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Climate Deal: US and China Join Paris Climate Accords (bbc.com)
An anonymous Slashdot reader quotes the BBC:
The US and China -- together responsible for 40% of the world's carbon emissions -- have both formally joined the Paris global climate agreement... It will only come into force legally after it is ratified by at least 55 countries, which between them produce 55% of global carbon emissions. Before China made its announcement, the 23 nations that had so far ratified the agreement accounted for just over 1% of emissions. This will put pressure on G20 nations over the weekend to move faster with their pledge to phase out subsidies to fossil fuels...
There's a G20 summit starting on Sunday, and the BBC's environmental analyst reports that the accord "will just need the EU and a couple of other major polluters to cross the threshold." Its ultimate goal is to stop global temperatures from rising more than 2 degrees Celsius -- "well above the aspirational 1.5C heating that the UN accepts should really be the limit" -- though U.K. researchers report that already 2016 temperatures may be rising 1.1C above pre-industrial levels.
There's a G20 summit starting on Sunday, and the BBC's environmental analyst reports that the accord "will just need the EU and a couple of other major polluters to cross the threshold." Its ultimate goal is to stop global temperatures from rising more than 2 degrees Celsius -- "well above the aspirational 1.5C heating that the UN accepts should really be the limit" -- though U.K. researchers report that already 2016 temperatures may be rising 1.1C above pre-industrial levels.
Speaking of Trump, climate change, and the Chinese, we have Trump's famous tweet that explains his position on the subject with atypical clarity.
Now please quit arguing that since China isn't doing anything, there's no point in the U.S. doing anything either. Fact is, the U.S. and China together are responsible for more than 38% of global greenhouse gas emissions, more than the EU, Russia, India, Japan and Brazil combined. We have a unique responsibility in the fight against global warming.
Yes, put our country back to work, let the market decide which technologies are efficient enough to take on coal. Why is our government only choosing energy production that only works when it's sunny or windy? Why is Bill Gates funding nuclear technology advancement in China and not here? Government shouldn't be picking winners and losers.
Yes, put our country back to work, let the market decide which technologies are efficient enough to take on coal. Why is our government only choosing energy production that only works when it's sunny or windy? Why is Bill Gates funding nuclear technology advancement in China and not here? Government shouldn't be picking winners and losers.
And furthermore:
- Canned talking point
- Canned talking point
- Unsubstantiated "fact"
- Canned talking point
- Political dog whistle
How Does the United States Ratify Treaties?
"The President...shall have Power, by and with the Advice and Consent of the Senate, to make Treaties, provided two thirds of the Senators present concur..." Constitution of the United States, Art. II, Sec. 2
[http://www.childrightscampaign.org/why-ratify/how-does-the-united-states-ratify-treaties]
Trump, our savior!
coal and oil are subsidized. there is a huge federal fund to pay for coal workers health problems which should be paid by the customers via higher prices. same with oil where the government leases land and passes all kinds of laws in case oil companies get sued after a spill
but Trump can't do anything about coal either way. Coal is in decline because most of it wasn't being used to generate electricity. It was being shipped to China to make steel. China (and the rest of the world) isn't building infrastructure anymore (those tax cuts have to come from somewhere, amairight?). That's what killed coal. Not the environment. Not outsourcing. Just plain ole fashion drop in demand.
Hi! I make Firefox Plug-ins. Check 'em out @ https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/youtube-mp3-podcaster/
Anyone who has ever done the classic experiment of heating ice water while recording the temperature increase will know that the word "already" has no place here.
The temperature dynamics of the earth's biosphere are a Rube Goldberg contraption. It's not even clear that adding heat couldn't lead (for some period of time) to a temperature decrease.
For example, let's suppose that the gas trapped in the permafrost was not methane, but a methane-like gas that promotes a net global cooling (under the condition of maximal sustained release); however, the net cooling effect is not evenly distributed, the permafrost at the poles continues to melt, this entrenched source of anti-methane is ultimately exhausted, and then the earth's temperature begins to warm again, now in a rapid rebound.
This story is not even a huge change in the particulars as we found them.
Just imagine if scientists were presently gasping in alarm at a global cooling of 1 degree C which presages (in accepted theory) a rapid rebound in the other direction. Then we'd be writing (perhaps correctly) that we've already experienced a fatal 1 degree C of cooling en route to an impossibly dire 2 degree C global warming.
The word "already" is being used here to cue the naive reader into the lazy presumption that we can cast off the nefarious ashes of system theory, and bust out instead narrative compass and straightedge.
No. We. Can't.
To be ratified, Congress must vote for the accord. That has not happened, and likely will not any time soon.
The US 'formally' joining the Paris Accord is based on Obama's claim that it's not actually a treaty, and therefore doesn't actually require Congressional ratification, despite the fact that that it incorporates compulsory actions on the part of the signatory countries, and is therefore a treaty.
Well it doesn't have any penalties. JFK could say "we will send a man to the moon by the end of the decade" without any legal problems of binding Congress and future presidents because it's no more than a statement of intent. The Paris accords are pretty much the same, we promise to work to reduce climate change. If we don't... we don't. Nothing has been explicitly regulated or banned, no money has been explicitly promised, it's basically a statement of good intentions put to paper. It's a symbolic agreement with less teeth than the Kyoto protocol exactly so it can pass anywhere, like the UN declaration of human rights even though they're regularly violated in many countries of the world.
Live today, because you never know what tomorrow brings
And who pays into those funds? The oil/coal producers.
The funds exist so the producers cannot declare bankruptcy and walk away. This is not the 1800s any more, there is a bit of control for the secondary effects.
The US 'formally' joining the Paris Accord is based on Obama's claim that it's not actually a treaty, and therefore doesn't actually require Congressional ratification, despite the fact that that it incorporates compulsory actions on the part of the signatory countries, and is therefore a treaty.
Well it doesn't have any penalties.
Is that the relevant point?
You don't think that agreements should be ratified when they don't have penalties?
You're saying it's okay for the president to speak for the country and make agreements without oversight?
Could there be any bad consequences down the road if we let it pass this one time?
China needs to be brought under control QUICKLY. The idea that they be allowed to build out 50 GW of new coal plants every year until 2030 is just plain STUPID. As it is, they are NOT at 33%, but are close to 50% OR MORE of emissions. Go look at OCO-2 sat. You can see how much they emit.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
When it comes to carbon footprint the top two on energy produced per greenhouse gasses emitted are hydroelectric and nuclear. Wind and solar are close behind. So close that if anyone wants to argue with me on this I'll call them all equal, perhaps I'd even grant wind and solar a 10x lead because even then nuclear is so much better than coal and oil. Geothermal is up there somewhere too but, like hydro, it is highly location dependent. Wind and solar are still location dependent but much less so. There are few places we cannot put nuclear.
Then there are lives lost per terawatt hour produced. Nuclear gets 0.04 lives lost per TWh produced, and this includes Fukushima, Chernobyl, and deaths by mining uranium. Rooftop solar has 0.1, wind has 0.15, hydro has 1.0 (mostly due to China, 0.1 otherwise), with the world average around 47, mostly due to coal, oil, and natural gas. Again, even if we take the nuclear number and multiply it by 10 it is still not bad compared to the rest.
When it comes to costs I'll take average numbers from the EIA because I feel like it and I found their numbers real quick. Nuclear is $95.2/MWh, conventional coal is $95.1, hydro is $83.5, peaking natural gas is $113.5, combined cycle natural gas is $75.2, wind is $73.6 onshore and $196.9 offshore, Solar is $125.3 for PV and $239.7 for thermal. Nuclear doesn't have a 10x advantage here but If someone wants to argue the numbers I'll grant a 2x advantage since then it still beats out the unreliable wind and solar in many cases. What I will not do is allow claims that wind and solar prices will improve but nuclear will not. If we grant that future technology improvement grants a better price for one energy source then we should be able to assume an equal gain on any other energy source. This is especially true if discussing any technology that turns heat or mechanical motion into electricity since nuclear power uses those just as much as wind or solar thermal.
Then it comes down to whether or not we can actually build it all. I saw a comparison on these energy sources based on a cubic mile of oil. This comparison spreads the construction over 50 years, and if we assume a 50 year lifespan of these power sources then it turns into a continuous rate of construction. We'd need one new 900MW nuclear power plant every week. 200 new 18GW hydroelectric dams every quarter. 1200 new windmills every week with 1.65MW capacity each. For PV solar we'd need to cover 250,000 roofs per day with 2.1kWh capacity each.
Here's where I think the final nail in the coffin on the idea that we can replace coal with wind lies. To replace coal with wind worldwide would require 10 billion tons of steel and concrete, and current annual production is 1.5 billion tons. Wind requires over 500 tons of steel and 1000 tons of concrete per MW installed, about ten times that of nuclear, coal, or gas. I got most of these numbers from the EIA and from Morgan Stanley.
I've heard people claim it is impossible for us to produce one new nuclear power plant per week worldwide. I call bullshit because nuclear power takes no more resources than coal or natural gas and we are currently building them at a similar rate. Arguments against nuclear on costs in lives and dollars also go out the window to anyone that does an honest analysis. Comparing nuclear to wind on resources required makes nuclear look so much easier. I tried to do a similar analysis on solar but my calculator doesn't do numbers that big.
I've largely ignored issues like reliability, location restrictions, etc. that count against wind and solar because I don't have to go there to make my point. If someone wants to argue about nuclear being unreliable but wind and solar can be predicted then I'll go there, but you'll lose.
I am armed because I am free. I am free because I am armed.
Let's get rid of hunting, cars, pesticides and buildings first then, since all of those result in more bird deaths than wind power: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... And roasting birds? Seriously? Come to think of it, roasted bird sounds good. Solar panels on every street corner, anyone?
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Also, don't forget the humble Felis Catus.
...si hoc legere nimium eruditionis habes...
Well, she hasn't had a chance to do anything - Why, she was only First Lady of the United States for 8 years, A US Senator for another 8 years, then Secretary of State for 4 years... How is she supposed to have effected any change in the world?
(For those that want to push back on her time as First Lady, I direct your attention to her "two for one" claim when Bill was campaigning AND her (failed) attempt to revamp the US Healthcare system, AKA Hillarycare.
Ken
It does have the effect of making a country's leadership look bad if they do not join the majority or joining, if they fail completely to make improvement.
Like the other guy posted, Donald Trump can be seen an example of someone who if elected does not intend to work towards the goals in this Accord. How does that make him look? Like a conspiracy loon, on top of other things.
https://twitter.com/realdonald...
You have a really low opinion of Hillary Clinton-- oh wait, you're assuming a Republican sweep? Heh.
If Trump is elected, no one is going to be worried about looking like an Obama-lover... it's more likely two-thirds of the country would be trying to secede and take Britain's place in the EU.
There is widespread opposition to the Paris accords in the US. If Trump announces his intention to flout the agreement, at least as many will cheer him as will think he looks bad.
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Obstructing evil is the most sacred obligation of Congress. That obligation is equivalent to obstructing Obama.
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Broken window fallacy. Replacing something with something else that does the same thing, is a waste of human effort.
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Energy is mostly a fungible resource. Whether you produce it with fossil fuels or renewable energy it's still the same thing. It's time to let go of the past and look to the future.
What replaces fossil fuels must have comparable energy densities and portability/replenishment/refueling cycle times and ranges.
What many fail to factor seriously enough is the effects of energy price increases on the poor and working-poor.
The effects of rising energy costs can be measured in lives lost among the most vulnerable. How many grannies freezing to death and babies starving per kilowatt/hour are you willing to pay for pushing energy costs up by pushing alternative energy sources that aren't yet mature/ready to meet energy needs at comparable costs etc (as outlined above)?
As electric vehicles grow in numbers a large amount will need to be spent on recharging infrastructure and they will also require a huge increase in electrical generation capacity of the US grid to basically switch all the energy formerly consumed by IC vehicles over to mostly being drawn from the national electrical grid which is already heavily stressed and at dangerously-low capacity due to the large numbers of coal plants taken offline and their capacity not being replaced (by anything, renewable/green or not) at anything like a 1:1 ratio.
Strat
Progressivism (aka US 'Liberalism'): Ideas so good they need a police/surveillance-state to enforce.
A trace component that is actually REQUIRED for life as we know it on this planet no less.
Fuck the climate religion.
False. While he did limit his number of 'executive orders', he issues more 'executive memorandum' than anyone else. What's the legal difference between the two? Not a thing, but parrots like you can keep saying he didn't do as much and blame the GOP despite the underlying facts not supporting your argument.
Help Brendan pay off his student loans
Not if the replacement has lower costs (including externalities). Replacing a cracked old single-pane window with a heat and noise insulating triple-paned window is an improvement.
Yes, dumbfuck, I grew up in coal country. Mining regulations and enforcement in the late 60's pretty much ended black lung. It lives on only in the minds of ignorant leftists. Most of what is blamed on black lung is due almost entirely to smoking.
What replaces fossil fuels must have comparable energy densities and portability/replenishment/refueling cycle times and ranges.
You're thinking in terms of transportation which accounts for about 28% of our energy use (in the USA). Most stationary applications can use electrical power and it doesn't matter how that's generated. Even in transportation electric cars currently have the range for about 90% of most people's driving and with battery technology improving year by year the range continues to improve.
Solar and wind power are competitive on price with other forms of power generation and they continue to get cheaper. It's just a matter of building out the infrastructure.
http://public.wsu.edu/~brians/errors/nonerrors.html#between
Keep your eyes to the sky.
I would say that he has a rather high opinion of Hillary, since he assumes that she will not continue the charade that this treaty is binding in the U.S. without Senate ratification. I tend to think that you are correct that, despite the clear statement of the Constitution, Hillary will act, and instruct those who answer to her to act, as if the Paris Treaty is legally binding.
The truth is that all men having power ought to be mistrusted. James Madison
Removing all subsidies to fossil fuels was on the table at Paris but, surprise, voted down.
Research the 1937 Pitman_Robertson Act. It is a 11% federal excise tax on firearms, ammunition, bows and arrows. This generates between $177 and $324 million dollars a year for wildlife consonvertation. Hunters are the best conservationist. Without animals and habitat you have no hunting.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...
Then we'd have to go through this 1,749,999 times every week for all the other roofs that would need to be covered to make up for the loss of one coal plant. Or, we can replace that one coal plant shut down every week with one nuclear power plant every week..
That's a lot of people up on roofs installing PV panels. No wonder PV fails compared to nuclear on deaths per terawatt hour. That would be a lot of people up on a roof and a lot of chances for people to fall off and break their neck.
I am armed because I am free. I am free because I am armed.
The USA isn't bound by any treaty until and unless it's ratified by the Senate.
-jcr
The only title of honor that a tyrant can grant is "Enemy of the State."
He won't need to. Despite what Obama says, this is a treaty and it's not valid without Senate approval.
What replaces fossil fuels must have comparable energy densities and portability/replenishment/refueling cycle times and ranges.
Kinda...
What it really needs, is lower cost. In stationary applications, cost per KwH is what matters. For transport fuels, it's cost per unit of payload * distance. Refueling time is a cost factor. Energy density is a cost factor.
-jcr
The only title of honor that a tyrant can grant is "Enemy of the State."
Yes, I agree. I generalized greatly. My post was starting to get long. Posts on an internet forum are a clumsy & ham-handed way to discuss an extremely complicated and nuanced subject.
In an effort to promote clarity, I try to keep posts relatively brief and as a result have to stay away from 'going into the weeds' too far when covering multiple aspects of a subject, as the 'wall-O-text' effect can make reading it once posted frustrating and painful for the reader.
Strat
Progressivism (aka US 'Liberalism'): Ideas so good they need a police/surveillance-state to enforce.
If he's saying "energy revolution" he invites you to project "trump is making america use green technologies". But he is proposing exactly the opposite: http://www.ecowatch.com/trump-...
Quoting his press release https://www.donaldjtrump.com/p... , he wants to:
Cancel the Paris Climate Agreement (limit global warming to 2 degrees Celsius) and stop all payments of U.S. tax dollars to U.N. global warming programs.
[...]
Save the coal industry and other industries threatened by Hillary Clinton’s extremist agenda.
And for the coal workers: At one of his rallies in west virginia he has said this:
Let me tell you: the miners in West Virginia and Pennsylvania, which was so great to me last week and Ohio and all over, they're going to start to work again, believe me. You're going to be proud again to be miners.
I don't know whether it qualifies as "projection" if you are just quoting his words as he says so much, but show me the quote where he said the thing about the new energy system.
Another example of Ready, Go, Set. ... then he says 'Doh!
CHina is the worst polluter on the planet, and continuing to grow it.
They account for 33%, while adding 50GW coal plants EACH YEAR (and only 33 GW of AE, which are very inefficient there).
And America is is the bottom 1/3 of polluters when Co2 per $ GDP. China is in top 3.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
No, no trouble. They'll just have their nonsense called out. By your weird logic drowning is impossible as we need water to live. You don't seem to understand some rather basic science.
Per person is one of the WORST measures on this since ppl do not make the choices.
The choices are made by Businesses and Gov. As such, GDP is the ONLY measure that will work to bring it down.
Also, America is not even in the TOP 10 of the worst per capita.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
Instead, you choose to support a sexist and racist woman? Or are you voting for Green or Libertarian and their incredibly short sighted and pandering platforms?
APK likes to ask for responses to the same things over and over. Maybe he just likes the responses?