Dec. 6, 2010
During the first week of the UN climate conference in Cancun, Erb Institute student Miguel Sossa helped a non-profit agency launch a sustainable-marketing campaign, ate lunch with like-minded students from across the world, observed as foreign dignitaries positioned their appeals, shook hands with a top UN official who replied "Go Blue!," and shared thoughts on the rice trade with an ambassador on his ride back to his hotel.
March 23, 2011
By Kevin Brown
The passage of health care reform “should free up the capabilities to forge climate change legislation,” President Barack Obama’s assistant for science and technology told a U-M audience Monday.
SPEAKER: Jennifer B. Dunn, Ph.D., Environmental Analyst, Argonne National Laboratory
TITLE: Investigating Potential Hot Spots in the Life Cycles of Biofuels and Electric Vehicles
Jennifer B. Dunn is an Environmental Analyst at Argonne National Laboratory. She investigates life cycle energy consumption and environmental impacts of advanced transportation and fuel technologies, including biofuels and battery-powered electric drive vehicles. Through this work, Jennifer contributes to the development of Argonne’s GREET (Greenhouse gases, Regulated Emissions, and Energy use in Transportation) software model for life-cycle analysis of advanced vehicle technologies and new fuels. At present, GREET has more than 20,000 registered users worldwide. Prior to joining Argonne, Jennifer led life cycle analysis projects in the United States for URS Corporation and supported mobile source emission reduction programs at the United States Environmental Protection Agency. She holds a Ph.D. in Chemical Engineering from the University of Michigan.
ABSTRACT: Two technologies that are proposed as part of the solution to reducing greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions from the transportation sector are biofuels and electric vehicles (EV). Both technologies have come under the microscope as to their long-term benefits. For example, the effect of increased biofuel feedstock production on land use world-wide has received a great deal of attention because of the potential carbon penalty should carbon-rich lands be transitioned to feedstock production. Further, some question whether the production EV batteries outweighs their lower carbon footprint during the use phase. We use life cycle analysis (LCA), a quantitative tool that holistically assesses the impacts, such as greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, of a technology over the course of its life cycle, to investigate these potential hot spots.
In the case of biofuel feedstock production-induced land use change, we have developed estimates of the changes in carbon stock that would occur should volumes of corn, corn stover, miscanthus, and switchgrass ethanol be produced to meet RFS2 targets. These estimates incorporate state-level, feedstock-specific emission factors, calculated with the CENTURY model, that reflect changes in soil organic carbon (SOC) from land transitions. Combined with factors for above-ground domestic carbon changes from the Carbon On-line Estimator database and international land-use change emission factors from Woods Hole, we have developed estimates of land-use change GHG emissions for cellulosic ethanol produced from these four feedstocks.
To determine the influence of battery production on overall EV life cycle GHG emissions and energy consumption, we have investigated the production of five different cathode materials that could be incorporated into lithium-ion batteries for all-electric vehicles and plug-in hybrid electric vehicles. The materials are lithium manganese oxide, lithium cobalt oxide, lithium iron phosphate, lithium nickel manganese cobalt oxide, and an advanced cathode material under development at Argonne. Results of this analysis indicated that battery production is not a major element of the GHG emissions of an EV over the course of its lifetime when a conventional electricity grid is used to charge the battery. Cathode materials that contain cobalt or nickel, however, do have a higher GHG and SOx impacts than materials that exclude those metals.
SPONSORS:
- Center for Sustainable Systems
- School of Natural Resources & Environment
- U.S.-China Clean Energy Center (CERC)
SS Forum - Phil Warburg
TITLE: Wind Power at a Crossroads: An American Technology’s Opportunities & Challenges
ABSTRACT: Once the domain of scrappy entrepreneurs and tree-hugging idealists, wind power is now firmly planted in mainstream America. Nine states today get 10 percent or more of their electricity from wind, and dozens of other states are quickly growing their reliance on this clean-energy resource. Philip Warburg, veteran environmental advocate and author of "Harvest the Wind", will look at the benefits that wind farms are bringing to legacy cities and cash-strapped rural communities. He will also describe some of the knotty environmental issues that threaten to stall the industry’s growth. His observations will draw extensively on his travels across America and his interviews with stakeholders including farmers, ranchers, biologists, community activists, and high-tech pioneers.
Biographical statement:
Philip Warburg is a seasoned environmental lawyer with roots going back to the 1970s. He was president of the Conservation Law Foundation, New England’s leading environmental advocacy group, from 2003 to 2009. Previously he directed the Israel Union for Environmental Defense in Tel Aviv and was an attorney at the Environmental Law Institute in Washington, DC. He has worked with governments and citizen groups on environmental initiatives in several Middle East nations and across Eastern Europe. He is a graduate of Harvard College and Harvard Law School. Further information can be found at http://philipwarburg.com.
SPONSORS:
Center for Sustainable Systems
School of Natural Resources and Environment