3. Just found this article about the solution of a "state institution" doing research on how to get independent from fossil fuels. I'm looking forward to see the oil companies fighting against NASA.
Semi-permable membrans make it able to grow algae in giant plastic bags in the ocean. While also taking CO2 ouf of the atmosphere and cleaning sewage provided as nutrition.
So the mentioned main reasons for unprofitable algae oil when it comes to land-based production seem to be eliminated: evaporation and price.
---------------------------------- NASA Envisions "Clean Energy" From Algae Grown in Waste Water
NASA scientists have proposed an ingenious and remarkably resourceful process to produce "clean energy" biofuels, that cleans waste water, removes carbon dioxide from the air, retains important nutrients, and does not compete with agriculture for land or freshwater.
When astronauts go into space, they must bring everything they need to survive. Living quarters on a spaceship require careful planning and management of limited resources, which is what inspired the project called “Sustainable Energy for Spaceship Earth.” It is a process that produces "clean energy" biofuels very efficiently and very resourcefully.
"The reason why algae are so interesting is because some of them produce lots of oil," said Jonathan Trent, the lead research scientist on the Spaceship Earth project at NASA Ames Research Center, Moffett Field, Calif. “In fact, most of the oil we are now getting out of the ground comes from algae that lived millions of years ago. Algae are still the best source of oil we know."
Algae are similar to other plants in that they remove carbon dioxide from the atmosphere, produce oxygen as a by-product of photosynthesis, and use phosphates, nitrogen, and trace elements to grow and flourish. Unlike many plants, they produce fatty, lipid cells loaded with oil that can be used as fuel.
Land plants currently used to produce biodiesel and other fuels include soy, canola, and palm trees. For the sake of comparison, soy beans produce about 50 gallons of oil per acre per year; canola produces about 160 gallons per acre per year, and palms about 600 gallons per acre per year. But some types of algae can produce at least 2,000 gallons of oil per acre per year.
The basic problem is growing enough algae to meet our country's enormous energy-consumption demands. Although algae live in water, land-based methods are used to grow algae. Two land-based methods used today are open ponds and closed bioreactors. Open ponds are shallow channels filled with freshwater or seawater, depending on the kind of algae that is grown. The water is circulated with paddle wheels to keep the algae suspended and the pond aerated. They are inexpensive to build and work well to grow algae, but have the inevitable problem of water evaporation. To prevent the ponds from drying out or becoming too salty, conditions that kill the algae, an endless supply of freshwater is needed to replenish the evaporating water.
When closed bioreactors are used to grow algae, water evaporation is no longer the biggest problem for algae's mass-production. Bioreactors, enclosed hardware systems made of clear plastic or glass, present their own problems. They can be computer-controlled and monitored around the clock for a more bountiful supply of algae. However, storing water on land and controlling its temperature are the big problems, making them prohibitively expensive to build and operate. In addition, both systems require a lot of land.
"The inspiration I had was to use offshore membrane enclosures to grow algae. We're going to deploy a large plastic bag in the ocean, and fill it with sewage. The algae use sewage to grow, and in the process of growing they clean up the sewage," said Trent.
It is a simple, but elegant concept. The bag will be made of semi-permeable membranes that allow fresh water to flow out into the ocean, while retaining the algae and nutrients. The membranes are called “forward-osmosis membranes.” NASA is testing these membranes for recycling dirty water on future long-duration space missions. They are normal membranes that allow the water to run one way. With salt water on the outside and fresh water on the inside, the membrane prevents the salt from diluting the fresh water. It’s a natural process, where large amounts of fresh water flow into the sea.
Floating on the ocean's surface, the inexpensive plastic bags will be collecting solar energy as the algae inside produce oxygen by photosynthesis. The algae will feed on the nutrients in the sewage, growing rich, fatty cells. Through osmosis, the bag will absorb carbon dioxide from the air, and release oxygen and fresh water. The temperature will be controlled by the heat capacity of the ocean, and the ocean's waves will keep the system mixed and active.
When the process is completed, biofuels will be made and sewage will be processed. For the first time, harmful sewage will no longer be dumped into the ocean. The algae and nutrients will be contained and collected in a bag. Not only will oil be produced, but nutrients will no longer be lost to the sea. According to Trent, the system ideally is fail proof. Even if the bag leaks, it won’t contaminate the local environment. The enclosed fresh water algae will die in the ocean.
The bags are expected to last two years, and will be recycled afterwards. The plastic material may be used as plastic mulch, or possibly as a solid amendment in fields to retain moisture.
“We have to remember,” Trent said, quoting Marshall McLuhan: “we are not passengers on spaceship Earth, we are the crew.”
For further information, please visit:
http://www.nasa.gov/centers/ames/greenspace/
Or visit:
http://www.nasa.gov/ames
Ruth Dasso Marlaire Ames Research Center, Moffett Field, Calif. -----------------------------
3. It will be interesting to see to what extent the immediate ten years looks like ecomarxist ideas or looks like ecological modernization...
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March 1, 2009 Eco barons lead the way Philip Beresford
Read the Green Rich List here
THE global rich are going green as never before. This first Sunday Times Green Rich List shows that the enthusiasm among the world’s wealthiest for investments in areas as diverse as electric cars, solar power and geothermal energy is unaffected by the recession.
The Green List has unearthed 100 tycoons or wealthy families worth £200m or more who have made either serious investments in green technology and businesses or hefty financial commitments to environmental causes. In total, the Green 100 are worth nearly £267 billion.This enormous sum demonstrates that many of the world’s richest tycoons and entrepreneurs have embraced environmentalism. Indeed, our list is dominated by America’s wealthiest financiers and entrepreneurs such as Warren Buffett (worth £27 billion) and Bill Gates (worth £26 billion).Related Links
* UK falls behind in green business
* The Green Rich List
These two canny investors, who regularly swap places at the top of Forbes magazine’s annual list of world billionaires, have spent some of their financial firepower on areas such as wind power and electric cars in Buffett’s case, while Gates has backed alternative fuels such as oil from algae. We are not talking trifling sums here. Buffett has invested $230m in the Hong Kong battery-maker BYD.Many of the 35 Americans in the Top 100 are drawn from Silicon Valley. [A real interesting bunch of atypical wealthy people: really quite libertarian (many I have read about quite innocent, pro-capitalistic, ideologically so...) leftists, actually.] Having made their first fortunes in microchips, the internet or software, the likes of Google’s Larry Page and Sergey Brin (each worth £7.5 billion) are turning to green investments with all the entrepreneurial zeal that made their first fortunes.
It helps that the Obama administration is committed to a huge stimulus package involving the very technologies that investors are focusing on.
Even tycoons who are not in President Barack Obama’s camp have moved into alternative energy, none more so than T Boone Pickens, oil explorer, corporate raider and a Texan Republican to his core. He is using part of his £1.8 billion fortune on filling the huge and windy Texas Panhandle with turbines as part of his Pickens Plan to wean America off its dependence on foreign energy.American money may be chasing smarter and greener technologies, while the Chinese rich on our list are definitely about mass production of green technologies.The 17 Chinese tycoons in the Top 100 are concentrated at the bottom end of the list and they are almost exclusively involved in solar and electric-car technology. [the world's largest automaker, Toyota, has just returned its first quarterly loss in over 70 years, out of attempting to challenge Chinese automakers for the hybrid market...and Japan lost.]
It is a ferociously competitive market with unremitting pressure to cut costs and gain market share.
As such, all the Chinese fortunes have been hammered as share prices have fallen sharply. A year ago, many would have been in the Top 50, but not now. Indeed, some of them will not survive the steep downturn they are now battling through. But out of it will emerge winners selling much cheaper and more technically advanced products to a huge market worldwide.
There are 10 British or British-based tycoons on the list. None is going head-to-head with the Chinese in mass production. And they are not taking the German route. The seven German tycoons are largely involved in wind turbines and the like. This is a bespoke market — meat and drink to the German industrial sector.
The pity is that aside from Sir Richard Branson, who is investing in alternative fuels, there are no real British equivalents of Aloys Wobben. A German engineering graduate, Wobben started Enercon in 1984, building his first wind turbine in his back garden. Today the company employs 6,000 staff and exports sophisticated turbines all over the world.
German entrepreneurs who have made their fortunes elsewhere are also moving into green technology in a serious way, defying the prevailing economic gloom.
Twins Andreas and Thomas Strungmann built a £6.8 billion pharmaceutical fortune.
Having sold their pharma business, they put many millions into saving a German solar company early last year just as the economic outlook worsened.
America’s wealthy are not just investing in new technology, they are also spending their fortunes on direct environmental activism, saving large tracts of wilderness from developers, [though creating large 'neoliberalist feudal' estates?] endowing university research into green energy, climate change and the like.
This can have a huge impact in changing the mood in favour of more green activism on the political front, making the climate right for Obama to push through radical green initiatives that would not have been contemplated in George Bush’s presidency.
There is little evidence of any appetite among Britain’s super-rich for this approach. Firmly rooted in property, finance or retailing, they have little time or surplus wealth for anything other than lip service to green issues. [This quite echoes the whole green movemnet in the UK--very dismal and always heavily repressed, as noted in the book Green States and Social Movements.]
They are also involved in firefighting to keep their businesses afloat. When the recession is over, there are precious few forecasters who think the City and the like will return to its glory days.
With traditional factories and industries closing in record numbers, where will Britain’s future prosperity come from? It is a sobering thought.
Dr Philip Beresford has compiled The Sunday Times Rich List since 1989
* Have your say
Paul from Wellington, actually, research is NOT conclusive on c02 helping plant growth. Generally the research results are mixed, with quite a few studies finding little or no benefit (Stanford's 2002 study). Those that do find benefit generally note that it is small, with a loss in plant protein. What is REALLY absurd, is people who make pronouncements about environmental issues without knowing the facts. I am going to side with the majority of the world's scientists (recent surveys by the Statistical Service and the University of Illinios indicate that they DO believe humans are having a serious negative impact on the environment and mitigating steps need to be taken urgently). For these wh0 are investing their money in green energy, fantastic!! I've just installed solar at my house and now the electricity company pays me for energy.
Frank, Sydney, Australia
Here in Frankfurt last year a block of four luxury apartments sold at double the going rate. The whole block is run on solar power.
Alan, Frankfurt, Germany
Even if this is not global warming, and merely a repeat of what happen those many decades ago... why doesn't anyone seem to realise that - then there were hardly any people let alone billions with cars, machinery etc etc which are speeding up the process of this change in climate!!!!!! !!!!!!
J.Grant, Luton,
Luis,
Of course it does!
If CO2 doesn't cause global warming it isnt a pollutant! It is actually good for the environment because it enhances plant growth.
A lot of people say this, "even if it doesn't cause global warming its still good to go green"
This is absurd.
Paul, Wellington, NZ
Even if you are right, Dom, does it keep you from polluting less?
Luis, Lisbon, Portugal
Global warming does not exist - warming that is occurring in localised areas is caused by natural causes. The CO2 debate for instance: CO2 constitutes less than 0.05% of the atmosphere & the man-made portion of that is less than 2% at most. From ice cores we know CO2 levels were higher in 1250AD.
Dom, London,
I'd like to point out to Danny from Surrey that Ted Turner made his fortune from CNN not Bison! It's clearly just his hobby to raise these beasts. Macro power generation (a solar panel on each house) and Sahara generation are a genuine answer to Europe's contribution to saving our planet.
Joe, Blackheath, UK
Ted Turner isn't exactly helping. He makes a profit out of bison and buffalo meat. How is that helping the enviorment? He shouldn't be on this list.
Danny, Surrey, England
Here, here! Small-scale distributed electrical generation,could involve most households (and imaginations) in a "green shift", and perhaps push the politicians, who don't seem to have much vision.
C.Smith, Lethbridge, Canada
Good luck to all you guys. Investing in green energy is the best thing ever to happen to this world. You have the power to forge a whole new economy. Stay at it with gods blessing, you have a long way to go.
The Green Rich List A special survey of how the world's wealthiest people are turning into eco-pioneers Philip Beresford
The global rich are going green as never before. This first Sunday Times Green Rich List shows that the enthusiasm among the world’s wealthiest for investments in areas as diverse as electric cars, solar power and geothermal energy is unaffected by the recession. Read the full articleClick on the names to read detailed files on each entry
U.S. Curbs Use of Species Act in Protecting Polar Bear May 8, 2009
The bear was listed as a threatened species under the act last May. But
the special rule, adopted in December, said this designation did not give
the Interior Department the authority to limit greenhouse gases outside
the bears’ Arctic range.
This article reminded me of the case study articles we had in class,
where different social sectors respond differently when environmental
problem occurs (e.g. treadmill, lobster management). In this article, the
government's decision is under the spotlight. I believe their rule may
lead to either outcome: - "enforce" middle sectors of manufacturing industries to reduce
emission.(hopefully even with WHAT and HOW they manufacture...) - continue to "encourage" emission regardless of endangered species.
According to Kostyack, executive director at National Wildlife
Federation, the rule is only going to grow unawareness of connection b/w
polar bears and greenhouse gas. I think he is partly right.
I do not know what 'the endangered species law' is, but it is considered
by environmental groups as a strong strategic legal tool to call for
government attention or rein in emmision.
In the latest polar bear protection update, it reports: "Interior Department officials said that the administration is committed to controlling such emissions using other means and protecting the bears from more direct threats using the act and other environmental laws."Throught this issue, I found that policies set up around endangered species is not only an environmental issue but a legal & administrative issue, and moreover boarderless issue as long as greenhouse gas "emission" is regarded as a major threat for these vulnerable creatures... So much for this "Interior" Department officials in nowadays of "global" warming.
----------------------------------------------
The Obama administration said Friday that it would retain a wildlife
rule issued in the last days of the Bush administration that says the
government cannot invoke the Endangered Species Act to restrict emissions
of greenhouse gases threatening the polar bear and its habitat.In essence, the decision means that two consecutive presidents have
judged that the act is not an appropriate means of curbing the emissions
that scientists have linked to global warming.The bear was listed as a threatened species under the act last May. But
the special rule, adopted in December, said this designation did not give
the Interior Department the authority to limit greenhouse gases outside
the bears’ Arctic range. In announcing Friday that the rule would stand, Interior Secretary Ken
Salazar said, “The single greatest threat to the polar bear is the
melting of Arctic sea ice due to climate change.” But, Mr. Salazar said,
the global risk from greenhouse gases, which are generated worldwide,
requires comprehensive policies, not a patchwork of agency actions
carried out for particular species.
“It would be very difficult for our scientists to be doing
evaluations of a cement plant in Georgia or Florida and the impact it’s
going to have on the polar bear habitat,” Mr. Salazar said. “I just don
’t think the Endangered Species Act was ever set up with that
contemplation in mind."“I do think what makes sense is for us to move forward with climate
change and energy legislation,” he added. “It is a signature issue of
these times.”
Environmental groups have turned in recent years to a variety of legal
tools, including the endangered species law, as a strategy to force
government agencies to rein in emissions that scientists say are the
dominant cause of recent warming.This year, for example, the Environmental Protection Agency, prodded by a
lawsuit, agreed under the Clean Water Act to start assessing the risks
posed by the main greenhouse gas emission, carbon dioxide, as it is
absorbed in seawater.
And only this week, also in response to a lawsuit, the Interior
Department announced that a study was being undertaken to assess whether
another mammal, the diminutive American pika, should be listed as
threatened because of climate change.
The administration’s decision to retain the polar bear rule appears to
signal President Obama’s willingness to let such suits play out in the
courts as broader policies are developed to fight global warming.
Environmentalists who had been pressing the White House to drop the Bush
-era rule criticized the decision, predicting that the rule would
ultimately be deemed illegal in the courts.
“The action taken by Salazar today, and the spin on that action, is
every bit as cynical, abusive and antiscientific as the Bush
administration,” said Kierán Suckling, executive director of the Center
for Biological Diversity, one of several environmental groups that have
sued to challenge the rule.Some critics of the decision said it contradicted the approach the
administration took when it chose to pursue restrictions on greenhouse
gases under the Clean Air Act. That measure, which applies to national
air pollution standards, is also not a perfect fit for a globally
dispersed gas like carbon dioxide, they said.
Yet Democratic lawmakers, dozens of whom had signed a letter to Mr.
Salazar urging that the rule be dropped, were largely silent on Friday.
They are pushing hard for climate legislation limiting greenhouse gases
and are still working out details with Mr. Obama.
Republicans in Congress and industry representatives had argued that
without the rule, any proposed housing development, power plant or other
project requiring a government permit could face a review of how its
emissions might harm not only polar bears but eventually a list of other
species that could be imperiled by climate change.
Jack N. Gerard, president of the American Petroleum Institute,
endorsed Friday’s move by the administration, saying it would provide “
greater regulatory certainty not only to the oil and natural gas industry
but also to all U.S. manufacturers.”Some environmental campaigners offered a mixed view of the situation.
John Kostyack, executive director for wildlife conservation and global
warming at the National Wildlife Federation, criticized the decision
to retain the rule, which he said falsely asserted that there was no
direct link between specific greenhouse gas emissions and the decline in
the polar bear’s habitat.But Mr. Kostyack said there was no way that the Fish and Wildlife
Service, the Interior Department agency responsible for carrying out the
Endangered Species Act, could handle the burden of trying to police
emissions.
In addition to conventional threats, a vital focus for wildlife managers
should be figuring out how to help vulnerable species adapt to climate
stresses, he said.
“The last thing we want to do,” he said, “is saddle them with solving
3. This is an article discussing how former president Carter believes that the failure of the United States to gain energy independence is a major contributing factor to global warming. He also thinks that it is severely limiting future economic growth. This article is important and interesting because it is extremely relevant in the world today.
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Carter pushes energy reform plan to Congress
* Story Highlights * "Our entire status as a leading nation" will depend on energy role, ex-president says * Energy independence would protect national security, create jobs, he claims * Congress continues to consider broad-reaching energy legislation
May 12, 2009 -- Updated 2311 GMT (0711 HKT)
* Next Article in Politics »
* Read * VIDEO
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WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Former President Carter warned members of Congress on Tuesday that America's failure to achieve energy independence is threatening the country's national security, undermining its long-term potential for economic growth and contributing to global warming. Former President Carter said Tuesday that the United States must end its energy-based vulnerability.
Former President Carter said Tuesday that the United States must end its energy-based vulnerability.
"Collectively, nothing could be more important than this question of energy," Carter said during a rare presidential appearance before a congressional committee.
"I would guess that our entire status as a leading nation in the world will depend on the role that we play in energy and environment in the future."
Carter, who in 1977 famously declared the fight for energy independence to be "the moral equivalent of war," told members of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee that reaching that goal is crucial to ending the country's "vulnerability to possible pressures and blackmail."
Right now, he noted, "whether we admit it or not, we are very careful not to aggravate our major oil suppliers." Video Watch Carter talk about energy and security »
He also asserted that more jobs will be gained than lost by transitioning the country away from fossil fuels and toward cleaner, renewable energy sources.
Carter's testimony came as Congress continues its consideration of broad-reaching energy legislation with the potential to dramatically tighten emissions controls while reshaping America's environmental standards.
Among other things, the American Clean Energy and Security Act would create a controversial "cap-and-trade" system establishing steadily declining limits on greenhouse gas emissions over the next four decades.
Under the bill, polluters would be able to buy and sell emissions credits while utilities would be required to generate an increasing amount of power from renewable sources.
Congressional attention to the issue is being driven by President Obama, who, like Carter, has placed energy near the top of his domestic agenda.
Carter suggested that energy reform advocates craft an omnibus proposal that could be considered collectively by Congress in order to minimize "adverse influence of special interest groups" opposed to any major changes.
Powerful entrenched interests ultimately helped derail his administration's energy agenda, he said.
Carter noted that his administration nevertheless succeeded in reducing net oil imports by 50 percent, from 8.6 to 4.3 million barrels per day. But after "a long period of energy complacency," he said, daily imports to the United States are now almost 13 million barrels.
America consumes 2.5 times more oil than China and 7.5 times more than India, he noted. On a per capita basis, the United States consumes 12 times more oil than China and 28 times more than India.
"Although our rich nation can afford these daily purchases, there is little doubt that, in general terms, we are constrained not to alienate our major oil suppliers, which puts a restraint on our nation's foreign policy," Carter said.
The former president reminded committee members that, as part of his drive for renewable energy, he had ordered 32 solar panels to be placed on the roof of the White House in 1979. But the panels were removed "almost instantaneously after [Ronald Reagan] moved into the White House, with assurances to the American people that such drastic action would no longer be necessary."
Sen. John Kerry, D-Massachusetts, opened the hearing by noting that the price of a barrel of oil has fallen $90 below the record high hit in summer 2008. Unfortunately, Kerry added, the "political will to take decisive action has dissipated" as each past energy crisis has subsided. advertisement
Carter "had the courage to tell the truth to Americans [and] set America on the right path in the 1970s," Kerry said. "Regrettably, the ensuing years saw those efforts unfunded [and] stripped away."
Richard Nixon was the first president to set a goal of energy independence, Kerry noted. Nixon called for that goal to be reached by
1. Young Hui Na 2. The Kuznets Curve and Environmental Optimism. 3. The article explains about the Kuznets curve and how more economic development essentially leads to better environment. I felt that this article shared similar views with the ecological modernization theory. However, the mere fact that it is more 'reliable than a revolution' doesn't sound so comforting. There are China, India and a variety of other countries ready to step up the ladder towards more growth, and countries will never give up on the competition to dominate the relatively superior economic positions. Unless this nature of capitalism is somehow safely bound by certain global measures or strong national consensus, the ecological modernization theory or the Kuznets curve only seem to explain the small portion of highly moral, future-oriented people.
------------------------- Use Energy, Get Rich and Save the Planet Sign in to RecommendSign In to E-Mail Print Reprints ShareClose LinkedinDiggFacebookMixxMySpaceYahoo! BuzzPermalinkBy JOHN TIERNEY Published: April 20, 2009 When the first Earth Day took place in 1970, American environmentalists had good reason to feel guilty. The nation’s affluence and advanced technology seemed so obviously bad for the planet that they were featured in a famous equation developed by the ecologist Paul Ehrlich and the physicist John P. Holdren, who is now President Obama’s science adviser.
Their equation was I=PAT, which means that environmental impact is equal to population multiplied by affluence multiplied by technology. Protecting the planet seemed to require fewer people, less wealth and simpler technology — the same sort of social transformation and energy revolution that will be advocated at many Earth Day rallies on Wednesday.
But among researchers who analyze environmental data, a lot has changed since the 1970s. With the benefit of their hindsight and improved equations, I’ll make a couple of predictions:
1. There will be no green revolution in energy or anything else. No leader or law or treaty will radically change the energy sources for people and industries in the United States or other countries. No recession or depression will make a lasting change in consumers’ passions to use energy, make money and buy new technology — and that, believe it or not, is good news, because...
2. The richer everyone gets, the greener the planet will be in the long run.
I realize this second prediction seems hard to believe when you consider the carbon being dumped into the atmosphere today by Americans, and the projections for increasing emissions from India and China as they get richer.
Those projections make it easy to assume that affluence and technology inflict more harm on the environment. But while pollution can increase when a country starts industrializing, as people get wealthier they can afford cleaner water and air. They start using sources of energy that are less carbon-intensive — and not just because they’re worried about global warming. The process of “decarbonization” started long before Al Gore was born.
The old wealth-is-bad IPAT theory may have made intuitive sense, but it didn’t jibe with the data that has been analyzed since that first Earth Day. By the 1990s, researchers realized that graphs of environmental impact didn’t produce a simple upward-sloping line as countries got richer. The line more often rose, flattened out and then reversed so that it sloped downward, forming the shape of a dome or an inverted U — what’s called a Kuznets curve. (See nytimes.com/tierneylab for an example.)
In dozens of studies, researchers identified Kuznets curves for a variety of environmental problems. There are exceptions to the trend, especially in countries with inept governments and poor systems of property rights, but in general, richer is eventually greener. As incomes go up, people often focus first on cleaning up their drinking water, and then later on air pollutants like sulfur dioxide.
As their wealth grows, people consume more energy, but they move to more efficient and cleaner sources — from wood to coal and oil, and then to natural gas and nuclear power, progressively emitting less carbon per unit of energy. This global decarbonization trend has been proceeding at a remarkably steady rate since 1850, according to Jesse Ausubel of Rockefeller University and Paul Waggoner of the Connecticut Agricultural Experiment Station.
“Once you have lots of high-rises filled with computers operating all the time, the energy delivered has to be very clean and compact,” said Mr. Ausubel, the director of the Program for the Human Environment at Rockefeller. “The long-term trend is toward natural gas and nuclear power, or conceivably solar power. If the energy system is left to its own devices, most of the carbon will be out of it by 2060 or 2070.”
But what about all the carbon dioxide being spewed out today by Americans commuting to McMansions? Well, it’s true that American suburbanites do emit more greenhouse gases than most other people in the world (although New Yorkers aren’t much different from other affluent urbanites).
But the United States and other Western countries seem to be near the top of a Kuznets curve for carbon emissions and ready to start the happy downward slope. The amount of carbon emitted by the average American has remained fairly flat for the past couple of decades, and per capita carbon emissions have started declining in some countries, like France. Some researchers estimate that the turning point might come when a country’s per capita income reaches $30,000, but it can vary widely, depending on what fuels are available. Meanwhile, more carbon is being taken out of the atmosphere by the expanding forests in America and other affluent countries. Deforestation follows a Kuznets curve, too. In poor countries, forests are cleared to provide fuel and farmland, but as people gain wealth and better agricultural technology, the farm fields start reverting to forestland.
Of course, even if rich countries’ greenhouse impact declines, there will still be an increase in carbon emissions from China, India and other countries ascending the Kuznets curve. While that prospect has environmentalists lobbying for global restrictions on greenhouse gases, some economists fear that a global treaty could ultimately hurt the atmosphere by slowing economic growth, thereby lengthening the time it takes for poor countries to reach the turning point on the curve.
But then, is there much reason to think that countries at different stages of the Kuznets curve could even agree to enforce tough restrictions? The Kyoto treaty didn’t transform Europe’s industries or consumers. While some American environmentalists hope that the combination of the economic crisis and a new president can start an era of energy austerity and green power, Mr. Ausubel says they’re hoping against history.
Over the past century, he says, nothing has drastically altered the long-term trends in the way Americans produce or use energy — not the Great Depression, not the world wars, not the energy crisis of the 1970s or the grand programs to produce alternative energy.
“Energy systems evolve with a particular logic, gradually, and they don’t suddenly morph into something different,” Mr. Ausubel says. That doesn’t make for a rousing speech on Earth Day. But in the long run, a Kuznets curve is more reliable than a revolution.
A very down to earth* kind of guy. I'm an environmental sociologist interested in establishing material and organizational sustainability worldwide. I'm always looking for interesting materials/technologies, inspiring ideas, or institutional examples of sustainability to inspire others to recognize their choices now. To be fatalistic about an unsustainable world is a sign of a captive mind, given all our options.
*(If "earth" is defined in a planetary sense, concerning comparative historical knowledge and interest in the past 10,000 years or so anywhere...) See both blogs.
1. Martin Weiser
ReplyDelete2. Algue grown in Waste
3. Just found this article about the solution of a "state institution" doing research on how to get independent from fossil fuels. I'm looking forward to see the oil companies fighting against NASA.
Semi-permable membrans make it able to grow algae in giant plastic bags in the ocean. While also taking CO2 ouf of the atmosphere and cleaning sewage provided as nutrition.
So the mentioned main reasons for unprofitable algae oil when it comes to land-based production seem to be eliminated: evaporation and price.
----------------------------------
NASA Envisions "Clean Energy" From Algae Grown in Waste Water
NASA scientists have proposed an ingenious and remarkably resourceful process to produce "clean energy" biofuels, that cleans waste water, removes carbon dioxide from the air, retains important nutrients, and does not compete with agriculture for land or freshwater.
When astronauts go into space, they must bring everything they need to survive. Living quarters on a spaceship require careful planning and management of limited resources, which is what inspired the project called “Sustainable Energy for Spaceship Earth.” It is a process that produces "clean energy" biofuels very efficiently and very resourcefully.
"The reason why algae are so interesting is because some of them produce lots of oil," said Jonathan Trent, the lead research scientist on the Spaceship Earth project at NASA Ames Research Center, Moffett Field, Calif. “In fact, most of the oil we are now getting out of the ground comes from algae that lived millions of years ago. Algae are still the best source of oil we know."
Algae are similar to other plants in that they remove carbon dioxide from the atmosphere, produce oxygen as a by-product of photosynthesis, and use phosphates, nitrogen, and trace elements to grow and flourish. Unlike many plants, they produce fatty, lipid cells loaded with oil that can be used as fuel.
Land plants currently used to produce biodiesel and other fuels include soy, canola, and palm trees. For the sake of comparison, soy beans produce about 50 gallons of oil per acre per year; canola produces about 160 gallons per acre per year, and palms about 600 gallons per acre per year. But some types of algae can produce at least 2,000 gallons of oil per acre per year.
The basic problem is growing enough algae to meet our country's enormous energy-consumption demands. Although algae live in water, land-based methods are used to grow algae. Two land-based methods used today are open ponds and closed bioreactors. Open ponds are shallow channels filled with freshwater or seawater, depending on the kind of algae that is grown. The water is circulated with paddle wheels to keep the algae suspended and the pond aerated. They are inexpensive to build and work well to grow algae, but have the inevitable problem of water evaporation. To prevent the ponds from drying out or becoming too salty, conditions that kill the algae, an endless supply of freshwater is needed to replenish the evaporating water.
When closed bioreactors are used to grow algae, water evaporation is no longer the biggest problem for algae's mass-production. Bioreactors, enclosed hardware systems made of clear plastic or glass, present their own problems. They can be computer-controlled and monitored around the clock for a more bountiful supply of algae. However, storing water on land and controlling its temperature are the big problems, making them prohibitively expensive to build and operate. In addition, both systems require a lot of land.
"The inspiration I had was to use offshore membrane enclosures to grow algae. We're going to deploy a large plastic bag in the ocean, and fill it with sewage. The algae use sewage to grow, and in the process of growing they clean up the sewage," said Trent.
It is a simple, but elegant concept. The bag will be made of semi-permeable membranes that allow fresh water to flow out into the ocean, while retaining the algae and nutrients. The membranes are called “forward-osmosis membranes.” NASA is testing these membranes for recycling dirty water on future long-duration space missions. They are normal membranes that allow the water to run one way. With salt water on the outside and fresh water on the inside, the membrane prevents the salt from diluting the fresh water. It’s a natural process, where large amounts of fresh water flow into the sea.
Floating on the ocean's surface, the inexpensive plastic bags will be collecting solar energy as the algae inside produce oxygen by photosynthesis. The algae will feed on the nutrients in the sewage, growing rich, fatty cells. Through osmosis, the bag will absorb carbon dioxide from the air, and release oxygen and fresh water. The temperature will be controlled by the heat capacity of the ocean, and the ocean's waves will keep the system mixed and active.
When the process is completed, biofuels will be made and sewage will be processed. For the first time, harmful sewage will no longer be dumped into the ocean. The algae and nutrients will be contained and collected in a bag. Not only will oil be produced, but nutrients will no longer be lost to the sea. According to Trent, the system ideally is fail proof. Even if the bag leaks, it won’t contaminate the local environment. The enclosed fresh water algae will die in the ocean.
The bags are expected to last two years, and will be recycled afterwards. The plastic material may be used as plastic mulch, or possibly as a solid amendment in fields to retain moisture.
“We have to remember,” Trent said, quoting Marshall McLuhan: “we are not passengers on spaceship Earth, we are the crew.”
For further information, please visit:
http://www.nasa.gov/centers/ames/greenspace/
Or visit:
http://www.nasa.gov/ames
Ruth Dasso Marlaire
Ames Research Center, Moffett Field, Calif.
-----------------------------
http://www.nasa.gov/centers/ames/news/features/2009/clean_energy_042209.html
1. Mark Whitaker
ReplyDelete2. "Eco Financial Barons" Go Green
3. It will be interesting to see to what extent the immediate ten years looks like ecomarxist ideas or looks like ecological modernization...
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March 1, 2009
Eco barons lead the way
Philip Beresford
Read the Green Rich List here
THE global rich are going green as never before. This first Sunday Times Green Rich List shows that the enthusiasm among the world’s wealthiest for investments in areas as diverse as electric cars, solar power and geothermal energy is unaffected by the recession.
The Green List has unearthed 100 tycoons or wealthy families worth £200m or more who have made either serious investments in green technology and businesses or hefty financial commitments to environmental causes. In total, the Green 100 are worth nearly £267 billion.This enormous sum demonstrates that many of the world’s richest tycoons and entrepreneurs have embraced environmentalism. Indeed, our list is dominated by America’s wealthiest financiers and entrepreneurs such as Warren Buffett (worth £27 billion) and Bill Gates (worth £26 billion).Related Links
* UK falls behind in green business
* The Green Rich List
These two canny investors, who regularly swap places at the top of Forbes magazine’s annual list of world billionaires, have spent some of their financial firepower on areas such as wind power and electric cars in Buffett’s case, while Gates has backed alternative fuels such as oil from algae. We are not talking trifling sums here. Buffett has invested $230m in the Hong Kong battery-maker BYD.Many of the 35 Americans in the Top 100 are drawn from Silicon Valley. [A real interesting bunch of atypical wealthy people: really quite libertarian (many I have read about quite innocent, pro-capitalistic, ideologically so...) leftists, actually.] Having made their first fortunes in microchips, the internet or software, the likes of Google’s Larry Page and Sergey Brin (each worth £7.5 billion) are turning to green investments with all the entrepreneurial zeal that made their first fortunes.
It helps that the Obama administration is committed to a huge stimulus package involving the very technologies that investors are focusing on.
Even tycoons who are not in President Barack Obama’s camp have moved into alternative energy, none more so than T Boone Pickens, oil explorer, corporate raider and a Texan Republican to his core. He is using part of his £1.8 billion fortune on filling the huge and windy Texas Panhandle with turbines as part of his Pickens Plan to wean America off its dependence on foreign energy.American money may be chasing smarter and greener technologies, while the Chinese rich on our list are definitely about mass production of green technologies.The 17 Chinese tycoons in the Top 100 are concentrated at the bottom end of the list and they are almost exclusively involved in solar and electric-car technology. [the world's largest automaker, Toyota, has just returned its first quarterly loss in over 70 years, out of attempting to challenge Chinese automakers for the hybrid market...and Japan lost.]
It is a ferociously competitive market with unremitting pressure to cut costs and gain market share.
As such, all the Chinese fortunes have been hammered as share prices have fallen sharply. A year ago, many would have been in the Top 50, but not now. Indeed, some of them will not survive the steep downturn they are now battling through. But out of it will emerge winners selling much cheaper and more technically advanced products to a huge market worldwide.
There are 10 British or British-based tycoons on the list. None is going head-to-head with the Chinese in mass production. And they are not taking the German route. The seven German tycoons are largely involved in wind turbines and the like. This is a bespoke market — meat and drink to the German industrial sector.
The pity is that aside from Sir Richard Branson, who is investing in alternative fuels, there are no real British equivalents of Aloys Wobben. A German engineering graduate, Wobben started Enercon in 1984, building his first wind turbine in his back garden. Today the company employs 6,000 staff and exports sophisticated turbines all over the world.
German entrepreneurs who have made their fortunes elsewhere are also moving into green technology in a serious way, defying the prevailing economic gloom.
Twins Andreas and Thomas Strungmann built a £6.8 billion pharmaceutical fortune.
Having sold their pharma business, they put many millions into saving a German solar company early last year just as the economic outlook worsened.
America’s wealthy are not just investing in new technology, they are also spending their fortunes on direct environmental activism, saving large tracts of wilderness from developers, [though creating large 'neoliberalist feudal' estates?] endowing university research into green energy, climate change and the like.
This can have a huge impact in changing the mood in favour of more green activism on the political front, making the climate right for Obama to push through radical green initiatives that would not have been contemplated in George Bush’s presidency.
There is little evidence of any appetite among Britain’s super-rich for this approach. Firmly rooted in property, finance or retailing, they have little time or surplus wealth for anything other than lip service to green issues. [This quite echoes the whole green movemnet in the UK--very dismal and always heavily repressed, as noted in the book Green States and Social Movements.]
They are also involved in firefighting to keep their businesses afloat. When the recession is over, there are precious few forecasters who think the City and the like will return to its glory days.
With traditional factories and industries closing in record numbers, where will Britain’s future prosperity come from? It is a sobering thought.
Dr Philip Beresford has compiled The Sunday Times Rich List since 1989
* Have your say
Paul from Wellington, actually, research is NOT conclusive on c02 helping plant growth. Generally the research results are mixed, with quite a few studies finding little or no benefit (Stanford's 2002 study). Those that do find benefit generally note that it is small, with a loss in plant protein.
What is REALLY absurd, is people who make pronouncements about environmental issues without knowing the facts. I am going to side with the majority of the world's scientists (recent surveys by the Statistical Service and the University of Illinios indicate that they DO believe humans are having a serious negative impact on the environment and mitigating steps need to be taken urgently).
For these wh0 are investing their money in green energy, fantastic!! I've just installed solar at my house and now the electricity company pays me for energy.
Frank, Sydney, Australia
Here in Frankfurt last year a block of four luxury apartments sold at double the going rate. The whole block is run on solar power.
Alan, Frankfurt, Germany
Even if this is not global warming, and merely a repeat of what happen those many decades ago... why doesn't anyone seem to realise that - then there were hardly any people let alone billions with cars, machinery etc etc which are speeding up the process of this change in climate!!!!!! !!!!!!
J.Grant, Luton,
Luis,
Of course it does!
If CO2 doesn't cause global warming it isnt a pollutant! It is actually good for the environment because it enhances plant growth.
A lot of people say this, "even if it doesn't cause global warming its still good to go green"
This is absurd.
Paul, Wellington, NZ
Even if you are right, Dom, does it keep you from polluting less?
Luis, Lisbon, Portugal
Global warming does not exist - warming that is occurring in localised areas is caused by natural causes.
The CO2 debate for instance: CO2 constitutes less than 0.05% of the atmosphere & the man-made portion of that is less than 2% at most. From ice cores we know CO2 levels were higher in 1250AD.
Dom, London,
I'd like to point out to Danny from Surrey that Ted Turner made his fortune from CNN not Bison! It's clearly just his hobby to raise these beasts. Macro power generation (a solar panel on each house) and Sahara generation are a genuine answer to Europe's contribution to saving our planet.
Joe, Blackheath, UK
Ted Turner isn't exactly helping. He makes a profit out of bison and buffalo meat. How is that helping the enviorment? He shouldn't be on this list.
Danny, Surrey, England
Here, here! Small-scale distributed electrical generation,could involve most households (and imaginations) in a "green shift", and perhaps push the politicians, who don't seem to have much vision.
C.Smith, Lethbridge, Canada
Good luck to all you guys. Investing in green energy is the best thing ever to happen to this world. You have the power to forge a whole new economy. Stay at it with gods blessing, you have a long way to go.
Robert Latimer, Brighton, England
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http://business.timesonline.co.uk/tol/business/specials/rich_list/article5821334.ece
The Green Rich List
A special survey of how the world's wealthiest people are turning into eco-pioneers
Philip Beresford
The global rich are going green as never before. This first Sunday Times Green Rich List shows that the enthusiasm among the world’s wealthiest for investments in areas as diverse as electric cars, solar power and geothermal energy is unaffected by the recession. Read the full articleClick on the names to read detailed files on each entry
http://business.timesonline.co.uk/tol/business/specials/article5816774.ece
Young-One Suh
ReplyDeleteU.S. Curbs Use of Species Act in Protecting Polar Bear
May 8, 2009
The bear was listed as a threatened species under the act last May. But
the special rule, adopted in December, said this designation did not give
the Interior Department the authority to limit greenhouse gases outside
the bears’ Arctic range.
This article reminded me of the case study articles we had in class,
where different social sectors respond differently when environmental
problem occurs (e.g. treadmill, lobster management). In this article, the
government's decision is under the spotlight. I believe their rule may
lead to either outcome:
- "enforce" middle sectors of manufacturing industries to reduce
emission.(hopefully even with WHAT and HOW they manufacture...)
- continue to "encourage" emission regardless of endangered species.
According to Kostyack, executive director at National Wildlife
Federation, the rule is only going to grow unawareness of connection b/w
polar bears and greenhouse gas. I think he is partly right.
I do not know what 'the endangered species law' is, but it is considered
by environmental groups as a strong strategic legal tool to call for
government attention or rein in emmision.
In the latest polar bear protection update, it reports: "Interior Department officials said that the administration is committed to controlling such emissions using other means and protecting the bears from more direct threats using the act and other environmental laws."Throught this issue, I found that policies set up around endangered species is not only an environmental issue but a legal & administrative issue, and moreover boarderless issue as long as greenhouse gas "emission" is regarded as a major threat for these vulnerable creatures...
So much for this "Interior" Department officials in nowadays of "global" warming.
----------------------------------------------
The Obama administration said Friday that it would retain a wildlife
rule issued in the last days of the Bush administration that says the
government cannot invoke the Endangered Species Act to restrict emissions
of greenhouse gases threatening the polar bear and its habitat.In essence, the decision means that two consecutive presidents have
judged that the act is not an appropriate means of curbing the emissions
that scientists have linked to global warming.The bear was listed as a threatened species under the act last May. But
the special rule, adopted in December, said this designation did not give
the Interior Department the authority to limit greenhouse gases outside
the bears’ Arctic range. In announcing Friday that the rule would stand, Interior Secretary Ken
Salazar said, “The single greatest threat to the polar bear is the
melting of Arctic sea ice due to climate change.” But, Mr. Salazar said,
the global risk from greenhouse gases, which are generated worldwide,
requires comprehensive policies, not a patchwork of agency actions
carried out for particular species.
“It would be very difficult for our scientists to be doing
evaluations of a cement plant in Georgia or Florida and the impact it’s
going to have on the polar bear habitat,” Mr. Salazar said. “I just don
’t think the Endangered Species Act was ever set up with that
contemplation in mind."“I do think what makes sense is for us to move forward with climate
change and energy legislation,” he added. “It is a signature issue of
these times.”
Environmental groups have turned in recent years to a variety of legal
tools, including the endangered species law, as a strategy to force
government agencies to rein in emissions that scientists say are the
dominant cause of recent warming.This year, for example, the Environmental Protection Agency, prodded by a
lawsuit, agreed under the Clean Water Act to start assessing the risks
posed by the main greenhouse gas emission, carbon dioxide, as it is
absorbed in seawater.
And only this week, also in response to a lawsuit, the Interior
Department announced that a study was being undertaken to assess whether
another mammal, the diminutive American pika, should be listed as
threatened because of climate change.
The administration’s decision to retain the polar bear rule appears to
signal President Obama’s willingness to let such suits play out in the
courts as broader policies are developed to fight global warming.
Environmentalists who had been pressing the White House to drop the Bush
-era rule criticized the decision, predicting that the rule would
ultimately be deemed illegal in the courts.
“The action taken by Salazar today, and the spin on that action, is
every bit as cynical, abusive and antiscientific as the Bush
administration,” said Kierán Suckling, executive director of the Center
for Biological Diversity, one of several environmental groups that have
sued to challenge the rule.Some critics of the decision said it contradicted the approach the
administration took when it chose to pursue restrictions on greenhouse
gases under the Clean Air Act. That measure, which applies to national
air pollution standards, is also not a perfect fit for a globally
dispersed gas like carbon dioxide, they said.
Yet Democratic lawmakers, dozens of whom had signed a letter to Mr.
Salazar urging that the rule be dropped, were largely silent on Friday.
They are pushing hard for climate legislation limiting greenhouse gases
and are still working out details with Mr. Obama.
Republicans in Congress and industry representatives had argued that
without the rule, any proposed housing development, power plant or other
project requiring a government permit could face a review of how its
emissions might harm not only polar bears but eventually a list of other
species that could be imperiled by climate change.
Jack N. Gerard, president of the American Petroleum Institute,
endorsed Friday’s move by the administration, saying it would provide “
greater regulatory certainty not only to the oil and natural gas industry
but also to all U.S. manufacturers.”Some environmental campaigners offered a mixed view of the situation.
John Kostyack, executive director for wildlife conservation and global
warming at the National Wildlife Federation, criticized the decision
to retain the rule, which he said falsely asserted that there was no
direct link between specific greenhouse gas emissions and the decline in
the polar bear’s habitat.But Mr. Kostyack said there was no way that the Fish and Wildlife
Service, the Interior Department agency responsible for carrying out the
Endangered Species Act, could handle the burden of trying to police
emissions.
In addition to conventional threats, a vital focus for wildlife managers
should be figuring out how to help vulnerable species adapt to climate
stresses, he said.
“The last thing we want to do,” he said, “is saddle them with solving
the causes of global warming, too.”
-------------------------------------------------
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/09/science/earth/09bear.html?_r=1
1. Anne Severe
ReplyDelete2. Carter & energy Reform
3. This is an article discussing how former president Carter believes that the failure of the United States to gain energy independence is a major contributing factor to global warming. He also thinks that it is severely limiting future economic growth. This article is important and interesting because it is extremely relevant in the world today.
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Carter pushes energy reform plan to Congress
* Story Highlights
* "Our entire status as a leading nation" will depend on energy role, ex-president says
* Energy independence would protect national security, create jobs, he claims
* Congress continues to consider broad-reaching energy legislation
May 12, 2009 -- Updated 2311 GMT (0711 HKT)
* Next Article in Politics »
* Read
* VIDEO
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WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Former President Carter warned members of Congress on Tuesday that America's failure to achieve energy independence is threatening the country's national security, undermining its long-term potential for economic growth and contributing to global warming.
Former President Carter said Tuesday that the United States must end its energy-based vulnerability.
Former President Carter said Tuesday that the United States must end its energy-based vulnerability.
"Collectively, nothing could be more important than this question of energy," Carter said during a rare presidential appearance before a congressional committee.
"I would guess that our entire status as a leading nation in the world will depend on the role that we play in energy and environment in the future."
Carter, who in 1977 famously declared the fight for energy independence to be "the moral equivalent of war," told members of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee that reaching that goal is crucial to ending the country's "vulnerability to possible pressures and blackmail."
Right now, he noted, "whether we admit it or not, we are very careful not to aggravate our major oil suppliers." Video Watch Carter talk about energy and security »
He also asserted that more jobs will be gained than lost by transitioning the country away from fossil fuels and toward cleaner, renewable energy sources.
Carter's testimony came as Congress continues its consideration of broad-reaching energy legislation with the potential to dramatically tighten emissions controls while reshaping America's environmental standards.
Among other things, the American Clean Energy and Security Act would create a controversial "cap-and-trade" system establishing steadily declining limits on greenhouse gas emissions over the next four decades.
Under the bill, polluters would be able to buy and sell emissions credits while utilities would be required to generate an increasing amount of power from renewable sources.
Congressional attention to the issue is being driven by President Obama, who, like Carter, has placed energy near the top of his domestic agenda.
Carter suggested that energy reform advocates craft an omnibus proposal that could be considered collectively by Congress in order to minimize "adverse influence of special interest groups" opposed to any major changes.
Powerful entrenched interests ultimately helped derail his administration's energy agenda, he said.
Carter noted that his administration nevertheless succeeded in reducing net oil imports by 50 percent, from 8.6 to 4.3 million barrels per day. But after "a long period of energy complacency," he said, daily imports to the United States are now almost 13 million barrels.
America consumes 2.5 times more oil than China and 7.5 times more than India, he noted. On a per capita basis, the United States consumes 12 times more oil than China and 28 times more than India.
"Although our rich nation can afford these daily purchases, there is little doubt that, in general terms, we are constrained not to alienate our major oil suppliers, which puts a restraint on our nation's foreign policy," Carter said.
The former president reminded committee members that, as part of his drive for renewable energy, he had ordered 32 solar panels to be placed on the roof of the White House in 1979. But the panels were removed "almost instantaneously after [Ronald Reagan] moved into the White House, with assurances to the American people that such drastic action would no longer be necessary."
Sen. John Kerry, D-Massachusetts, opened the hearing by noting that the price of a barrel of oil has fallen $90 below the record high hit in summer 2008. Unfortunately, Kerry added, the "political will to take decisive action has dissipated" as each past energy crisis has subsided.
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Carter "had the courage to tell the truth to Americans [and] set America on the right path in the 1970s," Kerry said. "Regrettably, the ensuing years saw those efforts unfunded [and] stripped away."
Richard Nixon was the first president to set a goal of energy independence, Kerry noted. Nixon called for that goal to be reached by
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http://edition.cnn.com/2009/POLITICS/05/12/carter.energy/index.html
[late submission]
ReplyDelete1. Young Hui Na
2. The Kuznets Curve and Environmental Optimism.
3. The article explains about the Kuznets curve and how more economic development essentially leads to better environment. I felt that this article shared similar views with the ecological modernization theory. However, the mere fact that it is more 'reliable than a revolution' doesn't sound so comforting. There are China, India and a variety of other countries ready to step up the ladder towards more growth, and countries will never give up on the competition to dominate the relatively superior economic positions. Unless this nature of capitalism is somehow safely bound by certain global measures or strong national consensus, the ecological modernization theory or the Kuznets curve only seem to explain the small portion of highly moral, future-oriented people.
-------------------------
Use Energy, Get Rich and Save the Planet
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LinkedinDiggFacebookMixxMySpaceYahoo! BuzzPermalinkBy JOHN TIERNEY
Published: April 20, 2009
When the first Earth Day took place in 1970, American environmentalists had good reason to feel guilty. The nation’s affluence and advanced technology seemed so obviously bad for the planet that they were featured in a famous equation developed by the ecologist Paul Ehrlich and the physicist John P. Holdren, who is now President Obama’s science adviser.
Their equation was I=PAT, which means that environmental impact is equal to population multiplied by affluence multiplied by technology. Protecting the planet seemed to require fewer people, less wealth and simpler technology — the same sort of social transformation and energy revolution that will be advocated at many Earth Day rallies on Wednesday.
But among researchers who analyze environmental data, a lot has changed since the 1970s. With the benefit of their hindsight and improved equations, I’ll make a couple of predictions:
1. There will be no green revolution in energy or anything else. No leader or law or treaty will radically change the energy sources for people and industries in the United States or other countries. No recession or depression will make a lasting change in consumers’ passions to use energy, make money and buy new technology — and that, believe it or not, is good news, because...
2. The richer everyone gets, the greener the planet will be in the long run.
I realize this second prediction seems hard to believe when you consider the carbon being dumped into the atmosphere today by Americans, and the projections for increasing emissions from India and China as they get richer.
Those projections make it easy to assume that affluence and technology inflict more harm on the environment. But while pollution can increase when a country starts industrializing, as people get wealthier they can afford cleaner water and air. They start using sources of energy that are less carbon-intensive — and not just because they’re worried about global warming. The process of “decarbonization” started long before Al Gore was born.
The old wealth-is-bad IPAT theory may have made intuitive sense, but it didn’t jibe with the data that has been analyzed since that first Earth Day. By the 1990s, researchers realized that graphs of environmental impact didn’t produce a simple upward-sloping line as countries got richer. The line more often rose, flattened out and then reversed so that it sloped downward, forming the shape of a dome or an inverted U — what’s called a Kuznets curve. (See nytimes.com/tierneylab for an example.)
In dozens of studies, researchers identified Kuznets curves for a variety of environmental problems. There are exceptions to the trend, especially in countries with inept governments and poor systems of property rights, but in general, richer is eventually greener. As incomes go up, people often focus first on cleaning up their drinking water, and then later on air pollutants like sulfur dioxide.
As their wealth grows, people consume more energy, but they move to more efficient and cleaner sources — from wood to coal and oil, and then to natural gas and nuclear power, progressively emitting less carbon per unit of energy. This global decarbonization trend has been proceeding at a remarkably steady rate since 1850, according to Jesse Ausubel of Rockefeller University and Paul Waggoner of the Connecticut Agricultural Experiment Station.
“Once you have lots of high-rises filled with computers operating all the time, the energy delivered has to be very clean and compact,” said Mr. Ausubel, the director of the Program for the Human Environment at Rockefeller. “The long-term trend is toward natural gas and nuclear power, or conceivably solar power. If the energy system is left to its own devices, most of the carbon will be out of it by 2060 or 2070.”
But what about all the carbon dioxide being spewed out today by Americans commuting to McMansions? Well, it’s true that American suburbanites do emit more greenhouse gases than most other people in the world (although New Yorkers aren’t much different from other affluent urbanites).
But the United States and other Western countries seem to be near the top of a Kuznets curve for carbon emissions and ready to start the happy downward slope. The amount of carbon emitted by the average American has remained fairly flat for the past couple of decades, and per capita carbon emissions have started declining in some countries, like France. Some researchers estimate that the turning point might come when a country’s per capita income reaches $30,000, but it can vary widely, depending on what fuels are available. Meanwhile, more carbon is being taken out of the atmosphere by the expanding forests in America and other affluent countries. Deforestation follows a Kuznets curve, too. In poor countries, forests are cleared to provide fuel and farmland, but as people gain wealth and better agricultural technology, the farm fields start reverting to forestland.
Of course, even if rich countries’ greenhouse impact declines, there will still be an increase in carbon emissions from China, India and other countries ascending the Kuznets curve. While that prospect has environmentalists lobbying for global restrictions on greenhouse gases, some economists fear that a global treaty could ultimately hurt the atmosphere by slowing economic growth, thereby lengthening the time it takes for poor countries to reach the turning point on the curve.
But then, is there much reason to think that countries at different stages of the Kuznets curve could even agree to enforce tough restrictions? The Kyoto treaty didn’t transform Europe’s industries or consumers. While some American environmentalists hope that the combination of the economic crisis and a new president can start an era of energy austerity and green power, Mr. Ausubel says they’re hoping against history.
Over the past century, he says, nothing has drastically altered the long-term trends in the way Americans produce or use energy — not the Great Depression, not the world wars, not the energy crisis of the 1970s or the grand programs to produce alternative energy.
“Energy systems evolve with a particular logic, gradually, and they don’t suddenly morph into something different,” Mr. Ausubel says. That doesn’t make for a rousing speech on Earth Day. But in the long run, a Kuznets curve is more reliable than a revolution.
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http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/21/science/earth/21tier.html?ref=earth