Main climate threat from CO2 sources yet to be built
From press release Stanford, CA— Scientists have warned that avoiding dangerous climate change this century will require steep cuts in carbon dioxide emissions. New energy-efficient or carbon-free technologies can help, but what about the power plants, cars, trucks, and other fossil-fuel-burning devices already in operation? Unless forced into early retirement, they will emit carbon dioxide into the atmosphere for decades to come. Will their emissions push carbon dioxide levels beyond prescribed limits, regardless of what we build next? Is there already too much inertia in the system to curb climate change?
Not just yet, say scientists Steven Davis and Ken Caldeira of the Carnegie Institution’s Department of Global Ecology. But to avoid the worst impacts we need to get busy building the next generation of clean energy technologies.
Davis and Caldeira, with colleague Damon Matthews of Concordia University in Montreal, calculated the amount of carbon dioxide expected to be released from existing energy infrastructure worldwide, and then used a global climate model to project its effect on the Earth’s atmosphere and climate.
“The problem of climate change has tremendous inertia,” says Davis. “Some of this inertia relates to the natural carbon cycle, but there is also inertia in the manmade infrastructure that emits CO2 and other greenhouse gases. We asked a hypothetical question: what if we never built another CO2-emitting device, but the ones already in existence lived out their normal lives?”
For a coal-fired power plant a “normal life” is about 40 years. For a late-model passenger vehicle in the United States it is about 17 years. After compiling data on lifetimes and emissions rates for the full range of fossil-fuel burning devices worldwide, the researchers found that that between the years 2010 to 2060 the total projected emissions would amount to about 500 billion tons of carbon dioxide added to the atmosphere. To gauge the impact, they turned to the climate model. The researchers found that atmospheric concentrations of CO2 would stabilize at less than 430 parts per million (ppm) and the increase of global mean temperatures since preindustrial time would be less than 1.3°C (2.3°F).
“The answer surprised us,” says Davis. “Going into this study, we thought that existing sources of CO2 emissions would be enough to push us beyond 450 ppm and 2°C warming.” In light of common benchmarks of 450 ppm and 2°C, these results indicate that the devices whose emissions will cause the worst impacts have yet to be built.
But the authors caution that while existing infrastructure is less of a threat to climate than they had expected, this does not minimize the threat of future emissions. “Because most of the threat from climate change will come from energy infrastructure we have yet to build, it is critically important that we build the right stuff now – that is, low carbon emission energy technologies,” says Caldeira. He adds that other factors besides devices that directly emit carbon dioxide might also contribute to the system’s inertia. “We have a gas station infrastructure but not a battery recharging infrastructure,” he says. “This makes it easier to sell new gasoline powered cars than new electric cars. Thus there are infrastructural commitments that go beyond our calculation of future CO2 emissions embodied in existing devices.”
“In our earlier work we found that every increment of carbon dioxide emission produces another increment of warming,” says Caldeira. “We cannot be complacent just because we haven’t yet reached a point of no return.”
The study is published in the September 10, 2010, issue of Science.
NOTE: The study was not provided with the press release
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Supplementary graph:
Graph shows projected decline of carbon dioxide emissions in gigatons (billions of tons) from existing energy and transportation infrastructure (multicolored wedge) over the next 50 years, compared to three emissions scenarios (dotted lines) from the Special Report on Emissions Scenarios (SRES) Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). Colors within the wedge indicate projected emissions by various countries and regions. Non energy emissions shown are global emissions projected under the SRES A2 scenario. High, middle, and low emissions projections correspond to the SRES A1G-FI, A2, and B1 scenarios, respectively.
Co2 does not drive climate.
Excerpt from: TomRude on September 10, 2010 at 6:45 pm
Ha! In Green Amerika the smart meters manage you!
Here in resource-rich Oz, it’s frustrating to observe the pointless increase of energy costs and the petty restraints on CO2 emissions due to loopy green policymaking…
…then to observe the massive emissions of CO2 (and particulates) from murderous “hot” burns in our bushland, due to – you guessed it! – loopy green policymaking.
Greens are the true “mindless conservatives” of our era: brutal, inflexible, and consistently wrong about everything.
Amount of CO2 in the atmosphere in comparison with the water vapour is negligible and it effect can be no more than negligible.
To paraphrase:
Never in the field of human scientific endeavour so many were misled (not to say deceived) by so few with so little.
Not another grant grabbing alarmist claim. I suppose these scientists use IPCC levels of residence time for CO2 which have been shown to exaggerate by some hundred times the true level. With atmospheric CO2 levels being low, for plants, at the moment we need more to help feed the worlds people.
Things are not as bad as we thought. So, to maintain the status quo, we must make changes so things will be worse than we thought.
If your goddess is CO2, should not your God be nuclear power plant.
We already have quite a lot of energy efficient sources of locomotion at the beck and call of any who believe it to be vital. Sadly, I don’t see the warmers of this world either using it or advocating it. If Al Gore were to move around on his legs, a bicycle or an ass; if he refused to use any foreign artifact that was not imported on a sailing ship, if he were to sit in the dark of an evening without benefit of candle; if he were to limit his pronouncements to the manually written word or his own electrically unenhanced voice; if he refused to eat anything that was not raw, pickled or salted, if he shunned all income that flowed in part from carbon dioxide producing processes; then many of us would continue to question his beliefs, but we would admire him as a man.
Consider Ray Bradbury’s “The Illustrated Man”. There is a short story in it called “The Other Foot” that is somehow relevant to your idea.
Lewis says:
September 10, 2010 at 6:59 pm
“…Who are the ‘Koch brothers’ ?- I’ve never heard of them but they seem a new way to beet us over the head with a water melon!…”
Here you go Lewis, this is a good read:-
“…Kochs are “at the epicenter of the anti-Obama movement. But it’s not just about Obama. They would have done the same to Hillary Clinton. They did the same with Bill Clinton. They are out to destroy progressivism…”
Newyorker article here:-
http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2010/08/30/100830fa_fact_mayer?currentPage=2
Andrew30 says:
September 10, 2010 at 5:56 pm
The nation actually has a massive mobile battery recharging infrastructure.
Alternators, one in every car.
Unfortunately claw pole alternators as commonly used in vehicles are very inefficient. Further more standard car batteries are not designed for frequent charge/discharge cycling. I know some of the latest vehicles have “smart” alternators, which boost output during braking to recycle otherwise wasted energy, but if you start making more use of features like this the batteries will need to be changed to deep cycle types, which are less suitable for engine starting. They would have to be larger (and heavier) to cope. And then you will have much greater variation in available voltage than is normal with conventional fixed regulators.
Many new cars have engine stop/start features for city driving. This will further stress the electrical system, and I have yet to find out how such vehicles keep the occupants warm or cool, when the engine isn’t running. In congested cities this could be a substantial part of the time. Webasto type heaters would be a possibility for winter time, but there is no way you can run an aircon compressor on battery power…
Nature produces 96.73% of all CO2 emissions, man only 3.27%. This is the Carbon Cycle.
If you dial in the effects of CH4, N2O, H2O and CFCs, nature produces 99.72% of the greenhouse gas effect, man 0.28%.
If man ceased to exist, the gge reduction would only be 1 part in 356.
The IPCC is truly living in another world.
This press release ignores clean energy technology yet to be invented and efficiencies and discoveries yet to be made. Had we listened to the brightest alarmist minds of 1900 we would be panicked about horse manure in the streets of London in 2000. :o) How many people in 1800 forsaw photovoltaic cells, nuclear power stations, aeroplanes, Apollo 11 landing on the moon, nuclear fusion research, home computers, air-conditioners, etc. Left alone we will create things unthought of today and man’s co2 output is not a problem to solve.
I rest my case: http://icecap.us/images/uploads/WINTER_201011.pdf
I think most people think people don’t control the climate.
If the people are not too poor to invest, the best machines are still to be built.
If we are too poor to invest, yes, the worst machines are still to be built or kept operating till they die, then us.
For CO2 emissions to trend monotonically down to zero by 2045 will require a tyrannical world government starting today.
Not too likely (I hope).
Dr. Dave says: “We have a gas station infrastructure but not a battery recharging infrastructure,” he says. “This makes it easier to sell new gasoline powered cars than new electric cars.”
Here all this time I was laboring under the delusion that the reason was that gasoline powered cars actually work and are practical and affordable whereas electric cars don’t and aren’t.
It’s actually a bit of both. We could charge e-cars overnight in our garages with modest impact for a daily 20-30 mile commute to work. Night time demand is way below available supply and power delivery infrastructure. (Your stove / oven can suck down 50 Amps at 240 Vac pretty easy, more than enough to charge a car, so just not plugging in while cooking dinner lets your present infrastructure do the deed).
Where it ‘falls apart’ is that this will result in MASSIVE increases in coal and natural gas burned. The nukes run full time, the coal takes long cycle modulation (like, day / night cycles) and the natural gas turbines pick up the rest.
So until nuclear plants are built in large quantity, added e-cars will simply result in a lot more coal and natural gas burned. (Solar and wind are nearly none of the energy mix at present, and will stay so for a decade or two even with gigantic percentage increases. The lead times to build the factories to make the parts to make the devices assures that…)
The other major problem is range. To make a run from SFO to LAX will be ONE nice large tank of gas, or it will be 3 to 4 recharge cycles for an e-car. So exactly where along I-5 are folks willing to sit for 2 hours at a time (assuming a stellar improvement in recharge times) for a total of 6 to 8 hours during that 7 hour ‘drive time’ trip? And will folks really want to double their ‘road time’ and add a stay at a hotel (and meals) to that trip?
RACookPE1978 says: First, their premise is dead wrong.
Then they compound it by somehow NOT including the time frames to “build” a replacement power plant.
BINGO! Lead Time, Lead Time, Lead Time. I once got to buy a 750 kVA transformer. There was ONE available for the west coast of the USA. They were built in ONE facility, to order, with a ‘couple of years’ lead time. Now suddenly quadruple their demand and how long does it take to build the machine tools to make a new build location to make more of those transformers?
Now multiply that by the dozens of specialized low volume parts used in large power plants. Be lucky to get the lead time down to 15 years if you started right now with a massive project.
RACookPE1978 says: Can we somehow “breed out” the liberal class from the reproductive group?
Well, it’s a bit complex, but is already happening. Folks who have a disposition to conservative religion end up in religions that promote a load of kids ( Catholics and Muslims come to mind, though there are others like Mormons too). While “liberal” ideals promote the notion of having few / no children. Those who are attracted to the liberal agenda tend to produce few children “for the planet”.
While it will take a while (maximum response comes in about 10 generations of strong selection for a trait, and at 30 years / gen that’s 300 years. Given a ‘start date’ for socialism of about 1900 A.D. in any significant degree, we have until 2200 A.D. to see the results.) But the effect is real and it is happening. It’s one of the more interesting aspects of economic demographics.
To counter this effect, such ideologies need a constant and strong recruitment process. Otherwise they tend to expire. Rather like several celibate communes over the years that have tended to expire with their members. (It’s a long list…)
One of the things I find most funny about it is that the same folks who panic over Malthus and shout about doom! based on exponential population growth, are most prone to removing themselves from the gene pool via celibacy or via low child count, thus increasing the percentage of the population who are of the “baby a year plan” groups; and promoting the very thing they fear (on a population dynamics basis).
One other minor point: The 17 year lifetime for cars. Note that Diesel trains, airplanes, and ships are even longer lifetimes. To have an impact in less than 20 years we would need to be replacing all that “fleet” early. It is the need to pass through “fleet change” that is lethal to the idea of an electric or hydrogen transportation infrastructure any time soon. To replace that fleet, we would need to be building them NOW, and we are not in any significant numbers. So, lets say it takes “only” a decade to get the production up. That’s 17 + 10 = 27 years MINIMUM to replace the fastest turnover part of the fleet. And the $Trillions it would take is even worse.
So the notion that we are going to change the fuel we use is just nutty.
The only sane plan is to keep the fuel type the same (it works fine) and get it from other sources. Make gasoline, Diesel, kerosene, etc. from things like coal, natural gas, trees and trash. (We can do this already, and it is being done near LAX. No R&D needed, just start building the plants). But that solution is “off the table” as far as the “warmers” are concerned.
Just like the top down driven push to use MTBE failed catastrophically, so too will a top down e-car push fail.
Eventually we’ll end up with plug-in hybrid electric cars (as they let you use gas to get to LA without sitting at charging stations for 8 hours, getting a hotel, and buying 3 meals for everyone in the car…) and using our coal and trash to make gasoline and Diesel. But I think it’s going to take a decade or so and a further economic collapse (yes, more from here) before folks “get it”.
Until then, we’ll be buying our gas and Diesel from Saudi and increasingly from Mexico and Brazil. But at least the U.S. Government is providing money to them to drill for more oil:
http://chiefio.wordpress.com/2010/09/12/obama-funds-pemex-not-american-oil/
Assuming one has a garage, or access to an exterior plug. I’m 48, and bought my first home with a garage only 8 years ago.
Someone would need to come up with a system for the vast majority of apartment dwellers to be able to charge their cars (assuming they don’t have adequate access to mass transit instead of driving). Apartment complex owners certainly aren’t going to pay for something like that. Employers might, but only for very large companies, I would think.
Dear moderators, this seemingly disappeared when I posted it, so I thought the spam filter got it, but it has yet to be rescued so I will assume it was somehow lost.
Re: Jeff Alberts on September 12, 2010 at 3:47 pm
You got it. They make electric cars good for short commutes in a city. Where do you plug in when you park on the street? Also dedicated outlets outside your residence will be a nightmare, besides with things like New York City’s “alternate side of the street” parking plans. Will they reserve open parking spaces all day in case the driver needs it?
At least it’s easier to answer as to who will pay for the additional infrastructure. You and me, pal, from our taxes and for “the public good.”