A roadmap for 'the only practical way to preserve the planet'

[n2doc]

Published: Friday, April 30, 2010 - 08:08 in Physics & Chemistry

The United States could completely stop emissions of carbon dioxide from coal-fired electric power plants ? a crucial step for controlling global warming ? within 20 years by using technology that already exists or could be commercially available within a decade. That's the conclusion of an article published online today, along with a news article on the topic, in the American Chemical Society's semi-monthly journal Environmental Science & Technology (ES&T). Both are scheduled for the June 1 print edition of ES&T.

Pushker Kharecha and colleagues say that the global climate change problem becomes manageable only if society deals quickly with emissions of carbon dioxide from burning coal in electric power plants. "The only practical way to preserve a planet resembling that of the Holocene (today's world) with reasonably stable shorelines and preservation of species, is to rapidly phase out coal emissions and prohibit emissions from unconventional fossil fuels such as oil shale and tar sands," they state.

The authors outline strategies to make that phase-out possible. They include elimination of subsidies for fossil fuels; putting rising prices on carbon emissions; major improvements in electricity transmission and the energy efficiency of homes, commercial buildings, and appliances; replacing coal power with biomass, geothermal, wind, solar, and third-generation nuclear power; and after successful demonstration at commercial scales, deployment of advanced (fourth-generation) nuclear power plants; and carbon capture and storage at remaining coal plants.

http://esciencenews.com/articles/2010/04/30/a.roadmap.only.practical.way.preserve.planet

[Warren Stupidity]

1. unless the gov starts taxing carbon emissions it ain't gonna happen.

And I do not see the political will to do that. So instead we are going to continue plunging off the cliff. We've already passed to point of no return regarding catastrophic climate change, we aren't doing diddly squat about it, and we won't until the mess is so damn evident that even the bagnuts will have to admit that their Angry God is REALLY FUCKING ANGRY. We librul hippy tree huggers will of course be blamed for it all.

[joshcryer]

2. Pretty much.

[kristopher]

3. Color me "not impressed"

The paper is basically a boilerplate resource assessment, and not a very deep one at that.

If you don't know what the noncarbon alternatives to fossil fuels are, this paper (coauthored by Hansen) is a good overview.

However, it provides little to no guidance as to which of those noncarbon alternatives work best to address our energy and climate change needs.

The paper is available here: http://pubs.giss.nasa.gov/authors/pkharecha.html