Ten Years and Counting

By Mimikatz

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) has released its fourth report (summary here), which synthesizes for policymakers attending the forthcoming UN conference in Bali  the three reports that it issued earlier this year as part of its Fourth Assessment Report.  Some of its conclusions are that

climate change is "unequivocal", that humankind's emissions of greenhouse gases are more than 90% likely to be the main cause, and that impacts can be reduced at reasonable cost.

But climate change may also bring about "abrupt and irreversible impacts" such as glacial melting and extinction of species.

"Approximately 20-30% of species assessed so far are likely to be at increased risk of extinction if increases in global average temperature exceed 1.5-2.5C (relative to the 1980-1999 average)," the summary concludes.

Other potential impacts highlighted in the text include:

• between 75m and 250m people are projected to have scarcer fresh water supplies than at present
• yields from rain-fed agriculture could be halved
• food security is likely to be further compromised in Africa
• there will be widespread impacts on coral reefs

One problem with the IPPC consensus process is that it takes a great deal of time, and thus it is not clear whether the newest report takes into account the accelerated arctic melting seen this year.  But it is clear that things are happening faster than anticipated, the BBC reports:

"If you look at the overall picture of impacts, both those occurring now and those projected for the future, they appear to be both larger and appearing earlier than we thought [in our 2001 report]," Martin Parry, co-chair of the impacts working group, told BBC News.

"Some of the changes that we previously projected for around 2020 or 2030 are occurring now, such as the Arctic melt and shifts in the locations of various species."

There are indications that projected increases in droughts are also happening earlier than expected, he said, though that was less certain.

Interestingly, the IPPC finds that absent human factors, the climate would have cooled over the last 50 years (due to volcanoes and solar changes); only models that simulate human effects produce warming over this period.  Warming is greatest in the northern polar regions and then in the north temperate and tropical zones (with the exception of the ocean area influenced by the jet stream).  It is least in the southern temperate zone and southern seas.  Human influences are "very likely" to have led to sea level increases.

The IPPC consensus now exhibits greater confidence in projections about droughts, heatwaves and floods, and their adverse consequences, plus stronger evidence of adverse impacts now on vulnerable ecosystems, such as polar and high-mountain regions and coral reefs. 

In the ffuture, as temperatures rise, Africa and Asia will be particularly hard hit, in part because they already face shortages of good water and areas of extreme drought.  Overall dry areas will become drier, low-lying areas will be wetter, smaller islands will be imperiled.  Arctic areas will be transformed.  Climate and weather will become more extreme.  The widely-held impression that North America will suffer the least seems to be somewhat true, although serious effects are anticipated in cities that already experience heat waves, as are water shortages in the West, significant variability in agricultural impacts, increased intensity of Atlantic hurricanes and stress on coastal areas generally.    

Projected changes are accelerating, and will persist for a millenium even if changes are made, raising the specter of whether, and how soon, we are facing irreversible changes or a "tipping point."  Most serious seems to be accelerating Arctic ice melting, as this could cause meters of sea level increases, beyond what the models anticipate.  The Jet Stream looks safe to the end of the century, despite some slowing, which will help moderate rising temperatures in Europe.  (In case you were wondering, Dubai's spectacular islands have been designed to withstand at least a half meter rise in sea level, which was the high end anticipated by the end of this century.  Some projections are now for three times that.) 

Dealing with climate change has costs, but so does failing to deal with climate change, given the near certainty of the trajectory of change.  The report concludes that

There is high agreement and much evidence that all stabilisation levels can be achieved by deployment of a portfolio of technologies that are either currently available or expected to be commercialised in coming decades, assuming appropriate and effective incentives are in place for their development, acquisition, deployment and diffusion and addressing related barriers.

But we need "substantial investment flows" and "effective technology transfer," meaning lots of money and getting the solutions to where they are needed.  The longer we wait, the harder it is, because we need to begin to reverse that nasty increasing trendline, and the longer we wait, not only is it getting steeper, but because of the persistence of greenhouse gases, the stabilization level, and the attendant changes (such as temperature and sea level increases), will be higher.  It looks from the chart like we have about ten years if we want things to stabilize at or near 2005 levels of greenhouse gases.  If the CO2 peak comes after the 2010-2030 period, the resulting world will look very different from what we have now.

Update:

Surprise, surprise.  The US representative tried to water the report down.   More of the Bush/Cheney regime's attempts to make policy by denying reality.  By contrast, the UN chief Ban Ki-moon calls for action.

Comments

[Mimikatz]

Meanwhile Congress dithers about the farm bill (cloture vote failed, so there it goes). A huge program for insurance for farmers in drought-prone areas doesn't seem too bright in light of the increasing prospect of droughts in such areas. Better to spend it on diversifying crops and bettering nutrition.

More on the climate report here.

[sid58]

I think you intend "extinction" of species (3rd sentence). Let's see how candidates address this important report.

[Mimikatz]

Thanks. Corrected.

I think this is an issue that will have become much more salient by summer 2008. Public opinion is going to outrun the politicians' ability to respond. The GOP base had better lose its "if Al Gore is for it, it has to be a fraud" attitude or they will leave their candidate no room to maneuver. That, in turn, might take Schwarzenegger out of the campaign. He will be busy trying to close our budget gap, but this is his issue for the GOP, and if it really looks like all the power is going to be with the Dems, he may cut a quiet deal. Or team up with Gore, like Bill and Bush Sr.

[JohnLopresti]

Schwarzenegger is a script reader. His words are protective of the environment only until you read what his policies are the day after. Cut the forest and cancel environmental protections. Faced with a private donation of miles of beachside cliff land, he refused to permit the gift to become part of state parks. Worse, he has BushCo writers and strategists; CA had a strong public meetings law, but when the legislature votes to strengthen it, Schwarzenegger vetoes it. His travel has private sponsors and the jets are gas-hogs. The day after announcing a greenhouse gas reduction law he agreed to sign, he announced his intention to use the shell game economic theory which lets polluters continue their destruction by buying 'credits' for polluting less elsewhere; talk about zero sum; any further public office for Schwarzenegger is a zero result for the folks he ostensibly represents. He represents that branch of his party that wants a figure to utter vacuous and deceptive part truths, a modern Reagan.
RealClimate had a nice series on the north pole ice recession setting a record; see August 10, 2007 article and associated writings by scientists there. RealClimate's main page remains the reference site on climate. I think the Republican strategy is to make money now, and let the Democrats lose rapport with business by Democrats controlling pollution after the Democrats are in charge. You know the Republicans are getting results when the Federalist society applauds the anticonstitutional remarks of Bush and two Scotus justices. Control the remedies courts are willing to offer; that is the wishlist of the FedSoc.

[Jodi]

I think that the scarcity of water problem will start to galvanize people and cause them to get very upset, but I still don't see any profound changes in America.

I see mostly comestic changes with windmills, a lot of publized efforts that are mostly show, and research efforts with some undefined payback at least 10 years out.

The one exception might be a comeback for the nuclear power plant industry which President Carter hamstrung so long ago.

France is 75% to 80% reliant on huclear power, now.

[JohnLopresti]

It can be fun to generate electric energy without the absurd pollution generations must face when the delicate tool which is radiation is diverted from applications such as medical imaging, for example, and instead used to line the pockets of the entrenched energy oligarchy. Attenuating the demibrave profile which is the nuclear industry's in our time will remove a dangerous toy which global politicians like to brandish, as well; there is at most one decade to deal with this brinkpersonship. It is time to ratchet back to a saner international environment, as well. That is what IPPC is impelling the great denialists to do; deniers like Bush, and the subtle demurrers India was contributing this past week, saying the polluting countries should add foreign aid to compensate the third world, during the India bartering sessions in Valencia. Folks forget the politics of India from fairly recent decades ago; their leadership recently decided to cancel Bush's atomic secrets tech transfer policy unilaterally because of its patent attempt to reshape that country's internal decisionmaking. Climate and radiation are vital issues. BushCo's idea of clarity is to deny climate is changing, but to pray for rain because Atlanta's water supply is parching. Land use and management, and population curbs wait in the wings; but act 2 is about to begin.

[JohnLopresti]

A nice nuclear safety site. I am glad mimikatz wrote about the IPPC today.

[MrX]

The IPCC mentions nuclear power as a mitigation technology. Even if you don't like nuclear technology, you're going to hear people other than Jodi - people with good intentions - raise the subject for discussion. We should look at it anew without prejudice. Just because Jodi is trying to antagonize you, you don't have to take the hook with the bait.

[P J Evans]

I was reading the fact article in the Jan/Feb '08 issue of Analog - it should hit the newsstands in a couple of weeks; I get it by mail - which is on controlled fusion. They're making progress in their experiments, but it may not be fast enough to help.
Whatever happend to the CANDU reactor design, which didn't need enriched uranium and could actually use depleted?

[BlueStateRedhead]

OT,
Nexthurranicks in Boston to hear/meet Marcy:
Pred, Katherineinma, gmoke, selise, humble self and assorted signif. others and friends for "No news is bad news".

Wonderful, town lit up for the occasion. Literally, as the lights were on at the BC Staidium even though it was an away game day and at Fenway in whose shadow we met.

Looking forward to reading EW about the conference if she chooses. Shorter me about her panel she was terrific and the MSM types while trying to be respectful were in so many words dissing the blogosphere and justifying their m.o. with a few words of apology from the NYT people.

[MrX]

CANDU reactors are still being built, the most recent locations being in Romania (2007), China (2003), and South Korea (1999). The reactor type built in these countries is known as PHWR CANDU-6, although AECL is currently marketing the ACR-1000.

South Korea's power infrastructure is 37% nuclear, Romania 9.9%, China 1.2%. France supplies 77.1% of its electricity via nuclear power, Sweden 43%.

According to the IEA (2005 statistics), the world's electricity generation profile breaks down as follows:

coal - 39.8%
natural gas - 19.6%
hydro - 16.1%
nuclear - 15.7%
oil - 6.7%
other - 2.1%

I suggest Japan as a representative of the world. Currently (CIA World Factbook 2001) Japan gets 60% of its electricity requirements from fossil fuel, 29.8% from nuclear, 8.4% from hydro, and 1.8% from other sources.

In the USA, the numbers are 71.4% fossil, 20.7% nuclear, 5.6% hydro, 2.3% other.

As an aside, Norway gets 99.3% of its electricity production via hydro, Sweden 50.8%.

[Brian in Seattle]

I asked this in very late in an older thread, but still am curious. What is this Jodi thing? It seems like a "smart" key word based spam bot that mines a Republican talking point database to post ASAP on every new topic here.

Just curious...

[Jodi]

Brian in Seattle

to repeat myself from Nov 17, 21:59: "I think that the scarcity of water problem will start to galvanize people and cause them to get very upset, but I still don't see any profound changes in America.

I see mostly comestic changes with windmills, a lot of publized efforts that are mostly show, and research efforts with some undefined payback at least 10 years out.

The one exception might be a comeback for the nuclear power plant industry which President Carter hamstrung so long ago.

France is 75% to 80% reliant on huclear power, now."

Now if you wish to think that is a bot, just curious Brian, ok, but hey fellow, tell me where I can get a couple like that, for it would save me a lot of effort.

: )

[bleh]

Wow, what a rich thread! You could make a whole blog out of this!

A few comments:

Does anyone think that the interests George Bush and Dick Cheney represent are all that upset with $100/bbl oil? Not that it's not inevitable, but it's certainly not a policy failure from their POV.

Why is nuclear successful in France (and Belgium) but not here? Answer: trust in centralized government. They got it, we don't.

Does anyone think that the American people are going to respond to even the most serious predicted effects of global warming? For crying out loud, look at how we've responded to the ongoing, multi-year, catastrophic disaster that is New Orleans. Ooh, bodies floating in water, scary for a day. But is Hannah Montana actually a virgin?

Oh wait, the Governor of Georgia is leading the state in prayer. That'll make a difference! How much attention is his budget getting, anyway?

[Alyx]

Yes very sad, sad indeed. I often don't understand why humans don't wake up and smell the coffee, or learn from our mistakes that we make century after century. The world will wait until something bad starts to really show up and then start with the large bandaid...sigh...a bandaid this large won't fit very well. We do as mentioned above need to start now. I know that there is work being done in utilizing the technology of solar power for our utilities but it is in the works as in IR&D for two large companies. Bravo to Norway for the hydro power.

Jodi...ahem we can send you to Chernobal and you can see how wonderful nuclear power can be.