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Global warming, Moore's Law and being French
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During Roger Pielke Jr.'s talk at Berkeley the other night, (see first article here, download the slides from his lecture here), he talked about how, since it would be political suicide to try to mandate reductions in the population or reductions in GDP, that we would need technological improvements to improve energy efficiency and reduce carbon emissions.
In 2006 (latest stats available) the world emitted 0.62 tons of CO2 for every $1,000 in GDP. We can improve on that--indeed, we have been 'decarbonizing' (making more money for every ton of CO2 we emit) since the industrial age began. It has improved impressively since 1980, when we emitted 0.93 tons of CO2 for every $1,000 in GDP to today's figures. But, and this is important, we can continue on this line for as long as we want, but because most of the world desperately wants a lot more GDP, the 'natural' trend towards decarbonization won't get us there. We need to be a bit 'unnatural' in our approach.
In order to meet the targets our government has set for us in ACES and other commitments, we have to move from 0.62 tonnes per $1,000 GDP to about 0.06 tons--a huge reduction, although not impossible. What's impossible, in Pielke's opinion (which I share), is to do this by 2050, as various government entities have pledged to do.
Now, this isn't a change of subject. The French have the greenest energy in the world, due to their large-scale adoption of nuclear power. They emit 0.3 tons of CO2 for every $1,000 in GDP, half that of the rest of the world. However, to reach one of our stated goals of 17% fewer emissions by 2020, the United States will have to be as efficient as France by, umm, 2006. Which is why Waxman and Markey's ACES legislation has so many loopholes in it. We cannot meet the goal.
Pielke spoke eloquently about the need to turn away from top-down mandated reductions in emissions to broad-based investment in technology to create a 'Moore's Law' of ever-increasing efficiency for energy generation, storage, distribution and usage. Moore's Law is not a natural law. It is a prediction by Gordon Moore about how much time it would take to double the number of transistors on a silicon chip. But because it was accepted, it became an industry goal, and software developers began making software that would run on the next generation of chips, which made it sort of mandatory for chip designers to meet Moore's Law. We could do something like that for energy, and I think we should.
Overall efficiency of technology has improved at between 1% annually, reaching 2% for short times in defined areas for a long time. We can push that up with incentives. We can certainly think outside the box--France is exporting clean electricity to Italy and other countries, and their reactors are not operating at full capacity. A Russian nuclear submarine was once used to provide electricity to a town near a naval base--and there are lots of nuclear submarines sailing around wondering where the Cold War went. A few aircraft carriers, as well.
But, and here's where I finally disagreed with Roger Pielke Jr, I think there is a strong role for government to play. I asked him if something like the Manhattan Project or Apollo program could be instituted to help solve energy issues, and he didn't think so--noting that both projects weren't huge, as a proportion of GDP, and more importantly, that both were 'engineering' projects that had to solve non-theoretical problems, as opposed to energy issues, where some theory remains to be worked out.
But (and regular readers will know what's coming) there are two energy generating systems that have received substantial research in the past and could be dusted off and brought into the mix--Ocean Thermal Energy Conversion, first used in 1931, still being researched by Japan in a big way, and formerly a field that received substantial U.S. research investment, and Space Based Solar Power, postulated in 1968 and receiving its first forward contract for electricity this year. U.S. government investment in both of these areas is almost certain to pay dividends, and not only in energy. OTEC systems also act as desalination plants and promote wildlife around the stations. Space Based Solar Power Stations that beam power back as microwaves will provide a lot of solar power--but also get us back into space. Last time we went there in a big way, the science we learned powered a generation.
So I would (and I believe Roger Pielke Jr. would as well) scrap the current muddled legislation for now. Let's spend some time and money investing in improvements both big and small (and a little bit for improving how we measure global warming would not be a mistake, either), and reconvene on targets after we've made our first serious push on solving the problem.
We're not finished analysing Pielke's lecture--lots more statistics to look at. What better way to spend a glorious 4th?
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- thomaswfuller3 at gmail dot com
