North Carolina is well-positioned to take the lead on energy independence

[jpak]

http://www.citizen-times.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=200661117060

Lt. Gov. Beverly Perdue believes North Carolina could become the first state in America to be nearly energy independent.

<snip>

The state must also reduce energy consumption by retrofitting old buildings and requiring that new ones be LEED certified, meaning they pass the U.S. Green Building Council’s system for rating the environmental performance of buildings.

<snip>

Larry Shirley, Director of the State Energy Office talked about sustainable energy strategies for North Carolina that include the use of biodiesel, wind, solar and biomass, a resource the state has in abundance.

“We’re the Saudi Arabia of biomass,” he said.

<more>

[wishlist]

1. Is abundance of biomass euphemistic for all the pig poop in N. C.?

[jpak]

2. No - that's just a part of it

Forestry wastes and other agricultural wastes are the major players...

[Greatwildbeast]

3. Might be an improvement

At first glance it is hard for me to believe that North Carolina could put their collective minds together and do ANYTHING constructive to help the environment. It being the state of Jesse Helms that is.

I have some online friends from NC and they get really pissed when i say those kinds of things. And maybe they should.

However another aquaintance of mine is hard headed and dumb as a rock concerning all things political. Still thinks Dubya is a "Great World Leader"...

So expect there to be trouble getting the eco ball rolling in NC.

[BR_Parkway]

13. You'd be very surprised - there are some major blue pockets in

the state, in fact our Gov is a Dem, the state legislature has gone blue in both houses and we have more Dem House members now. And if either of our useless Senators (Burr & Dole) were up for re-elect in '06, I'm certain at least one of them would have been replaced with a Dem.

As for eco friendly, you should visit Boone or Asheville. Appalachian State Univ has a Sustainable Development program and an Appropriate Technologies program (http://www.energy.appstate.edu/) and are very helpful in working with us to design a Net Zero Energy B&B and winery that we're trying to build. Several of the students just got funded to develop a biodiesel production facility, collecting all the restaurant waste grease and converting it into home heating fuel for low income in the area. Also goes to fuel the citywide bus service which is free to all in the community.

The county is working to capture the methane produced by landfill operations to power some micro businesses.

The state energy office lobbied for and got some terrific tax credits for solar, wind, hydro, etc. On some of our project we're getting 45-65% back in tax credits which makes putting in $50K worth of solar hot water or $55K worth of windmill a pretty brain dead decision - my payback time will be under 2 years!

And the NC Solar Center has been around for a couple of decades.

[JohnWxy]

4. Twice as much feces as New YOrk, chicago and los angeles COMBINED

http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/science/jan-june04/pigs_6-3.html

North Carolina's ten million hogs produce twice as much feces and urine as the populations of the cities of Los Angeles, New York and Chicago combined. Industrial farms, most with thousands of hogs each, store the waste in open-air pits, called lagoons. They spray the waste, untreated, as manure on adjacent fields.


that's a lot of fuel - from waste!

[NickB79]

5. Don't count on biofuels from manure for long-term energy production

Factory farming is incredibly dependent on cheap fossil fuels and cheap grain. Both will not be with us much longer (longer being within the next decade). If either Peak Oil or significant climate change occurs, meat will be a luxury, and the amount of animal manure available for biofuel production will be non-existant. Far fewer livestock will be raised, and their manure will be plowed back into the fields to replace expensive fertilizer rather than converted to fuel.

[jpak]

6. Solid biogas residues retain the phosphorus, nitrogen and refractory carbon

content of the fresh manure - and it's excellent fertilizer.

Also, biogas plants can be scaled to serve all live stock or dairy operations - large and small.

It will be an integral part of farming long into the future.

[NickB79]

9. Biogas to power local farms, yes. Biogas for towns and cities, probably not

Once the overall volume of manure drops, large-scale operations will not be feasible except on a local level.

[jpak]

12. Three words

Sewage Treatment Plants

(with anaerobic methane digesters)

There are over 3000 sewage/biogas plants operating in Europe today...

Sweden operates 5000 vehicles on biogas today...

New York City sewage treatment plants produce 45 million cubic meters of biogas methane per year - most of which is flared and not currently used for heat or electricity...

http://www.clarke-energy.co.uk/clarke_energy/case-study-severn-trent-water.htm

http://www.clarke-energy.co.uk/clarke_energy/case-study-sandon-dock-wwtw.htm

http://www.clarke-energy.co.uk/clarke_energy/case-study-reading-wwtw.htm

http://www.clarke-energy.co.uk/clarke_energy/case-study-watercare.htm

http://brightsurf.com/news/headlines/13620/More_biogas_less_sludge.html

www.cumminspower.com/www/literature/casehistories/F-1631-CanaryIslandWasteTreatment.pdf

Seattle is using fuel cells to generate electricity from sewage biogas today...

http://www.forester.net/de_0511_fuel.html

http://www.grida.no/climate/ipcc_tar/wg3/121.htm

Also Landfill Methane...

US potential for additional landfill methane power capacity is 3-6 GW...(from the current 1.5 GW today).

[JohnWxy]

7. Yeah, we'll be subsisting on roots and tubers as in the stone age.

No other source of fuels other than fossil fuels:
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=115x73104#73267

[NickB79]

8. I'm not that much of a Doomer

Great-Depression-era repeat is what I see as more probable.

[JohnWxy]

11. Ahhh, I see. Too bad there won't be any substitutes for gasoline, not a chance. Yep, we're doomed.

[depakid]

10. Now this just cracks me up

North Carolina is one of THE most wasteful car dependent places that I've ever been. In the so called Research Triangle," for example you can't even get a bus from the airport! There's no mass transit at all to speak of- partly due to the fact that there's no responsible land use planning, either. It's just miles and miles of inefficient suburbs, strip malls and business parks. Worse, they're paving over prime farmland at an appalling rate.

I thought to myself there whole time I was there in September: man, this place has no future and I wouldn't want to be anywhere near there in the coming decades.

[ItsTheMediaStupid]

14. You could make that statement about most places in the USA

Car dependent - like every city in the US without good mass transit.

How many cities have good mass transit except NYC, Washington, DC and Chicago? San Francisco has BART, but it's not great. Most suburbs anywhere require a car for transportation.

Face it, the whole country sucks at mass transit. We have pig vomit capitalism to thank for that.

A GM/oil company consortium purchased the light rail systems in most cities in the US in the 1930's and systematically destroyed them to make money selling cars and gasoline.

The rail systems were replaced by buses, which aren't nearly as efficient or environmentally friendly.