Climate Climate & Energy

On the climate change ‘point of no return’

I've argued that scientists are not overestimating climate change, and in fact are underestimating it because they are omitting crucial amplifying feedbacks from their models. In this post, I'll show how these omissions suggest the climate has a "point of no return" that severely constrains the safe level of human-generated emissions.

A major 2005 study [$ub. req'd] led by NCAR climate researcher David Lawrence, found that virtually the entire top 11 feet of permafrost around the globe could disappear by the end of this century. Using the first "fully interactive climate system model" applied to study permafrost, the researchers found that if we somehow stabilize CO2 concentrations in the air at 550 ppm, permafrost would plummet from over 4 million square miles today to 1.5 million. If concentrations hit 690 ppm, permafrost would shrink to just 800,000 square miles.

Small countries are going green

While the western media focuses primarily on what the developed world is doing to solve the climate crisis, there's some great coverage on how Third World countries are greening too. SciDev's "Science in the Himalayas," a series of editorials and features, gives credence to the notion that local, community efforts can be just as effective as large-scale centralized ones. And low-tech solutions are often just as good as their high-tech counterparts.

Nepal's successes in scientific application in recent decades aren't about grandiose hydropower dams or major infrastructure projects.

The new technologies that have worked have been indigenously designed, based on traditional skills and knowledge, and are cheap and easy to use and maintain. In fact, to visit Nepal these days is to see the "small is beautiful" concept of development economist E. F. Schumacher in action.

From Nakarmi's Peltric Sets to multi-purpose power units based on traditional water mills, from biogas plants to green road construction techniques in the mountains, Nepalis have shown that small is not just beautiful but also desirable and possible.

Bjorn Lomborg’s new book misunderstands risk and investment

This is a guest essay from Jon A. Anda, President of the Environmental Markets Network, an organization within Environmental Defense focused on legislation to create an efficient carbon market. He was previously a Vice Chairman of Morgan Stanley. —– Bjorn Lomborg’s forthcoming book says to Cool It about global warming. I am anxious to read […]

The Nation reports on sustainable revitalization of the New Orleans neighborhood

This article by Rebecca Solnit is reprinted from the Sept. 10, 2007 issue of The Nation, released today, which focuses on the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, two years later. Solnit is the author of a dozen books, including, most recently, Storming the Gates of Paradise: Landscapes for Politics.

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The word "will" comes up constantly in the Lower Ninth Ward now; "We Will Rebuild" is spray-painted onto empty houses; "it will happen," one organizer told me. Will itself may achieve the ambitious objective of bringing this destroyed neighborhood back to life, and for many New Orleanians a ferocious determination seems the only alternative to being overwhelmed and becalmed. But the fate of the neighborhood is still up in the air, from the question of whether enough people can and will make it back to the nagging questions of how viable a city and an ecology they will be part of. The majority of houses in this isolated neighborhood are still empty, though about a tenth of the residents are back, some already living in rehabilitated houses, some camped in stark white FEMA trailers outside, some living elsewhere while getting their houses ready. If you measured the Lower Ninth Ward by will, solidarity and dedication, from both residents and far-flung volunteers and nonprofits, it would be among the best neighborhoods in the United States. If you measured it by infrastructure and probabilities, it looks pretty grim. There are more devastated neighborhoods in New Orleans and neighboring St. Bernard Parish, let alone Mississippi and the Delta, but the Lower Ninth got hit hard by Katrina. Its uncertain fate has come to be an indicator for the future of New Orleans and the fate of its African-American majority.

A closer look at the argument for climate change underestimation

My previous post debunked an article that argued scientists have seriously overestimated climate change. Now let's look at the evidence for a serious underestimation of climate change.

To do that, we must understand the fatal flaw with the IPCC's over-reliance on the poorly named "equilibrium climate sensitivity" (ECS). Recall that the ECS is the "equilibrium change in global mean surface temperature following a doubling of the atmospheric (equivalent) CO2 concentration," which the IPCC's 2007 Fourth Assessment Report concluded was 2 to 4.5°C.

You might think that the ECS tells you how much the planet's temperature will rise if humans emit enough CO2 to double its atmospheric concentration. But it doesn't. It is just a theoretical construct. It tells you only how much the planet's temperature will rise if CO2 concentrations double and then are magically frozen.

That's because the ECS omits key carbon cycle feedbacks that a rise in the planet's temperature will likely trigger. For instance, a doubling of CO2 to 550 ppm will lead to the melting of the permafrost and the release of huge amounts of carbon currently frozen in it. These amplifying (or positive) feedbacks are the main subject of this post.

U.S. energy consumption decreased from 2005 to 2006

According to new data from the DOE, total U.S. energy consumption actually declined from 2005 to 2006, in large part due to an increasing demand for renewables. Rather fascinating stuff.

Details here.

Another guy with his hair on fire

Another good Scientific blogging interview is "Urgency and Global Warming: An Interview with Martin I. Hoffert." I'm tempted to quote the whole thing, but instead you should just go read it. He's much more of a techno-optimist than I think is warranted, but if we all shared his sense of urgency, it would probably be more realistic.

(Apparently he hasn't read The Black Swan either.)

Responsible climate policy means reducing transportation emissions

In the Northwest, it's impossible to address climate change without doing something about transportation. Take a look at this chart showing CO2 emissions from fossil fuels in Washington.

In Washington (as in Oregon), everything else pales in comparison to the emissions that come from transportation. In fairness, the chart above shows only emission from fossil fuels. But fossil fuels represent better than four-fifths of the state's entire portfolio of greenhouse-gas emissions [MS Word doc]. They're also the emissions that are best understood, and by far the most practical to cover in carbon legislation, such as cap-and-trade systems.

Whether we aim to reduce our climate emissions by 80 percent below 1990 levels (the amount that scientists say is necessary in the developed world if we're to slow climate change) or by 50 percent (the target that the state's leaders have proposed), there's pretty much no way to get around making big cuts in transportation emissions.

On a related note, the Western Climate Initiative -- the group of western states and provinces setting a joint climate strategy -- just announced their shared target. I was actually a bit surprised when I saw the numbers.

And it’s goood …

The NYT has done itself proud with not one but two op-eds this week pushing for energy efficiency — first Nic Kristof’s, and now the The Mustache of Understanding. I guess the idea is gaining traction. The Mustache references a potentially revolutionary change being pushed by Duke Energy’s Jim Rogers. (On Rogers, the cynical should […]

Could used chopsticks fuel a fire?

The whole point of alternative energy solutions is finding a fuel source that is already overly abundant and underused, and will continue to be ubiquitous for some time, right? In Japan, that fuel source is chopsticks.