Nature reports on moves by business leader to address climate change, in some cases in advance of government regulation. Lots of people have raised concerns about whether businesses can contribute positively to tackling climate change, since industry is seen as the cause of many of the problems.
Carbon markets and climate change policy in general are gaining momentum in the US for complex reasons. Industry realizes that if they don't act that there may be legislation but I think there is a more complex reason. In a conversation with two researchers from the National Intelligence Office we sketched out three forces that overlap to drive climate policy: climate change, national security and energy independence. It is becoming clear that part of the backlash against the Iraq war has manifested as a concern about the geopolitics of oil.
Sometimes images have more influence than words and scientific data.
Europe has led the world in the development of indirect taxation systems that seek to modify behaviour. A system co-ordinated across Europe would be more appealing as it would prevent consumers from simply purchasing in a jurisdiction that doesn't apply the same taxes. This already happens with tobacco and alcohol. But it also shows the extent to which a green agenda is being seen as a way of generating revenues in the course of modifying behaviour; part of a wider shift away from direct taxation of income and towards indirect taxation.
Wired, July 25, 2007. New research indicates that hacking the atmosphere -- pumping microscopic particles into the stratosphere or clouds to block sunlight and offset global warming caused by greenhouse gases -- is imminently possible. The problem is we could never, ever stop doing it.
Wired Magazine, July 24, 2007. Nestled into the fog and forest of San Francisco's Golden Gate Park, the California Academy of Sciences aims to be the world's largest eco-friendly public building when it reopens in 2008. (It's bucking for a platinum LEED green-building certification.) Architect Renzo Piano used a textbook's worth of enviro-engineering tricks for the seven-year effort, an almost total teardown and rebuild. At $484 million, it's one of the most expensive museum projects in a century.
New Scientist has just run another special issue on climate change covering a range of issues from the role of iodine in the oceans to the reasons why green buildings have not been as popular as they should be. There is detailed coverage of the new Australian cap and trade system and an interesting piece on the relationship between climate change and war in Chinese history. This theme came up in the early nineties as a number of international relations scholars wondered out loud about whether climate change and environmental degradation in general could cause conflict.
Every time you breath out, a little bit of carbon dioxide is released into the atmosphere. Add up all the carbon dioxide breathed out and it adds up to 0.6 billion tons of carbon dioxide or about 0.6 tons per person per year. Human waste adds in another 0.3 tons per year. Add in all the carbon dioxide from domestic animals and it adds up to about 2 billion tons.
A lot of people hope that reforestation or avoided deforestation will limit some of the increases in greenhouse gas levels in the atmosphere. Most people understand the simple story of how living plants absorb carbon dioxide, but this show how the system is more complex. Plant do increase in productivity up to a threshold and then they are not able to photosynthesise. Worst still, if trees die then they may rot, producing methane in large volumes, which is a very effective greenhouse gas. These problems apply both in northern and tropical forests.
The voluntary offset market has grown to a $55 million/year industry, prompting increased scrutiny of offset projects and companies. The Washington Post takes a look at the challenges faced in participating in an unregulated industry.