Transcript Global warming limited by carbon availability

Global Warming is Limited by
Carbon Availability
• presenter: Brian Davies, Physics Dept, WIU
• For a summary of this presentation with pointers to internet
resources, see my webpage:
http://frontpage.wiu.edu/~bmd111/carbon.htm
• The key analytical work presented here is that of Prof. David
Rutledge, Chair of the Division of Engineering and Applied Science
at the California Institute of Technology. See
http://rutledge.caltech.edu/ for a video and slide presentation.
• James Hansen and others are also working on updating their
assumptions about carbon availability.
• Conclusion: many of the scenarios in the IPCC study assume that
carbon emission is much higher than possible from known reserves.
Atmospheric CO2 has been steadily increasing
during the Anthropocene epoch (NOAA data)
From the Carbon Dioxide Information Analysis Center
http://cdiac.ornl.gov/trends/co2/graphics/mlo145e_thrudc04.pdf
The trend continues upward, and can be estimated by calculations, using as
an input an estimate of the emission of carbon dioxide by human activity.
The primary source from human activity is the combustion of fossil fuels
such as coal, petroleum and its derivative products, and natural gas.
Where does this line
trend in the future?
How much carbon
is available to be
burned and how
much will end up
in the atmosphere?
Reference: http://www.esrl.noaa.gov/gmd/ccgg/trends/
A goal of the calculations is to estimate this trend from basic physics.
The American Geophysical Union has released a statement
on “Human Impacts on Climate” which states that
“The Earth's climate is now clearly out of balance and is warming. Many
components of the climate system—including the temperatures of the
atmosphere, land and ocean, the extent of sea ice and mountain glaciers, the
sea level, the distribution of precipitation, and the length of seasons—are now
changing at rates and in patterns that are not natural and are best explained by
the increased atmospheric abundances of greenhouse gases and aerosols
generated by human activity during the 20th century.
...
If this 2°C warming is to be avoided, then our net annual emissions of CO2
must be reduced by more than 50 percent within this century. With such
projections, there are many sources of scientific uncertainty, but none are
known that could make the impact of climate change inconsequential.
…”
For the full statement (and it should be read as an entire statement) see:
http://www.agu.org/sci_soc/policy/positions/climate_change2008.shtml
UN Panel on Climate Change (IPCC)
• The UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change
(IPCC) publishes assessment reports that reflect the
consensus on climate change
• The 4th report has been released (www.ipcc.ch)
– Over one thousand authors
– Over one thousand reviewers
• Updated measurements
– Temperature rising 0.013C per year (1956-2005)
– JPL satellite measurements indicate that sea level
rising 3mm per year (1993-2003)
Cumulative Future Fossil-Fuel Carbon Emissions, Gt.
The IPCC report envisions 40 different
scenarios with varying assumptions.
2,000
1,000
0
2000
2050
2100
Adapted from: http://rutledge.caltech.edu
One of my major points in this talk:
We need to estimate the actual amount
of carbon emissions that could be emitted
by burning known amounts of
hydrocarbons, and not just make
simple assumptions about growth rates.
Annual Crude-Oil Production, billions of barrels.
Historical U.S. petroleum production
1970 Hubbert’s Peak
Alaskan oil
3
2
1
0
1900
•
•
1920
1940
1960
1980
2000
Data from the DOE’s Energy Information Administration (EIA)
From http://rutledge.caltech.edu
Cumulative Production, billions of barrels.
US Crude-Oil Production – cumulative plot
200
29Gb remaining
100
0
1900
•
•
•
1950
2000
2050
2100
EIA data (1859-2006), and graph by Rutledge
Cumulative production assumes an ultimate of 225Gb production
Hubbert’s larger ultimate was 200 billion barrels (the Alaska trend is 19 billion barrels)
Growth-Rate Plot for US Crude Oil
Growth Rate for Cumulative.
10%
Trend line is for normal fit
(225 billion barrels)
5%
0%
0
100
200
Cumulative Production, billions of barrels
•
•
EIA data (cumulative from 1859, open symbols 1900-1930, closed symbols 1931-2006)
This plot shows annual production divided by cumulative production (vertical axis) vs.
cumulative production (horizontal axis) (also known as Hubbert linearization)
Now consider world oil production
• This method (known as Hubbert Linearization in some
discussions) allows for an estimate of ultimate
production (the total amount of the resource that will
eventually be extracted from the ground).
• We will show the global oil production curves, then
• skip the display of world oil production and go on to
• estimate the ultimate quantity of all types of hydrocarbon
that will be extracted (Oil, natural gas, and natural gas
liquids, etc., but not liquids derived from biomass).
Consumption has overtaken discovery, with a 40 year lag in peaks.
From a talk by Albert Bartlett, U. Colorado (retired).
The projections in this graph are outdated, so just look at the historical data.
Growth Rate for Cumulative.
Growth-Rate Plot for World Hydrocarbons
(from Rutledge)
6%
4%
Trend line for
3Tboe remaining
2%
0%
0
1
2
3
Cumulative Production, trillion barrels of oil equivalent
•
•
•
Oil + natural gas + natural gas liquids like propane and butane
Data 1965, 1972, 1981, 2006 BP Statistical Review (open 1960-1982, closed 1983-2005)
The German resources agency BGR gives hydrocarbon reserves as 2.7Tboe
–
–
Expectation of future discoveries and future OPEC oil reserve reductions
Includes 500Gboe for non-conventional sources like Canadian oil sands
Cumulative Production,Tboe.
World Hydrocarbon Production (from Rutledge)
4
3
2
3Tboe remaining
1
0
1960
1980
2000
2020
2040
2060
2080
2100
• Cumulative normal (ultimate production 4.6Tboe)
• IPCC scenarios assume that 11 to 15Tboe is available
Coal production
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
Coal resources – ALL the coal underground (a huge resource)
Coal reserves – Coal that can be economically mined (much less)
New data on coal usually results in downgrading of the proven reserves.
German hard coal reserves were downgraded by 99 percent from 23 billion
tons to 0.183 billion tons in 2004.
German lignite reserves have been downgraded drastically, which is
noteworthy because Germany is the largest lignite producer world-wide.
Poland downgraded its hard coal reserves by 50 percent compared to 1997.
Poland downgraded its lignite and subbituminous coal reserves in two steps
since 1997 to zero.
Some of the IPCC scenarios assumed up to 18 TBoe of coal would be
mined and burned on a global basis, and we will see that estimates of
actually-recoverable coal reserves may be around 1.6 TBoe, much lower
than assumed by the IPCC authors. (Even generous estimates of coal
production yield a figure of 3.5 TBoe.)
British Coal Production (from Rutledge)
Annual Production, Mt .
300
200
100
0
1850
•
•
1900
1950
2000
Data from the US National Bureau of Economic Research (1854-1876),
the Durham Coal Mining Museum (1877-1956), and the British
Department of Trade and Industry (1957-2006)
In the peak production year, 1913, there were 3,024 mines
Cumulative Production, Gt.
Cumulative British Coal Production (from Rutledge)
Pre-war fit
20
Post-war fit
10
0
1850
•
•
1900
1950
2000
Pre-war lms fit (1854-1945, ultimate 25.6Gt, mean 1920, sd 41 years)
Post-war lms fit (1946-2006, ultimate 27.2Gt, mean 1927, sd 39 years)
Growth Rate for Cumulative .
Growth-Rate Plot for British Coal (from Rutledge)
4%
2%
0%
0
5
10
15
20
25
Cumulative Production, Gt
•
•
1854-2006, 1853 cumulative from William Jevons, The Coal Question
Already near the trend line in 1854
Reserves vs Trends for Remaining Production
Region
Reserves Gt
Trends Gt
North America
255
135
East Asia
190
70
Australia and New Zealand
79
50
Europe
55
23
Africa
30
10
223
18
Former Soviet Union
•
South Asia
111
Central and South America
20
World (at 3.6boe/t)
963 (3.5Tboe) 437 (1.6Tboe)
North America includes trends for the East (40Gt), the West (25Gt), reserves for
Montana (68Gt), and trends for Canada and Mexico (2Gt)
• IPCC scenarios assume 18Tboe is available for production
Cumulative Production, Tboe.
Future Fossil-Fuels Production (from Rutledge)
4
3
2
1
0
1960
•
•
•
•
3.0Tboe
hydrocarbons
remaining
1.6Tboe coal
remaining
1980
2000
2020
2040
2060
2080
2100
Hydrocarbons cumulative normal (ultimate 4.6Tboe, lms fit for mean 2018, sd 35 years)
2005 coal cumulative from the 2005 BGR Energy Resources Report (USGS for US)
Coal cumulative normal (ultimate 2.6Tboe, lms fit for mean 2024, sd 48 years)
The standard deviations of 35 and 48 years can be compared to time constants for
temperature and sea level
Fossil-Fuel Carbon Emissions (from Rutledge)
Cumulative Carbon Emissions, Gt.
800
600
•
Super-Kyoto
Profile
400
520Gt
remaining
200
0
1960
•
•
Producer-Limited
Profile
1980
2000
2020
2040
2060
2080
2100
Total fossil-fuel carbon is an input for climate-change models
Carbon coefficients from the EIA: oil (110kg/boe), gas (79kg/boe), coal (141kg/boe),
and future hydrocarbons weighted by BGR reserves (98kg/boe)
The Super-Kyoto Profile is a 50% stretch-out in time with the same ultimate production
Cumulative Future Fossil-Fuel Carbon Emissions, Gt.
From the work by Rutledge, the main point of this
talk comes in comparing with the IPCC Scenarios:
•
•
2,000
1,000
Producer-Limited Profile
0
2000
2050
2100
The Producer-Limited profile has lower emissions than any of the 40 IPCC
scenarios, which puts limits on the eventual temperature rise!
Jean Laherrere was the first to point out this anomalous situation
Conclusion: The Producer-Limited profile has lower
emissions than any of the 40 IPCC scenarios.
This means that these scenarios are probably unrealistic.
Carbon availability limits the eventual temperature rise;
it may be significantly lower than the IPCC estimates.
• Rutledge web site with video and accompanying Powerpoint slides:
http://rutledge.caltech.edu/
• Dr. Rutledge has also summarized this in a web discussion forum:
http://www.theoildrum.com/node/2697
• CalTech has several related video presentations (by Hansen, etc):
http://today.caltech.edu/theater/list?subset=science
• Ken Deffeyes, Hubbert’s Peak, in the Malpass library
• William Catton, Overshoot, in the Malpass library
• http://www.architecture2030.org/home.html
Concluding Thoughts from Dr. Rutledge
•
Results
– Estimate for future hydrocarbon production (3Tboe) is consistent with
reserves
– Estimate for future coal production (1.6Tboe) is about half of reserves
– The time constants for fossil-fuel exhaustion are of the order of 50 years
– The time constants for temperature and sea-level change are of the order
of 1,000 years
•
Implications
– Since estimate for future fossil-fuel production is less than all 40 UN IPCC
scenarios, producer limitations could provide useful constraints in climate
modeling
– A transition to renewable sources of energy is likely
– To lessen the effects of climate change associated with future fossil-fuel
use, reducing ultimate production is more important than slowing it down
•
Opportunities
– One-third of US fossil-fuel reserves are on federal lands, so ultimate
production could be reduced substantially by limits on new leases for
mining and drilling
– The US has an outstanding resource in its direct sunlight
from COAL: RESOURCES AND FUTURE PRODUCTION
Background paper prepared by the Energy Watch Group
March 2007 EWG-Series No 1/2007
updated version: 10th July 2007
US coal-producing regions
From a National Academy of Sciences report, June 2007
from COAL: RESOURCES AND FUTURE PRODUCTION
Background paper prepared by the Energy Watch Group
March 2007 EWG-Series No 1/2007
updated version: 10th July 2007
from COAL: RESOURCES AND FUTURE PRODUCTION
Background paper prepared by the Energy Watch Group
March 2007 EWG-Series No 1/2007
updated version: 10th July 2007
from COAL: RESOURCES AND FUTURE PRODUCTION
Background paper prepared by the Energy Watch Group
March 2007 EWG-Series No 1/2007
updated version: 10th July 2007
from COAL: RESOURCES AND FUTURE PRODUCTION
Background paper prepared by the Energy Watch Group
March 2007 EWG-Series No 1/2007
updated version: 10th July 2007
from COAL: RESOURCES AND FUTURE PRODUCTION
Background paper prepared by the Energy Watch Group
March 2007 EWG-Series No 1/2007
updated version: 10th July 2007
CO2 levels on geologic time scales were
much higher than in the paleolithic period (or now)
(present level is about 350 ppm = 0.03%)
R. Dudley,
J. Exper. Biol.,201,
1043, 1998.