Let's play "Energy Policy" together!
I found it avertised in "The Economist". Chevron ("the human energy"!!!) has launched a website with an interesting interactive game: basically you get to decide how to power a city of your choice from now until 2030, by means of different energy sources. To be honest, I think it is technically very well done. With regards to its methodology and purpose we could argue for months. I mean Chevron doesn't sell Brazilian nuts...yet. 
Thus, in spite of what the LibDem say these days, petrol remains a key source in this game. Even though this is just a game, I found interesting how it shows the trade-offs between economic, security and environment. I would encourage you to play (2 minutes) and then make your comments on this blog, rather than on the game's discussion forum.
Terrific! No matter what you do to avoid it, 12-25% of total energy will have to come from gas and/or petroleum. They've put an explicit minimum of 12% for petroleum in the mix.
With $150 oil prices, sounds like the future will be alright for them, eh?
Posted by: Nathan Rive | September 20, 2007 at 04:23 PM
And did anyone else notice the subliminal oil drop at the very beginning of the game's intro? It's right before the Chevron logo comes up.
Posted by: Nathan Rive | September 20, 2007 at 04:25 PM
With the minimum oil, I think they are pointing out that oil is the only fuel source now, then they introduce the hydrogen later. I didn't understand why hydrogen had a high env impact though.
What I didn't understand is why the capacity of wind and solar was limited. That is blatantly wrong, it might mean a high economic impact to stick in 30% solar straight up, but its technically possible.
Posted by: Will Dawson | September 20, 2007 at 11:43 PM
Fair point, Will, I didn't see that.
Re. solar - yeah, I guess it would be too complex to add a spinning reserve requirement to allow more solar.
Posted by: Nathan Rive | September 21, 2007 at 10:58 AM
Yeah I think that the limits on solar and wind have to do with their role in power generation. They are not used to provide baseload power due to the variability of output, and the technologies behind mass energy storage are still fairly primative (pump storage, thermal storage, etc).
Does anyone know of any other games similar to this one?
Posted by: Greg | June 24, 2008 at 03:36 PM