A couple of months ago, we discussed a short paper by Matthews and Weaver on the ‘climate change commitment’ – how much change are we going to see purely because of previous emissions. In my write up, I contrasted the results in M&W (assuming zero CO2 emissions from now on) with a constant concentration scenario (roughly equivalent to an immediate cut of 70% in CO2 emissions), however, as a few people pointed out in the comments, this exclusive focus on CO2 is a little artificial.
I have elsewhere been a big advocate of paying attention to the multi-faceted nature of the anthropogenic emissions (including aerosols and radiatively and chemically active short-lived species), both because that gives a more useful assessment of what it is that we are doing that drives climate change, and also because it is vital information for judging the effectiveness of any proposed policy for a suite of public issues (climate, air pollution, public health etc.). Thus, I shouldn’t have neglected to include these other factors in discussions of the climate change commitment.
Luckily, some estimates do exist in the literature of what happens if we ceased all human emissions of climatically important factors. One such estimate is from Hare and Meinshausen (2006), whose results are illustrated here:
The curve (1) is the result for zero emissions of all of the anthropogenic inputs (in this case, CO2, CH4, N2O, CFCs, SO2, CO, VOCs and NOx). The conclusion is that, in the absence of any human emissions, the expectation would be for quite a sharp warming with elevated temperatures lasting almost until 2050. The reason is that the reflective aerosols (sulphates) decrease in abundance very quickly and so their cooling effect is removed faster than the warming impact of the well-mixed GHGs disappears.
This calculation is done with a somewhat simplified model, and so it might be a little different with a more state-of-the-art ESM (for instance, including more aerosol species like black carbon and a more complete interaction between the chemistry and aerosol species), but the basic result is likely to be robust.
Obviously, this is not a realistic scenario for anything that could really happen, but it does illustrate a couple of points that are relevant for policy. Firstly, the full emissions profile of any particular activity or sector needs to be considered – exclusively focusing on CO2 might give a misleading picture of the climate impact. Secondly, timescales are important. The shorter the time horizon, the larger the impact of short-lived species (aerosols, ozone, etc.). However, the short-lived species provide both warming and cooling effects and the balance between them will vary depending on the activity. Good initial targets for policy measures to reduce emissions might therefore be those where both the short and long-lived components increase warming.
PS Denmark hasn’t been *forced* to export energy. How would you do that? “Hey, Denmark, give me some of your energy or we’ll shoot the puppy!”?
Current power production from all sources overproduce. If that overproduction cannot be sold (even at a loss), then it is dumped over a null load and ALL costs of production is lost.
“Forced”?
RS: “What a load of rubbish.”
Indeed, that paper is a load of rubbish.
RS: “This merely a diversionary tactic to take the discussion away from informed scientific debate.”
Yup, that’s what that lawyer is trying to do. Doesn’t stop denialists trumpeting its existence as a smoking gun, though. Because neither denialists nor this solicitor are interested in there being an informed scientific debate.
It is, after all, devastating to their case.
“Do your homework, Gilles.”
Lost cause, BPL.
He’s not listening.
“Because fossil fuels have remained cheaper for many applications (partly due to the failure to price in externalities);” – Me
“Oh yeeah here we agree ! so for you, replacing something cheaper by something more expensive has no implication on growth rate ?” – Gilles
Er, where did I say that? Unlike you, I don’t think maximising short-term GDP growth always trumps everything else. I think you missed my parenthesis: fossil fuels “cheapness” is heavily dependent on ignoring their pollution costs (and not only in regard to GHGs, as current events in the Gulf of Mexico should have shown even a dedicated oil-company-groupie such as you). Also, of course, the fact that x was cheaper than y at one point in time does not imply that it will remain so, does it? Aren’t you always stressing how we’re running low on cheap fossil fuels? There have, of course, been extensive studies on how much a serious attempt to mitigate AGW would cost in terms of GDP growth, most notably the Stern report. Answer: much, much less than not doing so.
[edit – Nuclear is OT]
Frank Giger wrote: “I am saying that when a regulatory agency is given sweeping powers to regulate the totality of the economy that’s a bad thing.”
Sure. Only ruthless, rapacious, reactionary fossil fuel corporations like ExxonMobil, BP, Koch Industries and Massey Energy should have such powers.
Ever heard of “the spurious regression problem?” Did you account for autocorrelation in the residuals? — BPL
Is that a yes or a no?
“Shutting down the coal industry is the general idea, General. WE want them to have the power to shut down the coal industry. The coal industry and then the other fossil fuels MUST get shut down ASAP to prevent the extinction of the human race. MORE POWER TO THE EPA!!!!!”
Thank you for establishing my point for me.
I would think that would be the job of Congress and the President, not by fiat of regulation.
So first it’s coal and then all fossil fuels. Just make a regulation stating that for reasons of environmental safety gasoline can only be sold in certain amounts per customer and restricted by hours and days of the week for sale.
And none of it done with any accountability until after the fact with a lengthy court battle.
438 Dr Nick Bone: “Are there any clever technologies that we should consider (like artificial trees/air capture devices), or are they just so expensive that no-one will ever use them?”
I am on your side. I want to fix the CO2 as much as you do. Fixing the problem, regardless of how, has the following problems. In short, people are the problem.
The first problem is how to sell the product so that the process would finance itself. It isn’t the price as much as that the cost would be a target for right wing filibuster and electioneering. It might get Federal financing some of the time. If there IS a market for the product, they will not want to stop the process if the CO2 concentration goes below 250 ppm.
The second problem is that so many people want to live in Illinois and have a Florida climate. Call it snow-phobia. They have not been trained to drive on snow, so they do everything exactly wrong and maximize the cost of accidents. [The cops in Illinois give the wrong advice. THEY haven’t had enough experience on snow either.] They think it is too cold just because it snows a little more. Many people wish for a warmer climate but won’t move.
“Sensible” has too much “point of view” attached to it until Homo “Sapiens” evolves into an intelligent species. On the average, we are half a pound of brain short at this time. Thus my campaign to require that all college students, regardless of major, take the Engineering and Science Core curriculum.
440 Barton Paul Levenson: nuclear is permanently off topic. Please don’t answer Gilles on nuclear so that I won’t have to answer you.
Neil (441),
I have seen this step-by-step bullet point list quite often and I’m not to sure it addresses key issues:
Actually, most of what you say is correct. The central estimate of 3 C has an uncertainty of approximately 50% on either side of it, so indeed, addressing the question of sensitivity is a large issue. The 20th century doesn’t really place good constraints on this because there is also tremendous uncertainty in the net anthropogenic forcing (what you call the “primary effect”). The CO2 component of this forcing is well constrained but the unknown effect of aerosols (especially on clouds) precludes confident statements regarding the net forcing, other than that it is virtually certain to have been positive over the industrial era.
Furthermore, many of the more “practical” effects, including regional temperature changes and precipitation all have their own inherent uncertainties. The general person is probably not very concerned with quantifying sensitivity as some temperature unit change per watts per square meter averaged over the globe. That has no meaning for ecosystem sensitivity, sensitivity for people’s personal lives (will they be able to go snowboarding, will they experience more droughts, will the fisheries near ENSO-influential regions be prone to changes, etc).
For this reason, the question of impacts and politics requires substantial improvement in regional and decadal scale predictions. While we are very confident that the bulk of 20th century warming is human-induced, delineating the natural vs. anthropogenic components on changes to the cyrosphere, biosphere, costs of storm destruction, etc is a much more difficult problem.
The uncertainty regarding sensitivity (whether in the traditional way of dividing the global temperature change by the radiative forcing and getting some number, or in a more broad sense as I’ve outlined here) in terms of “action” and “inaction” is ultimately a question of risk. There is no reason to suggest that the IPCC AR4 range is incorrect, and as Ray mentioned in (443), there are now many lines of evidence suggesting that it is correct. It is a fairly broad range but it is a finite range nonetheless and even the low end is worth worrying about, especially since it is very easy to surpass a doubling of CO2 under business-as-usual this century. Aside from this, the broad array of studies also indicate that the worst-case sensitivity and associated impacts are perhaps more likely to occur than a very low sensitivity (something not all supported by Earth’s climate history). And as some, such as Richard Alley at PSU,have repeatedly pointed out, there are often “surprises” lurking in the climate system which we can set off without a large push.
Traditional economics is a poor way to address all of this. I am not an economics expert, or even have much background at all, yet I can state fairly confidently that there is no consensus on how to quantify human migration (Especially when poorer countries are most impacted), ecosystem loss, glacier melt, long-range impacts, etc. The Arctic melt is not a tremendous economic motivator for change because in some ways it is economically beneficial (opening ship passages, etc) with no regard for its ecosystems and climatic importance. I also disagree with your neglecting of long-range impacts. 1,000 years seems like a long way away, although presumably we would not be happy if the Vikings left us an environmental turmoil which was difficult to adapt to or simply left us without aesthetic pleasantries. And work has shown (see David Archer’s publication list) that our CO2 emissions will indeed have climatic repercussions for generations that far away.
418, CFU: I was asking why wait 20 years before we start working on changing over to non-fossil fuel works.
Let me repeat: Humans (Chinese, Indians, Americans, Europeans, Japanese, Indonesians, and more) are not waiting.
430, Ray Ladbury: A similar effort would likely be required for renewables.
On this, and on most of the rest of that post, we agree. The effort is underway, will probably be reinforced, and may succeed — it will certainly make a huge difference. There is no perfect analogy with anything, but the primary motive is economic survival in a world with diminishing and increasingly more expensive oil. Look what has happened over the last 5 years and ask what limits there are: decreased cost of construction, decreased material per watt of power, increased skilled workforce for installation and maintenance, an increase by a factor of 8 in the US in production of power from renewables, dramatic improvements in storage (multiple types of batteries, capacitors, etc.), genetic engineering higher productivity from biofuel feedstocks. There isn’t a panacea, but collectively, across all energy sources, there has been tremendous growth, very closely approximated by exponential growth with different exponents of each kind (solar slower than wind, for example.)
[edit – no nuclear]
There has been some discussion of stabilization wedges
http://carbonsequestration.us/Papers-presentations/htm/Pacala-Socolow-ScienceMag-Aug2004.pdf
In that reference 15 options are defined to reduce fossil carbon release to the atmosphere. The paper was published in 2004, and i am interested in followup studies that estimate how far we have proceeded in the last 6 years with each option. I have made some calculations of my own which are discouraging.
Completely Fed Up says: 11 June 2010 at 9:45 AM
Current power production from all sources overproduce. If that overproduction cannot be sold (even at a loss), then it is dumped over a null load and ALL costs of production is lost.
Pray tell, where are the giant resistors? Would it help to know it’s a friendly voice pointing out you’re wrong? In all kindness, you should be more protective of your good word.
Frank Giger wrote: “I would think that would be the job of Congress and the President, not by fiat of regulation.”
The job of Congress and the President?
Do you understand that the EPA gets its power of “fiat of regulation” from laws passed by the Congress that gave it that power?
Do you understand that the EPA is an Executive Branch agency?
The Congress has done its job by creating the EPA and giving it the power to regulate.
The President has done his job by appointing the head of the EPA.
It is now the job of the EPA to regulate GHG emissions precisely because the Congress and the President have already done their jobs.
It seems to me that what those who keep repeating this idiotic talking point that we mustn’t have “unaccountable bureaucrats” at the EPA doing their job by regulating harmful pollutants and the whole thing should be left to “the Congress” really want is for the whole thing to be left to particular members of the legislature like Senator Murkowski and Senator Inhofe who have made it abundantly clear that they serve the interests of the fossil fuel corporations against the public interest and will block any and all efforts to regulate GHG emissions.
It is nothing but another obstruct-and-delay tactic to ensure that hundreds of millions of dollars in profit per day keep flowing into the pockets of the fossil fuel corporations at any cost to the human race.
Neil,
Your argument is that the basic direct effect of CO_2 doubling is well known, but because of uncertainties in how the feedbacks work, the IPCC suggests an range of from 1 deg K to 6 deg K. I thought the most frequently quoted range was somewhat narrower—2 to 5 deg K—but put that aside, and let’s accept your figures. That doesn’t mean that 1 deg is just as likely as 3 deg. More to the point, if you believe in that range, you should be very alarmed about waiting to deal with the problem. There is no reason to believe that the truth will lie at the low end rather than the high end. Of course, if we wait to act, and we find out the high end was closer to being accurate, it will be much too late to do anything about it. In fact even the low end entails some risks, and, moreover, switching to non-fossil fuels as quickly as possible makes snese for a variety of reasons having nothing to do with global warming. Developed nations rely on oil and gas supplies from unstable areas of the world, and so find their foreign policies severely constrained. In addition, the long term costs of the use of fossil fuels such as coal are not figured into their price. Those costs will come due.
Daniel, #431. “Gavin can and often does cut someone a new orifice, all with impeccable manners. Perhaps it’s not so much a question of pulling one’s punches as placing them more skillfully.”
Indeed Gavin articulates like no other on Climate Change, but he and others of his fantastic like will not reach the vast majority of ordinary people by being polite. I am sorry, but its time to be blunt :
http://arctic.atmos.uiuc.edu/cryosphere/IMAGES/seaice.anomaly.arctic.png
we are heading towards dramatic climate change and its time to hit the nay sayers where it hurts, they were and are flat out wrong, enticing others in this world to think incorrectly, Such crimes against intelligence and wisdom almost always ends up in disaster,
They recognize not their folly, So I have no hesitation to say that they should be exposed for being wrong wrong wrong, If TV broadcasters
place them on their shows, respondents are obliged to expose them as incompetent on this subject. Not being wrong once but many many times,
always they fail predicting the future, broadcasters be aware, ask them what they, the skeptics, have predicted right, what field work they have done on this subject recently? If they only rant
against those who were nearly always right, at least have the decency to point out that they cant predict anything about a subject which requires some predictive skills as a bare minimum. They are misleading the world without knowing the consequences of their actions. We help them do so by not responding every time they utter contrarian garbage.
We will always need fossil fuels in some amount and we also need to stress reliance upon more alternative biofuels and various cleaner energy sources. Wind and solar alone is not going to power the world no matter how much one might wish. And construction will not become 100% emission free,period.
457 Frank Giger: So you wanted more chances to go extinct, Frank Giger? I’ll say it again: Yes, we have to shut down the coal industry worldwide by the end of 2015. In this case, I don’t care about the niceties. I care about avoiding extinction. Congress and the court DID give EPA the authority and the requirement to write regulations. That IS the EPA’s job. There is no “Fiat” about it. EPA has been writing regulations ever since the EPA was created. For that matter, ALL departments of the government write regulations pursuant to the laws passed by Congress. Did you want the military to quit writing regulations as well? Or did you think a private in the army should be able to interpret the law for himself? I’ll give you a clue: He can’t. A private can’t follow a General’s orders either. He has to be told what to do by a corporal. That is the way the army works. Regulations are the detailed instructions that enable the next lower level to carry out the laws that Congress passes. Each level of management fills in more details for the level below. That is necessary. There is plenty of accountability. The regulations are what Congress ordered by writing the law that created the regulating body. Congress can’t get down to the detail of regulations. Without regulations, NOTHING would get done. I’m beginning top think that nothing is what you want to get done.
“gasoline can only be sold in certain amounts per customer and restricted by hours and days of the week for sale.” is top nonsense. The EPA is not going to make a regulation like that.
But I still care more about avoiding extinction. What good is Frank Giger’s theory of government if there are no people? Really, Frank, you need to learn more about how the government operates. And you should have noticed that the whole purpose of RC is to save us from climate catastrophe.
Thank you, 463, SecularAnimist.
Dr Nick Bone says:
10 June 2010 at 7:13 AM
RE #331 and #378.
Yes, it’s worth watching the methane/Arctic situation closely. However, I’m a bit concerned about some of the argumentation here. Edward, ccpo, you seem to be arguing:
1. That even if we did *immediately* go to zero emissions it still wouldn’t stop the Arctic sea-ice melting.
At this stage, if it indeed is going to melt any time between now and, say, 2020 (or even much longer)? Then, no, we can’t stop it.
2. That with the Summer sea ice gone, that will set off so much in extra methane emissions that the world will still warm uncontrollably (i.e. back to PETM temperatures, or even worse create loads of methane fuel-air explosions).
Actually, I didn’t state a direct result, and definitely not a magnitude, but, yes, we seem to be heading that way. What I am definitely saying is things are happening a LOT faster than modeled and we seem to have hit a bifurcation/tipping point based on the graph of sea ice volume in one of the links I provided further up thread. There was a definite shift @1998.
The problem is that if you push that line, the current climate skeptics can just change tack. They have three possible responses.
– You’re being insanely alarmist. I’m just not listening any more.
Who cares? They’re denialists. They will never be part of the solution, so bypass them.
– Since you believe we’re all doomed anyway, why shouldn’t we use our remaining time on Earth to have one last party (and burn all the oil, coal, gas, trees etc. we need to in the process)?
A legitimate question that we will almost certainly have to take a serious look at at some point. We cannot be afraid of legitimate responses. But my answers to that are:
1. If you are a true believer in survival of the fittest, then your answer might well be the above. Indeed, what would be the point if you think there is no solution? It’s a legitimate stance given the context. However, I question the premise that nothing can be done, and I have not said nothing can be done. In fact, I know it is possible to sequester enough carbon via sustainable farming techniques to begin to reduce carbon accumulation in the air and seas within just a few years, particularly if paired with large reductions in use of FFs.
2. Are you a Christian, or other deist, whose religion teaches anything like brotherly love and care or concern for others? Then you can’t just say screw it and throw up your hands.
3. Do you have children? ‘Nuff said.
4. Do you believe we are in any way at all our brother’s keepers? ‘Nuff said.
5. Are you really one to give up so easily? As long as some part of the globe will remain habitable, humanity will survive. If we party it out, we’re probably condemning ourselves to extinction.
– Our only hope of survival is now some form of geo-engineering and/or an accelerated space travel program. We will need a strongly-growing economy for either of those, so again we should burn all the fossil fuels, trees etc. that we need to.
I’d say, “You do not understand complex systems. The work of Tainter, Catton, Diamond and the pages of history show us solving a collapse of civilization by adding complexity simply ensures the collapse comes. Complex structures are susceptible to cascading failure. Conservation and simplification are your best bets.”
Probably not the conclusions you were hoping for!
It seems to me the right conclusions are:
3. We really need to stop digging. This means, stop emitting as soon as is *technically* possible. This is much much sooner than what is currently deemed *politically* possible.
I’d say you don’t quite see the whole picture. We need no new technology to reduce carbon emissions. Conservation and sequestration via natural methods can do this.
Don’t be afraid of the conversation we need to have, isolate those too selfish to speak the truth. Prosecute them. Take them to court. Be as aggressive as they are.
Or just ignore them and hold the media to account for reporting lies as facts. Or whatever.
SecularAnimist (463) et al, the only reasonable regulation is that which is very precise and very focused with very specific and explicit boundaries and objectives attached — as written by the legislature. Regulation that is broad and general is always a recipe for fascism heading for tyranny on its way to totalitarianism, which is why legislatures in democratic republics hardly ever (never?) do that — it would in effect turn over the legislative powers to the regulators. That’s why, e.g. traffic laws written by legislation are excruciatingly specific detail. Had they said simply ‘control transportation as you see fit’ we would have been a couple of decades away from a police state.
That’s why the EPA’s charge under the clean air act(s) is also extremely specific, though usually with specific limits, not absolute numbers. It’s also why (by intent) there is a long specific list and description of pollutants the EPA is supposed to control. The only ostensible limits the EPA has in CO2 control is that their promulgated rulings have to follow their holding hearings, have something seemingly to do with human well being, and generally be reasonable — the latter being words with virtually no effect. The traffic law above could have also added ‘be reasonable’ and not changed the end result one iota. Though, IIRC, the court at least implied that they are allowed to control CO2 emissions from transportation, not e.g. from electricity generation. So they didn’t get a completely blank check — though didn’t miss it very far… and probably not forever.
That’s why some folks are quite anxious over the EPA’s new-found powers and authority.
“gasoline can only be sold in certain amounts per customer and restricted by hours and days of the week for sale.” is top nonsense. The EPA is not going to make a regulation like that. — Edward Greisch
Did you get a secret message from EPA or something?
#448 flxble
“Yes, it is possible to have gains in GDP and reductions in FF use.”
You won’t find any post of mine where I’m denying that. I never said that no gain was possible. What I said is
“Gain is possible” is not at all equivalent to “we can live in the same way without them” (the analogy with food IS pertinent). And sorry, but to keep within 450 ppm, we need to reach an almost zero consumption before the end of the century.
So I argue that IF the right quantity to optimize is the economic growth RATE, such as the correlation with temperature seems to imply, then it won’t be solved by suppressing FF, which is very likely to have a much worse effect as far as the economic growth is concerned.
Second, conserving energy actually reduces the use of energy PER UNIT SERVICE (or GDP or any fancy index you want), as BC example shows. But it doesn’t insure
* neither that the annual consumption shrinks : both because economic growth increases the amount of services (or GDP ) , and the demographic growth.
* nor that the total amount of FF extracted diminishes, because of course nothing prevents to use them later if you have spared them now.
So if the total consumption curve peaked within 100 years, which is an almost certitude for oil and natural gas, and verylikely for coal, conserving doesn’t change a lot the total amount of FF burnt, which is of course the only relevant parameter for CO2. It only flattens the curve at best. Basically, it increases the wealth we’ll produce with them (which is not bad of course), but it doesn’t help reducing the global amount.
“And this is another reason that I believe the sole purpose of the GIS temperature set is producing ever higher, and completely invalid, temperature records.”
Data hates to be anthropomorphised.
And you should be able to find a number of people or documentary evidence as to this design goal of the GISS dataset to produce records.
(ps what happened when it wasn’t producing records?)
“After seeing this claim, I went and looked at HadCRUT and it showed no such record, not by large amounts.”
Because HadCRUT doesn’t include the polar figures because of the sparse record.
Please also note that this winter the cold weather experienced by temperate latitudes (included by both GISS and HadCRUT) was polar air dragged down to these lattitudes, which meant that warmer temperate air was being pulled up to the poles, making it much warmer. But this polar area isn’t included in HadCRUT.
Do you see what the effect this would have on the two temperature records?
Now, given we KNOW in this case what’s going on, isn’t this showing that *in this case* HadCRUT is underestimating the global temperature record?
Now, the HadCRUT dataset leaves out the poles because it’s a much less reliable set of data, therefore its inclusion *in the general case* would make the record average more true, but make the errors of that average greater. Hence they leave it out.
We will always need fossil fuels in some amount – Jacob Mack
That’s a bit of a shame, since they are a finite resource.
“And construction will not become 100% emission free,period.”
Really? Why don’t you do some research on Earthships, straw bale buildings, cob, rammed earth…
All of you who think we can just continue this lifestyle with a little greenwashing are in for a big surprise. Work takes energy. 2nd Law. Less energy means less work. The energy returned on energy invested (EROEI) for oil, for example, started out at around 100:1, but is now down to as low as 11:1 or less, and falling.
Technology will not solve these problems. Also, the Euro/US-centric thinking has got to go. If every country lived like the US, all oil, of any kind, would be gone in about 7 years.
Real change, or real problems.
NB 438: the world we are committed to (based on emissions so far) is going to be bad for us, but not unprecedented in Paleo-history, and not such as to destroy life on Earth.
BPL: Destroying life on Earth isn’t the threat. Destroying human civilization is.
Furry 442: Making wind power work economically requires producing everything that can be produced, and finding a way to use the excess whenever production exceeds demand.
BPL:
A. Store it. Pump water uphill. Spin flywheels.
B. Feather some of your turbines and disconnect the power feed.
Duh.
Furry 445: And this is another reason that I believe the sole purpose of the GIS temperature set is producing ever higher, and completely invalid, temperature records.
BPL: Been reading Anthony Watts?
BPL: Ever heard of “the spurious regression problem?” Did you account for autocorrelation in the residuals?
Rod B 456: Is that a yes or a no?
BPL: Let’s review, shall we? Ray cited peer-reviewed scientific studies showing that, when proper statistical analysis is done, the correlation between temperature and GDP growth is negative. You and several other statistical illiterates immediately jumped on that, saying, essentially, “We don’t know what the correlation is,” and “The correlation could be anything.” You’re wrong. Deal with it.
EG 460: 440 Barton Paul Levenson: nuclear is permanently off topic. Please don’t answer Gilles on nuclear so that I won’t have to answer you.
BPL: What the cake said to Alice, Ed.
re#465:Wayne ; Why dont you show the corresponding image links for Antartica and for Global Sea Ice, to better illustrate your point about impending disaster ?
JM 466: We will always need fossil fuels in some amount
BPL: Always??? Are you sure about that?
JM: Wind and solar alone is not going to power the world no matter how much one might wish.
BPL: Ever? How would you know?
JM: And construction will not become 100% emission free,period.
BPL: Ever? How would you know?
466 “We will always need fossil fuels in some amount and we also need to stress reliance upon more alternative biofuels and various cleaner energy sources.”
what do you mean by “always” ? can you give an estimate of the minimal amount of fossil fuels we are supposed to burn per year, and the timespan we can hope to keep this pace?
#480–
False equivalence.
Growing Antarctic ice is not, AFAIK, much of a feedback under current conditions. This is partly because, in the Antarctic, the change–that is, the growth in extent–occurs during the winter season, when short hours of daylight minimize the effect of albedo change, while in the Arctic case the change occurs in summer, when much of the Arctic basin has extremely long days indeed. Partly it’s a result of the opposite topology: land surrounding water, versus water surrounding land.
And partly, it’s a question of logical expectations: the Arctic case is going “with the grain” of rising temps, while the Antarctic bucks the trend and cannot be expected to continue to do so indefinitely.
Disclaimer: foregoing points based on logic, not first-hand knowledge of specific empirical study.
Pointers to same, anyone?
Jacob Mack, congratulations on the “bifecta” of having a questioned in immediate succession by BPL and Gilles both! A rare achievement indeed. . .
I think I’m more or less with BPL here; we’re a long way into speculative territory with this question.
Of course, that doesn’t mean that the general direction in which our economy should be moving isn’t pretty clear to most of us. It’s become very common for denialists to include avowals of their concern for “real” pollution, and while some is surely concern trolling or propagandist tactical BS, I’m sure a fair percentage actually mean it. Hope so, anyway, as that would mean that some constructive changes at least might escape the full weight of the disinformation campaign.
465 Bill, its already a disaster Antarctic sea ice always melts completely during its summer. Your point is exactly what? Look at the latitudes and especially at ice Volume. Before pointing out the obvious understand the nature of the ice caps…
Rod (#469),
This is off-topic so I’ll be brief. But if you’re concerned about a police state you must watch the policing agencies (FBI, NSA and so forth), not the EPA. Such agencies often use their authority outside of the law. Please peruse the findings of the Church committee. The rationale for the establishment of police states is national security, not traffic or pollution regulation. [edit – too far OT]
I don’t think an agency such as the EPA should control CO2 emissions either but, frankly, your proffessed concern about the EPA establishing a police state sounds mendacious.
Gilles #471,
> …nothing prevents [using fossil fuels] later
> if you have spared them now.
> …conserving doesn’t change a lot the total amount of FF burnt…
Conserving leaves our children the option to conserve. Not conserving leaves them nothing to conserve, nothing to burn, no option.
You imagine all fossil fuels must eventually be burned, whether because we won’t be able to replace them or because we won’t be willing to forgo them.
Conserving buys us and our children time to surpass the limits of your technical and moral imagination.
So I argue that IF the right quantity to optimize is the economic growth RATE, such as the correlation with temperature seems to imply -Gilles
No, it doesn’t imply that (where on earth did you pluck that from?), and no, it isn’t “the right quantity to optimise”: there is no such single quantity, and it’s astoundingly naive to think there is.
BPL (478), you just can’t deal with the elephant in the room, can you? Evidently your “spurious regression” and “autocorrelation in the residuals” told you it’s not there!
Anonymous Coward (486), the EPA has the power to cite (equivalent to arrest) and fine people/corporations — in some cases big bucks (at one time — maybe still — up to $25,000 just for carrying a tank of freon w/o a license). Essentially no different from the police. BTW, NSA can not do any of this.
I, too, doubt the EPA would actually be so draconian in the control of CO2. But make no mistake, it’s possible. Under their current authority the EPA, after some hearings, could issue a ban on the use of internal combustion engines entirely, immediately. Could they make it stick? There would be a bunch of court cases and maybe some quick legislation that would surely estop them. But they could, without any prior restraint, if they chose, do that. I find this a little unsettling. I don’t trust government (or anyone else) unequivocally to not do stupid or tyrannical things.
Completely Fed Up, Barton Paul Levenson & others — Please take power production, fossil fuels, and related matters to another blog where it comments will be appreciated. One possiblity is
http://bravenewclimate.com/
which runs an open thread. Over there I might clear up some misconceptions about poer production, none of which are related to climate change commitment.
Rod B says, ” Regulation that is broad and general is always a recipe for fascism heading for tyranny on its way to totalitarianism…”
Yup, it was over-regulation that brought Hitler to power… Oops! No, wait. He was democratically elected when UNREGULATED inflation destroyed the savings of the middle class…
But Mussolini, now there was a case of over-regulation… Oh. No? Hmm. Again, letting things get out of hand in the young Italian republic, leading to democratic election of the Fascists. Hmm!
The Bolsheviks. Yeah, now there was a case of Tsarist regulation! Oh, wait. That happened when the people were starving even as the Tsar waged a bitter war of attrition. Hmm. Things getting out of hand again.
But Mao. Now, there’s a classic case of… Oh! Damn! The people demanding strong government to combat anarchy and address public ills again.
Gee, Rod, I can’t seem to find much support for your hypothesis in actual, you know… history. Rather, it seems to me that people turn to totalitarianism when they fail to address threats to their well being before they become critical, cause panic and a triggering of the all to human desire for safety and stability at the expense of freedom. Maybe you want to revisit your thesis.
And maybe the way to avoid draconian government and action is to try and address the threat of climate change before we are committed to conditions where it becomes critical. (Did ya see how I brought it back on topic there at the last? Huh? Did ya see that?)
In the first link in this article, you refer to an earlier discussion in which you stated (relevant to the effect of ceasing all emissions): “CO2 concentrations would start to fall immediately since the ocean and terrestrial biosphere would continue to absorb more carbon than they release as long as the CO2 level in the atmosphere is higher than pre-industrial levels (approximately). And subsequent temperatures (depending slightly on the model you are using) would either be flat or slightly decreasing. With this definition then, there is no climate change commitment because of climate inertia. Instead, the reason for the likely continuation of the warming is that we can’t get to zero emissions any time soon because of societal, economic or technological inertia.”
This doesn’t make sense to me. Anthropogenic greenhouse gases create a transient, not steady-state, heat transfer problem. If they are causing a situation where we currently have, say, about a half-watt per square meter more net solar radiation coming in than infrared radiation going out (I realize the exact number is uncertain due largely to uncertainty associated with aerosols), that energy imbalance will not immediately disappear the moment we cease all greenhouse gas emissions. To achieve an energy balance, the Earth will still continue to warm up somewhat to increase the outgoing infrared radiation and thus match the net incoming radiation. So I believe there is, indeed, “climate inertia,” and temperatures should continue to rise, even if we achieve the admittedly unrealistic feat of instantly ceasing all our greenhouse gas emissions. If I am missing something here, I would appreciate clarification.
I am still working on the theories behind AGW. I believe it is Barton Paul Levenson who worked out equations to show how CO2 Band saturation will not take place…more CO2 will continue to continue warming.
I look at these charts of incoming Solar radiation and the radiation that is absorbed before reaching the ground. At the 1400 nanometer wavelength of incoming solar IR, nearly all the radiation is totally absorbed before it reaches the ground. Would more Water vapor and CO2 cause more absorption at this wavelength? Even though nearly all the radiation is absorbed? This is the part of AGW that really does not make much sense to me (does not mean it is incorrect, could just mean I am slow if not stupid..but I try my best). If nearly all the incoming radiation can be absrobed at the 1400 nm wavelength and adding more of either water vapor or CO2 will do little to change this, why will doubling CO2 have much effect when there is already enough CO2 in the air to absorb all the IR it can?
Absorption of Incoming Solar Radiation by Water Vapor and CO2.
Chuck (#491),
Yes, the Earth would keep warming in any case. But what you’re missing is that we’re mainly concerned about surface temperatures rather than about the total amount of heat.
In the zero-emissions scenario, according to Matthews, the oceans would keep warming but the surface temperatures would basically remain stable for several centuries (if memory serves… better check for yourself). When checking Matthews’ papers, mind the small print and follow the cites. Don’t just buy the sometimes extraordinary claims of the abstract on authority.
Also, note that the discussion your refer is to relevant to “ceasing all emissions” but just GHG or CO2 emissions (I don’t remember which). No one has claimed that ceasing aerosols emissions would not result in warming.
Ray Ladbury, all of your examples are that of extreme regulation instituted to control the people, El Duce being classic. It just had a different genesis and form.
I didn’t say that extreme regulation is the only thing that leads to tyranny. Nor did I say that the people will never support that direction. Many, because of misconceptions and misplaced trust coupled with things that others are doing that are repulsive to them will strongly support it as you imply — at least in the beginning. Like the Chicago folks a while back that wanted the police to enter anyone’s apartment without a search or arrest warrant to look for drugs.
Yes, and drastic climate change (or the fear of it) could trigger such a direction. I agree, good return.
Rod (#490),
Since the mods understandably frown upon discussion of the dynamics of totalitarian regimes, let me try another angle.
You say you’re concerned about the EPA banning combustion engines. Obviously the EPA wouldn’t do this and couldn’t possibly make it stick in the real world… but, from the point of view of your hypothetical slippery slope to a police state, consider that your government has already banned a number of hugely popular narcotics, with exteremely severe associated penalties. Please take a moment to research the number of people incarcerated or on parole for offenses related to narcotics in your country. Please look also at the number of deaths caused by this prohibition and its enforcement. Yet the USA is not generally considered as a police state.
A police state is not a state which fines, jails or even kills people who don’t heed laws and regulations but a state which fines, jails or kills political opponents of the government. Without political freedoms, you’ve got a potential dictatorship which is why people are concerned about political policing. But without the right to smoke weed or to drive SUVs, people can still organize to oust the government or influence policy (and possibly get back the right to smoke weed or drive SUVs).
Chuck@493
Try this.
https://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2007/06/a-saturated-gassy-argument/
The absorption does not saturate because 1)warmer regions below will continue to radiate to cooler ones above and 2)the wings of the absorption line broaden as CO2 concentration increases.
Norman say:
“I am still working on the theories behind AGW”, and goes on to say he doesn’t understand why saturation of the infrared bands by CO_2 doesn’t limit the greenhouse effect.
Perhaps he should look at
https://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2007/06/a-saturated-gassy-argument-part-ii/
BPL @ 476:
I do keep firmly fixed in my mind that you’re a science fiction writer when I respond to you.
A. Where? Where? and … Where?
Do you =actually= know how an =actual= electric grid works?
This isn’t a science fiction novel, where you can make up non-existent and/or impossible technologies. “Store it” isn’t a plot device — it’s a technical problem that has a large number of other technical problems all waiting to be solved. It also has a capital cost — building all those flywheels (not that this would be a bad idea, except that there are already a lot of flywheels involved in most electric grids …).
However, the easier solution at present is “produce it”. Electric grids already have the ability to adapt to changes in the production and consumption balance.