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Archive for the ‘Climate change and politics’ Category

Obama’s speech on Climate change

Maybe no other speech on climate change was so expected. Climate Change activists (called Climate Hawks too) were quite disappointed with Obamas first term and not so happy with seconds beginning but this speech last week, changed this point of view as explained by Joe Romm, and many others. It was even mentioned in European newspapers, and of course, by skeptics.

After one week, the positive opinions, mixed with others asking more action.

I found Obama’s speech inspiring as the great speaker he is and important considering climate change debate in USA. Clearly it is not enough for the change we need from americans from their huge CO2 emissions (three times those of China or even some European countries). It is far for explaining how to reduce the americans 18 Tons CO2 per capita to the more or less 1 Ton target, but it was a first step and no long way has been done without starting step by step. It did not explain the scope of the change needed but it attacked the weakest part of the problem: the acceptance of the problem and the need to act. And one of the virtues of americans is that they are able to act fast once they are convinced. I hope it is so. We all need that, China and USA are 40% of the emissions in current world.

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Climate change and politics

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Nicaragua plans 70 % of renewable energy production

Nicaragua map from Wikipedia

This link in spanish explains these news. They will install wind power,, solar, hydroelectric and geothermal energy. It will not change the climate change game as Nicaragua is a small country of 6 million inhabitants that only emit 0.8 Tons CO2 per capita (in 2009). So they are not only well below the world average, they are even close or below the secure emission path. If we all humans would emit like them climate change problem would be close to be solved. They have not created this problem, they could feel quite reassured in their position and ask others for action with solid ethical grounds but, in the contrary, they plan to get most of their electricity from renewable sources. And these are good news because it shows that a low-carbon growth is not only meaningful for poor countries, it is also profitable and more reliable. They are not part of the problem now but can be and should be part of the solution, more if we consider that they are the countries bringing more humans to this stressed world

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Climate change and politics, Small Great things

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China and Climate Change

China and World emission paths. The magnitude of the emissions if different but the scales are the same

China and World emission paths. The magnitude of the emissions if different but the scales are the same

Now that we are close to the new year eve in China it is a good time to write something about them. The figure in the beginning of the post displays how influential is China in the current emission path of the world.  25% of the emissions come from there, if the rest of the world would suddenly stop every emission China’s CO2 would be enough to be over the 20% maximum that is considered a reasonable equilibrium. Even more important than the share (lower than the population share) is the trend, whereas most developed countries are not increasing their emissions significantly lasts years Chinese CO2 is growing very fast. It is not the only one but it is the greatest and I think that the leader of the developing-developed countries group. In a previous posts I mentioned USA and China as keys. They are, all of us are to some extent. However, I think that China will fix the trend that many others will follow, because they can reverse the upwards emission path and fix the peak, after that the perspective will be different.

And how is it doing in China? I am not an expert and see news of both sides. In one part, they are burning half of the coal of the world, if they do not stop we will get quite hot.In the other hand there are signs for hope as most Chinese are convinced of the importance of climate change, they want to be more active in renewables and form part of International Renewable Energy Agency (IRENA) and even if their 6 ton per capita emissions per year are not far from many European countries (but far from the USA), they burn them in part to produce goods that export. Transport emissions are low for example.

Apart from those news there are three great reasons I believe should make us hopeful :

  • Chinese are quite vulnerable to extreme weather, so for climate change. It is they fight as it is everybody
  • They have the opportunity to lead the development of many renewable energy technologies.
  • They have the opportunity to build many things in their society in a low-carbon way and this is much easier than transforming high carbon structures.

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Climate change and politics

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The rough figure of World emissions

CO2 Emission percentaje by production sector in the world, source of data IEA.

CO2 Emission percentage by production sector in the world, source of data IEA.

I frequently think that the climate change solution is in transforming the power production sector and consumers mentality somehow. However, many times remember too that transportation is important and I got in mind the simple figure that one out of three CO2 tons comes from transport. Rough numbers help but it is always better to be more precise, and the two figures in this blog follow this purpose. They have been obtained with the open data from the Internationa Egergy Agency (IEA) and show total emissions in 2010.

The first one, at the beginning, displays the emission proportions by emission production sectors. In some cases, these divisions are not easy to understand but the main conclusion can be that electricity production is responsible for more than 40% of emissions and this is good news in my opinion because the progress in low-carbon electricity production has been much fester than in other factors and because in fact there are many countries producing most of their electricity without fossil fuels. Transport and industry account for other more or less 20% each (in industry excluding electricity use). Transport is a bit lower that the 33% that I expected and it is mainly road transport. Residential sector is surprisingly low.

CO2 Emission percentaje by consuming sector in the world, source of data IEA.

CO2 Emission percentaje by consuming sector in the world, source of data IEA.

In the other hand, the last figure classifies the same data by consuming sector. So roughly, industry is the objects we use, transport is transport and residential our houses. In this case, industry leads the figure with 36%, and transport and residential follow close to 20%.

The main reference is that we should reach 10-20% of current emissions to be on the safe side, so we have to make important effort in all areas.

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Climate change and politics, Renewable energy, Transportation

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Aside

COP18 talks in Doha are over, another lost opportunity

COP18 talks in Doha are over and once again the results are at least unclear. Most blogs offer more rigorous analyses but they agree in the poorness of the result. Climate Progress is critical with the result, as InsideClimateNews the NYtimes is only slightly more optimistic and the skeptics are celebrating the result, so they coincide in the analysis.

Kioto protocol has been prolonged but only involving countries accounting 15% of the CO2 emissions, there are some other promising results but not very clear. So, once again, everybody agrees about the magnitude of the problem (otherwise they would not meet every year) but few countries want to be legally bounded to a worldwide treaty. This approach is not working for the moment, however, it is not the only way.

Not being legally bounded does not mean that many countries are not going to act in some way and there are many other possible agents that can get significant results as subcountry entities (California is far more advanced that the USA for example), Cities-Towns, activist groups, Households and finally families and individuals. Nevertheless, a clear international agreement would be the definitive push for every other action for this uniquely global problem, next year we will see again.

Written

on 2012/12/12

Qatar government announcing big solar investment.

Qatar Coat of Arms, source: Wikipedia

Qatar Coat of Arms, source: Wikipedia

COP18 conference held in Qatar has produced at least a first beneficial output. The government has announced an important investment to produce 1800 MW by solar power out of a total electricity capacity of 7000 MW. Even better, they will encourage particulars to produce electricity at home by small solar panels with a feed-in-tarif.

As they explained, the official reason to such a political impulse in one of the mayor producers of liquefied gas is the reduction of cost and the abundance of sun in their home. Good reasons, I suppose that holding the COP18 being the biggest emitter (mentioned in many blogs) is another one.

I hope it will become true, because we need the commitment of everyone in this big challenge of climate change, and the competitions to avoid last places in this shameful classification could help.

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Climate change and politics, Renewable energy

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USA elections and Chinese change of leader

Xi Jinping leader, Source: Wikipedia

Xi Jinping leader, Source: Wikipedia

Maybe it’s to late to talk about Obama’s victory, but I don’t intend to be up to the fast pace of the news. Of course I got quite satisfied with USA elections results, due to the strong “drill baby drill” speech coming from Romey and more after the acceptance speech:

“We want our children to live in an America that isn’t burdened by debt, that isn’t weakened by inequality, that isn’t threatened by the destructive power of a warming planet,”

This important election was extensively covered by many climate blogs as Climate Progress, or Quark Soup. Even Pieckle Sr, usually a blog without political content, mentioned USA elections comparing them to Chinese process.  And there is where I wanted to arrive, if USA elections were very important for the climate change politics due to many factors,Chinese leadership is not less and has not been covered at the same extent.

Both states are the biggest CO2 sources in the world, more than 40% of the emissions between them. And ,although far from the USA in per capita emissions China’s development has made them the leaders in this classification and it is still growing fast. It will not be possible to do something meaningful in climate change without the implication of China, so Xi Jinping¡s ideas about climate change are even more important than Obama¡s and I do not know them. Maybe, next days in COP18 we will start to see. At least I hope so.

 

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Climate change and politics

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