Sustainable Arlington

Wednesday 15

Caribbean Nations Partner with Global Superstars & Corporate Giants for $1 Billion Climate Accelerator

An impressive coalition made up of 26 Caribbean nations, more than 40 private sector giants, 8-time Olympic gold medal winner Usain Bolt, and global music superstar Sean Paul are combining to launch the $1 billion Caribbean Climate-Smart Accelerator intended to make the region the world’s first climate-smart zone. Announced late last week by what can only be called a cavalcade of stars and parade of nations, the Caribbean Climate-Smart Accelerator was launched with pomp and ceremony and attended by the Prime Minister of Jamaica Andrew Holness, President of the InterAmerican Development Bank Luis Alberto Moreno, Virgin Group Founder Sir Richard Branson, World Bank Vice President for Latin America and the Caribbean, Jorge Familiar, and 8-time Olympic Gold Medal Winner Usain Bolt. The Caribbean Climate-Smart Accelerator bills itself as bringing together “an unprecedented group of leaders to implement transformative climate action” throughout the Caribbean, stemming from a high-level commitment made at French President Macron’s One Planet Summit (which we covered at the time).  The Accelerator intends to work to make the Caribbean the world’s first climate-smart zone which will include the implementation of solutions for resilience, renewable energy, development of sustainable cities, oceans, and transportation.  Beyond simply protecting the Caribbean region, the climate-smart zone will aim to create jobs and a new economy. “Being climate-smart means putting the people of the Caribbean at the center of all we do – to protect them from the challenges of climate change,” explained Prime Minister of Jamaica, Andrew Holness.  “The Caribbean Accelerator will also encourage[…]

VW's Electrify America Taps Flintstones, Jetsons for EV Campaign

Volkswagen AG unit Electrify America said on Monday it is launching a national advertising campaign using cultural U.S. cartoon icons the Flintstones and Jetsons in a bid to broaden consumer awareness of electric vehicles. The campaign here is part of $45 million public education program and includes a television commercial called "JetStones," which features General Motors Co's fully-electric Chevy Bolt model and includes existing models from five other automakers. The aim of the “brand neutral” campaign is to raise awareness of existing EV models, emphasize their increasing range and that infrastructure exists to keep them fueled on America’s roads, said Richard Steinberg, Electrify America’s senior director of green cities and communications. “We’re trying to say with this campaign that electric vehicles are fun to drive, the range is great, and charging is more widely available than people know,” Steinberg said. VW has agreed to spend a total of $2 billion nationwide on clean car infrastructure as part of an agreement with federal regulators after admitting to diesel emissions cheating.  This campaign, focused heavily on major U.S. cities, is part of that commitment....In the “JetStones,” an unshaven driver of an orange conventional internal combustion engine vehicle pulls up to a red light to the theme song of “The Flintstones,” a cartoon about a Stone Age family. A similar-colored Chevy Bolt pulls up with a dapper driver at the wheel to show music for “The Jetsons,” a cartoon about a futuristic family.  It pulls away at speed when the light turns green,[…]

The Technical and Economical Climate Solution

Even amongst global warming believers, there is a growing schism about how to address the warming problem. On the one hand, carbon pricing is widely seen as an efficient way to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, stimulate investments in low-carbon innovation, and create a sustainable economy. It was originally based on the free-market theory that if you tax something, you get less of it.  Without government regulation, the market will find the most efficient way to reduce carbon.   In every jurisdiction, however, where carbon pricing has been implemented, it increases regulation but even more problematically, the unconditional Intended Nationally Determined Contributions under the Paris Agreement is only consistent with an increase in temperature of 3.2°C by 2100.  Which as Ray Pierrehumbert, a physics professor at the University of Oxford has pointed out would see a significant drop in food production, an increase in urban heat waves akin to the one that killed thousands of people in India in 2015, and more droughts and wildfires. And to compound the issue, the free-marketeers don’t present a viable climate solution or at least one that is effective and publicly acceptable. As Schalk Cloete pointed out, “current technology-forcing policies imply that wind/solar power combined with battery electric vehicles represent our only viable energy future. . . .  Given the fundamental limitations of these technologies, this is a very dangerous notion.”...In the RealClimate piece, Ocean heat storage: a particularly lousy policy target + Update, Stefan Rahmstorf, Potsdam University, claims the basic ocean physics facts are:  (i)[…]

Electric Car Growth Produces Battery Shortages, Carmakers Can’t Match Production with Demand

Conventional car companies are in a quandary, where the only sources for batteries to compete with Tesla are companies like LG Chem, SK Innovation, CATL, and Samsung SDI, which are just beginning advanced NMC 811 production over the next year. It seems that only Tesla figured EVs would be successful this early and planned ahead to build a gigafactory to supply the vast amount of cells necessary to build the large numbers of electric cars consumers want.  Even Tesla has to expand its battery factory size and efficiency by 3× to fulfill demand for both storage and EV batteries.  The original plan was for 35 GWh for cars and 50 GWh total.  The updated plan is for about 100 GWh for cars and 150 GWh total. Tesla’s current rate of production of 75 kWh packs for the Model 3 is equivalent to 23–24 GWh annually.  This production level is expected to rise as Gigafactory 1 is completed. Read more at Electric Car Growth Produces Battery Shortages, Carmakers Can’t Match Production with Demand