Blowing Smoke

Ooops out of time

So tonight I'm going to

Party like it's 1999

    -Prince

What a nice surprise

Bring your alibis

   -The Eagles 

Greetings

     I just saw a book review of a book I'd like to read , it's called Bunk, The Rise of Humbug, Plagerists, Phonies, post Facts, and Fake News.  Review here.. Its kind of a history of hocum, and an inquiry into the human mind which continues to let itself be fooled.

    Of course the energy area is littered with hocum .  Best of all was, "too cheap to meter " .   How about "cold fusion" ?, or " abiotic oil" .   Mostly hog wash.    Ethanol from Algea?  From corn?  Balerrdash.   How about the hydrogen highway?    And of course,  natural gas, the "bridge fuel " (probably worse than coal) .   

     So,  I suppose we shouldn't be too surprised to see this article which explores  the reality behind  the "imaginary technology" of BECCS.  By putting our faith in this specter,  policy makers can embrace carbon budget busting programs with a straight face.  As one Obama era expect says,

    

 "The most important of the IPCC’s projections is that we’re screwed unless we can figure out how to take CO2 out of the atmosphere, because we haven’t acted fast enough,”

           Next up -"  green consumption",  or "Why cotton shopping bags may do more harm than good" .   All of us wealthy (and it's mostly the wealthy), concerned citizens, that  engage in earth friendly purchasing , which, although it makes us feel better, is  basically a waste of time.  So says Dave Roberts anyway, and he has a few studies to back him up.

      

Ecological footprint is mostly determined by wealth

The study was published in the June 2017 edition of the journal Environment and Behaviorwith a title that gives you some idea of what to expect: “Good Intents, but Low Impacts.”

Basically, research shows that the cynical view is roughly correct: Environmental identity will lead to some relatively low-impact (high-signaling) pro-environmental behaviors, but it rarely drives serious reductions in the biggest sources of lifestyle emissions. Environmental self-identification rises with income, but so do emissions.

(A 2012 study and a 2013 study, both based on a survey in Hungary, found roughly the same thing.)

The bottom line is pretty straight forward.  To really deal with our overshoot would require real lifestyle change.

"Consider what the average upper-middle-class American would actually have to do to make a substantial dent in her carbon footprint. Above all, she would have to drastically cut back on travel — virtually never fly and heavily favor walking and biking. She would have to give up meat and live in a small apartment in a dense, transit-served urban area. (On the issue of what it would truly mean to consume only the “fair” per-capita amount of energy, watch this hour-long talk by Saul Griffith. It will change your life

          But, we keep on falling for this stuff.    Why?  We want to beleive.  Can we rid ourselves of these psychological tendencies ?   Surely once we recognize our biases and limitations .   Perhaps.  But perhaps not.  See here

".... in his recent book Don’t Even Think About It, climate change activist George Marshall interviews the Nobel prizewinning psychologist Daniel Kahneman, the leading scholar of cognitive biases, and tries to nudge him into saying that understanding our brains’ limitations will, at the very least, make it easier to overcome them. “I’m not very optimistic about that,” Kahneman replies, despondently sipping tomato soup. “No amount of psychological awareness will overcome people’s reluctance to lower their standard of living. So that’s my bottom line: there is not much hope. I’m thoroughly pessimistic. I’m sorry.” 

Here's what Geoge Monbiot says

Green consumerism, material decoupling, sustainable growth: all are illusions, designed to justify an economic model that is driving us to catastrophe. The current system, based on private luxury and public squalor, will immiserate us all: under this model, luxury and deprivation are one beast with two heads.

There is some good news though.  In California they have implimented a cap and trade law.    See here.  Which just got an update see here     The next session of the Oregon legislature is set to take it up.  .

Here's a summary. from here

Oregon’s proposed program would cover approximately 100 businesses and have an emissions cap of 50 million metric tons of carbon dioxide equivalents. By linking with California, Ontario, and Quebec, Oregon would have access to a market with several hundred more compliance entities and an emissions cap ten times as large. Therefore, Oregon companies participating in a linked market would have significant flexibility in finding the lowest cost options to reduce their emissions. In addition to reducing compliance costs, linking a new Oregon market to one that has been in existence for several years will also reduce any volatility that Oregon businesses might experience. The twin benefits of least-cost compliance and minimal market volatility are clear benefits for Oregon in linking to a large market.

        Unlike some of the other ideas, mentioned above, this seems to be an idea that might actually make things better.  So that's good news.        Of course " better" is a pretty low bar.  At this point we are speeding towards a cliff at 80 miles an hour.  We need to put our foot on the brake.  But we are unwilling to do that.  It might affect our high energy lifestyle  

    Maybe cap and trade will lighten up on  the accelerator .  We just passed the sign that says "Last stop for 1.5 degrees".    We missed the turnoff.     Next comes the 2 degree cliff.  

      What does the future hold?  Well, of course renewable energy will be built out.  It is getting cheaper and cheaper.   The question is how fast.  Fast enough to avoid 2 degrees  ?  Probably not.  Fast enough to substitute for a depleting amount of fossil fuel?  Perhaps not .

     Ugo Bardi has dome some interesting modelling on the issue of energy transition.  See here.        He suggests that our build out is too slow.

According to these estimates, the current level of energy investments in new renewable energy is not sufficient to attain the transition within the assumed climatic and energetic constraints. <..>

In short, a transition that could maintain the “BAU” (business as usual) is technically feasible and physically possible if we were willing to increase of a factor of 5 (at the very least) our investments in it. Unfortunately, the trend is going in the opposite direction. The global investments in renewable energy seem to have levelled off and In 2016 were approximately at the same level as they were in 2010. Too little, too late.

So, basically, we are not making it. We are consciously choosing to go down the Seneca Cliff, even though we wouldn’t need to. It is maddening to think that we are failing at the challenge not because the transition is technologically unfeasible or unaffordable, but because the transition is politically inconceivable. Increasing investments in renewable energy requires sacrifices and this is a no-no in our world.