A bipartisan panel of scientists, former government officials, and energy experts is urging the U.S. government to explore the potential benefits, costs, and risks of geoengineering schemes to slow global warming.

In a new report, the 18-member panel convened by the Washington, D.C.-based Bipartisan Policy Center concedes that the use of technology to slow or reverse global warming — such as scattering light-reflecting aerosols into the atmosphere or seeding the oceans with iron to trigger CO2-absorbing algae blooms — is “no substitute” for cutting carbon dioxide emissions. But with the failure of the U.S. and the international community to take meaningful measures to reduce CO2 emissions, the panel recommends that the U.S. government should begin researching and testing alternatives in case the Earth’s climate system reaches a “tipping point” and immediate remedial action is required.

“The federal government is the only entity that has the incentive, responsibility, and capacity to run a broad, systematic, and effective program,” the report says. “It can also play an important role in effectively establishing international research norms.”

Article appearing courtesy Yale Environment 360.

photo: NASA

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Although the burning of natural gas emits far less carbon dioxide than coal, a new study concludes that a greater reliance on natural gas would fail to significantly slow down climate change. The study by Tom Wigley, who is a senior research associate at the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR), underscores the complex and sometimes conflicting ways in which fossil fuel burning affects Earth’s climate. While coal use causes warming through emission of heat-trapping carbon dioxide, it also releases comparatively large amounts of sulfates and other particles that, although detrimental to the environment, cool the planet by blocking incoming sunlight. As always the final picture of climate effect is very complicated to put together.

Wigley’s computer simulations indicate that a worldwide, partial shift from coal to natural gas would slightly accelerate climate change through at least 2050, even if no methane leaked from natural gas operations, and through as late as 2140 if there were substantial leaks. After that, the greater reliance on natural gas would begin to slow down the increase in global average temperature, but only by a few tenths of a degree.

The burning of coal releases more carbon dioxide than other fossil fuels, as well as comparatively high levels of other pollutants, including sulfur dioxide, nitrogen oxides, and particles such as ash. Since natural gas emits lower levels of these pollutants, some energy experts have proposed greater reliance on that fuel source as a way to slow down global warming and reduce the impacts of energy use on the environment.

But the effects of natural gas on climate change have been difficult to calculate. Recent studies have come to conflicting conclusions about whether a shift to natural gas would significantly slow the rate of climate change, in part because of uncertainty about the extent of methane leaks.

Wigley’s new study attempts to take a more comprehensive look at the issue by incorporating the cooling effects of sulfur particles associated with coal burning and by analyzing the complex climatic influences of methane, which affects other atmospheric gases such as ozone and water vapor.

By running a series of computer simulations, Wigley found that a 50 percent reduction in coal and a corresponding increase in natural gas use would lead to a slight increase in worldwide warming for the next 40 years of about 0.1 degree Fahrenheit (less than 0.1 degree Celsius). The reliance on natural gas could then gradually reduce the rate of global warming, but temperatures would drop by only a small amount compared to the 5.4 degrees F (3 degrees C) of warming projected by 2100 under current energy trends.

The main direct effect of sulfates on the climate involves the scattering of light, effectively increasing the Earth’s albedo. This effect is moderately well understood and leads to a cooling from the negative radiative forcing, partially offsetting the larger warming effect of greenhouse gases. The effect is strongly spatially non-uniform, being largest downstream of large industrial areas.

For further information:  http://www2.ucar.edu/news/5292/switching-coal-natural-gas-would-do-little-global-climate-study-indicates

Article by Andy Soos, appearing courtesy ENN.

photo:

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A British company has developed a new computer game that allows players to save the planet from the effects of global warming — at least in a simulated setting.

“Fate of the World,” produced by the gaming company Red Redemption, places players at the head of a global environmental organization — a “UN with teeth” — charged with saving the world over the next 200 years in the face of rising temperatures, diminishing resources, disappearing ecosystems, and growing population.

Using actual climate models and data from scientists at the University of Oxford, players can confront these challenges through a variety of policies — including cap-and-trade, promotion of renewable energy, and geoengineering schemes. “In many ways, it’s just a very complex puzzle,” Matt Giles Griffiths, one of the designers, said. “The first few times you try it, you’ll get absolutely creamed.”

While the makers of the game say they are pushing no particular agenda, some green groups say a surge in popularity of games focused on sustainability is helpful in raising awareness.

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As global warming intensifies, demands for human manipulation of the climate system are likely to grow. But carrying out geoengineering plans could prove daunting, as conflicts erupt over the unintended regional consequences of climate intervention and over who is entitled to deploy climate-altering technologies.

Last month, J. Craig Venter announced that his team had successfully developed the first self-replicating cell to be controlled entirely by synthetic DNA. Not artificial life exactly, but certainly something different: a synthetic cell in which humans had intervened deliberately with the express purpose of changing the genetic structure and characteristics of a natural organism.

Humans are lining up comparable purposeful interventions in the functioning of another physical system — not the microscopic system of a bacterium, but the macroscopic planetary system that fashions and delivers all our climates. The range of such potential climate intervention technologies — from altering how much of the sun’s energy strikes the Earth, to removing carbon dioxide from the atmosphere — continues to expand against a backdrop of anxiety that humanity may inadvertently be pushing global climate toward a dangerous state.

These two new ventures — manipulating the biological functions of cells and manipulating the physical functioning of the climate system — may be seen as simply the latest steps in the enduring human project of seeking control over the physical world.

Such interventions would bring about, if not exactly artificial climates, then certainly synthetic ones.

Hominid mastery of fire in the Paleolithic brought about radical changes in the possibilities for human life, and the manufacture of antibiotic drugs in the 20th century opened up a wide range of new medical treatments that have reduced suffering and extended human life. Designing self-replicating cells and re-tuning global climate may therefore appear as inevitable developments in our ingenuity and our ability to manipulate the world around us.

But compared to the questions raised by Venter’s biotechnologies, two categorically different sets of questions arise about climate manipulation: How do we judge the risks of unintended consequences? And who is entitled to initiate the large-scale deployment of a climate intervention technology — and under what circumstances?

Proponents are suggesting two broad categories of technologies to roll back global warming. The first, solar radiation management (SRM), calls for altering the solar radiation budget of the planet, using such technologies as mirrors in space, aerosols in the stratosphere, and cloud whitening over the oceans. And then there are technologies, grouped under the category of carbon dioxide removal (CDR), that propose to accelerate the removal of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere by fertilizing the oceans with iron, extracting CO2 from the atmosphere, or sequestering CO2 by heating biomass in oxygen-free kilns and burying the charcoal underground.

Such interventions would bring about, if not exactly artificial climates, then certainly synthetic ones. The calls for significant investments in these technologies have grown in boldness and urgency over the last few years. Whether from government agencies or private investors such as Richard Branson or the company, Climos, resources are being directed into pursuing something akin to Venter’s vision of synthetically controlled cells, but the “cell” in question here is the planetary climate.

Both genres of climate intervention technologies raise serious ethical questions about the propriety of such manipulations, about their accordance with the collective will of people on Earth, and about the unforeseen side effects of such interventions. But the proposition of creating synthetic climates through solar radiation management (less so with carbon dioxide removal) introduces a range of additional concerns not shared with microscopic cellular manipulation.

Concerns arise from the brute fact that there is only one climate system with which to experiment.

These concerns arise from the brute fact that there is only one climate system with which to experiment, and it is the one we live with. If it is planetary-scale manipulation of climate that is desired — and it is — then experimentation has to be conducted on a planetary scale to prove the effectiveness — or not — of the technology.

The first concern is the risk of unintended consequences. Given that it is not possible to conduct large-scale planetary experiments in solar radiation management before going “live” with the technology, risk assessments have to fall back on using virtual climates generated by computer models. The Earth system models currently used to explore the possible future effects of rising atmospheric concentrations of greenhouse gases are the same ones that have to be used to explore the simulated consequences of a variety of solar radiation interventions.

Using aerosols to offset the additional planetary heating caused by greenhouse gases is a relatively straightforward theoretical calculation; it is a case of simple planetary budgeting. Much harder is to know what this “re-balancing” of the global heat budget will do to atmospheric and ocean dynamics around the world. These are the dynamics that make weather happen at particular times and in particular places and which — through various combinations of rain, wind, temperature, and humidity — shape ecological processes and human social practices. The dangers and opportunities associated with climate occur through these local weather phenomena, not through an abstract index of global temperature.

If the goal of climate engineering is simply to reset the global temperature dial at its 19th or late-20th century register, that might be possible to do. But in the process of doing so, significant perturbations to regional climate conditions, and inter-annual variability around those conditions, are likely to be introduced. Even if changes in the frequency and intensity of storms and precipitation were to be a zero-sum game globally, the distributional effects of such changes will create winners and losers. Such phenomena as El Niño, the Asian monsoon, and the Arctic Oscillation will not remain unaffected. And given the far-from-adequate ability of Earth system models to simulate the regional-scale dynamics of the hydrological system, no one should be confident that the full risks of solar radiation management interventions will be revealed and quantified.

Which brings us to the second question that sets apart the project to fashion a synthetic climate from the project to create synthetic self-replicating cells: Under what future scenario could one imagine full-scale deployment of solar radiation management taking place?

Some argue solar radiation management should be available in the event of a climate emergency.

Many commentators have drawn attention to the multi-layered issues of financing, ethics, governance, geopolitics, and public opinion that surround most of these solar radiation intervention technologies. These were very much to the fore at the recent Asilomar International Conference on Climate Intervention Technologies in California earlier this year.

And yet a number of senior and significant voices in the scientific academy and policy community continue to speak of the urgency with which solar radiation management research should be pursued. They offer these putative control technologies as another option in the portfolio of climate management strategies, with climate manipulation joining climate change mitigation and climate adaptation in a trinity of strategies available for policymakers. At the very least, it is argued, solar radiation management should be available as a backstop technology if the world finds itself in a climate emergency when a dangerous tipping point needs to be avoided.

But can we imagine a possible scenario under which the decision to proceed to full deployment of solar radiation management might be made? Let us assume the injection of aerosols into the stratosphere had been placed at the top of the list of climate intervention technologies. Let us also assume that the basic operational mechanics of getting aerosols into the optimal layers of the stratosphere for maximum solar shielding had been figured out. One possible scenario might look something like this:

It is January 2028 and the United Kingdom — one of the permanent members of the UN Security Council — puts forward a formal resolution to start the systematic injection of sulfate aerosols into the stratosphere. The UK’s argument is that with Arctic sea ice extent the previous summer having shrunk to just 25 percent of its late-20th century value, with monitors in Canadian permafrost identifying increased rates of methane release, and with the explosion at a nuclear reactor in China two years earlier leading to a moratorium on all new nuclear power plant construction, such direct climate remediation measures are called for.

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) provides a report for the Security Council on the regional climatic risks of such intervention. Based on the best Earth system models, the IPCC offers probabilistic predictions of the 10-year mean changes in regional rainfall around the world that would result from sustained aerosol injection.

The 15 members of the Security Council argue over the evidence. In particular, they spend much time weighing the probabilities that the Asian monsoon might be weakened as a result. Security Council members also argue about how long the initial aerosol injection should continue — for 1 year, 3 years, or 5 years.

If the politics of Kyoto proved intractable, wait and see the geopolitics of engineering synthetic climates.

Against a background of vociferous, and at times violent, globally-coordinated public campaigns (both in favor and against such intervention), the Security Council votes 11-2 in favor, with 2 abstentions. The deployment will proceed for a one-year period, after which a full evaluation will be conducted.

Over the following months, protestors attempt to sabotage some of the planes being used to inject aerosols, and direct-action groups affiliated with HOME (Hands Off Mother Earth) send up their own aircraft in symbolic efforts to scrub the aerosols from the stratosphere. After one year the deployment is temporarily halted and climate data are evaluated.

Global temperature has indeed fallen from the previous 10-year mean of 15.23º C (the 1961-1990 average was 14º C) to just 14.57º C, the coolest year on the planet since 2014. But regional climate anomalies have been large and variable. Of most concern was a failure of the Asian monsoon, at the cost of $50 billion to the Indian economy, and the most intense cyclone season in the South China Sea for 20 years.

India — one of the rotating members of the Security Council — and China now trigger an emergency debate calling for a permanent ban on deployment of aerosol injection technologies. The IPCC argues that one year’s data prove nothing about the efficacy or impact of solar radiation management. But against a background of further global protests, led by the new popular civic movements in China and India, the Security Council now splits 5-5, with 5 abstentions. Turmoil ensues as two Canadian billionaires unilaterally continue aerosol injection.

Of course one could create a hundred other scenarios under which the story of solar radiation management may unfold. But I use this one to draw attention to the profound political obstacles and humanitarian risks that shadow attempts to engineer the climate through solar radiation management. The organization HOME already exists, seeking to mobilize people everywhere to tell climate engineers to proceed no further with climate manipulation.

The technical body supporting the work of the UN Convention on Biological Diversity has recently proposed a draft text along the following lines: “No climate-related geo-engineering activities [should] take place until there is an adequate scientific basis on which to justify such activities and appropriate consideration of the associated risks for the environment and biodiversity and associated social, economic and cultural impacts.” (Emphasis added.)

Words such as “adequate” and “appropriate” offer new grounds for contention in an already argumentative world. If the politics of climate mitigation policy under the guise of the Kyoto Protocol have proved intractable, just wait until we see the geopolitics surrounding the negotiation of the first protocol on engineering synthetic climates. In the name of saving the planet from inadvertent greenhouse-gas exacerbated climate change, climate engineers may simply be offering us one Promethean fire to offset the effects of another.

Article by Mike Hulme appearing courtesy Yale Environment 360.

photo: jurvetson

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Jonathan Hiskes recent Grist post is an excellent exploration of a schism in the environmental community over the long awaited American Power Act i.e. the Kerry/Lieberman and one time Graham bill. Earlier in May, I took a day off from my day job, put on my private citizen hat and joined the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) in Washington, DC for a day of lobbying in support of the bill.

The night before the bill was released Senator Kerry joined us for dinner. He made it clear that the bill would contain compromises, such as limited provisions on off-shore drilling or a pathway for coal. Kerry appealed to the NRDC to support the bill because politically, the window to put a price on carbon was rapidly closing. Although I cannot speak for NRDC, I think it would be fair to say that the consensus in the room was that, despite strong opposition to specific pieces of the bill, it was more important to get something done.

Hiskes does an excellent job of explaining the fine-line that environmental organizations are walking on climate legislation. For me, I’m convinced that in this case, a bird in hand is worth two in the bush.

photo: The Sierra Club

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Faced with a faltering economy, fatigue over the health care fight, and the prospect of congressional elections this November, proponents of a carbon cap-and-trade bill in the U.S. Senate face high hurdles when Congress returns from its winter recess next week.

The Obama administration and Sen. John Kerry of Massachusetts, the lead author on the climate bill, insist that they are proceeding with plans to pass climate and energy legislation this year.

The House of Representatives passed a bill last fall that would put a price and a cap on carbon. But some political analysts say that with the political environment shifting against the Democrats, the most that Congress may accomplish is to pass an energy bill that stimulates development of renewable sources of energy, nuclear power, and offshore drilling, while shelving plans for a cap-and-trade plan.

With prospects for a climate bill in doubt, environmental and industry groups are stepping up political pressure on the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), which has said that it will begin regulating greenhouse gases under the Clean Air Act.

Meanwhile, Tom Donohue, the head of the U.S. chamber of Commerce, has said that his organization might launch a legal challenge to the EPA’s effort to regulate CO2 emissions. Prospects for such a maneuver succeeding, however, are slim, as the U.S. Supreme Court has ruled that the EPA has the right to regulate greenhouse gases as a threat to human health.

Article appearing courtesy of Yale Environmen 360

photo: vassego

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Some projects are just too big to let the private sector handle them alone. Updating our aging one-way system of centralized power production to a smart grid is one of those projects. Left mostly to its own initiative, the energy industry has done very little in technology innovation during the past fifty years to make the grid more efficient and to accommodate distributed power production.

The need is so clear that even a group that supports limited government agrees that building a smart grid that conserves energy, integrates renewables, and diminishes peak power requires the guiding hand of the federal government.

The Lexington Institute has published a paper that neatly summarizes the smart grid challenges, and concludes that “Just as the grid of today required presidential initiative, the smart grid will take a high-level policy push, too.” The public policy research group, which says it “actively opposes the unnecessary intrusion of the federal government into the commerce and culture of the nation,” adds that “Smart grid will most likely require federal, state and local government incentives” and that “Policy action is worthwhile to move promising technologies closer to full adoption.”

The “Moving Forward on Smart Grid” report cites the Rural Electrification Project of the 1930’s as a success story where the federal government helped to bring electricity to farms.

The Lexington Institute’s seemingly contradictory position on government intervention is understandable given its energy independence/security and climate concerns. And the logic is sound. The demand for energy is likely to increase by 40 percent by 2030, and the choice is to either greatly increase efficiency while adding renewable power, or to plan on building hundreds more coal and nuclear power plants.

Utilities, whose business model has traditionally been to increase revenue by selling more power, will not change behaviors without federal incentives. Many utilities are in the midst of rollouts of thousands of smart meters to enable commercial and residential customers to manage their energy consumption. Federal grants, such as the Recovery Act funds, are enabling energy efficiency projects. For example, the Mississippi Development Authority, in partnership with smart grid company, SmartSynch, is installing smart meters at 1,500 state-run public facilities.

Also instrumental in prompting utility action are the investment tax credits and loan guarantees. Loan guarantees for energy efficiency make fiscal sense because the loans can be repaid through savings. One option would be to allow utilities to provide smart meters to customers, and instead of permanent rate hikes, have temporary rate increases that wouldn’t raise customer’s monthly bills above present levels as long as the expected reduction in consumption is met. Then, after the equipment is paid off, rates can be lowered.

Also, to get hundreds of power producers and sellers to design equipment that will work together requires federally mandated standards, and that process is already underway.

Appearing courtesy of Matter Network.

[photo credit: Flickr]

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Four Democratic U.S. senators are calling on their leadership to pass legislation setting renewable energy targets but to postpone the key element of a major climate and energy bill, which would put a cap and a price on carbon dioxide emissions.

The move by the senators — Blanche Lincoln of Arkansas, Ben Nelson of Nebraska, and Kent Conrad and Byron Dorgan, both of North Dakota — could pose a major challenge for cap-and-trade legislation that was passed by the House of Representatives in June and is now before the Senate.

Referring to the renewable energy and cap-and-trade provisions, Sen. Lincoln told Bloomberg News,

“The problem with doing them both together is that it becomes too big of a lift. I see the cap-and-trade being a real problem.”

The Democrats control 60 seats in the 100-member Senate, but because of procedural reasons will need 60 to pass the bill. Despite the reluctance of the four Democratic senators, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid vowed to bring the legislation to a vote. Meanwhile, details continue to emerge about how the American Petroleum Institute and other interests plan to hold town hall meetings across the U.S. in late August to rally opposition to the cap-and-trade bill.

Appearing courtesy of Yale Environment 360.

[photo credit: Flickr]

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Is the world warming, cooling or does it matter? Most of us will say it matters, a lot, at least in public anyway. And especially if you are hoping to pay rent or retire one day with a career based around the belief that Amsterdam, New York and Dubai will no longer exist unless we cut greenhouse gases and stop the icecaps from melting. But what has happened now that the earth cooled over the past year? Not to mention former NASA Chief Scientist Dr. Joanne Simpson’s claim last year that now that she is “no longer affiliated with any organization nor receive any funding” that she can publicly say that she “remains skeptical.” Recently the name was changed from ‘global warming’ to ‘climate change’ – what is really going on? Or does it matter?

This blog, by the way, is not about proving or disproving global warming, global cooling, or that the earth’s warming and cooling cycles over the past 6 ice ages really were the fault of mankind. This is about the fact that it does not matter what is happening with temperatures but that reducing both greenhouse gas emissions and energy use and creating renewable energy makes complete sense even without climate change political debates.

Republican, democrat, socialist or communist, the following 3 ideas for cutting greenhouse gases without relevance to climate change are hard to argue, but if you can I welcome you to comment below:

1. Releasing black substances that cause cancer into the air in which we breath is not healthy. As if it weren’t obvious enough, the EPA finds greenhouse gases pose a danger to health. That’s for any skeptics out there that think that ‘the solution to pollution is dilution’ and that puffing on a tailpipe is good for your skin. No reference to climate change here.
2. It costs money to put these black cancerous gases into the atmosphere. It is our extreme use of carbon based fuels, oil and coal, for transportation and electricity that our money is going to instead of being used for health care, education, infrastructure and your dividend payout. Who can argue that energy efficient policy and using energy efficient products, therefore, reduces the amount of these black gases that enter the atmosphere while basically paying you to do it. More legitimate reasons with no reference to climate change.
3. Politically and financially we cannot afford to continue to use finite sources of fossil based fuels, that create greenhouse gases, to power our lives. Some believe it is the left’s fear factors that say the earth is running out of oil to push their agenda. Even if true, definitely not the whole picture by any means. Briefly, China and India’s population and need for energy is skyrocketing while oil discovery is steadily declining (left). Therefore the most simple supply/demand curve from your first economics class will explain what that means for our future cost of energy. Renewable energy that does not create pollution nor depend on other nation’s economies and that does not put gases into the air solves more than one problem without the mention of climate change.

Simple enough? So depending on your argument there is a way to curb climate change for some, put money in the pockets of others and finally if neither of those are your flavor, how about not breathing poisonous gases? By using common sense and not trying to pinpoint who is right and wrong, we can appease the masses in one way or another by decreasing energy use and turning to renewable sources of energy. If you are able to think of it, what is a way to argue climate change that does not touch on the topics of health, immediate financial benefits or protecting us from the future cost of energy?

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