Month: January 2019

Policy and Politics

California’s fuel standard, designed to reduce emissions of CO₂ from transportation fuels sold in the state, is a valid measure, the Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco ruled last Friday.  As a result of last week’s letter by the economists about a carbon tax, columnist Robert J. Samuelson said he is “(slightly) less pessimistic about global warming.”  Two University of Pennsylvania academics argued in The Washington Post that the U.S. already has a carbon tax: “one that is hidden, unfair and ever-increasing.  Call it the do-nothing climate tax.”  In the first of a two part series at Environmental Health News, journalist Lewis Raven Wallace wrote: “Public housing residents, along with other poor, disabled, elderly, and vulnerable people, are becoming a first wave of climate migrants in the U.S.—people selectively displaced … because they can’t afford to stay.”  Part 2 is entitled “Lingering long after a storm, mold and mental health issues.”  Writing in The Guardian, Gabrielle Canon said “A study released this year by the National Institute of Building Sciences found that every $1 spent on hazard mitigation saved the nation $6 in future disaster costs.”

In a recent paper in Nature Climate Change, a team of academic researchers laid out the pervasive nature of misinformation campaigns on climate change instigated by the “climate countermovement” and proposed three approaches for dealing with it.  On Monday Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) said “Millennials and Gen Z and all these folks that come after us are looking up, and we’re like, ‘The world is going to end in 12 years if we don’t address climate change, and your biggest issue is how are we gonna pay for it?’.”  The press focused on the “12 years”, which caused Andrew Freedman at Axios to seek clarification from some prominent climate scientists.

At Axios, Amy Harder provided a primer on climate change policy.  On Thursday, Rep. Ted Deutch (D-FL) unveiled the ‘‘Energy Innovation and Carbon Dividend Act of 2019’’ with a few other Democrats and one Republican.  The bill would impose an initial $15-per-ton CO2-e “fee” on fossil fuel producers, processors, and importers that rises $10 annually.  All the revenues are returned to the public via a “dividend.”  On a split vote, a Virginia legislative committee approved a bill to halt construction of power plants that use fossil fuels and pipelines that carry such fuels after 2020 and to develop a plan for the state to rely totally on renewable energy for generating electricity by 2036.  Two polls out this week updated our understanding of the American public’s views on climate change.  Unfortunately, a significant majority of Americans are unwilling to contribute $10 each month to address it.

In another article in its series about agriculture and climate, Inside Climate News argued that industrial farming encourages practices that degrade the soil and increase emissions, while leaving farmers more vulnerable to damage as the planet warms.  On Wednesday, Vineyard Wind and a group of conservation organizations entered into an unprecedented agreement to protect critically endangered North Atlantic right whales.  The agreement offers a template for future development of offshore wind.

Potpourri

Guardian reporter Megan Mayhew Bergman, a southerner, continued her travels through the South assessing people’s responses to climate change.  She “found that many members of coastal communities have built up psychological resilience after living through years of extreme weather.”  At Yale Climate Connections, Amy Brady interviewed novelist Cai Emmons about his book Weather Woman.  Brady also interviewed interdisciplinary artist Catherine Sarah Young for her Burning Worlds newsletter.  In The Guardian, celebrated author Annie Proulx looked at her favorite books to help us cope with how our world is changing, writing “We need clear explanations of climate change, what it means and how to cope with it.”

Climate

On Thursday, Berkeley Earth became the second group to determine that 2018 was the fourth hottest year on record, following the Copernicus Climate Change Service earlier in the month.  Ordinarily, NASA and NOAA would have released their rankings by this time, but the government shutdown has delayed them.  Nevertheless, both are expected to also rank 2018 as fourth hottest.  Perhaps as a result of the past four years, more Americans now think that climate change is happening and is human-caused.

New research published by the International Committee of the Red Cross has established a relationship between a changing climate and conflict, leading to increased migration.  Furthermore, a new study published in the journal Global Environmental Change discovered that deteriorating climate conditions played “a statistically significant role” in the recent waves of migrants fleeing Middle East conflict.  The insurance giant Aon reported on Tuesday that the global cost of extreme weather in 2018 hit $215 billion.

Dr. Sigrid Lind, from the Institute of Marine Research and Bjerknes Centre for Climate Research in Norway, told a conference in Norway that the Barents Sea is changing from an Arctic climate to an Atlantic climate as the water gets warmer.  Also in the Arctic, Greenland’s enormous ice sheet is melting at an accelerated rate and could become a major factor in sea-level rise around the world within two decades.  Climate change is intensifying a new military buildup in the Arctic, as regional powers attempt to secure northern borders that until recently were reinforced by a continental-sized division of ice.

A new study, published Monday in the journal Nature Climate Change combined groundwater model results with global datasets of the planet’s ground and surface water to examine how long it takes groundwater sources around the world to respond to stresses caused by climate change, such as changes in rainfall patterns.  Another paper in Nature Climate Change, reported that over the last 40 years the number of krill in the Southern Ocean has decreased and their location has moved southward.  At the other pole, killer whales are extending their range into the Chukchi Sea as a result of warming water and less sea ice.

A consultant’s study warned that climate change’s future impacts on Virginia Beach could cost from $1.7 billion to $3.8 billion for new citywide infrastructure.  Failure to prepare, on the other hand, could cost more than a quarter of a billion dollars — a year.  Further south, Miami-Dade County is facing even larger problems, particularly to its water supply.  At Bloomberg Businessweek Christopher Flavelle examined the threats and the potential costs to adapt to them.  On the other side of the world, Bangladesh, already grappling with the Rohingya crisis, now faces a devastating migration problem as hundreds of thousands face an impossible choice between coastlines battered by sea level rise and urban slums.

Energy

A new report from Deloitte — entitled “New market. New entrants. New challenges.” — suggests that the market for pure electric (EV) and plug-in hybrid vehicles is fast approaching a “tipping point” that should drive soaring sales over the next decade.  Furthermore, it predicts that globally the cost of ownership for EVs will match gasoline and diesel models by 2024.  Nevertheless, speaking at the World Economic Forum in Davos on Tuesday, Fatih Birol, head of the International Energy Agency reminded the attendees that the growth in EV sales will have little impact on oil demand for the foreseeable future because it is being driven by trucks, the petrochemical industry, and planes.  BP said on Thursday it had invested in Chinese start-up PowerShare, which links electric vehicle drivers to charging points and helps power suppliers balance distribution.  Utility and auto executives, state and local government officials, and environmentalists gathered in Chicago Wednesday for a summit aimed at overcoming barriers to EV adoption in the Midwest.  Colorado Gov. Jared Polis on Thursday signed a sweeping executive order aimed at increasing the number of zero-emission vehicles in Colorado, a move that’s expected to mean more EVs will be available for purchase in the state and sets Colorado on a path to be aligned with California’s standards.  Cities that have purchased electric buses are reporting difficulty with the buses’ battery life when the weather is too hot or too cold, as well as difficulties on routes with hills.

The latest S&P Global Market Intelligence data show that 49 GW of new power generation capacity will be added in the U.S. in 2019, with 45% from wind and 22% from solar.  We will also see the retirement of nearly 6 GW of coal.  New information from Texas grid operator ERCOT showed that carbon-free resources made up more than 30% of its 2018 energy consumption.  The largest share of credit goes to the state’s massive wind farms, which provided 18.6% of 2018 energy.  A new report by the World Resources Institute has found that while progress has been made toward the goals of the Paris Climate Agreement, progress has been insufficient to allow global greenhouse gas emissions peak in 2020.  At Forbes, Jude Clemente argued that China’s coal reliance is not falling nearly as fast as some like to claim.

At the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, Eric Luo, president of China’s GCL System Integration Technology Co, a maker of solar panels, said the global solar power industry is about to lose a major competitive windfall as prices of Chinese-made solar panels begin to recover after a collapse last year.  Solar panel prices are already stabilizing and he expects them to rebound by 10 to 15% as the industry consolidates.  Agrivoltaics employs photovoltaic arrays that are raised far enough off the ground and spaced in such a way that some crops can still grow around and beneath the panels, or cattle can graze.

Projections from the Energy Information Administration suggest that by 2050, U.S. CO₂ emissions from energy use will decline only about 2.5% as oil and gas production expand.

Legal delays on key environmental permits for the $7 billion Atlantic Coast Pipeline (ACP) are starting to impact the pipeline’s owners – and raise concerns among investors.  A U.S. appeals court will let the Trump administration pull back a contested permit authorizing the ACP to cross under the Blue Ridge Parkway, allowing the National Park Service to reconsider the authorization and consult with other agencies.

These news items have been compiled by Les Grady, member and former chair of the CAAV steering committee. He is a licensed professional engineer (retired) who taught environmental engineering at Purdue and Clemson Universities and engaged in private practice with CH2M Hill, the world’s largest environmental engineering consulting firm. Since his retirement in 2003 he has devoted much of his time to the study of climate science and the question of global warming and makes himself available to speak to groups about this subject. More here.

Policy and Politics

Growing tension between the world’s major powers is the most urgent global risk and makes it harder to mobilize collective action to tackle climate change, according to a report prepared for next week’s World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland.  “Imposing a cost on carbon is the most economically efficient way to reduce greenhouse-gas emissions,” yet public support is an “obstacle” to this, argue three experts on climate policy and climate economics, in the journal Nature. However, “opposition can dissipate once the benefits become clear”, they say.  In letter published Wednesday evening in the Wall Street Journal (subscription required), forty-five top economists from across the political spectrum, including 27 Nobel laureates in economics, all four living former chairs of the Federal Reserve, 15 former chairs of the Council of Economic Advisors, and two former Treasury Secretaries, called for the U.S. to put a tax on carbon, saying it is by far the best way for the nation to address climate change.  Last week, 626 environmental groups sent a letter to every member of Congress calling on them to support the Green New Deal.  However, six of the largest, most influential environmental advocacy groups didn’t sign it.  In its present form, the Green New Deal is very proscriptive regarding clean energy, prompting David Roberts to opine that that is one fight that should be avoided right now.  Daisy Simmons listed six things everyone should know about it at Yale Climate Connection.

Andrew Wheeler, President Trump’s nominee to lead the EPA, stated during his confirmation hearing on Wednesday that he would continue the administration’s aggressive reversal of environmental rules.  The Trump administration’s replacement for the Clean Power Plan would increase greenhouse gas emissions in much of the U.S. more than doing nothing at all, according to new research.  Across the country, cities are implementing new housing and transit laws that have a secondary effect of lowering their emissions of greenhouse gases.  In The New York Times, senior economics correspondent Neil Irwin wrote about the four key issues determining climate change’s impact on the economy.  A new Pentagon report identifies significant risks from climate change at scores of military bases and says the Defense Department is taking protective measures against the threat.  But members of Congress, who requested the report, said it lacks the detail they were looking for.

While the Trump administration envisions energy and mineral exploration as part of the future of the land removed from Grand Staircase-Escalante and Bears Ears National Monuments, because of poor economics it is uncertain whether anyone will lease the land.  In a controversial move, President Trump issued an executive order on the Friday before Christmas that expands logging on public land in the West on the grounds that it will curb deadly wildfires.  Last week the West Virginia Department of Environmental Protection reopened a public comment period for modifications to a combined state and federal permitting process that Mountain Valley must complete before it can dig trenches through streams and wetlands for its pipeline.

A modeling study published in Nature Communications found that there is a 64% chance of holding global warming to less than 1.5°C if no new fossil fuel infrastructure is built and all existing such infrastructure is replaced by zero-carbon alternatives at the end of its useful life.  Executives at the major U.S. automakers are pressing the Trump administration and California to agree on standards for fuel efficiency and carbon emissions through 2025.  On Thursday Virginia’s State Corporation Commission rejected most of Dominion Energy’s $6 billion proposal to modernize its electrical grid, stating that the cost to customers was too high.  One of the most conservative legislators in the Virginia General Assembly has proposed using the proceeds from the sale of electricity from solar arrays at schools to help finance badly needed repairs at many schools.  Ivy Main posted her annual compilation of climate and energy bills files with the Virginia General Assembly this year.

With “This Land,” artist David Opdyke melds art and activism, hoping to inspire urgent changes in the perception of climate change.  On BBC Culture, Diego Arguedas Ortiz explored climate fiction by addressing the question: “Can imagined futures of drowned cities and solar utopias help us grasp the complexity of climate change?”.  Last year, academic political theorists Joel Wainwright and Geoff Mann published a book entitled Climate Leviathan: A Political Theory of Our Planetary Future.  Isaac Chotiner interviewed them for The New Yorker.  At Yale Climate Connections, SueEllen Campbell had a short piece highlighting two upbeat articles on strategies for combatting climate change that came out while I was taking Christmas break.  Also, SueEllen Campbell teamed up with philosopher, writer, and climate activist Kathleen Dean Moore to write an inspiring piece about why they won’t quit pushing for climate action.

Climate

A new study, published Monday in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, found that the rate of ice loss from Antarctica has accelerated since 1979 and is now six times larger than it was then.  Furthermore, the rate of ice loss from East Antarctica is much larger than had previously been thought.  Another study, published Wednesday in the journal Nature Communications, found that vast areas of permafrost around the world warmed significantly over the past decade, intensifying concerns about accelerated releases of methane and CO₂ as microbes decompose the thawing organic soils.  The disintegration of permafrost is also causing big problems for communities and military installations in the Arctic by damaging roads and other infrastructure as the land destabilizes and erodes.  In addition, mountain glaciers around the world are also melting, threatening water supplies for millions of people.  NYT journalist Henry Fountain and photographer Ben Solomon visited Kazakhstan to report on the Tuyuksu glacier, which is rapidly melting.

The same group of scientists that reported last week that the oceans were warming 40% faster than they were five years ago, reported this week that 2018 was the warmest year on record for the oceans.  Furthermore, the top five years of ocean heat content have come in the last five years.  Carbon Brief presented its “State of the Climate” report for 2018.

Research published on Wednesday in the journals Science Advances and Global Change Biology examined the future of coffee plants and found that 60% of the world’s coffee species are at risk of extinction in the wild due to climate change, habitat loss, and the spread of diseases and pests.  Scientist Brad Lister returned to the Luquillo rainforest in Puerto Rico after 35 years and found that 98% of ground insects and 80% of leaf canopy insects had vanished.  The most likely cause is global warming.

Rising global temperatures could lead to many more deaths a year than the 250,000 predicted by the World Health Organization just five years ago, according to an article in the New England Journal of Medicine.  Speaking of rising temperatures, Australia has been in the midst of a record-breaking heat wave this week.

An ambitious report on the global food system from a commission convened by the medical journal The Lancet calls for a radical change in food production.  “The dominant diets that the world has been producing and eating for the past 50 years are no longer nutritionally optimal, are a major contributor to climate change, and are accelerating erosion of natural biodiversity,” The Lancet‘s editors wrote in a commentary accompanying the report, released Wednesday.

Energy

According to a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission, Pacific Gas and Electric, California’s largest power company, intends to file for bankruptcy as it faces tens of billions of dollars in potential liability because of the wildfires that devastated parts of the state over the past two years.  This could have big impacts in the clean energy world.

China put just over 43 GW of new solar generation capacity into operation in 2018, down 18% from a year earlier.  Florida Power & Light Co. announced a major solar plan Wednesday, vowing to install more than 30 million solar panels in Florida by 2030.  In 2019, more renewable energy will be added to the U.S. grid than fossil fuel-based energy, according to estimates from the Energy Information Administration.  A scathing new report from the Rachel Carson Council examines the wood pellet biofuel industry, specifically operations in North Carolina, and its “severely adverse” environmental and health effects.  Wood pellet producer Enviva called the report misleading and factually incorrect.

A former chairman of the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission on Thursday cast doubt about whether nuclear technology can be used to combat climate change, calling it “old technology.”  Nuclear power has also remained terribly expensive.

Last week I linked to one of the articles that reported that U.S. greenhouse gas emissions rose 3.4% in 2018.  Part of that increase was caused by increased air traffic, with demand for jet fuel rising 3%.  On the subject of greenhouse gas emissions, Robinson Meyer at The Atlantic sought answers to the question of whether those emissions were following the worst case scenario proposed in the 2014 IPCC report.

Volkswagen has selected Chattanooga, Tennessee as its first North American manufacturing facility for electric vehicle (EV) production, which will require an investment of $800 million and create 1,000 new jobs.  GM is shifting 75% of its powertrain engineers from internal-combustion engines to electric vehicle development as it prepares to unleash of wave of EVs under the Cadillac brand.  Carbon dioxide emissions from EVs are 40% lower than internal combustion engine vehicles, even when the EVs are charged using electricity generated by coal-fired power plants, according to research by Bloomberg New Energy Finance.  Unfortunately, right now, according to Nexus Media, car companies aren’t even trying to sell EVs.  The U.S. Energy Department said on Thursday it is launching a research center on lithium battery recycling in an effort to reduce U.S. dependence on foreign sources for the metal that is used in electric vehicles and electronics.

These news items have been compiled by Les Grady, member and former chair of the CAAV steering committee. He is a licensed professional engineer (retired) who taught environmental engineering at Purdue and Clemson Universities and engaged in private practice with CH2M Hill, the world’s largest environmental engineering consulting firm. Since his retirement in 2003 he has devoted much of his time to the study of climate science and the question of global warming and makes himself available to speak to groups about this subject. More here.

Policy and Politics

The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday declined to take up ExxonMobil’s latest attempt to block Massachusetts’ investigation into whether the oil giant misled the public and investors about climate change.  The decision clears the way for state Attorney General Maura Healey to force the company to turn over records.  If you would like to read a recap of how the fossil fuel industry got the media to think climate change was debatable, Amy Westervelt provided one at The Washington Post.

President Trump has formally nominated Andrew Wheeler, a former energy lobbyist who has led the EPA in an acting capacity for six months, to serve as EPA administrator.  Meanwhile, the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California ordered the EPA to release about 20,000 emails exchanged between industry groups and 25 Trump officials, including Wheeler.  Nations that abandon the Paris Climate Agreement will ultimately be worse off economically despite some GDP benefits from reneging, according to a new analysis by researchers with the Brookings Institution.

One change with the new Congress is the appointment of a new House Select Committee on the Climate Crisis, chaired by Rep. Kathy Castor (D-FL).  USA Today interviewed her about her plans for the committee, given its restrictions.  Former Congressman Ryan Costello, a moderate Republican from southeastern Pennsylvania, has joined Americans for Carbon Dividends as managing director.  He warned that Republicans are at risk of losing more seats in Congress if they don’t start offering real solutions to climate change.  Washington Governor Jay Inslee is considering running for president with a campaign centered on climate change.  He has pledged not to accept campaign contributions from the fossil fuel industry should he run.

Signs are emerging that a significant shift is under way in the response to climate change, dividing it into two related, but distinct, priorities: working to curb greenhouse gases to limit the odds of worst-case outcomes later this century, while simultaneously boosting resilience to current and anticipated climatic and coastal hazards.  Hundreds of environmental organizations signed a letter Thursday backing a rapid transition away from fossil fuels in the U.S.  The groups, led by organizations like Friends of the Earth and the Center for Biological Diversity, told members of the House in the open letter that lawmakers should pursue the Green New Deal.  The Virginia State Air Pollution Control Board voted 4-0 in favor of a key permit for the Atlantic Coast Pipeline, allowing construction of a 54,000-horsepower natural gas compressor station in a historic African-American community.  Prior to the vote, two former board members maintained that the information available to the board from the utility and staff was inaccurate.  The permit for the compressor station requires the use of technology that will minimize the leakage of methane and other volatile organic compounds.

On Tuesday, Carbon Brief published its annual analysis of the climate-related papers that garnered the most attention in the media last year.  Rob Hopkins had a very interesting interview with artist James McKay at Resilience.  McKay works with engineers, scientists, and ordinary citizens to help them visualize what a low carbon future will look like.  Through his work, McKay has gone from being pessimistic about the future to being wildly optimistic.  Jonathan Watts interviewed climate scientist Katharine Hayhoe for The Guardian.  When asked how much she thought the world will warm, she replied “I hope with all my heart that we stay under 1.5°C, but my cynical brain says 3°C.  Perhaps the reality will be somewhere between my head and my heart at 2°C.”  At Quora, Hayhoe addressed the question “What do the most viable climate solutions look like, and how should they be implemented?”.  Forbes republished her answer.  If you’ve been wondering what it takes to do research on climate in the Arctic, you can read what Kristen Pope learned when she went to Greenland with climate scientist Elizabeth Thomas.  Richard Heinberg had a light-hearted (?) look at the Concretaceous and Hellocene periods of the Anthropocene.

Climate

According to a new report released Tuesday by the independent economic research firm Rhodium Group, U.S. CO₂ emissions rose an estimated 3.4% in 2018, the biggest increase in eight years, suggesting that it will be very difficult for the U.S. to meet its pledge under the 2015 Paris Climate Agreement.  In an essay at Yale Climate Connections, Dana Nuccitelli argued that innovation to lower CO₂ emissions will only be successful when the costs of the fossil fuels leading to those emissions reflect their impacts on the climate.

A new analysis, published Thursday in the journal Science, found that the oceans are heating up 40% faster, on average, than reported five years ago in the 5^th Assessment Report by the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.  The authors discussed the significance of their findings in a guest post at Carbon Brief.  The EU’s Copernicus Climate Change Service said on Monday that 2018 was the fourth warmest year on record.  Antarctic sea ice is “astonishingly low” this year, raising concerns about the impacts of ocean water on ice shelves.  In a “long read” at The Guardian, Dahr Jamail discussed the impacts of shrinking glaciers and thawing permafrost.

Refugia are areas of relative climate stability that provide a safe haven for certain species during periods of unfavorable climates.  Scientists are working to identify refugia so that they may be protected, thereby providing a haven for plants, animals, etc. as our climate changes.  Unfortunately, as reported in the journal Global Change Biology, just 5% of the Earth’s land surface is currently unaffected by humans.

During 2018 The Weather Channel published a series of articles under the heading “Exodus: The Climate Migration Crisis” that examined the stories of people all over the world being displaced by climate change.  The articles are compiled here.

Climate change and pollution are teaming up to increase the number of jellyfish in the world’s oceans, causing a variety of problems, including increased stings at Australian beaches.  In addition, coral disease outbreaks are becoming more frequent, severe, and widespread around the globe.  Many factors are contributing to the problem, including pollution and nitrogen runoff from fertilizers and coastal sewer and septic systems, but a key culprit is thought to be steadily increasing ocean temperatures.

Energy

Chevron and Occidental are investing in Carbon Engineering, a Canadian company aiming to commercialize technology that captures CO₂ emissions directly from the atmosphere.

In Colorado, wind power paired with a few hours of battery storage is now cheaper than the cost of operating existing coal-fired power plants.  The same is true of solar PV, and in many cases, solar PV paired with battery storage.  With excellent wind and solar resources, Texas is a national leader in renewable energy.  It also has its own power grid, which makes it a good location for testing the incorporation of large amounts of wind and solar power in its energy mix.  Economist Michael Greenstone wrote that with a moderate price on carbon, some advanced nuclear technologies could be competitive with natural gas combined cycle power plants.

Sales of electric and plug-in hybrid vehicles increased by 81% in 2018 in the U.S., with Tesla Model 3 leading EV sales and Toyota Prius Prime leading plug-in hybrid sales.  Bloomberg maintains, however, that new battery technology will be required for EVs to take over.

On Monday French rail multinational Alstom and UK rolling stock operating company Eversholt Rail Group unveiled the design for a new hydrogen fuel cell train that will begin to replace trains that still run on diesel by 2022.

“60 Minutes” on CBS presented a segment about Marshall Medoff, an 81-year-old eccentric inventor from Massachusetts who toiled in isolation with no financial support for more than a decade to develop a method for breaking down cellulose, making its sugars available for biofuel production.

These news items have been compiled by Les Grady, member and former chair of the CAAV steering committee. He is a licensed professional engineer (retired) who taught environmental engineering at Purdue and Clemson Universities and engaged in private practice with CH2M Hill, the world’s largest environmental engineering consulting firm. Since his retirement in 2003 he has devoted much of his time to the study of climate science and the question of global warming and makes himself available to speak to groups about this subject. More here.