Transcript Slide 1

Geoengineering and the Four
Climate Change Truths:
Perspectives of a LawyerScientist
A Presentation at the
Research Triangle Institute, International
November 18, 2008
Center for Environmental Stewardship
Thomas Jefferson Institute for Public Policy
Views of a Lawyer-Scientist
• Politics drive climate science
• Cost-efficient engineering will
drive political solutions
• None of this is good for
traditional environmentalism
Center for Environmental Stewardship
Thomas Jefferson Institute for Public Policy
Environmentalism Through a
Political Lens
• Pre-1960 environmentalism reflected
stewardship and could be described as
encompassing American Exceptionalism
• Post-1970 environmentalism split into two
groups, traditional greens and watermelon
greens.
Center for Environmental Stewardship
Thomas Jefferson Institute for Public Policy
American Environmental
Exceptionalism
• Traces to de Tocqueville and his
seminal work Democracy in America
(1835), consisting of three elements:
1. dynamism
2. religiosity
3. patriotism
Center for Environmental Stewardship
Thomas Jefferson Institute for Public Policy
American Environmental
Exceptionalism
Dynamism
• a wide-open scientific entrepreneurialism
• a very visible and loud debate regarding the
quality of temperature data and modeling
• consensus on the science would rise from
academic campuses as piecemeal science and
not from a political international body
Center for Environmental Stewardship
Thomas Jefferson Institute for Public Policy
American Environmental
Exceptionalism
Religiosity
• reflects traditional scientific mores
• competition in ideas would produce vigorous
challenges of any postulate or prediction
• scientists that study how to predict future events
would evaluate the basis of climate alarmism and
identify strengths and weaknesses
• valid criticisms, new information about actual
climate conditions and new theories on the
determinants of global climate would cause climate
projections to evolve
Center for Environmental Stewardship
Thomas Jefferson Institute for Public Policy
American Environmental
Exceptionalism
Environmental Patriotism
• stewardship would produce private cautionary
action
• businesses would revise long-range strategies
• private institutions and governments would
increase scientific investigation
• government intervention would be limited by
constitutional powers
• governmental actions would not cause the
export of economic opportunity
Center for Environmental Stewardship
Thomas Jefferson Institute for Public Policy
Greens, Watermelon Greens and
Gramscianism
• Antonio Gramsci (1891-1937),
a Marxist intellectual and politician
devised a seven step strategy for
culture war.
• Traditional greens adopt the mores and values
of Tocquevillian free-market environmentalism
• Watermelon greens are green outside and
“red” inside and adopt neo-Marxist Gramscian
revolutionary tactics
Center for Environmental Stewardship
Thomas Jefferson Institute for Public Policy
Marxism?
Culture war?
Revolution?
Whoa!
Center for Environmental Stewardship
Thomas Jefferson Institute for Public Policy
Gramscian Purposes
• Reverse the correlation of power
from the privileged to the
"marginalized“
• The “environmentally
marginalized” are not humans!
• There can be no revolution without
a proletariat.
Center for Environmental Stewardship
Thomas Jefferson Institute for Public Policy
Gramscian Methodology
(1) Delegitimize the dominant belief
systems, specifically human
dominion (hegemony) over
nature.
Center for Environmental Stewardship
Thomas Jefferson Institute for Public Policy
Gramscian Methodology
(2) Supply an alternative set of
hegemony values that the
environmental elite title
“sustainability” and is which
requires a reduction in human
population and consumption.
Center for Environmental Stewardship
Thomas Jefferson Institute for Public Policy
Gramscian Methodology
(3) Permeate all spheres of civil
society with the replacement
values, for example through
movies such as “An Inconvenient
Truth”, in school curricula, by
calendars, notebooks, tee-shirts,
and every sort of promotional
opportunity.
Center for Environmental Stewardship
Thomas Jefferson Institute for Public Policy
Gramscian Methodology
(4) Create a revolutionary
“consciousness” through
transformation of consciousness, typically seen as by some
as “education” and by others as
“indoctrination” and done while
permeating all spheres of civil
society, starting with children in
grammar schools
Center for Environmental Stewardship
Thomas Jefferson Institute for Public Policy
Gramscian Methodology
(5) Create an “organic” intellectual
elite who specializes in the
environmental revolution and are
supported by dedicated
organizations such as the Sierra
Club, The Pew Environmental
Group, and the Natural
Resources Defense Council
Center for Environmental Stewardship
Thomas Jefferson Institute for Public Policy
Gramscian Methodology
(6) Subscript “traditional”
intellectuals who “change sides”
and are well positioned within
established institutions, such as
corporate CEOs, legislators and
university professors
Center for Environmental Stewardship
Thomas Jefferson Institute for Public Policy
Gramscian Methodology
Step (6) Exemplar:
“The latest scientific data confirm that the earth’s climate is
rapidly changing. … The cause? A thickening layer of
carbon dioxide pollution, mostly from power plants and
automobiles, that traps heat in the atmosphere. …
[A]verage U.S. temperatures could rise another 3 to 9
degrees by the end of the century … Sea levels will rise,
[and h]eat waves will be more frequent and more intense.
Droughts and wildfires will occur more often. Diseasecarrying mosquitoes will expand their range. And species
will be pushed to extinction.”
“So says the National Resources Defense Council, with
agreement by the Sierra Club, Greenpeace, National Geographic,
the US National Academy of Sciences, and the US Congressional
House leadership. Concurrent views are widespread, as a visit to
the internet or any good bookstore will verify.”
Center for Environmental Stewardship
Thomas Jefferson Institute for Public Policy
Gramscian Methodology
(7) Reject the concept of moral absolutism and
replace it with situational ethics that
presumes morality is nothing more than a
social construction.
Thus, an act is moral if it serves the interests
of the “oppressed” or “marginalized”, which
in environmental terms means anything not
anthropogenic.
This final step demonizes human interests
and actions, and places them subservient to
“environmental” interests.
Center for Environmental Stewardship
Thomas Jefferson Institute for Public Policy
Gramscian Climate Science
Question Posed on the Google
Geoengineering Group:
“Are we certain we have sufficient quality and
quantity of data samples to identify accurate
assessment of climate change risks and
mitigations?”
Response of a “Watermelon Green”
Professor of climate science:
“Read the IPCC Working Group I report. All your
questions and concerns will be answered there.”
Center for Environmental Stewardship
Thomas Jefferson Institute for Public Policy
Gramscian Climate Science
Response of a “Traditional Green”
Member of the National Academy of Engineers:
Ask [the Watermelon green] what is the meaning
of consensus and does it have any relevance to
science, which is not decided or ordained by
consensus which explains nothing. Only when it
meets strict requirements does hypothesis
become theory. Blessing does not convert crap
into science although it may convert non
believers into believers; heaven help them. The
IPCC report is not the third testament.”
Center for Environmental Stewardship
Thomas Jefferson Institute for Public Policy
Gramscian Climate Science
Response of Dick Lindzen, Alfred P. Sloan Professor
of Meteorology at the MIT:
"Picking holes in the IPCC is crucial. The notion that
if you’re ignorant of something and some-body
comes up with a wrong answer, and you have to
accept that because you don’t have another wrong
answer to offer is like faith healing, it’s like
quackery in medicine – if somebody says you
should take jelly beans for cancer and you say
that’s stupid, and he says, well can you suggest
something else and you say, no, does that mean
you have to go with jelly beans?"
Center for Environmental Stewardship
Thomas Jefferson Institute for Public Policy
Gramscian Climate Science
The IPCC projections rely on models that do not comport
with actual climate phenomena.
Center for Environmental Stewardship
Thomas Jefferson Institute for Public Policy
Non-Gramscian Climate Science
The IPCC models show effects that have not occurred as projected.
Center for Environmental Stewardship
Thomas Jefferson Institute for Public Policy
Non-Gramscian Climate Science
Global Temperature Anomoly
1978-2008
1.5
Temperature Deg. C
1
IPCC Temperature Prediction
0.5
0
-0.5
Current 8 year Trend
Actual 30 year Trend
-1
Dec-06
Dec-04
Dec-02
Dec-00
Dec-98
Dec-96
Dec-94
Dec-92
Dec-90
Dec-88
Dec-86
Dec-84
Dec-82
Dec-80
-1.5
Dec-78
With 95% Confidence Interval
Traditional scientific hypothesis testing “falsifies” IPCC projections
Center for Environmental Stewardship
Thomas Jefferson Institute for Public Policy
Non-Gramscian Climate Science
IPCC models do not conform to traditional scientific
requirements for credibility.
Center for Environmental Stewardship
Thomas Jefferson Institute for Public Policy
Non-Gramscian Climate Science
Projection based
on multivariate
correlation of
known solar and
temperature
cycles.
The IPCC disregards non-CGM alternative predictive models.
Center for Environmental Stewardship
Thomas Jefferson Institute for Public Policy
Gramscian Climate Science
Despite the ongoing scientific debate on the nature
of global warming, the Gramscian environmental
power elite has won the science battle:
Ellen Goodman, Boston Globe:
By every measure, the U N 's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate
Change raises the level of alarm. The fact of global warming is
"unequivocal." The certainty of the human role is now somewhere
over 90 percent. Which is about as certain as scientists ever get.
I would like to say we're at a point where global warming is
impossible to deny. Let's just say that global warming
deniers are now on a par with Holocaust deniers,
though one denies the past and the other denies the present and
future.
Center for Environmental Stewardship
Thomas Jefferson Institute for Public Policy
Conclusions of the
Environmental Elite
• It is too late to wait.
• We will face a catastrophe unless
we reduce our carbon emissions
immediately.
Center for Environmental Stewardship
Thomas Jefferson Institute for Public Policy
2001 IPCC Goal 400 ppm
Includes a safety factor
2004 IPCC Goal 450 ppm
No safety factor
2008 IPCC Goal 550 ppm
The probability that this would prevent
catastrophic climate change is only 2.5%
Center for Environmental3 Stewardship
Source:
IPCC
SPM
Thomas
Jefferson
Institute
for Public Policy
Thomas Jefferson
Institute for Public Policy
Solutions
Gramscian Answer:
• Reduce carbon emissions without using
nuclear power and regardless of the cost.
• This “sustainability” agenda sought to
reduce population and consumption.
• “Carbon reduction only” is the
replacement for the failed “sustainability”
revolution.
Center for Environmental Stewardship
Thomas Jefferson Institute for Public Policy
The Gramscian Non-Solution
• It is too late to rely on a "carbon emissions
reduction only" strategy. This is the first
climate change truth.
• China and India won’t play.
• The economic dislocation is greater than the
“traditional greens” will accept, just as they
rejected the implications of the sustainability
agenda.
• The political ramifications have already altered
legislative proposals, allowing a safety valve
on the “cap”.
Center for Environmental Stewardship
Thomas Jefferson Institute for Public Policy
The Gramscian Non-Solution
• For stabilization at 450ppm we require an
almost immediate reduction of emissions
below the ‘no-climate-policy’ baseline, while at
the same time maintaining a global economic
growth rate of around 2% per year.
• Reductions required relative to today:
2030, –11%; 2050, –37%; 2070, –54%.
• Reductions required relative to baseline:
2030, –42%; 2050, –68%; 2070, –79%.
• Reductions made this rapidly would require all
new power plants to have zero net CO2
emissions
Center for Environmental Stewardship
Thomas Jefferson Institute for Public Policy
The Gramscian Non-Solution
Carmen Difiglio: IEA’s 450 Scenario … requires a
complete transformation of investment in the
electric power sector by 2012. …To quote the
World Energy Outlook 2007, p. 191: “exceptionally
strong and immediate policy action would be
essential for [the 450 Scenario] to happen and the
associated costs would be very high.”
Jeffrey Sachs: “… current technologies cannot
support both a decline in carbon dioxide
emissions and an expanding global economy.”
(Scientific American, April, 2008)
Center for Environmental Stewardship
Thomas Jefferson Institute for Public Policy
Solutions
Tocquevillian Answer:
• Reduce carbon emissions where it is costeffective, including nuclear power;
• Cool the planet with geoengineering so as to
stretch out the time available to transition to
non-carbon energy;
• Encourage entrepreneurialism that would costeffectively extract carbon from the air;
• Promote cost-effective adaptation;
• Expand scientific inquiry to reduce uncertainty.
Center for Environmental Stewardship
Thomas Jefferson Institute for Public Policy
The Second Battle of the
Climate Change Culture War
American Exceptionalism will defeat
environmental socialism on how to respond to
climate change because:
• The greens, and the rest of the society, reject
the moral absolutism of a “carbon emission
reduction only” strategy in light of its
inefficacy, costs and required changes in
lifestyle.
• This is the second truth on climate change.
Center for Environmental Stewardship
Thomas Jefferson Institute for Public Policy
Geoengineering
Geo-engineering is the deliberate modification
of Earth's environment on a large scale "to suit
human needs and promote habitability".
Geoengineering is at present the only
economically competitive technology to
offset global warming. The geo-engineering
option may be considered costless.6
William Nordhaus, Yale
Center for Environmental Stewardship
Thomas Jefferson Institute for Public Policy
Geoengineering
Responses to climate change
Mitigation:
• A defined term
• Means emissions reductions
• Does not mean consumption reduction
Adaptation:
• Build a dyke and wear sunscreen
Geoengineering:
• Deflect sunlight
(SRS - Solar radiation management)
• Sequester environmental carbon
Center for Environmental Stewardship
Thomas Jefferson Institute for Public Policy
Solar Radiation Management
The Magnitude of the Problem:
• Average solar radiation absorbed by the Earth is 236 W / m2
• Doubling of atmospheric CO2 concentration (from the preindustrial value of 280 ppm to 560 ppm, or today’s value of
380 ppm to 760 ppm) prevents about 3.7 W m2 of energy
from leaving the Earth
• This is approximately 100 times greater than the total primary
power used by human civilization on Earth (not including
solar inputs to agricultural production)
• 1.6 % of absorbed solar radiation would need to be
deflected to compensate for a doubling of atmospheric
CO2.
Center for Environmental Stewardship
Thomas Jefferson Institute for Public Policy
Solar Radiation Management
Ways to Deflect Solar Radiation:
• Cost-efficient Proposals
• Stratospheric Aerosols
• Cloud Whitening
• Cost-inefficient Proposals
• Space Mirrors
• Whiten the earth
Center for Environmental Stewardship
Thomas Jefferson Institute for Public Policy
Cloud Whitening
Center for Environmental Stewardship
Thomas Jefferson Institute for Public Policy
Cloud Whitening
The vessel produces 30
kg/sec of 0.8 micron drops of
sea water. Salt residues from
evaporated drops are ideal
cloud condensation nuclei.
The Twomey equation predicts
that, in the right conditions of
cloud, sunshine and clean
mid-ocean air, the extra solar
energy reflected from cloud
tops will be about 10 million
times more than the wind
energy needed for spray
generation.
Center for Environmental Stewardship
Thomas Jefferson Institute for Public Policy
Cloud Whitening
• To achieve a 4 W m2 offset it would be
necessary to seed at least a third of the suitable
marine cloud coverage.
• it could hold the Earth’s temperature constant
for a significant number of decades.
• It would likely be only one of a suite of
geoengineering techniques uses.
• Could use dedicated ships, but could also use
existing platforms.
Center for Environmental Stewardship
Thomas Jefferson Institute for Public Policy
Stratospheric Aerosols
Stratospheric Aerosol Geoengineering Mimics
Volcano Eruptions
Center for Environmental Stewardship
Thomas Jefferson Institute for Public Policy
Geoengineering
Temperature change
2 x CO2
2 x CO2
and
1.8% reduction in
solar intensity
Caldeira et al., 2008
-6
-4
-2
0
2
4
6
ºC
Area where change is
significant at 0.05 level
based on 30-yr
climatology
2 x CO2
2 x CO2
and
1.8% reduction in
solar intensity
(Significant over 12 % of Earth’s
area)
Area with significant temperature change
Caldeira et al., 2008
Area where change is
significant at 0.05 level
based on 30-yr
climatology
2 x CO2
Significant over 47%
of Earth’s area
2 x CO2
and
1.8% reduction in
solar intensity
Significant over 4 %
of Earth’s area
Area with significant precipitation change
Caldeira et al. 2008
Geoengineering
and plant growth
In the model, plants grow
much better in the
geoengineered world than
in the natural world.
Geoengineering results in
CO2 fertilization without the
increased heating that
leads to increased plant
respiration
Govindasamy et al., 2002
Two arctic geoengineering scenarios
remove ~0.37% of total solar insolation
Center for Environmental Stewardship
Thomas Jefferson Institute for Public Policy
Caldeira, 2007
Annual mean temperature response
2xCO2 - 560 ppm CO2, normal solar radiation
-6
-4
-2
0
2
4
Temperature change (ºC)
6
ºC
Caldeira et al., 2008
Annual mean temperature response
Geo71.25 560 ppm CO2, 25% solar reduction north of 71ºN
-6
-4
-2
0
2
4
6
ºC
Temperature change (ºC)
Caldeira et al., 2008.
Annual mean temperature response
Geo61.10
560 ppm CO2, 10% solar reduction north of 61ºN
-6
-4
-2
0
2
Temperature change (ºC)
4
6
ºC
Caldeira et al. 2008
Modeled September sea-ice
Caldeira et al.,2008.
Engineering options for placing aerosols
in stratosphere
• “Smokestack to the stratosphere”
– Skinny pipe/hose, ground to ~25 km-high HAA (DoD)
• Artillery (shooting barrels of particles into stratosphere)
– “…surprisingly practical” – NAS Study, 1992
• High-altitude transport aircraft
– “Condor/Global Hawk, with a cargo bay”
– Half-dozen B-747s deploy 106 tonnes/year of engineered aerosol;
towed lifting-lines/bodies for height-boosting the sprayer-dispenser an
additional 5-10 km above normal cruising ceilings
• Other options
– Anthropogenic (mini-)volcanoes
– Tethered (set-of-)lifting-body – a high-tech kites
Courtesy Lowell Wood
Sequester Environmental Carbon
Natural Peridotite Hydration and
Carbonation
• 1.5 km3 injection formation =
CO2 emissions from U.S. coalfired power plants
• $20 per ton CO2 for in situ
sequestration
Center for Environmental Stewardship
Thomas Jefferson Institute for Public Policy
Kelemen and Matter 2008
http://www.steel-trp.org/Briefing07slides/08-TRP9957_COLUMBIA-07IBS.pdf
Sequester Environmental Carbon
Matter has been working on a
separate project in Iceland, where
volcanic basalt, shows promise for
absorbing CO2 produced by power
plants. Trials there are set to begin
in spring 2009, in partnership with
Reykjavik Energy, and the
universities of Iceland and Toulouse
(France).
Center for Environmental Stewardship
Thomas Jefferson Institute for Public Policy
Sequester Environmental Carbon
Ocean Iron Fertilization - OIF
• Plankton that generate calcium or
silica carbonate skeletons, such as
diatoms, coccolithophores and
foraminifera, account for most direct
carbon sequestration.
• When these organisms die 20-30%
of their carbonate skeletons sink.
• Remain in deep ocean for 4000 yrs.
Center for Environmental Stewardship
Thomas Jefferson Institute for Public Policy
Sequester Environmental Carbon
Ocean Iron Fertilization - OIF
• NASA scientists have reported a minimum 6~9% decline in
global plankton production since 1980 and others report
10~12% losses.
• A full-scale international plankton restoration program could
regenerate approximately 3~5 billion tons of carbon
sequestration capacity worth €75 billion or more in carbon
offset value.
• $6.35 per ton CO2
• The London Convention / London Protocol: You may fertilize
if the intent is to grow fish but not if the intent is to dispose of
carbon in the ocean. Hence, focus on “restoration”.
Center for Environmental Stewardship
Thomas Jefferson Institute for Public Policy
Geoengineering
• Geoengineering research, and especially
carbon sequestration research, has only
just begun.
• Watermelon greens reject
geoengineering because it does not
result in reduction of human appetites
for natural resources.
Center for Environmental Stewardship
Thomas Jefferson Institute for Public Policy
The Third Truth - we are going to see a
federally mandated climate response.
The Fourth Truth - We are going to see
important environmental actions
sacrificed on the alter of global warming
response.
Center for Environmental Stewardship
Thomas Jefferson Institute for Public Policy
Mission Statements:
The mission of the Thomas Jefferson Institute for
Public Policy is to provide Virginia’s political, business,
academic, community and media leadership with
thoughtful, realistic, useful and non-partisan analysis
of public policy issues confronting our Commonwealth.
The mission of the Center for Environmental
Stewardship is to promote environmentalism
within the context of meeting all human needs.
David W. Schnare, Esq. PhD
Director
Center for Environmental Stewardship
[email protected]
http://www.thomasjeffersoninst.org/main/centers.php?subcategory_id=8
Thomas Jefferson Institute for Public Policy
http://www.thomasjeffersoninst.org/main/main.php
Center for Environmental Stewardship
Thomas Jefferson Institute for Public Policy