From Hansen’s “Two Plus Two Solution” to Global Warming:
The solution is two plus two: two important actions and two “tweaks”. By far the most important action is “coal” solution, specifically an immediate moratorium in the West (developed countries) on new coal-fired power plants without CO2-capture, and phase-out of such existing power plants (or installation of carbon capture) over the next several decades. Within a decade or less a similar moratorium will be needed in developing countries.
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The second important action required is a gradually rising price on carbon emissions, in the form of a tax, cap-and-trade, or some combination. Why is a rising price necessary, why not just burn oil and gas quickly? It is important to “stretch” oil and gas supplies because energy transitions take time. An increasing carbon price is needed to wean us off fossil fuels, to break the oil-addiction, to develop technology for a clean-planet future, to push us to higher energy efficiencies. Improved efficiencies will be essential in the “beyond petroleum” era. If we do not get on such a course, when “peak-oil” is reached we will be driven to planet-destroying actions such as squeezing oil out of coal, cooking the Rocky Mountains to drip oil out of tar-shale, or other brainless actions of a staggering, dangerous addict.
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In addition to “dirty-coal phase-out” and a carbon price, only two “tweaks” are needed to stabilize climate. The “tweaks” are easier actions that are not as likely to encounter resistance from special interests. The tweaks are needed, because readily available oil and gas will probably push CO2 somewhat beyond the “dangerous” level. Tweak 1: reduce non-CO2 forcings (methane, tropospheric ozone, and black soot); reducing these forcings can have a significant impact on the “permissible” CO2 amount, as quantified in “Greenhouse gas growth rates”. Tweak 2: it may prove necessary to draw some CO2 out of the atmosphere; this will be feasible by burning biofuels in power-plants with sequestration, provided that we only slightly overshoot the “permissible” CO2 level.
Clearly, Hansen falls into the “peak oil is a serious problem, but global warning is the more urgent problem”. I’m in the other camp the “PO > GW” crowd.
Let me make this painfully clear, especially for the people who have just wandered in off the Intertubes looking to buy a few sodas and road snacks before they continue their journey:
I think global warming is very serious, and I’m convinced that we’re already seeing some pretty horrible impacts from it, long before we get anywhere close to the Irwin Allen-esque stuff in the movie The Day After Tomorrow.
But we’re also seeing the early stages of peak oil, in the form of the price run-up that started in 2H2004 and the increasing push by oil companies to pursue and use very expensive oil reserves. The oil crunch, which is all we should care about, will come when supply and demand get far enough out of whack that it will take a very large price increase to bring them back into agreement. And peak oil will make that happen all the sooner and with far more impact.
I’ve also said that I think it will take a very large carbon tax to effect the kind of emissions reductions we need. I stand by that position, but let me clarify it just a bit: I assume that it will be almost impossible to stop building non-CCS coal plants around the world in the near-term, even with a hefty carbon tax. As a result, while we’re trying to shut down or clean up older plants, we’ll still be building some new ones. Hansen is talking about a different scenario, one in which we have an effective and complete moratorium on the building of non-CCS coal plants, and the carbon tax is used to force the cleanup of existing plants, not enforce a moratorium and trigger the cleanup.
Peak oil will be worse for most industrialized nations in the short- to mid-term, I believe, simply because we’re so thoroughly dependent on oil and the peak, and ensuing oil crunch, are so close. When the price of oil rises dramatically (and here I agree 100% with Hansen that fossil fuel is far too cheap), it will have a severe impact on entire societies and kick off a fundamental and far more painful adjustment.
The one saving grace in all of this is that one of the major tools at our disposal–conservation to exploit all that low-hanging fruit I always talk about–can powerfully address both peak oil and global warming. But unless there’s a huge rise in awareness among mainstream consumers about our situation it will take one hell of a shove from either the market or government to make us take those steps.
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July 30th, 2007 at 11:44 am
The place where these two crisis collide is that Peak Oil would cause a global economic slowdown (to use a euphemism; Depression is such an ugly word) which will render irrelevant predictions of future CO2 emissions growth. Looking at the various IPCC scenarios for future CO2 emissions, none of them incorporate “Black Swan” events like Peak Oil.
In short if Peak Oilers are correct then our whole future picture of the CO2 crisis is completely wrong and we are stumbling blindly into the unknown. We need a hard-headed look at what is likely to happen with a serious PO crisis in the next 10 years and its probable impact on the worldwide economy and CO2 growth, in order to set reasonable policies to mitigate these crises.
July 30th, 2007 at 2:39 pm
Hal: In all seriousness, you just wrote a key part of the introduction to my book.
If we were facing “just” PO or “just” GW, I would think that this is going to be a challenge, but at least while we’re dealing with PO we can use coal profligately in the mid-term, or conversely, while we’re cleaning up our CO2 emissions we won’t have a huge economic millstone hanging around our neck. It’s the combination, and the insanely bad luck that we have both bearing down on us at the same time, that keeps me up at night.
I’ve said before that the most encouraging thing I’ve experienced in some time is the response I get from the middle school kids I speak with. I tell them the unvarnished truth about how badly we’re polluting the air, how hard it will be (especially in the US) to import natural gas in coming years, how high oil prices could go by the time they’re getting their license, etc. And yeah, I apologize to them with all the sincerity I can muster for being part of the generation that screwed up so badly and then dumped the problem on them.
And they don’t care how tough the problems are–they want to leap into action and fix it now. If the dumb-ass adults who caused the mess can’t do it, then they’ll do it on their own. Not “try”, not “they think they can”, not “they’ll give it their best shot”, but it’s a done deal in their minds.
If I could give adults a teaspoon of their determination and innate activism, and give these kids a teaspoon of the adults’ power to change things, our situation would look a whole lot brighter.