By Paul
The UK’s first Energy Saving Day has ended with no noticeable reduction in the country’s electricity usage.
E-Day asked people to switch off electrical devices they did not need over a period of 24 hours, with the National Grid monitoring consumption.
BBC website: ‘No impact from Energy Saving Day’
The e-day website is here.
By Paul
A new GRL paper by Matthews and Caldeira suggests that, in order to stabilise the computer modelled future climate, CO2 emissions need to be reduced to near-zero.
The abstract of the paper is below:
GEOPHYSICAL RESEARCH LETTERS, VOL. 35, L04705, doi:10.1029/2007GL032388, 2008
Stabilizing climate requires near-zero emissions
H. Damon Matthews
Department of Geography, Planning and Environment, Concordia University, Montreal, Quebec, Canada
Ken Caldeira
Department of Global Ecology, Carnegie Institution of Washington, Stanford, California, USA
Abstract
Current international climate mitigation efforts aim to stabilize levels of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere. However, human-induced climate warming will continue for many centuries, even after atmospheric CO2 levels are stabilized. In this paper, we assess the CO2 emissions requirements for global temperature stabilization within the next several centuries, using an Earth system model of intermediate complexity. We show first that a single pulse of carbon released into the atmosphere increases globally averaged surface temperature by an amount that remains approximately constant for several centuries, even in the absence of additional emissions. We then show that to hold climate constant at a given global temperature requires near-zero future carbon emissions. Our results suggest that future anthropogenic emissions would need to be eliminated in order to stabilize global-mean temperatures. As a consequence, any future anthropogenic emissions will commit the climate system to warming that is essentially irreversible on centennial timescales.
So, ’emission impossible’ becomes even more difficult. The only way to achieve near-zero emissions is via air capture of CO2.
By Paul
Mass media efforts to raise American public concern about climate change, such as Al Gore’s “An Inconvenient Truth” and the “scientific consensus” media drumbeat, ironically may be having just the opposite effect, according to a new study appearing in the scientific journal Risk Analysis.
The above is taken from here.
Study Excerpt:
Paul Kellstedt, Sammy Zahran and Arnold Vedlitz examined results from an original and representative sample of Americans and found that “more informed respondents both feel less personally responsible for global warming, and also show less concern for global warming.” The researchers also found that “confidence in scientists has unexpected effects: respondents with high confidence in scientists feel less responsible for global warming, and also show less concern for global warming.” […] “Perhaps ironically, and certainly contrary to… the marketing of movies like “Ice Age” and “An Inconvenient Truth,” the effects of information on both concern for global warming and responsibility for it are exactly the opposite of what were expected. Directly, the more information a person has about global warming, the less responsible he or she feels for it; and indirectly, the more information a person has about global warming, the less concerned he or she is for it.”
The abstract from the paper is below:
Personal Efficacy, the Information Environment, and Attitudes Toward GlobalWarming and Climate Change in the United States
Paul M. Kellstedt,1∗ Sammy Zahran,2 and Arnold Vedlitz2
Despite the growing scientific consensus about the risks of global warming and climate change,
the mass media frequently portray the subject as one of great scientific controversy and debate.
Andyet previous studies of the mass public’s subjective assessments of the risks of global warming
and climate change have not sufficiently examined public informedness, public confidence
in climate scientists, and the role of personal efficacy in affecting global warming outcomes. By
examining the results of a survey on an original and representative sample of Americans, we
find that these three forces—informedness, confidence in scientists, and personal efficacy—are
related in interesting and unexpected ways, and exert significant influence on risk assessments
of global warming and climate change. In particular, more informed respondents both feel
less personally responsible for global warming, and also show less concern for global warming.
We also find that confidence in scientists has unexpected effects: respondents with high
confidence in scientists feel less responsible for global warming, and also show less concern
for global warming. These results have substantial implications for the interaction between
scientists and the public in general, and for the public discussion of global warming and climate
change in particular.
Risk Analysis, Vol. 28, No. 1, 2008 DOI: 10.1111/j.1539-6924.2008.01010.x
By Paul
OVERSEAS trips may become a once-in-lifetime experience and car travel needed to be cut by 80 per cent if we have any hope of avoiding “dangerous” climate change, experts say.
Energy experts from Monash University said the carbon emission standards recommended by the government-hired Professor Ross Garnaut would not be possible if Australia’s love affair with cars and planes continued.
Continue reading Car travel ‘cut by 80 per cent’
Jennifer Marohasy BSc PhD has worked in industry and government. She is currently researching a novel technique for long-range weather forecasting funded by the B. Macfie Family Foundation.
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