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Offshore Wind Affirmative GFCA Novice Packet 2014-15

Explanation

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Debating The Offshore Wind AffirmativeAffirmative Description

The affirmative offers two incentives for offshore wind: an investment tax credit, which gives a tax break to private companies that invest in offshore wind; and loan guarantees, which promise to pay back banks who lend out money to offshore wind companies in the event that their projects fail.

Affirmative Advantages

1. Global warming – the affirmative argues that global warming is happening now and will cause a variety of catastrophic impacts. Offshore wind can resolve global warming by providing massive amounts of clean electricity that displaces coal and natural gas.

2. Economy – the affirmative argues that economic growth is slow now due to a lack of jobs and a weak manufacturing industry. Offshore wind would create thousands of jobs and cause a massive expansion of manufacturing on the East Coast.

Negative answers to the Global Warming advantage

The negative can introduce a variety of arguments against the global warming advantage. First, the negative can argue that global warming has progressed too far and involves too many countries to be solvable. Second, they can argue that offshore wind doesn't produce very much energy. Third, they can argue that global warming isn't a serious concern because negative climate feedbacks will prevent it from getting out of hand. Finally, they can argue that wind energy will trade off with nuclear power, which is better equipped to solve global warming.

Negative answers to the Economy advantage

First, the negative can argue that offshore wind is expensive and will raise electricity prices, which would hurt manufacturing and therefore the economy. Second, they can argue that offshore wind will not result in job growth. Third, they can argue that incentives for offshore wind will harm the economy by trading off with more productive sectors. Fourth, they can argue that manufacturing is not key to the economy. Fifth, they can argue that the economy will be resilient to declines. Finally, they can argue that economic decline will not cause war.

Negative Answers to Solvency

First, the negative can argue that legal battles and other regulatory problems will stop offshore wind from being built. Second, they can argue that offshore wind hasn't worked in other countries, and therefore is unlikely to work here. Finally, they can argue that technological problems with offshore wind will prevent it from being successful.

Key Terms

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Loan guarantees – in order to get money to build offshore wind, companies will try to get loans from banks. Banks may be reluctant to issue these loans, however, because they're concerned that companies may not be able to pay them back. Loan guarantees are a government policy that promises to pay banks back if the wind company is unable to pay back their loan.

Feedbacks – these refer to the factors that effect whether global warming becomes more or less intense as time goes on. For instance, one factor that affects climate is the reflection of light off the Arctic ice caps, an effect which causes overall cooling of the Earth's atmosphere. As global warming melts the ice caps, less light is reflected back into outer space, and the Earth warms even more: as a result, the melting of the ice caps is referred to as a “positive feedback.”

On the other hand, some feedbacks can be negative. Some people argue that, as the Earth warms, clouds will change to reflect more light into the atmosphere. If this is true, it would cause a cooling effect that offsets the warming effect: or, a “negative feedback.”

Climate mitigation – although global warming may be too late to stop altogether, many people argue that there's still time to reduce its severity by implementing renewable technologies quickly. This is called “climate mitigation.”

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1AC

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1AC – PlanTherefore we propose the following plan: The United States federal government should offer an investment tax credit and federal loan guarantees for offshore wind produced off the coast of the United States.

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1AC – Global Warming

Contention 1 is Global Warming -First, global warming is real, happening now, and driven by use of fossil fuels – there is no other explanation for heat waves and droughts sweeping the globe. Now is the last chance to prevent its most catastrophic effectsHansen, 12 (James, director of the NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies. Published June 2, 2012, in the Washington Post. http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/climate-change-is-here--and-worse-than-we-thought/2012/08/03/6ae604c2-dd90-11e1-8e43-4a3c4375504a_story.htm)

When I testified before the Senate in the hot summer of 1988, I warned of the kind of future that climate change would bring to us and

our planet. I painted a grim picture of the consequences of steadily increasing temperatures, driven by mankind’s use of fossil fuels.

But I have a confession to make: I was too optimistic.

My projections about increasing global temperature have been proved true. But I failed to fully explore how quickly that average rise would drive an increase in extreme weather.

In a new analysis of the past six decades of global temperatures , which will be published Monday, my colleagues and I have revealed a stunning increase in the frequency of extremely hot summers, with deeply troubling ramifications for not only our future but also for our present.

This is not a climate model or a prediction but actual observations of weather events and temperatures that have happened. Our analysis shows that it is no longer enough to say that global warming will increase the likelihood of extreme weather and to repeat the

caveat that no individual weather event can be directly linked to climate change. To the contrary, our analysis shows that, for the extreme hot weather of the recent past, there is virtually no explanation other than climate change.

The deadly European heat wave of 2003, the fiery Russian heat wave of 2010 and catastrophic droughts in Texas and Oklahoma last year can each be attributed to climate change. And once the data are gathered in a few weeks’ time, it’s likely that the same will be true for the extremely hot summer the United States is suffering through right now.

These weather events are not simply an example of what climate change could bring. They are caused by climate change. The odds that natural variability created these extremes are minuscule, vanishingly small. To count on those odds would be like quitting your job and playing the lottery every morning to pay the bills.

Twenty-four years ago, I introduced the concept of “climate dice” to help distinguish the long-term trend of climate change from the natural variability of day-to-day weather. Some summers are hot, some cool. Some winters brutal, some mild. That’s natural variability.

But as the climate warms, natural variability is altered, too. In a normal climate without global warming, two sides of the die would represent cooler-than-normal weather, two sides would be normal weather, and two sides would be warmer-than-normal weather. Rolling the die again and again, or season after season, you would get an equal variation of weather over time.

But loading the die with a warming climate changes the odds. You end up with only one side cooler than normal, one side average, and four sides warmer than normal. Even with climate change, you will occasionally see cooler-than-normal summers or a typically cold winter. Don’t let that fool you.

Our new peer-reviewed study, published by the National Academy of Sciences, makes clear that while average global temperature has been steadily rising due to a warming climate (up about 1.5 degrees Fahrenheit in the past century), the extremes are actually becoming much more frequent and more intense worldwide.

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When we plotted the world’s changing temperatures on a bell curve, the extremes of unusually cool and, even more, the extremes of unusually hot are being altered so they are becoming both more common and more severe.

The change is so dramatic that one face of the die must now represent extreme weather to illustrate the greater frequency of extremely hot weather events.

Such events used to be exceedingly rare. Extremely hot temperatures covered about 0.1 percent to 0.2 percent of the globe in the base period of our study, from 1951 to 1980. In the last three decades, while the average temperature has slowly risen, the extremes have soared and now cover about 10 percent of the globe.

This is the world we have changed, and now we have to live in it — the world that caused the 2003 heat wave in Europe that killed more than 50,000 people and the 2011 drought in Texas that caused more than $5 billion in damage. Such events , our data show, will become even more frequent and more severe.

There is still time to act and avoid a worsening climate, but we are wasting precious time. We can solve the challenge of climate change with a gradually rising fee on carbon collected from fossil-fuel companies, with 100 percent of the money rebated to all legal residents on a per capita basis. This would stimulate innovations and create a robust clean-energy economy with millions of new jobs. It is a simple, honest and effective solution.

The future is now. And it is hot.

Second, unchecked global warming will be a global catastrophe – the world's top scientists agree that it will cause natural disasters, droughts, destruction of the oceans, political instability, and war Goldenberg, 14 (Suzanne, reporter for the British newspaper The Guardian, citing a report from the UN's intergovernment panel on climate change. “Climate Change a Threat to Security, Food, and Humankind,” 3-31-14. http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2014/mar/31/climate-change-threat-food-security-humankind)

A United Nations report raised the threat of climate change to a whole new level on Monday, warning of sweeping consequences to life and livelihood.

The report from the UN's intergovernmental panel on climate change concluded that climate change was already having effects in real time – melting sea ice and thawing permafrost in the Arctic, killing off coral reefs in the oceans, and leading to heat waves, heavy rains and mega-disasters.

And the worst was yet to come. Climate change posed a threat to global food stocks, and to human security, the blockbuster report said.

“Nobody on this planet is going to be untouched by the impacts of climate change,” said Rajendra Pachauri, chair of the IPCC.

Monday's report was the most sobering so far from the UN climate panel and, scientists said, the most definitive. The report – a three year joint effort by more than 300 scientists – grew to 2,600 pages and 32 volumes.

The volume of scientific literature on the effects of climate change has doubled since the last report, and the findings make an increasingly detailed picture of how climate change – in tandem with existing fault lines such as poverty and inequality – poses a much more direct threat to life and livelihood.

This was reflected in the language. The summary mentioned the word “risk” more than 230 times, compared to just over 40 mentions seven years ago, according to a count by the Red Cross.

At the forefront of those risks was the potential for humanitarian crisis. The report catalogued some of the disasters that have been visited around the planet since 2000: killer heat waves in Europe, wildfires in Australia, and deadly floods in Pakistan.

“We are now in an era where climate change isn't some kind of future hypothetical,” said Chris Field, one of the two main authors of the report.

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Those extreme weather events would take a disproportionate toll on poor, weak and elderly people. The scientists said governments did not have systems in place to protect those populations. “This would really be a severe challenge for some of the poorest communities and poorest countries in the world,” said Maggie Opondo, a geographer from the University of Nairobi and one of the authors.

The warning signs about climate change and extreme weather events have been accumulating over time. But this report struck out on relatively new ground by drawing a clear line connecting climate change to food scarcity, and conflict.

The report said climate change had already cut into the global food supply. Global crop yields were beginning to decline – especially for wheat – raising doubts as to whether production could keep up with population growth.

“It has now become evident in some parts of the world that the green revolution has reached a plateau,” Pachauri said.

The future looks even more grim. Under some scenarios, climate change could lead to dramatic drops in global wheat production as well as reductions in maize.

"Climate change is acting as a brake. We need yields to grow to meet growing demand, but already climate change is slowing those yields," said Michael Oppenheimer, a Princeton professor and an author of the report.

Other food sources are also under threat. Fish catches in some areas of the tropics are projected to fall by between 40% and 60%, according to the report.

The report also connected climate change to rising food prices and political instability, for instance the riots in Asia and Africa after food price shocks in 2008.

"The impacts are already evident in many places in the world. It is not something that is [only] going to happen in the future," said David Lobell, a professor at Stanford University's centre for food security, who devised the models.

"Almost everywhere you see the warming effects have a negative affect on wheat and there is a similar story for corn as well. These are not yet enormous effects but they show clearly that the trends are big enough to be important," Lobell said.

The report acknowledged that there were a few isolated areas where a longer growing season had been good for farming. But it played down the idea that there may be advantages to climate change as far as food production is concerned.

Overall, the report said, "Negative impacts of climate change on crop yields have been more common than positive impacts." Scientists and campaigners pointed to the finding as a defining feature of the report.

The report also warned for the first time that climate change, combined with poverty and economic shocks, could lead to war and drive people to leave their homes.

With the catalogue of risks, the scientists said they hoped to persuade governments and the public that it was past time to cut greenhouse gas emissions and to plan for sea walls and other infrastructure that offer some protection for climate change.

“The one message that comes out of this is the world has to adapt and the world has to mitigate,” said Pachauri.

Third, positive climate feedbacks threaten civilizationBrown, 08 (Lester, United States environmental analyst, founder of the Worldwatch Institute, and founder and president of the Earth Policy Institute, a nonprofit research organization based in Washington, D.C. “Plan B 3.0: Mobilizing to Save Civilization”)

Beyond what is already happening, the world faces a risk that some of the feedback mechanisms will begin to kick in, further accelerating the warming process. Scientists who once thought that the Arctic Ocean could be free of ice during the summer by 2100 now see it occurring by 2030. Even this could turn out to be a conservative estimate.78

This is of particular concern to scientists because of the albedo effect, where the replacement of highly reflective sea ice with darker open water greatly increases heat absorbed from sunlight. This, of course, has the potential to further accelerate the melting of the Greenland ice sheet.

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A second feedback loop of concern is the melting of per mafrost. This would release billions of tons of carbon, some as methane, a potent greenhouse gas with a global warming effect per ton 25 times that of carbon dioxide.79

The risk facing humanity is that climate change could spiral out of control and it will no longer be possible to arrest trends such as ice melting and rising sea level. At this point, the future of civilization would be at risk.

This combination of melting glaciers, rising seas, and their effects on food security and low-lying coastal cities could over whelm the capacity of governments to cope . Today it is largely weak states that begin to deteriorate under the pressures of mounting

environmental stresses. But the changes just described could overwhelm even the strongest of states. Civilization itself could begin to unravel under these extreme stresses.

Fourth, offshore wind is crucial to slow global warming – it's more efficient than onshore wind and can provide more power than current U.S. electricity demandThaler 12 (Jeff, University of Maine Law School, “Fiddling as the World Burns: How Climate Change Urgently Requires a Paradigm Shift in the Permitting of Renewable Energy Projects,” http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2148122)

Unfortunately, as the economic and health costs from fossil fuel emissions have grown so too has the byzantine labyrinth of laws and regulations to be navigated before a renewable energy project can be approved, let alone financed and developed. 6 The root cause goes back to the 1970s when some of our fundamental environmental laws were enacted, before we were aware of climate change threats, to slow down the review of proposed projects by requiring more studies of potential project impacts before approval.7 But in our increasingly carbon-based 21st century, we need a paradigm shift. While achieving important goals, those federal laws and regulations, and similar ones at the state and local levels, have become so unduly burdensome, slow, and expensive that they will chill investment in, and kill any significant growth of, renewable carbon-free energy sources and projects, thereby imposing huge economic, environmental and social costs upon both our country and the world8 unless they are substantially changed. Indeed, by 2050 the U.S. must reduce its greenhouse gas emissions by 80% to even stabilize atmospheric levels of carbon, and can do so by increasing generated electricity from renewable sources from the current thirteen percent up to eighty percent9-- but only if there are targeted new policy efforts to accelerate, fifty times faster than since 1990, implementation of clean, renewable energy sources.10

Thus, Part II focuses on one promising technology to demonstrate the flaws in its current licensing permitting regimes, and makes concrete

recommendations for reform.11 Wind power generation from onshore installations is proven, generates no GHGs and consumes no water,12 is increasingly cost-competitive with most fossil fuel sources, and can be employed relatively quickly in many parts of the United States and world. Offshore wind power is a relatively newer technology, especially deep-water floating

projects, and presently less cost-competitive than onshore wind. However, because wind speeds are on average about ninety percent stronger and more consistent over water than over land, with higher power densities and lower shear and turbulence,13 America’s offshore resources can provide more than our current electricity use.14 Moreover, these resources are near many major cities that are home to much of the population and electricity demand thereby “reducing the need for new high-voltage transmission from the Midwest and Great Plains to serve coastal lands…”15 Therefore, in light Part II’s spotlight on literally dozens of different federal (yet alone state and local) statutes and their hundreds of regulations standing between an offshore wind project applicant and construction, Part III makes concrete statutory and regulatory recommendations to much more quickly enable the full potential of offshore wind energy to become a reality before it is too late.

Finally, the most comprehensive studies establish that offshore wind results in enormous reductions greenhouse gas emissionsBurger, 12 (Andrew independent environmental journalist, researcher, and writer. Published September 25, 2012. http://www.triplepundit.com/2012/09/atlantic-offshore-wind-turbines/)

Offshore winds off the U.S. Atlantic coast could yield enough clean, renewable electrical power for at least one-third of the entire U.S., or the entire East Coast, from Maine to Florida, according to a Stanford University study released Sept. 14. That includes some of the country’s largest urban centers, as well as the nation’s capital.

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The Stanford research team employed a state-of-the-art offshore wind power model to simulate the installation of 144,000 5-megawatt wind turbines of the type typically found in European offshore wind farms at various ocean depths and distances from shore from Florida to Maine, concentrating them in the typically hurricane-free stretch of the Atlantic between Maine and Virginia, according to a Stanford University News report.

Now’s the time for U.S. offshore wind power development

They found that offshore winds off the U.S. East Coast produce between 965-1,372-terawatt-hours of electricity per year, enough to meet 1/3 of U.S. electricity demand, or all the power needs of the entire East Coast, from Maine to Florida. The study, “U.S. East Coast Offshore Wind Energy Resources and Their Relationship to Peak-Time Electricity Demand,” is available here.

In addition to adding significantly to the U.S. East Coast offshore wind power potential, the researchers found that East Coast offshore wind energy peaks in the middle of the day. That coincides exactly with peak power demands.

“We knew there was a lot of wind out there, but this is the first actual quantification of the total resource and the time of day that the resource peaks,” commented Stanford University professor of civil and environmental engineeering Mark Z. Jacobson, who directed the research project. “This provides practical information to wind farm developers about the best areas to place turbines.”

Added research team member and recent Atmosphere/Energy PhD program graduate Mike Dvorak, “People mistakenly think that wind energy is not useful because output from most land-based turbines peaks in the late evening/early morning, when electricity demand is low. “The real value of offshore wind energy is that it often peaks when we need the most electricity – during the middle of the day.”

Moreover, installing even this great a number of wind turbines off the U.S. East Coast needn’t compromise ocean vistas or threaten wildlife, according to the research team. In their analysis, the researchers limited installations to just one-third of available shallow-water sites out to 30 meters depth, with two-thirds of the remaining sites out to 200 meters depth.

Their analysis highlights the real possibility and multiple benefits that could be realized by developing very large-scale offshore wind farms in Atlantic waters near major East Coast cities, such as Boston and New York City. “Connecting the power to the grid would be technically as easy as laying a cable in the sand and hooking it directly into the grid without the need to build often controversial transmission lines on the land,” Dvorak said.

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1AC – EconomyContention 2 is the Economy -

First, the US economy is at risk of recession – growth is slow and recent job gains are low-wage and part-time – full-time manufacturing jobs are crucialFinancial Post, 14 (“U.S. may fall back into recession, high-profile analyst Gary Shilling says,” 7-28-14. http://business.financialpost.com/2014/07/28/u-s-may-fall-back-into-recession-high-profile-analyst-gary-shilling-says/)

The Canadian economy will be overshadowed this week by economic and employment data in the United States. Nothing too unusual there.

But one of North America’s most noted forecasters is raising the spectre of the world’s biggest economy actually falling back into recession, at least technically.

“I’m saying it’s possible,” Gary Shilling, the Wall Street analyst known for his often-contrarian predictions, many of which have proven correct, told the Financial Post. “These numbers are kind of in the lap of the gods, to a certain extent.”

Any meager growth, or a negative reading, in this week’s U.S. data, would certainly cast a dark cloud over Canada’s performance.

The U.S. reports second-quarter gross domestic product data on Wednesday, and many analysts are looking for a sizable rebound after a surprising 2.9% harsh-weather-induced contraction in the first quarter. Mr. Shilling, however, believes the economy could also have contracted between April and June — by definition, two consecutive quarterly declines in GDP qualifying as a “technical recession.”

“You got to always be very careful about forecasts,” Mr. Shilling said. “Those who are looking for 3%-plus real GDP growth in the second quarter, they either see something I don’t see, or they’re going to be sadly disappointed.”

Mr. Shilling added that “this is history, obviously.”

“We’re in the second half already. But it makes a huge difference because consistently in the last three years, the Fed and most forecasters have started off with 4% real GDP forecasts and they end up at 2%. And that’s where it is — 2%,” he said.

“If this turns out to be a very low or even negative report this Wednesday, then I think people are going to have to have an agonizing reappraisal of their usual look for a revival in the rest of the year — and that includes the Fed.”

Meanwhile, Statistics Canada will report May GDP numbers for this country on Thursday, with the consensus of economists being between 0.3% and 0.5% after edging up 0.1% in April. That was the same increase as in March, which brought the first–quarter reading to 1.2%. The Bank of Canada is forecasting 2.2% growth for all of 2014.

But, again, markets will likely still be digesting the U.S. economic data — along with a statement, also on Wednesday, from the U.S. Federal Reserve following policymakers’ two-day meeting in Washington.

“The Fed’s policy announcement will likely contain a few tweaks to last month’s statement, apart from another $10-billion tapering of asset purchases,” said Michael Gregory, senior economist at BMO Capital Markets.

“After the June minutes first introduced it, and chair [Janet] Yellen’s congressional testimony reiterated it, we look for the statement to contain a new line on when asset purchases will end, i.e., October,” he noted.

The Fed statement will be followed on Friday by the U.S. employment report for July.

Mr. Shilling — among only a few analysts to predict many previous U.S. recessions and periods of severe inflation — also questions forecasts for job growth.

U.S. payrolls jumped by 288,000 in June, after a 224,000 gain the previous month. That helped push the unemployment rate to a six- year low of 6.1%.

Most forecasters are expecting another 200,000-plius gain in employment, with the possibility that the jobless reading could fall to 6%.

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“What we’ve had here is, yeah, 200,000. Nice number. But if you look with in that, it’s surprising weak,” Mr. Shilling said.

“The number is really hiding the quality,” he said. “Well part-time jobs paid less than full-time jobs. And, also, most of the jobs that have been created in this recovery so far have been in things like leisure and hospitality, and retailing, which pay a lot less than manufacturing and utilities.”

Second, offshore wind will be a massive job creation project – it's comparatively better than fossil fuelsMahan, Pearlman, and Savitz, 10 (Simon, Renewable Energy Manager at the Southern Alliance for Clean Energy, Isaac, fisheries researcher at UC Santa Barbara, and Jacqueline, Deputy President of U.S. Campaigns at Oceana, an ocean convervation organization. Report for Oceana published in September 2010. “Untapped Wealth: Offshore Wind” Available at http://oceana.org/sites/default/files/reports/Offshore_Wind_Report_-_Final_1.pdf)

Offshore wind offers more than just clean electricity. It also can be a major source of jobs. Manufacturing, installing, operating, and maintaining offshore wind farms can provide thousands of local jobs in coastal states. These include positions that require unique engineering, manufacturing and maritime expertise. For example, offshore wind production requires oceanographic and ecological expertise. Experts in these fields would be needed to collect and analyze data on areas of interest to offshore wind developers. New or retrofitted heavy manufacturing facilities would need to be built in the United States to supply offshore turbines. Installing offshore turbines also would require maritime expertise and ships, similar to those needed by the offshore oil and natural gas industry. Specialized undersea cables would be needed to transmit electricity from the farm to the shore. Manufacturing and installation needs in each of these areas these would create additional jobs. As a result, a variety of long-term jobs would be created by offshore wind energy development, including electricians, meteorologists, welders, and operators among other general maintenance laborers.

Besides the sheer quantity of offshore wind energy compared to the offshore oil and natural gas resource, offshore wind power will also create many more jobs than the oil and gas industries. According to the American Petroleum Institute (API), the oil and gas sectors of

the United States directly employ 2.1 million people. API asserts that by opening up previously protected offshore areas (including the entire East and West Coasts), the natural gas and oil industry would create 39,079 jobs in 2030.

The permanence of these jobs is in question, since oil and gas supplies are finite, unlike renewable sources. The United Kingdom expects to create between 1 and 1.7 full-time equivalent jobs for each megawatt of offshore wind power installed. 89 If only 127 gigawatts of offshore wind farms are installed in the United States by 2030, similar to Europe’s ambitious plan, 90 this could create between 133,000 and 212,000 permanent American jobs annually. Offshore wind would create about three times as many jobs as would the offshore oil and gas industries. This comparison is consistent with studies conducted by the PERI Institute, which show a 3-to-1 ratio between jobs created by clean energy versus those created by fossil fuel industries 91 . OffshOre

Windp OW er Can Create MOre JObs than OffshOre Oilandgasdrilling The American Wind Energy Association (AWEA) estimates that currently in the United States, 85,000 people are employed by the wind industry. 92 In Europe, 19,000 people are already employed in the offshore

wind industry. 93 Installing, operating and maintaining offshore wind farms employ more people per megawatt of capacity installed than onshore wind power.

Third, offshore wind development will significantly expand the East Coast manufacturing basede Vries, 14 (Eize, longtime Wind Technology Correspondent for Renewable Energy Magazine. “Sourcing a supply chain for US offshore wind,” Wind Power Monthly, 7-31-14. http://www.windpowermonthly.com/article/1305160/sourcing-supply-chain-us-offshore-wind)

The US wind industry may be on the brink of launching into the offshore wind sector, prompting the supply chain businesses to consider joining the fray. The US government clearly had the same thought, commissioning a study into the competitive potential for a nascent US offshore wind sector.

Taking a snapshot of the 2013 supplier in relation to the market, the report, carried out by wind-industry supply-chain advisory group GLWN, found that unlike suppliers in many other countries, US manufacturers are located in the middle of the country, primarily supporting the current land-based wind farms.

The report compares the US market and potential with the current offshore supply chain in both China and Germany. It found that the German supplier base has been based in coastal regions from the outset, supporting onshore and, increasingly, local and European offshore projects, with proximity to main ports crucial for export. Most Chinese suppliers, too, are located near waterways to support land-based, offshore and turbine/components export.

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For the US to serve and support the emerging offshore wind market, it must therefore develop a new coastal manufacturing base. Given that most of the current projects under development are concentrated on the east coast, this region is poised to become the centre of such new industrial activities, the report concludes.

Comparing global regions

The study involved visiting 22 different manufacturing facilities, providing "a limited snapshot", according to Patrick Fullenkamp, director of technical services at GLWN. It looked at four main components: towers; blades; permanent magnet direct-drive generators; and four-legged steel jacket foundations. The first three account for 50-55% of wind-turbine capital expenditure (capex), says Fullenkamp, with the fourth, the foundation, representing about 15% of offshore-wind project capex.

The cost differences of these components across the three regions showed surprisingly little difference.

The US has imposed steep import duties on Chinese towers. However, even without this anti-dumping measure, the cumulative cost differences between a tower made in China and exported to the US, and a locally produced tower is minor. Germany proved the most expensive in this respect.

For jacket foundations the study again revealed Germany to have the highest overall cost level, followed by the US and China as the cheapest, but with only minor individual cost differences. Noticeably, China faces rather high marine-transport logistics related costs, whereas the burden rate — indirect costs associated with employees above payroll costs - prove highest in Germany and the US.

Raw materials

Surprisingly, China produced the highest cost for blades, followed by Germany, with the US proving the cheapest, largely because of the cost of materials. This is based on the raw materials for the composite structures of blades, encompassing fairly standard polyester or epoxy-based resins and glass fibre. This cost comparison may change with increased use of carbon fibre, which is expensive and requires a high degree of processing skill, and is therefore produced by only by a selected number of turbine and blade suppliers.

China finally comes out on top for permanent-magnet (PM) direct-drive generators in terms of overall cost, with Germany second, and the US showing the highest cumulative costs. China's main comparative advantages are down to favourable materials cost linked to lower magnet procurement costs - as the country is the main source for the rare-earth elements used for these — cheaper labour and lower costs for general administration and sales.

Mediumand, especially, high-speed PM generators, which use far less of this expensive material, were not included in the study. Double-fed induction generators (DFIG), induction and electrically excited synchronous generators do not use any permanent magnets.

Based on materials, quantity, direct labour and cost, the study showed China as being the most competitive for supply of towers, generators, and foundations, but without logistics factored in. For process technology and lowest total process man-hours, the US came out as most effective for production of towers, blades and generators, and Germany on foundations.

Scorecard

An integral part of the project was the development of a US manufacturing scorecard based on 280 US manufacturers already or about to be capable of making specific wind-turbine components. The scorecard, above, shows the relative competitiveness and US industry status for components for 3MW and 5MW land-based and offshore turbines, in terms of what can already be manufactured today and other areas, where some or major capital investments are necessary. However, with the global offshore market moving towards 6-8MW power ratings, catching up could prove an even bigger overall challenge in some areas for US industry.

Study conclusions

Fullenkamp stresses that the results must be seen as preliminary, given the scope of the projects studied. "It is possible that German companies were over-conservative with their cost figures, while others might have provided more optimistic data," he says. Additional valuable information, such as factory flow processes, various fault rates and overall quality of the product could to be included. Despite these limitations, however, this report indicates potential for a US supply chain for its nascent offshore sector.

"Germany has an excellent model for the US to follow," he says. "The German offshore industry build-up started in 2000 and its industrial base has progressed impressively ever since. Based on hard figures we could obtain, Germany's offshore sector had a turnover of EUR5.9 billion in 2011, of which manufacturing accounted for 61% of total value added and corresponding jobs growth. "This outcome leads to only one possible conclusion: US, go for manufacturing."

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Fourth, manufacturing strength is key to the economyEttlinger and Gordon, 11 (Michael and Kate, the Vice President for Economic Policy at the Center for American Progress, former director of the Economic Analysis and Research Network of the Economic Policy Institute and Vice President for Energy Policy at the Center for American Progress. Most recently, Kate was the co–director of the national Apollo Alliance, where she still serves as senior policy advisor. Former senior associate at the Center on Wisconsin Strategy, "The Importance and Promise of American Manufacturing" http://www.americanprogress.org/issues/2011/04/pdf/manufacturing.pdf–)

Manufacturing is critically important to the American economy. For generations, the strength of our country rested on the power of our factory floors—both the machines and the men and women who worked them. We need manufacturing to continue to be a bedrock of strength for generations to come. Manufacturing is woven into the structure of our economy: Its importance goes far beyond what happens behind the factory gates.

The strength or weakness of American manufacturing carries implications for the entire economy, our national security, and the well–being of all Americans. Manufacturing today accounts for 12 percent of the U.S. economy and about 11 percent of the private–sector workforce. But its significance is even greater than these numbers would suggest. The direct impact of

manufacturing is only a part of the picture. First, jobs in the manufacturing sector are good middle–class jobs for millions of Americans. Those jobs serve an important role, offering economic opportunity to hard–working, middle–skill workers. This creates upward mobility

and broadens and strengthens the middle class to the benefit of the entire economy. What’s more, U.S.–based manufacturing underpins a broad range of jobs that are quite different from the usual image of manufacturing. These are higher–skill service jobs that include the accountants, bankers, and lawyers that are associated with any industry, as well as a broad range of other jobs including basic research and technology development , product and process engineering and design, operations and

maintenance, transportation, testing, and lab work. Many of these jobs are critical to American technology and innovation leadership. The problem today is this: Many multinational corporations may for a period keep these higher–skill jobs here at home while they move basic manufacturing elsewhere in response to other countries’ subsidies, the search for cheaper labor costs, and the desire for more direct access to overseas markets, but eventually many of these service jobs will follow. When the basic manufacturing leaves, the feedback loop from the manufacturing floor to the rest of a manufacturing operation—a critical element in the innovative process—is eventually broken. To maintain that feedback loop, companies need to move higher–skill jobs to where they do their manufacturing. And with those jobs goes American leadership in technology and innovation. This is why having a critical mass of both manufacturing and associated service jobs in the United

States matters. The "industrial commons" that comes from the crossfertilization and engagement of a community of experts in industry, academia, and government is vital to our nation’s economic competitiveness. Manufacturing also is important for the nation’s economic stability. The experience of the Great Recession exemplifies this point. Although manufacturing plunged in 2008 and early 2009 along with the rest of the economy, it is on the rebound today while other key economic sectors, such as construction, still languish. Diversity in the economy is important—and manufacturing is a particularly important part of the mix. Although manufacturing is certainly affected by broader economic events, the sector’s internal diversity—supplying consumer goods as

well as industrial goods, serving both domestic and external markets— gives it great potential resiliency. Finally, supplying our own needs through a strong domestic manufacturing sector protects us from international economic and political disruptions. This is most obviously important in the realm of national security, even narrowly defined as matters related to military strength, where the risk of a weak manufacturing capability is obvious. But overreliance on imports and substantial manufacturing trade deficits weaken us in many ways, making us vulnerable to everything from exchange rate fluctuations to trade embargoes to natural disasters.

Finally, economic decline risks great power wars Royal, 10 (Jedediah, Director of Cooperative Threat Reduction at the U.S. Department of Defense, Economics of War and Peace: Economic, Legal, and Political Perspectives, pg 213-215)

Less intuitive is how periods of economic decline may increase the likelihood of external conflict. Political science literature has contributed a moderate degree of attention to the impact of economic decline and the security and defense behavior of interdependent states. Research in this vein has been considered at systemic, dyadic and national levels. Several notable contributions follow. First, on the systemic level, Pollins (2008) advances Modelski and Thompson’s (1996) work on leadership cycle theory, finding that rhythms in the global economy are associated with the rise and fall of a pre-eminent power and the often bloody transition from one pre-eminent leader to the next. As such, exogenous shocks such as economic crises could usher in a redistribution of relative power (see also Gilpin, 1981) that leads to uncertainty about power balances, increasing the risk of miscalculation (Fearon 1995). Alternatively, even a relatively certain redistribution of power could lead to a permissive environment for conflicts as a rising power may seek to challenge a declining power (Werner, 1999). Separately, Pollins (1996) also shows that global economic cycles combined with parallel leadership cycles impact the likelihood of conflict among major, medium and small powers, although he suggests that the causes and connections between global

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economic conditions and security conditions remains unknown. Second, on a dyadic level, Copeland’s (1996, 2000) theory of trade expectations suggest that “future expectation of trade” is a significant variable in understanding economic conditions and security behavior of states. He argues that interdependent states are likely to gain pacific benefits from trade so long as they have an optimistic view of future trade relations. However, if the expectations of future trade decline,particularly for difficult to replace item such as energy resources, the likelihood for conflict increases, as states will be inclined to use force to gain access to those resources. Crises could

potentially be the trigger for decreased trade expectations either on its own or because it triggers protectionist moves by interdependent states. Third, others have considered the link between economic decline and external armed conflict at a national level. Blomberg and Hess (2002) find a strong correlation between internal conflict and external conflict, particularly during periods of economic

downturn. They write, The linkages between internal and external conflict and prosperity are strong and mutually reinforcing. Economic conflict tends to spawn internal conflict, which in turn returns the favor. Moreover, the presence of a recession tends to amplify the extent to which international and external conflicts self-reinforce each other. (Blomberg and Hess, 2002, p. 89) Economic decline has also been linked with an increase in the likelihood of terrorism (Blomberg, Hess and Weerapana, 2004), which has the capacity to spill across borders and lead to external tensions. Furthermore, crises generally reduce the popularity of a sitting government. “Diversionary theory” suggests that, when facing unpopularity arising from economic decline, sitting governments have increased incentives to fabricate external military conflicts to create a “rally around the flag” effect. Wang (1996), DeRouen (1995) and Blomberg, Hess and Thacker (2006) find supporting evidence showing that economic decline and use of force are at least indirectly correlated. Gelpi (1997), Miller (1999), and Kisangani and Pickering (2009) suggest that the tendency towards diversionary tactics are greater for democratic states than autocratic states due to the fact the democratic leaders are generally more susceptible to being removed from office due to lack of domestic support. De DeRouen (2000) has provided evidence showing that periods of weak economic performance in the United States and thus weak Presidential popularity are statically linked to an increase in the use of force. In summary, recent economic scholarship positively correlates economic integration with an increase in the frequency of economic crises, whereas political science scholarship links economic decline with external conflict at systemic, dyadic and national levels . This implied connection between integration, crises and armed conflict has not featured prominently in economic-security debate and deserves more attention. This observation is not contradictory to other perspectives that link economic interdependence with a decrease in the likelihood of external conflict, such as those mentioned in the first paragraph of this chapter. Those studies tend to focus on dyadic interdependence instead of global interdependence and do not specifically consider the occurrence of and conditions created by economic crises. As such the view presented here should be considered ancillary to those views.

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1AC – SolvencyContention 3 is Solvency -First, federal support in the form of ITCs and loan guarantees solves offshore wind Caperton, Conathan, and Weidman, 12 (Richard - Director of Clean Energy Investment, Michael - Director of Ocean Policy, and Jackie - a Special Assistant for the Energy Opportunity team at the Center for American Progress, “Encouraging Investment Is Key to U.S. Offshore Wind Development,” Center for American Progress, Jan 12, Online: http://www.americanprogress.org/issues/green/news/2012/01/12/10951/encouraging-

investment-is-key-to-u-s-offshore-wind-development/)

This view is backed by Maryland Gov. Martin O’Malley, but as The Washington Post reported earlier this week, his efforts to make his state a leader in offshore wind appear to be in jeopardy. Monday’s article quoted Democratic Del. Dereck E. Davis saying, “The situation has gotten worse — not better — for offshore wind since the last time it was up for debate.” So what has changed? Congress holds the key The

answer lies in part in NRG Bluewater Wind’s fate. NRG was unequivocal in the reasoning behind its decision to cancel its power-purchase agreement. The company’s press release stated that it was “unable to find an investment partner.” Specifically, NRG placed the blame for this outcome squarely on the shoulders of Congress: Two aspects of the project critical for success have actually gone backwards: the decisions of Congress to eliminate funding for the Department of Energy’s loan guarantee program applicable to offshore wind, and the failure to extend the Federal Investment and Production Tax Credits … which have rendered the Delaware project both unfinanceable and financially untenable. While the challenges facing this project are big, they’re solvable. As NRG alludes to, targeted, efficient incentives from the federal government would allow this project to move forward. The production tax credit Currently, offshore wind projects are eligible for the production tax credit. This is a credit based on how much electricity a wind turbine generates, and is currently worth 2.2 cents per kilowatt-hour. Unfortunately, this credit expires at the end of 2012, and a long-term extension of the credit is uncertain. CAP has called on Congress to extend the credit for four more years, which will provide needed policy certainty for investors in wind projects. The investment tax credit While NRG Bluewater Wind would clearly benefit from a production tax credit extension, other incentives may be more useful for this project. For onshore wind projects—with relatively predictable performance over the life of the project—the production tax credit is very valuable. For offshore wind, however, the credit is less valuable to the project developer. Because offshore wind turbines are relatively new technology and are deployed in environments that have never been used for energy generation, developers can’t predict how much power a turbine will generate as accurately as they can with onshore wind. Thus, developers aren’t as certain about how big their tax credits will be, which affects the profitability of the project. Congress could fix this problem by making offshore wind eligible for the investment tax credit. Instead of getting a tax credit as power is generated, the investment tax credit would allow offshore wind developers to get an upfront credit for 30 percent of their initial investment, encouraging more to invest. This is much more useful for technologies with more performance uncertainty—like offshore wind—and would be a smart example of matching the tax code to the unique circumstances facing innovative industries. Loan

guarantees Uncertainty around offshore wind turbines’ operational performance also makes it difficult to finance these projects. When a bank evaluates a wind farm, it predicts how much power the turbines will produce each year and will only “count” the power that they’re extremely confident will be produced. With an innovative technology like offshore wind, this could mean that only half of the turbines’ expected output is “bankable.” This affects whether or not a bank thinks the developer will pay back a loan, and ultimately influences whether or not a bank offers a loan. This is a significant problem for offshore wind developers. But the federal government can solve this problem by guaranteeing a loan to a project developer. In this case the government agrees to pay back a loan if the developer is unable to. This puts banks at ease (after all, the U.S. government has a perfect track record of paying back loans) and will allow financing to flow freely. Congress has two simple ways to create a loan guarantee program for offshore wind. They can create a Clean Energy Deployment Administration, or “Green Bank,” which would offer financing tools like loan guarantees for innovative technologies. Or they can allocate funding to cover the cost of new loan guarantees for offshore wind under the existing Department of Energy Loan Guarantee Program. Either way forward would help drive investment in the burgeoning offshore wind industry. Somehow, the bright outlook from just a few years ago—moving the United States toward energy independence—has fogged over despite overwhelming evidence from statewide polls that demonstrates sustained support for proposed projects. Congress has the power to support constituents’ interests in the innovative clean energy and economic opportunities offshore wind can produce to move us out of the energy Stone Age and into a sustainable future.

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Second, offshore wind will be implemented quickly and modeled globally Barbosa et al., 09 (Professor of Engineering at the University of Portugal. Maciel, Luis Ferreira, Torres Farinha, Inácio Fonsec, Viriato Marques, and António Simões, “Integrating Wind Power energy into electric grids an environmental issue”, Conference on Energy Planning, Energy Savings, Environmental Education, Online: www.wseas.us/e-library/conferences/2009/lalaguna/EPREWA/EPREWA15.pdf)

The options for making major emissions reductions in the power sector between now and 2020 are basically three: energy efficiency and conservation; fuel switching from coal to gas; and renewable energy, primarily wind power. This power does not emit any climate change inducing carbon dioxide nor other air pollutants which are polluting the major cities of the world and costing billions in additional health costs and

infrastructure damage. While developments in 2008 show that the sector is well on track to meeting this target, a strong global signal from governments is needed to show that they are serious about moving away from fossil fuels and protecting the climate. It is not an exaggeration to claim that the future of human prosperity depends on how successfully we tackle the two central energy challenges facing us today: securing the supply of reliable and affordable energy; and effecting a rapid transformation to a low-carbon, efficient and environmentally benign system. Depending on the efficiency measures implemented, by 2030 world energy needs are predicated to be between 30 and 60% higher than current levels. This sharp increase in world energy demand will require significant investment in new power generating capacity and grid infrastructure, especially emerging economies such as India and China. Just as energy demand continues to increase, supplies of the main fossil fuels used in power generation are becoming more expensive and more difficult to extract. One result is that some of the major economies of the world are increasingly relying on imported fuel at unpredictable cost, sometimes from regions of the world where conflict and political instability threaten the security of that supply. In contrast to the uncertainties surrounding supplies of conventional fuels, and volatile prices, wind energy is a massive indigenous power source which is permanently available in virtually every country in the world. There are no fuel costs, no geopolitical risk and no supply dependence on imported fuels from politically unstable regions. Every kilowatt/hour generated by wind power has the potential to displace fossil fuel imports, improving both security of supply and the national balance of payments, which is not only an issue for the United States which sends more than half a trillion dollars a year out of the country to pay its oil bill. This is an even larger issue for poor countries in Africa, Asia and South America whose economies have been devastated by recent oil price hikes. Wind power also has the advantage that it can be deployed faster than other energy supply technologies. Even large offshore wind farms, which require a greater level of infrastructure and grid network connection, can be installed from start to finish in less than two years. This compares with the much longer timescale for conventional power stations such as nuclear reactors.

Finally, commitment to offshore wind results in economies of scale that decrease costs and overcome technological hurdlesThe Engineer, 13 (Technology and innovation news site. “Consistent growth will lower cost of offshore wind energy” 8-23-13. http://www.theengineer.co.uk/energy-and-environment/news/consistent-growth-will-lower-cost-of-offshore-wind-energy/1016987.article)

A study from Prognos and The Fichtner Group has found that that the cost of electricity from offshore wind can be reduced by around one third if it is developed consistently over the next decade.

‘The identified cost reduction potentials are based on the assumption that offshore wind power will be continuously developed and reach a capacity of nine Gigawatt or more by the year 2023. This is the way to gain project experience, to promote technological innovation and to significantly decrease costs,’ said Jens Eckhoff, president of Offshore-Windenergie in a statement. ‘Offshore wind power has a substantial cost reduction potential. However, the industry can only exploit this potential if there are reliable framework conditions to achieve significant market volumes.’

The study was commissioned by the German Offshore Wind Energy Foundation, Stiftung Offshore-Windenergie, along with associations and companies including DONG Energy Renewables, Iberdrola Renovables Offshore Deutschland Zwei, and Siemens.

It analysed the expected cost development of electricity generation from offshore wind power until the year 2023. For this purpose, two development scenarios were applied to evaluate three typical German sites for offshore wind farms.

The first scenario assumes a stable market development and describes the development of at least 9GW installed capacity in Germany by the year 2023.

In this scenario, the cost of offshore wind power decreases on average by about 31 per cent across all sites until 2023.

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The second scenario assumes an optimum market environment with a development of 14GW until 2023. In this case, costs could decrease by up to 39 per cent.

‘The main driver for the cost reduction is a continuous technological development across the entire value-added chain. Particularly regarding investment costs, substantial savings can be achieved. Costs for support structures and other components as well as for the installation go down. Larger turbines reduce specific investment costs as the energy yield substantially increases,’ said Frank Peter of Swiss consultancy Prognos, co-author of the study.

The study also shows that due to increasing experience in project planning, plant construction and operation, the risks - and subsequently the financing costs - can be reduced.

In addition, improved logistics, such as the use of more powerful ships and an optimised infrastructure, can positively affect the costs of offshore plant operation and maintenance.

The analysis also shows that in an optimum market environment an expanded serial production and increasing competition will contribute to cost reduction.

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2AC – Warming Advantage

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They Say: “Too Late to Solve”

Global warming has not passed a ‘tipping point’

Inhofe, 7

[James, senator on the US Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works. “Global Warming Alarmism Reaches a “Tipping Point,” http://epw.senate.gov/public/index.cfm?FuseAction=Minority.Speeches&ContentRecord_id=dceb518c-802a-23ad-45bf-894a13435a08]

All the while, activists like former Vice President Al Gore repeatedly continue to warn of a fast approaching climate "tipping point." I agree with Gore. Global warming may have reached a "tipping point." The man-made global warming fear machine crossed the "tipping point" in 2007. I am convinced that future climate historians will look back at 2007 as

the year the global warming fears began crumbling. The situation we are in now is very similar to where we were in the late 1970's when coming ice age fears began to dismantle. Remember, it was Newsweek Magazine which in the 1970's proclaimed meteorologists were "almost unanimous" in their view that a coming Ice Age would have negative impacts. It was also Newsweek in 1975 which originated the eerily similar "tipping point" rhetoric of today: Newsweek wrote on April 28, 1975 about coming ice age fears: "The longer the planners delay, the more difficult will they find it to cope with

climatic change once the results become grim reality." Of course Newsweek essentially retracted their coming ice age article 29 years later in October 2006. In addition, a 1975 National Academy of Sciences report addressed coming ice age fears and in 1971, NASA

predicted the world "could be as little as 50 or 60 years away from a disastrous new ice age." Today, the greatest irony is that the UN and the

media's climate hysteria grows louder as the case for alarmism fades away. While the scientific case grows weaker, the political and rhetorical proponents of climate fear are ramping up to offer hefty tax and regulatory "solutions" both internationally and domestically to "solve" the so-called "crisis." Skeptical Climatologist Dr. Timothy Ball formerly of the University of Winnipeg in Canada wrote about the current state of the climate change debate earlier this month: "Imagine basing a country's energy and economic policy on an incomplete, unproven theory - a theory based entirely on computer models in which one minor variable (CO2) is considered the sole driver for the entire global climate system . " And just how minor is that man-made CO2 variable in the atmosphere? Meteorologist Joseph D'Aleo, the first Director of Meteorology at The Weather Channel and former chairman of the American Meteorological Society's (AMS) Committee on Weather Analysis and Forecasting, explained in August how miniscule mankind's CO2 emissions are in relation to the Earth's atmosphere. "If the atmosphere was a 100 story building, our annual anthropogenic CO2 contribution today would be equivalent to the linoleum on the first floor," D'Aleo wrote.

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http://epw.senate.gov/public/index.cfm?FuseAction=Minority.Speeches&ContentRecord_id=dceb518c-802a-23ad-45bf-894a13435a08

http://epw.senate.gov/public/index.cfm?FuseAction=Minority.Speeches&ContentRecord_id=dceb518c-802a-23ad-45bf-894a13435a08


They Say: “Plan is too Small”

The most comprehensive evidence proves offshore wind can power globally

Chong and Jing 14 a. College of Meteorology and Oceanography, People’s Liberation Army University of Science & Technology b. National Key Laboratory of Numerical Modeling for Atmospheric Sciences and Geophysical Fluid Dynamics (LASG), Institute of Atmospheric Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences [Chong wei Zhenga & Jing Panb, Assessment of the global ocean wind energy resource, Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Volume 33, May 2014, Pages 382–391]

Against a background of an environmental and resources crisis, the ongoing development of clean energy sources seems increasingly inevitable if we are to deal with climate change and the energy crisis [1] and [2].

Currently, the utilization of solar and on-land wind energy is trending towards industrialization, although both are

restricted by geographical factors. Despite nuclear power generation being an effective energy source, it is also vulnerable to natural disasters and human error. For example, both the nuclear leakage caused by the tsunami in January 2011 in Japan, and the Chernobyl nuclear

disaster caused by operator errors in 1986, resulted in extremely serious consequences. Offshore wind energy offers substantial advantages over land-based turbines, including resource storage and greater stability [3], [4], [5] and [6]. Electivity generation by wind power is the principal mode of wind energy resource development, but wind power also has wide applications within navigation, water pumping, wind-heating, etc. However, offshore wind power

generation can provide the solutions of most practical value and so meet urgent demands associated with

problems such as coastal cities with a high demand for electricity , thereby closing the huge energy gap, and can serve remote islands, lighthouses at sea, marine weather buoys, and other power supply scenarios in

marine areas. This largely impeded the economic leap of the coastal city and rural island, meanwhile this predicament

promises offshore wind power with broad prospects. Consequently, the promise of abundant wind energy has become a particular

area of interest for developed countries [7] and [8]. The distribution of wind energy resource shows significant regional and seasonal differences, and in the large-scale development of wind power, the basic principle is one of ‘resource evaluation and planning ahead’. Blanco [9] calculated the onshore and offshore wind energy cost in Europe and pointed out that the local wind resource is by far the most important factor affecting the profitability of wind energy investments. An on-land wind energy distribution map of the United State was drawn up in 1986 using observations from 1000 weather stations [10]. The Risoe National Laboratory in Denmark collected observational data from 220 stations in 12 European

countries, and then developed an on-land wind-energy distribution map for Europe [11]. Previous researchers have made great contributions to the assessment of the potential of wind energy, but due to the lack of offshore wind data, most previous studies have focused on land, coastal, or local sea sites, rather than the global ocean wind-energy resource. In 1994, Gaudiosi [12] presented the characteristics of offshore wind-energy activity for the Mediterranean and other European seas. Emphasis was given to wind resource assessment, technical development, applications, economics, and environment. To promote wind energy in Senegal, Youm et al. [13] analyzed the wind energy potential along its northern coast, using wind data collected over a period of 2 years at five different locations. With an annual mean wind speed of 3.8 m/s, an annual energy of 158 kWh/m2 could be extracted. Results show that a potential use of wind energy in these locations is water pumping in rural areas. Karamanis [14] analyzed the wind energy resources on the Ionian–Adriatic coast of southeast Europe and showed that the mean wind-power densities were less than 200 W/m2 at 10 m height, suggesting the limited suitability of these sites for the usual wind-energy applications. However, these results indicate that wind power plants, even in lower-resource areas, can be competitive in terms of the energy payback period and reducing greenhouse emissions. With the rapid development of ocean observation technology, increasing amounts of satellite wind

data have been used to analyze wind-energy resources. In 2008, NASA [15] and Liu et al. [16] contoured global wind-power density

in JJA (June, July, and August) and DJF (December, January, and February), using QuikSCAT wind data. They found that the wind power density in the winter hemisphere is significantly higher than that in the summer hemisphere. During JJA, the regions of highest wind power density are located mainly around the Southern Hemisphere westerlies (ca. 1000–1400 W/m2) and the waters surrounding

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Somalia (ca. 1200 W/m2). During DJF, the areas of highest wind power density are located mainly around the Northern Hemisphere westerlies (ca. 1000–

1400 W/m2). Obviously, the wind power around the Southern Hemisphere westerlies during DJF is less than that during JJA. However, until now, there has been no comprehensive assessment of the distribution of the grade (see Table 1) of global ocean wind

energy resources. This study presents a grade classification map of the global ocean wind energy resource based on

CCMP (cross-calibrated, multi-platform) wind field data for the period 1988–2011, and also calculates, for the first time, the total storage and effective storage of wind energy across the global ocean (on a 0.25°×0.25° grid). Synthetically considering the wind power density, the distribution of wind energy levels and effective wind speeds, the stability and long-term trend of wind power density, and wind energy storage, we were able to analyze and regionalize the global ocean wind energy resource. The aim of this research is to fill the gap in our understanding in this field and provide guidance for future scientific research and development into wind energy resources such as electricity generation, water pumping, and wind-heating. We also hope to make a contribution towards alleviating the energy crisis and promoting sustainable development.

Offshore wind solves grid failure and high electricity costsMaracci 12, Silvio Marcacci Silvio is Principal at Marcacci Communications, a full-service clean energy and climate-focused public relations company based in Washington, D.C., 300,000 Jobs and $200 Billion Economic Potential from U.S. Offshore Wind, http://cleantechnica.com/2012/09/14/300000-jobs-and-200-billion-economic-potential-from-u-s-offshore-wind/

Grid Reliability and Price Benefits

Beyond creating new jobs and economic activity building and operating all these new turbines, plugging offshore wind into our nation’s grid can increase reliability and lower utility prices . Offshore winds blow strongest during the day and in heat waves – precisely the points when demand for electricity is highest and the risk of power shortages most acute . In addition,

the greatest potential wind power lies along some of the East Coast’s biggest cities. Grid congestion has constrained the ability of cheaper power to reach these demand pools and created some of the highest power prices in the country. But if these population centers could tap into steady electricity being generated just

offshore, growing demand could be met cheaply. In fact, New York State’s grid operator recently found consumers save $300 million in wholesale electricity costs for every 1GW of wind on the grid.

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They Say: “Negative Feedbacks”

Warming is real and human induced –– numerous studies proveRahmstorf 8

Stefan Rahmstorf is a German oceanographer and climatologist. Since 2000, he has been a Professor of Physics of the Oceans at Potsdam University. He received his Ph.D. in oceanography from Victoria University of Wellington. , Global Warming: Looking Beyond Kyoto, Edited by Ernesto Zedillo, “Anthropogenic Climate Change?,” pg. 42-4

It is time to address the final statement: most of the observed warming over the past fifty years is anthropogenic . A large number of studies exist that have taken different approaches to analyze this issue, which is generally called the "attribution problem." I do not discuss the exact share of the anthropogenic contribution (although this is an interesting question). By "most" I imply mean "more than 50

percent.”The first and crucial piece of evidence is, of course, that the magnitude of the warming is what is expected from the anthropogenic perturbation of the radiation balance, so anthropogenic forcing is able to explain all of the temperature rise. As discussed here, the rise in greenhouse gases alone corresponds to 2.6

W/tn2 of forcing. This by itself, after subtraction of the observed 0'.6 W/m2 of ocean heat uptake, would Cause 1.6°C of warming since preindustrial times for medium climate sensitivity (3"C). With a current "best guess'; aerosol forcing of 1 W/m2, the expected warming is O.8°c. The point here is not that it is possible to obtain the 'exact observed number-this is fortuitous because the amount of aerosol' forcing is still very' uncertain-but that the expected magnitude is roughly right. There can be little doubt that the anthropogenic forcing is large enough to

explain most of the warming. Depending on aerosol forcing and climate sensitivity, it could explain a large fraction of the warming, or all of it, or even more warming than has been observed (leaving room for natural processes to

counteract some of the warming). The second important piece of evidence is clear: there is no viable alternative explanation. In the scientific literature, no serious alternative hypothesis has been proposed to explain the observed global

warming. Other possible causes, such as solar activity, volcanic activity, cosmic rays, or orbital cycles, are well observed, but they do not show trends capable of explaining the observed warming . Since 1978, solar irradiance has been measured directly from satellites and shows the well-known eleven-year solar cycle, but no trend. There are various estimates of solar variability before this time, based on sunspot numbers, solar cycle length, the geomagnetic AA index, neutron monitor data, and, carbon-14 data. These indicate that solar activity probably increased somewhat up to 1940. While there is disagreement about the variation in previous centuries, different authors agree that solar activity did not significantly increase during the last sixty-five years. Therefore, this cannot explain the warming, and neither can any of the other factors mentioned. Models driven by natural factors only, leaving the anthropogenic forcing aside, show a cooling in the second half of the twentieth century (for an example, See figure 2-2, panel a, in chapter 2 of

this volume). The trend in the sum of natural forcings is downward.The only way out would be either some as yet undiscovered unknown forcing or a warming trend that arises by chance from an unforced internal variability in the climate system. The latter cannot be completely ruled out, but has to be considered highly unlikely. No evidence in the observed record, proxy data, or current models suggest that such internal variability could cause a sustained trend of global warming of the observed magnitude. As discussed, twentieth century warming is unprecedented over the past 1,000 years (or even 2,000 years, as the few longer reconstructions available now suggest), which does not 'support the idea of large internal fluctuations. Also, those past variations correlate well with past forcing (solar variability, volcanic activity) and thus appear to be largely forced rather than due to unforced internal variability." And indeed, it would be difficult for a large and sustained unforced variability to satisfy the fundamental physical law of energy conservation. Natural internal variability generally shifts heat around different parts of the climate system-for example, the large El Nino event of 1998, which warmed, the atmosphere by releasing heat stored in the ocean. This mechanism implies that the ocean heat content drops as the atmosphere warms. For past decades, as discussed, we observed the atmosphere warming and the ocean heat content increasing, which rules out heat release from the ocean as a cause of surface warming. The heat content of the whole climate system is increasing, and there is no plausible source of this heat other than the heat trapped by greenhouse gases. ' A completely different approach to attribution is to analyze the spatial patterns of climate change. This is done in so-called fingerprint studies, which associate particular patterns or "fingerprints" with different forcings. It is plausible that the pattern of a solar-forced climate change differs from the pattern of a change caused by greenhouse gases. For example, a characteristic of greenhouse gases is that heat is trapped closer to the Earth's surface and that, unlike solar variability, greenhouse gases tend to warm more in winter, and at

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night. Such studies have used different data sets and have been performed by different groups of researchers with different statistical methods. They consistently conclude that the observed spatial pattern of warming can only be explained by greenhouse gases.49 Overall, it has to be considered, highly likely' that the observed warming is indeed predominantly due to the human-caused increase in greenhouse gases. ' This paper discussed the evidence for the

anthropogenic increase in atmospheric CO2 concentration and the effect of CO2 on climate, finding that this anthropogenic increase is proven beyond reasonable doubt and that a mass of evidence points to a CO2 effect on climate of 3C ± 1.59C global-warming for a doubling of concentration. (This is, the classic IPCC range; my personal assessment is that, in-the light of new

studies since the IPCC Third Assessment Report, the uncertainty range can now be narrowed somewhat to 3°C ± 1.0C) This is based on consistent results from theory, models, and data analysis, and, even in the absence-of any computer models, the same result would still hold based on physics and on data from climate history alone. Considering the plethora of consistent evidence, the chance that these conclusions are wrong has to be considered minute. If the preceding is accepted, then it follows logically and incontrovertibly that a further increase in CO2 concentration will lead to further warming. The magnitude of our emissions depends on human behavior, but the climatic response to various emissions scenarios can be computed from the information presented here. The result is the famous range of future global temperature scenarios shown in figure 3_6.50 Two additional steps are involved in these computations: the consideration of anthropogenic forcings other than CO2 (for example, other greenhouse gases and aerosols) and the computation of concentrations from the emissions. Other gases are not discussed here, although they are important to get quantitatively

accurate results. CO2 is the largest and most important forcing. Concerning concentrations, the scenarios shown basically assume that ocean and biosphere take up a similar share of our emitted CO2 as in the past. This could turn out to be an optimistic assumption; some models indicate the possibility of a positive feedback, with the biosphere turning into a carbon source rather than a sink under growing climatic stress. It is clear that even in the more optimistic of the shown (non-mitigation) scenarios, global temperature would rise by 2-3°C above its preindustrial level by the end of this century. Even for a paleoclimatologist like myself, this is an extraordinarily high temperature, which is

very likely unprecedented in at least the past 100,000 years. As far as the data show, we would have to go back about 3 million years, to the Pliocene, for comparable temperatures. The rate of this warming (which is important for the ability of

ecosystems to cope) is also highly unusual and unprecedented probably for an even longer time. The last major global warming trend occurred when the last great Ice Age ended between 15,000 and 10,000 years ago: this was a warming of about 5°C over 5,000 years, that is, a rate of only 0.1 °C per century. 52 The expected magnitude and rate of planetary warming is highly likely to come with major risk and impacts in terms of sea level rise (Pliocene sea level was 25-35 meters higher than now due to smaller Greenland and Antarctic ice sheets), extreme events (for example, hurricane activity is expected to increase in a warmer climate), and ecosystem loss. The second part of this paper examined the

evidence for the current warming of the planet and discussed what is known about its causes. This part showed that global warming is already a measured and-well-established fact, not a theory. Many different lines of evidence consistently show that most of the observed warming of the past fifty years was caused by human activity. Above all, this warming is exactly what would be expected given the anthropogenic rise in greenhouse gases, and no viable alternative explanation for this

warming has been proposed in the scientific literature. Taken together., the very strong evidence accumulated from thousands of independent studies, has over the past decades convinced virtually every climatologist around the world (many of whom were initially quite skeptical, including myself) that anthropogenic global warming is a reality with which we need to deal.

Their studies don’t assume oceanic warmingRomm 2014 (Joseph; Climatologist: When Souped-Up Ocean Warming Ends, Global Temperatures Look Set To Rise Rapidly; Feb 12; theenergycollective.com/josephromm/339526/climatologist-when-souped-ocean-warming-ends-global-temperatures-look-set-rise-rap; kdf)¶

The last decade was the hottest on record, and 2010 was the warmest year on record, continuing the long-term trend driven by human emissions (see

above graph).¶ Still, in the past ten years, surface temperatures didn’t appear to warm as fast as many had expected —

although the oceans kept warming rapidly, and Arctic sea ice melted faster than expected, as did the great ice sheets in Greenland and

Antarctica (see here).¶ Now new research finds that the slowdown in the rate of surface warming is because trade winds have sped up in an unprecedented fashion, mixing more heat deeper into the oceans, while bringing cooler

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water up to the surface. Remember, more than 90 percent of human induced planetary warming goes into the oceans, while only 2 percent goes into the atmosphere, so small changes in ocean uptake can have huge impact on surface temperatures.¶ Lead author Prof. Matthew England explained in a news release:¶ “Scientists have long suspected that extra ocean heat uptake has slowed the rise of global average temperatures, but the mechanism behind the hiatus remained unclear…. But the heat uptake is by no means permanent: when the trade wind strength returns to normal –- as it inevitably will –- our research suggests heat will quickly accumulate in the atmosphere. So global temperatures look set to rise rapidly out of the hiatus, returning to the levels projected within as little as a decade.”¶ This is worrisome since the notion that there’s been a slowdown comes in large part from focusing on the HadCRUT4 data, rather than the NASA data. Since we don’t have permanent weather stations in the Arctic Ocean — the place where global warming has been the greatest — the decision by the UK’s Hadley Centre to exclude this area has meant they have lowballed recent warming. A recent reanalysis using satellite data to fill the gaps finds little slowdown in warming (see figure on right).¶ NASA, at least, has assumed the surface temperature in the Arctic is equal to that of the closest land-based stations. So NASA’s data is more accurate, and yet as you can see from the top chart, there has been no effective slowdown in surface temperatures, compared to the long-term trend. We have had a couple of La Niñas since 2010, and La Niñas temporarily reduce surface temps relative to the human-caused warming trend, much as El Niños increase surface temps relative to the trend.¶ When we see our next El Niño, which could be as soon as this summer,

we can expect to see another global temperature record shortly thereafter, in 2014 or 2015. What the new study finds is that temperatures are likely to jump even more in the coming years since “the net effect of these anomalous winds is a cooling in the 2012 global average surface air temperature of 0.1–0.2°C.”

Warming creates positive feedbacks – exponentially increases the impact – on the brinkHansen 8 – Professor of Earth and Environmental Science

James E. Hanson, head of the NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies in New York City and adjunct professor in the Department of Earth and Environmental Science at Columbia University, Al Gore’s science advisor, “Briefing before the Select Committee on Energy Independence and Global Warming,” US House of Representatives, 6-23-2008, “Twenty years later: tipping points near on global warming,” http://www.columbia.edu/~jeh1/2008/TwentyYearsLater_20080623.pdf

Fast feedbacks—changes that occur quickly in response to temperature change—amplify the initial temperature change, begetting additional warming. As the planet warms, fast feedbacks include more water vapor, which traps additional heat, and less snow and sea ice, which exposes dark surfaces that absorb more sunlight. Slower feedbacks also exist. Due to warming, forests and shrubs are moving poleward into tundra regions. Expanding vegetation, darker than tundra, absorbs sunlight and warms the environment. Another slow feedback is increasing wetness (i.e., darkness) of the Greenland and West Antarctica ice sheets in the warm season . Finally, as tundra melts, methane, a powerful greenhouse gas, is bubbling out. Paleoclimatic records confirm that the long-lived greenhouse gases— methane, carbon dioxide, and nitrous oxide—all increase with the warming of oceans and land. These positive feedbacks amplify climate change over decades, centuries, and longer. The predominance of positive feedbacks explains why Earth’s climate has historically undergone large swings: feedbacks work in both directions, amplifying cooling, as well as warming, forcings. In the past, feedbacks have caused Earth to be whipsawed between colder and warmer climates, even in response to weak forcings, such as slight changes in the tilt of Earth’s axis.2 The second fundamental property of Earth’s climate system, partnering with feedbacks, is the great inertia of oceans and ice sheets. Given the oceans’ capacity to absorb heat, when a climate forcing (such as increased greenhouse gases) impacts global temperature, even after two or three decades, only about half of the eventual surface warming has occurred. Ice sheets also change slowly, although accumulating evidence shows that they can disintegrate within centuries or perhaps even decades. The upshot of the combination of inertia and feedbacks is that additional climate change is already “in the pipeline”: even if we stop increasing greenhouse gases today, more warming will occur. This is sobering when one considers the present status of Earth’s climate. Human civilization developed during the Holocene (the past 12,000 years). It has been warm enough to keep ice sheets off North America and Europe, but cool enough for ice sheets to remain on Greenland and Antarctica.

With rapid warming of 0.6°C in the past 30 years, global temperature is at its warmest leve l in the Holocene.3 The warming that has already occurred, the positive feedbacks that have been set in motion, and the additional warming in the pipeline together have brought us to the precipice of a planetary tipping point. We are at the tipping point because the climate state includes large, ready positive feedbacks provided by the Arctic sea ice, the West Antarctic ice

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http://www.columbia.edu/~jeh1/2008/TwentyYearsLater_20080623.pdf


sheet, and much of Greenland’s ice. Little additional forcing is needed to trigger these feedbacks and magnify global warming. If we go over the edge, we will transition to an environment far outside the range that has been experienced by humanity, and there will be no return within any foreseeable future generation. Casualties would include more than the loss of indigenous ways of life in the Arctic and swamping of coastal cities. An intensified hydrologic cycle will produce both greater floods and greater droughts. In the US, the semiarid states from central Texas through Oklahoma and both Dakotas would become more drought-prone and ill suited for agriculture, people, and current wildlife. Africa would see a great expansion of dry areas, particularly southern Africa. Large populations in Asia and South America would lose their primary dry season freshwater source as glaciers disappear. A major casualty in all this will be wildlife.

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They Say: “Nuclear Power Tradeoff”

Global nuclear power is dead – and it's competing with natural gas, not windInstitute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, 13 (Citing Gregory Jaczko, former chairman of the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission. Published October 10, 2013. http://spectrum.ieee.org/tech-talk/energy/nuclear/former-nrc-chairman-says-us-nuclear-industry-is-going-away)

Gregory Jaczko, who was chairman of the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission at the time of the Fukushima Daiichi accident, didn't mince words in an interview with IEEE Spectrum. The United States is turning away from nuclear power, he said, and he expects the rest of the world to eventually do the same.

"I’ve never seen a movie that’s set 200 years in the future and the planet is being powered by fission reactors—that’s nobody’s vision of the future," he said. "This is not a future technology. It’s an old technology, and it serves a useful purpose. But that purpose is running its course."

Jaczko bases his assessment of the U.S. nuclear industry on a simple reading of the calendar. The 104 commercial nuclear reactors in the United States are aging, and he thinks that even those nuclear power stations that have received 20 year license extensions, allowing them to operate until they're 60 years old, may not see out that term. Jaczko said the economics of nuclear reactors are increasingly difficult, as the expense of repairs and upgrades makes nuclear power less competitive than cheap natural gas. He added that Entergy's recent decision to close the Vermont Yankee plant was a case in point.

"The industry is going away," he said bluntly. "Four reactors are being built, but there’s absolutely no money and no desire to finance more plants than that. So in 20 or 30 years we’re going to have very few nuclear power plants in this country—that’s just a fact."

Nuclear power can't solve global warming – long build times and too expensive

Gunter and Kamps, 13 (Linda, nuclear power researcher, founder of the anti-nuclear power organization Beyond Nuclear, and Kevin Kamps, nuclear waste expert at Beyond Nuclear). Published November 7, 2013, to CNN Opinion. http://www.cnn.com/2013/11/07/opinion/pandora-nuclear-gunter-kamps/)

The climate change crisis is upon us. The world's leading climate scientists agree that time is rapidly running out and that urgent steps are needed in the next 10 years to dramatically reduce our carbon emissions. But exchanging global warming for nuclear meltdown is not the answer.

From a purely practical standpoint — and ignoring for a moment nuclear power's other showstoppers such as cost, unmanaged nuclear waste,

atomic weapons proliferation and catastrophic accident — there simply isn't time to choose nuclear power. There are faster, affordable alternatives, including energy efficiency and renewable energy installations such as wind farms and solar arrays that can be completed in months to a few years.

The average construction time for a new nuclear power reactor is close to 10 years. A 2003 Massachusetts Institute of Technology study concluded that more than two new reactors would have to start operating somewhere in the world every month over the next 50 years to displace a significant amount of carbon-emitting fossil-fuel generation.

Such a fantasy does not pass the reality check in corporate boardrooms or on Wall Street where nuclear power has been soundly rejected. The exorbitant costs and unpredictably long completion time -- a reactor at Watts Bar in Tennessee, for

27


example, was "under construction" for 23 years and may be connected to the grid by 2015 -- make nuclear power an unappealing, even reckless, business choice for corporations and shareholders.

Construction costs for a new reactor are predicted to top at least $15 billion, assuming the project remains on budget, which those under way in France and Finland have demonstrably failed to do. Meanwhile, since 2008, the world market cost of solar photovoltaic modules has fallen by 80%.

In the U.S., the four reactors currently under already-behind-schedule construction in Georgia and South Carolina would never have begun without fleecing ratepayers in advance through a surcharge on their electricity bills. This cost is shouldered by ratepayers even if the reactor they are paying for is never completed.

Government support does not sweeten the pill. Constellation Energy abandoned its application for a new reactor in Maryland after being offered a federal loan of just under $8 billion, a burden that would likely have been shouldered at least in part by taxpayers. Constellation pulled out because it was unwilling to risk $880 million of its own money in federal financing charges.

Nuclear power is in global decline – new report provesMagill, 14 (Bobby, senior science writer for Climate Central, focusing on energy and climate change. Prior to joining Climate Central, Magill covered Western energy and environmental issues as a freelance writer for Popular Mechanics. 7-30-14. “Report Paints Bleak Future for Nuclear Power” http://www.climatecentral.org/news/bleak-future-for-nuclear-power-17833)

The globe’s nuclear power industry is aging, plagued with high costs and construction delays, and generally on the decline.

That’s the conclusion of the World Nuclear Industry Status Report released Tuesday, an annual assessment of the trends in nuclear power production and the state of nuclear reactors worldwide. While nuclear power is seen by some of the most prominent climate scientists in the U.S. as a necessary means of reducing greenhouse gas emissions from electricity generation to combat climate change, most growth in low-carbon electricity generation is in wind and solar.

The World Nuclear Industry Status Report, written by independent consultants in London and Paris with support from the German Green Party and the anti-nuclear Rocky Mountain Institute based in Colorado, shows that nuclear power’s share in global energy production declined to 10.8 percent in 2013, down from 17.6 percent at its peak in 1996.

“The industry has been in decline for a long time. It’s nothing new,” report lead author Mycle Schneider told Climate Central on Wednesday. “For the production of nuclear electricity, peak was reached in 2006. For the number of nuclear reactors, peak was reached in 2002. For the share of nuclear power in global electricity generation, (peak) was reached in the middle of the 1990s. We’re talking about a 20-year decline of the role of nuclear power.”

The U.S. Energy Information Administration doesn’t see nuclear power generation either growing or declining much in the next 25 years.

The EIA’s latest projections show nuclear power production remaining relatively flat through 2040, growing by 0.2 percent each year. Nuclear reactors provide about 20 percent of total U.S electricity generation.

But the new report paints a grim picture of the nuclear industry globally.

The industry, whose reactors average 28.5 years old, is trying to expand, but construction is fraught with delays, the report says. Of the 69 reactors being built worldwide, at least 49 of them, mostly in China, have encountered construction delays, some longer than a year.

Nuclear power plant operating costs are also increasing, with nuclear power generating costs jumping 16 percent over the last three years in France. Five U.S. nuclear reactors in Vermont, California, Wisconsin and Florida have been or are scheduled to

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be shut down in part because of high operating costs, the report says, with 38 other U.S. nuclear reactors in danger of closure for economic reasons.

Nuclear plant operating costs have increased worldwide to shore up reactors considered at risk following the Fukushima Daiichi disaster after the 2011 tsunami in Japan, according to the report.

Meanwhile, solar and wind power, meanwhile, continue to gain on fossil fuels and traditional power sources.

China had more solar power capacity installed — 18 gigawatts — than nuclear power capacity in 2013, while Spain generated more power from wind than any other source, marking the first time in history that wind has become the largest source of electricity over the course of a year for any country, the report says.

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2AC – Economy Advantage

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They Say: “Raises Electricity Prices”Offshore wind is the lowest cost energy source over the long termSavitz, 10 (Vice President for U.S. Oceans and Executive Director of Coast Alliance, 2010. Jacqueline, “Untapped Wealth: Offshore Wind Can deliver Cleaner, More affordable energy and More Jobs than Offshore Oil,” Oceana Report, September, Online: http://oceana.org/sites/default/files/reports/Offshore_Wind_Report_-_Final_1.pdf)

As shown in the three previous examples, offshore wind energy can create more electricity, heat more homes or power more cars than the offshore oil and gas that is being considered for production on the East Coast and in the eastern Gulf of Mexico.

Offshore wind energy potential is much greater than that of new offshore oil and gas and the cost is much lower. Developing the 127 gigawatts of offshore wind energy described above would cost about $36 billion less over 20 years than the estimated cost of producing the economically recoverable oil and natural gas combined. Better still, unlike the oil and natural gas resources, offshore wind is not finite and, unlike the oil and gas, will not become depleted. However, the estimated lifetime of an offshore wind turbine is about 20 years and a new turbine will eventually need to be installed in order to continue to capture wind energy.

Therefore a comparison of costs and benefits over 20 years is an appropriate one. According to MMS, 20 years worth of East Coast offshore oil at $110 per barrel would cost consumers $720 billion, and the natural gas would cost $449 billion . After the East Coast’s offshore oil and gas have been extracted, nearly $1.17 trillion will have been transferred from consumers to the oil and gas industry, and then no more energy will be available. Developing the 127 gigawatts of offshore wind energy described above – instead of drilling for oil and gas, would cost about $1.13 trillion, $36 billion less than the oil and gas costs over 20 years.

Notwithstanding the cost savings, as described above the wind investment also produced more energy in every scenario considered. By investing in offshore wind on the East Coast, instead of offshore oil and gas in the areas that were previously protected in the Atlantic and

eastern Gulf, Americans would get more energy for less money. There is another downside to high oil and gas prices. As oil and gas prices increase, the industry can use the proceeds to extract resources that were previously not cost-effective to recover – for instance, deep water oil and gas resources. In turn, the oil and gas companies sell these harder-to-extract resources at higher prices to customers. Thus, high oil prices not only increase the cost at the pump, they also increase the risks and potential harm to marine life from more extreme production processes.

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They Say: “No Job Growth”

Offshore wind is key to creating jobs in the United States and abroad in port economyHopkins 12

Robert B. Hopkins, Duane Morris LLP. "Offshore Wind Farms in US Waters Would Generate Both US and Foreign Maritime Jobs." Renewable Energy World. N.p., 12 July 2012. Web. 22 Aug. 2012. <http://www.renewableenergyworld.com/rea/news/article/2012/07/offshore-wind-farms-in-u-s-waters-would-generate-both-u-s-and-foreign-maritime-jobs?cmpid=rss>.

With no offshore wind energy farms yet built off U.S. coastlines, various states over the last few years have proposed offshore wind energy legislation as a future investment in renewable energy as well as a vehicle for American job creation. The immediate future of U.S. offshore wind farms may depend on whether Congress renews certain tax credit and federal loan guarantee programs. In the event that offshore wind farms move forward, it is likely that both U.S. maritime and foreign maritime workers will be involved in construction and maintenance. A recent study by The National Renewable Energy Laboratory estimated the potential generating capacity from offshore wind farms located off U.S. coastlines to be 4 times the present total U.S. electrical generating capacity. The construction and maintenance of offshore wind farms to tap into even a small percentage of this potential will demand a robust and competent maritime workforce. The U.S. understandably wants to avoid the situation that occurred in England with the installation of the Thanet Wind Farm, currently the largest operating offshore wind farm in the world (300 megawatts). The Thanet project received criticism for its lack of significant British job creation. U.S. wind farm developers, green energy advocates and some U.S. politicians have stressed that offshore wind farms will create jobs for both U.S. maritime and U.S. shore-based workers. In addition, some have pointed to a federal statute known as the Jones Act, to assert that foreign-flagged vessels crewed by foreign maritime workers may not even be involved in U.S. offshore wind farm projects. However, such a broad statement is not entirely accurate, and the issue is somewhat complex. The Jones Act, which was enacted in 1920, establishes a system for protecting American maritime jobs and requires that U.S.-flagged vessels be used to transport merchandise between points in U.S. territorial waters (i.e., up to 3 nautical miles off the coastline). Moreover, this requirement is extended 200 miles offshore to the Outer Continental Shelf (OCS) by the Outer Continental Shelf Lands Act (OCSLA) in certain scenarios involving man-made objects that are affixed to the seabed. Customs and Border Protection (CBP), the federal agency that enforces the Jones Act, has issued a number of rulings that conclude that the Jones Act in certain situations does not apply to the actual installation of wind turbines by large-scale vessels known as jack-up lift vessels. Moreover, there has been some debate on whether the Jones Act would apply to vessels travelling to an established wind farm located over 3 miles off the coastline in the OCS for such things as maintenance and repair. A bill clarifying that the Jones Act would apply in this maintenance/repair scenario (HR 2360) has recently passed the U.S. House of Representatives and is now awaiting a vote in the U.S. Senate. Thus, at present, from a purely legal standpoint, foreign-flagged vessels would likely be able to participate in the installation of the proposed wind farms, but there is some uncertainty as to whether foreign-flagged vessels would be able to participate in maintenance/repair work. Complicating all of this is the dearth of U.S.-flagged jack-up lift vessels capable of undertaking much of the very heavy work involved in the installation of offshore wind turbines. To further confound matters, with a boom in offshore wind farm construction in Europe and

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China, many foreign-flagged jack-up lift vessels capable of such work are now booked for the next several years. Factoring in all of the above, it is likely that large foreign-flagged vessels will play a significant role in the initial installation of wind turbines off U.S. coastlines, with an opportunity for smaller U.S.-flagged vessels to render assistance. However, with the lack of available large scale foreign-flagged vessels, there are obvious long term investment opportunities for the construction of large U.S.-flagged vessels or for the conversion of other large U.S.-flagged vessels to undertake much of the above heavy work. One possible option is to convert U.S.-flagged vessels now working in the oil and gas fields in the Gulf of Mexico for this purpose. Such investment opportunities will obviously become more attractive if a large number of wind farms move forward in the U.S.. As to certain maintenance/repair, which could be done by smaller U.S.-flagged vessels already in existence, if Congress passes HR 2360, U.S.-flagged vessels will be required to maintain and repair the wind turbines. Moreover from a practical standpoint, even if HR 2360 does not become law, it may not make economic sense to employ smaller foreign-flagged vessels for certain maintenance/repair work. Thus if U.S. offshore wind farms become a reality, U.S. maritime workers as well as foreign maritime workers will likely be involved in construction and maintenance

Offshore wind would revitalize weak US ports and shipyards and create millions of sustainable jobs DOE ‘11

[U.S. Department of Energy, Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy, Wind & Water Power Program U.S. Department of the Interior, Bureau of Ocean Energy Management, Regulation, and Enforcement, “A National Offshore Wind Strategy Creating an Offshore Wind Energy Industry in the United States” 2.7.2011 <http://www1.eere.energy.gov/wind/pdfs/national_offshore_wind_strategy.pdf>//wyo-hdm]

Deployment of wind energy along U.S. coasts would also trigger direct and indirect economic benefits. According to NREL analysis and extrapolation of European studies, offshore wind would create approximately 20.7 direct jobs per annual megawatt installed in U.S. waters (W. Musial 2010). Installing 54 GW of offshore wind capacity in U.S. waters would create more than 43,000 permanent operations and maintenance (O&M) jobs and would require more than 1.1

million job‐years to manufacture and install the turbines (W. Musial 2010). Many of these jobs would be located in economically depressed ports and shipyards, which could be revitalized as fabrication and staging areas for the manufacture, installation, and maintenance of offshore wind turbines. Offshore wind provides an opportunity for revitalization of U.S. ports and heavy industry facilities. Due to the large scale of offshore wind turbine components, towers and foundation structures, it is generally advantageous to limit or eliminate overland transport from assembly and installation

scenarios in order to maximize process efficiency and minimize logistics time and costs. In addition, European experience has clearly indicated that it will be necessary to create a purpose ‐ built installation, operations, and maintenance (IO&M) infrastructure for offshore wind, including specialized vessels and port facilities. To assist industry and regional port facilities in making informed decisions regarding design requirements for IO&M infrastructure, DOE will participate in collaborative studies of infrastructure needs and capabilities for the benefit of all national regions. A significant portion of the cost differential between land‐based and offshore wind energy systems lies in transport and installation requirements. European experience indicates that specialized wind system installation vessels, rather than adapted oil and gas vessels, will be required for cost‐effective, high‐ volume installation.

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They Say: “Incentives Fail”

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Economic incentives ensures upgradesSargent, ‘12 [Rob Sargent, U.S. Poised to Join the Race on Offshore Wind: Lawmakers Must Commit to More Pollution-Free Energy”, http://www.environmentamerica.org/news/ame/us-poised-join-race-offshore-wind]

The Turning Point for Atlantic Offshore Wind Energy includes details on the key milestones each Atlantic Coast state and along with the wind potential

and the economic benefits. Among the highlights of the report: Offshore wind energy will be an economic powerhouse for America. Harnessing the 52 gigawatts of already-identified available Atlantic offshore wind energy – just 4 percent of the estimated generation potential of this massive resource – could generate $200 billion in economic activity, create 300,000 jobs, and sustain power for about 14 million homes. (Europe already produces enough energy from offshore wind right now to power 4 million homes.) America is closer than ever to bringing offshore wind energy ashore. Efforts are underway in 10 Atlantic Coast states, with over 2,000 square nautical miles of federal waters already designated for wind energy development off of Massachusetts, Rhode Island, New Jersey, Delaware, Maryland, and Virginia. Environmental reviews finding no significant impacts have been completed, and leases are expected to be

issued for some of these areas by the end of the year. Despite this progress, leadership is urgently needed at both the state and federal level to ensure offshore wind energy becomes a reality in America: President Obama should set a clear national goal for offshore wind energy development, and each Atlantic state governor should also a set goal for offshore wind development off their shores. These goals must be supported by policies that prioritize offshore wind energy and other efforts to secure buyers for this new source of reliable, clean energy .

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They Say: “Manufacturing Not Key”Continued decline of the manufacturing sector eliminates the chance for robust economic growthWalter Musial, Principal Engineer, National Wind Technology Center at NREL and Bonnie Ram, Ram Power, L.L.C., September 2010, “Large-Scale Offshore Wind Power in the United States, Assessment of Opportunities and Barriers, National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NERL), http://www.nrel.gov/docs/fy10osti/40745.pdf, Accessed 5/10/2014

The nation is also recovering from the most significant economic downturn since the Great Depression. Economists are raising concerns about a return to economic slowdown (gross domestic product [GDP] growth fell from 3.7% in the first quarter of 2010 to 2.4% in the second quarter of 2010) and the prospect of a jobless recovery (as of this writing, the unemployment rate is at 9.5%, down just 0.6 percentage points from its high of 10.1% in October 2009; see Bureau of Economic Analysis 2010; Bureau of Labor Statistics 2010). In addition, the U.S. manufacturing sector, traditionally a source of economic strength, has been buffeted by the outsourcing of production operations overseas and, more recently, the recession. Data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics show that the manufacturing industry as a whole lost more than 4.1 million jobs between 1998 and 2008 and suggest that the sector will lose an additional 1.2 million jobs by 2018. A continued decline in manufacturing activity will likely increase our nation’s trade deficit; eliminate stable, high-wage jobs for skilled domestic workers; and generally reduce the potential for robust economic growth.

Current offshore wind energy program is behind the curve – expanded funding, updated grid infrastructure, and streamlined process for permitting and location to manage the difference – reinvigorates the manufacturing industryCasey 12

Tina, Triple Pundit Online, April 24,US and UK to collaborate on Offshore Wind Power, http://www.triplepundit.com/2012/04/us-and-uk-partner-on-floating-wind-turbines/,

The U.S. has to play a bit of catch-up, but the Obama Administration had the foresight to get itself into a good position just ahead of the conference with the March 1 announcement of a six-year, $180 million round of funding for four innovative offshore wind energy installations that will demonstrate the potential for lowering the cost of wind power through utility-scale planning. The Department of Energy will also provide support for reducing associated expenses including grid connection, permitting and approval processes – though unfortunately it seems

that at least one state legislature (okay, so Wisconsin) will not be of much assistance. Also coming into play is a five-year, $41 million round of funding for offshore wind projects announced by the Department of Energy last fall, aimed at getting new technologies out of the lab and into the water more quickly, partly by helping to spur domestic manufacturing and other aspects of the wind industry supply chain. The two latest funding rounds join a $24 million wind energy research program funded by the Recovery Act near the beginning of the Obama Administration in 2009. That funding went to three consortia headed by the Illinois Institute of Technology, the University of Maine and the University of Minneapolis to develop both onshore and offshore technologies, while establishing a long term academic platform for the development of career innovators in advanced wind power tech.

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http://www.doe.gov/articles/department-energy-awards-43-million-spur-offshore-wind-energy

http://www.triplepundit.com/2011/03/wisconsin-legislature-closes-door-wind-power/

http://energy.gov/articles/energy-department-announces-180-million-ambitious-new-initiative-deploy-us-offshore-wind

http://www.triplepundit.com/2012/04/us-and-uk-partner-on-floating-wind-turbines/


They Say: “Economy Resilient”

Not resilient – Economy improving but extremely fragile-Low consumer confidence

-Slow GDP growth

-Decreased capital expansion

-Frictional unemployment

-Lagging recession recovery

Cook 5/12

{Charlie, syndicated political analyst, Resident Fellow at the Harvard Institute of Politics, 2010 recipient of the Carey McWilliams award from the American Political Science Association, Georgetown grad, “Our Fragile Economy Still Needs Time to Gather Its Strength,” National Journal, 2014, http://www.nationaljournal.com/off-to-the-races/our-fragile-economy-still-needs-time-to-gather-its-strength-20140512 }

Americans remain pretty pessimistic about the economy . The National Bureau of Economic Research calculates that the most recent recession began in

December 2007 and ended in June 2009. But that is certainly news to most Americans. In a March NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll, 57 percent of respondents said they believe we are still in a recession, while 41 percent said we are not. Indeed, in the seven times that NBC/WSJ pollsters have asked the question since the latter half of 2001, a majority of Americans have felt that we were in a recession. While consumer confidence is on the rise and pretty close to the highest it has been since the last recession began, we are nowhere near the levels of optimism and

comfort that Americans felt during the period of 1992 until this latest recession began in late 2007. We feel better, but nowhere near good . The recent economic reports that we only had a one-tenth of a percentage point increase in the real gross domestic product is attributed to an unusually harsh winter; but a vibrant

economy doesn't sustain that kind of hit from a tough winter alone. As Mesirow Financial's Chief Economist Diane Swonk put it in a recent report to clients: "The economy came to a virtual standstill in the first quarter [of 2014], adding insult to injury to an economy still struggling to recover ." She added that it was "reflective of a fundamental weakening in a recovery that was already compromised ." This was and remains a very fragile economy . The monthly survey of top economists conducted by Blue Chip Economic Indicators

projects that the economy, as measured by change in real GDP, will likely grow at a rate of 3.4 percent for the ongoing second quarter of this year, then 3.0 and 3.1 percent for the third and fourth quarters, respectively. And projections for 2015 remain basically at the 3.0 percent level. Obviously, this is far better growth than we have had during recessions; looking back over the last three-quarters of a century, mid-to-high single digits is more the norm, so the economy will likely be growing—but compared with the pain we have gone through, n ot at nearly the rate we need and would like to have. SHARE THIS

STORY With projections calling for growth—but nothing like the impressive growth we have seen in previous eras—businesses are slow to risk huge investments in new plants and equipment . To paraphrase economist Michael Drury of McVean Trading and

Investments, without a surge in capital spending—which is not happening— this economic cycle will remain lackluster , but last longer. Manufacturing and employment in that sector is picking up strongly, but caution remains. Cornerstone Macro, a New York-based firm that advises its Wall Street clients on economics, policy, and investment strategy, said in a recent report that the manufacturing workweek is near a record high, and manufacturing wages are now on the increase after a stomach-churning plunge during the 2008 recession. The manufacturing employment rate for April was 5.6 percent, the largest increase in almost 30 years. Citing figures from the payroll firm ADP, the employment rate for small businesses—organizations with fewer than 50 workers—is at a record high. Now almost 50 million people work for small businesses, almost double those working for large businesses of 500 or more

employees. Hiring numbers for small, medium, and large firms are doing well, but not all of the unemployed have the skills for this new economy. The labor-participation rate (the percentage of the population working) is still languishing , and long-term unemployment remains a critical problem. Sadly , the longer people are unemployed, the more their skills and

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marketability atrophy, and the harder it is for them to find a new job. We were in a pretty deep hole during the recession, followed by an exceedingly sluggish recovery . Much of the good news in manufacturing is linked to the energy renaissance coming from the oil and gas sector. The International Energy Agency projects that the U.S. will surpass Russia and Saudi Arabia to become the world's top oil producer by 2015. Energy Information Administration figures show that U.S. crude-oil inventories are the highest since 1931, currently at almost 400 million barrels. This is roughly a third more than 10 years ago, and far greater than the 250 million during the energy crisis of the 1970's. U.S. oil production is now at double the amount of oil we import from OPEC, a huge plus for the United States for both economic and geopolitical reasons.

Heading into the recession that began in December 2007, imports far outstripped production. The bottom line is that while there is considerable good news, the bad news was so bad for so long, we need much better news for a much longer period of time.

Uneven recovery means extreme fragility – county surveys prove – also proves discipline key to recoveryPhilipps 14

{Jim, Manager at the National Association of Counties, “U.S. Economic Recovery Remains Uneven, Fragile across Counties,” NACO, 1/13, http://www.naco.org/newsroom/Documents/Press%20Release%20Documents/county%20tracker.pdf }

U.S. economic growth continued last year for the 3,069 county economies, but the recovery remained uneven and fragile, according to an analysis of four economic performance indicators by the National Association of Counties (NACo). As a result of the fragile and uneven recovery, many counties are continuing to struggle with their budgets, meet financial obligations and provide essential public services. NACo’s new study, County Tracker 2013: On the Path to Recovery assesses the performance of the nation’s county economies by studying annual changes in four indicators – economic output (GDP), employment, the unemployment rate and home prices. The report also contains case studies to illustrate how specific county economies fared during the recession and recovery. The counties profiled include, Tarrant County, Texas (population 1.9 million), Los Angeles County, Calif. (10 million), Linn County, Iowa (215,000) and Mountrail County, N.D. (9,000). The economic

indicators analyzed by NACo suggest that 2013 was a year of growth, but the recovery remained fragile. By 2013,

the economic output (GDP) in about half of all county economies recovered or had no declines over the last decade. Home prices were in the same situation. But this is only part of the story . Jobs recovered in one quarter of county economies and in only 54 county economies unemployment is back to pre-recession levels . The low unemployment recovery rates show the fragility of the recovery. The recovery has been also uneven. All counties, large, mid-sized or small, have been affected by the recession but the patterns of recovery vary significantly . Large county economies

were at the core of the recession and the recovery. Only 4 percent of the nation’s large county economies – in counties with more than 500,000 residents –

delivered around 58 percent of the county economies’ output (GDP) growth and a similar share of the added jobs over the recovery. Large county economies in the South such as in Tarrant County, Texas bounced back quickly. “While blessed with an economic diversity that enabled us to withstand the national recession better than other areas of the country, we were most impressed with the resilience of Tarrant County’s manufacturing and housing sectors, which allowed them to respond quicker to developing opportunities,” said Roy Brooks, commissioner, Tarrant County, Texas, and chair of NACo's Large Urban County Caucus (LUCC). Employment in medium-size county economies was more stable during the recession, but had a mixed record in 2013. About half of the medium-sized county economies – in counties with populations between 50,000 and 500,000 residents – had shorter and/or shallower job recessions than the national average. “One of the factors that helped stabilize Linn County’s economy through the recession was the amount of post-flood construction and revitalization that took place,” said NACo President Linda Langston, supervisor, Linn County, Iowa. “Nearly $1 billion was reinvested throughout our community from federal, state, local and private sources in the five years

since the flood. Linn County also has the benefit of the value-added agriculture industry and expanding new start-up businesses that helped to fully restore us to pre-recession levels.” The recovery in small county economies covered the entire scale of potential outcomes. Twenty-seven small county economies – in counties with fewer than 50,000 residents – had no recession or fully recovered across all four indicators by 2013. The housing market downturn was mild in small county economies, with more than half not going through

home price declines or already returned to pre-recession home price levels by 2013. This fragile and uneven recovery across county economies adds

to the challenges that counties face currently . Most counties survived through the recession because of their fiscally prudent approaches . “Los Angeles County would not have weathered the recession as strongly as we did without our focus on fiscal prudency , as well as the partnerships we have with our labor unions, who have foregone

cost of living increases to avoid furloughs and layoffs,” said Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors Chairman Don Knabe, member of the NACo Large Urban County Caucus. “Our frugality

has paid off through the rough economic times . Nevertheless, as we see improvements , we must remain disciplined and continue to operate within our means .” Counties with fast growing economies, such as Mountrail County, N.D.

have a hard time to keep up with the necessary service delivery. “The fast growth that Mountrail County experienced for the last several years has been great with jobs, but tough on the county’s infrastructure and on the county’s residents on fixed incomes,” said Greg Boschee, commissioner, Mountrail County, N.D. Other counties, with challenged economies are finding new ways to maintain

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services and prepare their counties for the future. “Trying to run county government in a contracting economy and declining population base has its challenges. But similar to running a business, if you are successful at making your organization as efficient as possible in delivering quality goods or services in trying times, you prepare your organization for greater success during more favorable times” said

Matthew McConnell, commissioner, Mercer County, Pa. In addition to the situation of their economy, all counties face a triple threat from the uncertainty around major federal policy changes , from tax reform, entitlement reform and appropriation cuts, not accompanied by cuts in

unfunded mandates and federal regulations. “The national economic numbers mask the growth patterns on the ground ,” said Emilia

Istrate, NACo’s director of research and lead author of the report. “The dynamics within county economies affect the capacity of counties to deliver services and meet their financial obligations. The County Tracker offers a reminder that the U.S. economy happens on the ground , in the 3,069 county economies that provide the basis for county governments. As fiscal tightening continues to limit the scope of state and federal investment, it is becoming imperative for states and the federal government to work with counties to maintain the fundamentals of the U.S. economy – county economies.”

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They Say: “Decline doesn’t lead to war”Perception alone causes global instabilityHarold James 7/3/13 (Professor of History and International Affairs at Princeton University and Professor of History at the European University Institute, Florence, project syndicate, “financial crisis and war” http://www.project-syndicate.org/commentary/financial-crisis-and-war-by-harold-james#6ObpMZcq3uXv7puL.99)

The approach of the hundredth anniversary of the outbreak of World War I in 1914 has jolted politicians and commentators worried by the fragility of current global political and economic arrangements. Indeed, Luxembourg’s prime minister,

Jean-Claude Juncker, recently argued that Europe’s growing north-south polarization has set the continent back by a century. The lessons of 1914 are about more than simply the dangers of

national animosities. The origins of the Great War include a fascinating precedent concerning how financial globalization can become the equivalent of a national arms race, thereby increasing the vulnerability of the international order. In 1907, a major financial crisis emanating from the United States affected the rest of the world and demonstrated the fragility of the entire international financial system. The response to the current financial crisis is replaying a similar dynamic. Walter Bagehot’s 1873 classic Lombard Street described the City of London as “the greatest combination of

economic power and economic delicacy that the world has ever seen.” In one influential interpretation, popularized by the novelist, Labour Party MP, and future Nobel Peace Prize laureate Norman Angell in 1910, the interdependency of the increasingly complex global economy made war impossible. But the opposite conclusion was equally plausible: Given the extent of fragility, a clever twist to the control levers might facilitate a military victory by the economic hegemon. The aftermath of the 1907 crash drove the hegemonic power of the time – Great Britain – to reflect on how it could use its financial clout to enhance its overall strategic capacity. That is the conclusion of an important recent book, Nicholas Lambert’s study of British economic planning and the First World War, entitled Planning Armageddon. Lambert demonstrates how, in a grand strategic gamble, Britain began to marry its military – and especially naval – predominance and its global financial leadership. Between 1905 and 1908, the British Admiralty developed the broad outlines of a plan for financial and economic warfare against Europe’s rising power, Germany. Economic warfare, if implemented in full, would wreck Germany’s financial system and force it out of any military conflict. When Britain’s naval visionaries confronted a rival in the form of the Kaiser’s Germany, they understood how power could thrive on financial fragility. Pre-1914 Britain anticipated the private-public partnership that today links technology giants such as Google, Apple, or Verizon to US intelligence agencies. London banks underwrote most of the world’s trade; Lloyds provided insurance for the world’s shipping. These financial networks provided the information that enabled the British government to discover the sensitive strategic vulnerabilities of the opposing alliance. For Britain’s rivals, the financial panic of 1907 demonstrated the necessity of mobilizing financial power themselves. The US, for its part, recognized that it needed a central bank analogous to the Bank of England. American financiers were persuaded that New York needed to develop its own commercial trading system to handle bills of exchange in the same way as the London market and arrange their monetization (or “acceptance”). The central figure in pushing for the development of an American acceptance market was Paul Warburg, the immigrant younger brother of a great Hamburg banker who was the personal adviser to Germany’s Kaiser Wilhelm II. The Warburg brothers, Max and Paul, were a transatlantic tandem, energetically pushing for German-American institutions that would offer an alternative to

British industrial and financial monopoly. They were convinced that Germany and the US were growing stronger year by year, while British power would erode. Some of the dynamics of the pre-1914 financial world are now reemerging. In the aftermath of the 2008 financial crisis, financial institutions appear both as dangerous weapons of mass economic destruction , but also as potential instruments for the application of national power. In managing the 2008 crisis, foreign banks’ dependence on US-dollar funding constituted a major weakness, and required the provision of large swap lines by the Federal Reserve. Addressing that flaw requires

renationalization of banking, and breaking up the activities of large financial institutions. For European bankers, and some governments, current efforts by the US to revise its approach to the operation of foreign bank subsidiaries within its territory highlight that imperative. They view the US move as a new sort of financial protectionism and are threatening retaliation. Geopolitics is intruding into banking practice elsewhere as well. Russian banks are trying to acquire assets in

Central and Eastern Europe. European banks are playing a much-reduced role in Asian trade finance. Chinese banks are being pushed to expand their role in global commerce. Many countries have begun to look at financial protectionism as a way to increase their political leverage. The next step in this logic is to think about how financial power can be directed

to national advantage in the case of a diplomatic conflict. Sanctions are a routine (and not terribly successful) part of the pressure applied to rogue states like Iran and North Korea. But financial pressure can be much more powerfully applied to countries that are deeply embedded in the global economy. In 1907, in

the wake of an epochal financial crisis that almost brought a complete global collapse, several countries started to think of finance primarily as an instrument of raw power that could and should be turned to national advantage. That kind of thinking brought war in 1914. A century later, in 2007-2008, the world experienced an even greater financial shock, and nationalistic passions have flared up in its wake. Destructive strategies may not be far behind.

Decline causes escalatory wars in multiple regionsKemp 10 (Geoffrey, Director of Regional Strategic Programs – Nixon Center and Former Director of the Middle East Arms Control Project – Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, The East Moves West: India, China, and Asia’s Growing Presence in the Middle East, p. 233-234)

The second scenario, called Mayhem and Chaos, is the opposite of the first scenario; everything that can go wrong does go wrong. The world economic situation weakens rather than strengthens, and India, China, and Japan suffer a major reduction in their growth rates, further

weakening the global economy. As a result, energy demand falls and the price of fossil fuels plummets, leading to a financial crisis for the

energy-producing states, which are forced to cut back dramatically on expansion programs and social welfare. That in turn leads to

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political unrest: and nurtures different radical groups, including, but not limited to, Islamic extremists. The internal stability of some

countries is challenged, and there are more “failed states.” Most serious is the collapse of the democratic government in Pakistan

and its takeover by Muslim extremists, who then take possession of a large number of nuclear weapons. The danger of war between India and Pakistan increases significantly. Iran, always worried about an extremist Pakistan, expands and weaponizes its nuclear program. That further enhances nuclear proliferation in the Middle East, with Saudi Arabia, Turkey, and Egypt joining Israel and Iran as nuclear states. Under these circumstances, the potential for nuclear terrorism increases, and the

possibility of a nuclear terrorist attack in either the Western world or in the oil-producing states may lead to a further devastating collapse of the world economic market, with a tsunami-like impact on stability. In this scenario, major disruptions can be expected, with dire consequences for two-thirds of the planet’s population

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2AC – Solvency

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They Say: “Legal Battles”Legal hurdles have been overcome – offshore wind is now poised to expandNational Geographic, 14 (“First U.S. Offshore Wind Farm Wins Federal Funds, Courtroom Fights” 7-17-14. http://energyblog.nationalgeographic.com/2014/07/17/first-u-s-offshore-wind-farm-wins-federal-funds-courtroom-fights/)

For over a decade, Cape Wind’s proposal to build a turbine farm off Cape Cod has generated excitement and opposition in large measures—but no power. New federal funding and recent courtroom victories may soon change all that , and launch America’s offshore wind industry in earnest.

The Department of Energy’s (DOE) Loan Programs Office has announced a conditional commitment to Cape Wind, a 130-turbine project slated for the shallow waters of Nantucket Sound. The $150 million loan guarantee would support construction of the 360 megawatt (MW) wind farm and might finally help the bid to spin turbines above the waters of Nantucket Sound.

“I think a big significance of the DOE’s conditional guarantee is that it makes the U.S. government a participant in the financing of America’s first offshore wind farm,” said Cape Wind spokesman Mark Rodgers. “That’s something that you see quite often in Europe, and I think it sends a message to other financial stakeholders about the confidence the government has in us. After all, although it was different agencies the government also approved the project and issued us our lease. We believe this commitment will help us to continue to attract additional commercial sector financial players.”

With commitments already in place for approximately 60 percent of Cape Wind’s $2.5 billion cost, Rodgers said Cape Wind expects financing to wrap up by year’s end. Initial construction of the onshore cable route could also begin before the end of 2014, he added, if final project financing is completed this fall. “With that schedule, as it stands now, ocean construction would begin in 2015 and we’d expect to commission at least a portion of the project and start producing electricity by the end of 2016, with the full project commissioned in 2017.”

Cape Wind has been fully permitted for several years. Now the long lineup of legal challenges it has weathered, dozens of suits dating back to 2003, may finally be drawing towards a close as well. In March four National Environmental Policy Act lawsuits brought by the Alliance to Protect Nantucket Sound, Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility, the town of Barnstable, and the Wampanoag Tribe of Gay Head (Aquinnah) were decided resoundingly in favor of Cape Wind by United States District Judge Reggie Walton. An appeal seems likely, but opponents of the project may finally be running low on further legal options.

“We’ve had a slew of major decisions, all of which have gone in our favor,” Rodgers said. “To date we’ve won 26 legal challenges against this project. Our opponents have been very litigious, but they have an overwhelmingly losing track record.” Rodgers added

that while further legal appeals are probably inevitable, he believes that the recent legal decisions have moved Cape Wind past the point where further courtroom wrangling could affect the schedule.

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They Say: “Empirically Fails”

It can be commercialized quicklyMatzat 13, Greg Matzat is the Senior Advisor for Offshore Wind Technologies at the U.S. Department of Energy in its Wind and Water Power Technologies Office and is the lead for the Department’s offshore wind demonstration projects. Greg has a degree Naval Architecture and Marine Engineering from Webb Institute and did graduate studies in Ocean Engineering at Stevens Institute of Technology. He is a licensed Professional Engineer. Before joining the Department of Energy, Greg was President and CEO of the naval architecture and engineering firm Sparkman & Stephens in New York where he worked for 20 years, Gearing Up for Offshore Wind Energy, http://www.dnv.com/resources/publications/dnv_forum/2013/forum_01_2013/gearing_up_for_offshore_wind_energy.asp

History shows that U.S. industry can gear up quickly . For instance, it took just nine years to install 54 GW of land-based wind in the U.S. with 13.1 GW of that installed in 2012 alone. As our offshore wind industry develops, we expect to see further improvements in production and installation, thereby reducing the total cost of offshore wind energy and driving further deployment.

And, Netherlands is failing because of onshore wind -- Offshore wind solves better than Onshore – quality, distance, height, and space Diez 10 [2010 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.Why offshore wind energy? M. Dolores Esteban, J. Javier Diez*, Jose S. López, Vicente Negro Universidad Politécnica de Madrid, C/Profesor Aranguren S/N, 28040 Madrid, Spain Renewable Energy 36 (2011) 444e450]

The main difference between onshore and offshore wind installations is on their respective environment, which are much more complex in the sea not only for the design but also for the construction and operation works, because of the significant increase of the factors that can condition all of them . In the following paragraphs, the most

emphasized advantages and disadvantages of the offshore wind technology in comparison with the onshore one are exposed [13e17]. The first advantage is the better quality of the wind resource in the sea, where wind speed is usually bigger, even increasing with the distance to the coast, and more uniform (softer), leading to less turbulence effects; therefore the fatigue is less

important and let to increase the lifetime of the offshore wind turbine generator. Other considerations due to the quality relates to the height at which a wind turbine is placed (the optimum height for a given offshore turbine diameter is that whose rotating blades are above the maximum wave height at the site). The characteristics of the layer of turbulent air adjacent to the ground and to the sea surface allow the offshore turbine to be mounted lower than the equivalent onshore machine. The second advantage becomes from the bigger suitable free areas in the sea where offshore wind farms can be installed, leading to greater installations. Its placement (far from population areas) lets to reduce the environmental regarding the noise emission, nearly all related with the increase of the blade-spit speed. Also, this large distance allows, in some cases, to reduce the visual impact from the coast . All of these statements, together with the not such strict limitations in connection with the load to transport, make possible to install bigger wind turbine units, achieving more production per install unit

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They Say: “Transmission Problems”Offshore wind is located close to major population centers – no transmission issuesSchroeder, 10 (J.D., University of California, Berkeley, School of Law, 2010. M.E.M., Yale School of Forestry & Environmental Studies, 2004; B.A., Yale University, 2003 [Erica Schroeder, COMMENT: Turning Offshore Wind On, October, 2010, California Law Review, 98 Calif. L. Rev. 1631])

Importantly, offshore wind also could overcome the problems that onshore wind faces regarding the distance between wind power generation and electricity demand. That is, although the United States has considerable onshore wind resources in certain areas, mostly in the middle of the country, they are frequently distant from areas with high electricity demand, mostly on the coasts, resulting in transmission problems. n74 By contrast, offshore resources are near coastal electricity demand centers. n75 In fact, twenty-eight of the contiguous forty-eight states have coastal boundaries, and these same states use 78 percent of the United States' electricity. n76 Thus, offshore wind power generation can effectively serve major U.S. demand centers and avoid many of the transmission costs faced by remote onshore generation. n77 If shallow water offshore potential (less than about 100 feet in depth) is met on the nation's coasts, twenty-six of the twenty-eight

coastal states would have sufficient wind resources to meet at least 20 percent of their electricity needs, and many states would have enough to meet their total electricity demand. n78

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