Climate Climate & Energy

Public presentations on global warming — not as easy as you might think

So I had an opportunity to go see a free, open-to-the-public talk by Dr. Michael Mann, one of the lead authors for the IPCC, the person most associated with the "hockey stick" graph of temperature, and a faculty member at Penn State University.

His topic: "Global Climate Change: Past and Present."

A review:

A new report

The Center for American Progress has a terrific new report on "Global Warming and the Future of Coal" by Ken Berlin and Robert Sussman.

The report explores what to do about the explosive growth in coal plant construction projected for the coming quarter century -- 1,400 gigawatts of electricity by 2030, with more than 10 percent in the U.S. alone.

In the absence of emission controls, these new plants will increase worldwide annual emissions of carbon dioxide by approximately 7.6 billion metric tons by 2030. These emissions would equal roughly 50 percent of all fossil fuel emissions over the past 250 years.

So we must have emissions controls on the vast majority of those plants. The report looks at a variety of policy measures that might achieve that goal and recommends:

Hey, At Least He Pronounced It Right

Bush announces climate plan, world squirms uncomfortably The world gave George W. Bush lemons, and he made some dee-licious lemonade. Yesterday, Bush said the U.S. would take the lead on the climate issue, convening a series of meetings of the world’s top 10 to 15 polluting nations and setting long-term goals for cutting emissions. Coming […]

On the NASA administrator’s comments

Michael Griffin is a highly educated guy. He has five Masters degrees (count 'em: aerospace science, electrical engineering, applied physics, business administration, and civil engineering) and a Ph.D. in aerospace engineering (see here).

However, his interview on NPR shows that all that book learnin' doesn't mean what he says is intelligent.

For a recap of the high points of the interview, see David's post. I'm going to talk in this post about what makes our climate optimal.

Wealthy nations should be held accountable for their actions

Oxfam has just taken a big step -- it wasn't easy, and they deserve heaps of kudos for it. It has called for a mandatory, global adaptation-funding regime, one that's on the right scale, or at least the right order of magnitude. It would make national obligations to pay -- to help poor and vulnerable communities adapt to the now inevitable impacts of climate change -- contingent on historical responsibility for the impacts of climate change, and on ability to pay.

I couldn't be more pleased, and not just because Oxfam's "Adaptation Financing Index" is closely related to our own work in developing a "Responsibility and Capacity Index." What's really important here is that a big outfit like Oxfam has stuck its neck out and spoken the simple truth. Let's hope they get some support for it, because they're sure going to get some pushback from the realos.

Hard to believe he’s part of the Bush administration!

Everybody and their cousin has already posted on this, so I won’t spend a lot of time on it, but yesterday on NPR, NASA administrator Michael Griffin said some extraordinarily stupid things. To wit: I’m aware that global warming exists. … Whether that is a longterm concern or not, I can’t say. … … I […]

That’s It, No More Toothpaste For Us

Growing palm-oil plantations put orangutans in peril Thank your lucky stars you evolved, because it’s not a great time to be an ape. In Indonesia and Malaysia, forests are being converted lickety-split into lucrative palm-oil plantations, and orangutans that leave their rapidly diminishing habitat to sneak in for a palmy snack are often tortured or […]

He’s Having Nun Of It

Exxon CEO Rex Tillerson commits to business as usual It takes a brave man to stare down a pleading nun, but that’s what Exxon CEO Rex Tillerson did yesterday. At a shareholder meeting in Dallas, Sister Pat Daly of New Jersey and others spoke in support of a resolution her order submitted, proposing that Exxon […]

CTLariffic!

Business writer Marc Gunther doesn’t like liquefied coal. Neither does the New York Times editorial board. If we have any musicians in the audience, do me a favor: write a song called "Coal Is the Enemy of the Human Race." I’ll do my best to make it a hit.

Depends on how it’s made

It depends on the fuel used to drive the conversion process -- according to a new study:

In particular, greenhouse gas emission impacts can vary significantly -- from a 3% increase if coal is the process fuel to a 52% reduction if wood chips are used.

These results come from the energy life-cycle wizards of Argonne Lab, who have published a new study, "Life-cycle energy and greenhouse gas emission impacts of different corn ethanol plant types," in the open-access Environmental Research Letters.

Here is a figure showing "well-to-wheels greenhouse gas emission changes by fuel ethanol relative to gasoline":