Environment & Energy
Related: About this forumUniversity of Michigan Study: Economic downturn needed to slow global warming
The study, conducted by José Tapia Granados and Edward Ionides of U-M and Óscar Carpintero of the University of Valladolid in Spain, was published online in the peer-reviewed journal Environmental Science and Policy. It is the first analysis to use measurable levels of atmospheric carbon dioxide to assess fluctuations in the gas, rather than estimates of CO₂ emissions, which are less accurate.
"If 'business as usual' conditions continue, economic contractions the size of the Great Recession or even bigger will be needed to reduce atmospheric levels of CO₂," said Tapia Granados, who is a researcher at the U-M Institute for Social Research.
Annual growth of the world economic output (green line, trillions of 2000 US dollars) and annual change of estimated CO2 emissions (millions of Kt, black dots). Data on CO2 emisions for 2009 and 2010 were computed from preliminary estimates of carbon emissions obtained from the Carbon Dioxide Information Analysis Center (CDIAC) of the US Department of Energy on March 2012. All other data from the World Bank (that takes estimates of CO2 emissions from the CDIC).
Tapia Granados and colleagues found no observable relation between short-term growth of world population and CO₂ concentrations, and they show that recent incidents of volcanic activity coincided with global recessions, which brings into question the reductions in atmospheric CO₂ previously ascribed to these volcanic eruptions.
In years of above-trend world GDP, from 1958 to 2010, the researchers found greater increases in CO₂ concentrations. For each trillion in U.S. dollars that the world GDP deviates from trend, CO₂ levels deviate from trend about half a part per million, they found.
As I was saying...
xchrom
(108,903 posts)GliderGuider
(21,088 posts)be following a strategy that has a demonstrated chance of working (slowing down the global economy) instead of working endlessly on faith-based initiatives like solar power?
Demeter
(85,373 posts)2) can wrestle the necessities of life from the 1% without too much destruction.
GliderGuider
(21,088 posts)Now where did I put my tumbrel and that leftover guillotine?
pscot
(21,024 posts)nukleer combat, toe to toe between China and India.
GliderGuider
(21,088 posts)I suffer from a serious lack of seriousness...
Kolesar
(31,182 posts)"...faith-based initiatives like solar power..."
GliderGuider
(21,088 posts)I sure am!
Kolesar
(31,182 posts)Consume your energies in a mode that doesn't bother everybody
GliderGuider
(21,088 posts)Somebody pee in your Wheaties this morning?
Kolesar
(31,182 posts)Basketball, or might I suggest yoga or mediation?
GliderGuider
(21,088 posts)See below for what amounts to a polite restatement of my original slur on faith.
ETA: If you had looked at the edits you'd have deduced that I first added a helpful comment, then decided it needed its own post. The "pee in the wheaties" comment stayed because I don't see what there is to get as fussed about as you did.
GliderGuider
(21,088 posts)Given the current penetration of solar PV into the global energy mix, the negligible impact it's going to have on the world's CO2 emissions within the next couple of decades, and the continuing climb in those emissions, anyone who is concerned about AGW should be putting their efforts into avenues that have already been shown to be helpful. There is only one of those: economic contraction.
The good news is that each of us can help that process along a bit simply by spending less money and buying less stuff - especially oil, natural gas and electricity. That's going to have far more impact than putting up a few solar panels.
kristopher
(29,798 posts)Let's say we have a massive effort to deploy a renewable grid and, as predicted by economists, that results in significantly improved economic health lasting more than 3 decades.
Since it has been conservatively calculated that less than 1/2 of one years worth of carbon consumption would be enough to completely fuel this change ...
We submit that the models provided here present a compel- ling case that the road to a sustainable future lies in concerted efforts to move from fossil fuels to renewable wind and solar energy sources. This transition can occur in two or three decades and requires very little fossil fuel (on the order of one half of a years present global consumption) and no revolutionary technological innovations. Since our model uses conservative estimates, the true renewable potential that is available to our society may be even more optimistic than we show. The primary anticipated obstacles to implementing this transition are non-technical, including lack of political will and economic prioritization. Nevertheless, this transition in the time scale of a few decades is imperative for global climate security.
http://iprd.org.uk/?p=6877
A Solar Transition is Possible
By Peter D. Schwartzman & David W. Schwartzman
March 2011
FogerRox
(13,211 posts)An extremely painful one. And in a worse case scenario precludes humans from ever getting out into the solar system.
Large scale deployment of renewables shifts emphasis away from crude oil and could make liquid fuels niche compared to today.