Geoengineering and the Four Climate Change Truths:

1
Geoengineering and the Four Climate Change
Truths Perspectives of a Lawyer-Scientist A
Presentation at the Research Triangle Institute,
International November 18, 2008
2
Views of a Lawyer-Scientist

• Politics drive climate science
• Cost-efficient engineering will drive political
  solutions
• None of this is good for traditional
  environmentalism

3
Environmentalism Through a Political Lens

• Pre-1960 environmentalism reflected stewardship
  and could be described as encompassing American
  Exceptionalism
• Post-1970 environmentalism split into two groups,
  traditional greens and watermelon greens.

4
American Environmental Exceptionalism

• Traces to de Tocqueville and his seminal work
  Democracy in America (1835), consisting of three
  elements
• dynamism
• religiosity
• patriotism

5
American Environmental Exceptionalism

• Dynamism
• a wide-open scientific entrepreneurialism
• a very visible and loud debate regarding the
  quality of temperature data and modeling
• consensus on the science would rise from academic
  campuses as piecemeal science and not from a
  political international body

6
American Environmental Exceptionalism

• Religiosity
• reflects traditional scientific mores
• competition in ideas would produce vigorous
  challenges of any postulate or prediction
• scientists that study how to predict future
  events would evaluate the basis of climate
  alarmism and identify strengths and weaknesses
• valid criticisms, new information about actual
  climate conditions and new theories on the
  determinants of global climate would cause
  climate projections to evolve

7
American Environmental Exceptionalism

• Environmental Patriotism
• stewardship would produce private cautionary
  action
• businesses would revise long-range strategies
• private institutions and governments would
  increase scientific investigation
• government intervention would be limited by
  constitutional powers
• governmental actions would not cause the export
  of economic opportunity

8
Greens, Watermelon Greens and Gramscianism

• Antonio Gramsci (1891-1937),
• a Marxist intellectual and politician
• devised a seven step strategy for
• culture war.
• Traditional greens adopt the mores and values of
  Tocquevillian free-market environmentalism
• Watermelon greens are green outside and red
  inside and adopt neo-Marxist Gramscian
  revolutionary tactics

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Marxism? Culture war? Revolution? Whoa!
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Gramscian Purposes

• Reverse the correlation of power from the
  privileged to the "marginalized

• The environmentally marginalized are not humans!

• There can be no revolution without a proletariat.

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Gramscian Methodology
(1) Delegitimize the dominant belief systems,
specifically human dominion (hegemony) over
nature.
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Gramscian Methodology
(2) Supply an alternative set of hegemony values
that the environmental elite title
sustainability and is which requires a
reduction in human population and consumption.
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Gramscian Methodology
(3) Permeate all spheres of civil society with
the replacement values, for example through
movies such as An Inconvenient Truth, in school
curricula, by calendars, notebooks, tee-shirts,
and every sort of promotional opportunity.
14
Gramscian Methodology
(4) Create a revolutionary consciousness
through transformation of conscious-ness,
typically seen as by some as education and by
others as indoctrination and done while
permeating all spheres of civil society, starting
with children in grammar schools
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Gramscian Methodology
(5) Create an organic intellectual elite who
specializes in the environmental revolution and
are supported by dedicated organizations such as
the Sierra Club, The Pew Environmental Group, and
the Natural Resources Defense Council
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Gramscian Methodology
(6) Subscript traditional intellectuals who
change sides and are well positioned within
established institutions, such as corporate CEOs,
legislators and university professors
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Gramscian Methodology
Step (6) Exemplar
The latest scientific data confirm that the
earths climate is rapidly changing. The cause?
A thickening layer of carbon dioxide pollution,
mostly from power plants and automobiles, that
traps heat in the atmosphere. Average U.S.
temperatures could rise another 3 to 9 degrees by
the end of the century Sea levels will rise,
and heat waves will be more frequent and more
intense. Droughts and wildfires will occur more
often. Disease-carrying mosquitoes will expand
their range. And species will be pushed to
extinction.
So says the National Resources Defense Council,
with agreement by the Sierra Club, Greenpeace,
National Geographic, the US National Academy of
Sciences, and the US Congressional House
leadership. Concurrent views are widespread, as a
visit to the internet or any good bookstore will
verify.
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Gramscian Methodology
(7) Reject the concept of moral absolutism and
replace it with situational ethics that presumes
morality is nothing more than a social
construction. Thus, an act is moral if it
serves the interests of the oppressed or
marginalized, which in environmental terms
means anything not anthropogenic. This final
step demonizes human interests and actions, and
places them subservient to environmental
interests.
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Gramscian Climate Science
Question Posed on the Google Geoengineering
Group Are we certain we have sufficient
quality and quantity of data samples to identify
accurate assessment of climate change risks and
mitigations?
Response of a Watermelon Green Professor of
climate science Read the IPCC Working Group I
report. All your questions and concerns will be
answered there.
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Gramscian Climate Science
Response of a Traditional Green Member of the
National Academy of Engineers Ask the
Watermelon green what is the meaning of
consensus and does it have any relevance to
science, which is not decided or ordained by
consensus which explains nothing. Only when it
meets strict requirements does hypothesis become
theory. Blessing does not convert crap into
science although it may convert non believers
into believers heaven help them. The IPCC report
is not the third testament.
21
Gramscian Climate Science
Response of Dick Lindzen, Alfred P. Sloan
Professor of Meteorology at the MIT "Picking
holes in the IPCC is crucial. The notion that if
youre ignorant of something and some-body comes
up with a wrong answer, and you have to accept
that because you dont have another wrong answer
to offer is like faith healing, its like
quackery in medicine if somebody says you
should take jelly beans for cancer and you say
thats stupid, and he says, well can you suggest
something else and you say, no, does that mean
you have to go with jelly beans?"
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Gramscian Climate Science
The IPCC projections rely on models that do not
comport with actual climate phenomena.
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Non-Gramscian Climate Science
The IPCC models show effects that have not
occurred as projected.
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Non-Gramscian Climate Science
Traditional scientific hypothesis testing
falsifies IPCC projections
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Non-Gramscian Climate Science
IPCC models do not conform to traditional
scientific requirements for credibility.
26
Non-Gramscian Climate Science
Projection based on multivariate correlation of
known solar and temperature cycles.
The IPCC disregards non-CGM alternative
predictive models.
27
Gramscian Climate Science
Despite the ongoing scientific debate on the
nature of global warming, the Gramscian
environmental power elite has won the science
battle Ellen Goodman, Boston Globe By every
measure, the U N 's Intergovernmental Panel on
Climate Change raises the level of alarm. The
fact of global warming is "unequivocal." The
certainty of the human role is now somewhere over
90 percent. Which is about as certain as
scientists ever get. I would like to say we're at
a point where global warming is impossible to
deny. Let's just say that global warming deniers
are now on a par with Holocaust deniers, though
one denies the past and the other denies the
present and future.
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Conclusions of the Environmental Elite

• It is too late to wait.
• We will face a catastrophe unless we reduce our
  carbon emissions immediately.

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2001 IPCC Goal 400 ppm Includes a safety factor
2004 IPCC Goal 450 ppm No safety factor
2008 IPCC Goal 550 ppm The probability that this
would prevent catastrophic climate change is only
2.5
Source IPCC SPM3
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Solutions

• Gramscian Answer
• Reduce carbon emissions without using nuclear
  power and regardless of the cost.
• This sustainability agenda sought to reduce
  population and consumption.
• Carbon reduction only is the replacement for
  the failed sustainability revolution.

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The Gramscian Non-Solution

• It is too late to rely on a "carbon emissions
  reduction only" strategy. This is the first
  climate change truth.
• China and India wont play.
• The economic dislocation is greater than the
  traditional greens will accept, just as they
  rejected the implications of the sustainability
  agenda.
• The political ramifications have already altered
  legislative proposals, allowing a safety valve on
  the cap.

32
The Gramscian Non-Solution

• For stabilization at 450ppm we require an almost
  immediate reduction of emissions below the
  no-climate-policy baseline, while at the same
  time maintaining a global economic growth rate of
  around 2 per year.
• Reductions required relative to today
  2030, 11 2050, 37 2070, 54.
• Reductions required relative to baseline
  2030, 42 2050, 68 2070, 79.
• Reductions made this rapidly would require all
  new power plants to have zero net CO2 emissions

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The Gramscian Non-Solution
Carmen Difiglio IEAs 450 Scenario requires a
complete transformation of investment in the
electric power sector by 2012. To quote the
World Energy Outlook 2007, p. 191 exceptionally
strong and immediate policy action would be
essential for the 450 Scenario to happen and
the associated costs would be very
high. Jeffrey Sachs current technologies
cannot support both a decline in carbon dioxide
emissions and an expanding global economy.
(Scientific American, April, 2008)
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Solutions

• Tocquevillian Answer
• Reduce carbon emissions where it is
  cost-effective, including nuclear power
• Cool the planet with geoengineering so as to
  stretch out the time available to transition to
  non-carbon energy
• Encourage entrepreneurialism that would
  cost-effectively extract carbon from the air
• Promote cost-effective adaptation
• Expand scientific inquiry to reduce uncertainty.

35
The Second Battle of the Climate Change Culture
War
American Exceptionalism will defeat environmental
socialism on how to respond to climate change
because

• The greens, and the rest of the society, reject
  the moral absolutism of a carbon emission
  reduction only strategy in light of its
  inefficacy, costs and required changes in
  lifestyle.
• This is the second truth on climate change.

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Geoengineering
Geo-engineering is the deliberate modification of
Earth's environment on a large scale "to suit
human needs and promote habitability".
Geoengineering is at present the only
economically competitive technology to offset
global warming. The geo-engineering option may
be considered costless.6 William Nordhaus, Yale
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Geoengineering
Responses to climate change

• Mitigation
• A defined term
• Means emissions reductions
• Does not mean consumption reduction

• Adaptation
• Build a dyke and wear sunscreen

• Geoengineering
• Deflect sunlight
• (SRS - Solar radiation management)
• Sequester environmental carbon

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Solar Radiation Management

• The Magnitude of the Problem
• Average solar radiation absorbed by the Earth is
  236 W / m2
• Doubling of atmospheric CO2 concentration (from
  the pre-industrial value of 280 ppm to 560 ppm,
  or todays value of 380 ppm to 760 ppm) prevents
  about 3.7 W m2 of energy from leaving the Earth
• This is approximately 100 times greater than the
  total primary power used by human civilization on
  Earth (not including solar inputs to agricultural
  production)
• 1.6 of absorbed solar radiation would need to
  be deflected to compensate for a doubling of
  atmospheric CO2.

39
Solar Radiation Management

• Ways to Deflect Solar Radiation
• Cost-efficient Proposals
• Stratospheric Aerosols
• Cloud Whitening
• Cost-inefficient Proposals
• Space Mirrors
• Whiten the earth

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Cloud Whitening
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Cloud Whitening
The vessel produces 30 kg/sec of 0.8 micron drops
of sea water. Salt residues from evaporated drops
are ideal cloud condensation nuclei. The Twomey
equation predicts that, in the right conditions
of cloud, sunshine and clean mid-ocean air, the
extra solar energy reflected from cloud tops will
be about 10 million times more than the wind
energy needed for spray generation.
42
Cloud Whitening

• To achieve a 4 W m2 offset it would be necessary
  to seed at least a third of the suitable marine
  cloud coverage.
• it could hold the Earths temperature constant
  for a significant number of decades.
• It would likely be only one of a suite of
  geoengineering techniques uses.
• Could use dedicated ships, but could also use
  existing platforms.

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Stratospheric Aerosols
Stratospheric Aerosol Geoengineering Mimics
Volcano Eruptions
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GeoengineeringTemperature change
2 x CO2
2 x CO2 and1.8 reduction insolar intensity
Caldeira et al., 2008
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Area where change is significant at 0.05 level
based on 30-yr climatology
2 x CO2
2 x CO2 and1.8 reduction insolar
intensity (Significant over 12 of Earths area)
Area with significant temperature change
Caldeira et al., 2008
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Area where change is significant at 0.05 level
based on 30-yr climatology
2 x CO2 Significant over 47 of Earths area
2 x CO2 and1.8 reduction insolar
intensity Significant over 4 of Earths area
Area with significant precipitation change
Caldeira et al. 2008
47
Geoengineeringand plant growth
In the model, plants grow much better in the
geoengineered world than in the natural
world. Geoengineering results in CO2
fertilization without the increased heating that
leads to increased plant respiration
Govindasamy et al., 2002
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Two arctic geoengineering scenarios remove 0.37
of total solar insolation
Caldeira, 2007
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Annual mean temperature response
2xCO2 - 560 ppm CO2, normal solar radiation
Temperature change (ºC)
Caldeira et al., 2008
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Annual mean temperature response
Geo71.25 560 ppm CO2, 25 solar reduction north
of 71ºN
Temperature change (ºC)
Caldeira et al., 2008.
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Annual mean temperature response
Geo61.10 560 ppm CO2, 10 solar reduction
north of 61ºN
Temperature change (ºC)
Caldeira et al. 2008
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Modeled September sea-ice
Caldeira et al.,2008.
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Engineering options for placing aerosols in
stratosphere

• Smokestack to the stratosphere
• Skinny pipe/hose, ground to 25 km-high HAA (DoD)
• Artillery (shooting barrels of particles into
  stratosphere)
• surprisingly practical NAS Study, 1992
• High-altitude transport aircraft
• Condor/Global Hawk, with a cargo bay
• Half-dozen B-747s deploy 106 tonnes/year of
  engineered aerosol towed lifting-lines/bodies
  for height-boosting the sprayer-dispenser an
  additional 5-10 km above normal cruising ceilings
• Other options
• Anthropogenic (mini-)volcanoes
• Tethered (set-of-)lifting-body a high-tech kites

Courtesy Lowell Wood
54
Sequester Environmental Carbon
Natural Peridotite Hydration and Carbonation

• 1.5 km3 injection formation CO2 emissions from
  U.S. coal-fired power plants
• 20 per ton CO2 for in situ sequestration

Kelemen and Matter 2008
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(No Transcript)
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http//www.steel-trp.org/Briefing07slides/08-TRP99
57_COLUMBIA-07IBS.pdf
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Sequester Environmental Carbon
Matter has been working on a separate project in
Iceland, where volcanic basalt, shows promise for
absorbing CO2 produced by power plants. Trials
there are set to begin in spring 2009, in
partnership with Reykjavik Energy, and the
universities of Iceland and Toulouse (France).
58
Sequester Environmental Carbon
Ocean Iron Fertilization - OIF

• Plankton that generate calcium or silica
  carbonate skeletons, such as diatoms,
  coccolithophores and foraminifera, account for
  most direct carbon sequestration.
• When these organisms die 20-30 of their
  carbonate skeletons sink.
• Remain in deep ocean for 4000 yrs.

59
Sequester Environmental Carbon
Ocean Iron Fertilization - OIF

• NASA scientists have reported a minimum 69
  decline in global plankton production since 1980
  and others report 1012 losses.
• A full-scale international plankton restoration
  program could regenerate approximately 35
  billion tons of carbon sequestration capacity
  worth 75 billion or more in carbon offset value.
  
• 6.35 per ton CO2
• The London Convention / London Protocol You may
  fertilize if the intent is to grow fish but not
  if the intent is to dispose of carbon in the
  ocean. Hence, focus on restoration.

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Geoengineering

• Geoengineering research, and especially carbon
  sequestration research, has only just begun.
• Watermelon greens reject geoengineering because
  it does not result in reduction of human
  appetites for natural resources.

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The Third Truth - we are going to see a federally
mandated climate response. The Fourth Truth - We
are going to see important environmental actions
sacrificed on the alter of global warming
response.
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