I left
the Canadian Government in 1975 to re-enter the private sector, this time as a
consultant - a role that was not unfamiliar to me on the inside of government
during my years in the Privy Council Office.
At the time I left. I had few plans,
except to take a few weeks or months of rest and relaxation. During that time I
talked to many old friends including Dr. Philip Lapp, formerly of SPAR but now
a private consultant.
Phil and I had worked closely together on
the satellite program during my RCA Victor period (1955-1965). We had jointly
set up the first satellite project group in Canadian industry in order to
develop the Alouette and ISIS series of research satellites. He was now (1975)
a consultant with an office in the Yorkville district of Toronto. He had been
Chief Engineer of the Special Products and Applied Research (SPAR) Division of
the de Havilland Aircraft Company in those days and had stayed long enough to
see it split off successfully as SPAR Aerospace before setting up on his own.
My thoughts had been going in a similar
direction to his and he was one of the colleagues I naturally turned to for
advice as to how to set about establishing my own consulting company. The
result of these friendly conversations was a decision to join forces. Phil
already had a small office in Ottawa, as well as his Toronto Office, so I took it over
with the intention of building up the Ottawa end of the business.
The arrangement could hardly have been
better. It meant no disruption to our lives and an opportunity to continue from
the outside of government what I had been doing for ten years on the inside.
After all, the Science Secretariat and MOSST were advisory bodies, albeit
internal. The Science Council, whose terms of reference I had drawn up, was an
external advisory body. Advising government was the business I was in. This was
just another direction of approach.
Consulting contracts turned up, not only
from the Federal Government, but also from several provincial governments. Most
of them resulted from approaches by the client to us and we put very little
effort into soliciting contracts and no money into advertising. There was not a
lot of competition at the time. Indeed I think I set a fashion for a stream of
senior executives who left the public service in the years that followed. A
large proportion of them seem to have set up consulting companies or (God
forbid) lobbying companies in Ottawa.
*****
Over the next few years we became
involved in a very wide range of consulting activities concerned with science
and technology policies and institutions right across Canada. I had travelled more in other countries than I had
in Canada, up to that time, so this work gave me the
opportunity to become better acquainted with most of the Provinces
Early in our association, we made a study
of the Ontario Research Foundation (ORF), which was headed by our old friend
Bill Stadelman. The province was showing the first signs of a policy that has
now spread to the federal government. It was threatening to reduce its
contribution to research and asking ORF to make up the shortfall by selling its
services to industry. We pointed out the necessity for a balance between
discretionary and contract research. Too much of the latter would turn the
place into a technological "job-shop" for industry.
We did similar studies in Saskatchewan, British Columbia, Québec and New Brunswick over the years. I am not sure they had a lasting
effect. These Research Councils now perform very little basic research and
could indeed be fairly described as technological job-shops, as a result of the
cut-backs of government funding in the '80s and in spite of our best efforts.
We also studied several federal
government activities. One of the most successful was the study of the Defence
Scientific Information Service. I had been involved with information policies
in OECD days in the joint preparation of the Piganiol Report. The Service was
suffering the transition to computer operation and there had been a tendency to
leave the scientists who had designed the system conducting the information
searches for clients. Not only were the scientists expensive but, dare I say
it, they were not nearly as adept as young people newly trained in the work.
Moreover they were, naturally, always tempted to make arbitrary changes to the
system. As anyone knows, an operational system must be absolutely predictable
and system changes only made infrequently and then quite formally. As a result,
I think we improved the Service and saved the Government a substantial amount
of money at the same time.
At one stage, we also became involved
with the Auditor-General – on the right side, I hasten to say! He proposed to
conduct a number of audits of research activities, both in government and in
Crown Corporations (where they are euphemistically known as "special
examinations"). There was little precedent for this work and, consequently
no audit guidelines. One of the great difficulties, of course is the
measurement of the output of research activities, not to mention the definition
of them.
I was thoroughly familiar with the OECD
Frascati Manual which, in the '60s, for the first time had attempted detailed
definitions of "pure" and "applied" research,
"advanced development" etc. On the basis of this we developed a very
thorough set of research audit guidelines which, I believe, are still in use.
We were then called upon to provide expert advice to the audit teams during
several such audits, including Transport Canada and the Atomic Energy of Canada Research Company. It
doesn't sound like a very exciting task, but I found working with the audit
teams on their visits to the 'clients' both stimulating and informative. I had
a high regard for the quality of the people I advised during these audits. It
was also a particular privilege to renew my acquaintance with the AECL Research
Company Laboratories in Chalk River and a great opportunity to update myself on their
excellent work, performed in spite of declining government support.
*****
I think it was in the summer of 1980 when
Arthur Porter approached me to help him with the environmental side of the
Ontario Royal Commission on Electric Power Planning (the Porter Commission), of
which he was head. Arthur was a graduate student at Manchester University when I arrived there in 1936, we were. He and I had
worked together on the (federal) Royal Commission on Government Organization,
in 1960. The Porter Commission had been going for about two years by the time
Arthur approached me and was only about four months from the deadline for the
final report. For some reason, the work towards Volume 6 of the Report, on the
environmental and health effects of electric power generation, had not been
productive up to that time. Arthur was now faced with the task of finding
someone who would produce this Volume of the Report in about four months
instead of two years.
Arthur Porter is a very persuasive man,
as well as being a cherished friend. I felt I couldn't let him down so I
undertook to do it. Rarely, since the war, had I worked so intensively for so
long. I accumulated masses of reference papers and books, searched computer
data files and, somehow, came up with a 60,000 word Volume 6 on schedule, with
the invaluable help of another independent consultant, Chris. Haussman.
I had been a member of the environmental
committees of OECD and NATO when they were first formed in the '60s. But I had
never been involved in serious work related to the environmental effects of the
production and use of energy before this time. It was something of a
revelation. As I studied all the latest scientific papers (because Volume 6
was, of course to be a review of scientific results as they apply to conditions
in Ontario), I realized more and more the incredible extent of the damage to
environment and health that was being caused by the burning of fossil fuels.
Yet the damage is so spread out over the whole country – indeed the whole world
– that few were noticing its magnitude. The nuclear disaster in Chernobyl horrified the world. Yet in the United States, for instance, which is a heavy coal-burning country,
the premature deaths each year due directly or indirectly to coal are
equivalent to something like several Chernobyls, the crash of 100 jumbo jets or
the sinking of a dozen or so cruise ships.
Most of the deaths from coal are due to
respiratory diseases and cancer, induced by the emissions from the smoke-stacks
– acid rain as we now call it – plus some carcinogenic solids. But the enormous
damage to people, lakes and forests due to these emissions may be insignificant
in the long term compared with the insidious, cumulative and irreversible
"greenhouse effect" due to the stupendous quantity of carbon dioxide
that is released into the atmosphere at the same time.
*****
Short of nuclear holocaust, the man-made
changes in the Earth's atmosphere due to the excessive burning of coal, oil,
gas, wood and garbage probably pose one of the severest threats to the future
of civilized life on Earth. The six billion tonnes of carbon dioxide from
fossil fuels every year are already causing disturbing changes in the global
climate. The effect is cumulative and the only way of reducing it is to reduce
by a large factor the burning of coal and oil all over the world. The prospect
is a climatic, economic and political nightmare. That is why politicians prefer
not to address the problem at all.
It is generally agreed by scientists that
we are already committed to at least a doubling of the atmospheric CO2
within the next thirty years or so. That would increase the mean temperature of
the Earth by some 2 to 4 degrees Celsius, cause substantial climatic changes,
widespread coastal flooding and increase the probability of extreme and unusual
weather conditions world wide. If the consumption of fossil fuels were to be as
high then as it is now, the world would inevitably face a trebling, quadrupling
and so on of the level of CO2 in the atmosphere. There is little doubt that the
associated effects would be catastrophic.
In order to prevent such a situation, it
would be necessary to start the reduction of fossil-fuel consumption on a
world-wide basis. A reduction of 2% per annum, starting in the year 2000, might
just achieve an equilibrium at not much more than the doubling level by the
middle of the next century. The total annual world consumption of energy is
about 8 billion tonnes of coal equivalent or 8 million megawatts of electric
power. Of this about 20% is actually coal, 30% is oil, 35% gas and only 14%
non-fossil. So a reduction of 2% per annum would imply the conversion of about
150,000 megawatts of power from fossil to non-fossil operation every year. That
is the equivalent of 150 average power stations.
Of course the reduction would have to
occur in all countries and in all sectors: electric power production,
industrial and domestic heating and, especially, transportation. In view of the
rapid growth of energy consumption in China, India and the needs of other developing countries, the
probability of this kind if reduction does not appear to be great.
The alternative is to substitute
non-polluting alternative sources of energy for coal and oil In the time
available there is not a lot of choice. On the scale we are talking about,
minor, but useful increases can be made by exploiting the last available
hydroelectric sources. Not much more can be expected from solar installations
for a long time, because they use so much material and construction that they
consume energy rather than provide it in the first few years. The only
technology that is ready for production on an appropriate scale is nuclear. And
that has been sadly inhibited by the efforts of anti-nuclear groups.
Nuclear energy is clean in normal
operation and is as safe as man cares to make it. However an expansion at the
needed rate may mean an eventual transition to breeder reactors in order to
conserve uranium. Few governments have faced the prospect of such a transition.
The case for nuclear energy has been
elegantly and convincingly made by Umberto Colombo, a distinguished member of
the Club of Rome, in a discussion paper (On Nuclear Power; Umberto
Colombo. CACOR Proceedings 1.15 Sept. 1995). He sees, as I do, that
the widespread development and use of nuclear power is essential and inevitable
so we might as well concentrate on doing it safely and professionally well.
*****
Even when most of the world’s electricity
is produced from nuclear power, the problem of mobile fuels to replace
polluting gasoline and oil remains. Hydrogen is the ultimate portable fuel,
with methanol and natural gas as substitutes in the transition period. When
hydrogen burns in air, the by-product is simply water. A well-managed
nuclear-hydrogen-electric economy poses no threat to the ecosphere. In spite of
all the attendant difficulties, it should be the long-term goal of Canada and the world, if only because it is the principal
available option once fossil fuels are abandoned for environmental reasons or
the supply is exhausted.
Hydrogen research depends a great deal on
electrochemistry, a discipline in which Canada is extremely weak in numbers, albeit having a handful
of brilliant electrochemists. We wrote a report for government in the late '70s
proposing the establishment of an institute of electrochemistry and hydrogen
research. The advice was eventually followed rather half-heartedly by the
Trudeau government. It seemed to me that the Institute could have been suitably
located either in Sheridan Park (an industrial research park in Mississauga, near Toronto) or at the AECL Atomic Energy Research Establishment
in Chalk River, Ontario. The latter site would have been ideal because Chalk River had a strong electrochemistry group related to its
work on the purification of heavy water.
In the event, the government made the
decision to locate the establishment, in Jean Chrétien's riding of Chicoutimi, Québec. That was shortly before the Liberals lost
the election. As soon as the Mulroney government came in they effectively
withdrew support from the project as it had been envisaged, even though the
buildings were virtually complete. Political manoeuvering of this kind at the
expense of science, does immense damage to Canada. It is only one of many such examples and they are
not limited to one political party.
*****
Having written Volume 6 of the Ontario
Royal Commission Report on the environmental consequences of energy production,
I seemed to be regarded as something of an expert on the subject and appeared
at hearings in Vancouver and in Toronto. Soon afterwards, in 1981, I was approached by the
National Research Council to provide a Secretariat for the International Energy
Agency Executive Committee on Hydrogen. Dr J. Bryan Taylor, of NRC, had been elected Chairman of that Committee
and it was therefore Canada's turn to manage the Committee affairs by providing
a Secretariat that, while not full-time, was available at all times. This
fitted in nicely with my ‘retirement’ plans to cut down involvement in the
consulting company. It also provided some further opportunities for travel.
The Committee had members from about ten
countries, including the United States, West Germany and Japan and the Commission of European Communities. It
sponsored a number of cooperative research projects concerned with the
production of hydrogen and, later, hydrogen storage, conversion and safety. The
main emphasis was the production of hydrogen from water by electrolysis – that
is to say by passing an electric current through it. However there were also
thermochemical projects related to the direct use of solar energy for hydrogen
production.
One of the virtues of this Committee,
from my point of view was that most of its members were scientists who were not
only among the world's leading experts in the subject but who held influential
positions in the scientific structure of their own countries. This was true of
the Canadian Chairman, Bryan
Taylor, who was head of
the energy activities in the National Research Council. The other Canadian
member was A.K. (Sandy) Stuart, the President of the Electrolyser Corporation
which is one of the world's leading designers of electrolysers for hydrogen
production.
A World Hydrogen Energy Conference was
held every two years, to review progress in hydrogen technology. The 1984
Conference was held in Toronto. From the Canadian point of view it was an upbeat
affair. It was chaired by Bryan
Taylor, with the
organization in the capable hands of Richard Champagne of the Hydrogen Industry
Council. The Canadian research effort was praised by delegates from Japan and the United States and Canada was referred to as "a world leader" in the
field. It was not to last. One of the first acts of the new Mulroney government
was to decimate the funding for research on solar energy and hydrogen. The
hydrogen research program in the National Research Council was terminated. Bryan Taylor, the kingpin of the hydrogen energy research program,
left NRC for a job in the battery industry on the West coast.. In abandoning
its research role, in the mid-80s, Canada threatened to become a nonentity in international
hydrogen circles. In contrast, Germany, Japan and Sweden inter alia have greatly intensified their
support of hydrogen research in recent years
Canada managed the IEA Executive Committee on Hydrogen for
about six years, after which the Chairmanship and the Secretariat became the
responsibility of Sweden. I confess I miss the IEA meetings in Paris, Vienna,
Stockholm etc., for the same reason that I am nostalgic about the days in OECD
and NATO. There is something uniquely rewarding about the international
fellowship that is developed. I miss the friends I made and I like to think
they miss me. But I regret most of all that my years of work for that Committee
have not led Canada any nearer to the hydrogen-electric economy so
capably described in an excellent 1987 report by David Scott (Hydrogen:
National Mission for Canada; Advisory Group on Hydrogen Opportunities
1987). Like most far-sighted rational proposals, it has been
comprehensively ignored by the Canadian government that commissioned it.
In 1994, a particularly nasty internecine
struggle broke out in the Canadian hydrogen community, ostensibly over the
question of hosting a year 2000 successor to the 1984 WHEC Conference in Toronto, but with much deeper implications. Arguments between
Canadians in an international forum have made this struggle painfully visible
to the rest of the world. As a result, the acceptance of Canada as the host country in the year 2000 is in jeopardy
at the time of writing and the hydrogen community is divided. Why do we persist
in shooting ourselves in the foot?
In spite of this, there is still a very
good argument for Canada to set its sights on a hydrogen-electric future. A future in which
most or all of its electricity is generated by non-fossil means, mainly hydro
and nuclear; where automobiles and trucks use hydrogen as their fuel; where
most inter-city freight and passenger traffic is electrically driven by rail
and where the larger cities have electrically driven high-speed commuter rail
services. There is even an argument for generating an excess of electricity
over Canada's requirements and exporting it to the United States and Europe. The U.S. uses so much coal and oil that a 'clean' kilowatt
exported from Canada would replace a 'dirty' kilowatt generated there. Europe
is close to the time when the importation of nuclear-electrically produced
liquid hydrogen (LH2) would be economically feasible. Such
initiatives would put Canada on the credit side of the global environmental
equation. In this way we could set an example to the world.
If Canada had this long-term future in
its sights, it would have to reverse its anti-nuclear stance and take a
positive attitude to hydro-electric developments in the North, such as James
Bay II, against which some journalists have launched effective but misguided
television propaganda. There is a risk that narrowly-focused environmental
protests, by delaying or obstructing the rational development of hydroelectric
and nuclear power, will cause much more damage to the environment globally than
they obviate parochially. It would be ironic if history showed that the
anti-nuke and anti-hydro protesters were among the greatest threats to the
future of mankind.
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