This article in Real Climate gave an amateur like me some perspective on an aspect of global warming I wasnt really aware of. Namely, the contrast between methane and CO2 as a GHG. We probably know that methane has about 20 times the warming potential of CO2 and while it exists in far lower concentrations in the atmosphere, it is often a focus of mitigation efforts because of its potency. But what I didnt realize was that methane has some important characteristics that set it apart from CO2 in a way that diminishes its importance as a GHG.
From the article, Pierre explains;
“Methane oxidizes to CO2 in about 10 years, and since we are dealing with so little methane, that extra ppm of CO2 you get after it oxidizes adds little ongoing warming. That means that the methane concentration in the atmosphere is determined by the methane emission rate averaged over the previous ten years, and the methane component of warming disappears quickly after emissions cease.”
So methane’s potent contribution to global warming is extremely short lived compared to CO2. After about 10 years the 20 times CO2 potency is gone and its effect is negligible on global warming.
“Over the long term, CO2 accumulates in the atmosphere, like mercury in the body of a fish, whereas methane does not. For this reason, it is the CO2 emissions, and the CO2 emissions alone, that determine the climate that humanity will need to live with for a time that stretches into the future at least as long as the time since the founding of the first Sumerian cities stretches into the past.”
And that CO2 induced warming can last about 8000 years, give or take a couple centuries.
So by focusing too much of our efforts on reducing methane in an attempt to curb short term warming and ‘buy us some time’ to get CO2 emissions under control, we are really just wasting the time we need to get moving on reductions that will have a real impact. If we let CO2 emissions increase at their current rates, even if we bring methane emissions down to zero, the subsequent amount of CO2 we would have emitted is the real concern, since it has the lasting effects.
“While we are “buying” (or frittering away) time dealing with methane, fossil-fuel CO2 emission rate, and hence cumulative emissions, continue rising at the rate of 3% per year, as they have done since 1900. By 2040, we have put another 573 gigatonnes of carbon into the atmosphere, bringing the cumulative fossil fuel total up to 965 gigatonnes. By controlling methane you have indeed kept the warming in 2040 from broaching the 2C limit, but what happens then? In order to keep the cumulative emissions below the 1 trillion tonne limit, you are faced with the daunting task of bringing the emissions rate (which by 2040 has grown to 22 gigatonnes per year) all the way to zero almost immediately. That wasn’t very helpful, was it? At that point, you’d probably like to return the time you bought and get a refund (but sorry, no refunds on sale items). More realistically, by the time you managed to halt emissions growth and bring it down to nearly zero, another half trillion tonnes or so would have accumulated in the atmosphere, committing the Earth to a yet higher level of long-term warming.”
By waiting on CO2 and focusing on methane we are locking ourselves into a warmer climate for millenia. Every tonne of methane we reduce in place of an equal reduction of CO2 (CO2e if you will) pushes us further into a long term warming future. On the other hand, we can wait to reduce methane, because it only takes a decade or so to oxidize and its increased potency to dissipate.
As Pierre puts it, “However, since methane responds within a decade to emissions reductions, we still get the full climate benefit of reducing methane even if the actions are deferred to 2040. The same cannot be said for deferral of action on CO2 emissions.”
The point is that methane is a Red Herring, its a distraction, a decoy. The nature of CO2 makes it the only GHG that really matters. Any defferal of CO2 mitigation now for the mitigation of other GHGs only further condemns the world to increased warming. Our focus must remain CO2, anything else is a waste of time and resources.
EDIT - After posting this I was troubled by the conlusions the article drew. I wondered that if methane is more potent than Co2 but eventually turns into Co2, why wouldnt we eliminate methane first, so that we avoide those 10 years of increased warming potential at the beginning? If it turns into Co2 then it would stay in the atmosphere for thousands of years anyway.
The answer I got when I posted this question on the website was that it has to do with the proportion on Co2 emitted directly (burning fossil fuels) vs. the proportion of Co2 emitted by oxidizing methane. Reducing methane emissions would have a negligibal impact on related Co2 emissions reductions, since the proportion of methane to Co2 we emit is massive, in favour of the latter.
The amount of Co2 we would avoid emitting from eliminating methane is said to be trivial in the face of the direct Co2 emissions we make. And the fact still stands that because methane’s increased potency is gone after 10 years, that decrease can be done at any time.
So it would seem that the argument really focuses on our focus. It would seem that if we invest 1 unit of effort into reducing Co2 we get a much better hedge against warming return on investment than if we invest that 1 unit of effort into reducing methane. Once we get Co2 emissions under control (the 350-400 ppm threshhold) then, and only then, should we turn our attention to methane.
Hope that helps clarify.
Another incredible accomplishment by the team at the National Film Board of Canada. Props to everyone from the people involved in making the Highrise docu to the web designers and visionaries who made this world come to life.
Highrise is a docu about the built vertical world and the people that live in it across the globe. Out My Window is the 360 degree interactive environment that allows you to explore each apartment and the people and stories they all hold.
The NFB (first with their Great Lakes docu site combo) are creating a new hybridization and telling stories through true multi-media. Watch, listen see, the depth of what you can find out on your own. Ive never felt this kind of depth in any other online space and Ive never felt so connected to people around the world. Integrate a social media aspect somehow, or a wiki component so people can build this, and you really have somehting going.
Take a look around, its impressive.
Wicked cool 3D visualizations of global events from over 200 different datasets (from international flights to ocean temperature) onto a 6 foot diameter sphere! This great way to see global patterns could be in a science centre near you.
NYT covers the perceptions of the future of fossil fuel finds. The age old adage that better technology will save us by squeezing out every last drop of hydro carbon from the earth is pervasive. The funny thing is that even the hopeful time frames for how long fossil fuels can sustain us are discussed in decades…
This industry isnt going anywhere soon, take a look at what they see in the future.
How to frame science for use in policy -
The European Commission recently released a guide to help researchers better communicate what they do and what they find with policy makers.
Change is the Norm, in the Arctic -
Understanding Feedbacks in the climate system -
In the science of climate change there is a lot that scientists have trouble predicting, particularly when it comes to magnitude. Its easier to understand that glaciers are melting but it gets tricky when we try to tell just how fast or exactly why they do so.
Feedbacks are aspects within the climate system itself that is part of the greater whole. Confusing? It is. But think of it this way. Something happens in the climate which changes its dynamics and has an effect. That effect does not exist in isolation but in fact “feeds back” into the the change in climate yet again. Its an accelerant.
The same concept exists in the pro-cyclical nature of the recent financial collapse. Where defaults on mortgages (an aspect of the greater financial system) caused uncertainty, which caused tightening of capital, which fed back into the financial system to further weaken it, resulting in an amplification of the uncertainty. So maybe thats not the clearest analogy. But read this article and you will get an excellent idea of the science behind feedbacks and why they are so crucial to understanding climate change.
Our attention spans keep getting shorter and this fits nicely, and reciprocally, with a news media cycle that just keeps getting shorter too. The depth of information we take in and the time we allow ourselves to roll it around in our heads is shrinking in the same way. The ongoing saga in Haiti is at least one example of this trend.
Initially all over the news, the tragedy of the Haitian people was on the tip of everyone’s tongue and our hearts ached for the terrors they were going through. As the disaster itself became less of a shock and other issues took top spot in the ‘breaking news’ segment of CNN and the like, it all slowly faded away. The immidiate devestation was gone, the exciting action was gone. Health officials told us how the rest would unfold; cramped conditions, poor sanitation, disease, infection, hostility, death. Turn the channel.
This is especially easy to do in the wealthy west, where we dont have to live with these issues as a daily reality. We turn the channel and the reality is gone, on to the next story (and thats exactly what it is to us) to occupy our minds. But for the vast majority of the world’s people it isnt a story, its a reality that doesnt go away when the channel is turned. It continues in the streets and in the home, it actually affects or even defines daily life. In the richer nations we dont have to cross the street and walk around, or live, in that side of town.
There is a cholera outbreak in Haiti now and 200 have died as a result, thus far, with several thousand infected any many more likely to contract. It was all predicted, anyone could have told you something like this was going to happen. But we dont want to hear about it until it reaches a tragic climax. Haiti was out of our minds until the new crisis arrived - and will get worse no doubt.
By bouncing from the latest news story to the next we lose perspective on what is really happening in the world. We become more surprised at what we were told would happen because we ignore it until it erupts again. The sad thing is that our short attention spans will push us farther away from the reality of the issue. We will get tired about hearing how bad the situation is in Haiti and express some aggravation as to why our relief millions arent doing their job and why these people cant help themselves out of this situation.
The effect on us as basic humans, is that it takes away our sympathy, we lose our ability, or desire, to empathize with others. We become detached from the situation and find it harder to feel compassion toward those stuck in these realties. When that happens, what have we become?
Ottawa just announced that it will have a research panel look into the state of environmental research and monitoring on the Alberta Tar Sands and will report back in 60 days. To date, I can tell you this isnt much and Canada needs an independent scientific body investigating the Tar Sand full time and releasing regular publications. So far this responsibility has been taken on, and rather well, by the Pembina Institute.
This is a promising step forward, as long as Prentice and the Cons dont just sit on the report and not let the rest of us peak. Opposition should keep a little pressure on so that the results of this study are made public, hopefully causing enough stir to introduce some full time research in the area.
As always, who is on these panels is important and it looks like the govt was smart enough to include real and accredited scientists with expertise in the field.
Here they are; Elizabeth Dowdeswell, Dr. Peter J. Dillon, Dr. Subhasis Ghoshal, Dr. Andrew Miall, Dr. Joseph Rasmussen and Dr. John Smol.
Perhaps one of the lasting legacies of THE financial crisis of our time will be our obsession with the question: “but will it stimulate the economy?”. Sure, modern capitalist society has always put economic return on a pedestal - value is always measured in dollars - and established growing profits as priority #1. Yet it would seem that we have entered into a period where every result must be an economic result, where every action must have a multiple and money making reaction. Its no wonder this has normalized in popular thought, the populous has a greater ‘stake’ in it. With all those jobs lost and billions of taxpayer dollars spent on healing an economic hemorrhage, we want to know that every dollar used in some policy or project will repay that deficit and get us back to making $ hand over fist.
And so in a recent Nature Journal article the question was asked “what is science really worth?” The premise here is that academies, institutes, and other PHD hangouts, are pushing for more government coin and pointing to the economic rate of return as the rationale for digging deeper into the pockets. These days, if you want to get anyone to pay attention to you, you’ve got to tell them how what you are doing will generate a plus to the GDP. Politicians like this because if they can point to an R&D investment they made that gives actually makes the country money, well the public smiles and business applauds the quick hand on the chequebook.
Science is much like art in that they both obviously have primary benefits that are beyond making money, an intrinsic, dare I say, human value. Yet today, asking what science is REALLY (like, come on you guys, lets get serious) worth means figuring out how much economic return you get on your investment. This should be obvious but I have to say - science is not about making money, it is about discovery, progression, knowledge, understanding, education and curiosity. But today we want to hold every dollar accountable to a cost benefit analysis, we want money in return for our science, not even solutions. To say that science must justify itself through a quarterly report dangerously misses the point.
Our recent nightmares and paranoia over an ill economy has only strengthened our faith in capitalism, it would seem. We are on the verge of sucking scientific research and development into the market model of a publicly traded company, where answers need only be given to shareholders and the goal is only to provide the greatest economic bang for the buck. Getting funding is already rife enough with bias toward patent rights and to be sure research can be highly political (just look at the history of atomic physics), but we are venturing down a path where science answers to the accountants first and foremost and perhaps only.
The bottom line is that science, like love or Radiohead, isnt justified in terms of economics. Value is not defined in dollars. When considering the economic benefits of science it is useful as positive externalities, but never as a driving force.
“They could tell you the whole hateful story of it, set forth in the inner soul of a city in which justice and honour, women’s bodies and men’s souls, were for sale in the marketplace, and human beings writhed and fought and fell upon each other like wolves in a pit; in which lusts were raging fires, and men were fuel, and humanity was festering and stewing and wallowing in its own corruption. Into this wild-beast tangle these men had been born without their consent, they had taken part in it because they could not help it; that they were in jail was no disgrace to them, for the game had never been fair, the dice were loaded. They were swindlers and thieves of pennies and dimes and they had been trapped and put out of the way by the swindlers and thieves of millions of dollars.” — Upton Sinclair - The Jungle (1906)
Biodiversity is one of those issues that seems to get ignored despite its enormous importance. A nice little study on salmon in Alaska’s Bristol Bay has shown that it is in fact extremely beneficial to the stability of the fish stock to have a bunch of genetic diversity amongst the fish. Among the millions that make the trek to spawn there are hundreds of different distinct populations and this has had benefits for the overall population.
As it goes, and as biodiversity in general goes, the more different kinds of a species you have the less suceptible the entire population is to changes in the environment and diseases. This particular study shows that the salmon population is able to stay relatively stable because when a few populations are struggling and decrease in numbers, others are more resistant and increase in numbers. Without this diversity they calculate that every 2 to 3 years the populations would flux to the point where fishing would have to be curtailed, while with the diversity this only occurs roughly once every 20-30 years.
The analogy they use in the study should hit home to many. When you invest your money in the market you gain long term stability (ie. you avoid frequent booms and busts) by ‘diversifying’ your portfolio. Put all your cash into one company and your well being rests solely on the health of that company. Put it into many and you smooth out those bumps. Same goes for flora and fauna. The proof is in the salmon.
The concern of stability is what concerns many people when it comes to genetically modified organisms (GMO), of which seeds are the most prominent example. When a seed company creates its own strain of plant (ie. a Monsanto soy bean) and propagate that seed en masse, you get biodiversity issues. The concern is that if (some would say when) these monocrops are hit with an affliction, the impacts on food supply will be devastating. If the example of the salmon stocks is any indicator, it would seem more wise to diversify our food porfolio, rather than invest in one or two stocks. The return may be higher, but so is the risk. Thats not something we would want with our food supplies.
In general, it is important to keep a variety of genes in the pool to build resilient populations. The same goes for any living organisms. The more diversity we loose the more instability we create.