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All future energy will have to be “clean”
Applied Energy 64 (1999) 79±88
www.elsevier.com/locate/apenergy
All future energy will have to be ``clean''$ Peter E. Doerell* ICL Sprl, Rue Capouillet 19/21, Box 1, B-1060 Brussels, Belgium
Of the three key postulates of any energy policy Ð safety of supply, low cost, environmental acceptability Ð the ®rst one is the most important. Energy is the lifeblood of a modern industrial society and an energy shortage can be very costly. However, with growing environmental awareness throughout the world, future energy will have to be as ``clean'' as technically possible and economically viable. Now what have the dierent energy industries done and what are they doing to ful®l this prerequisite? I shall start with OIL. We have the pleasure to be in Bahrain, and oil has been the world's no. 1 energy source for many years and will remain a principal source of energy for the foreseeable future. Demand for oil is projected to grow at a rate slightly less than 2% per year in real terms. Currently excess production capacity is within 2 million BOPD (Barrels of oil per day of demand, and supply will probably continue to exceed demand until 2005. By 2010, demand could outstrip production by as much as 11 million BOPD. However, since there is no replacement for petroleum in applications such as lubricants, cleansers, petrochemicals, fertilizers, cosmetics, food industry, synthetic rubber, road paving, and the like, oil's derivatives and products will continue to enjoy a prominent role in our daily lives. The most spectacular events which, environmentally, are most damaging for the oil industry's reputation, are, of course, tanker disasters polluting the ocean. Now, very often the responsible parties sail under ¯ags of convenience and international regulation will be required to enforce strict observance of all pertinent rules as well as better training of the crews. Another measure, to make sea transport of oil environmentally safer, is to reinforce the hulls of the tankers. Furthermore, oil dumping into the sea must be punished more severely. And it is in the oil industry's own interest that the safety and stability of oil rigs is constantly improved, that leaks in pipelines are minimised, and that pollution from re®neries is reduced to a minimum. Besides, EU Commissioner for the Environment, Mrs. Ritt Bjerregaard,
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The views expressed are those of the author. * Tel.: +32-2536-8682; fax: +32-2536-8600.
0306-2619/99/$ - see front matter # 1999 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved. PII: S0306-2619(99)00061-6
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envisages the prohibition of the sinking of ex-service rigs in the oceans. The 600 oil and natural gas rigs in the EU seas should in future be scrapped and disposed of on shore. The World Energy Council (WEC) last year published a comprehensive transport study. Its projection for the global transport sector suggests a near doubling of the energy consumption by 2020, accounting for half of the increase in world oil demand. This strong growth in transport activity, and the resulting increase in energy demand, will inevitably translate into detrimental eects on the environment. However, the scope for achieving a signi®cant departure from current trends by 2020 is limited Ð due to constraints imposed by social and political acceptability, technological feasability and economics. Mobility serves a wide range of social and economic needs; its absence con¯icts with deeply felt aspirations; its contraction is liable to arouse hostility. Simultaneously, there is widespread public demand for an improved environment in terms of emission reductions and curbed infrastructural development, the likely costs and implied mobility restrictions of which may not be considered. Policy makers have the dicult task of seeking to balance those pressures in the interests of sustainable development. From a global perspective, the greatest growth in emissions over the next two decades is expected to occur in rapidly developing countries, where little has been done so far to control motor vehicle emissions. In general, measures are needed to tackle vehicle use and rapidly expanding road trac. It is anticipated that a mix of tougher regulation, tightening standards, and economic instruments will be required. Reducing pollutants in oil products like gasoline and diesel is a challenge for the industry's chemists. If you think of the heavily polluted metropolises of Asia or Latin America, there is obviously still a lot to do. In the European Community in 1996, EUROPIA, the European Petroleum Industry Association, promoted an approach which sets speci®c emission reduction targets, according to each country's environment and contributing sources. In the Liquid Sulphur Framework Directive (LSFD), the European Commission attempts to implement tight and uniform sulphur limits across the EU, while EUROPIA consistently advocates an approach for the revision of the Large Combustion Plant Directive (LCPD). According to EUROPIA, emissions (of SO2, NOx and dust) should be reduced the ``rational'' way with country-speci®c measures to ensure the attainment of overall national reduction goals at the least cost to society. In any case, increasingly, severe regulation and voluntary eorts have already shown positive results in the Western World. Take polluted Los Angeles, USA, as an example. In their 1997 report, the ``South Coast Air Quality Management District'' (AQMD) stated that L.A.'s air today is cleaner than in the last 50 years. COAL Ð about 40% of all world electricity is generated from coal. To meet forecasted electricity demand till 2020, 1000 MW of capacity will have to be built every week throughout the world Ð at least 40% based on coal. Coal is by far the most important single electricity source in the world and, according to all reliable forecasts, it will retain this lead in the foreseeable future. Coal's reserves are plentiful, coal supply is safe, and coal is low-priced. In Asia e.g. coal's share of total Asian electricity production grew from 26% in 1980 to 42% in 1992, and is projected to rise to some 54% in 2010.
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But what about the environmental impact of electricity generation from coal? Any human activity aects our environment to a greater or lesser degree. The coal and the power industries have invested and are investing billions of US dollars to make coal power ``green''. There are, above all, two huge programs: in the US, the ``clean Coal Technologies Program'', and in the European Community the ``Thermie'' program. The main features of these technologies are a drastic reduction of SO2 and NOx, emissions, higher eciency and fuel saving. The US Department of Energy (DOE) is developing these advanced clean coal technologies in unique government-industry partnerships. Successfully commercialised clean coal technologies, coupled with such concepts as coal extraction methods which minimise methane release will reverse the inaccurate negative image of coal and replace it with an up-dated public view of coal as an economic, stable, ecient and clean fuel of choice. In this vision, coal will become a fuel that improves the world's political stability by supplying reliable energy that can meet the growing needs of both industrialised and developing nations', declared Dr. David J. Ihirad, DOE's Deputy Assistant Secretary for International Energy Policy at the ``Energex `96'' Conference in Beijing, China. The US government has invested 165106 USD in 1995 in its CCT program, a ®gure which rose to about 358106 m USD last year. In the 2000±2010 time frame, the programme will allow NOx emissions and other air toxins from existing power plants to be reduced by 70±90% and a reduction of the US industry's annual electricity costs by 8±13109 USD. In the early 1980s, studies showed that the most which one could hope to achieve in terms of coal-to-electricity eciency was 38% Ð a small increase over the power industry's average of about 33±34%. Today, technologies demonstrated in the programme are already operating at an eciency of 42±43%. Coal is now to push for an eciency of 60% or higher whilst lowering electricity costs. In the category of power generation systems, the DOE goal is to demonstrate, by AD 2000, an advanced coal technology with 42% cycle eciency whilst controlling SO2, NOx, and particulates to one third of current standards. For AD 2010, it is predicting a 55% eciency demonstration. In the ``Development of liquid fuels from coal'' sector, the DOE will try to demonstrate by 2010 that advanced coal-re®nery techniques for clean, safe generation of fuels, chemicals and other products based on coal can compete at costs of 30 USD per barrel. Most clean coal-technologies (CCTs) concentrate on power generation from coal. An impressive array of technologies is already commercially viable, and a large number of others will become available in the near future, states the World Coal Institute. Pulverised fuel (PF) combustion is the most widely used method for burning coal for power generation. In PF combustion, coal is milled to a powder and blown into the boiler with air. As a powder, coal has a large surface area and burns well. The heat is used to produce superheated steam to drive turbines. The average net thermal-eciency of new plants is up to 40%. Most of the world's coal-®red electricity is produced using PF combustion systems. Emissions from PF combustion can be reduced by post-combustion CCTs. Electrostatic precipitators and/or fabric ®lters can remove more than 99% of ¯y ash from ¯ue gases. Flue gas desulphurisation (FGD) methods can remove more than
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90% of the oxides of sulphur (SO2) from ¯ue gases, and can convert it into gypsum for use in the building trade. Among the key CCTs for PF combustion designed to minimise the production of oxides of nitrogen (NOx) are low-NOx burners and reburning techniques. These modify the combustion process to reduce NOx emissions by up to 50%, and are being widely adopted as they can be installed into existing plants. Selective catalytic NOx reduction can achieve reductions of 80±90%. The principal CCTs are at present: advanced pulverised fuel (PF) combustion, ¯uidised-bed combustion (FBC), gasi®cation and integrated coal gasi®cation combined cycle (IGCC), and hybrid systems. In AD 1990, support for the demonstration of new, and particularly ``clean'' processes for the combustion and conversion of coal became part of the overall THERMIE programme, implemented by the European Community in that year. The THERMIE programme supports the development of ``clean'' uses of coal, lignite and peat in combustion to produce heat, power or electricity or in conversion to a gas or liquid (which, again, would be used to generate heat, power or electricity with the possible further application as a chemical feedstock). Work on the use, treatment or enhancement of the waste, particularly the solid residues, from the processing of solid fuel is also included. Several demonstration projects have worked satisfactorily, and three designs, all different in concept, are now ready for commercial use: the High Temperature Winkler gasi®er, designed by Rheinbraun AG, the BGL gasi®er, developed by British Gas and Lurgi, and the Koppers-Totzek process. The two newest and most ecient clean coal power projects are Gardanne in France and Puertollano in Spain. The transformation of coal into a ``clean'' and even more ecient power station fuel is well under way. A leading energy solution is cogeneration, that is the combined production of electricity and heat. Its advantages: clean and ecient, competitive, cost-eective, low emissions. In Europe, cogeneration now accounts for 9±10% of electricity production. According to the COGEN federation, EU-15 as a whole could reach a 30% cogeneration share of total electricity production by AD 2010. The estimated potential for the USA is 680 TWh by AD 2010, about 40% (280 TWh) is already in place, representing about 8% of total national power-production. In Japan, cogeneration has only developed a little up to now, but the future potential is considered to be great. An untapped clean and practically in®nite energy source would be created by a technological breakthrough in underground coal gasi®cation. In the Earth's crust there are coal reserves which were estimated by the World Energy Council to be 44,600 billion tons. These reserves cannot be economically exploited with today's conventional mining methods but possibly could be with the techniques of the oil and natural gas industries. Present total world energy need is about 14 billion tons a year. The exploitation of the above coal resources could, therefore cover mankind's total energy requirements for 3200 years! NATURAL GAS occupies an increasingly predominant place in satisfying the world's fuel requirements. Its intrinsic qualities, combined with its abundant reserves, confer a major role on it in all power demand forecast scenarios, in particular due to electricity production. While, still only a few years ago, the use of this ``premium fuel''
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was prohibited in the EU power stations, there is a rush for natural gas electricity generation today. The principal reason for it is the fact that natural gas' CO2 emissions are the lowest of the fossil fuels. Natural gas is also plentiful. Although demand for it is growing, known reserves have been growing faster and will be adequate for many decades to come. The supply and use of natural gas have considerable environmental bene®ts. Natural gas combustion yields no SO2 emissions at all and fewer NOx emissions than other fossil fuels per unit of energy. The use of natural gas can contribute to the improvement of urban air quality and the ®ght against acid deposition. According to the European natural gas federation, EUROGAS, natural gas is also able to make a major contribution to curbing the potential enhancement of the natural ``greenhouse eect''. Important reasons for the renewed interest in natural gas for power generation are: . the development of high-eciency gas-®red combined cycle gas turbines (CCGT); . considerably lower environmental impact oered by gas-®red power generation than by other fossil fuels; . long-term availability of increasingly large natural gas reserves; and . CCGT plants can be built relatively quickly and at a relatively low cost of investment. The CCGT technology is the most ecient fossil-fuel based technology commercially available for electricity generation. The attraction of this new thermodynamic cycle technology resides in its ability to capture heat which would otherwise have been wasted and using it to generate additional electricity. The environmental advantages of natural gas obviously also apply to its use in the industrial and residential markets and, potentially, in the future transport sector. The world's natural gas industry declares itself to be very conscious of its responsibilities to optimise the inherent advantages of its fuel. It is con®dent that it will sustain the competitive expansion of natural gas in the energy market well into the future and thus continue to provide ``a cleaner energy for a greener world''. NUCLEAR ENERGY has massively entered the international energy scene during the two oil-price crises, when people were anxiously looking for alternative energy sources. This appearance was facilitated by the assertions of it being ``safe, in®nite, low-cost and environmentally friendly'' and led to very considerable market shares in several countries. However, practical experience with ever increasing costs (because of ever more stringent safety impositions) and a multitude of incidents, in particular the Chernobyl disaster, undermined public con®dence in this technology. As a result, with few exceptions, no new nuclear plants are being built or planned, and the industry is ®ghting for survival. In this situation, the ``global warming'' theory came as a god-send and the nuclear lobby is proposing ``CO2-free'' atomic energy as the ideal solution for avoiding the announced ``climate disaster''. Now, quite apart from the alleged dangers of CO2, this gas is emitted in uranium ore mining, uranium transportation and processing, and also during the construction of nuclear power stations. In any case, the response
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to the very considerable eorts in Kyoto to change public reservations was very poor. The environment protection organisations despise atomic power even more than fossil fuels. And they consider it, after Chernobyl, ridiculous to label an energy source of which one single core-melting can contaminate many hundreds of square kilometres for years with radioactivity as ``environmentally friendly''. Apart from the dangers from the operation of nuclear power plants, especially of the former Soviet make, it is the unsolved Ð and, apparently unsolvable Ð problem of nuclear waste which is the Achilles heel of this industry. In France alone, 43,000 cubic metres of radioactive waste are produced every year, 200 cubic metres of which has a very high radioactivity. Refuse, of low radioactivity, needs about 300 years to become safe: high-radioactive waste needs 1000 to 100,000 years. Burying the waste in salt domes or dumping it into the deep sea seem to be doubtful methods, and propositions like shooting it to the Moon show the desperate eorts to get rid of the ever-increasing residues. One should gladly attest that the nuclear energy producers are doing their best to constantly improve the safety of their operations. So there exists, for example, in France the Institut de Protection et de SuÃrete Nucleare (IPSN) which has just signed an agreement with its Chinese counterpart CIRP to develop measures to protect man against the radiological consequences of a nuclear accident or simply nuclear operations. But most prognostications are sceptical concerning the future development of atomic ®ssion. Nuclear fusion is still on the drawing-board and experience so far is not very encouraging, though a lea¯et of EU Commission's fusion research project JET (Joint European Torus) proudly declares: ``A new and almost limitless source of energy with no environment damage from `greenhouse' gases or acid rain will be the reward for the successful harnessing of nuclear fusion for power generation. Nuclear fusion would be inherently very safe since any malfunction automatically leads to shutdown.'' The on-going anti-CO2 campaign has provoked a cry for RENEWABLE ENERGIES. Their promoters point to improved energy security and diversity, reduced emissions of ``greenhouse'' gases and pollutants such as SOx and NOx, and increased levels of technological exports. Nevertheless, the World Energy Council (WEC) and the International Energy Agency (IEA) believe that Ð in spite of very heavy subsidies Ð only between 5 and 7% of global energy requirements can be met by wind power, photo-voltaic (solar energy) and the other renewable energy sources in the foreseeable future. At present these account for 2%. The potential of HYDRO-POWER is already widely exploited. Besides, environmentalists consider the construction of dams a grave interference with nature. The same applies even to WIND ENERGY, with ``spoiling the landscape'' and ``noise from the wind parks'' as arguments. Nevertheless there is no doubt that the exploitation of wind energy at windy and remote spots is reasonable. The EU Commission supported the world's ®rst o-shore wind farm in Denmark (4.4 MW) and subsequently three o-shore projects in the Netherlands (2 MW), the UK (1.5 MW) and Sweden (2.5 MW). At the end of 1995, the total installed wind power capacity was 5000 MW, a market volume Ð in money terms Ð worth about USD 1.5 billion. BIOMASS has long been used in the energy supply systems in many countries. The Nordic countries, especially Sweden and Finland, have a long established
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industrial sector around biomass. And take India, where the most popular heating material is cow dung. Now, while it is possible to transport, for example, liquid fuels from biomass, this transportation is expensive. As a EU conference two years ago in Brussels stated, it is by no means sure that biomass can be introduced on a larger scale in the near future. It has, no doubt, a great potential but existing technologies will have to be improved and their viability demonstrated. Environmental constraints are e.g. over-fertilization and mono-cultures. The biggest potential of all new renewable energies is most probably SOLAR ENERGY Ð especially in sunny countries where it could take over, after the exhaustion of oil and natural gas reserves, the tasks of these fuels. The principal environmental constraint is the need for extensive spaces, but the world has many deserts. A variety of applications for photovoltanic solar energy (PV) has been demonstrated by the EU's JOULE-THERMIE programs: building integration, central power plants, rural electri®cation, and professional systems such as PV pumps in remote areas, PV powered airport landing and lighting systems, navigation signals, and even PV powered boats. The costs of PV power generators have fallen by more than 60% during the last 5 years, largely through reductions in the costs of the system components other than the PV modules though these too are continuing to come down. Project design and installation costs have also fallen during this period as the installers have become more experienced. By the production start of British Petroleum's ``Apollo'' plant in Fair®eld, California has become the leading producer of PV panels in the World. BP SOLAR, which is strongly supported by US Vice President Al Gore, envisages long-term a capacity of producing 40 MW/year which would be a third of world production. Nevertheless, the president of the Californian Energy Commission (CEC), William Keese, showed himself cautious: ``Since renewables will remain more expensive than conventional sources of energy, either they con®ne themselves to a market niche or they have to ®nd investors. However, without the perspective of an important sales volume, an enterprise would be little inclined to invest.'' Summarizing the renewals, it is worth mentioning that an EU-sponsored conference on renewable energies held on the Canaries Islands at the beginning of this year (1988) showed the marked absence of the principal European electricity producers. This means, they are still very dubious of the economic consequences and the very important investments which the development of these energies necessitate. The ``Financial Times'' labelled the meeting ``Energy quest yields hot air''. . . When I said at the beginning of my presentation that, in future, energies will have to be as ``clean'' as technically possible and as economically viable, I was of course referring to real pollutants. Now, the world has been bombarded since the Rio Conference in 1992 with horror scenarios about the ``devastating'' in¯uence of CO2 on the climate, caused by the fossil fuels, ®rst of all by coal and oil. I fully understand that the competitors of fossil fuels welcome this campaign with joy Ð but science has to be impartial. And I can give you the names of more than 500 eminent scientists from all over the world, including more than 70 Nobel prize winners, who have protested vehemently and are vigorously protesting against ``pseudo-scienti®c arguments or false and non-relevant data''. It is alleged that all
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assertions of the ``global warming'' theory have been scienti®cally refuted. The highest, most competent and absolutely neutral energy body in the world, the World Energy Council (WEC), condemned in 1996 the IPCC recommendations as ``based on shaky evidence, could damage economic growth, de®cient and of little value to policymakers, unrealistic and in¯uenced by academics seeking to attract funding for their work''. It is an absolute scandal that these protests have been hushed up and these warnings remained unheard by the driving forces behind the anti-CO2 campaign: tax-greedy governments, politicians believing that ``climate protection'' would bring them votes, misinformed environmental organisations, and ideologists wanting another society. The only ``scienti®c'' argument of the ``global warming''-``experts'', some of them having warned only 10 years ago of a ``new ice age'' (!), is the sybillinic phrase in the 1996 IPCC assessment: ``The balance of evidence suggests a discernable human in¯uence on climate''. However, at the same time, at the World Energy Conference in Tokyo, IPCC Chairman Professor Bert Bolin admitted on record: ``We have no evidence.'' Now, what worth is the ``balance of evidence'' if there is no evidence at all? In fact, accurate satellite measurements prove that there was 0 C warming Ð and many scientists even predict a slight cooling for the foreseeable future. But the arguments of the CO2-witchhunters are ridiculous from the beginning to the very end: CO2 is not a pollutant and certainly not a ``climate killer''. On the contrary, it is a vital ``greenhouse'' gas because without it the world would have an average temperature of about ÿ20 C and there would be no life on our planet. We emit CO2 with every breath and we drink CO2 with every sip of beer, Coke and all other carbonated drinks. If CO2 was dangerous, mankind would have been extinct long since. Also what about the expected stronger concentrations of CO2? They will be bene®cial because CO2 stimulates plant growth, leading to up to 40% more harvests, helping thus to combat hunger in the world. Anthropogenic CO2 emissions only represent a tiny 4% of all CO2 present in the atmosphere. Should we succeed Ð with a huge eort, at a cost of thousands of billions of dollars, and unpredictable consequences for our economies and jobs Ð in lowering this 4% by say 25% (that is the 3 to 5 fold of the Kyoto targets), the result would be a 3% human share of total CO2. So what? Is this supposed to prevent a climate disaster?! Predictions of what will happen with our climate in 100 years are ridiculous. We cannot even predict the weather of the next week with certainty. In the history of our planet, there have always been disasters and deluges. However, massive burning of fossil fuels, which is being attacked as root of all evil, started only with the industrial revolution, that is 150 years ago! And what caused the disasters before? Even the IPCC declares that ``global warming'' can only be combated by global eorts. A national or regional go-alone with CO2-restrictions would therefore be absolutely useless if a major CO2 ``producer'' such as China declines to sign the Climate Convention. More than 80% of world's energy needs are covered by fossil fuels today and will continue to be covered in the foreseeable future. This means we shall continue to rely on fossil fuels if we wish to retain the standard of our civilisation and to improve that of developing countries.
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If the alleged warming of the atmosphere should come, it would have a very welcome side-eect: energy saving for heat production and preservation of our energy resources. The Kyoto agreement would require, in the USA, a one-third reduction in energy use to meet its initial goals, with further reductions required after. According to the Western Energy Fuels Association, this would mean an estimated loss in the United States of USD 227 billion in gross domestic product by AD 2010, cuts in household income of USD 2000 annually, and losses of 1.8 million to two million jobs. It passed deliberately unnoticed that the IPCC lowered Ð under the pressure of world science Ð their latest forecast (dated autumn 1996) of a ``global warming'' from 8 C (which sparked o Rio) to 2 C to be expected in the next 100 years. As a practical example of the eect of such warming, Britons would then have a mild Mediterranean climate and Scandinavians today's British climate. Is this a ``climatic disaster''? The ``aected'' populations would rejoice! We had 2 C rise in Roman times and at that time the present deserts of North Africa were the granary of the Roman Empire. Even in hot countries, more CO2 will be only bene®cial since CO2 does not cause deserti®cation but rather humid heat, more clouds and more precipitation (as in tropical rain forests). And last but not least: environmental protection is, of course, a very laudable aim Ð ``protection of the climate'', however is nonsense. To claim to be able to in¯uence our climate, is foolish arrogance. Man can do absolutely nothing against the forces of nature (earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, ¯oods, hurricanes, etc. Ð and likewise the climate). It took an earthquake of only a few seconds to destroy the world's most modern city, Kobe in Japan. And a heavy snowfall of a few hours can paralyse a metropolis like New York. Ideology According to the wishes of the ideologists among the driving forces behind the anti-CO2 campaign, the global economy is to be completely ``reorganised'' and ``naturally'' we are to change our own lifestyle and those of future generations. In their opinion, a redistribution (of the communist type) should take place between ``poor'' and ``rich''. The ``rich'' should ``restrict their consumption'' and maintain it at a lower level. This is just terrorising public opinion and leads to the stulti®cation of the masses by means of deliberate lies. The ``restricted consumption'' that is called for means reduced production and less pro®t for the companies, a cut in wages, salaries, and thus purchasing power for workers and employees, and millions more unemployed Ð in short, less quality-of-life for all. Transgressions against the market economy Moreover, the so eagerly praised policy contravenes every principle of the free market economy:
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. The supposed ``non-CO2 emitting'' energies are to be made competitive by means of huge subsidies Ð which is a clear distortion of competition by the government. . Whereas companies' costs are to be kept low in the interest of the general price level (and price discipline is preached by governments), the demanded CO2 tax would not only cause energy prices to increase, but also those of all products and services. The result would be in¯ation, inability to compete with other countries and economic crises. . Instead of thrifty budget planning, the anti-CO2 governments complaining about ®nancial crises continue to squander vast amounts of taxpayers' money on senseless ``climate summit meetings'' and ``climate protection'' organisations. . The trend which has been proven to be suitable for years aims to reduce government intervention in the economy drastically. Now precisely the opposite is to be practised. Intervention of public bodies into every sphere of life and supervision of CO2 emissions by a global police. A Kafkaesque horror vision!
I would now like to conclude, ladies and gentlemen. All support for ``clean'' energy! But let us stop the silly talk about CO2 being dangerous for the climate. Firstly, ``CO2 free'' energy does not exist. And secondly, CO2 is vital and bene®cial. It is part of our lives.
References [1] European Commission, DG XVII. THERMIE Ð Solid fuels technology projects, 1996. [2] European Commission, DG XVII. THERMIE Ð Coal can be green. (undated). [3] European Commission, DG XVII. THERMIE Ð Photovoltaic solar energy, and ALTENER Ð Photovoltaics in 2010. [4] European Commission, DG XVII. Proceedings of the Conference on Improving Market Penetration for New Energy Technologies, 1996. [5] European Commission/NOVEM/Delft University. Proceedings of the International Under-ground Coal Gasi®cation Symposium, 1989. [6] International Energy Agency. Renewable energy policy in IEA countries. (undated). [7] EUROGAS: A cleaner energy for a greener europe, and climate change: the case for gas. (undated) [8] European Petroleum Industry Association (EUROPIA). Activity Report, 1996. [9] World Coal Institute. Power for progress. The economic implications of international climate change policy. [10] World Council of Power Utilities. Proceedings of the International Conference on Green Power Ð the Need for the 21st Century, 1997. [11] FORATOM. Nuclear energy helps avoid climate change. (undated)
www.elsevier.com/locate/apenergy
All future energy will have to be ``clean''$ Peter E. Doerell* ICL Sprl, Rue Capouillet 19/21, Box 1, B-1060 Brussels, Belgium
Of the three key postulates of any energy policy Ð safety of supply, low cost, environmental acceptability Ð the ®rst one is the most important. Energy is the lifeblood of a modern industrial society and an energy shortage can be very costly. However, with growing environmental awareness throughout the world, future energy will have to be as ``clean'' as technically possible and economically viable. Now what have the dierent energy industries done and what are they doing to ful®l this prerequisite? I shall start with OIL. We have the pleasure to be in Bahrain, and oil has been the world's no. 1 energy source for many years and will remain a principal source of energy for the foreseeable future. Demand for oil is projected to grow at a rate slightly less than 2% per year in real terms. Currently excess production capacity is within 2 million BOPD (Barrels of oil per day of demand, and supply will probably continue to exceed demand until 2005. By 2010, demand could outstrip production by as much as 11 million BOPD. However, since there is no replacement for petroleum in applications such as lubricants, cleansers, petrochemicals, fertilizers, cosmetics, food industry, synthetic rubber, road paving, and the like, oil's derivatives and products will continue to enjoy a prominent role in our daily lives. The most spectacular events which, environmentally, are most damaging for the oil industry's reputation, are, of course, tanker disasters polluting the ocean. Now, very often the responsible parties sail under ¯ags of convenience and international regulation will be required to enforce strict observance of all pertinent rules as well as better training of the crews. Another measure, to make sea transport of oil environmentally safer, is to reinforce the hulls of the tankers. Furthermore, oil dumping into the sea must be punished more severely. And it is in the oil industry's own interest that the safety and stability of oil rigs is constantly improved, that leaks in pipelines are minimised, and that pollution from re®neries is reduced to a minimum. Besides, EU Commissioner for the Environment, Mrs. Ritt Bjerregaard,
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The views expressed are those of the author. * Tel.: +32-2536-8682; fax: +32-2536-8600.
0306-2619/99/$ - see front matter # 1999 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved. PII: S0306-2619(99)00061-6
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envisages the prohibition of the sinking of ex-service rigs in the oceans. The 600 oil and natural gas rigs in the EU seas should in future be scrapped and disposed of on shore. The World Energy Council (WEC) last year published a comprehensive transport study. Its projection for the global transport sector suggests a near doubling of the energy consumption by 2020, accounting for half of the increase in world oil demand. This strong growth in transport activity, and the resulting increase in energy demand, will inevitably translate into detrimental eects on the environment. However, the scope for achieving a signi®cant departure from current trends by 2020 is limited Ð due to constraints imposed by social and political acceptability, technological feasability and economics. Mobility serves a wide range of social and economic needs; its absence con¯icts with deeply felt aspirations; its contraction is liable to arouse hostility. Simultaneously, there is widespread public demand for an improved environment in terms of emission reductions and curbed infrastructural development, the likely costs and implied mobility restrictions of which may not be considered. Policy makers have the dicult task of seeking to balance those pressures in the interests of sustainable development. From a global perspective, the greatest growth in emissions over the next two decades is expected to occur in rapidly developing countries, where little has been done so far to control motor vehicle emissions. In general, measures are needed to tackle vehicle use and rapidly expanding road trac. It is anticipated that a mix of tougher regulation, tightening standards, and economic instruments will be required. Reducing pollutants in oil products like gasoline and diesel is a challenge for the industry's chemists. If you think of the heavily polluted metropolises of Asia or Latin America, there is obviously still a lot to do. In the European Community in 1996, EUROPIA, the European Petroleum Industry Association, promoted an approach which sets speci®c emission reduction targets, according to each country's environment and contributing sources. In the Liquid Sulphur Framework Directive (LSFD), the European Commission attempts to implement tight and uniform sulphur limits across the EU, while EUROPIA consistently advocates an approach for the revision of the Large Combustion Plant Directive (LCPD). According to EUROPIA, emissions (of SO2, NOx and dust) should be reduced the ``rational'' way with country-speci®c measures to ensure the attainment of overall national reduction goals at the least cost to society. In any case, increasingly, severe regulation and voluntary eorts have already shown positive results in the Western World. Take polluted Los Angeles, USA, as an example. In their 1997 report, the ``South Coast Air Quality Management District'' (AQMD) stated that L.A.'s air today is cleaner than in the last 50 years. COAL Ð about 40% of all world electricity is generated from coal. To meet forecasted electricity demand till 2020, 1000 MW of capacity will have to be built every week throughout the world Ð at least 40% based on coal. Coal is by far the most important single electricity source in the world and, according to all reliable forecasts, it will retain this lead in the foreseeable future. Coal's reserves are plentiful, coal supply is safe, and coal is low-priced. In Asia e.g. coal's share of total Asian electricity production grew from 26% in 1980 to 42% in 1992, and is projected to rise to some 54% in 2010.
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But what about the environmental impact of electricity generation from coal? Any human activity aects our environment to a greater or lesser degree. The coal and the power industries have invested and are investing billions of US dollars to make coal power ``green''. There are, above all, two huge programs: in the US, the ``clean Coal Technologies Program'', and in the European Community the ``Thermie'' program. The main features of these technologies are a drastic reduction of SO2 and NOx, emissions, higher eciency and fuel saving. The US Department of Energy (DOE) is developing these advanced clean coal technologies in unique government-industry partnerships. Successfully commercialised clean coal technologies, coupled with such concepts as coal extraction methods which minimise methane release will reverse the inaccurate negative image of coal and replace it with an up-dated public view of coal as an economic, stable, ecient and clean fuel of choice. In this vision, coal will become a fuel that improves the world's political stability by supplying reliable energy that can meet the growing needs of both industrialised and developing nations', declared Dr. David J. Ihirad, DOE's Deputy Assistant Secretary for International Energy Policy at the ``Energex `96'' Conference in Beijing, China. The US government has invested 165106 USD in 1995 in its CCT program, a ®gure which rose to about 358106 m USD last year. In the 2000±2010 time frame, the programme will allow NOx emissions and other air toxins from existing power plants to be reduced by 70±90% and a reduction of the US industry's annual electricity costs by 8±13109 USD. In the early 1980s, studies showed that the most which one could hope to achieve in terms of coal-to-electricity eciency was 38% Ð a small increase over the power industry's average of about 33±34%. Today, technologies demonstrated in the programme are already operating at an eciency of 42±43%. Coal is now to push for an eciency of 60% or higher whilst lowering electricity costs. In the category of power generation systems, the DOE goal is to demonstrate, by AD 2000, an advanced coal technology with 42% cycle eciency whilst controlling SO2, NOx, and particulates to one third of current standards. For AD 2010, it is predicting a 55% eciency demonstration. In the ``Development of liquid fuels from coal'' sector, the DOE will try to demonstrate by 2010 that advanced coal-re®nery techniques for clean, safe generation of fuels, chemicals and other products based on coal can compete at costs of 30 USD per barrel. Most clean coal-technologies (CCTs) concentrate on power generation from coal. An impressive array of technologies is already commercially viable, and a large number of others will become available in the near future, states the World Coal Institute. Pulverised fuel (PF) combustion is the most widely used method for burning coal for power generation. In PF combustion, coal is milled to a powder and blown into the boiler with air. As a powder, coal has a large surface area and burns well. The heat is used to produce superheated steam to drive turbines. The average net thermal-eciency of new plants is up to 40%. Most of the world's coal-®red electricity is produced using PF combustion systems. Emissions from PF combustion can be reduced by post-combustion CCTs. Electrostatic precipitators and/or fabric ®lters can remove more than 99% of ¯y ash from ¯ue gases. Flue gas desulphurisation (FGD) methods can remove more than
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90% of the oxides of sulphur (SO2) from ¯ue gases, and can convert it into gypsum for use in the building trade. Among the key CCTs for PF combustion designed to minimise the production of oxides of nitrogen (NOx) are low-NOx burners and reburning techniques. These modify the combustion process to reduce NOx emissions by up to 50%, and are being widely adopted as they can be installed into existing plants. Selective catalytic NOx reduction can achieve reductions of 80±90%. The principal CCTs are at present: advanced pulverised fuel (PF) combustion, ¯uidised-bed combustion (FBC), gasi®cation and integrated coal gasi®cation combined cycle (IGCC), and hybrid systems. In AD 1990, support for the demonstration of new, and particularly ``clean'' processes for the combustion and conversion of coal became part of the overall THERMIE programme, implemented by the European Community in that year. The THERMIE programme supports the development of ``clean'' uses of coal, lignite and peat in combustion to produce heat, power or electricity or in conversion to a gas or liquid (which, again, would be used to generate heat, power or electricity with the possible further application as a chemical feedstock). Work on the use, treatment or enhancement of the waste, particularly the solid residues, from the processing of solid fuel is also included. Several demonstration projects have worked satisfactorily, and three designs, all different in concept, are now ready for commercial use: the High Temperature Winkler gasi®er, designed by Rheinbraun AG, the BGL gasi®er, developed by British Gas and Lurgi, and the Koppers-Totzek process. The two newest and most ecient clean coal power projects are Gardanne in France and Puertollano in Spain. The transformation of coal into a ``clean'' and even more ecient power station fuel is well under way. A leading energy solution is cogeneration, that is the combined production of electricity and heat. Its advantages: clean and ecient, competitive, cost-eective, low emissions. In Europe, cogeneration now accounts for 9±10% of electricity production. According to the COGEN federation, EU-15 as a whole could reach a 30% cogeneration share of total electricity production by AD 2010. The estimated potential for the USA is 680 TWh by AD 2010, about 40% (280 TWh) is already in place, representing about 8% of total national power-production. In Japan, cogeneration has only developed a little up to now, but the future potential is considered to be great. An untapped clean and practically in®nite energy source would be created by a technological breakthrough in underground coal gasi®cation. In the Earth's crust there are coal reserves which were estimated by the World Energy Council to be 44,600 billion tons. These reserves cannot be economically exploited with today's conventional mining methods but possibly could be with the techniques of the oil and natural gas industries. Present total world energy need is about 14 billion tons a year. The exploitation of the above coal resources could, therefore cover mankind's total energy requirements for 3200 years! NATURAL GAS occupies an increasingly predominant place in satisfying the world's fuel requirements. Its intrinsic qualities, combined with its abundant reserves, confer a major role on it in all power demand forecast scenarios, in particular due to electricity production. While, still only a few years ago, the use of this ``premium fuel''
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was prohibited in the EU power stations, there is a rush for natural gas electricity generation today. The principal reason for it is the fact that natural gas' CO2 emissions are the lowest of the fossil fuels. Natural gas is also plentiful. Although demand for it is growing, known reserves have been growing faster and will be adequate for many decades to come. The supply and use of natural gas have considerable environmental bene®ts. Natural gas combustion yields no SO2 emissions at all and fewer NOx emissions than other fossil fuels per unit of energy. The use of natural gas can contribute to the improvement of urban air quality and the ®ght against acid deposition. According to the European natural gas federation, EUROGAS, natural gas is also able to make a major contribution to curbing the potential enhancement of the natural ``greenhouse eect''. Important reasons for the renewed interest in natural gas for power generation are: . the development of high-eciency gas-®red combined cycle gas turbines (CCGT); . considerably lower environmental impact oered by gas-®red power generation than by other fossil fuels; . long-term availability of increasingly large natural gas reserves; and . CCGT plants can be built relatively quickly and at a relatively low cost of investment. The CCGT technology is the most ecient fossil-fuel based technology commercially available for electricity generation. The attraction of this new thermodynamic cycle technology resides in its ability to capture heat which would otherwise have been wasted and using it to generate additional electricity. The environmental advantages of natural gas obviously also apply to its use in the industrial and residential markets and, potentially, in the future transport sector. The world's natural gas industry declares itself to be very conscious of its responsibilities to optimise the inherent advantages of its fuel. It is con®dent that it will sustain the competitive expansion of natural gas in the energy market well into the future and thus continue to provide ``a cleaner energy for a greener world''. NUCLEAR ENERGY has massively entered the international energy scene during the two oil-price crises, when people were anxiously looking for alternative energy sources. This appearance was facilitated by the assertions of it being ``safe, in®nite, low-cost and environmentally friendly'' and led to very considerable market shares in several countries. However, practical experience with ever increasing costs (because of ever more stringent safety impositions) and a multitude of incidents, in particular the Chernobyl disaster, undermined public con®dence in this technology. As a result, with few exceptions, no new nuclear plants are being built or planned, and the industry is ®ghting for survival. In this situation, the ``global warming'' theory came as a god-send and the nuclear lobby is proposing ``CO2-free'' atomic energy as the ideal solution for avoiding the announced ``climate disaster''. Now, quite apart from the alleged dangers of CO2, this gas is emitted in uranium ore mining, uranium transportation and processing, and also during the construction of nuclear power stations. In any case, the response
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to the very considerable eorts in Kyoto to change public reservations was very poor. The environment protection organisations despise atomic power even more than fossil fuels. And they consider it, after Chernobyl, ridiculous to label an energy source of which one single core-melting can contaminate many hundreds of square kilometres for years with radioactivity as ``environmentally friendly''. Apart from the dangers from the operation of nuclear power plants, especially of the former Soviet make, it is the unsolved Ð and, apparently unsolvable Ð problem of nuclear waste which is the Achilles heel of this industry. In France alone, 43,000 cubic metres of radioactive waste are produced every year, 200 cubic metres of which has a very high radioactivity. Refuse, of low radioactivity, needs about 300 years to become safe: high-radioactive waste needs 1000 to 100,000 years. Burying the waste in salt domes or dumping it into the deep sea seem to be doubtful methods, and propositions like shooting it to the Moon show the desperate eorts to get rid of the ever-increasing residues. One should gladly attest that the nuclear energy producers are doing their best to constantly improve the safety of their operations. So there exists, for example, in France the Institut de Protection et de SuÃrete Nucleare (IPSN) which has just signed an agreement with its Chinese counterpart CIRP to develop measures to protect man against the radiological consequences of a nuclear accident or simply nuclear operations. But most prognostications are sceptical concerning the future development of atomic ®ssion. Nuclear fusion is still on the drawing-board and experience so far is not very encouraging, though a lea¯et of EU Commission's fusion research project JET (Joint European Torus) proudly declares: ``A new and almost limitless source of energy with no environment damage from `greenhouse' gases or acid rain will be the reward for the successful harnessing of nuclear fusion for power generation. Nuclear fusion would be inherently very safe since any malfunction automatically leads to shutdown.'' The on-going anti-CO2 campaign has provoked a cry for RENEWABLE ENERGIES. Their promoters point to improved energy security and diversity, reduced emissions of ``greenhouse'' gases and pollutants such as SOx and NOx, and increased levels of technological exports. Nevertheless, the World Energy Council (WEC) and the International Energy Agency (IEA) believe that Ð in spite of very heavy subsidies Ð only between 5 and 7% of global energy requirements can be met by wind power, photo-voltaic (solar energy) and the other renewable energy sources in the foreseeable future. At present these account for 2%. The potential of HYDRO-POWER is already widely exploited. Besides, environmentalists consider the construction of dams a grave interference with nature. The same applies even to WIND ENERGY, with ``spoiling the landscape'' and ``noise from the wind parks'' as arguments. Nevertheless there is no doubt that the exploitation of wind energy at windy and remote spots is reasonable. The EU Commission supported the world's ®rst o-shore wind farm in Denmark (4.4 MW) and subsequently three o-shore projects in the Netherlands (2 MW), the UK (1.5 MW) and Sweden (2.5 MW). At the end of 1995, the total installed wind power capacity was 5000 MW, a market volume Ð in money terms Ð worth about USD 1.5 billion. BIOMASS has long been used in the energy supply systems in many countries. The Nordic countries, especially Sweden and Finland, have a long established
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industrial sector around biomass. And take India, where the most popular heating material is cow dung. Now, while it is possible to transport, for example, liquid fuels from biomass, this transportation is expensive. As a EU conference two years ago in Brussels stated, it is by no means sure that biomass can be introduced on a larger scale in the near future. It has, no doubt, a great potential but existing technologies will have to be improved and their viability demonstrated. Environmental constraints are e.g. over-fertilization and mono-cultures. The biggest potential of all new renewable energies is most probably SOLAR ENERGY Ð especially in sunny countries where it could take over, after the exhaustion of oil and natural gas reserves, the tasks of these fuels. The principal environmental constraint is the need for extensive spaces, but the world has many deserts. A variety of applications for photovoltanic solar energy (PV) has been demonstrated by the EU's JOULE-THERMIE programs: building integration, central power plants, rural electri®cation, and professional systems such as PV pumps in remote areas, PV powered airport landing and lighting systems, navigation signals, and even PV powered boats. The costs of PV power generators have fallen by more than 60% during the last 5 years, largely through reductions in the costs of the system components other than the PV modules though these too are continuing to come down. Project design and installation costs have also fallen during this period as the installers have become more experienced. By the production start of British Petroleum's ``Apollo'' plant in Fair®eld, California has become the leading producer of PV panels in the World. BP SOLAR, which is strongly supported by US Vice President Al Gore, envisages long-term a capacity of producing 40 MW/year which would be a third of world production. Nevertheless, the president of the Californian Energy Commission (CEC), William Keese, showed himself cautious: ``Since renewables will remain more expensive than conventional sources of energy, either they con®ne themselves to a market niche or they have to ®nd investors. However, without the perspective of an important sales volume, an enterprise would be little inclined to invest.'' Summarizing the renewals, it is worth mentioning that an EU-sponsored conference on renewable energies held on the Canaries Islands at the beginning of this year (1988) showed the marked absence of the principal European electricity producers. This means, they are still very dubious of the economic consequences and the very important investments which the development of these energies necessitate. The ``Financial Times'' labelled the meeting ``Energy quest yields hot air''. . . When I said at the beginning of my presentation that, in future, energies will have to be as ``clean'' as technically possible and as economically viable, I was of course referring to real pollutants. Now, the world has been bombarded since the Rio Conference in 1992 with horror scenarios about the ``devastating'' in¯uence of CO2 on the climate, caused by the fossil fuels, ®rst of all by coal and oil. I fully understand that the competitors of fossil fuels welcome this campaign with joy Ð but science has to be impartial. And I can give you the names of more than 500 eminent scientists from all over the world, including more than 70 Nobel prize winners, who have protested vehemently and are vigorously protesting against ``pseudo-scienti®c arguments or false and non-relevant data''. It is alleged that all
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assertions of the ``global warming'' theory have been scienti®cally refuted. The highest, most competent and absolutely neutral energy body in the world, the World Energy Council (WEC), condemned in 1996 the IPCC recommendations as ``based on shaky evidence, could damage economic growth, de®cient and of little value to policymakers, unrealistic and in¯uenced by academics seeking to attract funding for their work''. It is an absolute scandal that these protests have been hushed up and these warnings remained unheard by the driving forces behind the anti-CO2 campaign: tax-greedy governments, politicians believing that ``climate protection'' would bring them votes, misinformed environmental organisations, and ideologists wanting another society. The only ``scienti®c'' argument of the ``global warming''-``experts'', some of them having warned only 10 years ago of a ``new ice age'' (!), is the sybillinic phrase in the 1996 IPCC assessment: ``The balance of evidence suggests a discernable human in¯uence on climate''. However, at the same time, at the World Energy Conference in Tokyo, IPCC Chairman Professor Bert Bolin admitted on record: ``We have no evidence.'' Now, what worth is the ``balance of evidence'' if there is no evidence at all? In fact, accurate satellite measurements prove that there was 0 C warming Ð and many scientists even predict a slight cooling for the foreseeable future. But the arguments of the CO2-witchhunters are ridiculous from the beginning to the very end: CO2 is not a pollutant and certainly not a ``climate killer''. On the contrary, it is a vital ``greenhouse'' gas because without it the world would have an average temperature of about ÿ20 C and there would be no life on our planet. We emit CO2 with every breath and we drink CO2 with every sip of beer, Coke and all other carbonated drinks. If CO2 was dangerous, mankind would have been extinct long since. Also what about the expected stronger concentrations of CO2? They will be bene®cial because CO2 stimulates plant growth, leading to up to 40% more harvests, helping thus to combat hunger in the world. Anthropogenic CO2 emissions only represent a tiny 4% of all CO2 present in the atmosphere. Should we succeed Ð with a huge eort, at a cost of thousands of billions of dollars, and unpredictable consequences for our economies and jobs Ð in lowering this 4% by say 25% (that is the 3 to 5 fold of the Kyoto targets), the result would be a 3% human share of total CO2. So what? Is this supposed to prevent a climate disaster?! Predictions of what will happen with our climate in 100 years are ridiculous. We cannot even predict the weather of the next week with certainty. In the history of our planet, there have always been disasters and deluges. However, massive burning of fossil fuels, which is being attacked as root of all evil, started only with the industrial revolution, that is 150 years ago! And what caused the disasters before? Even the IPCC declares that ``global warming'' can only be combated by global eorts. A national or regional go-alone with CO2-restrictions would therefore be absolutely useless if a major CO2 ``producer'' such as China declines to sign the Climate Convention. More than 80% of world's energy needs are covered by fossil fuels today and will continue to be covered in the foreseeable future. This means we shall continue to rely on fossil fuels if we wish to retain the standard of our civilisation and to improve that of developing countries.
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If the alleged warming of the atmosphere should come, it would have a very welcome side-eect: energy saving for heat production and preservation of our energy resources. The Kyoto agreement would require, in the USA, a one-third reduction in energy use to meet its initial goals, with further reductions required after. According to the Western Energy Fuels Association, this would mean an estimated loss in the United States of USD 227 billion in gross domestic product by AD 2010, cuts in household income of USD 2000 annually, and losses of 1.8 million to two million jobs. It passed deliberately unnoticed that the IPCC lowered Ð under the pressure of world science Ð their latest forecast (dated autumn 1996) of a ``global warming'' from 8 C (which sparked o Rio) to 2 C to be expected in the next 100 years. As a practical example of the eect of such warming, Britons would then have a mild Mediterranean climate and Scandinavians today's British climate. Is this a ``climatic disaster''? The ``aected'' populations would rejoice! We had 2 C rise in Roman times and at that time the present deserts of North Africa were the granary of the Roman Empire. Even in hot countries, more CO2 will be only bene®cial since CO2 does not cause deserti®cation but rather humid heat, more clouds and more precipitation (as in tropical rain forests). And last but not least: environmental protection is, of course, a very laudable aim Ð ``protection of the climate'', however is nonsense. To claim to be able to in¯uence our climate, is foolish arrogance. Man can do absolutely nothing against the forces of nature (earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, ¯oods, hurricanes, etc. Ð and likewise the climate). It took an earthquake of only a few seconds to destroy the world's most modern city, Kobe in Japan. And a heavy snowfall of a few hours can paralyse a metropolis like New York. Ideology According to the wishes of the ideologists among the driving forces behind the anti-CO2 campaign, the global economy is to be completely ``reorganised'' and ``naturally'' we are to change our own lifestyle and those of future generations. In their opinion, a redistribution (of the communist type) should take place between ``poor'' and ``rich''. The ``rich'' should ``restrict their consumption'' and maintain it at a lower level. This is just terrorising public opinion and leads to the stulti®cation of the masses by means of deliberate lies. The ``restricted consumption'' that is called for means reduced production and less pro®t for the companies, a cut in wages, salaries, and thus purchasing power for workers and employees, and millions more unemployed Ð in short, less quality-of-life for all. Transgressions against the market economy Moreover, the so eagerly praised policy contravenes every principle of the free market economy:
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. The supposed ``non-CO2 emitting'' energies are to be made competitive by means of huge subsidies Ð which is a clear distortion of competition by the government. . Whereas companies' costs are to be kept low in the interest of the general price level (and price discipline is preached by governments), the demanded CO2 tax would not only cause energy prices to increase, but also those of all products and services. The result would be in¯ation, inability to compete with other countries and economic crises. . Instead of thrifty budget planning, the anti-CO2 governments complaining about ®nancial crises continue to squander vast amounts of taxpayers' money on senseless ``climate summit meetings'' and ``climate protection'' organisations. . The trend which has been proven to be suitable for years aims to reduce government intervention in the economy drastically. Now precisely the opposite is to be practised. Intervention of public bodies into every sphere of life and supervision of CO2 emissions by a global police. A Kafkaesque horror vision!
I would now like to conclude, ladies and gentlemen. All support for ``clean'' energy! But let us stop the silly talk about CO2 being dangerous for the climate. Firstly, ``CO2 free'' energy does not exist. And secondly, CO2 is vital and bene®cial. It is part of our lives.
References [1] European Commission, DG XVII. THERMIE Ð Solid fuels technology projects, 1996. [2] European Commission, DG XVII. THERMIE Ð Coal can be green. (undated). [3] European Commission, DG XVII. THERMIE Ð Photovoltaic solar energy, and ALTENER Ð Photovoltaics in 2010. [4] European Commission, DG XVII. Proceedings of the Conference on Improving Market Penetration for New Energy Technologies, 1996. [5] European Commission/NOVEM/Delft University. Proceedings of the International Under-ground Coal Gasi®cation Symposium, 1989. [6] International Energy Agency. Renewable energy policy in IEA countries. (undated). [7] EUROGAS: A cleaner energy for a greener europe, and climate change: the case for gas. (undated) [8] European Petroleum Industry Association (EUROPIA). Activity Report, 1996. [9] World Coal Institute. Power for progress. The economic implications of international climate change policy. [10] World Council of Power Utilities. Proceedings of the International Conference on Green Power Ð the Need for the 21st Century, 1997. [11] FORATOM. Nuclear energy helps avoid climate change. (undated)