Brittle Power- PARTS 1-3 (+Notes) - Natural Capitalism Solutions

270National Energy Securityready to step into the breach immediately if a major unit fails), and oftenhydroelectric pumped-storage systems or other costly ways to reconcile asteady output with a fluctuating load. In contrast, economically efficient use ofenergy would reduce electrical demand—especially the most fluctuating kinds—so far that present and small hydro capacity would meet most of the total load,not just a modest fraction as they do today. Storage could then be provided atno extra cost simply by closing valves and retaining water behind the dams. 10Other forms of renewable energy are even easier to store. Biomass liquidfuels, being produced and used in a rather decentralized pattern, can be storedin tanks which avoid the tempting concentrations of oil terminals. As the exampleof a superinsulated house showed (Chapter Fifteen), efficient energy usemakes the storage of domestic heat for days or weeks straightforward. By usingrocks, molten salts or metals, or other suitable materials, heat can be storedeven at high temperatures for industrial processes. 11 In all these cases, the energystorage devices, instead of being concentrated in large and vulnerable“lumps,” would tend to be relatively dispersed and invulnerable. Most of thestored energy, being at or near the site of end use, could not be cut off at all.In short, a least-cost combination of investments in energy productivity and inrenewable energy supply can largely avoid the excessive and vulnerable energystorage required for reliable service with highly centralized systems.Not all renewable sources make sense.This discussion considers only those renewable sources—elsewhere called“soft technologies” 12 —which supply energy at the scale and in the quality appropriateto the task at hand, so as to provide that energy service at least cost tothe consumer. Since this is not the usual approach—most analysts like to considerany and all kinds of renewable technologies, especially those which arelarge, central-electric, and speculative—it is worth explaining the rationale forthis restriction. It is actually quite simple and rests on basic economics.Chapter Fourteen and Appendix One show how a mismatch of scale betweensource and use can roughly double energy service costs by incurring the costsand losses of a vast distribution network. Proper scale for each task can minimizethose costs and losses. Likewise, supply energy of the right form foreach task can minimize the costs and losses of energy conversion. 13Thus, for example, the ninety-two percent of U.S. delivered energy whichis needed in the form of heat, or as a portable fuel for vehicles, is most economicallysupplied in those forms—not as electricity, which is cost-effectiveonly for a premium eight percent of all delivered energy needs. This is becauseelectricity is conventionally generated in costly, complex machines which lose