Is it true that we've made no progress on climate change in the past two years as Greta Thurnberg has claimed?
I fear that it is. This is why:
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Breaking the law by government is organised crime, and this government is prepared to do this by breaking the law on EU withdrawal agreement and Ireland as you have outlined in previous posts. The government therefore has no longer a leg to stand on by accusing Extinction Rebellion protesters preventing the printing of the Sun, Times, Telegraph and Mail last Saturday by illegally obstructing a highway in protest at these publications, either first denying climate change or supporting inertia in tackling this. Action to prevent ecocide by non-violent direct action seems to the only way that the authorities are woken up to the crisis we are facing. Greta is right, we must act now.
You refer to the Arctic ice cap, don’t you mean the Antarctic ice cap or the Greenland ice cap, or both? The Arctic ice cap is sea ice, its melting will not affect sea level. The other two are land ice and their melting will certainly cause sea level to rise. Maybe a bit nit picky but it’s important to get the story right.
Ap[ologies if I got it wrong
I think the I million tons per minute refers to meltwater from the Greenland ice cap – which would raise sea levels (unlike Arctic sea ice).
Apologies – a slip in an unscripted video, as these are
The question “are we doing enough” can only be addressed globally. Two sets of numbers have meaning with respect to CO2 emissions. Current and historic.
Historically the numbers are :USA 400bn tonnes (25%), EU 353bn tonnes (22%) and China 210bh tonnes (13%). In the case of China around 168 bn tonnes have been emitted since 1990 as it “modernised”. Morally, both the EU and USA need to slash emissions because of historic emissions.
Current emissions per year: USA 5bn tonnes, EU 4.5bn tonnes, China 10bn tonnes. Chinese emissions took-off post 2000. Example: the country has made itself the No1 global steel producer (51% of capacity) 930 million tonnes steel and around 2 billion tonnes of CO2 emissions associated with this. All this from an almost standing start in 2000. Wonder why the climate disaster is accelerating – look to China.
The EU target of a 55% reduction in CO2 emissions by 2030 is probably not enough, but is certainly more than that proposed by any other region. China and the USA have nothing on the table close to this. Indeed, Chinese emissions continue to accelerate as they make a bid to become the global economic power. This link gives a taste for what is happening:
https://foreignpolicy.com/2020/05/19/dont-let-china-steal-your-steel-industry/
I and my business partners are currently analysing what it will take to get to 55% reduction (2030 vs 1990) in the EU. Depending on the stats, its either 2254 million tonnes reduction (our calculation) or 1534 million tonnes (Commission calculation). Examining each sector, it is difficult to see how -55%.will be reached in 9 years. It implies the decarb of most of the electrical power generation sector and most of transport.
Meanwhile, I still see morons driving SUWs (the W is for Wanker) with Euro OEMs playing the part of crack-cocaine dealers in this respect (they’ve got their junkies on the habit & they ain’t going to let them go). Energy rennovation with respect to the thermal fabric of buildings is at a standstill (jobs? what jobs?) and the construction of renewables in an unreformed electricity market is sluggish (gee I wonder if they could be linked).
I sympathise with much of what Ms Thurnberg says & indeed we are not going fast enough – but at least there is a dialogue in the EU and some movement. In Truumpland things are stationary and in China dialogue gets you locked up. Which is why I advocate a trade war with China. Barriers up and let the Chinese stew in their own juice. No more trade, nothing.
Thanks
But China is only trying to lift its people out of poverty as we and the US did last century.
China has such a big population, that emissions will be huge to rise its people to our levels of comfort.
Why should they not be allowed to follow our example?
We did not kn ow we were destroying the planet
They do
So they have to find green alternatives like the rest of us
Sorry: fact. They too are suffering the consequences already, after all
You can’t drive an SUW, you can only be an SUW. I should know, I am one. Justified on the basis it was bought used, that we have two kids, two dogs, it’s a (cleaner and lower maintenance) non turbo petrol, it’s our only car, and we’ll own it until we can afford an electric one (in about 5 years time).
Another excellent video.
To be clear, the melting of (floating) Arctic ice will not DIRECTLY raise sea levels because the ice shrinks as it melts. However, while white ice reflects most of the sun’s heat that hits it, the dark sea surrounding the ice absorbs nearly all of the incident heat. So first, the warm surrounding water accelerates the melting. Second, as there is less white ice to bounce the heat back into space, the average temperature of the planet increases. At the same time land-based ice cover has reduced significantly in Greenland, the Antarctic and all the major mountain ranges. Planet-wide then, a) the rate of ice loss is increasing and b) as there is less ice to reflect the sun’s rays, temperatures are rising in these areas.
So, the principle cause of climate change — heat trapped by ‘greenhouse’ gases — has created this second major source of global heating to be taken into account.
1) Sea levels are rising already.
2) The rate of sea level rise is increasing.
3) The increasing ferocity of hurricanes etc. adds to the vulnerbility of cities and communities worldwide.
So your point that “every minute, a million tonnes of Arctic ice melts” is well made.
While these facts are hugely alarming to anyone who is willing to think about it, public awareness of them is minimal.
In her recent broadcasts on both Swedish and BBC radio,
Greta Thunberg: said “I’ve met many of the most powerful people in the world. And even among them, pretty much everyone lacks even some of the most basic knowledge … (P)eople understand much less about the climate crisis than you’d think … the level of knowledge and awareness is close to nonexistent” (https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/m000kwcc July 2020).
A similar conclusion was drawn by Rebecca Willis who reported “In return for anonymity, MPs agreed to speak candidly with me about climate change. … (One MP) said that just a few of her 600 or so fellow parliamentarians took climate seriously as an issue: ‘You might not get into double figures.’ ” (www.theguardian.com/environment/2020/may/21/i-dont-want-to-be-seen-as-a-zealot-what-mps-really-think-about-the-climate-crisis?utm_campaign=Carbon%20Brief%20Daily%20Briefing&utm_medium=email&utm_source=Revue%20newsletter 21 May 2020)
You are dealing brilliantly with the ignorance of economics. I commend you for this foray into climate and ecological science.
Thanks
The problem is that the thunbergs phrases the problem is a too simplistic way. They phrase the problem incorrectly, it is not a problem of politics or wants but one of technical engineering issues. Most green new deals simply assumes these technical issues away.
The issues can be broken into four broad technical elements of emissions due to; electricity, fuels, heat and materials.
Electricity has solutions with the only real unknowns being the technical viability of battery storage, and cost. Nuclear can reduce the unknown of battery storage (current batteries are used for frequency control).
Fuels can be partially replaced with the electric vehicles, though this adds to the prior demands of transforming the electricity grid. Heavy logistics will likely require biofuels/nuclear until green hydrogen can be proven. The cost of green H2 needs to decline dramatically by an order of magnitude.
Heating could be electric as well, as demonstrated by France. But again you place even more demand on the above. Heat pumps could be another solution by I don’t know their viability.
The last is materials. Our world and any green world, is going to be built on steel, cement, fertilisers, pharmaceuticals, petrochemicals and glass. Other materials are either not suitable (wood) or far to immature (carbon fibre). Decarbonising these are very difficult with current proposals being at best, at a lab stage (except for steel eafs, though these only supply certain grades). That is 10-20 years before the first industrial sized production plant, if the research is successful. There are circa 600 integrated steel plants worldwide with many more finishing/specialist steel plants. These billion tonne industries account for 20-30% of all emissions.
Real engineering solutions are needed and placard waving does little to help these solutions along.
Respectfully, you have clearly not read the Green New Deals I have
So I take it by your comments that those green new deals present demostrated* solutions to large scale battery storage and decarbonising steel and cement on a large scale? Please cite those that show the engineering solutions?
Where demonstration scale for an integrated cement/steelworks would be 1 million tonnes per annum.
Why not go and do your reading
No one says every problem is solved
And cement may never be
But for heaven’s sake – what are you saying is the alternative? All frying alive?
Dealing with some of the points made:
1.”Electricity has solutions with the only real unknowns being the technical viability of battery storage, and cost. Nuclear can reduce the unknown of battery storage (current batteries are used for frequency control).”
Response
Renewables and nuclear do not work very well together – the latter is not very flexible & as EdF said to me: “we struggle to modulate our reactors in the spring against the surge in hydro production” (I’m quoting EdF directly btw). Batteries provide a “solution” to renewables in terms of frequency response and sub-24hr storage. For multi-day storage you need something else (& no – not “Liquid Air” ).
2.”Heavy logistics will likely require biofuels/nuclear until green hydrogen can be proven. The cost of green H2 needs to decline dramatically by an order of magnitude.”
Response
Green hydrogen was “proven” and industrialised by NoskHydro’s forerunner in the late 19th century. Individual electrolysers can scale to 5 – 10MW which is sufficient to build 100MW – 500MW systems. In the case of price, this is a function of electricity costs. Systems soon to be built in Spain (20MW) will deliver green-H2 at around 5eurocents/kWh – this is equivalent to H2 from so-far-unproven SMR-CCS systems (Foster Wheeler did a nice report on the subject for the IEA).
3. “Heating could be electric as well, as demonstrated by France. But again you place even more demand on the above. Heat pumps could be another solution by I don’t know their viability.”
Response
Heat pumps are part of the solution but require buildings to be thermally renovated to a good standard (i.e. such that their thermal demand drops by 50% – I can supply you with a thermal model to twiddle with if you wish).
4. “Our world and any green world, is going to be built on steel, cement, fertilisers, pharmaceuticals, petrochemicals and glass. Other materials are either not suitable (wood) or far to immature (carbon fibre). ”
Response
In the case of carbon fibre and its lack of maturity this will be news to many manufacturers of wind turbine blades and bicycle frames. In the case of wood – widely used in Scandinavia & very long lasting. In the case of the tropics – bamboo buildings can last many decades and are zero carbon (as opposed to corrugated iron and breeze-blocks). Your comments with respect to steel (& its emissions) could be address by moving from blast furnace/basic oxygen furnace systems to direct reduction using (green) hydrogen.
Thanks Mike
Heat pumps do not require buildings to be highly insulated before installation. This is a requirement (sensible) of subsidy legislation rather than physics.
The fact is that heat pumps are 3 or 4 times more efficient at providing heat from electricity than resistance heating . Any installation of heat pumps is therefore likely to improve the efficiency of heating over whatever is currently used. Insulation can only help but should not be seen as a pre-requisite.
The EU green new deal posted in 2019 had little to say about how steel and cement gets decarbonised. One comment on steel, it mentions:
“This framework should foster the deployment of innovative technologies and infrastructure, such as smart grids, hydrogen networks or carbon capture, storage and utilisation, energy storage, also enabling sector integration.”
Now you can take a view on whether smart grids (with large scale storage) are developing or not, but large scale hydrogen production & networks and CCS do not exist, outside of oil, gas and petrochemical operations.
So clearly depending on these to scale to multi billion tonne Industries, is an assumption. The same or similar assumptions are used in the AOC green new deal.
As mentioned electric arc furnaces recycling steel are mature and these should be increased. However steel recycling rates are quite high and unfortunately many steel grades, especially high strength, require blast furnace routes still. That means our worldwide steel inventory is increasing. Nucor may have something to say about that in the future. Outside that, hybrit is 2025 for a 100000 tonne plant, hlsarna should be sooner, but requires CCS, and the thyssen goals are 2030 at best.
Cement is a different kettle of fish given the co2 emissions are inherent in the chemical reactions.
These industries, along with fertilisers and others mentioned, are called foundation industries for a reason. 90%+ of the modern world is built out of them. Ignoring the technical challenges required in their decarbonisation, is not a valid way forward.
Now go and read some better ones
Try Common Weal in Scotland, for example
What follows deals with some of the points raised by Don.
1.”but large scale hydrogen production & networks and CCS do not exist, outside of oil, gas and petrochemical operations”
Response
This is true as far as it goes, but most existing gas pipelines can carry 80 – 100bar hydrogen with little modification. As you may know, Gasunie looked at their Dutch HP/IP network and came to that conclusion. I’m sure you are also aware of the 80bar 1000km hydrogen pipeline running through France and the benelux.
2. “As mentioned electric arc furnaces recycling steel are mature and these should be increased. However steel recycling rates are quite high”
Response. (From the 2018 SITRA Circular Economy Report)
“Europe already produces around 100 Mt of scrap every year. In 2016, EAF plants in the EU produced some 65 Mt of steel, while 18 Mt of scrap was exported, and the remainder used in integrated steel plants…. we estimated that by mid-century, the amount of available scrap covers 80% of EU steel requirements”
The conclusion of the report covering steel was that if the EU implemented full circular economy measures, primary steel production in the EU could reduce to 15% of what it is now. This 15% could very easily covered by direct reduction/green H2 – which is a money problem not a technology problem.
My position is based in science and engineering. A basic understanding of cement manufacturing shows why, and it is extended to the other foundation Industries. And unfortunately the common weal also falls into the same assumptions for foundation Industries.
That does not mean it should not be implemented and given that most of your suggestions are both positive for the environment and are implementable over time (so let’s implement), it does not mean we should ignore the built environment. It is largely fossil fueled and with few alternatives (for example as you suggest clearly reducing excess deaths due to cold by better insulation etc, is a must). But we must face the problems.
As I said with the 4 elements, 3 have likely or possible solutions. At least we can see solutions for many of their issues, albeit those issues remain technical. The built environment though, is far different.
The issue we face is not one of wishes or politics or wants. It is an an issue of technical engineering capabilities. This must be the starting point of any proposals, i.e. what can we solve and what is likely to remain problematic.
I don’t think there is a video I disagree with. But a video of what can’t we do would not only be innovative in these types of discussions, but would also provide impetus on acting faster on what we can.
Do you want to sketch those issues in greater depth
My colleagues in the GND Group are now engaging with engineers, often now
We have no desire to duck issues
Richard,
Another excellent, succinct video. Thank you.
Have we made enough progress over the last two years? Clearly not, but I believe there are grounds for some optimism from the fact that people in many organisations are now addressing the issue seriously, in a way they weren’t before. This applies to some businesses (though I accept that for many it is still, at best, just a token). Newcastle City Council has just produced the first draft of a lengthy action plan to achieve net zero carbon by 2030. Real work is being done on this. My own church is working seriously on the same target, as set by Synod, and what has surprised me is the high level of commitment by some, but also acceptance more generally that this has to be done.
I give these as examples of what I believe is now a wider acceptance that climate change has to be addressed, that changes will have to be made and, crucially, that work on addressing the practical issues involved is underway. I am not claiming that this is universal and, of course, it should have happened 30 years ago, but I live in hope.
Since quite a few people read this blog they might get the wrong idea from reading the post by Mr Faux with respect to heat pumps. He is correct, heat pumps can be installed in a house that has not been thermally renovated. Now the detail as to why things are not that simple.
Air source heat pump performance (the most common type installed) is a function of outside air temperature. Winters have been warmer of late so let’s stick with a coefficient of performance (COP) of 3 (they can be much less when temps are below zero Centigrade). A typical 3 bed semi needs roughly 18,000kWh of heat per year. Thus a heat pump with a COP of 3 will use around 6,000kWh of electricity. This costs roughly 20pence/kWh so per year the heat pump bill will be about £1200. Gas costs around 4.1pence/kWh gas boilers are roughly 95% efficient giving a price of £776/year to deliver the same level of comfort.
That’s why you need to energy renovate your house. Economics. That said, perhaps some people are happy paying +£400/year extra?
There is also the attendant problem of: can existing urban electricity networks handle heat pump penetrations of above circa 30%. No. Which is why elec network operators are trying to convince the UK “gov” that HPs are a very very good idea – they are hoping to make a great deal of money “reinforcing” their networks.