[GWSG] VT Yankee down; 22% vs. 11%; new reliables; active moments & successes; methane control; Become Ocean

[Tilley, Al]

1.  The Vermont Yankee nuclear power plant provided 35% of the state’s power.  Now it has been shut down because, as the power company says, it is uncompetitively expensive to operate.  The power company points to natural gas rates, while a Public Service Commissioner echoes the governor in saying that “We are moving full speed ahead with local, sustainable no-carbon renewable in Vermont.”  Decommissioning the plant will take decades and cost an estimated $1.5 billion.  http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/dec/29/vermont-shutters-nuclear-power-plant-yankee  The power company said that economics were behind the shutdown.  An alternative explanation is the rising tide of protests against the plant.  http://ecowatch.com/2014/12/29/vermont-yankee-shuts-down/

2.  Globally, renewables now supply twice as much energy as nuclear plants: 22% vs. 11%.  The share of renewables is likely to increase and that of nuclear, to fall (though modular reactors and other new designs remain on the horizon and may prove successful).  http://ecowatch.com/2014/12/30/nukes-fade-wind-solar-soar/?utm_source=EcoWatch+List&utm_campaign=2139f14e0a-Top_News_12_30_2014&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_49c7d43dc9-2139f14e0a-85965093

3.  Carl Pope observes that heat, cold, water shortage, water surplus, and fuel supply fluctuations all render fossil fuel and nuclear power plants unreliable.  For reliability we may turn to renewable energy.  http://ecowatch.com/2014/12/29/carl-pope-grid-reliability-myth/?utm_source=EcoWatch+List&utm_campaign=bd978974b9-Top_News_12_29_2014&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_49c7d43dc9-bd978974b9-85965093

4.  US climate activists produced some memorable moments and some significant successes in 2014.  http://ecowatch.com/2014/12/30/climate-movement-victories-2014/?utm_source=EcoWatch+List&utm_campaign=2139f14e0a-Top_News_12_30_2014&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_49c7d43dc9-2139f14e0a-85965093

5.  Next month the Obama administration expects to release measures to control methane emissions, which account for 9% of total US greenhouse gas emissions.  Leaks contribute 50% of methane emissions, and 90% of those leaks come from production and transmission of natural gas, oil, and coal.  A NASA map of anomalous methane emissions shows where the leaks are.   http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/delaware-sized-gas-plume-over-west-illustrates-the-cost-of-leaking-methane/ar-BBhkXWu?ocid=AARDHP

6.  The Alaskan composer John Luther Adams won the 2014 Pulitzer Prize for Music for his Become Ocean.  It is a 42 minute orchestral piece in which swelling and subsidence take the place of melodic development.  I don’t think you have to have been at sea to listen to it with pleasure, but it will help.  It will also help to know something about sea level rise.  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Luther_Adams
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