My biggest skepticism is that solar, wind, and efficiency can do the job alone. When I go through the numbers, Asia and Africa swamp the US even if they are efficient (i.e., 25% of US per capita which is half the per capita of Switzerland). My guess is that some kind of baseload source will be needed (sequestered coal or LNG, fission, fusion, something that makes power 24/7 with little or no net carbon).

In the meantime, best wishes for 2008 to the climate movement.

You take down the grid, you kill people. You don’t care? You would if you had to watch them die.

Besides the solutions we are advocating that R Margolis has a right to be skeptical of, would reduce the health and ecological burdens of fossil fuels, increase employment, launch a new green economy, and maybe make the world a little more fair. If that combination of factors isn’t enough for us to launch a new, green economy why should we embrace some hideously expensive experiment that more than likely kill us all off?

I often wonder if much of the public’s hesitation for more immediate action on the carbon issue is that they keep hearing about social revolution as a siginificant goal of the climate movement. Any combination of solutions will have big social and economic impacts already and require amelioration. I would think that disempowered and impoverished people will need more electricity not less to give them health and economic opportunity.

As for “evil corporations”, they seem more followers than leaders. If the price of renewables becomes lower than fossil fuels when carbon finally gets regulated, then Exxon will build windmills and solar panels (maybe some sequestration and nuclear for baseload). My experience is that they have less of a grand agenda than most folks think.

2. The last severe global warming episode ended because ocean life removed the excess carbon from the air over thousands of years.

3. I suggest we improve nature’s ability by seeding an extensively tested genetically modified organism into the ocean.

Support:

“We now have evidence from the Earth’s history that a similar event happened fifty-five million years ago when a geological accident released into the air more than a terraton of gaseous carbon compounds…we have already put more than half this quantity of carbon gas into the air…and as a consequence the Earth is now returning to the hot state it was in before, millions of years ago, and as it warms, most living things will die.” (The Revenge of Gaia)

“But getting billions of humans to make serious cuts in CO2 emissions anytime soon may be even less realistic politically. As Dr. Lovelock and Dr. Rapley write: Processes that would normally regulate climate are being driven to amplify warming. Such feedbacks, as well as the inertia of the Earth system — and that of our response — make it doubtful that any of the well-intentioned technical or social schemes for carbon dieting will restore the status quo. What is needed is a fundamental cure.” (New York Times, Oct. 1)

“A rapid cutback in greenhouse gas emissions could speed up global warming…because current global warming is offset by global dimming - the 2-3ºC of cooling cause by industrial pollution, known to scientists as aerosol particles, in the atmosphere.” http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/main.jhtml?xml=/earth/2007/10/29/eaclim129.xml

“Last time Earth suffered a carbon-induced fever, it was the oceans that helped saved the day…the last severe global warming episode 55 million years ago was accompanied by several thousands of years of ocean plant life kicking into high gear…unfortunately, this process is slow and thus lags the buildup of carbon in the atmosphere…”
http://dsc.discovery.com/news/2007/12/26/global-warming-ocean.html