Transcript wedge
Carbon Storage Mitigating Climate Change? Will this work? Is it too late? Carbon Retention Timescale is Long Lag Time Issue Is really quite serious We don’t even know yet of the climate system is responding to increased CO2 Other factors (water vapor feedback loop, aerosol suppression, increased clouds) may be at work If the lag time (some times called the warming pipeline) is large then stabilization targets may be coming too late The Physics of the Problem CO2 long atmospheric lifetime Ocean (water) takes a long time to heat up and cool off ocean SST is primary driver of global climate change. Estimates suggest warming pipeline is 0.5 – 1 degree C (and there is nothing we can do about this) Probability and Concerns A recent, thorough analysis has yielded this thoroughly discouraging result: Complications Aerosols/global dimming may well be masking the warming signal this is an area of much current research Feedback from clouds looks likely to be positive rather than negative in the most recent grid models that actually contain clouds This means the 2 degree C stabilization target has already been exceeded The Stabilization Triangle The 500 PPM Difficulty 7 GTC/year reduction, relative to BAU must be achieved by 2050. Our current annual emission is 7 GTC! Look for somewhat equal contributions in all areas (e.g. storage, production, fuel, etc) Wedge steps to get there by 2054 Each Wedge step requires a large scale, multi-national effort! Wedges correspond to worldwide emissions – each country’s contribution varies; US will have to reduce or sequester about 80% of its current carbon emission to play fair Energy Efficiency and Conversion • Increase fuel economy for 2 billion cars from 30 to 60 mpg • or, decrease annual miles for 2 billion 30 mpg cars from 10,000 to 5000 • Efficient buildings: cut carbon emissions in buildings by 25% • Increase coal fired electricity efficiency from 40% to 60% using advanced high temperature materials New Fuel Sources • Replace 1400 GW of 50% efficient coal fired plants with gas plants • Increase ethanol production by a factor of 100 relative to current US production utilizing 1/6 of world available cropland • Add 4 million 1 MW peak windmills (100 times current world capacity) for Hydrogen production for fuel cells CCS • Capture at baseload power plant (at 800 GW Coal or 1600 GW of Natural Gas) • Capture at steam-reforming Hydrogen production plants at levels of 250 Mt/year for gas and 500 Mt/year H-production by coal • Capture at coal-liquid plants crucial; future facilities could produce 30 million barrels a day Alternative Energy @ 2TW • Substitute wind power for Coal power at the scale of building 400,000 5 MW turbines on land or offshore • Substitute PV power for Coal power at the level of 2000 GW North African Desert • Scale up the Dragons and Snakes on the ocean waves to 2000 GW Wedge Approach – 1GTC reduction per wedge by 2054 One Wedge achieved by US if it reduces its carbon intensity 2.1% per year for next 50 years 2 billion cars have large lever arm on the wedge In 2000, Coal power plants operated at 32% efficiency and produced ¼ of all carbon emissions (1.7 GTC) a wedge is achieved at 60% efficiency Wedge Approach Continued One wedge achieved by displacing 1400 GW of coal with gas by 2054. Requires China/Russia agreement on Natural Gas. 700 GW of Nuclear fission would achieve a wedge requires restoration of public confidence in safety and waste disposal Wedge achieved by implementation of any 2 TW alternative energy scheme for electricity production 34 million gallons of ethanol production achieves a wedge Summary