Moving with the EV

This article provides some data to support the fact that EVs are better for the environment in Nova Scotia.

Energy Options for Automobiles

Yes! The electricity generated to power EVs is generally cleaner than gasoline and it’s getting cleaner over time as we integrate more renewable energy on the grid. Even if an electrical grid was powered entirely by coal, EVs would still only produce 88% of the emissions of gasoline powered vehicles. While it’s also true that producing the battery in an EV can sometimes result in higher emissions during the manufacturing process, that gap is closed within 18 months of driving. With our current electricity mix in Nova Scotia, at the end of its lifecycle, an EV cuts the emissions of gas-powered alternatives in half. (Ev Basics, n.d.)

The CAA Driving Cost Calculator for Sustainable Transportation compares the estimated total annual driving costs for the 2023 Hyundai Kona EV Ultimate 4D Utility EV ($7,803.96/year) and the 2023 Hyundai Kona Preferred 4D Utility AWD ($8,366.97/year). (Based on owning the vehicle for 5 years)

CAA Driving Cost Calculator. (2023, June 16). Canadian Automobile Association. Retrieved December 6, 2023, from https://carcosts.caa.ca/en/compare

The Schumpeter business column, at the Economist, asks how green is your electric vehicle, really? It reports that EVs are in the middle of an obesity epidemic that shows itself in even though some manufacturers claim sustainability as a founding principle, they are building bigger, burlier cars, even when they are electric.

For now, carmakers can argue that however big the electric rigs, they have a positive impact on the planet. Though manufacturing evs—including sourcing the metals and minerals that go into them—generates more greenhouse gases than a conventional car, they quickly compensate for that through the absence of tailpipe emissions. Lucien Mathieu of Transport and Environment, a European ngo, says that even the biggest evs have lower lifetime carbon emissions than the average conventional car. That is true even in places with plenty of coal-fired electricity, such as China.

Ultimately, the industry is almost sure to realise the folly of pursuing size for its own sake. The penny is starting to drop. Ford’s ceo, Jim Farley, recently said carmakers could not make money with the longest-range batteries. His opposite number at General Motors, Mary Barra, has taken the unexpected step of reversing a plan to retire the affordable Chevy Bolt ev. In Europe, carmakers like Volkswagen are building smaller, cheaper evs. Tesla is said to be planning a compact model made in Mexico.

The pressure is partly coming from competition. Felipe Munoz of Jato Dynamics, a car consultancy, says China prizes battery efficiency above bigness and is hoping to muscle in on overseas markets with lighter, cheaper brands, such as byd. Innovation in batteries based on solid-state or sodium-ion chemistry may also make evs more efficient. For the time being, drivers with money to splurge will no doubt relish flaunting their low-carbon credentials from the vantage point of a large suv or monster truck. And so they should—until they realise that they may be making electrification less accessible to the rest of humanity. (How Green Is Your Electric Vehicle, Really?, 2023)

The absence of tailpipe emissions in EV’s results in lower greenhouse gas lifetime output than the average conventional ICE car. As battery technology improves to solid state and sodium-ion designs, the efficiency will improve and the number of charging stations will grow.

References

CAA Driving Cost Calculator. (2023, June 16). Canadian Automobile Association. Retrieved December 6, 2023, from https://carcosts.caa.ca/en/compare 

Ev Basics. (n.d.). EV Assist. Retrieved December 6, 2023, from https://evassist.ca/ev-basics/ 

How green is your electric vehicle, really? (2023, June 16). the Economist. Retrieved December 6, 2023, from https://www.economist.com/business/2023/08/10/how-green-is-your-electric-vehicle-really? 

Jobs, Labour Unions, and Climate Action

 

Action to address replacing the jobs to be lost in fossil fuel production and transportation as a result of plans to build back better with a carbon reduced economy is urgently needed to maintain public support for the changes.

Job loss in fossil fuels

 

  A report on powering Alberta's future with renewable energy by the Pembina Institute, working to solve today’s greatest energy challenges — reducing the harmful impacts of fossil fuels while supporting the transition to an energy system that is clean, safe and sustains a high quality of life, finds that two thirds of Albertans support reaching net-zero emissions by 2050. Respondents to the phone survey were asked about their perceptions of energy and climate policy, the role of the oil and gas industry in the province, and their expectations for future climate action.

 "These results reveal that Albertans expect a much stronger focus on climate action than is being offered. It’s clear that Albertans take climate action seriously and recognize it’s important for Alberta’s future prosperity. They want their government to take the steps needed to decarbonize heavy industry, which would unlock major capital investment. This means creating stable, forward-looking climate policy that aligns with Canada’s federal government targets and the targets of more than 100 other countries, now representing more than 70 per cent of global emissions. These results also show that Albertans would prefer more collaboration and dialogue between government, industry and diverse stakeholders the public to advance economic diversification and technological innovation that can also accelerate necessary improvements in environmental performance." — Chris Severson-Baker, Alberta director, Pembina Institute1

Al Jazeera discusses the situation where  US unions and environmentalists disagree about oil and gas pipelines. Biden’s moves to wean US off fossil fuels may lead to discord between the two sides. While climate activists celebrated KXL’s demise, labour unions, reeling from the downturn in global oil prices, have mobilised to keep ongoing projects from being derailed.

 

Mike Knisley, the secretary and treasurer of the Ohio State Building and Construction Trades Council, which endorsed Biden, said he has been leaning on state officials to talk to the president about how his rapid-fire climate announcements are affecting his union membership’s support. “I tell them they need to get back with Biden and ask if this all really has to happen on Day Two of the new administration,” Knisley said. “I just get so frustrated that there’s almost no common ground [on pipelines] with the environmental community.” But Biden was endorsed by a number of key labour unions that work on pipelines, refineries and other energy installations, including the International Teamsters and North America’s Building Trades. Those unions celebrated the victory of a pro-labour president, but opposed the Keystone move and are lining up against threats to the other pipelines.2

A news release from the Government of Nova Scotia reports that the Green Fund is supporting energy efficiency, renewable energy and youth jobs.

 

The Brookings Institution, a nonprofit public policy organization based in Washington, DC, reports how clean energy jobs can power an equitable COVID-19 recovery. As previous Brookings Metro research on advancing inclusion through clean energy jobs has shown, policymakers need to recognize and invest in careers that offer equitable wages, promote transferable skills, and pose lower formal educational barriers to entry. Clean energy jobs offer all three benefits, making them crucial for the post-pandemic recovery.

What’s easy for policymakers to overlook is just how many clean energy occupations pay higher wages while posing lower formal educational barriers to entry compared to all jobs nationally. Nearly two-thirds of solar installers (62.3%) have a high school diploma or less, as do nearly three-quarters of construction workers (73.2%)—both significantly higher than the national share for all occupations (32.2%). These occupations also tend to pay higher wages, especially for workers just starting out their careers or at lower ends of the income spectrum; for example, despite having lower educational requirements, solar installers have a mean hourly wage of $22.50, close to the national mean of $25.72. The opportunity for well-paying clean energy jobs is clear, and it is time to seize it.3 

Sectors of the economy, like fossil fuel production and transportation, currently support many workers in well paid jobs. Gaining and maintaining the support of these workers requires action now to begin transition to better and more sustainable work in the new energy economy.

 

References

 

1	(2008, August 19). Powering Alberta's Future with Renewable Energy - Pembina .... Retrieved January 15, 2021, from https://www.pembina.org/reports/greeningthegrid-report.pdf
2	(2021, February 1). US unions, environmentalists disagree about oil and gas pipelines .... Retrieved February 2, 2021, from https://www.aljazeera.com/economy/2021/2/1/us-unions-environmentalists-disagree-over-oil-and-gas-pipelines
3	(2020, September 10). How clean energy jobs can power an equitable COVID-19 recovery. Retrieved February 2, 2021, from https://www.brookings.edu/blog/the-avenue/2020/09/10/how-clean-energy-jobs-can-power-an-equitable-covid-19-recovery/

Australian fires, climate and political action

Nerilie Abraman, an investigator at the ARC Center of Excellence for Climate Extremes and an associate professor at the Research School of Earth Sciences at the Australian National University, concludes that the catastrophic fires raging across the southern half of the continent are largely the result of rising temperatures.

Source: https://static.scientificamerican.com/blogs/cache/file/6E29B90E-E7D9-46AF-9DC660AAA45BF510_source.jpg?w=590&h=800&EFE3D1D5-0F10-44A8-A2A29309DDAF3513

 The angry summer playing out in Australia right now was predictable. The scientific evidence is well known for how anthropogenic greenhouse gas emissions are causing long-term climate change and altering climate variability in ways that increase our fire risk. The role of climate change in the unprecedented fires gripping Australia is also well understood by our emergency services. Sadly, though, this summer has occurred against a backdrop in which the Australian government has argued, on the world stage, to scale back our greenhouse-gas-emissions-reduction targets. Our leaders are literally fiddling while the country burns.1

One of the factors driving this long-term loss of winter rainfall is the positive trend in the Southern Annular Mode (SAM). This change is causing the westerly winds that circle the Southern Ocean to shift southward toward Antarctica, causing rain-bearing winter cold fronts to pass south of the Australian continent. The role of anthropogenic climate change in driving this trend in the SAM is also clear in the science.The Bureau of Meteorology has produced a video to help understand one of Australia's key climate drivers, the Southern Annular Mode (SAM).

Ben Piven at Al Jazeera News wonders will youth climate activists see their pleas answered in 2020?

If a climate-driven "act of God" sets off a true financial crisis - with insurance firms unable to stay afloat after unprecedented wildfires and cyclones - political leaders could respond in kind.2

Mark Jaccard, energy economist and adviser to world leaders, known in global climate circles as a leading architect of British Columbia's successful climate struggle, wants to tell the world there is hope.

Storm surge

He admits that in fossil fuel-producing areas of the world like Australia and Alberta, there are many who will remain impossible to sway.

 "It is difficult to get a man to understand something when his salary depends on his not understanding it."3

The first step of Mark Jaccard's strategy is to put the immediate effort on two areas that mostly affect a country's domestic markets. Those two areas, energy production and transport — essentially power plants and cars and trucks — are responsible for the majority of most countries' greenhouse gas emissions.

Transition away from fossil fuel

At the same time, that transition will lay foundations that will make later industrial decarbonization easier.

 Because in the long run, getting carbon out of world's atmosphere cannot be completed by a few individuals doing good, it must instead be a project of people using politics to transform regional and national rules about carbon. Jaccard says those regions and countries will then combine to put carbon tariffs on the world's free riders, not a project for 2020.3

Jaccard recommends… donating… to a pro-climate group that can identify and support climate-sincere politicians and point a finger at the majority of those who are "faking it."

References

1	(2019, December 31). Australia's Angry Summer: This Is What Climate Change .... Retrieved January 2, 2020, from https://blogs.scientificamerican.com/observations/australias-angry-summer-this-is-what-climate-change-looks-like/
2	(2020, January 1). Will youth climate activists see their pleas answered in 2020 .... Retrieved January 1, 2020, from https://www.aljazeera.com/ajimpact/youth-climate-activists-pleas-answered-2020-191227161642426.html
3	(2019, December 30). What you can do in 2020 to keep the world from ... - CBC.ca. Retrieved December 30, 2019, from https://www.cbc.ca/news/business/climate-change-failure-1.5400663

Two ways of hope in climate change

Don Pittis of CBC News reports that Mark Jaccard, energy economist and adviser to world leaders, known in global climate circles as a leading architect of British Columbia's successful climate struggle, wants to tell the world there is hope.

Two effective political actions

He admits that in fossil fuel-producing areas of the world like Australia and Alberta, there are many who will remain impossible to sway.

"It is difficult to get a man to understand something when his salary depends on his not understanding it."1

While business can perform a valuable role, with fossil fuels so cheap and easy to use, the economic pressure to act must come from government regulation. Without government rules, the free market would simply continue to use the atmosphere as a free garbage dump for carbon.

That's why the first step of Jaccard's strategy is to put the immediate effort on two areas that mostly affect a country's domestic markets.

Those two areas, energy production and transport — essentially power plants and cars and trucks — are responsible for the majority of most countries' greenhouse gas emissions. At the same time, that transition will lay foundations that will make later industrial decarbonization easier.

Jaccard recommends… donating… to a pro-climate group that can identify and support climate-sincere politicians and point a finger at the majority of those who are "faking it."

Because in the long run, getting carbon out of world's atmosphere cannot be completed by a few individuals doing good, it must instead be a project of people using politics to transform regional and national rules about carbon. Jaccard says those regions and countries will then combine to put carbon tariffs on the world's free riders, not a project for 2020.1

 1 (2019, December 30). What you can do in 2020 to keep the world from ... - CBC.ca. Retrieved December 30, 2019, from https://www.cbc.ca/news/business/climate-change-failure-1.5400663

Gaps in our path to mitigate climate change

The efforts to reduce GHG emissions are undertaken to decrease the rate at which the temperature of the planet is increasing.

Temperature rising

Nicole Mortillaro of the CBC reports that the Earth is set to warm 3.2 C by 2100 unless efforts to cut emissions are tripled according to a new UN report. The United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) released its annual Emissions Gap Report on Tuesday — 168 pages, compiled by 57 leading scientists from 33 institutions across 25 countries — calling on governments to act immediately, within the next decade, to limit global warming to 1.5 C or 2 C by 2100.

Some key highlights from the report include:
Greenhouse gas emissions (GHG) have increased 1.5 per cent annually over the past decade. By 2030, annual emissions need to be 15 gigatonnes of CO2 lower to reach the 2 C goal, and 32 gigatonnes lower for 1.5 C. GHG emissions have to drop by 2.7 per cent per year from 2020 to 2030 for the 2 C goal, and by 7.6 per cent per year for the 1.5 C target.To reach these goals, efforts must increase at least fivefold for the 1.5 C goal and threefold for the 2 C.Of the G20 nations, of which Canada is one, only five countries have committed to Nationally Determined Contributions (NDC) set out in the Paris Agreement, which outline each country's efforts to reduce national emissions to limit global warming to 2 C below pre-industrial levels.
Canada has not committed to a target that is in line with this scenario.1 

Another report by Climate Analytics, released for the UN Secretary General’s Climate Action Summit, shows how fast coal needs to be phased out in order to meet the objectives of the Paris Agreement, in light of the latest science from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC).

No fossil fuels 

It also assesses whether the efforts to reduce coal use in electricity generation since the adoption of the Paris Agreement put us any closer to a pathway consistent with its 1.5°C limit.

 Key messages

Although the new coal pipeline shrunk by 75% since the adoption of the Paris Agreement, cancelling new coal is nowhere near enough to meet its 1.5°C limit Phasing out coal from the electricity sector is the single most important step to get in line with 1.5°C Governments are not on track to phase coal out of the electricity sector in line with the 1.5°C in the Paris Agreement To get on a 1.5°C pathway, they will need to introduce effective regulation to shut down coal plants before the end of their technical lifetime and to significantly limit their use in the meantime, and refrain from building new coal capacity It is critical that governments significantly scale up their NDCs by 2020. The new pledges must include clear commitments to phase out coal, remove subsidies for fossil fuels, and build support for renewables and energy efficiency2

Ralph Torrie of Torrie Smith Associates has prepared a new report that provides a 'pathway' to get Nova Scotia off coal by 2030.

Nova Scotia off coal path

Jack Julian of CBC News quotes the Ecology Action Centre 'We've known that this is technically possible for a long time.'

 This would include:
"Deep-energy retrofits" for 80 per cent of homes and commercial buildings, which would help reduce power consumption by seven per cent of current levels. Forty per cent of personal vehicles being either fully electric or plug-in hybrid cars. Doubling the province's wind power capacity.Increases in solar power. Building a second transmission link to New Brunswick, which would allow greater reliance on hydro power from Quebec. Torries said the cost of making these changes and the corresponding savings would almost net out.3

Continuous improvement is an engineering and economically sound strategy to combat the climate emergency.

Transportation is the largest source of carbon pollution in the U.S., but it doesn't have to be that way.

 Carmakers have proven time and time again that they are fully capable of making their vehicles cleaner and more fuel efficient. The government just has to ask them. Energy expert Hal Harvey explains. Youtube A Plan For Zero Carbon Transportation4

The path to mitigate the effects of the climate emergency can be followed using best practices of engineering and economics.

References

1	(2019, November 26). Earth set to warm 3.2 C by 2100 unless efforts are tripled, new .... Retrieved November 26, 2019, from https://www.cbc.ca/news/technology/un-emissions-report-1.5373154
2	(n.d.). Coal phase-out: Insights from the IPCC Special Report on 1.5 .... Retrieved November 26, 2019, from https://climateanalytics.org/publications/2019/coal-phase-out-insights-from-the-ipcc-special-report-on-15c-and-global-trends-since-2015/
3	(2019, November 26). HOLD-New report provides 'pathway' to get Nova Scotia off .... Retrieved November 26, 2019, from https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/nova-scotia/ecology-action-centre-report-nova-scotia-coal-free-by-2030-1.5373002
4	(2019, September 19). A Plan For Zero Carbon Transportation - YouTube. Retrieved November 26, 2019, from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pQzSyMnEw-o

Warming Atlantic Ocean, the IPCC, and the Fishery

Following the IPCC recommendations on electrical generation and transportation will mean thousands of energy and transportation workers will transition to jobs building new systems and eventually operating them but what will happen to fishermen if we do not heed the latest warnings from the IPCC about the changes in the oceans and the polar regions?

Climate changes fishery

The CBC reports that Canadian fishermen are feeling the effects of climate change as the IPCC world panel sounds an alarm bell. Compiled by more than 100 authors who examined 7,000 scientific publications, the IPCC Special Report on the Ocean and Cryosphere in a Changing Climate emphasized that the ocean is warmer, more acidic and less productive.

Warmer and more acidic

When Stuart Beaton started fishing for lobster in 1971, the ocean waters off the northern coast of Nova Scotia and the marine creatures that lived beneath the waves behaved differently than today.
There is now less ice coverage in the spring, new species have arrived and lobsters are flocking to more northern waters amid rising ocean temperatures. His family, with three generations of lobster fishermen, have watched the changes in real time over half a century.
"In our business, we're very exposed to what happens. If two degrees kills the oceans..." said his son, Gordon Beaton, during an interview on a wharf in Ballantynes Cove, N.S., before his father added: "We're going to be the first to know."
Their comments come as a UN-backed panel of experts released a new study Wednesday about the ocean and the cryosphere — the frozen parts of the planet.1 

The Guardian offers a report on the climate crisis explained in 10 charts.The level of CO2 has been rising since the industrial revolution and is now at its highest for about 4 million years. The rate of the rise is even more striking – the fastest for 66m years – with scientists saying we are in “uncharted territory”.

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2019/sep/20/the-climate-crisis-explained-in-10-charts

Greenland has lost almost 4 trillion tonnes of ice since 2002. Mountain ranges from the Himalayas to the Andes to the Alps are also losing ice rapidly as glaciers shrink. A third of the Himalayan and Hindu Kush ice is already doomed.

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2019/sep/20/the-climate-crisis-explained-in-10-charts

Sea levels are inexorably rising as ice on land melts and hotter oceans expand. Sea levels are slow to respond to global heating, so even if the temperature rise is restricted to 2C, one in five people in the world will eventually see their cities submerged, from New York to London to Shanghai.

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2019/sep/20/the-climate-crisis-explained-in-10-charts

As heating melts the sea ice, the darker water revealed absorbs more of the sun’s heat, causing more heating – one example of the vicious circles in the climate system. Scientists think the changes in the Arctic may be responsible for worsened heatwaves and floods in Eurasia and North America.

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2019/sep/20/the-climate-crisis-explained-in-10-charts

An analysis of a national climate poll by Seth Klein concludes that when it comes to climate action, the public is ahead of our politics.

My main takeaway from this national opinion survey of 2,000 people is that the public is ahead of our politics. A large share of Canadians is already deeply worried about the climate crisis, and they are increasingly ready for bold and ambitious actions. In the wake of the latest report from the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), released last October, combined with recent weather events, we may well be witnessing a shift in public opinion.
People are deeply anxious about what climate change means for the fate of our children and grandchildren. When asked if climate change represents a “major threat to the future of our children and grandchildren,” 81% responded that it does (49% strongly agree and a further 32% agree). Even 67% of Albertans agree with this statement.3 

Coastal changes in Nova Scotia

“All politics is local” is an important cliche

Political action required

when Atlantic Canadians consider how the fishery may be severely impacted by the increasing concentration of C02 in the atmosphere causing the oceans to warm and turn acidic.

References

1	(2019, September 25). Fishermen feel effects of climate change as world panel .... Retrieved October 3, 2019, from https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/nova-scotia/un-climate-change-report-nova-scotia-lobster-fishery-1.5296635
2	(2019, September 19). The climate crisis explained in 10 charts | Environment | The .... Retrieved October 3, 2019, from https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2019/sep/20/the-climate-crisis-explained-in-10-charts
3	(2019, August 12). Is climate change “an emergency” and do Canadians ... - Abacus Data. Retrieved August 13, 2019, from https://abacusdata.ca/is-climate-change-an-emergency-and-do-canadians-support-a-made-in-canada-green-new-deal/