EENews (subscription required) reported yesterday that the organization “CO2 Is Green,” a front organization for energy companies, published a particularly rabble rousing ad in today’s Washington Post.
Because describing it is so much less satisfying, I reprint the ad in full here (you can see an image of the ad here):
The Kerry-Lieberman Cap and Trade Bill will drive the USA away from cheap efficient energy and permanently increase your cost of electricity, transportation fuel, and food.
Global Warming is caused by several factors such as the release of greenhouse gases like carbon dioxide into the atmosphere. One solution to the problem is to capture the carbon dioxide before it enters the atmosphere, and instead, deposit the CO2 into the ground. However, up to this point, scientists have been unable to effectively track how it might move underground. The desire is to get the CO2 in place and not have it move elsewhere and potentially cause problems. Now, with the advent of Electrical Resistivity Tomography (ERT), developed at the
There are many earth cycles. One is a cycling between warmer and colder periods which are commonly called ice ages. The causes of these cycles are complex and are related to how much sun radiation we get as well as some slight variation in the sun itself. Scientists have recently found a possible source of a huge carbon dioxide burp that happened some 18,000 years ago and which helped to end the last ice age.
The widespread adoption of energy efficient light bulbs, fans, refrigerators, air conditioners, and irrigation pumps can overcome India’s electricity shortage by 2013 and significantly reduce the country’s rapidly growing carbon dioxide emissions, according to a new report. The study by the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory said such simple energy efficiency measures could add $608 billion to India’s gross domestic product by 2020 because they would eliminate the chronic energy shortages that frequently force businesses and factories to reduce production.
Process improvements can reduce carbon dioxide (CO2) air emissions. When that is done there can be left over, permitted CO2 air emissions that can be sold to other users. In doing so, a certain percentage of the original CO2 emissions are eliminated and cannot be sold. Hence a reduction in permitted CO2 air emissions overall.
Hungary last week carried out the first sale of certified emissions reductions (CERs) which Hungarian companies had already used to offset against their emissions in the European Union’s emissions trading scheme. These emission offsets are sold internationally to other companies.
Under the Kyoto Protocol, countries were granted a certain number of permits to release greenhouse gases into the atmosphere, called Assigned Amount Units (AAUs), which are equivalent to one ton of CO2 and are roughly equivalent to a CER.
The Protocol was originally signed in 1997 and went into full effect in 2005. The Protocol is intended to help reduce greenhouse gas emissions, such as CO2, and stabilize any potential climate change effects. Currently there are 187 countries that have ratified the Protocol.
Certain countries have a surplus of these AAU’s, partially due to much older or obsolete technology that was retired.
Wal-Mart officials have vowed to cut the company’s greenhouse gas emissions by 20 million metric tons by 2015, a sweeping strategy by the retail giant to reduce the carbon footprint of its network of suppliers and stores.
Company leaders say the cuts will more than offset the expected growth of its carbon emissions globally, and represent the equivalent of taking 3.8 million cars off the road.
Initially the company will target the suppliers and producers that emit the highest levels of carbon dioxide. Matt Kistler, senior vice president of sustainability, said initiatives will include cutting the CO2 emissions within the company’s massive transportation operation and reducing waste for fresh foods.
Friday, December 18th, 2009 was one of the saddest days of my career. The Copenhagen Climate Conference had ended with a non-binding Copenhagen Accord. And no one knew what it meant. When I returned to the negotiating center, it was as empty as the Copenhagen Accord. The NGO and government leaders had abandoned the center. And the accord’s emission reduction commitments were blank.
On January 31st, we got to see what the pledges are. The small island nation of the Maldives has committed to 100% mitigation by 2020. The Maldives foreign minister announced, “The Maldives’ submission of its mitigation action is voluntary and unconditional…The Maldives looks forward to its mitigation action being registered and publicly available.” That’s leadership.
Growing algae for biofuels is an energy-intensive process that can generate more greenhouse gases than the process sequesters, according to a new study.
Examining the life cycle of algal biofuels, researchers from the University of Virginia found that the process emits high levels of greenhouse gases because algal production requires using large amounts of fertilizer.
As the UN conference enters its second and decisive week, the calls for strong global action to deal with climate change do not appear to be penetrating inside Copenhagen’s Bella Center.
One week down here in Copenhagen, and an enormous tide of words and images and sounds. There have been nonstop press conferences (the press briefing room at the Bella Center actually has bouncers to make sure the rhythm never stops), and an anarchist can’t throw a rock without hitting a blogger. On Sunday, I attended an incredibly beautiful service at the central Lutheran cathedral, where the Archbishop of Canterbury preached one of the most powerful sermons I’ve heard in years.
Research conducted by the University of Bristol, and the University of Leeds in the UK have demonstrated that our climate models may be underestimating the effects of CO2 on global temperatures.
In the long term, the Earth’s temperature may be 30-50 per cent more sensitive to atmospheric carbon dioxide
than has previously been estimated, reports a new study published in Nature Geoscience this week.
The results show that components of the Earth’s climate system that vary over long timescales — such as land-ice and vegetation — have an important effect on this temperature sensitivity, but these factors are often neglected in current climate models.
Christmas Lights … scrooge or savior? (an annual refrain …) Do you love those displays of Christmas (or Hannukah or Kwanza or …) lights? Are you awed by those so impassioned that they string up 1000s of lights in awesome displays worthy of a city center?
I once did, pausing on cold winter nights, white clouds issuing from my mouth, enjoying being in the glow of beautiful displays. And, in a way, I was inspired that they would spend $1000s (or $10,000s) on displays and the electricity to power them so that others could enjoy the sight on those cold winter nights. But … no longer … not for awhile.
A study of the accumulation of carbon dioxide in the world’s oceans from 1765 to the present shows that as humanity pumps more CO2 into the atmosphere, the capacity of the world’s oceans to continue absorbing carbon appears to be decreasing.
Researchers from Columbia University and NASA estimate that since 2000, the proportion of fossil-fuel emissions absorbed by the oceans may have declined by as much as 10 percent. In effect, researchers say that industrial activity has been producing so much C02 since 1950 that the oceans are slowly becoming saturated with the gas.
The University of Bristol in the UK has published a study based not on climate modeling, but on statistical analysis of data including historical data from Antarctic ice cores.
The study shows that the balance between the airborne and the absorbed fraction of carbon dioxide has stayed approximately constant since 1850, despite emissions of carbon dioxide having risen from about 2 billion tons a year in 1850 to 35 billion tons a year now. This suggests that terrestrial ecosystems and the oceans have a much greater capacity to absorb CO2 than had been previously expected.
Global emissions of carbon dioxide will drop 3 percent in 2009, including a 5.9 percent decrease in the United States, as a result of the economic recession, according to energy forecasts.
A decrease in industrial activity accounts for three-quarters of the global emissions decline, the International Energy Agency reported at United Nations climate talks in Bangkok. The rest of the decline is the result of nations switching to renewable energy sources and nuclear power.
In the U.S., coal demand will likely drop 9 percent this year as electricity demand slips and more states switch to natural gas in the face of stiffer government oversight of greenhouse gas emissions, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration. Economic recovery would likely reverse the trend, and the agency predicts a 1.1 percent increase in CO2 emissions in 2010.