RE: Emissions abatement & Cooling

[rob...@rtulip.net]

Can I say, I read and appreciate all the emails on these group threads about climate policy.  Thank you all very much for such important and stimulating discussions.

 

I want to especially thank Doug Grandt for his comment today that “this seems to me to be a fundamental fact that would undermine any resistance to artificially brightening the earth: Earthshine as measured on the dark side of the moon declined about 25% from 1998 to 2017. That ain’t normal, so why not do all we can to compensate for the lost albedo?”

 

With due acknowledgement to Pink Floyd*, we see the risk that the dam breaks open many years too soon.  This rapid 25% fall in planetary brightness is a simple measure of the path to collapse.  Planetary darkening is something that can readily be remedied with investment in the billions, whereas carbon-based climate strategies cost trillions and won’t work, except as a follow-on to brightening.  Step back from the precipice before thinking about more complicated approaches.

 

The loss of albedo is generally unknown among the public, as is its effect on warming.  So too, the entire argument I have made that albedo is a more tractable climate lever than carbon creates cognitive dissonance for those who have put all their faith in renewable energy.  I will write a 600 word newspaper op-ed with this title, albedo is a more tractable climate lever than carbon,  based on the arguments I presented in my reply to McKibben that we can influence albedo far more quickly, cheaply, easily, safely and effectively than greenhouse gases.  The critical path to climate stability starts with brightening the planet.  A simple climate model can be measured by looking at the dark side of the moon. Without that emergency engineering response, there is no hope.

 

I do not blame politicians at all that they don’t believe we’re on the eve of destruction, as Barry McGuire put it in his number one 1965 hit song.  My perception is that a feasible path from here to there, a way to solve the climate problem, has never been presented in public.  Instead, we just see the neo-Marxist idea at COP that shutting down fossil fuels as fast as possible is the main agenda.  Such a class war strategy has no prospect of success.  The other side is too powerful, and this populist carbon focus simply entrenches polarisation based on the entirely reasonable views that accelerating decarbonisation is expensive and destabilising and would not achieve its stated goal.  A focus only on carbon without albedo is a case of the tail trying to wag the dog, treating a secondary driver as primary.   

 

The judo strategy, using the opponent’s momentum, requires partnership with the fossil fuel industry on albedo.  That is such a hard pill to swallow for most leftists that it seems they would prefer planetary destruction over ongoing emissions.

 

I would love to get some of these ideas into popular media.  I do not see anyone outside PRAG and HPAC and NOAC advocating anything similar, or even acknowledging what we say.  There is a vast implicit censorship, not by deliberate malice or conspiracy, but due to our failure to put the argument in clear and distinct ideas.

 

To date the closest I have personally come to a public conversation on these topics is my interview on the ABC Science Show, due solely to the serendipitous grace of intervention by Herbert Huppert.  Again, like David Hume’s treatise of human nature, what I said there largely fell dead-born from the press. Continuing the discussion on email groups is a great way to crystallise the key points.  As Hume went on to say, “being naturally of a cheerful and sanguine temper, I very soon recovered the blow, and prosecuted with great ardour my studies”.

 

Regards

Robert Tulip

 

*

G                            A

  And if the dam breaks open many years too soon

    C                                   G

And if there is no room upon the hill

G                                    A7

  And if your head explodes with dark forebodings too

     C                                   G     Bm7  Em7  A  A7

I'll see you on the dark side of the moon

 

 

From: healthy-planet-...@googlegroups.com <healthy-planet-...@googlegroups.com> On Behalf Of Robert Chris
Sent: Friday, 25 November 2022 8:48 AM
To: Clive Elsworth <cl...@endorphinsoftware.co.uk>; Ye Tao <t...@rowland.harvard.edu>; healthy-planet-action-coalition <healthy-planet-...@googlegroups.com>; noac-m...@googlegroups.com; Planetary Restoration <planetary-...@googlegroups.com>
Subject: Re: Emissions abatement & Cooling

 

Hi Clive

I think you're still oversimplifying it.  The climate, the politicians, the public, the scientists, life in all it many forms, the oceans and so on, all form part of a series of multiple nested or overlapping complex adaptive systems in which everything is interconnected and to a greater or lesser degree interdependent.  While the basic laws of cause and effect operate, the complexity means that it is not possible to establish clear and unambiguous causal chains.  Almost nothing is this or that, almost everything is intermixed and contingent.  Events are highly path dependent making secure prediction based on extrapolations of past events utterly forlorn in anything other than the most limited situations.  The best that having a good education can do is to make us aware of our limitations and of the error bars around our predictions.  Delving into Cultural Theory explains that the vast majority of the 'general public' are categorised as Fatalists.  Fatalists cope with what life throws at them, they don't shape it.  What happens is fought out between the Individualists (leave me alone to make it happen), Hierarchists (I'll make sure it happens in an orderly manner) and Egalitarians (I want what happens to be fair).

In short, we're all victims of our circumstances and each of us just has to do what we think best and hope that it all comes out right and not get too uptight if it doesn't.

Regards

Robert

On 24/11/2022 21:11, Clive Elsworth wrote:

Hi Ye

 

Taking a step back for a moment, I've come to the conclusion that most  politicians have a lot less power than we generally assume, otherwise why have so many COPs been so ineffectual? Political systems evolved when environmental stability could be taken for granted and politicians bear many additional responsibilities, mainly national security, energy security, food security and economic growth. In other words politicians must cater to the many diverse needs of voters. Thus it is the educational level of voters that  (theoretically at least) determines political outcomes in democracies. 

 

Therefore, those of us who are privileged to have received a good education bear a responsibility to make environmental imperatives clear to the general public. This is what PRAG group members and many others are trying to do, and what we can all contribute to.

 

Clive

On 24/11/2022 09:23 GMT Ye Tao <t...@rowland.harvard.edu> wrote:

 

 

In a sane world, we would have made it a constitutional requirement to hold a PhD degree in STEM to run for office, or to hold a top position at one of the ministries.    And annual addresses by leaders needs to also include a 30 min talk on original research, followed by live Q&A, just to make sure they are still rationally using their brains and up-to-date with the literature.

Ye

On 11/24/2022 4:12 AM, Clive Elsworth wrote:

There you have it then Ye, popular global climate policy is determined by people who are ignorant of the salient facts.

 

Clive

On 24/11/2022 07:44 GMT Ye Tao <t...@rowland.harvard.edu> wrote:

 

 

Most people do not read peer-reviewed papers.

Ye

On 11/24/2022 2:16 AM, Clive Elsworth wrote:

Hi Robert

 

Did you get any peer reviewed articles on the need for cooling by albedo enhancement?

 

It seems to me that given the numerous peer-reviewed papers that indicate the large contribution of most aerosols to negative radiative forcing, it should be self evident. However this is clearly not the case for most people. That is a puzzle I’m at a loss to explain.

 

Clive

On 21/11/2022 18:22 GMT Robert Chris <robert...@gmail.com> wrote:

 

 

I am writing a piece that seeks to explain why net zero will not deliver sufficient cooling to avert some of the dangerous consequences of anthropogenic emissions.

I'd be really grateful if those on these two lists could each point me to the one or two pieces of peer reviewed research that they think most convincingly justifies the claim that cooling is now essential.

I am keen to distinguish between

a) the argument that cooling is necessary because atmospheric GHGs can't feasibly be reduced by any combination of emissions abatement and GGR soon enough to bring surface temperature under control.  We might call this the limits of human capacity argument. and

b) the argument that cooling is necessary because even if we got to net zero by 2050 or soon thereafter, the continuing warming effect of past emissions would be sufficient to precipitate many of the feared negative climate impacts.  We might call this the constraints of nature's response argument.

No long responses, please.  Just the citations of the favoured papers or links to them.

Regards

Robert

 

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[Robert Chris]

Hi Clive and everyone else on these lists

Attached is my draft on the need for albedo management.  The title is my little joke, I hope not too subtle, but I suspect I'll have to sacrifice it before submitting this for publication.

It is a draft, not for circulation or citing, and I would appreciate feedback that might improve it, and hopefully not lengthen it.  I'd also welcome suggestions about where to submit it.  My first thought is to The Conversation, although it might be a bit long for them, and maybe not sufficiently novel.  My lack of experience at being published means I need all the advice I can get in this regard.

Regards

Robert

On 24/11/2022 22:28, Clive Elsworth wrote:

Hi Robert

 

I don't disagree with your assessment.

 

I find myself confronted with a continual choice: Give up, or pursue a (granted) simple approach of identifying with the help of others what look to be affordable, safe, effective solutions, and then collaborating to develop them further. The hard part is then explaining those solutions, even to other scientists, in a way that the ideas might gain some traction.

 

What's also hard is finding sufficient time (and sometimes motivation) to be effective. I'd say the collaborative effort is what generally gives me most motivation. So I appreciate all the communications and efforts of others, including yours.

 

I appreciate you have a fuller, more realistic view of the situation than me, but in my case I need to set myself relatively simple, achievable goals. I then trust that others will take things further forward as they see fit.

 

I look forward to reading your piece on the need for albedo enhancement when you're ready with it.

 

Clive

[Robert Chris]

[Clive Elsworth]

Hi Robert

 

I don't disagree with your assessment.

 

I find myself confronted with a continual choice: Give up, or pursue a (granted) simple approach of identifying with the help of others what look to be affordable, safe, effective solutions, and then collaborating to develop them further. The hard part is then explaining those solutions, even to other scientists, in a way that the ideas might gain some traction.

 

What's also hard is finding sufficient time (and sometimes motivation) to be effective. I'd say the collaborative effort is what generally gives me most motivation. So I appreciate all the communications and efforts of others, including yours.

 

I appreciate you have a fuller, more realistic view of the situation than me, but in my case I need to set myself relatively simple, achievable goals. I then trust that others will take things further forward as they see fit.

 

I look forward to reading your piece on the need for albedo enhancement when you're ready with it.

 

Clive

[Clive Elsworth]

[Tom Goreau]

Funny joke, but most won’t get it! For a clearer title that decision-makers would get try:

 

Brighten up!: The case for direct cooling

 

From: healthy-planet-...@googlegroups.com <healthy-planet-...@googlegroups.com> on behalf of Robert Chris <robert...@gmail.com>
Date: Friday, November 25, 2022 at 3:38 AM
To: Clive Elsworth <cl...@endorphinsoftware.co.uk>, Ye Tao <t...@rowland.harvard.edu>, healthy-planet-action-coalition <healthy-planet-...@googlegroups.com>, noac-m...@googlegroups.com <noac-m...@googlegroups.com>, Planetary Restoration <planetary-...@googlegroups.com>
Subject: Re: Emissions abatement & Cooling

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[Stephen Salter]

Hi All

A fleet of 800 spray vessels weighing 90 tonnes each would total 72000 tonnes of self-propelled high tech machinery but with some scrap value.  I hope that later  ones would last the 25 years of ordinary ships so tonnes per year looks quite attractive.

Stephen

From: healthy-planet-...@googlegroups.com <healthy-planet-...@googlegroups.com> On Behalf Of Ye Tao
Sent: 25 November 2022 10:47
To: Robert Chris <robert...@gmail.com>; Clive Elsworth <cl...@endorphinsoftware.co.uk>; healthy-planet-action-coalition <healthy-planet-...@googlegroups.com>; noac-m...@googlegroups.com; Planetary Restoration <planetary-...@googlegroups.com>
Subject: Re: Emissions abatement & Cooling

 

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Hi Robert,

Excellent piece.  I really appreciate your weight comparisons.  200Gt per year of silicate rock mining would be insane.   MEER infrastructure total weight for 40Gt per year offset is 500Mt, 0.3% of mineralization route, or 10% of annual concrete production.   

Suggested edit:

1) "Net zero means that we lock in a temperature increase of 1.5C, 2C, and likely more, that will subside only slowly over a century assuming insignificant presence of positive feedback..."

2) Check annual concrete production number.  You wrote 24 Gt.  I remember ~5 Gt.

Ye

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[Kyle K]

Hi Clive,

To chime in here: with regards to what determines political outcomes in democracies, 2 points.  First, you may be familiar with the 2014 study by Martin Gilens and Benjamin Page which shows public opinion has little to no bearing on American political action.  That opinion is certainly informed by education but even were we to be a country of post-docs it likely wouldn't matter, because as the study further explicates America is not a democracy.  There's something to be said about education being informative in how people view their position within a community but we also have armies of MBAs from Harvard who are passionately dedicated to growth-centric ideologies.  We can explain to people until we're blue in the face about how absolutely imperative immediate action and specifically EEI is but ~2/3 Americans already think the USFG should be doing more on climate change.  Peter Gelderloos just released a great book titled The Solutions Are Already Here which I highly recommend if you have the time.  He asks the question "Are we buying more time for endangered species, threatened habitats, and vulnerable human populations or buying more time for governments and companies to continue enriching themselves and to slowly wean themselves off of fossil fuels when it is convenient to their profit margins and geopolitical strategies?"  We should of course always weaponize our privilege against the omnipresent violence of state but I think it's important not to fall into the trap of thinking non-violent pressure by the public leads to truly liberatory action (something also covered in the book and in his other writings).

Best,

Kyle

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[Ye Tao]

Indeed Stephen, what you need is order 1-10% of the global auto industry.  So most certainly feasible.  Have you thought about building a scaled model with all the mechanical and mechanical-pressure, mechanical-electricity conversion capabilities?  What scaled model would be able to house all the details and how much would it cost?

800 for the size of the fleet is overly optimistic, as it assume sustained wind at the required wind speed and direction.  I would relax the number by X10-X100, to 8,000-80,000 vessels, without hurting feasibility.

Cheers,

Ye

p.s. The 500Mt we need is currently going to landfills:(

[Ye Tao]

Hi Robert,

Excellent piece.  I really appreciate your weight comparisons.  200Gt per year of silicate rock mining would be insane.   MEER infrastructure total weight for 40Gt per year offset is 500Mt, 0.3% of mineralization route, or 10% of annual concrete production.   

Suggested edit:

1) "Net zero means that we lock in a temperature increase of 1.5C, 2C, and likely more, that will subside only slowly over a century assuming insignificant presence of positive feedback..."

2) Check annual concrete production number.  You wrote 24 Gt.  I remember ~5 Gt.

Ye

On 11/24/2022 5:38 PM, Robert Chris wrote:

To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/healthy-planet-action-coalition/829a7c8a-2186-557c-a929-208bc73c3ad4%40gmail.com.

[Chris Vivian]

Ye/Robert,

 

Global cement production was 4.3 Gt in 2021 - https://www.iea.org/reports/cement. Global sand and gravel production, much of it used for making concrete, is estimated to be 32-50 Gt per annum e.g., https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2022/apr/26/50bn-tonnes-of-sand-and-gravel-extracted-each-year-finds-un-study. So Robert’s estimate of 40 Gt for concrete production looks to be in the right ball park!

 

Chris.

 

From: noac-m...@googlegroups.com <noac-m...@googlegroups.com> On Behalf Of Ye Tao
Sent: 25 November 2022 10:47
To: Robert Chris <robert...@gmail.com>; Clive Elsworth <cl...@endorphinsoftware.co.uk>; healthy-planet-action-coalition <healthy-planet-...@googlegroups.com>; noac-m...@googlegroups.com; Planetary Restoration <planetary-...@googlegroups.com>
Subject: Re: Emissions abatement & Cooling

 

Hi Robert,

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[Stephen Salter]

Hi Steve

A complication, or perhaps simplification, is that the CO2 content of the oceans is about 50 times more than the atmosphere.  If we were able to reduce atmospheric CO2, quite a big IF, the ocean CO2 would come back out.

Stephen

 

Emeritus Professor of Engineering Design

School of Engineering

University of Edinburgh

Mayfield Road

Edinburgh EH9 3DW

Scotland

0131 650 5704 or 0131 662 1180

YouTube Jamie Taylor Power for Change

 

 

 

From: healthy-planet-...@googlegroups.com <healthy-planet-...@googlegroups.com> On Behalf Of Stephen Penningroth
Sent: 25 November 2022 15:56
To: Robert Chris <robert...@gmail.com>
Cc: Clive Elsworth <cl...@endorphinsoftware.co.uk>; Ye Tao <t...@rowland.harvard.edu>; healthy-planet-action-coalition <healthy-planet-...@googlegroups.com>; noac-m...@googlegroups.com; Planetary Restoration <planetary-...@googlegroups.com>
Subject: Re: Emissions abatement & Cooling

 

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Hello Robert,

 

I am new to this forum and climbing a steep learning curve about climate change and SRM.

 

I have a question: In your paper, does "net zero" mean zero CO2 emissions? Or does it mean that CO2 emissions are balanced by an equal amount of CO2 removal? Peter Eisenberger distinguished between these two definitions in his recent talk and if I understood correctly, he defined "net zero" as CO2 emissions = CO2 removal. I wonder which meaning you have in mind?

 

I would like to say how much I appreciate this forum with its passionately honest exchange of ideas and information. For a climate novice like me, it feels like a master class in the global debate on warming.

 

Best regards,                  Steve Penningroth

 

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[Clive Elsworth]

Hi Robert

 

From an initial skim it looks good, if a bit long.

 

I'd say it helps to do the reader's thinking for them. So when you say climate action is like comedy - it's all in the timing, I'd add: We wait for the moment to pass at our peril.

 

I can't improve on Tom's title suggestion, which tells the reader what they are about to read, and the conclusion all in one pithy slightly witty way.

 

Most people won't have thought about this yet and so will be more impressionable than later on when they will have formed an opinion, and will be gathering evidence to support that opinion. So you are exploiting an  important opportunity at a good time.

 

Clive

[Robert Chris]

Ye & Vivian

I got the 24Gt of concrete from this report that says that 2021 global concrete production was 10.1Gm3.  Using a density of 2400kg/m3, I calculated the weight to be 24Gt.  I now realise that this datum refers to ready mix concrete only, excluding precast concrete.  The report says that the former represents more than 75% of the total, so I'll change my figure to 35Gt.  That's more in line with Vivian's figure.  It doesn't alter the point that 200Gt, assuming unrealistically that 40GtCO2 CDR was done entirely by enhanced weathering, is a crazy high number.

Thanks for picking this detail up.

Regards

Robert

[Stephen Penningroth]

Hello Robert,

I am new to this forum and climbing a steep learning curve about climate change and SRM.

I have a question: In your paper, does "net zero" mean zero CO2 emissions? Or does it mean that CO2 emissions are balanced by an equal amount of CO2 removal? Peter Eisenberger distinguished between these two definitions in his recent talk and if I understood correctly, he defined "net zero" as CO2 emissions = CO2 removal. I wonder which meaning you have in mind?

I would like to say how much I appreciate this forum with its passionately honest exchange of ideas and information. For a climate novice like me, it feels like a master class in the global debate on warming.

Best regards,                  Steve Penningroth

To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/healthy-planet-action-coalition/829a7c8a-2186-557c-a929-208bc73c3ad4%40gmail.com.

[Ye Tao]

Hi Steve,

Good to see you on the forum.   A quick addition to what Stephen wrote.  Any removal from the atmospheric pool leads to a reduction of future atmospheric concentrations, which over time would have led to a smaller net flux into the ocean compared to that in a parallel universe in which no CO2 was captured from the atmosphere. Thus CO2 currently stored would (virtually) come out even before net zero is reached.

I could be wrong, but I don't think existing carbon capture schemes take this depreciation into account.

Ye

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[Robert Chris]

Hi Steve

Welcome to the nuthouse!  That this is a nuthouse is evidenced by the fact that we all believe that we're the only ones who are sane.

Net zero always means current fossil fuels emissions less historical emissions currently removed from the ambient atmosphere.  If we emit 40GtCO2 and we want to be net zero, we have to remove and permanently sequester 40GtCO2 from the atmosphere in the same accounting period.  Being picky, what's removed from the atmosphere doesn't necessarily have to have been previously emitted by burning fossil fuels, it could equally have come from plant or animal respiration or from many other natural sources. The point being made about ocean outgassing by Stephen and Ye in their responses, references the complex carbon cycle.   A molecule of CO2 is a molecule of CO2 wherever it came from.  Most of the CO2 in the atmosphere did not come from humans burning fossil fuels.

Regards

Robert

[Anderson, Paul]

Robert,

 

Well written.   But too lengthy for most people.  

 

Yes, a 600 word item would make sense.   And stronger with 10 co-authors or “concurring authors” (a made- term for people who “sign on” in support of a document.)

 

In my case, my specialty is CDR via biochar.   In the past I have had minimal interest in SRM and  albedo management.  But recently, as stimulated by you and others in this group with the Healthy Planet Action Coalition, I am coming “to see the light” (or “to see the reflected light of albedo”).

 

I am highly impressed by the info on       Earthshine as measured on the dark side of the moon declined about 25% from 1998 to 2017.

I do ask you to send some links to sources about such a finding, which I do not doubt, but we must have some confirmation to provide to the serious doubters.

 

Thank you for the Hume reference.  Being ignored is indeed disappointing.

 

Paul

 

Doc / Dr TLUD / Paul S. Anderson, PhD

         Email:  psan...@ilstu.edu       Skype:   paultlud

         Phone:  Office: 309-452-7072    Mobile & WhatsApp: 309-531-4434

Websites:    https://woodgas.com see Resources for 1) biochar white paper, 2) RoCC kilns, and 3) the Quick Picks for TLUD stove technology.  The full DrTLUD.com website is moving to woodgas.com .

                      https://capitalism21.org for societal reforms and free digital  novella “A Capitalist Carol”  with pages 88 – 94 about solving the world crisis for clean cookstoves.

 

From: healthy-planet-...@googlegroups.com <healthy-planet-...@googlegroups.com> On Behalf Of rob...@rtulip.net
Sent: Thursday, November 24, 2022 5:26 PM
To: 'Robert Chris' <robert...@gmail.com>; 'Clive Elsworth' <cl...@endorphinsoftware.co.uk>; 'Ye Tao' <t...@rowland.harvard.edu>; 'healthy-planet-action-coalition' <healthy-planet-...@googlegroups.com>; noac-m...@googlegroups.com; 'Planetary Restoration' <planetary-...@googlegroups.com>
Subject: RE: Emissions abatement & Cooling

 

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[Stephen Penningroth]

Hi Robert,

Thank you for clarifying "net zero."

My next question is: How is global warming reduced just by getting to net zero CO2? If it were suddenly possible tomorrow to remove as much CO2 from the atmosphere as is being emitted into the atmosphere by natural sources and by burning fossil fuels, wouldn't that mean that the current concentration of CO2, 415 ppm, would remain as it is? And that the earth system would eventually reach a new energy balance with a higher temperature commensurate with 415 ppm?

Or: Does "net zero," as the term is used in climate policy discussions, always assume that a lower concentration of CO2, say, 275 ppm, has been reached through emissions reductions, such that "net zero" means CO2 emissions from natural and anthropogenic sources also equals 275 ppm and consequently Earth's energy balance is reestablished at a lower temperature?

Thanks!

Best regards,              Steve

[rob...@rtulip.net]

Hi Paul

 

Thanks for this query.  I checked Doug Grandt’s claim of a fall in earthshine of 25% after mentioning it in my email below and found it is actually 0.5%. Sorry for this mistake.

 

The Earthshine paper says planetary albedo fell by 0.5 watts per square metre over 20 years to 2017.  NASA says earth’s albedo is 100 w/m², so the fall of 0.5 would be 0.5%, not 25%.

 

I was intrigued by this paper and wrote to the author Professor Phillip Goode, who replied “In the 2021 paper we noticed an abrupt drop in albedo beginning in 2014, or so, which is clear in both the earthshine and CERES data.”  

 

It seems earthshine data has not been collected since 2017, so we don’t know if this alarming trend is continuing, unless it is available from CERES.

 

Measuring earthshine presents an interesting way to integrate all the effects of global warming in the darkening of the planet. 

 

I find it interesting to compare this measurement of albedo to the modelled calculation at An imperative to monitor Earth's energy imbalance Fig 1 attached, which appears to give calculated albedo as stable from 2000 to 2016.  It is like the difficulty in comparing measurement of GHG levels to calculations of where they come from.

 

Robert Tulip

[Robert Chris]

Hi Steve

You're diving straight into some big questions.

Human CO2 emissions are only one source of CO2 going into the atmosphere.  They are the primary reason that atmospheric CO2 has been rising in the last century.  The paleo record, long before humans, saw others times when CO2 rose and fell.  Evidence has largely discounted a recurrence of those distant 'natural' events as the cause of current warming. 

The theory is that if emissions stopped tomorrow, atmospheric concentrations of greenhouse gases (GHGs) would begin to subside.  Think of a bath in which the water is filling up faster than it escapes down the plughole.  If you stop putting more in, the water in the bath will go down at a rate dependent on how big the plughole is.  If the baby is going to drown with more than 6 inches of water, and there are now 12 inches, it's going to take some time to reach the safe level.  We're at >415ppm now and it is argued that the safe level is <350ppm, and maybe even <300ppm, much closer to the pre-industrial level of 278ppm.  So, stopping emissions instantly will result in the ppm slowly reducing but this won't stop warming for many decades.  It might stop increasing, so if when we get to net zero the amount of warming in the pipeline from past emissions amounts to 3degC, it'll stay close to that before it starts slowly reducing.  But 3degC is still warming as is 2degC and 1degC, so until we get to cooling, the polar ice will continue to melt and calve, and incremental energy that drives severe weather will still be there.  It'll all just happen a bit slower and you just have to hope that the dreaded tipping points haven't tipped before we get back to a safe level.

An alternative scenario is that instead of turning the water off, you turn it down so that it's filling at the same as the rate it's escaping down the plughole.  Now the level stays the same.  If there were 12 inches of water when you turned the water down, it'd stay at 12 inches and the baby would drown.  Ditto emissions.

What is happening is the equilibration of temperature as you describe.  Most of the excess energy in the climate system is stored in the oceans, so as the GHGs reduce following net zero, more heat escapes from the atmosphere to outer space, causing the temperature difference between the atmosphere and the oceans to increase and this causes more heat to emerge from the ocean into the atmosphere to bring them back into balance.  This is why, when reducing atmospheric C, it takes so long for surface temperature to respond.

A confounding factor is the role of aerosols.  These are mostly pollutants emitted along with the C emissions from fossil fuels.  Most of the aerosols are negative forcers, that is they cool rather than warm.  The problem is that they fall out of the atmosphere within days and weeks, so reducing emissions reduces the aerosols and accelerates warming.  It is estimated that they account for about 1degC of cooling, so when you hear that we've already warmed by 1.2degC, it's really 2.2degC offset by 1degC from the aerosols.  Cut the aerosols and we very soon feel the full force of the 2.2degC warming.  If we are headed for 2degC, that's really 3degC without the aerosols.  This has interesting policy implications.  If we get to net zero emissions by not reducing emissions but fully offsetting them with GHG removal, we keep the cooling benefit of the aerosols.  But if we get to plain zero emissions with no GGR, we lose the cooling from the aerosols and this would significantly slow down the reversal of the warming.  This suggests that to the extent that we actually reduce emissions, we should simultaneously replace the aerosols with something that will do the same job of cooling.  No one's talking about that at the COPs.

Hope that helps.  There are loads of resources available on the Internet to explore these issues.  If you're minded to do that, always take account of the quality of the source.  There's a lot of rubbish out there.

The key message from the groups you're linked to here is that decarbonisation is no longer capable of preventing dangerous human interference in the climate system and we now need actively and directly to cool the planet.  How we do that is the big as yet unanswered question.  But decarbonisation is still essential otherwise we'll never get back to where we need to be.

Regards

Robert

[robbi...@gmail.com]

Robert C

 

You say “The theory is that if emissions stopped tomorrow, atmospheric concentrations of greenhouse gases (GHGs) would begin to subside.”

 

We have discussed this theory on these lists, and I find it impossible to understand, especially in Michael Mann’s assertion on 60 Minutes that it is the new consensus. 

 

If emissions stopped, we would remain at a level of GHGs not seen for three million years, when sea level was about ten metres higher and temperature was about three degrees hotter. 

 

Surely the path toward earth system equilibrium would cause subsequent ongoing heating after net zero? 

 

And surely this forcing would cause increased methane release that would continue to increase the overall GHG level with amplifying feedback, not the theorised subsidence?

 

RT

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[John Nissen]

Hi Robert,

Replying to your original question about why net zero will not deliver sufficient cooling to avoid dangerous consequences of human GHG emissions, there is little peer-reviewed literature for reasons which Kyle has explained: the fossil fuel and neoclassical "pro-growth" economists have hijacked the IPCC and these people want to keep the status quo, which has worked wonders for nigh on 40 years.  Thus most published papers have to tow the line that emissions reduction is the answer/solution to climate change.  In fact emissions have been growing steadily for all these 40 years!  These people no doubt anticipate that net zero will not be achieved for at least 40 years under current commitments, and may never be achieved because the cost of decarbonisation is so high.

The danger from tipping points is quite clear, hence the strong support from many eminent scientists for keeping under 1.5C, even though some admit this is now impossible and 1.5C is likely to be passed within a decade.

So who might prick the bubble?  One is Jim Hansen who expects that the rate of warming is liable to double over the next 25 years due to the reduction in SO2 emissions as the world decarbonises, which he describes as a Faustian Bargain.  Another is Michael Mann who understands that the increase in extremes of weather and climate are due to the disruption of jet stream behaviour caused by a reduction in temperature gradient between the Arctic and tropics as the Arctic warms x4 faster than the global mean.  However neither Hansen nor Mann advocate SRM, which shows how taboo it still is, with a real stigma attached (e.g death threats for David Keith).

To conclude: losing the cooling from SO2 through burning less fossil fuel or cleaner fossil fuel (e.g. in ships) is making matters worse, and a continuation of rapid Arctic warming ensures that the Greenland Ice Sheet will accelerate sea level rise and extremes of weather and climate will get worse, at least in the Northern Hemisphere.  The main political barrier to refreezing the Arctic is that governments of countries around the Arctic, including the US, want to exploit the Arctic.  The fossil fuel companies are behind this again, as Kyle points out.

Cheers, John

To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/healthy-planet-action-coalition/8effe936-0ef9-8d09-b853-ef6e45c5ebdd%40gmail.com.

[rob...@rtulip.net]

To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/planetary-restoration/022b01d90118%24ad986970%2408c93c50%24%40gmail.com.

[H simmens]

John,

It’s not true or at least it wasn’t true that Hansen doesn’t advocate for SRM. In an article in Science from July that I posted back then the last paragraph is as follows:

“But with Earth having warmed by some 1.2°C since preindustrial times, Hansen thinks there’s little hope of cutting emissions fast enough to meet the 1.5°C target he and other scientists have called for. And so the solution, he says, could come back to aerosols, this time ones spread deliberately through solar geoengineering—the controversial idea of lofting sulfate particles into the stratosphere and creating a global, reflective haze. “It will be necessary to take temporary corrective measures,” he says, “almost surely including temporary purposeful use of aerosols to avoid catastrophic implications.”

I have not been able to find any additional citations supporting his use of SRM since then nor have I found anything that negates the statement above.  

Herb

Herb Simmens

Author A Climate Vocabulary of the Future

@herbsimens

On Nov 25, 2022, at 4:57 PM, John Nissen <johnnis...@gmail.com> wrote:



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[H simmens]

Robert,

You may remember that I posted this excerpt from a book by Mark Jacobson a month or two ago basically reinforcing your comment that ending emissions by mid century may result in a concentration of CO2 equal to 350 ppm by the end of the century. 

I periodically respond to the climate scientists and others on Twitter who express great optimism that reaching net zero would lead to the end of global warming soon there after. I point out what you have said, which is that while perhaps temperatures will stop increasing, they will remain elevated at a level incompatible with civilized life for many many decades, along with continued destabilization of the Ecosystems that support all life. 

I have yet to have anyone even acknowledge that somewhat straight forward, yet critical observation, much less agree with it, or even attempt to refute it. 

It seems sadly to be one of those climate third rails that one must not speak of in polite company. 

Herb

Herb Simmens

Author A Climate Vocabulary of the Future

@herbsimens

On Nov 25, 2022, at 5:46 PM, Robert Chris <robert...@gmail.com> wrote:



Hi Robert

There is no inconsistency between my statement that GHG concentration would begin slowly to subside and yours that they'd remain at a level not seen for 3M years.  My understanding of the science, and as we all know, I'm not a climate scientist, is that on stopping emissions, natural processes would tend to equilibrate CO2 between the various sinks, in particular the atmosphere, oceans and land, while at the same time the natural processes that drawdown atmospheric CO2 would continue.  MacDougall et al use a multi-model analysis to show that:

In all simulations atmospheric CO2 concentration declines after emissions cease, with a rapid decline in the first few decades followed by a slower decline thereafter. The rates of decline vary across the models. By 50 years after emissions cease [...], the change in atmospheric CO2 concentration ranged from -91 to -52 ppm, with a mean of -76 ppm and median of 80 ppm.

Over 100 years they show a decline in CO2 concentration in a range from about -110 to -60ppm with a median and mean of about  -100ppm, i.e. back to <350ppm if cessation happened in the next 20 years. 

The critical point that I think we both agree on, is that warming would continue.  The temperature anomaly would stop increasing but if it stays where it is, which is what McDougall et al also show happens, there'll still be warming, just not increasing warming.  Temperature doesn't fall along with concentration because of the heat transfer from the land and oceans referred to above.  That's why it takes centuries for the cessation of emissions to be reflected in a lowering of surface temperature and why net zero is not any kind of solution to global warming.

If I've got this wrong, can someone please set me straight.

Regards

Robert

On 25/11/2022 21:55, robbi...@gmail.com wrote:

Robert C

 

You say “The theory is that if emissions stopped tomorrow, atmospheric concentrations of greenhouse gases (GHGs) would begin to subside.”

 

We have discussed this theory on these lists, and I find it impossible to understand, especially in Michael Mann’s assertion on 60 Minutes that it is the new consensus. 

 

If emissions stopped, we would remain at a level of GHGs not seen for three million years, when sea level was about ten metres higher and temperature was about three degrees hotter. 

 

Surely the path toward earth system equilibrium would cause subsequent ongoing heating after net zero? 

 

And surely this forcing would cause increased methane release that would continue to increase the overall GHG level with amplifying feedback, not the theorised subsidence?

 

RT

 

From: planetary-...@googlegroups.com <planetary-...@googlegroups.com> On Behalf Of Robert Chris
Sent: Saturday, 26 November 2022 8:17 AM
To: Stephen Penningroth <steph...@gmail.com>
Cc: Clive Elsworth <cl...@endorphinsoftware.co.uk>; Ye Tao <t...@rowland.harvard.edu>; healthy-planet-action-coalition <healthy-planet-...@googlegroups.com>; noac-m...@googlegroups.com; Planetary Restoration <planetary-...@googlegroups.com>
Subject: [prag] Re: Emissions abatement & Cooling

 

Hi Steve

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[rob...@rtulip.net]

Hi Robert C

 

I went through your paper in revision mode with comments, attached.

 

Thanks, great paper!

 

Robert Tulip

 

From: healthy-planet-...@googlegroups.com <healthy-planet-...@googlegroups.com> On Behalf Of Robert Chris
Sent: Saturday, 26 November 2022 7:33 PM
To: H simmens <hsim...@gmail.com>
Cc: robbi...@gmail.com; Stephen Penningroth <steph...@gmail.com>; Clive Elsworth <Cl...@endorphinsoftware.co.uk>; Ye Tao <t...@rowland.harvard.edu>; healthy-planet-action-coalition <healthy-planet-...@googlegroups.com>; noac-m...@googlegroups.com; Planetary Restoration <planetary-...@googlegroups.com>
Subject: Re: [prag] Re: Emissions abatement & Cooling

 

Hi Herb

Thanks for your comments.  They caused me to reflect on a point I should also have made.

My remark that 'net zero is not any kind of solution to global warming' should absolutely not be interpreted to mean that net zero is not necessary.  It is saying no more than net zero is no longer sufficient.  The consequence of persistent failure to reduce emissions over the last three decades is not that we now need to do something different instead of emissions abatement, but that we now need to do something in addition to it because it's no longer enough.  Net zero is an important milestone but it is not the destination.

Regards

Robert

To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/healthy-planet-action-coalition/03ac9785-bf19-7cee-5b3d-d7ca6e80d1db%40gmail.com.

[Robert Chris]

Hi Robert

There is no inconsistency between my statement that GHG concentration would begin slowly to subside and yours that they'd remain at a level not seen for 3M years.  My understanding of the science, and as we all know, I'm not a climate scientist, is that on stopping emissions, natural processes would tend to equilibrate CO2 between the various sinks, in particular the atmosphere, oceans and land, while at the same time the natural processes that drawdown atmospheric CO2 would continue.  MacDougall et al use a multi-model analysis to show that:

In all simulations atmospheric CO2 concentration declines after emissions cease, with a rapid decline in the first few decades followed by a slower decline thereafter. The rates of decline vary across the models. By 50 years after emissions cease [...], the change in atmospheric CO2 concentration ranged from -91 to -52 ppm, with a mean of -76 ppm and median of 80 ppm.

Over 100 years they show a decline in CO2 concentration in a range from about -110 to -60ppm with a median and mean of about  -100ppm, i.e. back to <350ppm if cessation happened in the next 20 years. 

The critical point that I think we both agree on, is that warming would continue.  The temperature anomaly would stop increasing but if it stays where it is, which is what McDougall et al also show happens, there'll still be warming, just not increasing warming.  Temperature doesn't fall along with concentration because of the heat transfer from the land and oceans referred to above.  That's why it takes centuries for the cessation of emissions to be reflected in a lowering of surface temperature and why net zero is not any kind of solution to global warming.

If I've got this wrong, can someone please set me straight.

Regards

Robert

On 25/11/2022 21:55, robbi...@gmail.com wrote:

[Robert Chris]

Hi Herb

Thanks for your comments.  They caused me to reflect on a point I should also have made.

My remark that 'net zero is not any kind of solution to global warming' should absolutely not be interpreted to mean that net zero is not necessary.  It is saying no more than net zero is no longer sufficient.  The consequence of persistent failure to reduce emissions over the last three decades is not that we now need to do something different instead of emissions abatement, but that we now need to do something in addition to it because it's no longer enough.  Net zero is an important milestone but it is not the destination.

Regards

Robert

On 26/11/2022 00:26, H simmens wrote:

[Ye Tao]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YBdmppcfixM

Speaker gives a tutorial on speaking with confidence in spite of
constant self-contradictions and logical inconsistencies.

The number of views and the comments give another sobering view of the
backdrop we are working against.

Ye

[Robert Chris]

Hi RobertT

Thanks for taking time to read through my draft with care and reflection.  Just shows how important 'reflection' is in all its senses.

I shall incorporate most of your amendments but I need to think through some a little more.

I'm not keen on Albedo Cooling because it suggests to me that the albedo is being cooled, rather than tweaks to albedo will do the cooling.  I take your point about Albedo Increase.  I think I still prefer Albedo Management because the 'management' clearly indicates that it's a human intervention that does something to albedo.  That it doesn't make clear that albedo has to be increased doesn't seem to me to be that important.  Also, in the title, the word Albedo spoils the alliteration.

You comment that 'a shift from carbon credits to radiative forcing credits would enable commodification of albedo increase'.  Have I dismissed too rashly the notion that 'radiative forcing credits' (RFC) is a viable option?  At a micro-project level, how will the radiative forcing be assessed?  What kind of governance regime would be needed for an orderly market in RFC's?  I need to be convinced that this is truly practicable and not open to the kind of manipulation and Wild West practices we've seen in emissions trading and carbon credits.  I have fundamental objections to reliance on market forces as the primary route to addressing the threats of climate change, but that's not something I want to get into in this piece.

You suggest replacing 'protect those who might be harmed by it' with 'minimise the risk of harm'.  I don't think that a claim to 'minimise harm' is sufficiently compelling.  The primary policy concern is harm to people, the rest of the ecosystem comes a (poor) second.   If you're on the other side of the negotiating table, you'll not be comforted by suffering less harm, you'll want to be protected from, or compensated for, whatever harm is inflicted on you.  Why should you be used as a get out of jail free card for other players?  In practice, it's not just about minimising risk, it's also about protecting those who suffer even that minimised risk from its consequences.  Arguing that they should be grateful that they didn't suffer greater harm isn't very reassuring!

I think we've both missed a confusion I've repeated.  I wrote 'Net zero means that we lock in a temperature increase of 1.5o or 2oC, or perhaps more, that will subside only slowly over a century or so' and you added 'if at all'.  What I should have written is that while CO2 concentration will subside by about 100ppmv over a century after reaching net zero, surface temperature will remain at its elevated level for centuries afterwards.  Your 'if at all' then becomes redundant.  This is all to do with the cooling from the reduced atmospheric GHG burden being offset by warming from the oceans as the temperature between the oceans and atmosphere equilibrates. 

You comment 'Only the world ocean has the area, energy and resources to convert carbon into safe forms at the scale required, through large scale ocean based algae production.'  This is a can of worms I'd rather not open in this piece.  I'm not sure that the evidence is that enhanced algal production results in the necessary permanent sequestration of CO2.  There are also all manner of unanswered ecosystem questions about consequential effects of this process at scale.  In any event, the central point of this piece is that even if it were effective at delivering net zero tomorrow, it still wouldn't be sufficient to generate the cooling necessary to avoid the dreaded tipping points.

On the title, I like 'Brighten up!' but I'm leaning towards 'Lighten up!'  It has a more powerful double entendre.

I shan't finalise this text until I have resolved (or not) some issues with friends at CCRC.

Regards

Robert

[Cl...@endorphinsoftware.co.uk]

Robert C

 

All very good points which I generally agree with, although it’s a much taller order to ensure that everyone is protected versus minimising harm to everyone. In the end I suspect that even some harm to a few would be massively offset to nearly all of them by an overall benefit they would also receive over time, versus the alternative of tipping points taking the whole world into an altered state.

 

Regarding the title, I prefer “Brighten up”, to be consistent with marine cloud brightening. That also has a double entendre of people getting brighter. By getting brighter, you imply that they recognise the benefit of immediately reducing radiative forcing.

 

Clive

[Douglas Grandt]

Paul and all in copy,

Hoping all here in the US have enjoyed happy and heathy Thanksgiving — I have been offline since Thursday morning, overeating and socializing, myself.

Reference my email sent Thursday morning (24 Nov 9:40am ET) 

I cannot remember back to April 28 — when I created a series of earthshine slides for my May 1st  presentation — how I might have come up with a 25 percent decline, but it seems that I transposed 0.25 W/m2 per decade to 25% in a quick mental gymnastic based on the Abstract:

We measure a gradual, but climatologically significant 0.5 W/m2 decline in the global albedo over the two decades of data. 

https://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1029/2021GL094888

Appreciate RobertT’s  catching the error.

Apologies for any confusion I may have caused by that careless mistake.

Best,

Doug Grandt

Sent from my iPhone (audio texting)

On Nov 25, 2022, at 3:44 PM, Anderson, Paul <psan...@ilstu.edu> wrote:



Robert,

 

Well written.   But too lengthy for most people.  

 

Yes, a 600 word item would make sense.   And stronger with 10 co-authors or “concurring authors” (a made- term for people who “sign on” in support of a document.)

 

In my case, my specialty is CDR via biochar.   In the past I have had minimal interest in SRM and  albedo management.  But recently, as stimulated by you and others in this group with the Healthy Planet Action Coalition, I am coming “to see the light” (or “to see the reflected light of albedo”).

 

I am highly impressed by the info on Earthshine as measured on the dark side of the moon declined about 25% from 1998 to 2017. SHOULD BE 0.25W/m2 per decade.

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[Stephen Salter]

Paul

A recent estimate of the problem from Dame Julia Slingo, recently Head of the Hadley Centre is the problem then was 1.7 watts per square since preindustrial times which is close enough. They average it over 24 hours and use the entire surface area of the earth.  The total solar input is about 340 watts per square metre so the problem is ‘only’ 0.5 %.

I think that the Earth Shine idea is brilliant.

Stephen

From: healthy-planet-...@googlegroups.com <healthy-planet-...@googlegroups.com> On Behalf Of Anderson, Paul
Sent: 27 November 2022 20:10
To: Douglas Grandt <answer...@mac.com>
Cc: Rob...@rtulip.net; Robert Chris <robert...@gmail.com>; Clive Elsworth <Cl...@endorphinsoftware.co.uk>; Ye Tao <t...@rowland.harvard.edu>; healthy-planet-action-coalition <healthy-planet-...@googlegroups.com>; noac-m...@googlegroups.com; Planetary Restoration <planetary-...@googlegroups.com>
Subject: RE: [prag] RE: Emissions abatement & Cooling

 

This email was sent to you by someone outside the University.

You should only click on links or attachments if you are certain that the email is genuine and the content is safe.

Doug and all,

 

Please put this into perspective.   Does a decline in earthshine of 0.25 W/m2 per decade make any convincing difference? 

 

I can read and recite back 0.25 W/m2 per decade

But I cannot comprehend it.   Four decades since 1980 would mean 1 W/m2, and 2 W/m2 since the start of WWII.  

 

Is that a lot or a little?   Meaningless number without some “expert” interpretation(s). 

 

How many m2 is being referenced?   Half the earth’s surface because half is exposed to (or is “seeing”) and reflecting the sun’s incoming radiation.

 

Paul

 

Doc / Dr TLUD / Paul S. Anderson, PhD

         Email:  psan...@ilstu.edu       Skype:   paultlud

         Phone:  Office: 309-452-7072    Mobile & WhatsApp: 309-531-4434

Websites:    https://woodgas.com see Resources for 1) biochar white paper, 2) RoCC kilns, and 3) the Quick Picks for TLUD stove technology.  The full DrTLUD.com website is moving to woodgas.com .

                      https://capitalism21.org for societal reforms and free digital  novella “A Capitalist Carol”  with pages 88 – 94 about solving the world crisis for clean cookstoves.

 

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[rob...@rtulip.net]

Hi RC

• My comments on your reply of 27 Nov are at bullet points below.

Regards

Robert Tulip

 

From: planetary-...@googlegroups.com <planetary-...@googlegroups.com> On Behalf Of Robert Chris
Sent: Sunday, 27 November 2022 11:53 PM
To: rob...@rtulip.net; 'H simmens' <hsim...@gmail.com>
Cc: robbi...@gmail.com; 'Stephen Penningroth' <steph...@gmail.com>; 'Clive Elsworth' <Cl...@endorphinsoftware.co.uk>; 'Ye Tao' <t...@rowland.harvard.edu>; 'healthy-planet-action-coalition' <healthy-planet-...@googlegroups.com>; noac-m...@googlegroups.com; 'Planetary Restoration' <planetary-...@googlegroups.com>
Subject: Re: [prag] Re: Emissions abatement & Cooling

 

Hi RobertT

… I'm not keen on Albedo Cooling because it suggests to me that the albedo is being cooled, rather than tweaks to albedo will do the cooling.  I take your point about Albedo Increase.  I think I still prefer Albedo Management because the 'management' clearly indicates that it's a human intervention that does something to albedo.  That it doesn't make clear that albedo has to be increased doesn't seem to me to be that important.  Also, in the title, the word Albedo spoils the alliteration.

• Albedo Cooling could be extended to Albedo-Based Cooling, simple as ABC.  You are grammatically correct about the ambiguity, but actually the ambiguity of AM is far worse.  I look at AC as a simpler title that conveys far more content to the public about exactly what is proposed, while still introducing the little known concept of albedo to non-scientific audiences. “Management” and “Modification” are cowardly weasel words that fail to mention the required direction of change.  Such terminology is typical of how scientists are too cautious and obscure in engaging in the politics of climate.  “AM” and “SRM” convey the ambigious impression we don’t know if we want albedo and radiation to go up or down.  And the problem with the term geoengineering is that it focuses on the process rather than the outcome.  Albedo Cooling exactly describes a required impact on the climate system, even if slightly clunky from a technical process viewpoint.

You comment that 'a shift from carbon credits to radiative forcing credits would enable commodification of albedo increase'.  Have I dismissed too rashly the notion that 'radiative forcing credits' (RFC) is a viable option?  At a micro-project level, how will the radiative forcing be assessed?  What kind of governance regime would be needed for an orderly market in RFC's?  I need to be convinced that this is truly practicable and not open to the kind of manipulation and Wild West practices we've seen in emissions trading and carbon credits.  I have fundamental objections to reliance on market forces as the primary route to addressing the threats of climate change, but that's not something I want to get into in this piece.

• Thanks very much for these questions.  I have been promoting Radiative Forcing Credits for some years without explaining it in detail, from my generalist perspective.  I see RFC as the fairly simple measure of Cooling Return On Investment (CROI) as promoted by Ye Tao.  The 675 GtC in the CO₂ emitted to date has increased RF by about 2 w/m² according to Fig 1 at DOI: 10.1038/NCLIMATE2876  Therefore 1 GtC has RF of 2/675 at a first approximation, or 0.003 w/m².  By comparison, adding 20 Mt SO₂ to the stratosphere per year would cut RF by 2 w/m² according to Fig 5 at https://acp.copernicus.org/articles/18/2769/2018/. 
• That SRM calculation is about 700 times the RF effect of removing 1 GtC (and at far lower cost).
• Over time this ratio would be less where C removal is long term. 
• All climate interventions can be measured on this single RFC scale, once they are accepted as safe to deploy. 
• If we are serious about cooling then all public funding to mitigate climate change should be based on this common RFC metric, while recognising that cutting emissions also serves other non-climate benefits that can be measured separately.
• Otherwise governments will continue to waste money on activities that cannot achieve cooling objectives.
• RFCs are better than carbon credits because they offer a platform to integrate the life cycle analysis of interventions on a level basis. 
• An RFC offset market raising capital of $10 billion per year could be enough to stabilise the climate while slower carbon-based approaches are developed.
• Standards International started work on a standard for Radiative Forcing but abandoned it.

You suggest replacing 'protect those who might be harmed by it' with 'minimise the risk of harm'.  I don't think that a claim to 'minimise harm' is sufficiently compelling.  The primary policy concern is harm to people, the rest of the ecosystem comes a (poor) second.   If you're on the other side of the negotiating table, you'll not be comforted by suffering less harm, you'll want to be protected from, or compensated for, whatever harm is inflicted on you.  Why should you be used as a get out of jail free card for other players?  In practice, it's not just about minimising risk, it's also about protecting those who suffer even that minimised risk from its consequences.  Arguing that they should be grateful that they didn't suffer greater harm isn't very reassuring!

• I don’t think you should encourage the idea played up by opponents that brightening the planet will harm people.  The likely benefits appear to far exceed the risks.  It is important in rhetoric to present one’s own advocacy in the most positive reasonable light. Don’t give them an easy hook for criticism when the evidence of likely harm is so weak.
• Maybe a better formulation is “The big questions are not about how to do AC cost-effectively, but how to ensure transparent and accountable international governance that enables safe and acceptable technology development.” 
• Risk of harm is very low from MCB, MEER and Arctic Refreezing, at first view.  SAI risk might be minimised by testing at extremely low concentration.

I think we've both missed a confusion I've repeated.  I wrote 'Net zero means that we lock in a temperature increase of 1.5o or 2oC, or perhaps more, that will subside only slowly over a century or so' and you added 'if at all'.  What I should have written is that while CO2 concentration will subside by about 100ppmv over a century after reaching net zero, surface temperature will remain at its elevated level for centuries afterwards.  Your 'if at all' then becomes redundant.  This is all to do with the cooling from the reduced atmospheric GHG burden being offset by warming from the oceans as the temperature between the oceans and atmosphere equilibrates. 

• I honestly think the MacDougall ZEC paper is just rubbish.  GHG concentration won’t subside without albedo increase.  As Mike McCracken has pointed out, the Zero Emission Commitment analysis ignores amplifying feedbacks from Arctic methane.  These feedbacks would totally swamp direct anthropogenic emissions unless the Arctic is refrozen.  For Michael Mann to promote ZEC as “the new climate consensus” is totally outrageous when it has such massive scientific holes. The ZEC idea of a “stable” climate in 2050 with 700 ppm of CO₂e is absurd.

You comment 'Only the world ocean has the area, energy and resources to convert carbon into safe forms at the scale required, through large scale ocean based algae production.'  This is a can of worms I'd rather not open in this piece.  I'm not sure that the evidence is that enhanced algal production results in the necessary permanent sequestration of CO2.  There are also all manner of unanswered ecosystem questions about consequential effects of this process at scale.  In any event, the central point of this piece is that even if it were effective at delivering net zero tomorrow, it still wouldn't be sufficient to generate the cooling necessary to avoid the dreaded tipping points.

• I added that as a comment rather than a revision, mainly to explain where I am coming from.
• Start with albedo while building ocean biomass as top climate priorities.
• I don’t agree with the permanence argument made against algae and biochar.  If we could increase living ocean biomass by 50 GtC that would be a big carbon sink that could be sustained and enhanced in perpetuity. 
• Biochar might not provide permanent removal, but that does not matter if we aim to permanently increase average world soil depth by (say) five metres by mining carbon from the air and sea via photosynthesis. 
• Mining phosphate and nitrate etc from the ocean by hydrothermal liquefaction of algae can massively add to living carbon stores. 
• On ecosystem effects, my view is that intensive algae cultivation on 1% of the world ocean would have massive benefits to enhance biodiversity.
• These comments are for information, not as suggested changes to the paper.

On the title, I like 'Brighten up!' but I'm leaning towards 'Lighten up!'  It has a more powerful double entendre.

• Brighten up is a positive triple entendre, including improvements to albedo, intelligence and mood, indicating that actual solutions are at hand. 
• Lighten up connotes asking greens to relax their hostility toward discussion of albedo.  Some would regard the implication that many greens are uptight, humourless and censorious as overly rude and negative.
• Thanks!

To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/planetary-restoration/936bf81f-7f79-0d09-14d4-ec33c718e10c%40gmail.com.

[Anderson, Paul]

Doug and all,

 

Please put this into perspective.   Does a decline in earthshine of 0.25 W/m2 per decade make any convincing difference? 

 

I can read and recite back 0.25 W/m2 per decade

But I cannot comprehend it.   Four decades since 1980 would mean 1 W/m2, and 2 W/m2 since the start of WWII.  

 

Is that a lot or a little?   Meaningless number without some “expert” interpretation(s). 

 

How many m2 is being referenced?   Half the earth’s surface because half is exposed to (or is “seeing”) and reflecting the sun’s incoming radiation.

 

Paul

 

Doc / Dr TLUD / Paul S. Anderson, PhD

         Email:  psan...@ilstu.edu       Skype:   paultlud

         Phone:  Office: 309-452-7072    Mobile & WhatsApp: 309-531-4434

Websites:    https://woodgas.com see Resources for 1) biochar white paper, 2) RoCC kilns, and 3) the Quick Picks for TLUD stove technology.  The full DrTLUD.com website is moving to woodgas.com .

                      https://capitalism21.org for societal reforms and free digital  novella “A Capitalist Carol”  with pages 88 – 94 about solving the world crisis for clean cookstoves.

 

From: 'Douglas Grandt' via Healthy Planet Action Coalition (HPAC) <healthy-planet-...@googlegroups.com>

Sent: Sunday, November 27, 2022 8:51 AM
To: Anderson, Paul <psan...@ilstu.edu>

To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/healthy-planet-action-coalition/BE2EB75F-2D59-4532-865B-125B60506A2D%40mac.com.

[rob...@rtulip.net]

Paul

 

The fall of planetary albedo by 0.5 w/m² so far this century is a significant driver of heating.

 

As I said in my last email, the 675 GtC in the CO₂ emitted since the industrial revolution to date has increased Radiative Forcing by about 2 w/m² according to Fig 1 at DOI: 10.1038/NCLIMATE2876 . Therefore 1 GtC has RF of 2/675 at a first approximation, or 0.003 w/m². 

Half a watt, the albedo fall over the last two decades, equates to addition of about an extra 160 GtC (=675/4).  That is big. 

I would welcome expert checking of this calculation.  For example I have not factored in the 120 year CO₂ half life or indirect effects such as albedo feedback.

If each tonne of C costs $100, CO₂ removal on the scale need to cut RF by half a watt costs $16 trillion on these numbers.  That is big.

 

Darkening the planet is changing in a bad direction.  Trends in ice and snow indicate the darkening will worsen.  We need to brighten the planet as a primary security goal.

 

Robert

To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/planetary-restoration/SA2PR03MB5932CDB9EDE0E3585D4DA647DB109%40SA2PR03MB5932.namprd03.prod.outlook.com.

[Reiss Jones]

Love love love this.

This exactly how we get people on board with SRM.

Best,

Reiss

Reiss Jones

Climate + Engineering + Synbio

Inventions Linkedin Blog

To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/healthy-planet-action-coalition/020e01d90307%249a8d5bb0%24cfa81310%24%40rtulip.net.

[Douglas Grandt]

William,

I love visual diagrams (graphs) and mathematical expressions, so I appreciate these.

Diagrams like these increase my knowledge, and usually my understanding.

Throughout my career, I have used diagrams to convey recommendations for capital investments to Upper Management in my positions as an industrial engineer petroleum engineer, corporate planner, project manager, and various operations management positions. Fundamental to those recommendations were the assumptions and sensitivity to possible deviations of reality vs. assumptions. Showing the red CO2 curve along with the blue CO2 curve is very much appreciated.

I have two questions:

1) If the blue curve assumes immediate “hit the ground running” Net Zero, the curve apparently represent an ~85% decline from ~420 ppm to ~301 ppm in 28 years.  The red curve apparently is the assumption of a 28 year ramping up to Net Zero by 2050. That apparently represents a ~50% decline from ~420 ppm to ~350 ppm in 28 years. Am I understanding this correctly? 

2) The red curve may (or may not) represent natural "sinking" only the accumulated legacy atmospheric CO2, such that the gigatons of CO2 removed naturally equates to approximately 2.5 ppm reduction per year, the total gigatons of CO2 removed from the atmosphere being equivalent to 70 ppm.  Is that true, or does the exponential expression take into account the many times more gigatons of CO2 that returns from the ocean as the ocean and atmosphere equilibrate (if equilibrate is the right expression)? 

Looking at the blue curve, it seems odd to me that natural “sinking" could bring the atmospheric concentration down 85% to ~301 ppm in 28 years when it took 112 years since 1910 of fossil fuel combustion (and other anthropogenic activities) to bring us to where we are today.

If natural sinks are alleged to be so effective, one might conclude that decades of 30-40 gigatons per year CO2 emissions should have had no effect on atmospheric concentration, which is obviously not the case, or that the 28 year time scale is incorrect. What am I missing here?

I remain perplexed.  Please elucidate.

Best,

Doug Grandt 

From: William Calvin <wca...@uw.edu>

Subject: Re: [prag] RE: Emissions abatement & Cooling

Date: November 28, 2022 at 12:56:33 PM EST

To: rob...@rtulip.net

Cc: "Anderson, Paul" <psan...@ilstu.edu>, Douglas Grandt <answer...@mac.com>, Robert Chris <robert...@gmail.com>, Clive Elsworth <Cl...@endorphinsoftware.co.uk>, Ye Tao <t...@rowland.harvard.edu>, healthy-planet-action-coalition <healthy-planet-...@googlegroups.com>, noac-m...@googlegroups.com, Planetary Restoration <planetary-...@googlegroups.com>

From a ms of mine:

After net zero is achieved by annually sinking as much extra CO2 as we add that year, how long will nature need to take most of the excess carbon dioxide out of circulation? Rough answer: at the current rates, it takes 28 years for nature to clean up half of the 140-ppm excess.

 

Imagine we fixed our emissions tomorrow. There would still be a 50% excess of carbon dioxide overhead. ‘Net zero’ would only take us down to 350 ppm 28 years later. While 350 ppm has been proposed as a backing-up goal, on the way up that concentration was reached about 1990, after the continents started warming four times faster than the ocean surface in the mid-1980s. Thus 350 ppm is not a sufficient goal; it is still in the danger zone.

 

Figure 1. The history of surface temperature since 1950. Sea surface temp­er­atures (SST) have been slid up about 9°C to overlap land temperatures in 1977. Though the concen­tration of carbon dioxide was steadily rising, something comp­en­­sated to keep global surface temperatures from rising between 1950 and 1976.  After 1976, surface temper­at­ure ramped up in parallel on both land and ocean. Land and SST track one another from 1900 until the mid-1980s when the continents and the Arctic began warming almost four times faster. Increas­ing temper­a­ture contrast at coastlines tends to rearrange the winds that deliver rain, leading to droughts here and floods there.     There was a 13-year period when, despite rising CO2 levels, global temperature stayed flat without major volcanic eruptions to blame. Here the squares are annual averages; the heavy line is Lowess smoothed over five years, which spreads out sudden transitions that are best judged from the blue SST squares showing the annual average without smoothing.      “Global” (not shown) is the mix of 71% SST, 29% land. SST varies year-to-year less than land; on continents, evaporative cooling varies with that year’s drought acreage. Though I understand the 1970s energy budget reasons for talking of a global average temperature, most of us live on continents that are heating up 3-4x faster since 1985. It no longer makes much sense to dilute our chosen temperature index with several parts of slower-rising sea surface temperature, especially when so many people underestimate the climate problem when it is presented as a change of only a fraction of a degree in some future decade. But then surface temps, diluted or not, turn out to be a poor index of climate troubles.

The 320 ppm of the mid-1960s, when the excess CO2 was only 40 ppm, was the last ‘possibly safe’ concentration before the warming ramp began in the mid-1970s. Assuming we could shut down annual emissions tomorrow, how long would it then take for nature’s processes to cool the earth’s surface back to the surface temperatures associated with 320 ppm?

 

The fastest way is probably via increasing the sunlight reflected back out into space, the way that sea ice, clouds and hazy skies do. That is not a long-term silver bullet because it does nothing to address the other effect of rising CO2: acidification of surface waters, which kills off the ocean’s food chain.

 

Volcanic eruptions reaching the stratosphere cool us for several years; “under a white sky” is a good description of 1991 after the Mount Pinatubo eruption.

 

Natural carbon-cycle processes cool by cleaning up the lingering CO2 excess: some sink CO2 and organic debris into the ocean depths, others weather limestone, and some goes into fertilizing additional plant and plankton growth.

 

How long does all of that take—and how vulnerable is the CO2 storage they utilize? The resulting CO2 decay curve is not exponential with a 15-year time constant, as one might assume from plotting the early years on a semi-log graph and fitting a straight line. Essentially, stopping annual emissions today might see a 50% decrease in the excess carbon dioxide accum­ul­ation over the next 28 years. The natural removal processes for CO2 will take a thousand years to draw the accumulation down to 20% remaining. Such a decay curve is said to have a “long, fat tail,” tapering more like an alligator’s than a dog’s.

 

Figure 2. Nature’s time course (orange) for getting rid of extra carbon dioxide once the annual additions stop; from Joos et al (1996). Blue line shows what an exponential fit to the first decade would have suggested about the future time course. After 28 years, natural processes have only removed about half of the excess. Another 28 years only reduces the excess by an additional 8%.

 

Now let us ask: How long, once sunk, will the excess carbon remain out of the carbon cycle’s circulation loop, what traps that extra heat? Decades? Centuries? Millennia? Forever? It depends. New grass takes CO2 out of the air, but it decomposes or burns in several years, putting most of that CO2 back into the air. If leaves fall off and rot every winter, they don’t count, only the carbon in whatever wood growth remains alive....etc.

The era for the usual long-term thinking about climate action has passed; so has the era of not-good-enough-yet hesitation about countermeasures. The fixes now need to be big and quick because of extreme weather threaten­ing our food supply and infrastructure. To protect carbon dioxide Cleanup projects (and us) in the meantime, we will also need some Shade projects.

 

And yes, they may have some undesirable side effects—but we can no longer wait. Again, the medical mindset is relevant: as with cancer chemotherapy, we are seeing the price of past inattention, denial, being slow to reevaluate, and delay. Now we are forced to risk some treatment side effects in order to keep going.

Cheers, Will

 

--

  William H. Calvin
    WCa...@UW.edu      WilliamCalvin.org

[Peter Fiekowsky]

Reiss-

This is how we get people on board.

Which specific people do we need to have on board?

Reality is specific. Actions act on specific people.

Who is the critical audience? 

What outcome might we see if they were on-board?

Peter

To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/healthy-planet-action-coalition/1538A26C-BF61-442D-BFC7-9B3FB1668A14%40gmail.com.

[rob...@rtulip.net]

Peter

 

I think the most critical audience is the mass media.

 

High profile newspaper comment articles and television and radio interviews in support of brightening the planet would promote informed public debate about the size, cost, safety, speed, impact, ethics, adequacy and viability of different climate policies.

 

My view is the outcome would be political pressure to conduct field tests of various brightening methods, in recognition that albedo is a more tractable lever than energy to cool the planet. 

 

I have started to attempt to do this with this Australian radio interview.  It has not led to any adverse commentary I have seen, although the dominant sentiment remains to completely ignore such scientific information.

 

Another critical audience is the greenhouse gas removal community, people such as you. 

 

It is essential to debate the relative priority of albedo increase and GHG removal in response to the growing view that GHG removal is too slow to prevent dangerous tipping points. 

 

I heard the welcome news that Methane Action are debating albedo. I don’t know if this has any relation to the recent HPAC policy statement that HPAC would not endorse the Methane Action petition because the petition does not recognise the central role of albedo increase in slowing methane increase. 

 

It would be great to see wider public debate about albedo and climate.  All paths to promote dialogue should be encouraged, to end the unjustified exclusion of albedo from COP discussions.

 

Regards

 

Robert Tulip

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[rob...@rtulip.net]

Dear William

 

Thank you for your calculations on the CO2 level after net zero emissions. I have used your numbers against net zero by 2050 to produce this chart.

 

It assumes emissions will continue to grow at the current rate to 2030 and then decline to net zero by 2050.  That produces about 483 CO2 ppm in 2050 by my calculation. Your figure of a fall of 70 ppm CO2 over 28 years after net zero would bring a return to 413 ppm in 2078 and ongoing fall after that.

 

I find this implausible as a realistic scenario for climate stability.  The high ongoing level of atmospheric CO2 would lead to tipping points with accelerating feedbacks such as Arctic methane release and wildfires. 

 

The high risks of this path show the urgency of albedo increase to prevent tipping points.  It shows the IPCC is derelict in its duty by failing to advocate higher albedo.

 

My view is that most of the net in net zero would need to come from conversion of CO2 to biomass while emissions continue.  That means the fall after net zero could be even faster with larger removals of CO2.  But that is not feasible unless the climate is first stabilised by higher albedo.

 

Regards

 

Robert Tulip

 

From: William Calvin wca...@uw.edu
Sent: Tuesday, 29 November 2022 4:57 AM
To: rob...@rtulip.net
Cc: Anderson, Paul <psan...@ilstu.edu>; Douglas Grandt <answer...@mac.com>; Robert Chris <robert...@gmail.com>; Clive Elsworth <Cl...@endorphinsoftware.co.uk>; Ye Tao <t...@rowland.harvard.edu>; healthy-planet-action-coalition <healthy-planet-...@googlegroups.com>; noac-m...@googlegroups.com; Planetary Restoration <planetary-...@googlegroups.com>
Subject: Re: [prag] RE: Emissions abatement & Cooling

 

From a ms of mine:

After net zero is achieved by annually sinking as much extra CO2 as we add that year, how long will nature need to take most of the excess carbon dioxide out of circulation? Rough answer: at the current rates, it takes 28 years for nature to clean up half of the 140-ppm excess.

 

Imagine we fixed our emissions tomorrow. There would still be a 50% excess of carbon dioxide overhead. ‘Net zero’ would only take us down to 350 ppm 28 years later. While 350 ppm has been proposed as a backing-up goal, on the way up that concentration was reached about 1990, after the continents started warming four times faster than the ocean surface in the mid-1980s. Thus 350 ppm is not a sufficient goal; it is still in the danger zone.

 

Figure 1. The history of surface temperature since 1950. Sea surface temp­er­atures (SST) have been slid up about 9°C to overlap land temperatures in 1977. Though the concen­tration of carbon dioxide was steadily rising, something comp­en­­sated to keep global surface temperatures from rising between 1950 and 1976.  After 1976, surface temper­at­ure ramped up in parallel on both land and ocean. Land and SST track one another from 1900 until the mid-1980s when the continents and the Arctic began warming almost four times faster. Increas­ing temper­a­ture contrast at coastlines tends to rearrange the winds that deliver rain, leading to droughts here and floods there.     There was a 13-year period when, despite rising CO2 levels, global temperature stayed flat without major volcanic eruptions to blame. Here the squares are annual averages; the heavy line is Lowess smoothed over five years, which spreads out sudden transitions that are best judged from the blue SST squares showing the annual average without smoothing.      “Global” (not shown) is the mix of 71% SST, 29% land. SST varies year-to-year less than land; on continents, evaporative cooling varies with that year’s drought acreage. Though I understand the 1970s energy budget reasons for talking of a global average temperature, most of us live on continents that are heating up 3-4x faster since 1985. It no longer makes much sense to dilute our chosen temperature index with several parts of slower-rising sea surface temperature, especially when so many people underestimate the climate problem when it is presented as a change of only a fraction of a degree in some future decade. But then surface temps, diluted or not, turn out to be a poor index of climate troubles.

The 320 ppm of the mid-1960s, when the excess CO2 was only 40 ppm, was the last ‘possibly safe’ concentration before the warming ramp began in the mid-1970s. Assuming we could shut down annual emissions tomorrow, how long would it then take for nature’s processes to cool the earth’s surface back to the surface temperatures associated with 320 ppm?

 

The fastest way is probably via increasing the sunlight reflected back out into space, the way that sea ice, clouds and hazy skies do. That is not a long-term silver bullet because it does nothing to address the other effect of rising CO2: acidification of surface waters, which kills off the ocean’s food chain.

 

Volcanic eruptions reaching the stratosphere cool us for several years; “under a white sky” is a good description of 1991 after the Mount Pinatubo eruption.

 

Natural carbon-cycle processes cool by cleaning up the lingering CO2 excess: some sink CO2 and organic debris into the ocean depths, others weather limestone, and some goes into fertilizing additional plant and plankton growth.

 

How long does all of that take—and how vulnerable is the CO2 storage they utilize? The resulting CO2 decay curve is not exponential with a 15-year time constant, as one might assume from plotting the early years on a semi-log graph and fitting a straight line. Essentially, stopping annual emissions today might see a 50% decrease in the excess carbon dioxide accum­ul­ation over the next 28 years. The natural removal processes for CO2 will take a thousand years to draw the accumulation down to 20% remaining. Such a decay curve is said to have a “long, fat tail,” tapering more like an alligator’s than a dog’s.

 

Figure 2. Nature’s time course (orange) for getting rid of extra carbon dioxide once the annual additions stop; from Joos et al (1996). Blue line shows what an exponential fit to the first decade would have suggested about the future time course. After 28 years, natural processes have only removed about half of the excess. Another 28 years only reduces the excess by an additional 8%.

 

 

Now let us ask: How long, once sunk, will the excess carbon remain out of the carbon cycle’s circulation loop, what traps that extra heat? Decades? Centuries? Millennia? Forever? It depends. New grass takes CO2 out of the air, but it decomposes or burns in several years, putting most of that CO2 back into the air. If leaves fall off and rot every winter, they don’t count, only the carbon in whatever wood growth remains alive....etc.

 

The era for the usual long-term thinking about climate action has passed; so has the era of not-good-enough-yet hesitation about countermeasures. The fixes now need to be big and quick because of extreme weather threaten­ing our food supply and infrastructure. To protect carbon dioxide Cleanup projects (and us) in the meantime, we will also need some Shade projects.

 

And yes, they may have some undesirable side effects—but we can no longer wait. Again, the medical mindset is relevant: as with cancer chemotherapy, we are seeing the price of past inattention, denial, being slow to reevaluate, and delay. Now we are forced to risk some treatment side effects in order to keep going.

 

Cheers, Will

 

On Mon, Nov 28, 2022 at 12:58 AM <rob...@rtulip.net> wrote:

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--

  William H. Calvin
    WCa...@UW.edu      WilliamCalvin.org

[rob...@rtulip.net]

Reply to your comment on Radiative Forcing Credits

1. I strongly suspect that implementing a CROI-based RFC regime would be considerably more challenging than you suggest here.  One obvious concern is that while Ye has put the CROI idea out there, and I agree that it has great merit, to operationalise it is far from straightforward.  Establishing the RF impact of any intervention is going to be as much art as science.  This challenge is made more problematic by virtue of the fact the the whole idea of AM/AC/ABC (tbd!) is not yet widely recognised as a necessary policy response.  The primary purpose of my piece is to get AM/AC/ABC on the policymakers' agenda.  The details of how it's to be done can be discussed later.  If we open up these questions now, the whole discourse will get bogged down.  That said, it may be sensible, quietly in the background, for a group including Ye to work up a practical plan for CROI.  I've already asked him about this but he says he has other priorities right now.

The value of Radiative Forcing Credits, or Cooling Return On Investment, is to obtain a common measure for all cooling effects from changes to albedo and greenhouse gases.  The current carbon credit system provides no way to monetise the climate benefit of higher albedo, even though albedo increase has higher cooling offset value than emission reduction or GGR.  Getting albedo on the policy agenda requires order of magnitude understanding of its cooling cost and risk advantages compared to carbon reduction and removal.   Quantifying the order of magnitude of RF effects is an important research agenda to inform climate policy priorities.

 

Reply to comment on harm and safety

• Again, I'm reluctant to talk about specific applications because it is the issue of principle that I believe has to be argued over first.  Until AM/AC/ABC is regarded as necessary, any discussion of these details will be a distraction.  However, there is no technology that when deployed at scale doesn't have negative consequences for someone.  I think it imprudent to suggest that any form of cooling intervention does not have safety concerns that need to be considered in a way that means those who might suffer harm are not allowed to feel that they're being hung out to dry for everyone else's benefit.

It is essential to make safety central to all technology research, development and deployment. You have convinced me that mentioning protection from harm is essential.  The point I was trying to make is that it is important to balance the costs and benefits.  The possible harms from a well governed program of albedo increase are hypothetical unknowns, and are likely to be minimal, while the likely benefits of a brighter planet are high for reduction of extreme weather, extinction, heating and sea level rise.  My view is that benefits from higher albedo are likely to far overwhelm any negatives, notably in the potential of MCB to reduce extreme weather and the overall benefit for biodiversity conservation, but this balance between costs/harms and benefits needs to be a central research and policy concern.   Compensation for loss and damage from a well-managed global albedo program would be far less expensive and traumatic than the compensation for loss and damage from the unmitigated disaster of doing nothing to increase albedo as discussed at COP27.

 

Reply to comments on albedo and GHGs

1. Here I really need help. 

We all need to help each other to understand this complex interrelationship between GHGs and albedo, since we are proposing a paradigm shift in climate policy.

2. What is the mechanism whereby increased albedo reduces GHG concentrations?  I don't understand the physics. 

My comment was that “GHG concentration won’t subside without albedo increase.” The biggest factor here may be that increased albedo slows the thaw of permafrost and rotting of vegetation that releases methane.  Polar methane release could have as much global warming potential as all other emissions (link). If we do nothing to increase albedo, polar methane release will accelerate.  So I am not saying increased albedo reduces GHG concentrations, rather that it slows the speed of the concentration rising.  Absent higher albedo, the GHG concentration rise would be far more than assumed in the Zero Emission Commitment paper of MacDougall et al.

3. You can't dismiss this paper as rubbish merely because you don't like its results.  Do you have a problem with their methodology, their integrity, or their proficiency as scientists?

Just methodology. I think they have ignored the accelerating feedback mechanisms of committed warming and the risks of planetary sensitivity and fragility.

4. Does it really matter whether GHG concentrations reduce or not, isn't the central concern about what's happening to the temperature anomaly?  If so, the MacDougall et al paper shows that there is little change in the temperature anomaly i.e. we stick with the warming induced by past emissions but we don't get any more, but equally, we don't see it subsiding.  Mike MacC and most others sources I've looked at, agree with this.  The critical point here is that this paper says that the models indicate an absence of short term interdependence between GHG concentration and temperature, therefore, if it's temperature you're concerned about, don't get too hung up about GHG concentration.

GHG concentrations have to go down to provide long term climate stability, but the effects of reductions will not kick in for decades.  In the meantime, albedo is our only lever.  I don’t think the Macdougall et al paper “shows” little change in the temperature anomaly, rather it asserts this finding while not taking sufficient account of the factors that could produce bigger change.  If tipping points overwhelm the climate system, efforts to address this by cutting carbon won’t work.

5. I hadn't thought about the amplifying feedbacks.  Aren't these little more than the foothills of tipping points?  Natural phenomena such as those you mention are epiphenomena of our past excesses and present failure to correct for them.  Doesn't their prospect just mean that we have to step up our action over the things we can now control to ensure that we can arrest their progress?  Doesn't this strengthen the case for cooling?  If we're worried, for example, about bursts of Arctic methane we are not going to offset their warming effects by emissions reduction and we'd struggle in the short term to do it by GGR, but we could do it with AM/AC/ABC, couldn't we?

My understanding is that amplifying feedbacks are much more than “foothills of tipping points”.  The ice-albedo feedback has darkened the planet by 0.5% over the last two decades, reinforcing the methane feedback.  The amplification creates risk of a planetary phase shift like the piercing acoustic feedback screech from a loudspeaker system.   

1. Aren't these further distractions from the core focus of the paper?  That there might be effective CDR methods doesn't affect the point I'm trying to get across, namely that no amount of decarbonisation whether through emissions abatement or GGR, is going to reduce the temperature anomaly fast enough to prevent the onset of one, or probably many more, tipping points?

I was not suggesting you discuss CDR methods, only raising the point that the critical engineering path over the next century requires albedo increase and GHG removal to develop in parallel, with the expectation that climate effects of GGR would be important in the second half of this century, while albedo effects could be immediate.

 

1. Brighten up is in the lead by a short head.

The triple entendre of brighten up for mood, reflectivity and intelligence is hard to pass up.

 

Regards

 

Robert Tulip

 

From: healthy-planet-...@googlegroups.com <healthy-planet-...@googlegroups.com> On Behalf Of Robert Chris
Sent: Wednesday, 30 November 2022 3:35 AM
To: rob...@rtulip.net
Cc: 'Ye Tao' <t...@rowland.harvard.edu>; 'healthy-planet-action-coalition' <healthy-planet-...@googlegroups.com>; noac-m...@googlegroups.com; 'Planetary Restoration' <planetary-...@googlegroups.com>
Subject: Re: Emissions abatement & Cooling

 

Hi RobertT

I've only now had time to address your comments below.  Some I agree with, others not, but here I want to explore some a little further.  See my comments in red below.

Regards

Robert

On 28/11/2022 01:35, rob...@rtulip.net wrote:

Hi RC

1. My comments on your reply of 27 Nov are at bullet points below.

Regards

Robert Tulip

 

From: planetary-...@googlegroups.com <planetary-...@googlegroups.com> On Behalf Of Robert Chris
Sent: Sunday, 27 November 2022 11:53 PM
To: rob...@rtulip.net; 'H simmens' <hsim...@gmail.com>
Cc: robbi...@gmail.com; 'Stephen Penningroth' <steph...@gmail.com>; 'Clive Elsworth' <Cl...@endorphinsoftware.co.uk>; 'Ye Tao' <t...@rowland.harvard.edu>; 'healthy-planet-action-coalition' <healthy-planet-...@googlegroups.com>; noac-m...@googlegroups.com; 'Planetary Restoration' <planetary-...@googlegroups.com>
Subject: Re: [prag] Re: Emissions abatement & Cooling

 

Hi RobertT

… I'm not keen on Albedo Cooling because it suggests to me that the albedo is being cooled, rather than tweaks to albedo will do the cooling.  I take your point about Albedo Increase.  I think I still prefer Albedo Management because the 'management' clearly indicates that it's a human intervention that does something to albedo.  That it doesn't make clear that albedo has to be increased doesn't seem to me to be that important.  Also, in the title, the word Albedo spoils the alliteration.

2. Albedo Cooling could be extended to Albedo-Based Cooling, simple as ABC.  You are grammatically correct about the ambiguity, but actually the ambiguity of AM is far worse.  I look at AC as a simpler title that conveys far more content to the public about exactly what is proposed, while still introducing the little known concept of albedo to non-scientific audiences. “Management” and “Modification” are cowardly weasel words that fail to mention the required direction of change.  Such terminology is typical of how scientists are too cautious and obscure in engaging in the politics of climate.  “AM” and “SRM” convey the ambigious impression we don’t know if we want albedo and radiation to go up or down.  And the problem with the term geoengineering is that it focuses on the process rather than the outcome.  Albedo Cooling exactly describes a required impact on the climate system, even if slightly clunky from a technical process viewpoint.

You comment that 'a shift from carbon credits to radiative forcing credits would enable commodification of albedo increase'.  Have I dismissed too rashly the notion that 'radiative forcing credits' (RFC) is a viable option?  At a micro-project level, how will the radiative forcing be assessed?  What kind of governance regime would be needed for an orderly market in RFC's?  I need to be convinced that this is truly practicable and not open to the kind of manipulation and Wild West practices we've seen in emissions trading and carbon credits.  I have fundamental objections to reliance on market forces as the primary route to addressing the threats of climate change, but that's not something I want to get into in this piece.

3. Thanks very much for these questions.  I have been promoting Radiative Forcing Credits for some years without explaining it in detail, from my generalist perspective.  I see RFC as the fairly simple measure of Cooling Return On Investment (CROI) as promoted by Ye Tao.  The 675 GtC in the CO₂ emitted to date has increased RF by about 2 w/m² according to Fig 1 at DOI: 10.1038/NCLIMATE2876  Therefore 1 GtC has RF of 2/675 at a first approximation, or 0.003 w/m².  By comparison, adding 20 Mt SO₂ to the stratosphere per year would cut RF by 2 w/m² according to Fig 5 at https://acp.copernicus.org/articles/18/2769/2018/. 
4. That SRM calculation is about 700 times the RF effect of removing 1 GtC (and at far lower cost).
5. Over time this ratio would be less where C removal is long term. 
6. All climate interventions can be measured on this single RFC scale, once they are accepted as safe to deploy. 
7. If we are serious about cooling then all public funding to mitigate climate change should be based on this common RFC metric, while recognising that cutting emissions also serves other non-climate benefits that can be measured separately.
8. Otherwise governments will continue to waste money on activities that cannot achieve cooling objectives.
9. RFCs are better than carbon credits because they offer a platform to integrate the life cycle analysis of interventions on a level basis. 
10. An RFC offset market raising capital of $10 billion per year could be enough to stabilise the climate while slower carbon-based approaches are developed.
11. Standards International started work on a standard for Radiative Forcing but abandoned it.

12. I strongly suspect that implementing a CROI-based RFC regime would be considerably more challenging than you suggest here.  One obvious concern is that while Ye has put the CROI idea out there, and I agree that it has great merit, to operationalise it is far from straightforward.  Establishing the RF impact of any intervention is going to be as much art as science.  This challenge is made more problematic by virtue of the fact the the whole idea of AM/AC/ABC (tbd!) is not yet widely recognised as a necessary policy response.  The primary purpose of my piece is to get AM/AC/ABC on the policymakers' agenda.  The details of how it's to be done can be discussed later.  If we open up these questions now, the whole discourse will get bogged down.  That said, it may be sensible, quietly in the background, for a group including Ye to work up a practical plan for CROI.  I've already asked him about this but he says he has other priorities right now.

You suggest replacing 'protect those who might be harmed by it' with 'minimise the risk of harm'.  I don't think that a claim to 'minimise harm' is sufficiently compelling.  The primary policy concern is harm to people, the rest of the ecosystem comes a (poor) second.   If you're on the other side of the negotiating table, you'll not be comforted by suffering less harm, you'll want to be protected from, or compensated for, whatever harm is inflicted on you.  Why should you be used as a get out of jail free card for other players?  In practice, it's not just about minimising risk, it's also about protecting those who suffer even that minimised risk from its consequences.  Arguing that they should be grateful that they didn't suffer greater harm isn't very reassuring!

13. I don’t think you should encourage the idea played up by opponents that brightening the planet will harm people.  The likely benefits appear to far exceed the risks.  It is important in rhetoric to present one’s own advocacy in the most positive reasonable light. Don’t give them an easy hook for criticism when the evidence of likely harm is so weak.
14. Maybe a better formulation is “The big questions are not about how to do AC cost-effectively, but how to ensure transparent and accountable international governance that enables safe and acceptable technology development.” 
15. Risk of harm is very low from MCB, MEER and Arctic Refreezing, at first view.  SAI risk might be minimised by testing at extremely low concentration.

• Again, I'm reluctant to talk about specific applications because it is the issue of principle that I believe has to be argued over first.  Until AM/AC/ABC is regarded as necessary, any discussion of these details will be a distraction.  However, there is no technology that when deployed at scale doesn't have negative consequences for someone.  I think it imprudent to suggest that any form of cooling intervention does not have safety concerns that need to be considered in a way that means those who might suffer harm are not allowed to feel that they're being hung out to dry for everyone else's benefit.

I think we've both missed a confusion I've repeated.  I wrote 'Net zero means that we lock in a temperature increase of 1.5o or 2oC, or perhaps more, that will subside only slowly over a century or so' and you added 'if at all'.  What I should have written is that while CO2 concentration will subside by about 100ppmv over a century after reaching net zero, surface temperature will remain at its elevated level for centuries afterwards.  Your 'if at all' then becomes redundant.  This is all to do with the cooling from the reduced atmospheric GHG burden being offset by warming from the oceans as the temperature between the oceans and atmosphere equilibrates. 

1. I honestly think the MacDougall ZEC paper is just rubbish.  GHG concentration won’t subside without albedo increase.  As Mike McCracken has pointed out, the Zero Emission Commitment analysis ignores amplifying feedbacks from Arctic methane.  These feedbacks would totally swamp direct anthropogenic emissions unless the Arctic is refrozen.  For Michael Mann to promote ZEC as “the new climate consensus” is totally outrageous when it has such massive scientific holes. The ZEC idea of a “stable” climate in 2050 with 700 ppm of CO₂e is absurd.

2. Here I really need help. 
3. What is the mechanism whereby increased albedo reduces GHG concentrations?  I don't understand the physics.  You can't dismiss this paper as rubbish merely because you don't like its results.  Do you have a problem with their methodology, their integrity, or their proficiency as scientists?
4. Does it really matter whether GHG concentrations reduce or not, isn't the central concern about what's happening to the temperature anomaly?  If so, the MacDougall et al paper shows that there is little change in the temperature anomaly i.e. we stick with the warming induced by past emissions but we don't get any more, but equally, we don't see it subsiding.  Mike MacC and most others sources I've looked at, agree with this.  The critical point here is that this paper says that the models indicate an absence of short term interdependence between GHG concentration and temperature, therefore, if it's temperature you're concerned about, don't get too hung up about GHG concentration.
5. I hadn't thought about the amplifying feedbacks.  Aren't these little more than the foothills of tipping points?  Natural phenomena such as those you mention are epiphenomena of our past excesses and present failure to correct for them.  Doesn't their prospect just mean that we have to step up our action over the things we can now control to ensure that we can arrest their progress?  Doesn't this strengthen the case for cooling?  If we're worried, for example, about bursts of Arctic methane we are not going to offset their warming effects by emissions reduction and we'd struggle in the short term to do it by GGR, but we could do it with AM/AC/ABC, couldn't we?

You comment 'Only the world ocean has the area, energy and resources to convert carbon into safe forms at the scale required, through large scale ocean based algae production.'  This is a can of worms I'd rather not open in this piece.  I'm not sure that the evidence is that enhanced algal production results in the necessary permanent sequestration of CO2.  There are also all manner of unanswered ecosystem questions about consequential effects of this process at scale.  In any event, the central point of this piece is that even if it were effective at delivering net zero tomorrow, it still wouldn't be sufficient to generate the cooling necessary to avoid the dreaded tipping points.

6. I added that as a comment rather than a revision, mainly to explain where I am coming from.
7. Start with albedo while building ocean biomass as top climate priorities.
8. I don’t agree with the permanence argument made against algae and biochar.  If we could increase living ocean biomass by 50 GtC that would be a big carbon sink that could be sustained and enhanced in perpetuity. 
9. Biochar might not provide permanent removal, but that does not matter if we aim to permanently increase average world soil depth by (say) five metres by mining carbon from the air and sea via photosynthesis. 
10. Mining phosphate and nitrate etc from the ocean by hydrothermal liquefaction of algae can massively add to living carbon stores. 
11. On ecosystem effects, my view is that intensive algae cultivation on 1% of the world ocean would have massive benefits to enhance biodiversity.
12. These comments are for information, not as suggested changes to the paper.

13. Aren't these further distractions from the core focus of the paper?  That there might be effective CDR methods doesn't affect the point I'm trying to get across, namely that no amount of decarbonisation whether through emissions abatement or GGR, is going to reduce the temperature anomaly fast enough to prevent the onset of one, or probably many more, tipping points?

On the title, I like 'Brighten up!' but I'm leaning towards 'Lighten up!'  It has a more powerful double entendre.

14. Brighten up is a positive triple entendre, including improvements to albedo, intelligence and mood, indicating that actual solutions are at hand. 
15. Lighten up connotes asking greens to relax their hostility toward discussion of albedo.  Some would regard the implication that many greens are uptight, humourless and censorious as overly rude and negative.
16. Thanks!

17. Brighten up is in the lead by a short head.

To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/healthy-planet-action-coalition/45f49d2f-b638-10d5-cf0f-49b3b1cc3368%40gmail.com.

[Douglas Grandt]

G’day RobertT,

I turned your chart on its side — more familiar to my eye.

As I suggested before, to me it is inconceivable that the gigatons represented by the difference between 350ppm and peak atmospheric concentration (including the gigatons absorbed by the ocean) from ca. 1990 to 2050 (60 years) can be removed by natural sinks from 2050 to ca. 2095 (45 years) without anthropogenic assistance on par with the extraordinary effort it took to get the gasses up there in the first place.

Is there a set of unstated assumptions that supports these curves I am not privy to?  

Lacking realistic assumptions, the mathematics fails common sense. If natural sinks are this “powerful” the legacy emissions would have not stood a chance and would have been removed rather than accumulating. Nonsense.

Cheers,

Doug 

Sent from my iPhone (audio texting)

On Nov 29, 2022, at 7:03 PM, Robert Chris <robert...@gmail.com> wrote:



Hi William and RobertT

Robert, I'm not yet comfortable with the provenance of these numbers but I totally endorse the conclusion in your final sentence.  What drives this is the impact of temperature equilibration between the ocean and atmosphere as the atmosphere cools by virtue of there being a smaller burden of GHGs.  Surface temperature and atmospheric GHG burden rise and fall significantly out of sync.

Regards

Robert

On 29/11/2022 23:31, rob...@rtulip.net wrote:

Dear William

 

Thank you for your calculations on the CO2 level after net zero emissions. I have used your numbers against net zero by 2050 to produce this chart.

 

<image005.jpg>

It assumes emissions will continue to grow at the current rate to 2030 and then decline to net zero by 2050.  That produces about 483 CO2 ppm in 2050 by my calculation. Your figure of a fall of 70 ppm CO2 over 28 years after net zero would bring a return to 413 ppm in 2078 and ongoing fall after that.

 

I find this implausible as a realistic scenario for climate stability.  The high ongoing level of atmospheric CO2 would lead to tipping points with accelerating feedbacks such as Arctic methane release and wildfires. 

 

The high risks of this path show the urgency of albedo increase to prevent tipping points.  It shows the IPCC is derelict in its duty by failing to advocate higher albedo.

 

My view is that most of the net in net zero would need to come from conversion of CO2 to biomass while emissions continue.  That means the fall after net zero could be even faster with larger removals of CO2.  But that is not feasible unless the climate is first stabilised by higher albedo.

 

Regards

 

Robert Tulip

 

From: William Calvin wca...@uw.edu
Sent: Tuesday, 29 November 2022 4:57 AM
To: rob...@rtulip.net
Cc: Anderson, Paul <psan...@ilstu.edu>; Douglas Grandt <answer...@mac.com>; Robert Chris <robert...@gmail.com>; Clive Elsworth <Cl...@endorphinsoftware.co.uk>; Ye Tao <t...@rowland.harvard.edu>; healthy-planet-action-coalition <healthy-planet-...@googlegroups.com>; noac-m...@googlegroups.com; Planetary Restoration <planetary-...@googlegroups.com>
Subject: Re: [prag] RE: Emissions abatement & Cooling

 

From a ms of mine:

After net zero is achieved by annually sinking as much extra CO2 as we add that year, how long will nature need to take most of the excess carbon dioxide out of circulation? Rough answer: at the current rates, it takes 28 years for nature to clean up half of the 140-ppm excess.

 

Imagine we fixed our emissions tomorrow. There would still be a 50% excess of carbon dioxide overhead. ‘Net zero’ would only take us down to 350 ppm 28 years later. While 350 ppm has been proposed as a backing-up goal, on the way up that concentration was reached about 1990, after the continents started warming four times faster than the ocean surface in the mid-1980s. Thus 350 ppm is not a sufficient goal; it is still in the danger zone.

 

<image001.png>

Figure 1. The history of surface temperature since 1950. Sea surface temp­er­atures (SST) have been slid up about 9°C to overlap land temperatures in 1977. Though the concen­tration of carbon dioxide was steadily rising, something comp­en­­sated to keep global surface temperatures from rising between 1950 and 1976.  After 1976, surface temper­at­ure ramped up in parallel on both land and ocean. Land and SST track one another from 1900 until the mid-1980s when the continents and the Arctic began warming almost four times faster. Increas­ing temper­a­ture contrast at coastlines tends to rearrange the winds that deliver rain, leading to droughts here and floods there.     There was a 13-year period when, despite rising CO2 levels, global temperature stayed flat without major volcanic eruptions to blame. Here the squares are annual averages; the heavy line is Lowess smoothed over five years, which spreads out sudden transitions that are best judged from the blue SST squares showing the annual average without smoothing.      “Global” (not shown) is the mix of 71% SST, 29% land. SST varies year-to-year less than land; on continents, evaporative cooling varies with that year’s drought acreage. Though I understand the 1970s energy budget reasons for talking of a global average temperature, most of us live on continents that are heating up 3-4x faster since 1985. It no longer makes much sense to dilute our chosen temperature index with several parts of slower-rising sea surface temperature, especially when so many people underestimate the climate problem when it is presented as a change of only a fraction of a degree in some future decade. But then surface temps, diluted or not, turn out to be a poor index of climate troubles.

The 320 ppm of the mid-1960s, when the excess CO2 was only 40 ppm, was the last ‘possibly safe’ concentration before the warming ramp began in the mid-1970s. Assuming we could shut down annual emissions tomorrow, how long would it then take for nature’s processes to cool the earth’s surface back to the surface temperatures associated with 320 ppm?

 

The fastest way is probably via increasing the sunlight reflected back out into space, the way that sea ice, clouds and hazy skies do. That is not a long-term silver bullet because it does nothing to address the other effect of rising CO2: acidification of surface waters, which kills off the ocean’s food chain.

 

Volcanic eruptions reaching the stratosphere cool us for several years; “under a white sky” is a good description of 1991 after the Mount Pinatubo eruption.

 

Natural carbon-cycle processes cool by cleaning up the lingering CO2 excess: some sink CO2 and organic debris into the ocean depths, others weather limestone, and some goes into fertilizing additional plant and plankton growth.

 

How long does all of that take—and how vulnerable is the CO2 storage they utilize? The resulting CO2 decay curve is not exponential with a 15-year time constant, as one might assume from plotting the early years on a semi-log graph and fitting a straight line. Essentially, stopping annual emissions today might see a 50% decrease in the excess carbon dioxide accum­ul­ation over the next 28 years. The natural removal processes for CO2 will take a thousand years to draw the accumulation down to 20% remaining. Such a decay curve is said to have a “long, fat tail,” tapering more like an alligator’s than a dog’s.

 

Figure 2. Nature’s time course (orange) for getting rid of extra carbon dioxide once the annual additions stop; from Joos et al (1996). Blue line shows what an exponential fit to the first decade would have suggested about the future time course. After 28 years, natural processes have only removed about half of the excess. Another 28 years only reduces the excess by an additional 8%.

 

<image002.png>

 

From: healthy-planet-...@googlegroups.com <healthy-planet-...@googlegroups.com> On Behalf Of Robert Chris

Sent: Friday, 25 November 2022 8:48 AM

To: Clive Elsworth <cl...@endorphinsoftware.co.uk>; Ye Tao <t...@rowland.harvard.edu>; healthy-planet-action-coalition <healthy-planet-...@googlegroups.com>; noac-m...@googlegroups.com; Planetary Restoration <planetary-...@googlegroups.com>
Subject: Re: Emissions abatement & Cooling

 

Hi Clive

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[Veli Albert Kallio]

People can build alternative realities just like Vladimir Putin. To certain Internet-addicted sector of society there is phenomenon of cyber-infallibility, an extension of TV- and press infallibility where printed, then broadcasted messages attained infallibility, on third age of this it is the Internet-hype.

That such phenomenon of "underdogs" in science or "truth" in politics exist, just see this thread: https://twitter.com/P_Kallioniemi/status/1594965325828820992

Pekka Kallioniemi on Twitter: "In today's #vatnik soup I'll introduce a KGB agent and a billionaire who disguises himself as a holy man.His name is Vladimir Mikhailovich Gundyayev,but he's better known as Patriarch Kirill. Gundyayev is a close ally of Putin and he has called Putin's rule a "miracle of god" 1/8" In today's #vatnik soup I'll introduce a KGB agent and a billionaire who disguises himself as a holy man.His name is Vladimir Mikhailovich Gundyayev,but he's better known as Patriarch Kirill. twitter.com

Donald Trumps numerous false claims is another example of this phenomenon.

Vladimir Putin uses it cleverly for his war propaganda: https://twitter.com/JuliaDavisNews/status/1597089807171485696

Julia Davis on Twitter: "Meanwhile in Russia: the host and his guest concur that Ukraine should be erased off the map and even the memory that it existed should be destroyed. The host says that Russia will always be an empire and being in a state of war is only natural for any empire of Russia's size. https://t.co/NaMqQRPp2n" / Twitter “Meanwhile in Russia: the host and his guest concur that Ukraine should be erased off the map and even the memory that it existed should be destroyed. The host says that Russia will always be an empire and being in a state of war is only natural for any empire of Russia's size.” twitter.com

Vladimir Putin is here made the underdog and Ukraine the villain fighting occupying Putin's Russia, despite Russian invasion there. People buy in and get brainwashed by it.

---

From: noac-m...@googlegroups.com <noac-m...@googlegroups.com> on behalf of Aaron Franklin <stateoft...@gmail.com>
Sent: 27 November 2022 11:39
To: Ye Tao <t...@rowland.harvard.edu>
Cc: healthy-planet-action-coalition <healthy-planet-...@googlegroups.com>; Planetary Restoration <planetary-...@googlegroups.com>; robbi...@gmail.com <robbi...@gmail.com>; Stephen Penningroth <steph...@gmail.com>; noac-m...@googlegroups.com <noac-m...@googlegroups.com>; Robert Chris <robert...@gmail.com>
Subject: Re: Judith Curry

 

She appears to make good sense.

 Except no mention of the Accelerating geomagnetic excusion, the continuing decimation of the Ozone caused by that and the Polar Volcanic Halogens (it never showed any signs of recovery, the blaming of CFCs was misdirection and a commercial scam to replace them with new patented perfluorocarbons).

She mentions the abrupt deglaciation caused by Subglacial volcanism but is unaware it's already running away far past any possibility of slowing it. 

She is stuck in a technology worshipping cult that fails to understand that all satellites, powergrids, electronics will be lost within a decade as the hemisphere wide effects of the radiation belt discharging into the Atmosphere on the Atlantic side of the planet makes the Carrington event look like a spark plug next to an arc welder.

Ye. This had slapped us on a 12000 year cycle for decisively undeniably the last 200 thousand years and probably much longer.

There's a big blowup at the moment about paleomagnetic data being scrubbed of any data points that didn't fit their theories of these being slow and rare events.

Bad science and unscrupulous elitists have shot us in the foot.

Aaron Franklin

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[Chris Vivian]

Robert,

 

I have added some comments, suggestions and minor corrections to your paper.

 

Best wishes

 

Chris.

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[William Calvin]

From a ms of mine:

After net zero is achieved by annually sinking as much extra CO2 as we add that year, how long will nature need to take most of the excess carbon dioxide out of circulation? Rough answer: at the current rates, it takes 28 years for nature to clean up half of the 140-ppm excess.

 

Imagine we fixed our emissions tomorrow. There would still be a 50% excess of carbon dioxide overhead. ‘Net zero’ would only take us down to 350 ppm 28 years later. While 350 ppm has been proposed as a backing-up goal, on the way up that concentration was reached about 1990, after the continents started warming four times faster than the ocean surface in the mid-1980s. Thus 350 ppm is not a sufficient goal; it is still in the danger zone.

 

Figure 1. The history of surface temperature since 1950. Sea surface temp­er­atures (SST) have been slid up about 9°C to overlap land temperatures in 1977. Though the concen­tration of carbon dioxide was steadily rising, something comp­en­­sated to keep global surface temperatures from rising between 1950 and 1976.  After 1976, surface temper­at­ure ramped up in parallel on both land and ocean. Land and SST track one another from 1900 until the mid-1980s when the continents and the Arctic began warming almost four times faster. Increas­ing temper­a­ture contrast at coastlines tends to rearrange the winds that deliver rain, leading to droughts here and floods there.     There was a 13-year period when, despite rising CO2 levels, global temperature stayed flat without major volcanic eruptions to blame. Here the squares are annual averages; the heavy line is Lowess smoothed over five years, which spreads out sudden transitions that are best judged from the blue SST squares showing the annual average without smoothing.      “Global” (not shown) is the mix of 71% SST, 29% land. SST varies year-to-year less than land; on continents, evaporative cooling varies with that year’s drought acreage. Though I understand the 1970s energy budget reasons for talking of a global average temperature, most of us live on continents that are heating up 3-4x faster since 1985. It no longer makes much sense to dilute our chosen temperature index with several parts of slower-rising sea surface temperature, especially when so many people underestimate the climate problem when it is presented as a change of only a fraction of a degree in some future decade. But then surface temps, diluted or not, turn out to be a poor index of climate troubles.

The 320 ppm of the mid-1960s, when the excess CO2 was only 40 ppm, was the last ‘possibly safe’ concentration before the warming ramp began in the mid-1970s. Assuming we could shut down annual emissions tomorrow, how long would it then take for nature’s processes to cool the earth’s surface back to the surface temperatures associated with 320 ppm?

 

The fastest way is probably via increasing the sunlight reflected back out into space, the way that sea ice, clouds and hazy skies do. That is not a long-term silver bullet because it does nothing to address the other effect of rising CO2: acidification of surface waters, which kills off the ocean’s food chain.

 

Volcanic eruptions reaching the stratosphere cool us for several years; “under a white sky” is a good description of 1991 after the Mount Pinatubo eruption.

 

Natural carbon-cycle processes cool by cleaning up the lingering CO2 excess: some sink CO2 and organic debris into the ocean depths, others weather limestone, and some goes into fertilizing additional plant and plankton growth.

 

How long does all of that take—and how vulnerable is the CO2 storage they utilize? The resulting CO2 decay curve is not exponential with a 15-year time constant, as one might assume from plotting the early years on a semi-log graph and fitting a straight line. Essentially, stopping annual emissions today might see a 50% decrease in the excess carbon dioxide accum­ul­ation over the next 28 years. The natural removal processes for CO2 will take a thousand years to draw the accumulation down to 20% remaining. Such a decay curve is said to have a “long, fat tail,” tapering more like an alligator’s than a dog’s.

 

Figure 2. Nature’s time course (orange) for getting rid of extra carbon dioxide once the annual additions stop; from Joos et al (1996). Blue line shows what an exponential fit to the first decade would have suggested about the future time course. After 28 years, natural processes have only removed about half of the excess. Another 28 years only reduces the excess by an additional 8%.

 

Now let us ask: How long, once sunk, will the excess carbon remain out of the carbon cycle’s circulation loop, what traps that extra heat? Decades? Centuries? Millennia? Forever? It depends. New grass takes CO2 out of the air, but it decomposes or burns in several years, putting most of that CO2 back into the air. If leaves fall off and rot every winter, they don’t count, only the carbon in whatever wood growth remains alive....etc.

The era for the usual long-term thinking about climate action has passed; so has the era of not-good-enough-yet hesitation about countermeasures. The fixes now need to be big and quick because of extreme weather threaten­ing our food supply and infrastructure. To protect carbon dioxide Cleanup projects (and us) in the meantime, we will also need some Shade projects.

 

And yes, they may have some undesirable side effects—but we can no longer wait. Again, the medical mindset is relevant: as with cancer chemotherapy, we are seeing the price of past inattention, denial, being slow to reevaluate, and delay. Now we are forced to risk some treatment side effects in order to keep going.

Cheers, Will

 

On Mon, Nov 28, 2022 at 12:58 AM <rob...@rtulip.net> wrote:

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[rob...@rtulip.net]

Thanks Ye

 

The assumptions in my graph were from William Calvin, in his post below suggesting the CO2 level would fall 70 ppm 28 years after net zero emissions. 

 

I made the graph to show this assumption is not feasible, for the reasons Doug mentioned. 

 

As I understand it, Michael Mann and David Keith have asserted it is consensus science.

 

Regards

 

Robert Tulip

 

From: healthy-planet-...@googlegroups.com <healthy-planet-...@googlegroups.com> On Behalf Of Ye Tao
Sent: Wednesday, 30 November 2022 8:05 PM
To: Douglas Grandt <answer...@mac.com>; Robert Chris <robert...@gmail.com>
Cc: Rob...@rtulip.net; William Calvin <wca...@uw.edu>; Anderson, Paul <psan...@ilstu.edu>; Clive Elsworth <Cl...@endorphinsoftware.co.uk>; healthy-planet-action-coalition <healthy-planet-...@googlegroups.com>; noac-m...@googlegroups.com; Planetary Restoration <planetary-...@googlegroups.com>
Subject: Re: Net Zero By 2050

 

I agree with Doug. 

RobertT, could you please share the list of assumptions, including which sinks are included and functions of their annual net flux as a function of [CO2]_(atm)?   If the slope could be half as steep as depicted in your sketch, we wouldn't need to be here discussing this issue.

Cheers,

Ye

On 11/29/2022 9:08 PM, Douglas Grandt wrote:

G’day RobertT,

 

I turned your chart on its side — more familiar to my eye.

 

As I suggested before, to me it is inconceivable that the gigatons represented by the difference between 350ppm and peak atmospheric concentration (including the gigatons absorbed by the ocean) from ca. 1990 to 2050 (60 years) can be removed by natural sinks from 2050 to ca. 2095 (45 years) without anthropogenic assistance on par with the extraordinary effort it took to get the gasses up there in the first place.

 

Is there a set of unstated assumptions that supports these curves I am not privy to?  

 

Lacking realistic assumptions, the mathematics fails common sense. If natural sinks are this “powerful” the legacy emissions would have not stood a chance and would have been removed rather than accumulating. Nonsense.

 

Cheers,

Doug 

 

 

 

To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/healthy-planet-action-coalition/75581aeb-3745-49b3-e42e-4db07878b232%40rowland.harvard.edu.

[rob...@rtulip.net]

Hi Robert C again.

 

Readers may think this conversation is already long, but we are opening new ideas about a paradigm shift in how our species inhabits our planet.  We are really in the foothills of describing new ways to live. 

 

Putting albedo first reverses the established order of climate policy, with far-reaching implications for society, economy and ecology.  Since my own university studies in philosophy, my central interest has been imagining paradigm shifts, including in religion and cosmology as well as the practical salvation of the world from climate catastrophe.  I don’t want to open up religion and cosmology now, except to note that once a broader public recognition of putting albedo first emerges, discussion of these broad topics will help to explore the psychology and politics of how and why the IPCC has got it so disastrously wrong about albedo, and why entrenched opinion is so hard to shift.

 

You are right that I am trying to simplify the analysis.  Whether that is ‘over-simplifying’ is important, and I am always eager to be proved wrong, but the converse risk of over-complicating the discussion also has to be kept in mind.  If the objective is to formulate a message that can cut through into public debate, then crystallising its simplest expression is essential.  This was the basis of my suggestion of Albedo Cooling, but I agree with you that Albedo Enhancement is a more scientifically accurate title.  I would see Albedo Cooling as a valid slogan for broad public use, with Brighten The Planet, Put Albedo First, Repair the Climate and Cutting Emissions Is Not Enough.

 

A global paradigm shift to regulate the atmosphere with sound governance would bring benefits that far outweigh its costs, and could be politically possible.  The good results include slowing sea level rise, protecting and enhancing biodiversity, supporting world peace, security, stability and prosperity, mitigating climate change, establishing an effective incremental climate policy, and limiting extreme weather.  These massive concerns are of high moral and financial value.  Risks of harm have to be managed through the ethical objective of finding a gradual transition path that fully respects human dignity and inclusion and justice. 

 

I believe negative side effects of MCB, MEER and Arctic Refreezing will prove to be minimal by comparison to the positive and welcome impacts of programs to enhance planetary albedo.  There is more uncertainty about SAI, but the general principle remains that safety, monitoring and governance systems must protect against harm.  Actions with risk of causing harm should not be agreed.  I think it is possible to increase albedo on a ‘do no harm’ basis, but that would need wide acceptance and validation before any albedo program could gain political acceptance as a good idea.

 

Questioning the likely level of harm from an AE program is not about making ‘imprudent assumptions’.  Scenario bias in current policies has exaggerated the risks of albedo increase for political reasons.  Showing that this popular bias against brightening is unwarranted is part of making the case for a change in thinking.  The context is that the moral evil of allowing planetary darkening now totally prevents the good impacts that would come from investment to research and develop AE programs.

 

You are right to note that ‘any new idea that might work to the disadvantage of the O&G sector will provoke concerted and powerful opposition’.  My view, controversially, is that albedo enhancement can only be achieved through alliance with fossil fuel industries.  The quid pro quo of taking pressure off emission reduction would serve the commercial interests of these big companies and bring them to the table. 

 

At the moment, UN leaders and the popular climate action movement are baying for massive rapid decarbonisation, essentially mounting a war against fossil fuels.  These companies are looking for a policy that is better than denial or CCS.  It is likely that albedo increase will find traction among people who want a slower transition path away from emissions.  Radiative Forcing Credits would support that agenda, by enabling money that now goes to carbon offsets and decarbonisation to instead be used to brighten the planet, as a market mechanism with far more cooling impact. 

 

I have previously endorsed the concept raised by Herb Simmens of a Grand Bargain with the fossil fuel industry to brighten the planet in exchange for licence to continue emitting.  Arguments against such a deal have basic weaknesses. There is no immediate alternative to neo-liberal dynamics, in view of their economic and political power.  Radiative Forcing Credits offer a neo-liberal way to address the climate crisis with capitalist methods, and would slow the urgency of transformation of every sector of the economy through rapid decarbonisation as promoted by UN agencies.

 

The ‘polluter pays’ principle can be achieved through Radiative Forcing Credits by requiring polluters to fund albedo enhancement.  That is a far better deal for everyone than anything else on offer.  Using tax to fund albedo enhancement is a market mechanism that supports a major public good, while avoiding the economic harm and disruption and risk of building new energy infrastructure.  There is of course much to be criticised in our neo-liberal system, but the idea that climate repair requires a political revolution seems to me entirely wrong, generating polarisation where an integrated inclusive approach would work much better.   I therefore disagree with your comment that ‘The idea that [climate] can be satisfactorily addressed by neo-liberal dynamics seems to me to be a total contradiction in terms.’ 

 

Refusing to endorse concerted action on albedo exposes the world to massive risk of climate phase shift. Meanwhile, climate impacts of carbon-based policies will not kick in for decades, allowing major social, economic and ecological harm. The disruption and cost of decarbonisation scenarios make them unfeasible. 

 

The main disadvantage for the O&G sector of an albedo program might be to make it harder to exploit Arctic energy resources under a frozen pole, but this could be compensated by opening the Arctic for shipping through ice canals.  My view, and again this is a big paradigm shift, is that converting CO2 into useful bioproducts such as biochar, biomass, bioenergy and biomaterials will grow to be the biggest industry on Earth, at a scale that will enable ongoing extraction of fossil fuels while the GHG level falls.  Net zero and then net negative emissions will mainly be achieved by removal, not reduction, alongside continued operation of fossil fuel industries.

 

You mention the butterfly effect from chaos theory.  The beauty of AE is that it reduces the ‘tectonic’ pressures on the climate system that drive extreme weather, notably by cooling ocean currents and restoring jet streams.  For example with MCB, cooling the ocean surface along hurricane alley in the Atlantic seems to only have benefits, as far as I can tell, while refreezing the Arctic would stop the heat blobs and icy weather caused by the erratic movement of the jet stream.  Earth System Sensitivity means the chaotic ‘butterflies’ created by not increasing albedo are far more dangerous than potential side effects of brightening the planet.  The existence of possible side effects makes sound international governance of geoengineering interventions essential. I agree it is essential not to make unsubstantiated claims about safety, and see the priority of research as the way to prevent this.

 

Your point that ‘climate models do not attempt to model the onset and impact of tipping points’ is not quite right.  Lenton et al report “World on brink of five ‘disastrous’ climate tipping points, study finds.”  This is a climate model.  The fact that other models have not incorporated this information is a basic weakness, misinforming public debate.  As I have argued before, it is curious that Tim Lenton himself opposes brightening the planet, in view of the potential of AE to prevent the tipping points he describes.  Some informed observers have speculated that Lenton’s view is based more on politics than on science.

It is dubious that “if the temperature anomaly is arrested below the threshold that sets off the tipping points, then they won't occur.”  That claim is based on the assumption that earth system feedback impacts and committed warming from cumulative emissions are zero.  It ignores the argument that the earth system will stabilise at the sea level and temperature previously seen with current GHG levels. As you say, “ZEC being zero isn't enough to stop the march of the tipping points.”

 

When the tipping points will start tipping is more than a guess – it is something Lenton and others have calculated with appropriate error bounds.  The overall point is that only AE can slow this danger with immediate effect. 

 

Your work to set climate policy in the context of Complex Adaptive Systems is an essential contribution to philosophy and to public policy.  Viewing our planet as a Complex Adaptive System with all its homeostatic feedback processes leads to the conclusion that AE is an essential intervention to maintain system stability and balance.  I think of it by analogy with the human body, where levels of trace elements affect the whole system health.  We can think of AE as like a medical treatment, including studying the chemical processes of elements such as sodium, chlorine, carbon, iron and sulphur for their earth system cooling impact.

 

“Building protective redundancy and resilience to systemic collapse” has to be a core strategy for system security and stability.  You point out this “is just not part of the neo-liberal mindset if doing so undermines the power and wealth of the decision makers.”  The challenge is to see if concerted action on albedo could be endorsed by current ruling political elites.

 

That then raises the question of which is most important – economic redistribution or climate stability.  Current thinking on the political left tends to see redistribution as more important.  My worry is that without a stable climate there will be far less wealth to distribute, so it is better to see how the current system can evolve than to propose revolutionary change.

 

Your conclusion about “the necessity for urgent action on AE to keep the tipping points at bay, and the necessity of simultaneously ramping up emissions abatement and GGR to address the medium to long-term stability of the climate system by rebalancing the EEI” accords with the Climate Triad policy of the Healthy Planet Action Coalition.  You might like to publish a preprint of your paper at the HPAC site.  Emissions abatement includes GGR. My personal emphasis is that ramping up abatement can mainly be achieved through photosynthetic conversion of CO2, ie through GGR, and that restructuring energy grids at high expense should be a lower priority, while the main work on cooling comes from AE.

 

Thanks so much Robert for this exchange.

 

Regards

 

Robert Tulip

 

From: Robert Chris <robert...@gmail.com>
Sent: Thursday, 1 December 2022 2:03 AM
To: rob...@rtulip.net
Cc: 'Ye Tao' <t...@rowland.harvard.edu>; 'healthy-planet-action-coalition' <healthy-planet-...@googlegroups.com>; noac-m...@googlegroups.com; 'Planetary Restoration' <planetary-...@googlegroups.com>
Subject: Re: Emissions abatement & Cooling

 

Hi RobertT

Your responses identify a significant difference between us.  One of us has got some things wrong.  I'll try and set it out so that we both end up wiser.

But first let me try an alternative to SRM, AI, AC, AM, ABC.  How about AE for albedo enhancement?

The core issue is about nuance.  My sense is that you over-simplify the process of turning a good idea into established global policy. 

CROI

Ye has already responded regarding the challenges relating to CROI.  We all seem to agree that it is a compelling idea, but how to get it established into the mainstream and replace carbon credits when there is already such a huge intellectual and financial investment in them, is far from obvious.  It must also be remembered that any new idea that might work to the disadvantage of the O&G sector will provoke concerted and powerful opposition.  How we break through all that on a timescale that will make a climatic difference is for me the big problem.  As with everything to do with responding to climate change, the challenges are almost all political rather than scientific or engineering.

Rhetoric around 'harm'

I think you make some unwarranted and potentially imprudent assumptions about the safety of AE.  Any AE intervention anywhere that has significant local climatic impact will also have impacts in adjacent areas.   There is nowhere that is not totally interlinked with adjacent areas and those with others, eventually encompassing the whole interdependent climate system and all the life within it.  The problem is that there's no control environment in which to test ideas for the global environment.  So, interventions at measurable scale anywhere will have implications elsewhere and you immediately become bogged down in all the associated politics.  Lorenz's notion of the 'butterfly effect' describes the irresolvable unpredictability of such a complex system and the impossibility of knowing with confidence what the knock on effects of any intervention will be.  Local weather is driven by temperature gradients that are driven by insolation.  Any change to insolation will change those temperature gradients and change local weather.  Climate models are not capable of determining what those effects will be.  That's not an issue about computing power or algorithms,  it's about the impenetrable complexity and path dependent unpredictability of the natural systems they are trying to describe.  The upshot of all this that there is no evidence base for your confidence that the benefits would outweigh the harms.  On the other hand, there's no evidence base that they wouldn't.  The concern I have am expressing is about making unsubstantiated claims as if they were established facts.  I believe this just makes it too easy for the forces of repression to repress.  We have to be cleverer.

A second concern I have is that all this talk of harm, cost and benefits ignores the great likelihood that there are both spatial and temporal differences that hugely complicate the moral arguments behind them.  The actual people who are being invited to bear most of these financial costs or be harmed are generally not those that who will reap the benefits.  This is possibly the most intractable of all the problems behind dealing with climate change.  I like to think that any normal sense of justice would require that those who reaped the benefits of the externalisation of the environmental costs of fossil fuels to be the ones who bear the bulk of the burden in dealing with the problems it has caused.  This is a simple application of the general principle 'polluter pays' or that we should each take responsibility for the consequences of our actions.  Well, that principle would require me and my baby boomer mates around the developed world to contribute a major part of our accumulated wealth to fund climate restitution.  Good luck with that!  Making these arguments may serve one's moral sensibilities, but in the real world they are beset by massive problems.  We live in a neo-liberal age and money and what's good for me are what now speak most loudly.   Climate change is the mother of all community problems.  The idea that it can be satisfactorily addressed by neo-liberal dynamics seems to me to be a total contradiction in terms.

Emissions abatement and cooling

This is where this thread started.  Our exchange on this has been really helpful to me in sorting the wheat from the chaff.  Here goes!

I think we agree that in principle and practice AE is necessary to keep surface temperature within acceptable bounds while emissions abatement is also necessary for its longer term contribution to rebalancing EEI.  Our differences are in the detail.

As far as I'm aware, climate models do not attempt to model the onset and impact of tipping points.  That isn't their purpose and, again as far as I'm aware, the modellers don't have any empirical data upon which to base such algorithms.  In addition, few models (if any?) allow for the slow climate system feedbacks that occur over millennia, focussing only on the fast short term system dynamics.  A feature of all models is that it is not possible to know the accuracy with which they predict the future until that future has arrived.  Statistical probability functions are great at providing an understanding of the interdependence of the system elements being modelled, but they are not designed to predict all eventualities, and most especially not to predict system singularities such as climate tipping points.

You say 'Absent higher albedo, the GHG concentration rise would be far more than assumed in the Zero Emission Commitment paper of MacDougall et al.'  I'd accept that, but that isn't what MacDougall et al were addressing.  Their study was based on runs from a number of standard climate models used throughout academia to support a whole range of assessments about climate futures, none of which include tipping points (AFAIA).  The system feedbacks that Mike MacCracken and you have referred to are, in my opinion, well described as 'the foothills of tipping points', although I'd accept that in some case the foothills might already be some way up mountainside.  To argue that assessments of the temperature effect of emissions abatement don't take account of natural system feedbacks and therefore they are of little use, is to miss the point.  What they are saying is no more than when you get zero anthropogenic emissions there'll be no incremental warming from those past emissions.  Of course, if by then you've triggered tipping points that set off vast releases of GHGs previously trapped in permafrost or biomass, then obviously things are going to get worse and the tipping points will accelerate.  However, the obverse is also true, that if the temperature anomaly is arrested below the threshold that sets off the tipping points, then they won't occur.

The problem I have, as a result of this long exchange, is that I now realise that ZEC being zero isn't enough to stop the march of the tipping points.  If the harms from global warming we're already seeing from just a 1.2degC rise are bad, they'll get worse faster if the temperature anomaly increases, whether from future emissions or getting to net zero but not compensating for the cooling from the aerosols that would be lost from reducing reliance on fossil fuels, or from triggering GHG emitting tipping points.  But they'll still get worse, just a bit slower, if we do get to net zero, even if the cooling effect of the lost aerosols is compensated.  It'll still be anyone's guess as to when the tipping points will start tipping.

The upshot of this is that AE has to be both at sufficient scale to reduce the temperature anomaly back towards zero, after compensating for the lost aerosol cooling, and sufficiently fast to prevent the tipping points tipping.

The problem with singularities is that by nature, they have two challenging features.  First, their onset is unpredictable, and second, by the time you can see incontrovertible evidence of them, it's too late to stop them.  This means that to prevent them you have to over-react to the prior partial evidence.  That requires building in redundancy to the system in order to provide sufficient robustness to withstand shocks, and resilience to enable it to adapt in good time to a changing environment.  This is true of all complex adaptive systems of which the climate system is just one example.  Building redundancy and resilience into a system reduces its immediate cost-effectiveness because those features are dormant until called upon.  They are just an overhead that only has value if and when needed.

That's the theory.  The practice is that if you search any of the IPCC WGIII reports, you will find large counts for the expression 'cost-effectiveness' (in AR6 WGIII it's mentioned 173 times).  But the cost against which the effectiveness is being assessed never includes the cost that would arise from the advent of a climate tipping point.  We need to understand that the response to climate change is under the control of a neo-liberal elite for whom markets are the panacea to all ills, including climate change.  Unfortunately, the climate is not a good or service to which market rules apply.  But they plough on relentlessly and blindly, rejecting anything that they perceive to undermine the operation of the market mechanism that they believe so fervently will solve the climate crisis, oblivious to the fact that global warming is at root the mother of all market failures, and will get resolved by the mother of all market corrections.  The more they resist change, the more dramatic that correction will be, even potentially, destroying the current geopolitical structures and economic globalisation.   Building protective redundancy and resilience to systemic collapse is just not part of the neo-liberal mindset if doing so undermines the power and wealth of the decision makers.

Conclusion

This has been a fascinating exchange.  I hope others have found it as valuable as I have.  I think I've now reached a landing on the necessity for urgent action on AE to keep the tipping points at bay, and the necessity of simultaneously ramping up emissions abatement and GGR to address the medium to long-term stability of the climate system by rebalancing the EEI.  This leaves open a stack of vita questions about how, when and where, but until the message has got through that AE is now necessary and decarbonisation is no longer sufficient, I doubt that the resources will be available to make much progress.

Regards

RobertC

[Robert Chris]

Hi RobertT

I've only now had time to address your comments below.  Some I agree with, others not, but here I want to explore some a little further.  See my comments in red below.

Regards

Robert

On 28/11/2022 01:35, rob...@rtulip.net wrote:

Hi RC

• My comments on your reply of 27 Nov are at bullet points below.

Regards

Robert Tulip

 

From: planetary-...@googlegroups.com <planetary-...@googlegroups.com> On Behalf Of Robert Chris
Sent: Sunday, 27 November 2022 11:53 PM
To: rob...@rtulip.net; 'H simmens' <hsim...@gmail.com>
Cc: robbi...@gmail.com; 'Stephen Penningroth' <steph...@gmail.com>; 'Clive Elsworth' <Cl...@endorphinsoftware.co.uk>; 'Ye Tao' <t...@rowland.harvard.edu>; 'healthy-planet-action-coalition' <healthy-planet-...@googlegroups.com>; noac-m...@googlegroups.com; 'Planetary Restoration' <planetary-...@googlegroups.com>
Subject: Re: [prag] Re: Emissions abatement & Cooling

 

Hi RobertT

… I'm not keen on Albedo Cooling because it suggests to me that the albedo is being cooled, rather than tweaks to albedo will do the cooling.  I take your point about Albedo Increase.  I think I still prefer Albedo Management because the 'management' clearly indicates that it's a human intervention that does something to albedo.  That it doesn't make clear that albedo has to be increased doesn't seem to me to be that important.  Also, in the title, the word Albedo spoils the alliteration.

• Albedo Cooling could be extended to Albedo-Based Cooling, simple as ABC.  You are grammatically correct about the ambiguity, but actually the ambiguity of AM is far worse.  I look at AC as a simpler title that conveys far more content to the public about exactly what is proposed, while still introducing the little known concept of albedo to non-scientific audiences. “Management” and “Modification” are cowardly weasel words that fail to mention the required direction of change.  Such terminology is typical of how scientists are too cautious and obscure in engaging in the politics of climate.  “AM” and “SRM” convey the ambigious impression we don’t know if we want albedo and radiation to go up or down.  And the problem with the term geoengineering is that it focuses on the process rather than the outcome.  Albedo Cooling exactly describes a required impact on the climate system, even if slightly clunky from a technical process viewpoint.

You comment that 'a shift from carbon credits to radiative forcing credits would enable commodification of albedo increase'.  Have I dismissed too rashly the notion that 'radiative forcing credits' (RFC) is a viable option?  At a micro-project level, how will the radiative forcing be assessed?  What kind of governance regime would be needed for an orderly market in RFC's?  I need to be convinced that this is truly practicable and not open to the kind of manipulation and Wild West practices we've seen in emissions trading and carbon credits.  I have fundamental objections to reliance on market forces as the primary route to addressing the threats of climate change, but that's not something I want to get into in this piece.

• Thanks very much for these questions.  I have been promoting Radiative Forcing Credits for some years without explaining it in detail, from my generalist perspective.  I see RFC as the fairly simple measure of Cooling Return On Investment (CROI) as promoted by Ye Tao.  The 675 GtC in the CO₂ emitted to date has increased RF by about 2 w/m² according to Fig 1 at DOI: 10.1038/NCLIMATE2876  Therefore 1 GtC has RF of 2/675 at a first approximation, or 0.003 w/m².  By comparison, adding 20 Mt SO₂ to the stratosphere per year would cut RF by 2 w/m² according to Fig 5 at https://acp.copernicus.org/articles/18/2769/2018/. 
• That SRM calculation is about 700 times the RF effect of removing 1 GtC (and at far lower cost).
• Over time this ratio would be less where C removal is long term. 
• All climate interventions can be measured on this single RFC scale, once they are accepted as safe to deploy. 
• If we are serious about cooling then all public funding to mitigate climate change should be based on this common RFC metric, while recognising that cutting emissions also serves other non-climate benefits that can be measured separately.
• Otherwise governments will continue to waste money on activities that cannot achieve cooling objectives.
• RFCs are better than carbon credits because they offer a platform to integrate the life cycle analysis of interventions on a level basis. 
• An RFC offset market raising capital of $10 billion per year could be enough to stabilise the climate while slower carbon-based approaches are developed.
• Standards International started work on a standard for Radiative Forcing but abandoned it.

• I strongly suspect that implementing a CROI-based RFC regime would be considerably more challenging than you suggest here.  One obvious concern is that while Ye has put the CROI idea out there, and I agree that it has great merit, to operationalise it is far from straightforward.  Establishing the RF impact of any intervention is going to be as much art as science.  This challenge is made more problematic by virtue of the fact the the whole idea of AM/AC/ABC (tbd!) is not yet widely recognised as a necessary policy response.  The primary purpose of my piece is to get AM/AC/ABC on the policymakers' agenda.  The details of how it's to be done can be discussed later.  If we open up these questions now, the whole discourse will get bogged down.  That said, it may be sensible, quietly in the background, for a group including Ye to work up a practical plan for CROI.  I've already asked him about this but he says he has other priorities right now.
  

You suggest replacing 'protect those who might be harmed by it' with 'minimise the risk of harm'.  I don't think that a claim to 'minimise harm' is sufficiently compelling.  The primary policy concern is harm to people, the rest of the ecosystem comes a (poor) second.   If you're on the other side of the negotiating table, you'll not be comforted by suffering less harm, you'll want to be protected from, or compensated for, whatever harm is inflicted on you.  Why should you be used as a get out of jail free card for other players?  In practice, it's not just about minimising risk, it's also about protecting those who suffer even that minimised risk from its consequences.  Arguing that they should be grateful that they didn't suffer greater harm isn't very reassuring!

• I don’t think you should encourage the idea played up by opponents that brightening the planet will harm people.  The likely benefits appear to far exceed the risks.  It is important in rhetoric to present one’s own advocacy in the most positive reasonable light. Don’t give them an easy hook for criticism when the evidence of likely harm is so weak.
• Maybe a better formulation is “The big questions are not about how to do AC cost-effectively, but how to ensure transparent and accountable international governance that enables safe and acceptable technology development.” 
• Risk of harm is very low from MCB, MEER and Arctic Refreezing, at first view.  SAI risk might be minimised by testing at extremely low concentration.

• Again, I'm reluctant to talk about specific applications because it is the issue of principle that I believe has to be argued over first.  Until AM/AC/ABC is regarded as necessary, any discussion of these details will be a distraction.  However, there is no technology that when deployed at scale doesn't have negative consequences for someone.  I think it imprudent to suggest that any form of cooling intervention does not have safety concerns that need to be considered in a way that means those who might suffer harm are not allowed to feel that they're being hung out to dry for everyone else's benefit.
  

I think we've both missed a confusion I've repeated.  I wrote 'Net zero means that we lock in a temperature increase of 1.5o or 2oC, or perhaps more, that will subside only slowly over a century or so' and you added 'if at all'.  What I should have written is that while CO2 concentration will subside by about 100ppmv over a century after reaching net zero, surface temperature will remain at its elevated level for centuries afterwards.  Your 'if at all' then becomes redundant.  This is all to do with the cooling from the reduced atmospheric GHG burden being offset by warming from the oceans as the temperature between the oceans and atmosphere equilibrates. 

• I honestly think the MacDougall ZEC paper is just rubbish.  GHG concentration won’t subside without albedo increase.  As Mike McCracken has pointed out, the Zero Emission Commitment analysis ignores amplifying feedbacks from Arctic methane.  These feedbacks would totally swamp direct anthropogenic emissions unless the Arctic is refrozen.  For Michael Mann to promote ZEC as “the new climate consensus” is totally outrageous when it has such massive scientific holes. The ZEC idea of a “stable” climate in 2050 with 700 ppm of CO₂e is absurd.
  

• Here I really need help. 
  
• What is the mechanism whereby increased albedo reduces GHG concentrations?  I don't understand the physics.  You can't dismiss this paper as rubbish merely because you don't like its results.  Do you have a problem with their methodology, their integrity, or their proficiency as scientists?
  
• Does it really matter whether GHG concentrations reduce or not, isn't the central concern about what's happening to the temperature anomaly?  If so, the MacDougall et al paper shows that there is little change in the temperature anomaly i.e. we stick with the warming induced by past emissions but we don't get any more, but equally, we don't see it subsiding.  Mike MacC and most others sources I've looked at, agree with this.  The critical point here is that this paper says that the models indicate an absence of short term interdependence between GHG concentration and temperature, therefore, if it's temperature you're concerned about, don't get too hung up about GHG concentration.
• I hadn't thought about the amplifying feedbacks.  Aren't these little more than the foothills of tipping points?  Natural phenomena such as those you mention are epiphenomena of our past excesses and present failure to correct for them.  Doesn't their prospect just mean that we have to step up our action over the things we can now control to ensure that we can arrest their progress?  Doesn't this strengthen the case for cooling?  If we're worried, for example, about bursts of Arctic methane we are not going to offset their warming effects by emissions reduction and we'd struggle in the short term to do it by GGR, but we could do it with AM/AC/ABC, couldn't we?
  

You comment 'Only the world ocean has the area, energy and resources to convert carbon into safe forms at the scale required, through large scale ocean based algae production.'  This is a can of worms I'd rather not open in this piece.  I'm not sure that the evidence is that enhanced algal production results in the necessary permanent sequestration of CO2.  There are also all manner of unanswered ecosystem questions about consequential effects of this process at scale.  In any event, the central point of this piece is that even if it were effective at delivering net zero tomorrow, it still wouldn't be sufficient to generate the cooling necessary to avoid the dreaded tipping points.

• I added that as a comment rather than a revision, mainly to explain where I am coming from.
• Start with albedo while building ocean biomass as top climate priorities.
• I don’t agree with the permanence argument made against algae and biochar.  If we could increase living ocean biomass by 50 GtC that would be a big carbon sink that could be sustained and enhanced in perpetuity. 
• Biochar might not provide permanent removal, but that does not matter if we aim to permanently increase average world soil depth by (say) five metres by mining carbon from the air and sea via photosynthesis. 
• Mining phosphate and nitrate etc from the ocean by hydrothermal liquefaction of algae can massively add to living carbon stores. 
• On ecosystem effects, my view is that intensive algae cultivation on 1% of the world ocean would have massive benefits to enhance biodiversity.
• These comments are for information, not as suggested changes to the paper.

• Aren't these further distractions from the core focus of the paper?  That there might be effective CDR methods doesn't affect the point I'm trying to get across, namely that no amount of decarbonisation whether through emissions abatement or GGR, is going to reduce the temperature anomaly fast enough to prevent the onset of one, or probably many more, tipping points?
  

On the title, I like 'Brighten up!' but I'm leaning towards 'Lighten up!'  It has a more powerful double entendre.

• Brighten up is a positive triple entendre, including improvements to albedo, intelligence and mood, indicating that actual solutions are at hand. 
• Lighten up connotes asking greens to relax their hostility toward discussion of albedo.  Some would regard the implication that many greens are uptight, humourless and censorious as overly rude and negative.
• Thanks!

• Brighten up is in the lead by a short head.
  

I shan't finalise this text until I have resolved (or not) some issues with friends at CCRC.

[Robert Chris]

Hi William and RobertT

Robert, I'm not yet comfortable with the provenance of these numbers but I totally endorse the conclusion in your final sentence.  What drives this is the impact of temperature equilibration between the ocean and atmosphere as the atmosphere cools by virtue of there being a smaller burden of GHGs.  Surface temperature and atmospheric GHG burden rise and fall significantly out of sync.

Regards

Robert

On 29/11/2022 23:31, rob...@rtulip.net wrote:

[Ye Tao]

CROI-based RFC should apply to both albedo and carbon approaches.   In the end, it is the Earth's Energy Balance that matter, not how many CO2 molecules are in the air or what the Earthshine number is.

The accounting for both are unsolved scientific and engineering challenges.  Much of currently sold carbon credits have no reliable monitoring mechanism in place, and most will not be realized given not taking into account things like climate trajectory-tree physiology limits.

The challenge to a precise accounting of RF from albedo enhancement requires improved understanding of boundary layer dynamics, cloud feedback, local, and global circulation impacts, both at the top of the atmosphere, and at various heights within the boundary layer where biologically-relevant processes occur.   Data to inform many of the definitions and conventions will slowly emerge with time, but RobertT is correct in saying that a CROI-based RFC regime would be a major (but I am convinced a worthwhile) challenge.

For both carbon and albedo, it should be possible to assign first-order estimates of RFC, which international governing agencies could modify as new science emerge.

Best,

Ye

[Ye Tao]

I agree with Doug. 

RobertT, could you please share the list of assumptions, including which sinks are included and functions of their annual net flux as a function of [CO2]_(atm)?   If the slope could be half as steep as depicted in your sketch, we wouldn't need to be here discussing this issue.

Cheers,

Ye

On 11/29/2022 9:08 PM, Douglas Grandt wrote:

[William Calvin]

Robert,

You are thinking just as I am.

Best wishes,

--Will

[Robert Chris]

Hi RobertT

Your responses identify a significant difference between us.  One of us has got some things wrong.  I'll try and set it out so that we both end up wiser.

But first let me try an alternative to SRM, AI, AC, AM, ABC.  How about AE for albedo enhancement?

The core issue is about nuance.  My sense is that you over-simplify the process of turning a good idea into established global policy. 

CROI

Ye has already responded regarding the challenges relating to CROI.  We all seem to agree that it is a compelling idea, but how to get it established into the mainstream and replace carbon credits when there is already such a huge intellectual and financial investment in them, is far from obvious.  It must also be remembered that any new idea that might work to the disadvantage of the O&G sector will provoke concerted and powerful opposition.  How we break through all that on a timescale that will make a climatic difference is for me the big problem.  As with everything to do with responding to climate change, the challenges are almost all political rather than scientific or engineering.

Rhetoric around 'harm'

I think you make some unwarranted and potentially imprudent assumptions about the safety of AE.  Any AE intervention anywhere that has significant local climatic impact will also have impacts in adjacent areas.   There is nowhere that is not totally interlinked with adjacent areas and those with others, eventually encompassing the whole interdependent climate system and all the life within it.  The problem is that there's no control environment in which to test ideas for the global environment.  So, interventions at measurable scale anywhere will have implications elsewhere and you immediately become bogged down in all the associated politics.  Lorenz's notion of the 'butterfly effect' describes the irresolvable unpredictability of such a complex system and the impossibility of knowing with confidence what the knock on effects of any intervention will be.  Local weather is driven by temperature gradients that are driven by insolation.  Any change to insolation will change those temperature gradients and change local weather.  Climate models are not capable of determining what those effects will be.  That's not an issue about computing power or algorithms,  it's about the impenetrable complexity and path dependent unpredictability of the natural systems they are trying to describe.  The upshot of all this that there is no evidence base for your confidence that the benefits would outweigh the harms.  On the other hand, there's no evidence base that they wouldn't.  The concern I have am expressing is about making unsubstantiated claims as if they were established facts.  I believe this just makes it too easy for the forces of repression to repress.  We have to be cleverer.

A second concern I have is that all this talk of harm, cost and benefits ignores the great likelihood that there are both spatial and temporal differences that hugely complicate the moral arguments behind them.  The actual people who are being invited to bear most of these financial costs or be harmed are generally not those that who will reap the benefits.  This is possibly the most intractable of all the problems behind dealing with climate change.  I like to think that any normal sense of justice would require that those who reaped the benefits of the externalisation of the environmental costs of fossil fuels to be the ones who bear the bulk of the burden in dealing with the problems it has caused.  This is a simple application of the general principle 'polluter pays' or that we should each take responsibility for the consequences of our actions.  Well, that principle would require me and my baby boomer mates around the developed world to contribute a major part of our accumulated wealth to fund climate restitution.  Good luck with that!  Making these arguments may serve one's moral sensibilities, but in the real world they are beset by massive problems.  We live in a neo-liberal age and money and what's good for me are what now speak most loudly.   Climate change is the mother of all community problems.  The idea that it can be satisfactorily addressed by neo-liberal dynamics seems to me to be a total contradiction in terms.

Emissions abatement and cooling

This is where this thread started.  Our exchange on this has been really helpful to me in sorting the wheat from the chaff.  Here goes!

I think we agree that in principle and practice AE is necessary to keep surface temperature within acceptable bounds while emissions abatement is also necessary for its longer term contribution to rebalancing EEI.  Our differences are in the detail.

As far as I'm aware, climate models do not attempt to model the onset and impact of tipping points.  That isn't their purpose and, again as far as I'm aware, the modellers don't have any empirical data upon which to base such algorithms.  In addition, few models (if any?) allow for the slow climate system feedbacks that occur over millennia, focussing only on the fast short term system dynamics.  A feature of all models is that it is not possible to know the accuracy with which they predict the future until that future has arrived.  Statistical probability functions are great at providing an understanding of the interdependence of the system elements being modelled, but they are not designed to predict all eventualities, and most especially not to predict system singularities such as climate tipping points.

You say 'Absent higher albedo, the GHG concentration rise would be far more than assumed in the Zero Emission Commitment paper of MacDougall et al.'  I'd accept that, but that isn't what MacDougall et al were addressing.  Their study was based on runs from a number of standard climate models used throughout academia to support a whole range of assessments about climate futures, none of which include tipping points (AFAIA).  The system feedbacks that Mike MacCracken and you have referred to are, in my opinion, well described as 'the foothills of tipping points', although I'd accept that in some case the foothills might already be some way up mountainside.  To argue that assessments of the temperature effect of emissions abatement don't take account of natural system feedbacks and therefore they are of little use, is to miss the point.  What they are saying is no more than when you get zero anthropogenic emissions there'll be no incremental warming from those past emissions.  Of course, if by then you've triggered tipping points that set off vast releases of GHGs previously trapped in permafrost or biomass, then obviously things are going to get worse and the tipping points will accelerate.  However, the obverse is also true, that if the temperature anomaly is arrested below the threshold that sets off the tipping points, then they won't occur.

The problem I have, as a result of this long exchange, is that I now realise that ZEC being zero isn't enough to stop the march of the tipping points.  If the harms from global warming we're already seeing from just a 1.2degC rise are bad, they'll get worse faster if the temperature anomaly increases, whether from future emissions or getting to net zero but not compensating for the cooling from the aerosols that would be lost from reducing reliance on fossil fuels, or from triggering GHG emitting tipping points.  But they'll still get worse, just a bit slower, if we do get to net zero, even if the cooling effect of the lost aerosols is compensated.  It'll still be anyone's guess as to when the tipping points will start tipping.

The upshot of this is that AE has to be both at sufficient scale to reduce the temperature anomaly back towards zero, after compensating for the lost aerosol cooling, and sufficiently fast to prevent the tipping points tipping.

The problem with singularities is that by nature, they have two challenging features.  First, their onset is unpredictable, and second, by the time you can see incontrovertible evidence of them, it's too late to stop them.  This means that to prevent them you have to over-react to the prior partial evidence.  That requires building in redundancy to the system in order to provide sufficient robustness to withstand shocks, and resilience to enable it to adapt in good time to a changing environment.  This is true of all complex adaptive systems of which the climate system is just one example.  Building redundancy and resilience into a system reduces its immediate cost-effectiveness because those features are dormant until called upon.  They are just an overhead that only has value if and when needed.

That's the theory.  The practice is that if you search any of the IPCC WGIII reports, you will find large counts for the expression 'cost-effectiveness' (in AR6 WGIII it's mentioned 173 times).  But the cost against which the effectiveness is being assessed never includes the cost that would arise from the advent of a climate tipping point.  We need to understand that the response to climate change is under the control of a neo-liberal elite for whom markets are the panacea to all ills, including climate change.  Unfortunately, the climate is not a good or service to which market rules apply.  But they plough on relentlessly and blindly, rejecting anything that they perceive to undermine the operation of the market mechanism that they believe so fervently will solve the climate crisis, oblivious to the fact that global warming is at root the mother of all market failures, and will get resolved by the mother of all market corrections.  The more they resist change, the more dramatic that correction will be, even potentially, destroying the current geopolitical structures and economic globalisation.   Building protective redundancy and resilience to systemic collapse is just not part of the neo-liberal mindset if doing so undermines the power and wealth of the decision makers.

Conclusion

This has been a fascinating exchange.  I hope others have found it as valuable as I have.  I think I've now reached a landing on the necessity for urgent action on AE to keep the tipping points at bay, and the necessity of simultaneously ramping up emissions abatement and GGR to address the medium to long-term stability of the climate system by rebalancing the EEI.  This leaves open a stack of vita questions about how, when and where, but until the message has got through that AE is now necessary and decarbonisation is no longer sufficient, I doubt that the resources will be available to make much progress.

Regards

RobertC

On 30/11/2022 01:19, rob...@rtulip.net wrote:

[Ye Tao]

I got confused by who wrote what.  The text in red was evidently from RobertC.  So RobertC is correct in pointing out the need for additional research to fully operationalize albedo RFC to more than 2 significant digits.  RobertT is correct in noting the need to put carbon and albedo RF on the same, more fundamental footing of energy balance.

Ye