I’ve often said my email is like a fire hose. Here’s an example of something that got lost in the stream and I didn’t find it until last night while looking for another email.
Zeke Hausfather writes (In August 2012):
We have a new memo through Berkeley Earth that attempts to discern the causes of recent declines in U.S. CO2 emissions. The switch from coal to gas is the single largest factor, though others are important as well.
Some of the inspiration for the research came from a post you did last year: http://wattsupwiththat.com/2012/07/02/us-co2-emissions-may-drop-to-1990-levels-this-year/
The memo is available here: http://static.berkeleyearth.org/memos/explaining-declines-in-us-carbon.pdf
I’m also attaching the summary figure. The black portion represents actual emissions, with each “wedge” showing how much additional emissions would have occurred without the associated factor.
Henry, just in case, I wanted to clarify that GDP (gross domestic product) reflects goods made here, even if those goods are part of something that is put together in some other country. GNP (gross national product) reflects both GDP and overseas return on investments. Most countries report GNP. The US switched over to GNP to be comparable with the numbers being reported by other countries. It is always interesting to compare the two numbers. It can reflect the changing “mix” of just making things here compared to the combination of making stuff here AND investing in businesses in other countries to make stuff there. It is why we can be losing jobs here yet have a growing GNP.
” Errors. Error analysis is not a part of this exploration of the data. The first order of business is to see what if anything the data as given tells use. Can we begin to ferret out the causes
of the decline in C02. Again, if folks want to take the next step they can knock themselves out.
One of the points of a memo as opposed to a full blow paper is that its aims are somewhat limited.”
Yes, and let’s put the cart before the horse. Without knowing the error limits of the data, how can you do any analysis? Did you ever receive any training in a science? In my day some of the first science classes in high school discussed this issue.
The 85 bn that the Fed spends monthly to buy Treasury Securities on the open market removes the interest income from the regular economy. Instead of that interest income going to the private sector, i.e: individuals, university funds, pension funds, businesses, banks, or trust funds–which would grow the economy–it is now going to the Fed, and that interest income after expenses must be returned to the US Treasury by law (since 1947). The 2012 Annual Report is here.
The amount returned to the US Treasury, by law, in 2012 was $88 billion ($88,418 million)
NB: those are not ‘Federal Reserve Notes’ as in dollar bills (approx. $650 billion/yr), which the Fed buys, no matter what the face value, from the US Bureau of Printing and Engraving for about $0.07/ea ($0.08 or $0.09 for the new Oct/2013 $100 color bills, can’t remember). As explained in a New York Fed doc here, they are “purchases [that] kept the quantity of Treasury securities held by the private sector lower than it would have otherwise been in order to put downward pressure on longer-term interest rates.”
So called Quantitative Easing, except that it is essentially an asset swap (from savings accts at the Fed to checking, or technically, from ‘securities’ accts to ‘reserves’) that winds up being a tax on the US economy to the tune last year of $88 billion!
No time for ‘owsyourfather. He has nothing valid to contribute IMHO.
Bill,
The black line is the EIA data, and shows a 12 percent decline. The wedges show what would have happened if each factor identified has remained at 2005 levels (either per-capita or constant, depending on the specific scenario).
Col Mosby,
We are using wind generation rather than wind capacity, with the assumption that if those wind turbines had not been built an equivalent amount of generation would have been required from other sources. I’m well aware that wind does necessarily offset baseload generation due to intermittency (though this is somewhat mitigated by backup gas turbines and grid storage), so in practice this might be somewhat overestimating wind-related carbon reductions as peaking/cycling plants tend to be a bit less carbon-intensive. The 50% coal number you mention is assuming a fixed 2005 grid mix as the counterfactual.
Mike Jonas,
Figure 24 in the memo shows a version with a 0 to 550 scale for reference.
Its also worth noting that the Residential, Commercial, and Industrial categories represent non-electric CO2 emissions in each. The memo also breaks down electricity use reductions by end-use, but they are excluded from the summary graph to make it more readable. The interesting take-away is that almost all declines in electricity use and the majority of declines in non-electric CO2 emissions are focused in the Industrial sector, as heavy industries have outsourced production overseas over the last few decades.
It is important to note that some of the emission reductions attributable to declining industrial energy use might not represent actual emission reductions from the perspective of a global carbon budget. As industrial production moves from the United States to countries like China, the energy and emission intensity may actually increase. However, as this analysis focuses solely on U.S. emissions, we do not attempt to account for these shifts in emission location.
The US with no Carbon Tax but an effective fracking technology reduced its emissions by 208.0 million tons.
Australia with its new Carbon Tax reduced its emissions by 0.3 million tons. Nice price per ton there.
The UK with all its new wind power increased its emissions by 20.5 million. Germany with all its new wind and solar power increased its emissions by 14.0 million tons.
The market and effective technology is the way to reduce emissions, not Carbon Taxes and pie-in-the-sky subsidized wind and solar power.
Society needs to do things that simply work. Not things that make some people feel better but simply don’t work. Its a simple principle that took us out of the stone age.
Bill: powerful argument. Would you have the links easily accessible for this? I could look them up on my own, but it would take me over 90 minutes because I don’t know where to go. Thx.
“increasing gas prices in late 2012/early 2013 have led to somewhat increased coal use”
This is an important point. Coal and NG are competitors. Without coal, NG would have a tendency to ramp up. But Obama’s EPA, in its infinite wisdom is trying to shut coal down.
All of this talk about carbon accounting though, is pointless. In terms of climate, it means absolutely nothing. Its’ sole function lies in the squabbling among nations over who is to “blame”, who should pay, and how much.
All this teeth knashing scrutiny and measuring of CO2 emission is like counting fleas and tics on deer. The purpose would be? Certainly the deer don’t care. Other animals don’t care. Hunters don’t care. But someone obviously cares and thinks that humans are to blame for fleas and tics on deer. So a tax on the fleas and tics on deer has been initated. Sounds silly doesn’t it. But apparently “silly” has managed to become the world’s new reality.
Policycritic says:
December 8, 2013 at 6:14 am
——————-
http://www.eia.gov/environment/emissions/carbon/
http://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/news/labor-under-pressure-to-axe-the-carbon-tax/story-fni0cx4q-1226777879365
http://phys.org/news/2013-02-german-greenhouse-gas-emissions-rose.html
https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/provisional-uk-emissions-estimates
@Bill Illis
Powerful, just wow. And thanks for the follow-up with links. I can’t help but feel that including robust nuclear expansion would greatly enhance our energy portfolio, too. Like you, I just want energy technology that actually works.
I estimate that 92% of this reduction can be attributed to a poorly performing economy, not to any improvement in technology:
http://devoidofnulls.wordpress.com/2013/12/08/back-of-the-envelope-estimate-of-emissions-reduction-due-to-the-great-recession/
Hardly something to be too pleased about.
Oh frack you. Jokes aside, I want co2 levels in our atmosphere to go up to 800ppm. I love co2.
Write a paper.
In October of this year it was reported that US co2 emissions fell nearly 4% in 2012, reaching the lowest level since 1994, while the economy grew by 2.8%. Re-do your “back-fo-the-envelope-calculations”.
http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2013/10/21/us-carbon-emissions-energy-lowest-1994/3146123/
Jimbo- As it presently stands, my estimate is a “back of the envelope” calculation, and it is not as sophisticated as I would expect necessary for a formal paper. That being said, if you or anyone else has the skills and knowledge, I would be happy to collaborate on a formal paper on this subject.
As for your belief that the economy growing and CO2 emissions shrinking in *any* way refutes my argument, no, it absolutely does not. In my counterfactual scenario, total private expenditures grew about 15% between 2007 and 2012. In *reality* what happened was that private expenditures were 3 percent *less* in 2012 than in 2007. In other words, the private economy is about 16% *smaller* than it it would have been if it had kept growing, rather than experiencing a recession. But my counterfactual scenario involves an economy which is 5% *more* efficient (metric tons/$) than the actual economy! I assume *faster* technological progress than actually occurred, and I *still* get the bulk of reductions coming from a poorly performing economy. Where did you think the other 8% of reductions came from? In my counterfactual scenario, emissions are still lower in 2012 than 2007-by by a very small amount, *rather than a very large amount.*