Guest essay by Steven Capozzola, CAP Media
The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is preparing to finalize its Clean Power Plan, which aims to reduce power plant carbon dioxide emissions by 30% from 2005 levels over the next 15 years.
Looking at some of the best-case scenarios for CO2 reductions, the plan could potentially cut roughly 300 million tons of CO2 annually.
Because global man-made CO2 emissions reach roughly 30 billion tons annually, it’s estimated that the EPA plan could result in a possible 1% reduction in annual man-made CO2.
Overall, man-made CO2 accounts for only 4% of total atmospheric CO2. So the true atmospheric reduction in CO2 from the EPA plan would be approximately 0.04%.
The cost for this plan is estimated at $50 billion annually, with the loss of roughly 15,000 U.S. jobs each year. Increases in household utility bills could reach $100 billion annually.
These high costs have prompted diverse criticism.
Dr. Charles Steele, Jr., the president of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC), is troubled by the higher utility rates that consumers will face.
“The EPA’s plan will do next to nothing for global warming but will raise the cost of electricity for both homes and businesses,” said Dr. Steele. “As a person who has spent a lifetime fighting on behalf of poor people, this concerns me greatly.”
Terry Jarrett, who has served on both the Missouri Public Service Commission and the National Association of Regulatory Utilities Commissioners, says the potential risk to the U.S. electrical grid in term of lost generating capacity is significant.
“Under the EPA’s ‘Clean Power Plan,’ consumers will undoubtedly pay higher electricity bills,” said Jarrett. “But the more tragic problem is the possibility of widespread power outages during the coldest parts of winter. The EPA’s regulatory plan amounts to very reckless toying with the nation’s power grid.”
As the U.S. contemplates climate issues, one has to ask whether the EPA plan represents a sound approach, both logistically and financially.
That is $3.3 million per job. Sounds unlikely to me.
Please elaborate.
50,000,000,000 / 15,000 = 3,333,333
I meant, please elaborate on the unlikeliness part. What numbers would sound plausible to you and why? Thank you.
The US GDP is 17 trillion $, produced by 150 million jobs, so each job produces 113K, perhaps double if they are higher-paying job. Not 3 million $.
Thank you. So your position is that: a) the plan’s costs are wrongly calculated, b) the 15,000 figure is wrongly calculated, c) simply equating one with the other as you have done is wrong, d) none of the above (please supply).
I have no idea what is wrong or right, but I recognize garbage when I see it.
I’m afraid you fail to realize that others cannot read your mind. What is the garbage to you? The plan? Its cost? Establishing too simple a relationship between the plan’s cost and jobs?
Since a job on average generates $113K of the GDP a loss of 15K jobs should equate to a loss of GDP of $1,695,000,000, much smaller than the 50,000,000,000 touted in the article. Even if there is not equality, the discrepancy is large enough to qualify as garbage. I would not buy a used car from people peddling this kind of nonsense, would you?
Your patience is appreciated.
So, what you are trying to demonstrate with the simple math you provide shows that the report made by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce’s Institute for 21st Century Energy is garbage, independently of the merits or demerits of the EPA plan itself.
I wonder, however, if your conclusion rewarding the trustworthiness of the motivations of these people isn’t premature.
Let us consider that it has taken you microseconds to completely and utterly debunk, in your mind, their work. Is it not reasonable to assume these people are rather too stupid, literally speaking, to be capable of “peddling” anything?
I await your further comments on this important subject. If, as you claim, the members of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce are in fact drooling idiots, these and further insights of yours must be shared with the entire world at once.
Please elaborate in coherent detail.
If you would take the trouble to read the report you will find that the 15K jobs is not what the report says [more like 224K], so your conclusion [expressed in coherent detail] should just be that the quote is wrong.
So, all of this back and forth because the quote is wrong? Who is then “peddling” what? What’s your point? You have to understand that you are making claims regarding the motivations of, up to this point still, unclear parties. This surely requires exceptional justification.
The incoherent ‘back and forth’ originates with you. I stated my opinion succinctly from the start. The numbers quoted din’t look right, that is all. And it turned out that they weren’t. End of story.
Lief – The US GDP is 17 trillion $, produced by 150 million jobs, so each job produces 113K, perhaps double if they are higher-paying job. Not 3 million $.
For 2013 total Fed Govmt spending = $3,509 Billion of which $690 Billion was borrowed. $690/$14,100 = 4.9% of GDP is the Fed’s spending borrowed money out of todays 2% growth.
http://www.heritage.org/multimedia/infographic/2014/12/the-federal-budget-1994-2014
Since the Feds spent this money, that means 4.9 percent of our GDP was spending borrowed money and shows up as current growth in GDP. When it is paid back, it is not considered GDP and no effect is made. So not only are the Feds putting your kids and grandkids in debt, they are stealing their GDP growth.
Now look at some of the fudging going on with other spending.
In this chart, PCE dwarfs everything else. If you just look at the BEA’s numbers you see that personal consumption expenditures in the second quarter were running at a $10 trillion annual rate, 70.7% of the $14.1 trillion GDP figure. But when you actually look at the detailed breakdown of PCE, you get a much different picture. I divided PCE into five categories
The first category includes household spending on goods and services which are primarily domestically-produced. That would be things like food, recreation, haircuts, utilities, legal fees, airplanes, auto repair, and so forth. This category—roughly $4.3 trillion, or 30% of GDP—is all ‘pocketbook’ expense. Households lay out money, which primarily goes to support domestic production and employment.
Second category: Import-intensive goods. These are items such as clothing, personal computers, cell phones, televisions, toys, sporting goods, cars, gasoline, and so forth. These are items where a substantial amount of production is done abroad, either directly or indirectly.
For such import-intensive goods, a $1 of consumer spending does not correspond to a $1 of domestic activity. If you buy a shirt or a laptop which is made overseas, much of your money supports economic activity in China or Taiwan, not the U.S. This category is worth $1.7 trillion, or 12% of GDP.
Third category of PCE—“imputed services.” What this means is that the BEA assigns a number to certain economic activities, even though no money actually changes hands. The two most important imputed services are “imputed rental of owner-occupied nonfarm housing” and “financial services furnished without payment”. Respectively, these are the money you supposedly pay yourself to live in your own home, and the money you supposedly pay the bank for such services as free checking (by accepting lower or no interest on your demand deposits). This category—worth $1.5 trillion or 11% of GDP
Are you saying you didn’t know that GDP includes a rent payment on the portion of your paid for house? It does.
category—healthcare goods and services, including hospitals, drugs, doctors, nursing homes, and health insurance. Because of the vagaries of national income accounting, most of the money that the government pays for Medicare and Medicaid, and that businesses pay for employer health insurance, shows up in the PCE category. To put it another way—if Medicare pays the hospital $25 K for your father’s knee replacement, that money shows up as personal consumption expenditures. If your company health plan pays $30K for the birth of your son—that counts as PCE, even though you never see the money.
The healthcare category totals roughly $2 trillion, or 15% of GDP. But in fact, only about (roughly!) 15% of healthcare spending is “out of pocket”. The rest comes from government or through employee health plans.
final catch-all category, which I have labeled “social services, religious activities, R&D, and other similar activities.” This category includes spending by religious groups, such as the Catholic Church. It includes community food and housing relief. It includes R&D spending by private educational institutions, like Harvard. It includes social advocacy groups, like Greenpeace. It includes (I’m relatively sure) spending by political parties—Democrats and Republicans alike. In other words, this wonderful category—totaling about $400 billion, or 3% of GDP—includes all sorts of spending which could be described as “social” rather than “individual”. And it’s funded by individuals, government, charitable contributions, and investment income.
So when I added this all up, I got that households actually lay out about $5.5 trillion a year which drives domestic economic activities—about 40% of GDP.
http://www.businessweek.com/the_thread/economicsunbound/archives/2009/08/get_it_straight.html
Only Government accounting has more made up numbers than AGW & climate change.
As I said, the numbers are fishy.
Your anger is unjustified, lsvalgaard. Do you not want to be understood? And, if you aren’t, is it unreasonable to ask for an explanation that, after all, should underlie your motivation to communicate? If your motivation is other, please explain.
And speaking of motivations, you claim that the misquote you have discovered reveals the motivation of still unknown parties (the “peddling” comment). Would you please shed light on your obtuse words? Again, mind-reading remains a skill only you have. Thank you.
No anger, just remarking that the numbers don’t add up in my humble opinion. I couldn’t give a rat’s a** why not, and I find your interest in this to be of no interest. I have tried, in vain, to explain why I find the numbers fishy. If you are happy with them, good for you, but they don’t cut the mustard for me, that is all.
lsvalgaard, you seemed stuck on the idea that a simple equation is somehow problematic. It isn’t. What is unclear is what you are trying to get at.
For instance, here are your very words:
“I would not buy a used car from people peddling this kind of nonsense, would you?”
What does this mean TO YOU?
For starters, who are these “people”? If you are capable of finally formulating into words who you are talking about, please proceed by explain how this is a problem TO YOU and how this somehow implies “peddling” anything TO YOU.
I understand your frustration but I cannot read minds.
Nobody is asking you to read minds or to understand anything. If you can’t that is fine with me.
Summing up, then, you have made certain claims that have led you to make (still unsubstantiated) accusations regarding the actions of (still undetermined) people.
When asked for substantiation of the accusations or identification of the accusees, you become incoherent, self-contradictory, and fundamentally uninformative. Ultimately, you allege a “lack of interest” in your own very words.
Nonsense. I remarked that the numbers in my opinion didn’t add up. You seem to be gullible enough to accept the numbers at face value.
It’s $50billion + 15K jobs.
15 K jobs decrease every year from now on [“annually”] forever?
It seems that the decrease would happens mostly when the measures are put in place. And it still seems that the job loss would be a lot larger if you impose a cost of 50B, but have it your way, as I’ll have it my way.
I see Leif knows as little about economics and business as I know about solar science!
loss of 15K jobs every year forever?
No the actual report states ( click the COST link)
“The analysis found that EPA’s potential new carbon regulations would:
-Lower U.S. Gross Domestic Product (GDP) by $51 billion on average every year through 2030
-Lead to 224,000 fewer U.S. jobs on average every year through 2030
-Force U.S. consumers to pay $289 billion more for electricity through 2030
-Lower total disposable income for U.S. households by $586 billion through 2030
”
224 Thousand jobs on average every year through 2030.
That is a substantial difference.
I believe the author, Mr. Cappozzola, either misread the report or made an error in summarizing it. He interpreted the job loss as 224,000 TOTAL jobs lost over 15 years (by 2030). Dividing by 15 years, he came up with 15,000 jobs per year. His headline should read 224,000 jobs lost ANNUALLY. As it is written, the numbers indeed do not add up. The total job loss by 2030 would be 3.36 million, over two percent of the workforce, and that is a very serious number.
The math doesn’t work that simply. The economy can absorb expense and not cost a job. Lots of it will come in the form of opportunity costs such as pay raises not given, jobs not created and actual costs like pay cuts, reduced benefits, etc. Basically everything costs more and it has to come from somewhere, but not every penny equates to somebody’s job. Statists like to spread the suffering equally…amongst the poor and middle class.
It can, but usually doesn’t. Ask the guy who was laid off because of the extra cost to comply with regulations.
What I love most about this kind of thing is that the $15 minimum wage in Seattle caused the closing of the Socialist bookstore.
Check out the layoffs in Alberta (and rippling across the Canada all the way to Newfoundaland) due to an oil price change. Tens of thousands of jobs. Gone.
Some thought “low” fossil fuel costs would spur manufacturing in Ontario and Quebec. But guess what? Ontario’s experiment with “renewables ” and high minimum wages has closed the auto plants and exported those jobs to Mexico and even back to lower wage United States locations. The layoffs continue, GM is closing a plant this fall and another 1000 jobs get exported.
The EPA plan to raise energy costs will export jobs to China, India, South East Asia, South America, Central America and Africa.
Who answers your help line when you call late at night?
The math works alright. But only for developing countries. Everything according to plan.
I am getting cynical in my old age, but I keep seeing cycles over and over again.
[Snip. Fake email address. -mod]
Thanks mod
Meaning the regulation will cause a loss of 15,000 jobs annually.
So each job is responsible for 3.3 million dolares. Highly unlikely, and the job loss seems to be more like 224K.
@lsvalgaard
You seem to be assuming all loss is due to jobs. One can have economic loss from capitol flight and destruction as well. Also note the loss from financial paper evaporation just a few years back. Loss is not just labor.
Not ALL, of course, just enough to make the comparison. Okun’s law.
It is extremely difficult, as is predicting long term weather, to predict the numbers of jobs lost to a particular regulation. What regulation does, though is make basic needs like housing, transportation, energy, food and health care more expensive. People have, therefore, less money to spend on other things, and so those people producing other things lose their jobs. The question simply is whether the cost of reducing CO2 by that amount is worth the cost.
Are you sure that the Costs don’t include actual… costs? shuttering plants, replacing them with solar/wind, other mitigation strategies, etc? I didn’t get the sense that costs were merely lost man-hours.
Leif, there is no relationship between the cost and the job loss; they are independent variables. And if you think it a bit of an exaggeration, look at Ontario or Spain. This is criminal destruction.
Apart from the fact that the 15K was wrong to begin with, I do think there is a relationship when the number of cases is high enough, cf. Okun’s law:
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/7/77/Okuns_law_quarterly_differences.svg/300px-Okuns_law_quarterly_differences.svg.png
Can we keep the 1% in CO2 and cut the EPA?
Elect Rand Paul?
The plan is bigger than any politician.
There are some sacrifices that we have to make now, financially and in our standard of living, to allow for the world to be an amenable place for our species to survive in the future.
Somebody has to give the first step and it is world renowned that most countries always follow in the steps of the EPA. It is quite common to find a copy-paste of EPA regulations in other country’s environmental policies.
The EPA’s influence has a very far reach. Anybody that has worked in the Middle East, North Africa, Asia, and so forth (assuming they have worked in the oil industry) can attest ho much of the regulations follow EPA.
Whatever the US does is certain to have a world impact.
@Francisco
“There are some sacrifices that we have to make now, financially and in our standard of living, to allow for the world to be an amenable place for our species to survive in the future.”
Please explain in coherent detail why there is a need for such sacrifices.
@Brute
http://climate.nasa.gov/
Any further questions?
Global temperatures up 1.4 degrees F since 1880 Brute (from Warren’s link), with nothing to suggest it’s any different from the natural warming from 1880 to 1950.
… but hey ho, you should be bedwetting along with Warren anyway.
@warrenlb, @philincalifornia
Please explain in coherent detail why there is a need for the sacrifices outlined by Francisco. It is important to get the message out there. Please stop pretending to be dullards or I will have no choice but to conclude that you both are nothing but deniers in disguise attempting to ridicule AGW with crude clownishness.
That actually doesn’t answer Brute’s question to Francisco about unnecessary sacrifices, plus it’s not actually coherent either (well it is NASA with Gavin’s adjustments) 😉
OK. Can you tell us what the impact will be — in total cost and in global temperature reduction — if everybody follows the EPA plan?
@Gerald Wilhite.
http://www.ciesin.columbia.edu/docs/003-311/003-311.html
@Gerald Wilhite
This is the link I intended in reply to your question:http://www2.epa.gov/sites/production/files/2014-06/documents/20140602ria-clean-power-plan.pdf
From your link, Warren:
That means a single PM2.5 particle produced anywhere within the US (not counting all those that occur naturally, of course) will cause some level of premature death (the entire cost “savings” of the proposed regulations–OK, just 98% and 91% depending on the pollutant).
Which is, like, totally awesome. Sign me up for your homeopathy! LNT is a silly, unjustified, unverified metric, so entirely appropriate for the EPA.
As a professional in the field of air pollution, I chuckled when I originally read the support information for EPA’s proposal. Almost all of the health improvement cited by EPA comes from PM reduction. NOT CO2 reduction – PM reduction. Because…..
There isn’t any proof that CO2 reduction will accomplish anything. EPA would achieve the same benefit at a fraction of the cost by merely mandating improved PM controls. In effect, EPA’s own supporting analysis clearly shows there is no benefit to reducing CO2 emissions.
– WS1835
@Francisco
I have worked in the Middle East, North Africa, and sub-Saharan Africa.
They don’t even bother to spell EPA.
@Bubba Cow
Not true. With respect to environmental policy, the EPA is the thought leader for those countries. Francisco’s comment is spot on, not only with respect to the Middle East, but also for the EU and Japan.
@ warrenlb
please share your sources for these “thought” leaders
@Bubba Cow
The source is my 40 year US and International Technology Career working with EPA and other Countrys’ Environmental Agencies on Equipment Efficiency Standards and Climate Change regulatory Issues. While not always agreeing with EPA, those other countries usually respected EPA’s analysis and leadership positions, and often followed them with identical, or similar, initiatives.
@ warrenlb
any details? or just appeals?
@Bubba Cow
EU, Japanese, and Chinese CFC and HCFC Phase-Out and Fluid Substitution Policies, Recommended Technologies for low Global Warming solutions, HFC Cap and Trade Proposals for the Global Montreal Protocol Negotiations. Each of these occurring at intervals over several years and in multiple phases. And Technologies to address the unique needs of the Middle East with respect to low Global Warming fluids for Air Conditioners. There are probably others I’ve overlooked.
@warrenlb
HCFC phase out – good on you.
I worked with Faisal family on water needs for KSA – we went nuclear.
Personally, not big on desalination, but water is big issue for life.
Cap and Trade?? – you against CO2? buy carbon as fix?
big time wrong that
Working now on coal fired power for Nigeria. Sahel is greening, I can see it.
Good thing we fixed that Ozone hole thingy with those regulations, Warren…
@Tsk Tsk
You’re wrong:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/capital-weather-gang/wp/2014/09/11/ozone-layer-is-healing-expected-to-recover-by-around-2050-major-report-finds/
How much “climate change / global warming” will be averted as the result of the $50,000,000,000 EPA scheme? Please include supporting data.
Unknown; and, currently, unknowable.
Chris,
Supporting data? From warren??
Ask for something reasonable, like a list of his authorities that all say exactly the same thing.
Based on current verifiable scientific evidence? Zero!
That’s fine if you think CO2 is problematic. Most of here of course, do not.
Francisco appears to be missing the point.
Francisco – before politicians with agendae got hold of it, the warm periods in the world’s history like the Minoan, Roman and Medieval warm periods were all called optima – as in really good for everything in nature and humanity. The level of CO2 has been far higher than it is now for many thousands of years without any ‘tipping point’ or catastrophe befalling the Earth. In consequence what the EPA is doing and what you support is making things worse for nature and humanity. In the Little Ice Age the level of CO2 at 280ppm was only just above the survival level for plants – and therefore the world was teetering on the brink of all major life forms dying. You and the EPA want to go back to that?
If anyone wants to assist the poorer areas of the world then give them easy cheap reliable base load power. I can assure you that China and India will not follow the EPA example. They will just take the manufacturing jobs that the enfeebled US grid can no longer support. Well done Francisco and the EPA!
CO2, the life-giving gas, not “Carbon Pollution”. A Limerick – and explanation.
What then is this “Carbon Pollution”?
A sinister, evil collusion?
CO2, it is clean,
Makes for growth, makes it green,
A transfer of wealth, a solution.
http://lenbilen.com/2014/02/22/co2-the-life-giving-gas-not-carbon-pollution-a-limerick-and-explanation/
Some of these comments, the stupid, it burns!
Take two aspirin and call yourself in the morning.
nice
What does the MD mean? Mis-directed?
The Environment Protection Agency will do ANYTHING to protect the environment from the effect of human existence. It is their JOB. Logic of the cost to everyone is not in their world view. pg
What’s unfathomable is that even leftist alarmists using IPCC’s erroneous CO2 forcing assumptions freely admit that even if the U.S. We’re to cut CO2 emissions by 30% by 2030 it would only lower global temps by 0.03C by 2100, which is completely insane.
The left even goes makes the absurd claim that increasing energy costs will stimulate economic growth and create jobs….
Hmmmm… I don’t know where Obama’s economic advisers learned their economics, but if tactors of procpduction costs increase, production efficiency decreases, which: increases the costs of goods, decreases competiveness, decreases profits, increases the unemployment rate, increases welfare expenditures, increases budget deficits, increases debt monetization, lowers wages, decreases disposable income, decreases savings rates, decreases real marginal consumption, increases trade deficits and devalues currencies– among many other cascading negatives consequences that only worsen over time…
The world has gone temporarily insane….There is simply no other explanation to explain this insane behavior by leftist governments and organizations.
The good news is that there has already been almost 20 years with no significant global warming trend and all the dire predictions CAGW projected are not occurring.
The longer CAGW’s dire predictions don’t reflect reality, , the sooner this insanity will end….
Job gains come from solar and renewable energy – though it take 10-20 times the number of employees to produce the same quantity of energy. Which should give the leftists some idea of the differences in efficiency
I can guarantee full employment by banning tractors too. There may be a few casualties during the glorious transition, but Gaia thinks it’s worth it.
The economic data shows that for every job added to the expensive, inefficient, diffuse, unreliable and intermittent wind/solar alt-en sector, two jobs are lost in the private sector for the aforementioned economic reasons.. Look at Spain’s economy…. 25% unemployment… Oh, goody…
Cheap, abundant and reliable fossil fuel energy is the motive power that allows economies to grow and prosper. Wind/solar are at least 5 TIMES as expensive as fossil fuels, so it’s insane to use them.
If cheaper, cleaner and unlimited alt-en technologies like Molten Salt Reactors (MSRs) are utilized,, yes, HUGE economic growth/benefits are possible, but trying to use MORE expensive alternative energy sources like wind/solar destroy economies, especially if other market players don’t do something this foolish and stupid.
China’s first test MSR starts this year and India’s first test MSR starts next year. It’s China’s revised plan to have a working MSR design for massive rollout by 2024… Western countries’ economies will be gutted if they don’t catch up with MSR technology as it has the potential to be 50% cheaper than coal/natural gas, and 10 TIMES cheaper than wind/solar on a $/kWh basis.
[snip – policy violation @gmail.edu is not a valid email address -mod]
Draconian: Definition – (of laws or their application) excessively harsh and severe.
I think draconian implies some kind of good application of a law, just too harsh.
This is not the case; the EPA is being futile and anti-people.
15K jobs a year? When I click the link I find this:
page 7 of the report itself talks about this, the 224K doesn’t appear to be a typo. To put this in perspective, I read here that there were 5 million job openings in March of this year.
hmm, my link to the report is messed. It’s this in my browser window:
http://www.energyxxi.org/sites/default/files/Assessing_the_Impact_of_Potential_New_Carbon_Regulations_in_the_United_States.pdf
which is much more reasonable[225K/job]. A gain of a job increases the GDP [because people usually produce something, except when they are lawyers, politicians or some such], a loss of a job decreases GDP, and the amount is about right.
What? 244 thousand per job? Is it cocktail hour already?
No, a loss of 224K jobs per year.
You are assuming a direct relationship between GDP and jobs while forgetting about the very important economic metric of “productivity”. The US is currently seeing a small increase in jobs with lower productivity and as a result near-zero GDP growth. The EPA’s war on CO2 will increase energy prices, regulatory costs, and supply uncertainty and will reduce the productivity of all workers not just the ones who lose their jobs…i.e. the GDP losses will exceed the $/job lost. (Ironically this is similar to to equating sunspots to TOA :-))
All of that doesn’t matter, as the 15K was a misquote. The actual number should have been a much more reasonable 224K.
Evidently the author calculated jobs lost per year as 224,000 / 15 = 15,000 jobs/yr approx, but if the text was accurate and if the jobs lost were a constant number each year, then the correct calculation would yield 30,000 jobs lost per year in order to get 225K jobs lost on average because you have 0 jobs lost in the 0th year and 450,000 jobs lost in the 15th year, and so 225,000 jobs lost as the average of those end points.
Which just by itself …. will cause the loss of 2 to 4+ million jobs in the public sector … wherein that “disposable income” was previously being expended, ….. with the “low-wage earners” being hit the hardest.
The statement above “man-made CO2 accounts for only 4% of total atmospheric CO2” is approximately true but is irrelevant to the issue. CO2 in the atmosphere and oceans approximates chemical equilibrium. When more CO2 is added to the atmosphere, that causes more CO2 to dissolve in the oceans. Fossil fuel burning has added well more than 100 ppm equivalent CO2 to the atmosphere. In addition, the atmosphere also exchanges its CO2 with the oceans (and with living organisms, marine and terrestrial) at a CO2 molecular rate that is far greater than the rate fossil fuel burning adds CO2 to the atmosphere. This means that a CO2 molecule from fossil fuel burning is rather quickly replaced in the atmosphere by a CO2 molecule from the ocean (or from life).
I frequently see comments which indicate that some do not understand these concepts of equilibrium and reservoir exchange.
THUS, ALTHOUGH THE ACTUAL CO2 MOLECULES IN AIR FROM FOSSIL FUEL BURNING MAY BE ONLY 4%, THE NET RELEASE OF FOSSIL FUEL BURNING DID SIGNIFICANTLY CONTRIBUTE TO THE APPRECIABLE RISE IN ATMOSPHERIC CO2. This is independent to what one thinks about the role of CO2 in warming.
Uh. Warmer water holds less dissolved gas. I’m not convince the gas didn’t effectively evolve from the oceans. Two miles of ice over Chicago should cure the problem.
Yes, simple chemical physics predicts that warmer oceans will dissolve less CO2, which shifts more CO2 into the atmosphere.
And experimental botany has shown that increased atmospheric CO2 increases incorporation of CO2 into plants (as commented below). So a small portion of the overall CO2 equilibrium is shifted from oceans to life.
+1
thank you for writing, Donb – keep it up, please
this matter needs to be clear
Donb,
OK, forget the fact that the rise in CO2 from whatever source has not caused the predicted global warming. Or any measurable warming over the past 10 – 18 years for that matter. How about the measurable rise in agricultural productivity that has resulted? Can we discuss that?
Also, if a 1% cut in CO2 costs 15,000 jobs annually, will a 1% rise in CO2 add 15,000 more jobs every year? And add $50 billion to the economy? That’s only about 8 ppm.
Can the public vote on that?
All of the jobs are going to illegal aliens now. I wonder how they’re going to take being thrown out of work in a sketchy attempt to save the polar ice caps (Which are growing, by the way).
As I understand it the Fed/EPA goal is to reduce CO2 output from the power generation sector by 30%. Some say reduce coal fired CO2 by 30%. They are not the same.
30% reduction in power generation CO2 times 38% of US CO2 contribution times 19% global CO2 contribution = 2.27% reduction on global CO2. Whoopee.
Eliminating half of coal fired generation: 0.5 * 0.245 * 0.19 = 0.0233 or 2.33% of global CO2 burden.
Massive economic disruption for an inconsequential result.
http://www.epa.gov/climatechange/ghgemissions/gases/co2.html
(Generation produces 38% of US CO2.)
http://www.epa.gov/climatechange/ghgemissions/global.html
(US produces 19% of global CO2.)
http://www.c2es.org/energy/source/coal
(Coal CO2 represents 24.5% of US GHGs.)
Regarding manmade CO2 being only 4% of atmospheric CO2:
Atmospheric CO2 increased 40% since the pre-industrial era, and man-made CO2 was almost twice the amount needed to accomplish that. Nature removed some of the manmade CO2 from the atmosphere.
Please have a look at, for one thing:
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2015/04/19/the-secret-life-of-half-life/
As for other relevant info:
http://www.tyndall.ac.uk/global-carbon-budget-2010
Also, there is the Suess Effect, showing a substantial amount of CO2 in the atmosphere to have fossil carbon.
What’s that ? This plan will cause a loss of 15,000 EPA jobs ?
The fraction of actual CO2 molecules from fossil fuel burning is ESTIMATED in two ways — from the amount of radioactive 14C present and from the 13C/12C isotopic ratio. Both ways of estimating have issues. (Half-life only refers to 14C.) In fossil fuels the 14C has long decayed away, whereas 14C is produced within the atmosphere by cosmic rays. So adding more fossil fuel CO2 decreases the 14C in air. But exchanging that air CO2 into the oceans, and then sometimes back again into air before all 14C has decayed, complicates the calculation. And one must accurately know the 14C/12C production ratio in the atmosphere.
Life produces a quite low 13C/12C ratio, as reflected in both fossil fuels and living organisms. 13C/12C in the oceans is relatively high. Other carbon reservoirs, e.g. freshwater, soils, volcanoes, limestones, mostly have intermediate 13C/12C. Each of these carbon reservoirs can influence the atmospheric 13C/12C, depending on how much they exchange their carbon.
As with much geological data, the devil can be in the details.
EPA regulations will increase the cost of electricity for both homes and businesses. Businesses will then pass their higher costs onto customers. But with customers also paying more for energy, they will have less money to spend less on the products and services these businesses provide. Exports will also be reduced due to higher costs. With fewer customers, businesses will be forced to lay off workers or operate at a loss. And laid-off workers will then be forced to cut their spending. All of this will result in an irreversible death spiral for the economy until there are no more businesses or jobs left. (Sorry, I got carried away while channeling my inner alarmist.) Actually, the economy will eventually reach a new equilibrium. No one knows exactly how many jobs will be lost, but it won’t be pretty. Hopefully, Congress can get the EPA to take its head out of the clouds and come back down to reality before the economy takes too big of a hit.
How about going to Spain and seeing how they have made out, they took globle warming Heart about seven or eight years ago . Just check and see how they have made out.
I do a lot of business with Spain and have the pleasure of visiting there often.
It’s a gorgeous country with wonderful people, but their leftist government has helped destroy the Spanish economy.
Unemployment is now almost 27%… and growing….
The high costs of energy, caused by MASSIVE amounts of taxpayer money being wasted on wind/solar projects, has helped destroy their economy as has their excessive labor laws, business regulations and high taxes.
Interesting post by Ross McKitrick that proves that Obama’s 97% claim is just more of his BS and McKibben has been caught out lying AGAIN.
In fact he shows that many so called experts are not even aware of the IPCC’s position on many of the issues in relation to our ability to forecast future climate etc. Will they ever wake up?
http://business.financialpost.com/fp-comment/climate-change-consensus-among-the-misinformed-is-not-worth-much
Looks like Enron’s plan is approaching fruition.
Death to the coal industry, with natural gas replacing coal as fuel in electrical generating plants.
I’ve suggested this before as an extreme way to wake them up to how stupid there ideas are, is for all the coal and gas power plants to announce they will shut off supply for a couple of days to show what these sort of regulations will do for the country.
James Bull
what’s difference this 1% will make. And how long to execute this plan.
Has anybody been watching the Solar Impulse tour?
These guys have possibly done the world a big favour.
Inasmuch as I think that after years of brainwashing, most of the general public now imagine that a few dozen solar panels would generate enough power to at least replace the engine on a Cessna.
Now we get to see that a solar powered craft with a wingspan equivalent to an A340 will transport just one man very very slowly and in only the finest weather conditions. With a massive back-up team travelling by conventional (fossil fuel powered) means.
Whilst the A340 itself transports several hundred tonnes of steel, luggage and several hundred people through the sky for just ~$30 of jet fuel per nautical mile.
The image in this link is the perfect graphic explanation of why the replacement of fossil fuels with solar presents a massive massive problem.
http://techon.nikkeibp.co.jp/english/NEWS_EN/20100330/181484/?SS=imgview_e&FD=46728356
The EPA’s “plan” isn’t worth the paper it’s printed on.
Even if it was a pdf…
Meanwhile recent study shows that regulations cost almost 2 trillion dollars per year.
The EPA is a major contributor.
http://www.thenewamerican.com/economy/item/19116-federal-regulations-cost-u-s-2-trillion-per-year-study-shows
“Federal regulations imposed on America have been costing the U.S. economy more than $2 trillion every year and growing, according to a new study that sought to quantify the economic damage inflicted by Washington, D.C., politicians and bureaucrats. That drag represents well over 10 percent of GDP, the report said. Especially burdened under the perpetually expanding regulatory regime are manufacturers and small businesses — two of the key sectors urgently needed to drive employment, growth, and exports amid ballooning U.S. trade and budget deficits. The most harmful and costly regulations and decrees, researchers found, surround alleged “environmental” issues.”
The EPA is littering the rhetorical landscape with random numbers just to obfuscate the issue. The real point here is that the Administration wants to hobble the electric power industry with an ever-increasing load of regulations until they get what THEY want, regardless of what is best for the rest of the population.
On the other hand, China agrees with the EPA’s plan and they are our friends, right? I imagine North Korea would be on board with it as well as other countries who only have our best interests at heart, along with reputable organizations such as al qaeda and isis. It’s hard to say no to all that affirmation.
Effect of Going back to the Stone Age (minus Campfires)
“Eliminating all U.S. greenhouse gas emissions by 2050 would reduce the warming by 0.014oC (as per the EPA MAGICC model). This is an amount of warming that is much smaller than the uncertainty in even measuring the global average temperature.”–Prof. Judith Curry, Chair, School of Earth and Atmospheric Sciences
Georgia Institute of Technology
Help please! I struggle with the arguments concerning the contribution of fossil-fuel burning to the proportion of CO2 in the atmosphere. I understand that the atmosphere is constantly exchanging CO2 with sources and sinks thereof, so for example the respiration of animals converts O2 to CO2, while that of plants takes in CO2 and produces O2. Similarly the oceans and the atmosphere exchange CO2 on the basis of the relative concentrations therein and the solubility of CO2 at the prevailing water temperature. In the absence of any fossil-fuel burning (and I guess volcanic activity), at a given global temperature distribution (not realistic I know, but bear with me), presumably a rough equilibrium will exist between CO2 absorbed from and given up to the atmosphere? If you then start up the power stations and generate “man-made” CO2 (the global temperature distribution staying more or less the same) this would increase the concentration of CO2 in the atmosphere so that the previous equilibrium would be disrupted. With a higher concentration of CO2 in the atmosphere the oceans would absorb more (and so too presumably would plants and other sinks) until a new equilibrium were achieved. This new equilibrium would involve a higher concentration of CO2 in the atmosphere. The bit I struggle with is why, when the fossil-fuel burning contribution to CO2 emissions is of the order of 4% (or so I have been led to believe), does the new equilibrium result in around a 30% increase in the concentration of CO2 in the atmosphere? This seems excessive unless the sinks are close to saturation?
This is an easy answer. Run the EPA’s climate model with and without those changes? What is the difference?
Next!
There goes the neighborhood.
Reblogged this on Public Secrets and commented:
We have met the enemy, and it is the EPA.
The right way to formulate an environmental policy by calculating it is to express its bottom line in human lives.
The Clean Air Act kills at least hundreds, probably thousands of people a year (by forcing them into smaller cars that don’t protect them in wrecks). Compare that to how many fewer people per year are killed by air pollution than in 1970 (when the Act took effect). I’d guess that number to be fewer than 20.
Result: everyone involved in enacting, enforcing, renewing, or strengthening the Act should be put on trial for murder.
But since the air is even cleaner now, obviously a similar calculation for the new bill will find against it even more strongly.
Then do similarly with the Clean Water Act, Endangered Species Act, and all other environmental laws.
I want the job of head prosecutor in a new agency that will carry out these reforms.
Yes, the correct job loss estimate due to the EPA’s clean power plan (according to the U.S. Chamber of Commerce) is 224,000/annually.
Here’s the link and key points:
https://www.uschamber.com/press-release/energy-institute-report-finds-potential-new-epa-carbon-regulations-will-damage-us
The analysis found that EPA’s potential new carbon regulations would:
-Lower U.S. Gross Domestic Product (GDP) by $51 billion on average every year through 2030
-Lead to 224,000 fewer U.S. jobs on average every year through 2030
-Force U.S. consumers to pay $289 billion more for electricity through 2030
-Lower total disposable income for U.S. households by $586 billion through 2030