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Using ice cores, tree-ring records, and log books of mariners who plied Arctic waters hundreds of years ago, researchers have discovered that the extent of sea ice between Greenland and Svalbard is lower today than it has been in 800 years. 

Writing in the journal Climate Dynamics, the researchers also found that the 20th century saw the lowest sustained maximum extent of sea ice in the region since the year 1200.

By combining ice core and tree ring “proxy records” with data from logbooks of whalers and fishermen who travelled to the boundary of the sea ice, the researchers were able to reconstruct many ups and downs over time, according to Aslak Grinstead, a geophysicist at the University of Copenhagen.  They found that even though the 13th century was very warm and sea ice sparse, it could not compete with declines seen during the 2oth century. 

That finding is significant because global warming skeptics claim the warming we are experiencing today was rivaled by that of the Medieval Warm Period. Their reasoning is that since the warming of that period was perfectly natural, so could the warming of the present period. Now, the reconstruction of sea ice conditions dating back to the Medieval Warm Period shows that what at least one region of the Arctic has been experiencing is indeed unprecedented. 

For a press release on the new findings, go here. For the paper itself, click here. (Note: subscription to Climate Dynamics probably needed.)

Meanwhile, a daily update of Arctic sea ice conditions by the National Snow and Ice Data Center shows that the extent right now is well below the 1979 to 2000 average: 

Under an EPA ruling today, the State of California will be able to impose strict limits on emissions of greenhouse gases from cars and trucks.

The Bush administration had turned down a previous request from California to set its own limits on the grounds that it would impose an undue burden on car makers, which would have had to meet one set of requirements in California, and a different set in other states. Under today’s decision, the federal government will adopt California’s standards, so there will be no dichotomy — until 2017, that is, when California will be free to set even tougher standards. 

See this story in the L.A. Times for a good summary of the decision, and a broader agreement the Obama administration reached with carmakers and the State of California.

One way or another, history will likely be made today when the House of Representatives votes on the Waxman-Markey climate and energy legislation. 

The bill may not be up to the task it was supposedly designed to accomplish — drastically reducing our greenhouse gas emissions over the next four decades and kick-starting a transition to a renewable energy economy. But it does represent the most serious attempt to date at the national level to tackle climate change. I hope fervently that the supporters of Waxman-Markey are right: that this is just a first step in the right direction, and that if it is ultimately signed into law other countries will no longer be able to justify dragging their feet by saying that the U.S. is failing to take climate change seriously. 

I also fear that if the legislation fails, we will not see another serious national effort at tackling climate change for a long time to come. It’s too bad that this is the reality of the situation — it’s too bad that a stronger, less overwhelmingly complex bill is politically impossible. But I’ve come to accept that this probably the best we can do for now. 

As readers of this blog probably know, my concern about the legislation is that it is incredibly complex and too weak. On the latter point, the cost of carbon seems to be too low to get the job done. But you’d never know that from the debate being waged in Congress and in the blogosphere. Republicans are making disgraceful claims about the cost of the legislation, while climate activists are hammering home the point that the legislation would impose very modest costs on Americans. Republicans are saying, for example, that Waxman-Markey would raise the cost of gasoline by 77 cents a gallon by 2020, whereas there is reason to believe the real figure is closer to 20 cents per gallon. (For a good analysis of these numbers, with accompanying primary source documentation, see Joe Romm’s post here.)

But does anyone really believe that a hike of 20 cents per gallon is going to have a significant effect on American drivers?

I agree with Thomas Friedman on this point:

Imposing an immediate “Freedom Tax” of $1 a gallon on gasoline — with rebates to the poor and elderly — would be a triple positive: It would stimulate more investment in renewable energy now; it would stimulate more consumer demand for the energy-efficient vehicles that the reborn General Motors and Chrysler are supposed to make; and, it would reduce our oil imports in a way that would surely affect the global price and weaken every petro-dictator.

But I’ve been writing about climate change and energy, teaching about climate change and energy, and haranguing friends and family about climate change and energy since 1982, and if Waxman-Markey passes today, it will really be the first time in all those years that I will be able to say we’ve gotten serious about the issues on a national level. (I know that some will excoriate me for using that word “serious,” so I hope we can have that debate next.)

I’ll also have mixed emotions, because I’ll know just how tentative a step we will have taken.

In shorter run renewables don’t grow under the plan — but nukes and coal do

For two days now, I’ve been trying to write about a new EPA analysis of the Waxman-Markey climate and energy legislation now under consideration in the House. But every time I turn around, I find seeming contradictions stemming from the mind-bending complexity of this bill — which I believe now tops 1,200 pages. 

But I think I’ve figured some things out. Bear with me now…

For climate activists like Joe Romm, the Waxman-Markey cap-and-trade legislation praised by President Obama yesterday won’t cost consumers very much at all, yet it will somehow drive the long hoped-for transition from carbon-based energy to renewable technologies such as solar and wind. Somehow, that always seemed fishy to me. And on one level, a new analysis from the Environmental Protection Agency suggests that I haven’t just been imagining the stink.

The EPA says the Waxman-Markey legislation would actually result in less renewable energy by 2025 than if we just went about our business as usual. There are two reasons for this. One is actually cause for some cheer: the legislation contains energy efficiency measures that would reduce demand for electricity significantly. And that would mean less need for new electrical generation capacity, including renewables. (The efficiency measures would also mean consumers’ utility bills in 2020 would be 7 percent lower than they are today.)

But another reason for the slow growth of renewable energy at least in the short run may not be cause for cheer: the cost of carbon under the Waxman-Markey cap-and-trade scheme is just too low to drive a big, quick transition to renewables. (For additional analysis and commentary on the EPA report, please see Jesse Jenkins’s thorough post on the Breakthrough Institute blog.)

But hold on a minute. Citing the EPA analysis, a press release from the House Energy and Commerce Committee says the “United States would almost double the share of energy from zero or low carbon sources by 2030, as opposed to the business-as-usual approach.” What’s up with that? It turns out that by “zero or low carbon sources” the EPA means not only renewable energy but also nuclear energy and coal-fired power plants outfitted with carbon capture and storage technology, or CCS. 

So that explains the contradictions. If we trust that nuclear and CCS are going to come online like gangbusters, then we can have both slow growth of renewables and reduced carbon emissions. But would that trust be well placed? And on balance, would a nuclear building spree — with the attendant issues of radioactive waste and nuclear proliferation — be a good thing? 

Moreover, the relatively cheap cost of carbon in the legislation means that renewables can’t really compete. And if your goal is to see a transition to a renewable energy economy — not just to reduce carbon emissions but to strengthen the economy in the long run and wean us from foreign oil — then maybe Waxman-Markey isn’t your dream come true.  

I must admit that my head is spinning. A simple carbon tax would have been so much simpler. But alas, what do I know about Washington politics?

More flaws in the Waxman-Markey climate legislation emerge

I’ve come back from vacation to find that the cap-and-trade debate rages on — today with Paul Krugman of the Times entering the fray in a blog post about the costs of the legislation.

Citing a Congressional Budget Office report pegging the cost of Waxman-Markey cap-and-trade at $22 billion in 2020, he notes that given the projected population, that works out to just 18 cents a day per person. Krugman’s conclusion is that “the costs of cap-and-trade are very, very low.” 

But Krugman then fails to address the crucial issue: If burning carbon doesn’t cost all that much in 2020, then what incentive would we have to switch to more expensive, carbon-free alternatives? Perhaps the answer is that the period between now and 2020 is intended as a transition period during which we will get used to the idea of cap-and-trade, and that after 2020 the cost of carbon will increase dramatically. But if that’s the case, then what of the argument that cap-and-trade won’t cost much? (Not to mention all of the climate-altering carbon emissions that will not be mitigated up to 2020.)

Conversely, if under cap-and-trade, carbon will never cost all that much, then how will we avert climate mayhem?

Meanwhile, the Los Angeles Times is reporting that the Waxman-Markey cap-and-trade legislation would result in more coal being burned in 2020 than at present. 

” . . . to attract vital support from congressional Democrats representing heavily coal-dependent areas, authors of the legislation, including Rep. Henry A. Waxman (D-Beverly Hills), have made a series of concessions that substantially soften its effect on coal — at least over the next decade or so.

Citing an EPA analysis, the article says the legislation “gives utilities a financial incentive to keep burning coal by joining the cap-and-trade system” — namely, the use of offsets. (For example, paying farmers to plant trees, which absorb CO2 from the atmosphere, rather than phasing out coal plants.)

“We’ve ensured a role for coal,” said Rep. Rick Boucher (D-Va.), as quoted by the L.A. Times. 

So here’s another question for Krugman, and other supporters of the legislation such as Joe Romm: If it really is an effective policy for avoiding climate change, then why are supporters of coal so enthusiastic about it?

Again, maybe Waxman-Markey supporters are just kicking the ball down the road a bit. After all, the EPA projects that the use of coal would fall rapidly after 2020. But according to the L.A. Times story, that prediction rests on two assumptions: new nuclear power plants will begin pumping power into the grid; and carbon capture and storage technology will start having a big impact. Maybe. But maybe not.

One thing seems certain: Even if Waxman-Markey becomes law, it will accomplish very little until at least until 2020. And there are good reasons to doubt that it will ever be remotely enough to lead us toward the promised land: an 80 percent cut in carbon emissions by mid-century.

Ain’t got no ambition

I’m heading out on vacation for two weeks, and it looks like we’re fixin’ to get lost on the Lost Coast of California. So CEJournal will go dormant for a little while. I may blog a bit from our friends in Arcata, so check in from time to time. But for sure, please come back to CEJournal on or about June 18 or 19. 

Thanks to everyone for your support over the past few months!

And as Satchmo says…  Ba bo baby ba boo bubby hmm bo zheyys.    Ohhhh yeah!

– Tom

A couple of days ago, I noticed a steep spike in page views here at CEJournal, and it has kept up. This was puzzling because I hadn’t begun to do anything particularly new or novel.

When I investigated I discovered that Marc Morano is driving traffic my way because he had included CEJournal on the blogroll of his Climate Depot Web site. For those of you who don’t know who Marc is, many progressives consider him to be the evil leader of the climate denialist empire. (And simply because I’m on Morano’s blogroll, I fully expect the Romm  – ulans to attack me as a “denier-eq”.) 

This got me to wondering: Why the heck would any of you Moranoans bother to read my stuff? When it comes to climate change, I obviously believe that we have a very serious problem demanding strong action. Moreover, I think many of you guys live in an alternate universe in which your basic political and philosophical orientations preclude acceptance  of the very idea that humans could dominate global life support systems. Perhaps this is because acceptance of this idea comes with recognition that the free market alone isn’t going to help us get out of this fix. And for many people, that’s simply anathema. (Of course, folks who make their fortunes in the fossil fuel biz, along with their facilitators, have their own reasons.)

On the other hand, I also acknowledge that some climate activists live in their own alternate universe. At the extreme, some folks in this universe see every puff of wind and every thunderstorm as attributable to climate change (not to mention bridge collapses). 

So why do we beam down into each others’ alternate universes through our blogs? Are we really open to ideas that conflict with our own? Or is something else going on?

With a nudge from Nicholas Kristof’s terrific column in today’s New York Times, I sought some answers at www.yourmorals.org. The site includes a series of surveys developed by researchers to assess how liberals and conservatives weigh various factors differently. Their goal is to learn something about moral psychology. My goal in taking the surveys was to learn something about why I think what I think, and whether I’m as open minded as I like to think I am.

Continue reading “Why can’t we just get along?” →

Lack of surveillance could contribute to emergence of a deadly pandemic

At a teleconference with reporters last week timed to coincide with release of a new study, a team of researchers said the H1N1 virus sickening people worldwide could have been circulating undetected in pigs for years.

The results are significant because of fears that current agricultural practices, including so-called concentrated animal feeding operations, or CAFOs, as well as a lack of monitoring of swine for influenza, could be raising the risks of a global flu pandemic. (For a well-sourced argument for why CAFOs may be “a perfect system for manufacturing highly-virulent disease organisms that can be disseminated quickly into a world without walls,” please see this posting at a blog hosted by Nature.com, the publisher of the prestigious science journal Nature.)

“This study reinforces the fact that swine are an important reservoir of influenza viruses with the potential to cause significant respiratory outbreaks or even a possible pandemic in humans, and the results of the study show the global need for more systemic surveillance of influenza viruses in pigs,” said Nancy Cox, a researcher with the Centers of Disease Control and a lead author on the study published in Science. (Click here for the study; here for an excellent summary at ScienceInsider; and here for a transcript of the teleconference at which the results were discussed.) 

Pigs are “classic mixing vessels” in which various flu strains can swap genes, creating new and potentially dangerous influenza viruses, says Peter Hotez, president of the Sabin Vaccine Institute at George Washington University. Quoted in a USA Today story, he says the new results are “a wake-up call that we have to have aggressive, ongoing monitoring of flu in pigs,” Hotez says.

But while Canadian pig farmers are currently required to report outbreaks of flu among their herds, Americans are not, according to a story in the New York Times. In fact, the U.S. Department of Agriculture says it analyzes just 500 samples a year from some 100 million American pigs. 

Continue reading “U.S. and other countries fail to adequately monitor pigs for flu” →

UPDATE 5/27/09: See Roger Pielke, Jr.’s description of Joe Romm’s 180 degree turn on cap-and-trade policy, particularly the use of offsets. Two excerpts:

I’ve come to depend upon Joe Romm for ideological rigidity and his unwavering faith in his own infallibility. Such commitment provides a useful touchstone in the climate debate. So I have been dismayed to see Romm not just abandon some of his most firmly held views, but sprint in the opposite direction while at the same time lambasting those who would have the gall to espouse views that he only recently held.

Why Romm has made an about-face on cap-and-trade:

Perhaps the real Joe Romm has been kidnapped, and an offset-loving, climate-delayer-eq, fossil fuel drinking replacement has been quietly spirited into his place? A look at the recent flip-flopping by Joe Romm might help us understand the transformation, and with some luck, locate the real Joe Romm and return him to his proper place in the climate debate.

Okay, on to my original post about Romm’s unfailing habit of accusing others of behavior that is actually his stock in trade: 

Joe Romm tees off on Breakthrough Institute and journalists

Once again, I can feel the spittle flying out of my computer screen when I read Joe Romm’s latest post taking The Breakthrough Institute to task for questioning the current cap-and-trade legislation now wending its way through Congress — and for journalists who have quoted TBI analysts. 

I believe psychologists have a word for Romm’s consistent, unseemly behavior: “projection.” (Or possibly ”transference“?)

What’s Romm so upset about? Several posts at the Breakthrough Institute blog questioning the capacity of the Waxman-Markey cap-and-trade legislation for bringing down greenhouse gas emissions. Romm himself once criticized the very same loopholes in Waxman-Markey that he now says are no problem. Fine. Being open to new interpretations and analyses and changing one’s mind is a sign of maturity and intelligence. But so is sticking to debating ideas with respect and civility. And as many readers of CEJournal know, Romm is constitutionally incapable of sticking to ideas and showing respect and civility. (For the Breakthrough Institute’s detailed response to Romm’s post, go here.)

Romm takes most disagreement with his ideas personally. He then lashes out using language that describes nothing other than his own approach. In his post about the Breakthrough Institute, for example, Romm uses the word “attack” ten times: “They attacked President Obama’s cap-and-trade climate plan…” “They attacked Henry Waxman…” “They launched a lengthy attack against Al Gore…” “…they have launched a series of attacks on it — attacks based on misrepresentation and misanalysis.” “TBI has recently written two attacks on Waxman-Markey, “The Flawed Logic of the Cap-and-Trade Debate,” which attacks any effort to significantly raise the price of carbon pollution…”  And on and on and on.

Romm doesn’t seem to understand the difference between the words “attack” and “critique.” Shellenberger, Nordhaus and the other authors at The Breaktrhough Institute mostly do the latter — they offer “detailed analysis and assessment.” While Romm certainly is capable of the same, he also wallows in the former. 

What a shame. He clearly has much to offer in the way of ideas, analysis and assessment. But he seems to relish the role of the bully more. I wonder what demons he is working out in public on his blog.

Study in the Journal Climate received very little press attention

Many environmentalists are rejoicing over approval in committee of the Waxman-Markey climate legislation, but a new study by MIT researchers suggests we have a much steeper mountain to climb than anyone thought. (Find the paper here; press release here.)

Using a model that takes into account both economic activity and climate processes, the researchers found that without dramatic and quick action to rein in greenhouse gas emissions, there is a median probability of surface warming of 5.2 degrees Celsius by 2100 — more than twice what was predicted just six years ago. The model shows a 90 percent probability that the increase will range between 3.5 and 7.4 degrees. 

The model did not find a significant difference in outcomes from previous projections if there is strong global action to reduce emissions.

Unless the world acts boldly, “there is significantly more risk than we previously estimated,” says study co-author Ronald Prinn, the co-director of MIT’s Joint Program on the Science and Policy of Global Change . (He was quoted here in an MIT press release.) “This increases the urgency for significant policy action.”

Environmentalists hope the Waxman-Markey legislation that passed yesterday will prove to be a significant step toward a global 80 percent cut in emissions by 2050. But the legislation is shot through with loopholes and give-aways to industry, and it falls far short of providing the level of funding for clean energy R&D that’s needed to avoid the terrible outcomes predicted in the roulette wheel above.

Meanwhile, the new MIT study received scant attention in the press, even though the hearings on Waxman-Markey provided a strong news peg.

Two days ago, I drank the cap-and-trade Kool-Aid, spiked by a generous portion of climate modeling. I wrote that if the legislation likely to pass a House committee today actually were to help lead to slashing greenhouse gas emissions 80 percent worldwide by 2050, we may well avoid some of the nastier impacts of climate change. 

Today I have a hang over, and the words of my AP Physics teacher are ringing in my ears: “If your grandmudder had veeels,” he would say in a thick German accent, “she’d be a motorcycle.” This was his way to say how lame we were in our attempts to wriggle out of mistakes by posing bogus hypotheticals. 

I think you will agree that after posing my 80%-reduction hypothetical in Wednesday’s post, there is very little chance that my grandmother is now cruising around a graveyard on Long Island like a possessed Harley Davidson. 

The question I failed to ask myself after I received the climate model results from Tom Wigley was whether the Waxman-Markey cap-and-trade legislation really is a good first step toward an 80 percent reduction in greenhouse gases globally by 2050. And my hangover is telling me that we could have done much better. 

Continue reading “Cap-and-trade hangover” →

Yesterday, my colleague and friend Keith Kloor posted an hysterical send up of some of the players in the climate debate. He pictures a “Democratic politician (Waxman-Markey) at the wheel of a new Lexus GS.” This politician is “clumsily groping at an anorexic cap and trade bill in the front passenger seat.” In the back is Republican wacko, ‘doesn’t have the nuts‘ Joe Barton, who is smaking Waxman-Markey’s head, seated next to climate scientist James Hansen, who is urging Waxman-Markey to crash the car. 

You get the idea — a car packed with disputatious characters careening down the road at high speed. I really hope Keith will forgive me for this, but I believe he’s got the metaphor wrong.

I picture Animal House.

House Minority Leader John Boehner and his Republican Omega House compatriots, resplendent in their plaid-suit regalia, have their tits in a wringer over the outrageous behavior of some of their former boy toys over at Delta House. Yes, it’s truly hard to believe, but big business is frolicking happily in Waxman-Markey’s cap-and-trade bed. Their wild ménage à trois partners? Democrats and environmentalists. (Make we want to shout!)

You can’t make this stuff up. Politico reports that the likes of Duke Energy, Johnson & Johnson, Shell Corp. and other large corporations, “are backing cap-and-trade proposals by the United States Climate Action Partnership coalition, a group of environmental groups and businesses advocating legislation to reduce greenhouse gases.” The Omega House frat boys feel jilted. And in a bizarre twist that is only possible in Washington, here, according to Politico, is how they are trying to turn the situation to their advantage and kill cap and trade: “Tee off on Big Business, and tie it around the neck of the Democrats.”

Politico says it has obtained a strategy memo penned by Republican staffers for the Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works that spells out the strategy. From the memo: 

By supporting cap-and-trade, Democrats are choosing big business over consumers, by pushing legislation that enriches several big corporations at the expense of American consumers, their jobs, their livelihoods, and their futures.” 

TAKE THAT BIG BAD BUSINESS! That’ll teach you to drop us and hop into bed with those Democrat slobs over at Delta House!

NCAR climate modeler Tom Wigley runs several scenarios for CEJournal to find the answer

How big an impact would the cap-and-trade legislation now being marked up in a House committee actually have on climate change, assuming that the legislation’s goal of a roughly 80 percent reduction in greenhouse gas emissions were applied globally? 

That was the question I posed to climate modeler Tom Wigley of the National Center for Atmospheric Research in an email message last week (before all of the precise details of the cap-and-trade legislation were known). Wigley kindly used a model to answer my questions, and the results have convinced me that if the complex scheme actually were to work globally — a very huge if — the impact on climate, and particularly sea level rise, would be quite significant. And this is true despite the very significant delay in reducing emissions of greenhouse gases that is almost certainly built into the Waxman-Markey legislation. So if you’ve been following the debate about a carbon tax versus cap-and-trade, you may be interested to see the numbers that Wigley came up with.

Continue reading “Cap-and-trade: how much would the legislation tame global warming?” →

First an environmental nightmare. Now an environmental justice outrage.

In December, 5.4 million cubic yards of coal ash laden with arsenic, lead and radioactive elements spilled from an impoundment at the Tennessee Valley Authority’s Kingston Power Plant, creating a cleanup nightmare. But I suspect that even in their worst dreams, the residents of two counties in Georgia and Alabama never imagined that the TVA would be shipping the deadly sludge off to them.

Actually, I take that back. Both counties have large black populations and high rates of poverty, according to Facing South, an online magazine of the Institute for Southern Studies. So maybe residents there are used to being on the receiving end of nastiness.

The Chattanooga Times Free Press reports that the TVA is shipping some of the coal ash to two landfills, one in Taylor County near Mauk, Georgia, and the other in Perry County in Alabama, as part of a two-week “disposal test.” The authority actually stonewalled requests to identify where specifically the ash would be shipped, but Times Free Press reporter Pam Sohn figured it out independently.

Residents of those counties had no say in the TVA’s decision to use them as guinea pigs, according to Facing South:

The communities that will be getting the coal ash from Tennessee apparently did not get a chance for meaningful involvement in that decision since neither the TVA — a federally-owned corporation — nor regulatory authorities provided an opportunity for public comment.

So, first the TVA is responsible for the worst environmental catastrophe in the history of the Southern United States. Then it bungles management of the disaster in the immediate aftermath, and falsely minimizes the dangers from coal ash. Now it looks like they are determined to add environmental racism to their list of nightmarish accomplishments.