US greenhouse gases rose 1.7 pct in 2004: EPA

[Up2Late]

(And this is from the Bush EPA, imagine how bad it really is!)

US greenhouse gases rose 1.7 pct in 2004: EPA

Mon Feb 27, 2006 05:48 PM ET

By Timothy Gardner

NEW YORK (Reuters) - U.S. emissions of gases blamed for global warming rose 1.7 percent in 2004, as the country burned more fossil fuel for transportation and electricity, according to federal environment regulators.

The United States, the world's leading emitter of greenhouse gases, released about 7.075 billion metric tons of carbon dioxide equivalent last year, according to a draft report from the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). U.S. greenhouse gas emissions, which include carbon dioxide, methane and nitrous oxide, have risen 15.8 percent from 1990 to 2004, according to the EPA.

President George W. Bush says U.S. greenhouse gas intensity, or the amount of greenhouse gas emission for every dollar of economic output, is falling. He prefers voluntary methods of cutting emissions. The United Nations' Kyoto Protocol on global warming signed by 156 countries requires developed nations to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 5.2 percent of their 1990 levels from 2008 to 2012.

President George W. Bush pulled out of the Kyoto pact in 2001, saying it would harm the economy.

(more at link below)

<http://go.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?type=domesticNews&storyID=11355687&src=rss/domesticNews>

[hatrack]

1. Gee, guess all those voluntary measures aren't getting the job done!

Gosh, who knew?

:eyes:

[Up2Late]

2. Yeah, no kidding, and did you see this?

"...President George W. Bush says U.S. greenhouse gas intensity, or the amount of greenhouse gas emission for every dollar of economic output, is falling...."

Is that the most twisted way of looking at this, or what? I guess his policies only work when we go into a recession. :crazy:

[eppur_se_muova]

3. That happens naturally when profits are on paper only.

Financial deals -- including selling off big chunks of infrastructure, and especially outsourcing -- generate vast amounts of money, but very little GHG, at least in US. So use the ratio of gas passed/money raked in and you get a smaller number. Typical.

edit to correct ratio

[hatrack]

4. Yep - my personal nominee for "Most Meaningless Statistic"

:puke:

[Strelnikov_]

5. Probably Too Late To Prevent Extinction Anyway

But we could at least, for those coming after us, try.

Hotter, Faster, Worser
http://www.commondreams.org/views06/0222-27.htm

. . .

First, there hasn’t been any real uncertainty in the scientific community for more than a decade. An unholy alliance of key fossil fuel corporations and conservative politicians have waged a sophisticated and well-funded misinformation campaign to create doubt and controversy in the face of nearly universal scientific consensus. In this, they were aided and abetted by a press which loved controversy more than truth, and by the Bush administration, which has systematically tried to distort the science and silence and intimidate government scientists who sought to speak out on global warming.

But the second reason is that the scientific community failed to adequately anticipate and model several positive feedback loops that profoundly amplify the rate and extent of human-induced climate change. And in the case of global warming, positive feedback loops can have some very negative consequences. The plain fact is, we are fast approaching – and perhaps well past – several tipping points which would make global warming irreversible.

. . .

The last time it got warm enough to set off this feedback loop was 55 million years ago in a period known as the Paleocene-Eocene Thermal Maximum or PETM, when increased volcanic activity released enough GHGs to trigger a series of self-reinforcing methane burps. The resulting warming caused massive die-offs and it took more than a 100,000 years for the earth to recover. It’s looks like we’re on the verge of triggering a far worse event. At a recent meeting of the American Academy for the Advancement of Sciences in St. Louis, James Zachos, foremost expert on the PETM reported that greenhouse gasses are accumulating in the atmosphere at thirty times the speed with which they did during the PETM.

. . .

Our children may forgive us the debts we’re passing on to them, they may forgive us if terrorism persists, they may forgive us for waging war instead of pursuing peace, they may even forgive us for squandering the opportunity to put the nuclear genie back in the bottle. But they will spit on our bones and curse our names if we pass on a world that is barely habitable when it was in our power to prevent it. And they will be right to do so.


Methane Burps: Ticking Time Bomb

http://www.energybulletin.net/3647.html

. . .

Now here's the scary part. A temperature increase of merely a few degrees would cause these gases to volatilize and "burp" into the atmosphere, which would further raise temperatures, which would release yet more methane, heating the Earth and seas further, and so on. There's 400 gigatons of methane locked in the frozen arctic tundra - enough to start this chain reaction - and the kind of warming the Arctic Council predicts is sufficient to melt the clathrates and release these greenhouse gases into the atmosphere.

. . .

The most recent of these catastrophes occurred about 55 million years ago in what geologists call the Paleocene-Eocene Thermal Maximum (PETM), when methane burps caused rapid warming and massive die-offs, disrupting the climate for more than 100,000 years. The granddaddy of these catastrophes occurred 251 million years ago, at the end of the Permian period, when a series of methane burps came close to wiping out all life on Earth.

More than 94 percent of the marine species present in the fossil record disappeared suddenly as oxygen levels plummeted and life teetered on the verge of extinction. Over the ensuing 500,000 years, a few species struggled to gain a foothold in the hostile environment. It took 20 million to 30 million years for even rudimentary coral reefs to re-establish themselves and for forests to regrow. In some areas, it took more than 100 million years for ecosystems to reach their former healthy diversity.

. . .

The cause of all this havoc? In both cases, a temperature increase of about 10.8 degrees Fahrenheit, about the upper range for the average global increase today's models predict can be expected from burning fossil fuels by 2100. But these models could be the tail wagging the dog since they don't add in the effect of burps from warming gas hydrates. Worse, as the Arctic Council found, the highest temperature increases from human greenhouse gas emissions will occur in the arctic regions - an area rich in these unstable clathrates.

[PhilipShore]

6. Reuters: US greenhouse gas growth rate rose in 2004: EPA

Reuters
US greenhouse gas growth rate rose in 2004: EPA
Feb 27, 2006

http://today.reuters.com/investing/financeArticle.aspx?type=bondsNews&storyID=2006-02-27T235659Z_01_N27491639_RTRIDST_0_ENERGY-CARBON-EMISSIONS-UPDATE-1.XML

NEW YORK, Feb 27 (Reuters) - The growth rate of U.S. emissions of gases blamed for global warming rose in 2004, as the country burned more fossil fuel for transportation and electricity, according to federal environment regulators.

The United States, the world's leading emitter of greenhouse gases, released about 7.075 billion metric tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent last year, according to a draft report from the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA).

The growth rate was stronger than in each of the previous two years with emissions rising 0.6 percent in 2003 and 0.7 percent in 2002. In 2001, when the economy was sluggish, emissions fell 1.6 percent, EPA said.

U.S. greenhouse gas emissions, which include carbon dioxide, methane and nitrous oxide, have risen 15.8 percent from 1990 to 2004, according to the EPA.

[Lisa]

7. interesting!

Here in Canada, the conservatives have been going on about the US having a lower emissions increase than us, and saying that we too should back away from the Kyoto Protocol (assuming that this would automatically enable us to cut our emissions). Guess they won't be able to say that much longer!

[KAZ]

8. Yes they will.

Facts don't mean much in this debate, and a strong 35% will believe whatever talking points they want to believe. Also, a bump of an increase down here, translates into what up north?

[Up2Late]

9. kick for the a.m. crew

:kick: