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The Best Science Writing Online 2012
Showcasing more than fifty of the most provocative, original, and significant online essays from 2011, The Best Science Writing Online 2012 will change the way...
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Have you heard enough already about global warming? It’s so ... last year’s news! Plenty of people are “doing something” about it. Becoming carbon-neutral has gone as mainstream as Girl Scout cookies; help is on the way. Can we move on, please?
Unfortunately not. For all the consciousness-raising value of grassroots initiatives, the world is still far from squarely facing up to the issues. Both Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama promise on their Web sites to reduce carbon emissions to just 20 percent of 1990 levels by 2050—a laudable goal. But because what matters is the load of greenhouse gases in the entire atmosphere, reaching those numbers would be hard, to say the least, for the U.S. to do alone. John McCain’s Web site simply offers “commonsense approaches to limit carbon emissions by harnessing market forces that will ... see to it that ... all nations do their rightful share.”
If the candidates’ statements—perhaps out of political necessity—are short on specifics, the reason is partly that much of the electorate still finds it hard to grasp the size and urgency of the problem. Like the naive passengers on board an ocean liner, who lean carelessly over the rail as their ship drifts into an iceberg, most of us are oblivious to the magnitude of the impending disaster. The separation closes too slowly for us to appreciate the force of the coming crunch.
What is even more misleading, most climate changes so far seem gentle, even pleasant—an earlier spring, a later fall. Only occasionally does an ungentle reminder break through: this past February 160 square miles of Antarctica’s Wilkins ice shelf disintegrated. James Hansen of the NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies and his colleagues argue in a recent paper submitted to Science that the present carbon dioxide (CO2) level in the atmosphere, 385 parts per million (ppm), has already crossed into dangerous territory. According to their study of past climatic sensitivity to changes in atmospheric CO2, there is substantial risk that within just a few centuries the earth could lose its great Antarctic and Greenland ice sheets, causing catastrophic rises in sea level, unless CO2 levels are quickly brought back to 350 ppm.
All six of the scenarios considered by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) assume that by the end of this century atmospheric greenhouse gases will reach the warming equivalent of 600 ppm of CO2 (600 ppm CO2-eq). At that level the IPCC pegs the chances at about two thirds that by 2100 the earth will have warmed between two and three degrees Celsius (between 3.6 and 5.4 degrees Fahrenheit) since preindustrial times. If concentrations rise to 1,250 ppm CO2-eq or above, as they do in two of the IPCC scenarios, the chances become about one in six that the warming will exceed five degrees C (nine degrees F). According to the Stern Review, a major report on the economics of climate change, a five-degree increase would be “far outside the experience of human civilisation.” It would also risk “irreversible ... physical changes, such as the collapse of ocean currents,” as well as “mass migrations and social instability.” It gets worse. The IPCC puts the chances at 5 percent that even if CO2-eq levels stabilize at 550 ppm, global temperatures will eventually rise by eight degrees C (14.4 degrees F).
Both the Stern Review and John Broome, in his article “The Ethics of Climate Change,” are explicit about the ethical dimensions of society’s response to global warming. At bottom, the issue is much like the one older voters must face when their local government proposes a hike in school taxes. How much do we really care about the well-being of future generations? How much of the good life in the present are we willing to forgo to provide for our children and grandchildren?
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13 Comments
Add CommentI was with you right up until this bit: "Imagine you are living in the year 2108, and you are keenly aware that the political dislocations all around you were preventable catastrophes."
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI'm no AGW denialist, and I accept the need for attempting to mitigate, but since no climate scientist I've found will go on record supporting the assertion that global warming would be averted by such-and-such action, our descendants can't *know* that the catastrophes you predict were preventable, only *suspect*.
Here's a better analogy. Imagine it's 2008 and food riots are happening around the world because environmental policies have created energy and food shortages.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisHow do you feel, SA, being one of the bullhorns calling for more of the same?
If you truly were a scientific journal you would look at the evidence all around you that for the last 30 years, environmental solutions have done NOTHING but increase human misery, suffering and death around the globe.
If this is your cure to climate change, give me the disease.
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Edited by frgough at 05/19/2008 7:22 AM
> Here's a better analogy. Imagine it's 2008 and food
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this> riots are happening around the world because
> environmental policies have created energy and food
> shortages.
>
> Edited by frgough at 05/19/2008 7:22 AM
Well, you have apoint there.
I am with you that "environmental policies" have done great harm to hundreds of millions feeling the after-shock of converting food crops to energy crops.
Do have a look at the cover story of National Geographic on October 2007: Using Corn to make ethanol is the least effective source of biofuel! I assume that without government subsidies corn would never be (ab-)used for feeding gas guzzlers (via ethanol) instead of feeding cattle or people.
Spending tax money to redirect grain from the food chain to industrial use, .to [b]create[/b] food price inflation all over the world -- that is beyond me.
But is that the only example you know of "environmental policies"?
I am proud of fellow scientists and technicians who are improving the efficiency of energy collection from sun radiation, wind, waves, running water, plant material, even waste -- and I am glad that different environmental policies can create win-win solutions for environment [u]and[/u] business, with us humans benefitting from both.
> ...last 30 years, environmental solutions have done NOTHING but increase human misery, suffering and death ...
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisCorrectly, misguided, non-wholistic, environmental regulations have caused problems. This strident statement would work better if you provided evidentiary statements.
There are some instances citeable:
- The ban on DDT resulted in at least 100 million preventable malaria deaths. But malaria also prevented Europeans from buying up all that beachfront property.
- Stopping nuclear power resulting in high carbon emissions causing global warming and release of more radioactives into the environment than nuclear power could.
However, there are other instances of environmental solutions being of great help. For instance:
- Air quality regulations have made air breathable in every city in the developed world. You have to go to India and China now to find air that chokes you and cuts your life short by a decade or more.
- Water quality regulations have made it possible for rivers and lakes to support life again. It has been a while since a river has caught fire and burned.
Wow, talk about getting your villains mixed up. The ethanol thing is not about the environmentalists at all. It's about Agribusiness stepping in to make a lot of money under the charade that they're "doing something good" for the planet. The "Denialists" say the "Hot Planet Folks" have a "secret agenda", but they never articulate just what that may be. In the end this may very well play out like "Easter Island", only on a much, much, bigger scale. Jared Diamond would most likely concur.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAmerican science has failed to protect humanity and the environment for over half a century, a period that should have been the golden age of American scientific discovery. Instead of producing large-scale energy production solutions to eliminate fossil fuel burning generators American scientists chose to dedicate themselves to far simpler research that perpetuated fossil fuel burning for profit. Either American scientists upgrade their cultural values immediately to end atmospheric CO2 escalation with the sense of urgency that current tipping point events demand, or we are screwed.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this>American science has failed to protect humanity and the environment for over half a century, a period that should have been the golden age of American scientific discovery.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe internal gas combustion engine dates back to 1824. Maybe people should consider actually utilizing discoveries made in the past [u]150[/u] years before they expect them to somehow magically protect the environment.
The government isn't going to kill the gas powered automobile industry and the big car companies certainly are not going to do it. They make far too much money in replacement parts to willingly make the switch to much simpler (and cheaper) technologies.
There are a few startup companies such as "Telsa Motors" http://www.teslamotors.com/ and my personal favorite "Engine Air" http://www.engineair.com.au/ that are heading in the right direction but people really should consider making tax deductible donations to various environmental charities. These problems are only going to be fixed through research and consumer demand despite the governments unwillingness to act.
For my part I am currently back in university at the age of 32 working towards a degree in mechanical engineering because I am unwilling to sit on my hands waiting for someone else to come save the day.
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Edited by Natedog at 05/20/2008 1:34 PM
What disasters are global warming going to cause? I find the scientific literature limited to ice caps melting and coastal flooding. Here's where I go dense: Glaciers are seem rather useless, and coastal flooding means people have to move. So what? Once and awhile I'll hear reports of stronger weather, but since we can't predict the weather 3 days from now with any better than a 50% accuracy this doesn't seem to be a problem. This post isn't meant to be provocative. I really am dense about this subject even though I've been researching it for 3 years.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisNatedog, excellent idea to find a better way to fix problems that PhDs failed to prevent over the last half century.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisBut be very aware that no one warned us any better than President Eisenhower did in his 1961 “Farewell Address to the Nation†about the cultural failures in academia, especially science: [url http://mcadams.posc.mu.edu/ike.htm][/url]
You should read and heed Ike’s warnings very carefully to prevent following in the wasted footsteps of far too many of our best minds who chose to become part of a giant academic welfare program instead of dedicating themselves too saving mankind from climate changes documented by Keeling and Hockey Stick curves that have been accelerating for over half a century.
I wish you the best Natedog.
The reality of carbon is that all of our economics are now petrodollars. Addressing the issue properly means someone has to stand up and say, "We need to reduce our economic infrastructure overall, or find something besides oil that can drive the world economy."
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisNobody will do that.
Studying for 5 years and you still don't know the consequences? Have you read the IPCC report for starters or RSS such websites as Gristmill?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisFor polar bears and penguins, glaciers are hardly 'useless'. However, I myself could care a less about snow skiers.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisBut if the Antarctic and Greenland ice sheets and glaciers melt, it will be a big deal.
According to National Geographic, some 50% of the world's population lives within 25 miles of the seas and oceans. When Bangladesh, half of Florida, and the N.E. megalopolitan corridor are under water I think it will be a very severe big deal.
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Edited by ZenGalacticore at 05/26/2008 1:23 PM
The EPA and the IPCC have determined that CO2 " most likely " cause of global warming" [12]
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe complete removal of all catalytic converters will drastically reduce our footprint of CO2 gases introduced into the atmosphere.
[12] Le Treut H, Somerville R, Cubasch U, Ding Y, Mauritzen C, Mokssit A, Peterson T and Prather M (2007) (PDF). Historical Overview of Climate Change Science In: Climate Change 2007: The Physical Science Basis. Contribution of Working Group I to the Fourth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (Solomon S, Qin D, Manning M, Chen Z, Marquis M, Averyt KB, Tignor M and Miller HL, editors). Cambridge University Press. pp. 5,10. http://ipcc-wg1.ucar.edu/wg1/Report/AR4WG1_Print_Ch01.pdf. Retrieved 2009-01-18.
E.P.A. Says Catalytic Converter Is
Growing Cause of Global Warming
By Matthew L. Wald
Copyright 1998 The New York Times
May 29, 1998
WASHINGTON -- The catalytic converter, an invention that has sharply reduced smog from cars, has now become a significant and growing cause of global warming, according to the Environmental Protection Agency.
Hailed as a miracle by Detroit automakers even today, catalytic converters have been reducing smog for 20 years. The converters break down compounds of nitrogen and oxygen from car exhaust that can combine with hydrocarbons, also from cars, and be cooked by sunlight into smog.
But researchers have suspected for years that the converters sometimes rearrange the nitrogen-oxygen compounds to form nitrous oxide, known as laughing gas. And nitrous oxide is a potent greenhouse gas, more than 300 times more potent than carbon dioxide, the most common of the gases, that is warming the atmosphere, according to experts.
This spring, the EPA published a study estimating that nitrous oxide now comprises about 7.2 percent of the gases that cause global warming. Cars and trucks, most fitted with catalytic converters, produce nearly half of that nitrous oxide, the study said. (Other sources of nitrous oxide include everything from nitrogen-based fertilizer to manure from farm animals.)
The EPA study also showed that nitrous oxide is one of a few gases for which emissions are increasing rapidly. Collectively known as greenhouse gases, they trap heat in the earth's atmosphere.
The increase in nitrous oxide, the study notes, stems from the growth in the number of miles traveled by cars that have catalytic converters. And the problem has worsened as improvements in catalytic converters, changes that have eliminated more of the nitrogen-oxygen compounds that cause smog, have conversely produced more nitrous oxide.
Wylie J. Barbour, an EPA official who worked on the recently published inventory, said that the problem created by the converter is classic. "You've got people trying to solve one problem, and as is not uncommon, they've created another."
Nitrous oxide, or N2O, is not regulated because the Clean Air Act was written in 1970 to control smog, not global warming. And no regulations exist to control gases that are believed to cause global warming.
The United States and the other industrialized nations agreed in Kyoto, Japan, last December to lower emissions of greenhouse gases to 5 percent below 1990 levels, over the next 10 to 15 years, but the agreement has not been approved by the Senate, and no implementing rules have been written.
"This hadn't really been on people's radar screen until climate change started becoming an issue," said one EPA official involved in reducing pollution from cars, who asked not to be identified by name.
The EPA has not proposed a solution at this point, and is seeking public comment on its study. Auto industry experts say they could solve the problem by tinkering with the catalytic converter, but some environmentalists suggest that the growing production of nitrous oxide is yet another reason to move away from gasoline-powered cars. The EPA's study estimated that nitrous oxide may represent about one-sixth of the global warming effect that results from gasoline use.
"It's like, clean is not green," said Sheila Lynch, executive director of the Northeast Alternative Vehicle Coalition, a public-private partnership that encourages non-traditional power sources.
Another expert, Christopher S. Weaver, an engineering consultant who wrote a study on the subject for the environmental agency, said, "We haven't cared enough to establish standards."
Precisely how much nitrous oxide the converters produce remains an issue. A report used by the EPA in preparing its greenhouse gas study, calculated that a car with a fuel economy of about 19 miles a gallon would produce .27 grams of nitrous oxide per mile. That represents an amount that is about one-third the limit of emissions for nitrogen oxide, the chemicals causing smog.
Steven H. Cadle, a research scientist at General Motors, said, "it's a huge number." In contrast, an older car without a catalytic converter produces much larger amounts of nitrogen oxides, but only about a tenth as much nitrous oxide, the greenhouse gas.
The EPA calculated that production of nitrous oxide from vehicles rose by nearly 50 percent between 1990 and 1996 as older cars without converters have neared extinction. Using a standard unit of measure for global warming gases, millions of metric tons of carbon equivalent, nitrous oxide emissions rose to 54.7 million tons from 36.7 million during those years, the study said.
The contradictory impact of the converter has not been lost on environmental officials or industry experts, who continue to debate not only the extent of the growing problem as well as how to reduce the emissions in future years.
Ned Sullivan, the head of the Maine Department of Environmental Protection, said the converter problem requires a "comprehensive" response. "This specific issue fits into a broader context that our regulatory system has tended to deal with pollutants on an individual, rather than a comprehensive, basis," he said.
He and others favor moving away from today's typical car design, a big gasoline engine driving the wheels, to electric cars. Maine would like electric cars. Another solution is hybrid cars, which use small, efficient engines running on gasoline to help turn the wheels and to charge batteries for electric motors that also run the wheels. Those have much higher fuel economy, and thus lower greenhouse gas emissions.
Car industry experts, however, favor less drastic changes. They propose cutting nitrous oxide production by adjusting catalytic converters in future models. They suspect that the gas is produced when the converter is warming up, and believe the converters could be redesigned to reach optimum temperature faster. That would also help them destroy other pollutants better.
Weaver said that measurements on more kinds of cars and light trucks would be needed to be certain about the size of the problem. But Weaver said, "It is quite clear that you produce nitrous oxide in a catalyst, in some circumstances."
At the Union of Concerned Scientists, an environmental group, an expert on transportation pollution, Roland Hwang, said, "We can't be pushing forward trying to reduce smog while making the global warming problem worse; we can't have programs that undercut each other." He said this was evidence that the transportation system would have to use something besides gasoline.
Cadle, of General Motors would not go that far. But, he said, "You have to be holistic and try and look at everything, which is obviously difficult."