Managing stormwater is a huge challenge, and climate change isn't making it any easier. If you've ever been to a wastewater plant, you've probably heard about some of the bonkers challenges that excess stormwater can cause.
In today's edn of "You did what in Excel??": new tool!
Just got notification that our first paper on the cost model we built for @iDST_Team was accepted, so I wanted to do a little thread on the model.
Basic point: distributed stormwater infrastructure (like swales) can help a lot. But it's really hard to tell how much it costs.
Big issue: people can be hesitant to commit to infra like bioswales, raingardens, and porous pavements if they don't have a good idea of how it will perform.
Doubly true when 1) using public money for 2) safety-critical infrastructure that 3) replaces something they understand
"I know the pipes + wastewater treatment plant approach fails sometimes, but it works / fails in predictable ways, and no one will judge me too harshly if I do what we usually do"
[should that be true? different convo]
"I don't really know how a rain garden is going to do in my climate, my soils, my city.
And I extra don't know how much it will cost over the decades it will be in place, especially if this is the first one I'm installing."
I built the French drain for my last house myself.
I have very little recollection of how much it cost or how long it took. That's tricky bc now the next person has very little go on.
We need some way to estimate costs across v different situations.
We put together a life cycle cost tool for 16 classes of distributed stormwater control measures (SCMs), looking at grayer (e.g., above ground storage tanks) to greener (e.g., bioswales) approaches in the US.
We use a bottom up quantity estimation approach to calculate how much each SCM will cost over its whole life cycle, which means there's a cost database (high, medium, low) embedded, plus neat features like the ability to regionalize and escalate costs.
Yes! It's in Excel. Also a true model, though: estimates update when you change the assumed size of the SCM in question, there's a ton of scenario analysis built in, etc.
We also estimate and calculate monetized environmental impact -- ping if you want to discuss that decision.
Ultimately this will integrate with the full release of the @iDST_Team decision support tool, with tons of hydrologic detail and all that good stuff as well.
For now: download! Use! Really proud of this work + my student Jenna Krieger. Hope it's helpful!
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Ok I’m going to live my dream: a living thread of Google reviews of power plants. These are hilarious to me because they are completely unsolicited and often rule. Will post as the spirit moves me…kicking off with —
On the occasion of the @IPCC_CH Synthesis Report (coincidentally!) -- if you'd like to spend 8 minutes with me on a journey about fossil phaseout & why we need to plan it carefully & righteously (#midtransition), have I ever got a TED talk for you.
Fossil fuels support ~80% of commercial energy consumption, which means we have an enormous amount of stuff to retire over the next couple of decades, while simultaneously building a replacement system /and/ dealing with worsening climate change effects.
🚨new paper🚨 on the water consumption of electrolytic hydrogen 🫧 that I have literally been working on since before modern hydraulic fracturing was a thing
Under deep decarb electrolytic H2 could consume ~15% of today's water for energy
Big headlines: 1) a lot of processes we think we might need for deep decarb (sustainable aviation fuels, various kinds of CDR, hydrogen) might use a LOT of water
(and electrolytic hydrogen is probably on the low end for water intensity of proposed ways to make hydrogen)
2) decarbonization also dewaters the grid (see doi.org/10.1016/j.jhyd…) so we should think about both what the water needs are /now/ and what they would be for a mature industry
this new piece uses NZA and ZCAP scenarios for both H2 production & grid mix projections
As many of you know I'm obsessed with physical infrastructure & want to invite you on this journey re: fossil fuel supply chains in a decarb'd future with me.
Basically: examine claims of future small fossil use critically. A lot of these systems have minimum viable scale.
The ("the") neat thing about flow renewables like wind & solar is that they do fuel harvesting & conversion at the same place, with the same equipment.
Not so for fueled systems (e.g., fossil). You need multiple industries, mostly private in the US, to keep operating.
If I have one wind turbine I can just run it or not (ofc there are construction supply chains -- but I'm talking once it's built). If I have one gas plant I need a gas well, a processing plant, pipelines, safety inspectors, reservoir engineers, educational infrastructure...
Re: CCS in the IRA 1) emissions cuts model suggests ~1b tons of CO2 sequestered 2024-2031 due to IRA 2) Senate finance committee suggests ~0.04b tons of CO2 claiming 45Q credit 2022-2031 (0.05b if it's all tied to EOR, or 0.3b if EOR & no multiplier)
These cannot both be true.
Plus, the lack of requirement to capture on an entire plant (it's unit only) means the CCS part could effectively subsidize the uncontrolled units if the math works, which it might--particularly if the capture is coupled to $90/bbl EOR.
🔥🏭 NEW from your methane attribution dream team, Diana Burns & me🏭🔥
How much do CH4 emissions contribute to GHG footprint of US natural gas-fired power, CCS, and DAC?
*Unit, utility, BA, & NERC region-level #s for power
*AR6 GWPs. Doc drop-->pub'd in 40 hours ain't bad!
HEADLINES: methane matters, a lot, and emissions are spatially variable. We used our state-level consumer-attributed emissions estimates (iopscience.iop.org/article/10.108…) + the usual EIA & EPA data suspects to see what's up. What's up is CO2e: +13-48% of CO2 ems for utility gas fleets.
The top 10 utilities with highest methane burden are largely out West, and the lowest methane burdens are heavily associated with the low-leakage Marcellus. (Btw: if people claim a low CH4 emitting supply, ask: are you blessed with Marcellus gas, or did you do something?)