Robert Repetto, professor in the practice of economics and sustainable development at the Yale School of Forestry & Environmental Studies has put together a website that reviews 25 of the leading economic models used to predict the economic impacts of reducing emissions. And he says a national policy to cut carbon emissions by as much as 40 percent over the next 20 years could still result in increased economic growth.
"As Congress prepares to debate new legislation to address the threat of climate change, opponents claim that the costs of adopting the leading proposals would be ruinous to the U.S. economy. The world's leading economists who have studied the issue say that's wrong -- and you can find out for yourself," says Repetto.
The interactive website, synthesized thousands of policy analyses in order to identify the seven key assumptions accounting for most of the differences in the model predictions. The site allows visitors to choose which assumptions they feel are most realistic and then view the predictions of the economic models based on the chosen assumptions.
Among the key optimistic assumptions are that renewable energy technologies will be available at stable or increasing prices; that higher fossil fuel prices will stimulate energy-saving technological change; that reducing U.S. carbon emissions will reduce economic damages from climate change and air pollution; and that the United States will incorporate international trading of emission permits into its national policy.
Growth rates of the U.S. Gross Domestic Product (GDP) have been 3 percent per year over recent decades. With emissions reduced by 40 percent below projected business-as-usual trends, even under most pessimistic assumptions the GDP would grow 2.4 percent a year, reaching $23 trillion by 2030, according to the website's predictions. Under the most favorable assumptions, GDP would rise slightly above 3 percent a year.
"The website shows that even under the most unfavorable assumptions regarding costs, the U.S. economy is predicted to continue growing robustly as carbon emissions are reduced," said Repetto. "Under favorable assumptions, the economy would grow more rapidly if emissions are reduced through national policy measures than if they are allowed to increase as in the past."
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Awesome multimedia effort by Reuters for the 5th anniversary of the Iraqi invasion (warning some images are graphic).
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Global Warming has become a hot button issue over the last few years. A vision of huge hurricanes, ice sheet loss, and extreme drought are brought up frequently in the media as the true story of global warming. But to truly understand global warming we must analyze it through the larger scope of climate change, because it is only one mechanism at work in large machine which drives the world's atmosphere.
In 1993 a paper came out detailing how radiation from the sun had decreased by 0.33% yearly from 1967-1986 (Stanhill and Moreshet). This was a little understood phenomena and in the past 15 years has been dubbed "global dimming". Global dimming has the opposite effect of global warming. As pollutants such as Sulphur Dioxide, soot, and ash are released in the air they collect with clouds causing a dense mass to form and reflect much of the suns light. This in turn causes the oceans to cool a bit and changes weather patterns.
A large effect of this was seen in the 1990's in Africa as the waters which regularly evaporated from the Northern Atlantic and brought upon the rainy season on the Sahel in Northern Africa disappeared. In a January 15, 2005 BBC documentary titled Horizon a chilling conclusion was offered: "what came out of our exhaust pipes and power stations [from Europe and North America] contributed to the deaths of a million people in Africa, and afflicted 50 million more" with hunger and starvation.
Scientists believe that Asia may be hit soon with effects from dimming. Every year the Indian subcontinent and Southeast Asia receive nourishing rains from a "monsoon season". If the evaporative mechanisms which produce these rains are altered the irrigation and sustenance of not only farming ventures but wildlife reserves may be threatened.
Another mechanism affecting dimming is called the "Contrail Effect" where the "condensation trails" of jets are leaving behind remnants that form cirrus clouds which block sunlight but also trap heat. Studies have shown that contrails from just six aircraft can expand to shroud some 7,700 square miles. Just after September 11, 2001 scientists had an opportunity of a lifetime to study the contrail effect as all commercial flights were grounded due to the terrorist attacks. During those three days that commercial aircraft were grounded the days had become warmer and the nights cooler, with the overall range greater by about two degrees Fahrenheit. David Travis of the University of Wisconsin-Whitewater and two colleagues measured the differences and say the results suggest "that contrails can suppress both daytime highs (by reflecting sunlight back to space) and nighttime lows (by trapping radiated heat)."
In skies usually crosshatched with condensation trails, the only contrails seen in this image from September 12, 2001, were left by the plane returning President Bush to Washington from Nebraska and several escort fighters (image credit: NASA).
In this true-color satellite image shot above northwestern Europe, the contrast between skies with contrails and those without offers a striking sense of the influence these pseudo clouds might have on regional climate.
This phenomena of global dimming is not the hot new issue or the latest thinking about global climate change, it is simply a cog in the understanding of how our climate is shaped and what we are doing to alter its natural cycles. This is the same way we should consider global warming. Everything we throw into the atmosphere is going to have a different effect with secondary and tertiary cascading effects which we may not understand for another 20 years. There are going to be mechanisms discovered which will shift the way we think about global warming and dimming, and that in turn will shape what we know about climate.
Fire and brimstone fear induction should stop now. This is something that is serious and with enough research our scientists will begin to understand the complex workings of our climate. But it is important to realize that we are affecting the world around us and that everyone, whether you are rich or poor, or republican or democrat, needs to agree that right now the Earth provides for us very well and we have to make an effort to maintain our relationship with that equilibrium or be forced to adapt when our safety net of normality is shifted. The reality is that the public needs to be aware that we may face a global crisis very soon because of our interaction with the planet, for millions of years the Earth has shielded our fragile bodies from the harshest of conditions and let us tread on favorable ground. But now we must show the same respect and care that has been given to us, we are a powerful force with the overreaching ability to manipulate and alter our surroundings. Attention must be paid to how we tread and our minds must be open to new discoveries and a shift in the way we think.
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Hey Stifled Minds, this is The Dean. I apologize for my recent absence. I started a new job, and I have yet to strike a workable balance between work and blogging. Hopefully as things progress I will find a way to waste a little more of my employers time on this site!
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Spain, my home away from home, has already begun the lead into a solar powered world with two construction companies working in multiple locations around the world to set up solar power stations. Now the Spanish construction giant Sener and Abu Dhabi's Masdar are teaming up in a joint venture called Torresol Energy. The initial investment of €800 million ($1.24B) will be used to construct three solar plants in Spain.
One of the plants will use an array of heliostats surrounding a central receiver (pictured above), which the company says will be its first commercial deployment. Other companies such as BrightSource, SolarReserve, and eSolar are planning to use this same design in future deployments.
This type of technology has been developed at the Sandia National Laboratory since the 1970's and was successfully demonstrated by Solar Two, an installation using molten salt in the central receiver. The surrounding array of heliostats, or sun-tracking mirrors, reflect and concentrate sunlight onto a central receiver, generating a great amount of heat. The design is more efficient because all of the heat exchanging and steam generation take place inside the central tower, but the heliostats are also delicate and expensive.
The other two Spanish plants in the works will use parabolic trough technology, Torresol tells us. Startups like Solel are also using the trough approach, which heats liquid-filled tubes. The hot liquid must be pumped to a steam generator at an energy cost, but the troughs are supposed to be more robust than heliostats. They're hoping to generate at least 380 megawatts of power in the next five years, with a one-gigawatt goal for 10 years out.
Torresol also has some even loftier hopes for its solar thermal technology. The company plans to “facilitate” 500 megawatts of concentrating solar power plants around the world by 2012, in places like the American Southwest, the Middle East, North Africa and Northern Australia.
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Burn coal to boil water, use steam to spin turbines and run generators to make electricity. Transport this electricity long distances to connect to a coil at the bottom of a tank--to make hot water. Solar hot water panels are just as dumb too, but because they're so simple. Often times they are just a box with a glass lid and black pipes in it; you can even build them yourself. Others, like evacuated tube collectors are more efficient if more expensive.
A solar water heater could save $450 a year and keep almost a ton of CO2 emissions out of the air, multiply that by 80 million American homes. And the technology has been around for a while as Chinese manufacturers are cranking them out. So why doesn't every house have them?
"First, installation can cost more than $5,000 dollars, especially in older houses. Second, new home buyers apparently don't like to see solar water heaters disrupting their roof lines"-EcoGeek.
In Israel its the law new houses have solar heated hot water, and in the city of Fresno rebates and financing is available for those who wish to add solar to their home. And it isn't just for the sunny south either. Solar hot water is the cheapest and most effective active solar power system there is. It leaves fossil fuels and electricity for uses that require a higher grade of heat. Let's put it in the building codes.
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Last week I put together a report on the worlds water situation here. This week even more news concerning water shortages as Egypt reports that 6% of their population goes without clean drinking water daily. And new reports shows sewage coming through the water pipes as poor care has been taken with their water delivery infrastructure.
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