – all installed in one year.

🔌💡

Mapped: How climate change affects extreme weather around the world - Carbon Brief Attribution studies calculate whether, and by how much, climate change affected the intensity, frequency or impact of extremes – Carbon Brief has mapped every published study on how climate change has...

Here’s the full interactive portal: interactive.carbonbrief.org/attribution-...

"Why are electricity prices so high if renewables break generation records and are so cheap?" I have been asked.

The main reason: Gas still sets the price 63% of the time in wholesale electricity markets in EU27 & >90% in some countries.

The graphic is from the Draghi Report.

Tesla thinks it can out-compete others without the $7500 tax credit. This will be hugely damaging to other automakers producing EVs, most of them in GOP districts (in GA, TN, IN, NC, SC etc). Will House reps let Trump cut off their constituents' nose to spite Biden's face & further enrich Elon? 🔌💡

The Japanese Government and automakers believe that low carbon ICEs using hybrid technologies and biofuels/ e-fuels remain a dominant technology, not a niche. I guess they are optimistic about cheap CDR technologies.

ガソリンにバイオ燃料１０％、３０年度までに導入を…経産省が目標を正式発表 【読売新聞】　経済産業省は１１日、乗用車の脱炭素化に向け、ガソリンに混ぜるバイオ燃料の導入目標を正式に発表した。石油元売りに対し、２０３０年度までにバイオ燃料を最大１０％混ぜた燃料の供給を求める。バイオ燃料の安定的な調達やコスト低下

METI announced its first biofuel target for passenger vehicles, sourcing from Brazil, the U.S., and SE Asia. Its "multi-pathway" decarbonization approach raises efficiency concerns for climate and industrial policies. Japan's ICE phaseout remains far off.
www.yomiuri.co.jp/economy/2024...

Hey #EnergySky the California Energy Storage Alliance seeks a new policy director. This is such an important job, not just for advancing battery storage but also for driving the market for LDES. Spread the word! storagealliance.org/careers