There are many opportunities for slowing global warming. However, there are many reasons to believe that global warming is ultimately inevitable.
Carbon dioxide, once produced, stays in the atmosphere for thousands of years. It takes a long time for the atmosphere to come into equilibrium with the ocean, and even longer for dissolved CO2 to be deposited as carbonate rock. Cutting CO2 production in half will not prevent significant global warming, just delay it.
China currently produces 10% of global CO2 output. Chinese energy consumption is projected to quadruple in the next 40 years. Other lesser developed countries will also increase their CO2 output.
An EPA projection finds annual world energy consumption rising from 290 exajoules (1985) to 585 exajoules (2025). This projection assumes the western democracies substantially improve energy efficiency. In this projection, developing country annual consumption rises from 65 exajoules to 296 exajoules.
China has recently admitted its coercive birth control policy is a failure.
Fossil fuels are abundant, much more so than was commonly believed in the 70’s. Global oil reserves have jumped 30% in the last three years, and reserves/(rate of consumption) is now at more than 45 years, some of this increase is due to conservation. The production cost for oil in the mideast is very low; any attempt to replace oil with nonfossil sources of energy will just cause OPEC to cut prices (production costs at some Saudi fields are < $1 per barrel).
Global coal reserves are up 80% (!) in the last three years, to 1.1 trillion tons. This is enough carbon to increase atmospheric CO2 by about 700 ppm, almost tripling current CO2 levels. China has 610 billion tons of this reserve.
Natural gas reserves are doubling every ten years.
The upshot is that there will be a strong disincentive to switch to more expensive energy sources, such as renewables or nuclear, and more extreme forms of conservation will be uneconomical. Any country that tries to unilaterally reduce its CO2 production too much will put itself at a disadvantage in the global economy.
The best realistic hope, I think, is that warming can be delayed enough to give us time to improve alternate technologies so they can outcompete fossil fuels. Failing that, we’d better get ready to put sunshades at the earth-sun L1 point.
Popularity: 19% [?]
