Report from the Gigaton Throwdown Initiative Team

[Yangbo Du]

I have posted to the group files list a recently-released report from
the Gigaton Throwdown Initiative Team -- a task force led by academic
researchers and heads of clean energy ventures -- charting a path for
greenhouse gas emissions abatement to 2020. Seven technologies --
efficient building design and retrofitting, efficient building
materials, non-corn based (or land-intensive) biofuels, nuclear, solar
PV, solar thermal, and wind -- are currently technologically ready for
scale-up that results in annual reduction of at least 1 Gt CO2-
equivalent by 2020. Geothermal energy is also deemed capable of such
scale-up assuming aggressive technology R&D starting in the immediate
future, while scaling-up deployment of plug-in ICE/electric hybrid
vehicles, the remaining technology option evaluated in the study, for
the 1-Gt goal requires mandating that all new light-duty vehicles sold
worldwide from 2010 to 2020 be plug-in hybrids, not a realistic
target. Compared to our policy recommendations, those of Gigaton
Throwdown appeared more strongly in favor of efficiency standards (not
as substitutes for financial incentives) but were otherwise quite
similar.