There Is Now No Clear Path to Preventing Catastrophic Climate Change

With the Copenhagen climate meeting ending with the UN taking “note” of the Copenhagen Accord agreed to by the US, China, India, Brazil, and South Africa the belief that a UN agreement signed in 1992 would lead to the world taking steps to prevent catastrophic climate change has been proven to be an illusion. Instead of the world trying to solve the global warming problem we are left with a blame game for who is to blame for the failure. The environmental organization Friends of the Earth is blaming the rich countries. Gordon Brown, the Prime Minister of the UK, a rich country, is blaming China and some other developing countries. And so forth. The Kyoto Protocol, ratified by all developed countries except the US was supposed to be the first step toward stopping global warming and the meeting in Copenhagen was supposed to be where the details of the second step would be agreed on. Well, it looks like there is no second step. Apparently the billions of people in the world will be left to face the consequences of the build up of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere not to mention the acidification of the oceans that threatens to wipe out marine life. So far Barack Obama hasn’t given us any indication that he can step in and stop this hurtling toward self-destruction. Up against the powerful fossil fuel industry, a public that largely doesn’t want to pay more for electricity no matter what the long-term consequences, coal miners and many others who depend on the coal mining industry for their jobs, and a Republican party that just seems to say no to any call for change by the Democrats, what can Obama really do? Probably he should have spoken out more about this problem, but would that really have helped? I guess we better get ready to pass some climate tipping points. This is not going to be pretty.

Copenhagen Accord Provides Hope of Avoiding 5°C to 6°C by 2100

It is hard for climate scientists to find any good news in the Copenhagen Accord that was hammered out at the climate meeting that just ended but Andrew Waston from the University of East Anglia in Britain told the French news agency AFP that “At least it may signal that there is some willingness to take action, so that we might have a hope of limiting the rise to 3.0°C to 4.0°C and avoid the really unknown territory that lies beyond.” That unknown territory seems to be where we are heading by the end of this century according to some recent scientific studies. So if the bar is set low enough maybe the meeting wasn’t a failure after all. For all the talk at the meeting about staying below a 2.0°C or 1.5°C rise in global temperature above preindustrial levels it seemed none of the big polluters really cared about those targets at all. Based on their pledges to lower emissions or lower the rate of increase in emissions, staying below 5.0°C seemed good enough although that was never uttered in public. So perhaps the only positive legacy of the Copenhagen meeting will be getting us on track to avoid 5.0°C. That’s probably about as low as the bar can be lowered.

Can Obama Save the Climate Summit?

It is hard to believe that anybody can save the Copenhagen climate summit as the final two days for negotiating approach but British environmentalist and columnist George Monbiot thinks Obama can do it. In his column in The Guardian Monbiot writes that “Because of the size and weight of the United States, and the moral power invested in the current president, it is Barack Obama, and Barack Obama alone, who can rescue the climate negotiations from dismal bickering into which they have slumped.” I doubt if very many Americans believe Obama can save the day. After all, whatever he proposes has to be approved by the US Congress. How is that for an unmovable obstacle? Here is what Monbiot says Obama should say in his upcoming speech: "I hereby commit the United States to cutting greenhouse gases by 50% against our 1990 levels by 2020. I commit to this cut regardless of what other nations might do, but I urge you to compete with me to exceed it. We should be striving to outbid each other, not to undercut each other.” Congress is having trouble passing a bill with target as low as about 5% below 1990 levels. What Republican or Blue Dog Democrat would vote for 50% below? Monbiot says Obama should end his speech by saying "I have no illusions about the resistance these proposals will encounter. This will be the political battle of my life. But I know it is a battle worth fighting. If I duck it, future generations will never forgive me, just as they will not forgive anyone in this room for failing to rise to our greatest challenge. This is the battle we owe to our children and to their children. This is the time to do not what is expedient, but what is right." Last I heard Obama is hoping to get something passed on health care reform very soon and then take on financial regulatory reform and job creation next year. Where would he have time for waging this fight to reduce greenhouse gas emissions? At this point it doesn’t appear that President Obama or anyone else on the planet can save this meeting from tanking.

Keeping Global Temperature Rise Below 1.5°C Is Almost Impossible

When it comes to global warming there is little that the countries of the world seem to agree upon except perhaps that the rise in global temperature should be kept below 2°C (3.6°F). But now even that point of consensus has been shattered by a proposal at the climate meeting in Copenhagen by small island nations and poor African countries that the rise in temperature should be kept below 1.5°C. But according to climate science is that even possible? In a report from the BBC, the head of climate science at the UK’s Met Office, Vicky Pope, says "There's no way you'd get a 50% chance of avoiding 1.5°C…If you reduced everything to zero immediately you'd still get about 1.3°C because of the greenhouse gases already in the atmosphere." She noted that policies to ensure a reasonable chance of remaining under 1.5°C would involve "negative emissions" - sucking CO2 out of the air. So why are so many countries and climate activists embracing what seems to be virtually an impossible goal? Perhaps it is a symbolic way at making a statement that the richer countries are not doing enough. Or perhaps it is an act of desperation since anything approaching a rise in temperature of 2°C would probably lead to a sea level rise that would obliterate many of the small island countries and cause climate change in Africa that would be devastating.

What should the goal be? The 2°C target would expose us to a high risk of catastrophic climate change but while extremely difficult to meet according to the experts it remains realistically possible whereas the 1.5°C target would reduce the risks of catastrophic climate change but is apparently an unrealistic goal. Having postponed real action on this issue for two decades the world is left with no good choices.

Hopes for Copenhagen Climate Meeting Fizzling Fast

Once billed by some as the most important meeting in human history, the global climate meeting set to begin in Copenhagen in a little over a week is failing to live up to the hype. The major political leaders have been simply thumbing their noses at science with commitments to reduce greenhouse gas emissions falling way short of the mark as pointed out in an Associated Press article. So far Obama has pledged that the US will reduce emissions by a paltry 17% from 2005 levels by 2020 and the leading global warming polluter China will not agree to reduce emissions at all but only to reduce “carbon intensity” which refers to emissions per unit of production. We know the jig is up but still the politicians pretend that it isn’t, that progress will go on and on. Americans can continue to enjoy affluence if they are just willing to pay about the price of a postage stamp a day more for electricity. Hundreds of millions of poor Chinese will continue to be lifted out of poverty as hundreds of millions have before them and same for the struggling poor of India, even though some critical resources are growing short as the world population balloons toward 9 billion and the evidence that climate change is much more serious than the scientists thought only a few years ago seems to grow almost every day and it appears that climate change could threaten civilization itself. So it turns out we are not going to be saved at December meeting in Copenhagen at the end of 2009 after all. And in fact it turns out we are not going saved period. Darn!

Lower Standard of Living Called for to Fight Climate Change

To avoid catastrophic climate change, lower levels of consumption are needed in the rich countries says Professor Kevin Anderson, director of Britain’s Tyndall Center for Climate Change which released a study on how to combat global warming. In an interview with The Times, Anderson said “That may mean having only one car per household, a smaller fridge, buying fewer clothes and electronics and curtailing the number of weekend breaks that we have…It’s a very uncomfortable message, but we need a planned economic recession. Economic growth is currently incompatible with reductions in absolute emissions.” That’s quite a message to countries trying to get out of an unplanned recession. It is also pretty much the opposite of the message that we hear from Al Gore, Thomas Friedman, and numerous Democratic politicians who have been trying to convince everyone that going green to fight global warming is the key to economic growth. It is hard to imagine any politician in one of the rich countries such as the United States running for office on a platform that includes calling for an unplanned recession and promising the voters to lower their standard of living. Who wouldn’t want to run against an opponent saying that. To have any chance of succeeding with calls for lower levels of consumption would require ratcheting up the fear of climate change among the voters to a level that right now is unimaginable. It would have to be palpable fear. The type that keeps you up at night. The type that drives people to drinking and other means of mental escape. Unless the television networks replace all their reality shows, games shows, sit coms, dramas, and sports events with documentaries on global warming it seems unlikely that fear of global warming will increase to above its present level which is nearly undetectable based on the polls that have been taken. It appears in all likelihood that the rich countries will continue to party on and our planet will continue to grow warmer and warmer.

Australia Overtakes the US as Leader in CO2 Emissions per Person

After being recently replaced by China as the number one greenhouse gas polluter in the world, the US has now been surpassed by Australia as the leading nation in CO2 emissions on a per capita basis. According to Reuters, the US emissions of 19.8 tons per capita annually was only good for second place, with Australia taking over the lead with 20.6 tons. In third place was Canada at 18.8 tons. Per capita emissions have become a major sticking point in the negotiations on a climate treaty to replace the Kyoto Protocol which expires in 2012 as developing countries, particularly China and India, have been arguing that developed countries should assume most of the burden for reducing emissions since on a per capita basis their emissions are several times higher. However, the British economist Nicholas Stern, who wrote an influential report on climate change, recently noted in a talk given in Beijing, China, that although China’s emissions on a per capita basis are much lower than those of developed countries, there were 13 provinces, regions, and cities in China that actually had higher emissions per capita than France and 6 with higher emissions than Britain. According to the AFP news agency, Stern has calculated that for the risk of dangerous climate change to be minimized emissions would need to be reduced to 2 tons per person worldwide. Unfortunately, with millions of people in China and India rapidly adopting Western lifestyles and many developed countries including the US refusing to commit to the necessary reductions in carbon dioxide emissions by 2020 called for by the leading climate scientists the prospects for minimizing the risks of dangerous climate change appear to be rapidly diminishing.

UK Royal Society Gives Geoengineering the Okay for Future Research

Geoengineering schemes to combat global warming got a boost from a study by the UK Royal Society which came to the conclusion that it is technically possible for geoengineering to play a role and research on the schemes should go forward. A report from BBC News says that the Society found that of the two basic approaches, carbon dioxide removal from the atmosphere and reflecting sunlight, that the former was preferred. It may turn out that whether of not geoengineering schemes to alter the climate are technically possible may be beside the point as the study noted that “The greatest challenges to the successful deployment of geoengineering may be to social, ethical, legal and political issues associated with governance rather than scientific issues.” Yes, this could be one heck of a mess. Perhaps the best advice from this study is the recommendation for an international body to come up with some sort of procedure whereby treaties could be devised for determining who would have responsibility for carrying out the research that might have risks and benefits on a global scale. The situation we are in was nicely summarized by the chairman of the study group, Professor John Shepherd from the University of South Hampton, who said "Geoengineering and its consequences are the price we may have to pay for failure to act on climate change.” If things go unexpectedly wrong that could be quite a high price.

Indian Environment Minister Says Westerners Need to Live with Only One Car Not Three

With the countdown to the UN’s climate meeting in Copenhagen reaching the 100-day mark yesterday India’s environment minister, Jairam Ramesh, gave a speech in Delhi in which he reiterated that India will not agree to a target for reducing greenhouse gas emissions. According to an article in The Guardian, Ramesh said that “For us this is about survival. We need to put electricity into people’s homes and do it cleanly. You in the west need to live with only one car rather than three. For you it is about luxury.” Luxury? Wait a minute! Perhaps if Ramesh has a family with a teenage driver he should rent a McMansion in one of our cul-de-sac suburban developments for awhile and try to live with one car. Good luck! He would quickly find out that to get to anything other than a nearby neighbor’s house that he would have to drive. If he takes the car to work his wife would be either stranded at home all day or unable to get to her job. If the teenage driver takes the car to see a friend in the evening or on weekends they would both be stranded at home. Ramesh would quickly come to realize that two cars are a necessity and even having that third car avoids a lot of conflicts. These houses don’t have three-car garages for nothing. To really change things Ramesh would have go back in time to the 1950s and stop our government from building the interstate highway system and subsidizing mortgages through the GI bill. In other words, he would have to stop the things that made building our sprawling suburbs possible. We can’t now in 2009 turn back time. “The die has been cast.” If Ramesh and India are waiting for us to go from three cars to one car it promises to be a very long wait.

Phase-out of “Super” Greenhouse Gases Through the Montreal Protocol Might Limit Climate Change

A report by the non-profit Environmental Investigation Agency (EIA) says that using the Montreal Protocol ozone treaty to phase out hydrofluorocarbons (HFCs), chemicals that are now being used in refrigerators and air conditioners as a substitute for chemicals that are responsible for the ozone hole, could be a major step in the fight against global warming. In an article from the Inter Press Service News Agency, a senior U.S. climate campaigner from EIA is quoted as saying that “An HFC phase-down under the Montreal Protocol will do far more for climate protection than the Kyoto Protocol has accomplished in its entire history or than Copenhagen will achieve in the next decade.” The HCFs are called “super” greenhouse gases because these molecules can trap hundreds or thousands of times more heat than carbon dioxide. Phasing out HFCs is particularly important when considering projections of increased use of refrigerators and air conditioners in China and India between now and the year 2050. According to the EIA report, phasing out HFCs by 2050 would be the same as preventing from 118 to 224 billion tons of carbon dioxide being released. The G8 countries have made a commitment to phase-down HFCs. The members of the Montreal treaty next meet in November. So even with all the controversy over climate legislation in the U.S. and the bleak outlook for a global agreement on reducing greenhouse gas emissions in Copenhagen maybe progress will still be made toward limiting climate change before it is too late.

Huge Antarctic Glacier Melting Much More Rapidly Than Believed

Here is yet another wake up call to the countries of the world that cannot agree on what to do about climate change, the massive West Antarctic Pine Island Glacier has been found to be melting four times faster than it was reported to be melting just 10 years ago. In an article posted on TimesOnline one of the British researchers who studied the glacier is quoted as saying “This is unprecedented in this area of Antarctica. We’ve known that it’s been out of balance for some time, but nothing in the natural world is lost at an accelerating exponential rate like this.” It is now predicted that if this accelerated melting continues the main section of the glacier will completely disappear in 100 years rather than the 600 years which was the previous estimate. Last year it was reported that this glacier was moving toward the sea at an accelerated rate of 7% greater than the previous year. Before the annual rate of increase was 1%. Scientists estimate that the melting of this glacier and the stationary ice behind it could raise sea level by about a foot. Adding that to predictions of sea level rise from other sources equals a more dire situation for coastal areas in the future.

Seal the Climate Deal or Face Disaster Warns UN Secretary-General

As the countdown to the December climate meeting in Copenhagen continues, Ban Ki-moon, the UN Secretary-General, issued a stern warming in Seoul, South Korea that failure to reach an agreement will result in numerous devastating consequences. Reuters reports that Ban labeled climate change as a “fundamental threat to mankind.” The UN chief is so concerned about the lack of progress in negotiations so far that he has called for a special meeting of world leaders at the UN in New York City on September 22. This week the negotiators are at it again in Bonn, Germany trying to make progress on what appears to be a negotiation going nowhere. This negotiating process has been going on for almost 2 years now and so far there has been no breakthrough to bridge the gap in demands between the developed and developing countries. The two most important countries in this process, the US and China which presently account for almost one half of global warming pollution, remain far apart with China demanding that unless the US agrees to cut its emissions 40% below 1990 levels by 2020 it will not agree to reduce its emissions and the US saying that it cannot reduce its emissions that much but that China must agree to reduce its emissions. The next most important country, India, has been saying that it will not agree to reduce its emissions under any circumstances but on a per capita basis its emissions will not rise above those of developed countries. With the Kyoto Protocol agreement ending in 2012 there is little time left to reach an agreement, ratify it, and then begin implementation. The scientists say that global emissions need to peak by 2015 to have any realistic chance of avoiding going over the warming threshold for catastrophic climate change. Under normal economic conditions global emissions increase by about 3%-4% annually so to level off by 2015 will take some doing. The good news is that in the past the world was able to reach an agreement to fix the problem of the ozone hole. The bad news is that the problem this time appears to be infinitely more complicated than finding substitute chemicals to keep air conditioners and refrigerators running.

Wind Turbine Syndrome a Possible Threat to Human Health

A prominent New York pediatrician, Nina Pierport, has identified a number of medical conditions caused by living close to wind farms, which she has dubbed the wind turbine syndrome. An article on her research was published in The Independent. Among the conditions that she says can be caused by wind farms are heart disease, migraines, vertigo, tinnitus, nausea, and sleep disturbance. Her research, which has been peer-reviewed, will be published in October. Dr. Pierpont has noted that not all people who live close to wind farms are susceptible. Her findings are based on a 5-year study of people living near wind farms in the US and four other countries. Central to her connecting wind turbines with various medical disorders is research conducted last year in the UK and Australia which showed that low-frequency vibrations and noise from the turbines can be transmitted through human ear bones. The research demonstrated that the human vestibular system is sensitive to low-frequency vibration, a phenomenon that was previously demonstrated in fish and frogs. The vibrations and low-frequency noise from the wind turbines therefore can cause abnormal stimulation of the vestibular system. Dr. Pierpont told The Independent that “The wind industry will try to discredit me and disparage me…This is not unlike the tobacco industry dismissing health issues from smoking.” Further research will surely be needed to prove that the wind turbine syndrome actually exists. But in the meantime Dr. Piermont’s research no doubt will be used as ammunition by opponents of wind farms when the siting is anywhere near residential areas and may be considered by planners when it comes to choosing sites.

Doubts Raised about Effectiveness of White Roofs for Combating Global Warming

The US Secretary of Energy Steven Chu has advocated painting roofs white as a way to limit global warming. The advantage of white roofs over dark roofs is that white roofs reflect most of the sunlight hitting the roof back out into space whereas dark roof absorb most of the sunlight as heat. An article in the Washington Post says that according to Chu recent research shows that by painting about 63% of the roofs white in 100 large cities in temperate and tropical regions around the world that would equate to removing all of the cars in the world from the road for 10 years. However, the Post article notes that climate scientist Ken Caldiera from the Carnegie Institution in Stamford, California is less than enthralled with idea. Says Caldiera “It’s hard enough, in many of the cities in the world, to keep the streets swept, much less to keep the city reflective.” If painting roofs white includes slanted roofs such as those on houses, that raises the problem of aesthetics as the Post article points out. Of course, there are other things that can be done with roofs to help the cause besides painting them white. They can be covered with solar panels. Also, instead of white roofs they can be turned into green roofs by covering them with soil and adding plants. In any case, for flat roofs at least, white roofs, green roofs, and solar roofs all seem preferable to dark roofs.

US Secretary of Energy Advocates Geoengineering Scheme

Last month President Obama’s chief scientific advisor John Holdren stirred things up by saying geoengineering schemes should not be taken "off the table" as a means of fighting global warming. Now Obama’s Secretary of Energy Steven Chu has advocated one such scheme in a speech in London. His statement is unlikely to kick up much political dust however because this was not some scheme that could be attacked as scientific madness but simply painting roofs white and making roads the color of concrete. White roofs and light-colored roads reflect sunlight back into space and thereby prevent heating. According to The Independent Chu said that “…if you look at all the buildings and make all the roofs white, and if you make the pavement a more concrete-type of color than a black-type of color, and you do this uniformly... It's the equivalent of reducing the carbon emissions due to all the cars in the world by 11 years.... It's actually geoengineering." Wonder whether we will hear that word soon from Congress.

Gadget Happy Consumers Threaten Greenhouse Gas Targets

It looks like we may be Twittering and I-Phoning our way out of a chance to limit global warming. The addiction to being connected and entertained via electronic devices on a 24/7 basis has been increasing the consumption of energy around the world just as the need to reduce energy consumption has become critical to the goals of reducing greenhouse gas emissions. An article in The Guardian says that a study by the International Energy Agency forecasts that the total energy consumed by information, communication, and consumer technologies will triple in only two decades. By the end of this year it is expected that there will be 1,000,000,000 personal computers in the world. As computers continue to advance with more powerful processors, greater memory capacity, etc. they require more energy. There are nearly 2,000,000,000 televisions in the world and the new large plasma-screen TVs are particularly energy hungry. Wind turbines and solar panels will not be able to replace fossil fuels if energy demand keeps rising. The conclusion seems inescapable that the digital lifestyle is on a collision course with nature. The Director of the International Energy Agency, Nobuo Tanaka, is quoted as saying “Despite anticipated improvements in the efficiency of electronic devices, these savings are likely to be overshadowed by the rising demand for technology.” In other words, if we want to have a habitable planet maybe we should consider going back to reading books, listening to the radio, and talking on a corded phone. Okay, that may sound somewhat boring but it beats extinction any day of the week.

Computer Simulation Study Shoots Down Cosmic Ray Explanation for the Cause of Global Warming

There is more than enough evidence that human sources are the main cause of global warming to conclude that strong action is needed to reduce greenhouse gas emissions but one alternative explanation for the warming that has not been completely ruled out is known as the “cosmic ray hypothesis.” According to this explanation solar activity has an effect on cosmic rays which reduces cloudiness, thereby resulting in more sunlight reaching the surface of the earth which leads to increased warming. Science Daily reports that Peter Adams and Jeff Pierce, scientists from Carnegie Mellon University and Dalhousie University (Halifax, Canada), respectively, developed a computer model to test this hypothesis and reported in Geophysical Research Letters that there were not enough changes in the concentrations of particles affecting clouds to make any difference in the climate. Adams told Science Daily that he expects the results of the computer simulation to be challenged but thinks the results will withstand any questioning. The history of science is full of controversial explanations eventually proving to be correct but it appears this will not be the case for the cosmic ray hypothesis.

Plans for New UN Climate Agreement Lack Ambitious Targets for Reducing Emissions

If anyone expects that the Kyoto Protocol will be replaced by a new UN climate agreement that finally addresses what climate scientists say needs to be done to avoid a climate catastrophe it looks like they will be sorely disappointed. Reuters has analyzed plans submitted by developed nations for a new pact and the targets for greenhouse gas emissions reductions are not much stronger than the tepid ones of the Kyoto Protocol. Reuters concluded that the cuts called for range from 9 to 16 percent below 1990 levels by 2020. The Kyoto Protocol calls for a 5 percent reduction in emissions from developed countries by 2012. What do the climate scientists say is needed? According to the 2007 report of the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) emissions reductions of 25 to 40 percent below 1990 levels are needed by 2020. The cuts may even need to be steeper based on emissions data obtained after the report was released. For all the pronouncements we have heard from leaders of the developed countries that global warming needs to be finally addressed based on scientific knowledge none of them apparently are willing to do it. Perhaps at the final hour the leaders of the developed countries will face the facts and finally do what is needed but right now it seems far more likely that they will postpone taking the necessary steps even though postponement may almost guarantee future disaster.

Carbon Dioxide Increasing at a Record Rate in the Arctic

Measurements of atmospheric CO2 levels in northern Norway show that last week the levels hit a peak of over 397 parts per million (ppm). What was even more alarming than the actual level was the rate of increase because compared with the 2008 peak level the increase was more than 2.5 ppm. Professor of Atmospheric Physics at the Norwegian Polar Institute, Johan Strom, told The Guardian that “It is not the level of CO2 that is the problem, because the earth will adapt. What is very worrying is the speed of change. Levels [at this measuring station] are now increasing 2-3 ppm a year. The rate of increase is much faster than only 10-20 years ago. You can almost see the changes taking place. Never before have CO2 levels increased so fast.” The level of CO2 increased annually by about 1.5 ppm from 1970 to 2000 but has accelerated to about 2.1 ppm during this decade. The measurements obtained in the Arctic are typically a little higher than those obtained in Hawaii by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). A climate scientist from the Met Office Hadley Center in Britain, Dr. Vicky Pope, said that “These are quite large numbers. It sounds like this is an Arctic phenomenon. It fits with the general increase in emissions. You would expect the concentrations of CO2 to grow.” Despite all this alarming information we still hear reports that leaders in China and India and even in the United States contend that coal needs to play a large role in meeting future energy needs. This vision of the future which includes more coal burning is not very promising.

Methane Increases in Atmosphere for Second Year in a Row

There is more evidence that atmospheric levels of the greenhouse gas methane are trending upward again after a decade of stability. This bad news comes from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). Methane doesn’t last nearly as long in the atmosphere as the number one greenhouse gas carbon dioxide but an equivalent amount of methane can trap much more heat. A big question is why are methane levels increasing? The answer that we do not want is that the main source of the increase is melting permafrost in the Arctic region. That would mean that the dreaded positive feedback mechanism of global warming releasing methane from the permafrost which in turn would cause more global warming, etc. has kicked in enough to show up in atmospheric measurements. Hopefully there is some other explanation.