The CO2 State:

If Texas were its own country, it would be the 48th most populous in the world, right between North Korea and Ghana. In terms of landmass, at 268,000 square miles it would be the 40th-biggest. But when it comes to environmental impact, Texas is on par with some of the largest, most industrialized nations on the planet.

Were the Lonestar State to secede from the union it would be the world’s eighth-largest emitter of the greenhouse gas carbon dioxide, just behind Canada, with 630 million metric tons spewed into the atmosphere in 2005, according to new figures released this week by the U.S. government’s Energy Information Administration. That’s actually a reduction of 40 million metric tons since 2003, when Texas was the globe’s seventh-largest CO2 contributor. But even though the state is improving, Texas still outpaces the combined emissions of California and Pennsylvania, the states with the second- and third-highest CO2 outputs.

Considering its role in the U.S. economy, it’s no surprise Texas ranks as it does. As the nation’s leading producer of energy, and with more cattle and oil refineries than any other state, it is essentially America’s power plant, gas pump and beef basket. Yes, all those cows play a part. While many environmentalists focus on the methane (another greenhouse gas) produced by cows, the raising of cattle also contributes to CO2 emissions (the burning of fuel to transport cattle and meat, etc.). A study released last summer by Japanese scientists showed that production of just 1 kilogram of beef results in more CO2 emissions than going for a three-hour drive while leaving all the lights on at home. Texas also has the largest petrochemical industry in the country, which churns out a host of consumer products, everything from makeup to motor oil.

But it’s not just industry and agriculture that give Texas such an outsize carbon footprint. Texans epitomize America’s penchant for overconsumption, so much so that they’ve even coined their own phrase for superlarge portions: Texas-sized. The state’s 23.5 million residents use nearly 3,000 more kilowatt-hours of electricity every year than the average American and a higher percentage of them drive large, gas-guzzling vehicles. Of the 20 million registered vehicles in Texas, one in four is a pickup truck. Of the 245 million vehicles registered in the United States, only 16 percent are pickups, according to the Alliance of Automobile Manufacturers. Last year light trucks made up 61 percent of all new vehicles (both personal and commercial) sold in Texas, compared to just over half of total vehicle sales in the country.

Nearly a third of Texas’s carbon emissions come from transportation. With so much wide-open space, Texas hasn’t needed the kind of urban planning that promotes density. Rather, it is a state of far-flung towns and cities, connected by highways and with practically no mass transit. Air quality has suffered as a result; by some estimates more than half of all Texans live in areas where the air is unsafe to breathe, as defined by the EPA’s Clean Air Act.

Even in the reddest of Red States, one would think that such a health hazard would cause Texas to get serious about air pollution. But it is one of only 15 states without a climate action plan in place or even under consideration. This at a time when some of the most aggressive state plans have taken shape under Republican governors, according to national climate protection groups.

I think we have to be very careful in how we deconstruct statistics like these to avoid leaping to ridiculous conclusions.

My take on it:

• The portion of Texas’ emission due to the production of energy or food simply means that this just happens to be there. In other words, it says much about the market overall, particularly the US, than it does about Texas.
• The propensity for trucks (and large SUV’s, I’d guess) is no doubt at least partially attributable to the type of jobs common in Texas, but (guessing again) nowhere near enough to account for all of the difference. In other words, I strongly suspect that a large portion of the tilt towards larger vehicles in Texas is purely a fad, just as it is everywhere else in the US, but for some cultural reason (see next bullet) it’s more pronounced in that state.
• The lack of regulatory control over emissions is nothing more than terrible public policy from denier and/or gutless and/or bought politicians who’ve felt insufficient push back from their constituents. And let’s be honest here–even within the often dreadfully butt headed US, Texas is probably the state in the US with the worst case of “I’ll do what I damn well please, even if it hurts me, and in any case it’s none of your stinking business” syndrome.

Will Cellulosic Ethanol Take Off?:

Cellulosic ethanol, a fuel produced from the stalks and stems of plants (rather than only from sugars and starches, as with corn ethanol), is starting to take root in the United States. This month, Celunol, based in Cambridge, MA, broke ground on an ethanol plant in Louisiana that will be able to produce 1.4 million gallons of the fuel each year starting in 2008. Other companies are moving forward as well with plans to build plants.

But experts from industry and environmental groups say that without loan guarantees and other incentives, the nascent industry will fail to emerge from the current demonstration phase to produce commercial-scale quantities of ethanol. And without that, it may be impossible to meet President Bush’s ambitious goal of producing 35 billion gallons of renewable fuels a year by 2017.

Cellulosic ethanol is attractive because the feedstock, which includes wheat straw, corn stover, grass, and wood chips, is cheap and abundant. Converting it into ethanol requires less fossil fuel, so it can have a bigger effect than corn ethanol on reducing greenhouse-gas emissions. Also, an acre of grasses or other crops grown specifically to make ethanol could produce more than two times the number of gallons of ethanol as an acre of corn, in part because the whole plant can be used instead of just the grain. That’s good news because many experts estimate that corn-ethanol producers will run out of land, in part because of competing demand for corn-based food, limiting the total production to about 15 billion gallons of fuel. (Already, corn-ethanol plants–existing and planned, combined–have a capacity of about 11 billion gallons.) The greater productivity of cellulosic sources should eventually allow them to produce as much as 150 billion gallons of ethanol by 2050, according to a report by the National Resources Defense Council (NRDC). That’s the equivalent of more than two-thirds of the current gasoline consumption in the United States.

Yep, we have to prime the pump for new technologies, and cellulosic ethanol seems to be one of the advances that’s worth the money.

“Stabilizing climate requires near-zero emissions”:

Avoiding climate catastrophe will probably require going to near-zero net emissions of greenhouse gases this century. That is the conclusion of a new paper in Geophysical Research Letters (subs. req’d) co-authored by one of my favorite climate scientists, Ken Caldeira, whose papers always merit attention. Here is the abstract:

Current international climate mitigation efforts aim to stabilize levels of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere. However, human-induced climate warming will continue for many centuries, even after atmospheric CO2 levels are stabilized. In this paper, we assess the CO2 emissions requirements for global temperature stabilization within the next several centuries, using an Earth system model of intermediate complexity. We show first that a single pulse of carbon released into the atmosphere increases globally averaged surface temperature by an amount that remains approximately constant for several centuries, even in the absence of additional emissions. We then show that to hold climate constant at a given global temperature requires near-zero future carbon emissions. Our results suggest that future anthropogenic emissions would need to be eliminated in order to stabilize global-mean temperatures. As a consequence, any future anthropogenic emissions will commit the climate system to warming that is essentially irreversible on centennial timescales.

And you thought the “80% reduction below 1990 levels by 2050″ target was tough.

I have to admit that I reached for my tinfoil hat when I read this. It’s not that I don’t believe these findings, but that I think they’re so obviously true, from a simple queuing theory perspective, that I have to ask: Why didn’t we figure this out 20 years ago? And if we did, then why in the world is the IPCC and everyone else talking about the 80% target?

I’m not suggesting that this is the global warming equivalent of governments knowing about peak oil but virtually never mentioning it because they don’t want to panic the plebes. But I don’t see how a study like this can come out without raising a boatload of very uncomfortable questions.

EPA’s Johnson Gets It Exactly Backwards:

Inside EPA reports that EPA Administrator Johnson has postponed making a decision on whether greenhouse pollution endangers public health and welfare as the Supreme Court directed him to do in Mass. v. EPA until he can sort out the ramifications such a finding might have for industry:

[see original for Inside EPA quote.]

That, in a nutshell, exposes the fallacious reasoning that predominates his thinking on global warming and his duties under the federal Clean Air Act. It is not his job to decide whether the CAA is the best vehicle for addressing global warming. Instead, he is obliged to determine whether, in the words of section 202(a), greenhouse pollution “may reasonably be anticipated to endanger public health or welfare.” This language does not permit a balancing of human health and welfare against economic impact or inconvenience to industry. If he determines that greenhouse pollution endangers the public (as it obviously does), he must discharge his statutory responsibilities as set forth in the Act, and at that point he can consider cost of compliance and other factors to the extent permitted by the Act.

The Bush Follies continue, right up to the day they fold their tents and scatter to the wind.

The commentary above (from Warming Law) on this ongoing EPA train wreck perfectly illustrates one of the basic notions of governance: Do you want all parts of a presidential administration working in perfect unison, or do you want them to pursue each agency’s own goals, even when those are in conflict with other parts of the government, forcing their common management, i.e. the President, to settle differences?

My philosophy is that we always want the latter approach. I want Commerce and Labor and the EPA and the DOE and Defense, etc. to duke it out over policy and have the common vision or management style or whatever come from the White House. Having everyone in perfect agreement sounds wonderful, at a superficial level–who doesn’t want government to be more productive, after all–but it means you get unqualified hacks or sell outs in high-level government positions who shun the basic mission of their own departments. In my opinion, that’s a formula for doing a bad job for their bosses, namely the citizens.

VW to Show Golf Diesel Hybrid Concept, New Natural Gas Vehicle at Geneva Motor Show (emphasis added):

Volkswagen will make seven international premiere presentations at the upcoming Geneva Motor Show (6-16 March), including a Golf TDI diesel-electric hybrid concept and the new 150-PS Passat Estate TSI EcoFuel natural gas vehicle. Other Volkswagen world premieres will be the fuel-efficient Sharan BlueMotion, the four-wheel-drive Golf Estate 4Motion, and the completely re-engineered Scirocco sports car. The Passat CC will also be on display for the first time in Europe.

The Golf TDI Hybrid concept consumes no more than 3.4 liters of diesel fuel per 100 kilometers (69 mpg US), with 89 g/km CO2 emissions. The full-hybrid supports an all-electric mode. Power transmission to the front axle is managed by 7-speed DSG technology.

I’ve felt for some time that one of the companies best poised to exploit diesel technology in the US is VW. They make much more affordable cars than Audi or Mercedes, and they have a huge amount of experience in engineering diesels in Europe.

A Golf that gets 69 MPG would make a lot of US drivers forget about the hassles (real or perceived) of finding diesel fuel at gas stations in a hurry.

Peak oil in Shell’s National Dialogue on Energy Security:

Peak-oil related excerpts from Shell’s National Dialogue on Energy Security (20 page, 1MB PDF), released in February.

The Myth: We’re running out of oil.

The “peak oil” theory came up in nearly every market. While this wasn’t necessarily surprising, the pervasive nature of this strongly held belief was. Similarly, in a related survey that we conducted, more than half of the respondents said global oil production will peak within the next 20 years. This leads people to dismiss oil and gas from being part of the future energy portfolio. Also not surprisingly, we found that few people were aware of the scale of untapped domestic resources on the Outer Continental Shelf, or of the huge undeveloped unconventional resources, such as oil shale, oil sands and heavy oil.

The Reality: Oil resources are out there, should we choose to develop them.

When individuals think of peak oil, they tend to think that a sudden drop in global production follows soon thereafter. We don’t expect to see this on a global level. It is possible, though, that we will reach a plateau in the next few decades, followed by a gradual decline of conventional oil and gas production.

There is no shortage of molecules of oil and gas in the ground. However, there are multiple influences that will affect the pace at which this can, and will, be developed.

On the demand side, we are seeing a step-change in the growth of demand for energy, particularly as emerging economies, such as China and India, enter more energy-intensive phases in their economic development. It will be vital to become more efficient in how we use energy and to develop unconventional sources of oil and gas (such as oil sands), biofuels and vehicle electrification to meet this surge in demand. All energy sources added together will struggle to match demand – we will need all of the energy we can get.

On the supply side, many existing reservoirs are facing a natural decline in production. This means that high levels of continuous investment are required just to maintain status quo or to invest in enhanced oil recovery (EOR) techniques. In addition, ever-increasing levels of investment are required as smaller fields are developed and more complex frontier environments become the targets for hydrocarbon exploration and production, alongside the development of unconventional oil and gas supply. There are also uncertainties about the pace of investment in sensitive regions such as the Middle East and Latin America. Naturally, major resource-holding governments seek also to develop their sovereign reserves at a pace that matches their own economic goals.

There are plenty of uncertainties, which is why we explore future possibilities through scenarios. Looking at the oil picture, we find it misleading to think in terms of concepts like peak oil or try to put a timeframe to it. The significant economic point comes when tensions arise between the growth of global demand for energy and the pace of investment, production and supply. We believe we are entering such a period and will face this increasingly for some time to come.

Page 11

“Easy oil” will not keep up with demand. While we do not subscribe to the peak oil theory, the truth is that, particularly outside the Middle East, the readily accessible sources of conventional oil are being depleted. [28] To tap new resources requires hard choices. In some cases, that means spending more on exploration and development to find and tap ultra-deepwater resources as we are doing in the Gulf of Mexico. It means technology investments to convert oil sands to useable oil fluids as we are doing in Canada. And it means making the policy decisions necessary to grant access to areas where federal restrictions currently limit exploration and drilling.

Page 18

[13] In the town hall survey, 30 percent of respondents predicted global oil production would peak in less than 10 years; 28 percent predicted it would peak in 10-19 years. The general population responses were even higher: 33 percent and 35 percent respectively.

So… we’re not going to wake up one morning and see 72-point headlines that say “WORLD RUNS OUT OF OIL”, but we are in for one hell of a tight, and growing ever tighter, market because cheap oil is no longer enough to meet demand? Sounds like someone at Shell has been reading Skrebowski or Simmons or even this site.

Just whatever you do, don’t call it That Which Must Not Be Mentioned Or Validated, peak oil.

Boo!