Tag Archives: natural gas

GreenBiz

The challenges of building electrification — or, the parable of flameless wok hei | GreenBiz

By Adam Aston

Consider the humble wok. Little more than a wide metal bowl, a good wok can transmute high heat and simple ingredients into sublime flavors. Peek in the back of your favorite Chinese hole-in-the-wall and you may spy a chef calmly working the mix as flames engulf the wok and powerful jet burners roar below. A chef can spend years perfecting this fusion of fire and heat, oil and spice — or wok hei, the “breath of the wok.” 

Elemental as they may be to Chinese cuisine, gas-fired woks are wildly inefficient. More of their heat is wasted than is used. Harmful combustion byproducts, such as carbon monoxide, can spike to levels far higher than allowed by safety codes. And much of the excess cooking heat radiates beyond the kitchen, boosting costs to cool and vent neighboring spaces.

The tension between gas-fired woks’ unique capabilities and the challenge of finding a good substitute given their outsize climate footprint is evocative of the wider challenges to decarbonize commercial buildings. And the urgency to find workable solutions is rising. 

More regions are advancing plans to curtail natural gas, a powerful greenhouse gas. Since 2019, when Berkeley, California, became the first U.S. city to pass a ban to discourage the use of natural gas in new homes and buildings, big cities including Denver, New York, Seattle and San Francisco either have introduced or approved similar rules. 

Homes and businesses account for about 13 percent of U.S. greenhouse gas emissions, with a large share of that coming directly from the combustion of natural gas to cook food, fire furnaces and heat water, as well as to wash and dry laundry. Methane — the main ingredient in natural gas which frequently leaks — traps 80 times more heat than carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. Curtailing the installation of new natural gas capacity, let alone retrofitting the millions of buildings that rely on it today, amounts to a monumental challenge. 

But the consensus view from a group of building professionals who gathered virtually for VERGE Electrify last month reflected progress for electrification. Efforts are advancing, whether for new construction (easier), retrofits (harder) or even restaurant electrification (among the hardest) — including, yes, those woks. Here are some highlights:

Bigger, taller, better buildings. Just five or 10 years ago, green building pros frequently faced fundamental doubts about electrification, those “Can it be done?” sorts of questions. “We’ve passed that,” said Shawn Hesse, business development director at the International Living Future Institute (ILFI), a nonprofit that established the Living Building Challenge in 2007. “Today we get questions about scale and complexity.” From tens of thousands of square feet a few years ago, “We’re seeing projects come through that are a million square feet or more today.” 

Advancing ambitions. In that earlier era, advanced buildings often were at the bleeding edge of technology. Milestone net-zero energy projects helped to prove viability, refine learning and inspire further advances. “We’re not being guinea pigs anymore,” said Calina Ferraro, a principal at Integral Group’s San Diego office, “we’re building taller and more challenging facilities.” At one pioneering project, Seattle’s self-powered Bullitt Center, “Our main goal was to be a replicable model,” so others could follow in its footsteps, said Jim Hanford, a principal at Miller Hull, which designed the building. To boost its solar potential in cloudy Seattle, the center’s distinctive solar canopy cantilevers out beyond the building’s edges. 

Integration drives innovation. Early successes opened the door to more ambitious building system integration and higher overall performance goals, said John Elliott, chief sustainability officer at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (LBNL). By setting whole-building performance targets — instead of just trying to beat energy codes — LBNL’s newest high-performance building achieves deep efficiency, using a little less than a third of the energy of the facility it replaced. “We integrate the building to a campus-wide operating system and build applications on top of that,” Elliott said. “We’re seeing a drastic increase in our ability to scale energy management and be much more innovative.”

Good enough can still be great. Keep in mind that not every project can hit the high bar of complete electrification — and that’s OK. Whether to score certification or hit a standard, a “kind of tunnel vision” can take over on some projects, Ferraro noted. “Some feel that if we can’t hit that, then we’re going to scrap it.” Such perfectionism can derail good-enough approaches that take a step in the right direction and set the stage for greater impact later. For example, quicker upgrades that reduce demand — such as lighting improvements — cut overall building demand load, making electrification easier when it happens.

Incrementalism accelerates retrofits. In fact, step-by-step incrementalism is often the only way existing facilities can be electrified. At San Francisco International Airport (SFO), the challenge of financing upfront conversion costs, questions about technology maturity and the staggered timeline of tenant lease renewals are just a few variables influencing the rollout of the airport’s complex electrification plans across a campus of 103 buildings, according to Amy Nagengast, energy program manager at SFO. 

An audit of its menagerie of hangers, mechanical facilities and passenger spaces is giving SFO a deeper understanding of the challenge ahead. Most of the airport’s energy (56 percent) already comes from electricity; natural gas supplies 44 percent. And of all the buildings using natural gas, four-fifths are tenant-occupied. “We’re really trying to figure out what equipment uses that natural gas,” said Nagengast, along with where it’s located, what electric alternatives are available and how best to finance a conversion. The audit is helping SFO sequence a conversion plan for both its own facilities and those occupied by tenants.

Electrifying restaurants is getting easier. SFO found that among its food and beverage tenants, natural gas consumption was concentrated in a short list of kitchen equipment: deep fryers, ovens and ranges. Swaying those restaurants to electrify is as much about education as it is about picking the best alternative gear. 

Once chefs start using electric induction ranges, they tend to like them, said Christopher Galarza, a pro chef who has electrified commercial kitchens and now runs Forward Dining Solutions. But preconceived beliefs can make conversion tough: “Chefs are, by nature, stubborn. We don’t like change.” Some of those doubts are founded on past experience, from underpowered ’50s-era electric coil stoves to vendors that can’t yet support the latest induction cooktops. 

But today, commercial kitchen suppliers have rolled out a full range of like-sized electric induction gear, which by many measures are better than their gas counterparts. Since electric induction cooktops are so efficient, much less energy is wasted. Food can cook more quickly and more consistently, thanks to more precise temperature control. And because kitchens are cooler overall, staff are less stressed and diners can be brought in closer to the cooking experience. Even skeptical kitchen vets are often “blown away by how this equipment can improve the restaurant experience,” Galarza said.

A CookTek commercial induction range. Via Cooktek.com.

About those woks

For all the advantages electric induction offers, development of new cooking equipment has followed a familiar arc. Early commercial induction stovetops and ovens arrived at high prices, beset with occasional performance glitches. Increasing scale is helping suppliers to work out those kinks, improve reliability and drive down costs.

Today, you’ll still find more natural gas cookers in supplier catalogs, but electric induction options are multiplying as prices fall and more chefs and restaurant managers discover their sometimes surprising advantages. Electric induction deep fryers, for example, use about half the oil of gas-heated versions, and the oil can last days longer. 

Woks have been trickier to convert but are tracing a similar path. When placed on a flat induction surface, too little of the wok heats up. The solution? A design that nestles the wok in a concave induction cavity delivers all of the heat — if none of the flame — using a fraction of the energy.

A quick scan of commercial kitchen supply houses shows induction woks remain costly but the price tags are coming down — lately to around $2,000 per station, about twice the price of a conventional pro rig. 

What’s next?

Don’t worry — your favorite stir fry isn’t going away. The parable of the wok illuminates an uneven path ahead for wider electrification. Change is hard and will take time, but it is underway. The technology is increasingly ready, but it will be pricey at first, which can make convincing skeptical stakeholders — from wok hei masters to big property developers — that much tougher. 

For their part, property developers are finding that as the barriers to electrification shrink, priorities are changing. “I would frame it as: What’s the cost of not electrifying?” said Becca Rushin, vice president of sustainability and social responsibility at Jamestown, a global real estate investment and management company. “In the grand scheme, the increased costs of electrification ends up being incremental. And you’re insulating yourself from the transition risk of being unprepared when legislation is passed.”

Published at GreenBiz.com on June 7, 2021. See the original here: https://www.greenbiz.com/article/challenges-building-electrification-or-parable-flameless-wok-hei

GARP, White papers

The Energy Transition: Risks and Opportunities | GARP

GARP-Energy-Risk-White-Paper-2021

  • This white paper surveys changes sweeping the global energy industry as net-zero carbon policy and alternative technologies begin to displace fossil fuels.
  • Researched and wrote 5,000-word report, drawing on primary research, press coverage and subject matter interviews; researched and designed data visualizations.
  • Target audience: Finance, traders and risk professionals in the finance, oil/gas, utility and renewables sectors.
  • On behalf of the Global Assn of Risk Professionals.  Published February 2021. 
  • Download the full report here or at garp.org.

GreenBiz

Cheap natural gas drives manufacturers, energy companies to shift gears | GreenBiz

Last week, Joe Nocera reminded me of how disconnected and angry the debate over fracking — the process of injecting fluids into deep, dense rock formations to fracture them and release natural gas — has grown. At The New York Times Energy for Tomorrow conference, Nocera moderated a series of panels that were focused on a broad variety of energy issues, but repeatedly returned to the hot button issue of fracking.

In a rhetorical question, he asked if the tradeoff in environmental harm and public health one we just have to accept. The answer is no, of course. But, as Nocera added, the fact is that fracking is already happening in a very big way. For those not following this issue, he’s an op-ed columnist for the Times who supports fracking as an innovation that, done responsibly, can lead to game-changing new supplies of energy, job growth and economic expansion.

Nocera’s position crystalizes much of the debate around this energy technology. His writing has drawn ire, especially in greater New York City and its hinterlands, where proposals to drill for natural gas in the city’s upstate watershed have sparked enough protest to turn the Hudson Valley into the epicenter of national anti-fracking efforts.

There’s good reason for alarm. ProPublica, a nonprofit investigative journalism entity has — in my opinion — amassed the best work documenting the environmental harm done by fracking. Here are just a few of the key environmental harms associated with the practice:

These issues make a strong case against the practice, and explain why Nocera’s “develop responsibly” position is controversial. The mixed reactions to his endorsement of the practice highlight the schisms dividing interest groups, coming between neighbors who are fighting over whether to frack or not and between national environmental groups who disagree about the environmental pluses and minuses of the practice.

For example, Nocera draws some of his analysis from work done by the Environmental Defense Fund, which is also pushing for tightly regulated fracking. Nocera’s approach has drawn heavy fire from climate activists such as Bill McKibben, a writer and scholar who backs a moratorium, arguing the risks of fracking are simply too high, as well as from Joseph Romm, a former Clinton-era energy official and now an influential climate commentator at Climate Progress.

Putting aside the fight over whether fracking should extend into new areas, Nocera’s talk drew my attention to a facet of fracking that gets less attention. Away from the main boxing ring where the issue is being fought out, large-scale industrial investment is rapidly reorganizing based on the long-term promise of low-cost gas. In short, industry is betting that fracking is here to say. Here’s where fracking already is impacting industry:

Power generation

The fracking binge has already altered the outlook for the U.S. power and manufacturing sectors. More than the rise of renewables, cheap natural gas has paved the way for the retirement of more than 100 coal-fired powered plants, too aged to meet federal clean air rules.

Efforts to build new coal plants are constrained too. Because natural gas power plants are cheaper to build and fuel, the natural gas boom has radically lowered the count of new coal-fired plants being proposed. According to data tracked by the National Energy Technology Lab and Sierra Club, plans for more than 160 coal plants have been shelved in recent years, partly due to natural gas’ cost advantage, as well as soft growth of demand for power.

“Natural gas has done more than other legislative initiative to push coal out of the equation,” said panelist Michael Levi, a senior fellow for energy and the environment at the center for foreign aaffairs, and by my reckoning, one the smartest observers out there on this issue.

Manufacturing

Cheap natural gas is rewriting the rules for other manufacturers too. Less than a decade ago, natural-gas-reliant manufacturers were decamping from the U.S., transplanting operations to the Arabian Gulf, Latin America and other gas-rich regions.

Now many are returning. Makers of chemicals, fertilizer and pharmaceuticals, all of which use natural gas as both an energy source and a raw material are returning stateside, lured by natural gas for under $2.50 per thousand cubic feet, less than fifth of the price in Europe or East Asia.

As Jim Motavalli reports in The New York Times, Nucor, which uses natural gas to make steel, is building a $750-million facility in Louisiana, just eight years after shutting down a similar plant in the same state and shipping it to Trinidad, to tap the island’s recently-developed natural gas supplies.

The cost advantage provided by cheap natural gas is even sharper for companies that use methane as a raw material — to make plastics, for example. Kevin Swift, chief economist at the American Chemistry Council, tells the Times that because European chemicals companies use oil-based raw materials derived to make plastics, the U.S. has a 50-to-1 advantage. “‘Shale gas’ is really driving this,” he says. “A million [British thermal units] of natural gas that might cost $11 in Europe and $14 in South Korea is $2.25 in the U.S. Partly because of that, chemical producers have plans to expand ethylene capacity in the U.S. by more than 25 percent between now and 2017.”

Add up the impact of investments like these and high rates of shale gas recovery could result in a million new manufacturing jobs by 2025, according to a 2011 PricewaterhouseCoopers study cited by Motavalli.

Transportation

Compared to current petroleum prices, natural gas costs $1.50 per gallon equivalent, nearly two-thirds less than current pump prices for gasoline or diesel. Large fleets of heavy-duty vehicles — from buses to garbage trucks to delivery vehicles — have been among the earliest converts. One-quarter to a half of Navistar’s new vehicle sales in these markets opt for natural gas.

Long-distance highway trucking may be the next to switch. Speaking with the Times, Navistar chief executive Dan Ustian, predicts that natural gas could capture up to a fifth of sales of highway tractor-trailers within a year.

The need for on-road refueling infrastructure remains a constraint. There simply aren’t many publicly accessible natural gas refueling sites. The count is under 1,000, less than 1 percent the number of gas stations. Last month, GE and natural gas producer Chesapeake Energy inked a joint venture to build 250 natural gas refueling points around the country.

Policy

Industry is clearly digging in even as environmental opposition gains momentum. Complicating the politics of this debate is that fracking is an intensely regional issue. State-level cultural perceptions of energy vary, for instance. Some families in Texas welcome gas rigs in their backyards, while some landowners in New York are suing to prevent nearby drilling.

Geology is different everywhere too, of course. So what was done safely in Oklahoma may not be replicable in Pennsylvania. “Local conditions matter significantly,” said Mark Brownstein, a panelist at the Times event and chief counsel for the Environmental Defense Fund’s energy program.

These polarizations have driven the debate to unproductive levels of ire, the panelists at the NYT event argued. “This is the perfectly dysfunctional fight,” said Levi, from the Council on Foreign Affairs. “There are environmentalists who believe this cannot be done safely. And there are those in the industry who say regulations will destroy their business.” The loudest voices amount to an all-or-nothing proposition, Levi added, which makes the process of brokering a solution to the fracking question very difficult.

There is a web of substantial existing regulation covering fracking, Brownstein explained, including the Clean Air Act, and the Clean Water Act. “The fundamental question is whether they are sufficient,” he said, and how to improve them if not. Another weak link he pointed to is variations in state level rules and enforcement of well construction, where one poorly built well, after all, can do enormous environmental damage.

Indeed, pointing to these weakest links, Levi made a case for the role of federal regulation. If one state underinvests or underenforces, a single disaster could stir up a far-reaching political backlash that could ultimately slow or halt development.

Some state-level policies, such as Texas’ tough disclosure rules on what frackers inject into the ground, can be cut and pasted to other state or national rules. New York State’s rules are also shaping up to be a benchmark in this respect. And some rules, such as the “Halliburton exception,” which excluded fracking from Clean Water Act standards for what is injected into wells, can only be fixed by an act of Congress.

With the scale of fracking rising, the stakes to get regulation right are growing — and making the fight harder to resolve. Some in the industry are beginning to welcome tougher regulation, recognizing that it could help level the playing field. If tougher regulations could ensure fracking can be done safely, but added 10 or 20 percent to unit cost of gas, the fuel remains cheap, Levi pointed out. “If I were a fracker, I’d rather have 20 cents extra charge” than the environmental and political risks facing the energy today, he said.

Check out Nocera, Levi, Brownstein and others here at The New York Times Energy for Tomorrow conference.

Global CCS Institute

Could natural gas emissions exceed coal? The case for gas with CCS | Global CCS Institute

Though natural gas extracted from shale is the fastest growing energy source for power plants in the U.S., shale gas is now facing fresh challenges, with the release of a new study suggesting the fuel’s carbon intensity is as high as or higher than coal’s.

Given the rapid growth of natural gas, the findings could upend a consensus view that it’s a greener alternative to coal. The natural gas industry maintains that the fuel emits only about half the CO2 of coal, and therefore has promise as a “bridge” from today’s carbon-intensive fuel mix to future low-carbon options. The new findings suggest that, if natural gas emissions are undercounted, there’s greater urgency to develop CCS for natural gas plants, alongside coal.

Already, the low cost of natural gas—along with its low emissions of conventional air pollutants—has led many utilities to shutter older, dirtier coal plants and replace them with gas turbines.  Earlier this week, for instance, the Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) agreed to a landmark deal with the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to shutter 11 of its most polluting coal plants, replacing some with natural gas.

Yet if shale gas is as carbon intensive as coal, the results of swapouts like these could cause greenhouse gas emissions to actually rise.

“Compared to coal, the footprint of shale gas is at least 20 percent greater and perhaps more than twice as great on the 20-year horizon and is comparable when compared over 100 years,” Robert Howarth, a Cornell ecologist writes in a pre-publication version of the paper, originally obtained by The Hill newspaper, and which can be viewed here.

The gist of Howarth’s findings has been made public in the past and are already being fiercely debated. The issue has been re-energized since the study is being published in a peer reviewed scientific journal, Climate Science, boosting their credibility.

It’s important to emphasize Howarth’s findings are based on natural gas extracted from shale reserves, rather than natural gas from conventional reserves.

That said, prior analysis, including one by the EPA, have put to the test claims that natural gas emits 50% less green house gases than coal, as is often claimed. Earlier this year, as detailed by ProPublica, the EPA issued analysis (see the report here) that methane leakage during transmission and processing may cut in half the advantage that is frequently attributed to natural gas.

Howarth and his colleagues—Anthony Ingraffea and Renee Santoro, also at Cornell—contend the process of hydraulic fracturing releases far more methane than conventional drilling.  When fluids, which are pumped into the well to crack open shale and release the gas, resurface to be reused, they release large volumes of methane, according to the study. Howarth is quoted by the New York Times, saying:

“…we came up with two things that surprised me. First, I expected the indirect CO2 emissions from trucks moving frac water, the compressors, the drills, etc., to be greater than we found. They are actually pretty small, when you add up all the numbers. And second, the influence of methane is greater than I expected…”

Howarth’s finding could fuel critics of shale gas, especially in Northeast US states, where public anxiety is rising that fracking threatens underground sources of fresh water.

via globalccsinstitute.com