David Roberts wonders why we (humanity) are not taking advantage of the huge economic savings associated with a much more aggressive energy transition. Roberts is always interesting, but something important is missing from his answer. Sure, weak leadership is a problem, but what motivates leadership? Big corporations, or big individuals for that matter, who are making gobs of money in the current situation, and don’t care about anything else, are very good at motivating leaders, both in democracies and authoritarian states. In democracies there are too many voters who place their bets on whoever makes the best sales pitch on today’s biggest pocketbook issues, or some other immediate concern that has popped up. Bad weather events are becoming such a concern, but maybe not yet quite enough to induce real pressure.
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A computer model commissioned by the Club of Rome in 1973 predicted that civilization was likely to collapse by 2040 due to the advance of unsustainable practices. According to a recent re-evaluation of its message, “The bad news for us is that the model seems to be spot-on so far.” The model was based on the philosophy that there are limits to growth on a finite planet, and those limits were subject to being identified in advance.
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A separate study, just published, used a similar philosophy while analyzing interactions between the world’s developed and underdeveloped economies. “High-income countries often rely more on non-extractive industries, such as manufacturing and services, but also consume more per capita and import more raw materials…..In contrast, in low-income countries, populations depend more on extractive industries such as agriculture, logging and mining, but have lower per capita consumption rates and higher population growth.” In the underdeveloped countries the combination of climate change and rapid growth leads to ecological destruction and a lower standard of living. https://phys.org/news/2018-09-sustainable-co-exist-current-economic-growth.html
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A new report on US carbon emissions from the EIA. Total energy-related emissions fell slightly in 2017 and are down 12% since 2005. All of the recent improvement has been caused by the reduced burning of coal for electric power generation. Oil and gas together are about unchanged for this century.
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An update on the huge Larsen C ice shelf that broke away in July 2017. After being slowed by grounding for about a year it is now free to roam about in the waters of the great circumpolar current beyond Antarctica.
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A new study of climate conditions during the PETM, an extremely warm event 56 million years ago. It came to the disturbing conclusion that the actual consequences of the warmup may have been much greater than those predicted by using the standard setup of current climate models. The research methods relied on bits of physical evidence found in deep strata.
Carl