Windfall: Unlocking a Fossil Free Future, by Ketan Joshi

Energy industry insider Ketan Joshi gives a bracing history of Australia's climate wars.

In Windfall: Unlocking a Fossil Free Future, renewable industry insider Ketan Joshi gives a teeth gnashing account of Australia's interminable climate debates. Working as a data analyst and communicator at Infigen Energy, Joshi sometimes wound up as collateral damage himself. He was hit with a defamation lawsuit from an anti wind turbine group for live tweeting the innocuous details of a senate inquiry. It was vexatious litigation, designed to suppress and scare.

The minutiae of climate science can often make the eyes glaze over. Ketan Joshi does a superb job of explaining the complex and arcane in a manner that is often riveting. Windfall is informative, but also enjoyable and stimulating. What we learn is that the decades wasted in pointless 'debate' have done Australians a great economic disservice. While renewable prices have dipped, greater savings could have been made had not the scare campaigns worked so effectively. The renewable energy industry gets some of the blame, too: they failed to effectively engage at a grass roots level with suspicious communities who felt railroaded into accepting new technologies.

Windfall is perfect for the lay reader and non-specialist wanting to know how climate policy went so terribly wrong, and offers hope that a decarbonised future is within reach.

Windfall: Unlocking a Fossil Free Future, by Ketan Joshi. Published by New South Books. $29.99

Review by Chris Saliba

This review first published at Books + Publishing. Click here.

Blackout: How Is Energy Rich Australia Running out of Electricity, by Matthew Warren

Energy expert Matthew Warren explains the politics, economics and science of our power grid. Non-partisan, accessible and illuminating, Blackout is a breath of fresh air. 

Who can make sense of Australia's energy policy over the past decade? It's been a time of time of hot, often over-the-top political debate. In such a noisy atmosphere the average punter has little hope of sorting fact from fiction. Into this breach steps Matthew Warren, an energy insider with fifteen years experience.

As Warren explains in Blackout, his guide for the perplexed, in the past none of us had to pay much attention to how energy was produced, transmitted and marketed. The grid was run (mostly) on coal, and that was that. Then came climate change, a scientific theory we are reminded, not a proven fact, and everything started to change. Insurance companies, who were key stakeholders when it came to climate variation, started to price in climate change. While politicians on the right and left bickered, business started moving, accepting that climate change was most likely real and entering it into their decision making. Soon enough it was no longer viable to invest in new coal generation. As coal plants have continued to close, with more slated to wind down in the coming years, Australia's electricity grid has become more fragile.

On top of this there has been a mammoth uptake of rooftop solar, the result of a shambolic series of government policies giving subsidies to middle-class home owners. Prices for solar have dropped, making it a cheaper source of power generation than coal. The problem now for the grid is to integrate intermittent renewable power with traditional thermal power, such as coal and gas. This is not as easy as it seems, there being many technical problems that need to be overcome. The process is not helped by the ad hoc policy making of politicians, most of whom don't understand energy or climate change.

Matthew Warren has done us all a service by writing this lucid explainer on how Australia's energy grid works. It's a complex, sometimes messy story where science, technology and politics clash. Despite this, Blackout offers a clear narrative that is often fascinating. Read this non-partisan book and feel better informed.
  
Blackout: How Is Energy Rich Australia Running out of Electricity, by Matthew Warren. Published by Affirm Press. RRP: $29.99

The End of Oil, by Paul Roberts

The title of this book, The End of Oil, is really a misnomer. The book is more about the future of energy, its viability and the challenges the world faces in the future. So a little surprisingly, you’ll find in equal measure a discussion of gas, hydrogen power, green power etc. etc. You’ll also find plenty on sustainability, politics and the possibility of future energy wars.

All in all this is a pretty nifty book that gives an all round picture. Nor did I find it to be ideologically driven in any way. Common sense rules Paul Roberts’ arguments. He says the over consumption of oil by US citizens is plain stupid, but also criticises green groups.

Roberts is also a good writer. Many of the themes and topics I’ve read about in other books but could not get my head around are well explained here. Roberts has a lucid style that clarified what a cap-and-trade system is, and how a hydrogen fuelled car would work.

I’d call The End of Oil a non-alarmist book, unlike others on the same subject. He says we should not go too fast with Kyoto, which would keep those on the right happy. But balances this by saying that it is of the utmost importance that we get cracking with a range of measures to ensure a smooth as possible transition to a new energy future.

Roberts says we are all far too ignorant of where our energy comes from. We take things for granted and have a vague idea that magic technologies are just waiting in the wings to make things all right. This is not so. A safe energy future is something that will have to be worked towards, and it will not be achieved by individual volunteers switching off that light in the hallway.

It will happen by government setting in place incentives in the market, and by taxing polluters. Roberts makes a perfectly good argument that it was the market that made twentieth century technologies so successful (cars and electricity gobbling gadgets). It is only by putting the right signals into the market that there will be an incentive to create a new energy future. This means government policies.

Paul Roberts has written another book called The End of Food, which is no wonder, as he says that the first energy source was calories for humans to hunt and gather with.

From page seventy:

‘Photosynthesis begins when solar energy falls on a leaf and causes a water molecule inside to split into oxygen and hydrogen. This sundering is not easily accomplished; water is a very stable compound: its oxygen and hydrogen atoms are tightly bound. Splitting them apart required a great deal of energy – in this case, a burst of solar energy, which, in essence, attaches itself to the hydrogen atom. The cargo of solar energy makes the newly liberated hydrogen atom highly unstable. To regain stability, the hydrogen must now share its extra energy by binding with a new partner – in this case, an atom of carbon, to create a new compound, a carbohydrate, or sugar. This is why sugars are high-energy compounds: their bonds contain the solar energy brought over by the hydrogen. Sugars, in other words, are chemical storage for energy from the sun. and hydrogen is the energy carrier.’

Very much recommended.

High and Dry, by Guy Pearse

Guy Pearse is a Liberal Party member, lobbyist and former advisor to the Howard government. (ABC viewers may remember him first blowing the whistle on the Liberal Party on Four Corners in February 2006.)

Baffled at why so many of the business groups (tourism, insurance for example) who were central to the climate change debate had been silent, Pearse began a PhD on the subject at the Australian National University. He carried out extensive interviews with the Australian Industry Greenhouse Network (AIGN), a group whose members are some of the biggest polluters, and discovered that they were almost writing government environmental policy. Why does the Howard government continue to support these big polluters and eschew renewable energy? Why does it refuse to see the economic benefits of investing in solar enengy?

'Between 1998 and 2005, the Liberal Party received at least $3.3 million from AIGN members.'

This book is not an anti-Howard tirade, although the book is forcefully argued. As a Liberal Party member, he wants to set his party on the right track. As a firm believer in the disastrous effects global warming will have on us, he sees the need for a turn around in Howard Government policy as utterly urgent.

Interestingly, the Liberal Party under Andrew Peacock was way ahead of Labor on the need to reduce carbon emissions. Under Howard this has all changed.

Reading this book, you'd think it was written by some greenie, such is its urgent tone. The detail is quite amazing. The author really knows his stuff, and leaves no stone unturned. The intricate web of persons within the big polluting businesses and the Liberal Party is explained in exhaustive detail. Indeed, sometimes I thought, Enough! I get your point.

If you want to read about how big buisness is calling the shots, and shake your head at why John Howard is doing their bidding, you should read this excellent insider's account.

Visit the High and Dry website here.

Blood and Oil, by Michael T. Klare

American author Michael T. Klare has written extensively on war, arms production and politics. Some of the titles of his other books give a good idea of where he’s coming from. Try these on for size: American Arms Supermarket; Supplying Repression:U.S. Support for Authoritarian Regimes Abroad; War Without End: America Planning for the Next Vietnams.

The statistics in this book alone are mind boggling, making it clear that American involvement in the middle-east, whether it be politically or economically, can only increase dramatically over the coming years. Going by the statistics alone, it seems that we are just at the beginning of our democratic ‘make-over’ of the middle east.

For example, the American Department of Energy projects that U.S foreign consumption of oil will rise from 55 percent in 2001, to an estimated 58 percent in 2010, 66 percent in 2020 and 70 percent in 2025. Now couple that with dropping domestic production, from 5.7 barrels per day in 2001 to a projected 4.6 barrels per day in 2025. Having looked into the future, now look into the past. After World War two, American reliance on foreign oil was 20 percent of total consumption. In 1973 this figure crossed the 30 percent mark, the 40 percent mark in 1976 and 45 percent in 1977. Then in April 1998 foreign dependency on imports reached the 50 percent mark.

Of course everyone knows where most of the world’s oil is concentrated. That’s right, the middle east. The top five runs thus, in barrels by the billion. Number one, Saudi Arabia with 261.8 billion barrels of proven reserve and 25 percent of the world total. Iraq comes in at number two, boasting 112.5 billion barrels and 10.7 percent of world total. Then the United Arab Emirates, 97.8 billion barrels and 9.3 percent. Four is Kuwait with 96.5 billion barrels and 9.2 world total. And finally fifth is Iran with 89.7 billion barrels and 8.6 percent of world total.

Cynics will holler from the sidelines that it’s as clear as day that the only reason the U.S wants stability and democracy in the middle east is so that they may have unfettered access to oil, until there’s not another drop left. While idealistic true believers assert that the invasion of Iraq is a high-minded and moralistic enterprise, determined to rid the world of tyranny and despotism.

Klare does not take such a black and white position as this, although throughout his book he does argue that oil and conflict have a habit of turning up at the same place at the same time. Here Klare writes of the decision to go into Iraq, thereby junking Colin Powell’s pre-September 11 idea of ‘smart sanctions’, meant to tighten restrictions on high-tech goods with potential military applications.

‘Why did the president choose to abandon the Powell plan and seek the forcible ouster of Saddam Hussein? No single factor can account for this momentous decision. Security considerations were certainly an important part of the equation: White House officials were obviously worried about the continuing buildup of Iraq’s military capabilities and the threat they posed to regional stability. But, as I have argued, security was directly tied to the safety of the Persian Gulf oil supplies and thus to the prospects for increased output. So long as Saddam Hussein remained in power, the Gulf would never be entirely stable, and the United States would never be able to boost Iraqi petroleum production.’

The most fascinating part of this oil dilemma is the peculiar relationship between the U.S and Saudi Arabia, a love that dare not speak its name. That a world leading democracy supports such a creepy regime, arming it to the back teeth, is amazing. The Roosevelt administration got the ball rolling, using the Lend-Lease Act of 1941 to start arming the kingdom (it gave the president authority to sell, exchange, lease or otherwise transfer military goodies to any country the president deemed vital to the country’s defence). In Roosevelt’s own words, ‘The defence of Saudi Arabia is vital to the defence of the United States.’

In February 1945, Roosevelt flew to Egypt, meeting King Ibn Saud aboard the USS Quincy, an American cruiser anchored in the Suez Canal. Among Ibn Saud’s entourage were Bedouin bodyguards, households slaves, and the royal astrologer. The discussions between these two entirely different leaders went on for some five hours. No records were kept, and no other Americans were present, so what was discussed remains a mystery. Yet ever since the two nations have been locked in a strange marriage of convenience. The U.S gets oil, and in return the kingdom receives arms.

The author explains how critical the relationship has been to the growth of the U.S as a major economy:

‘Without the oil that Saudi Arabia and the other Gulf producers supplied, the United States and its European allies could never have achieved the spectacular economic growth they posted in the post war era. Nor could Washington have sustained the great armies, navies, and air forces it deployed in every theatre of possible confrontation with the Soviet Union and its allies.’

However, with this spectacular economic growth came a price. The defence of the kingdom:

‘At the same time, however, this Saudi oil imposed a significant strategic burden on American leaders. Saudi Arabia’s forces were no match for those of its more heavily armed neighbours, and so it fell to the United States to ensure the kingdom’s defence, as well as the safety of its oil fields and pipelines and the sea-lanes that connect the Gulf to markets abroad. Moreover, President Roosevelt had made a promise, implicit or otherwise, to defend the Saudi government itself – which meant, in practice, the Saudi royal family. And because the royal family periodically came under attack from its own subjects, the United States became mired in Saudi Arabia’s internal affairs, primarily through its aid to the monarchy’s police and internal-security forces.’

The Reagan administration alone sold 8.5 billion dollars worth of arms to the kingdom, a sale passed by a none too happy Congress.

As I said at the beginning, none of this is going to get any better in the future, unless the U.S, and the world, can wean itself off oil its dependency. Something which seems unlikely. The book lists figures showing how the Gulf region will be producing an even bigger proportion of the world’s oil supply in the future, from 27 percent in 2000, to 36 percent in 2025. Add to that even more alarming figures about how much oil the world will need to produce to keep up with consumption. World oil production would have to grown by 60 percent between 1999 and 2020 in order to meet projected consumption needs of 119 million barrels per day, according to the International Energy Outlook. Output in the gulf would have to increase 85 percent to meet this demand. One wonders what the political, cultural and economic outcome will be in twenty years.
And this is just one aspect of the oil dilemma. Then there are the other oil producing areas, many of which are political hotspots. Don’t forget China either, with its burgeoning economy. It will want its slice of the pie too.

What’s the answer to all of these headaches? Pretty simple: wind back oil use and dependency. Whether it can or will be done is another matter.

From Arab Nationalism to OPEC, by Nathan J. Citino

A fascinating book on the beginnings of America's interests in Saudi Arabia and the Middle East in general. It's a quite complicated story, covering the late 1950s, and I didn't grasp all of it.

Basically, it shows how the US stepped into the shoes of the British Empire. Due to the fact that the West's economy is so dependent on oil, we have developed this strange relationship with the autocratic royal family of Saudi Arabia.

The book shows how US business interests had an impact on the Saudi State, how Arab Nationalist movements were inimical to it, plus the political maneuverings to keep the Soviet Union out of the Middle East. It really shows how much we have to do with Saudi Arabia, propping up a corrupt regime, and actually militarizing it - weapons to be used against its own people.

See, it's so complex I can barely summarise it properly. Here's a more cogent quote.

"The crescendo of Arab nationalism and decline of British prestige in the Middle East confronted Eisenhower with a fateful choice. American hopes that the oil corporations themselves could palliate Arab nationalism met with disappointment during the Suez crisis. The U.S would either have to adjust its policies to the reality of Arab nationalism and get behind development plans proposed by the Arabs and non-Arabs for sharing the region's oil wealth, or assume the British mantle as enforcer of the post war petroleum order. Eisenhower opted for the second alternative, and this decision proved much more important for defining the future U.S role in he Middle East than his earlier one to halt the aggressors at Suez."