{"id":97723,"date":"2016-11-04T11:02:18","date_gmt":"2016-11-04T15:02:18","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/countingpips.com\/?p=97723"},"modified":"2016-11-04T06:03:27","modified_gmt":"2016-11-04T10:03:27","slug":"why-the-paris-climate-change-agreement-means-nothing","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.investmacro.com\/forex\/2016\/11\/why-the-paris-climate-change-agreement-means-nothing\/","title":{"rendered":"Why the Paris Climate Change Agreement Means Nothing"},"content":{"rendered":"
November 4, 2016<\/div>
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By WallStreetDaily.com<\/u><\/a> \"Why<\/p>\n

Even if all 197 countries that agreed to the emissions-limiting treaty do what they\u2019ve said they\u2019ll do, we\u2019re on track for a 2.9 to 3.4 degrees Celsius average increase in global temperature.<\/strong><\/i><\/p>\n

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It just doesn\u2019t matter.<\/p>\n

The Paris Agreement \u2014 a deal driven by the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change \u2014 \u201centers into force\u201d today.<\/p>\n

But according to a report from the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), we\u2019re still on track for a 2.9\u20133.4 degrees Celsius temperature increase compared with pre-industrial levels.<\/p>\n

And that\u2019s even if all 94 current signatories and the 103 countries whose signatures are still outstanding live up to commitments under the Paris Agreement.<\/p>

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In its annual Emissions Gap Report, UNEP concluded that emissions in 2030 will be 12\u201314 gigatonnes above levels necessary to keep the temperature increase below the 2\u00b0C that over the course of the last 40-odd years has become the climate-change speed limit.<\/p>\n

First suggested by Yale economist William Nordhaus in 1975, that two degrees is now recognized as a \u201cpragmatic, simple, and straightforward\u201d level beyond which it\u2019s widely accepted Earth will experience changes in precipitation patterns, more droughts and heat waves, stronger hurricanes, rising sea levels, and multiple and varied regional effects.<\/p>\n

To have a chance at limiting the global average temperature rise to 2\u00b0C means holding 2030 emissions to about 42 gigatonnes. And 2\u00b0C only gives us a chance to avoid the worst. Hitting a lower target of 1.5\u00b0C \u201cwill only reduce, rather than eliminate, impacts.\u201d<\/p>\n

That certainly seems dramatic and urgent.<\/p>\n

The good news is that there are dramatic and urgent developments taking place in laboratories around the world that may yet give us some hope of surviving climate change.<\/p>\n

Take, for instance, the October 12, 2016, announcement by scientists at the Oak Ridge National Laboratory in Tennessee that they \u201chave developed an electrochemical process that uses tiny spikes of carbon and copper to turn carbon dioxide, a greenhouse gas, into ethanol.\u201d<\/p>\n

This technology, ramped up to commercial scale, could provide the basis for utility-scale batteries that would support broad adoption of solar and wind for base-load electric power generation.<\/p>\n

The good news is that there are dramatic and urgent developments taking place in laboratories around the world that may yet give us some hope of surviving climate change.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

It\u2019s also carbon-neutral, because the carbon dioxide created in the process of burning ethanol is reclaimed in the catalytic process.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re taking carbon dioxide, a waste product of combustion, and we\u2019re pushing that combustion reaction backward with very high selectivity to a useful fuel,\u201d said Adam Rondinone, the lead author of the Oak Ridge team\u2019s study.<\/p>\n

\u201cEthanol was a surprise \u2014 it\u2019s extremely difficult to go straight from carbon dioxide to ethanol with a single catalyst.\u201d<\/p>\n

According to Oak Ridge National Laboratory: \u201cThe catalyst\u2019s novelty lies in its nanoscale structure, consisting of copper nanoparticles embedded in carbon spikes. This nano-texturing approach avoids the use of expensive or rare metals such as platinum that limit the economic viability of many catalysts.\u201d<\/p>\n

Here\u2019s the thing about the Oak Ridge discovery: It was an accident, \u201cserendipitous.\u201d<\/p>\n

So can anything be written \u2014 a 1.5\u00b0, 2.0\u00b0, 2.9\u00b0, 3.4\u00b0, or any increase in the global average temperature \u2014 when beneficial occurrences and\/or discoveries like this can still happen?<\/p>\n

On another storage note, scientists at Rice University have discovered a new candidate for the U.S. Department of Energy\u2019s benchmarks for materials that would enable the use of clean-burning hydrogen for everyday cars and trucks.<\/p>\n

Materials scientists Rouzbeh Shahsavari and Farzaneh Shayeganfar published their work on October 23, 2016, in the American Chemical Society\u2019s journal Langmuir<\/em>.<\/p>\n

Their laboratory work suggests \u201cnewly designed 3-D-pillared boron nitride (PBN) and pillared graphene boron nitride (PGBN)\u2026 enhance the surface and free volume for storage within the nanomaterial and increase the gravimetric and volumetric hydrogen uptake capacities.\u201d<\/p>\n

Here\u2019s the thing about the Oak Ridge discovery: It was an accident, \u201cserendipitous.\u201d<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

The computer models \u2014 which would require months for experimentalists to verify \u2014 provide solid evidence of a battery sufficient to power light-duty vehicles in a post-internal-combustion-engine world.<\/p>\n

We\u2019re also making incredible advances in photovoltaic technology that will help more and more folks get off the grid \u2014 and at the same time drive additional reductions in carbon emissions.<\/p>\n

Scientists at the Los Alamos National Laboratory, in New Mexico, published a study in Nature Energy<\/em> on October 10, 2016, indicating that, according to IEEE Spectrum<\/em>, \u201ca thin film of quantum dots on everyday glass could be the key to achieving acceptable efficiency in window photovoltaic systems\u00a0at low cost.\u201d<\/p>\n

There is a way to go for Victor Klimov, a nanotechnology researcher at Los Alamos, and his team. Their quantum dots right now produce overall energy efficiency conversion of 1.9%. To be commercially viable, they need to get to 6%.<\/p>\n

We\u2019re also making incredible advances in photovoltaic technology that will help more and more folks get off the grid \u2014 and at the same time drive additional reductions in carbon emissions.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

That may be a matter of increasing quantum dot concentration and getting a better grasp of their absorption properties.<\/p>\n

But the process is simple in application on window glass. And theoretically, it\u2019s cheap.<\/p>\n

Reducing emissions at the utility level by making solar and wind even more viable replacements for coal-fired electrical power, at the light-duty vehicle level by creating powerful and clean storage technology, and at the residential level by helping more folks get off the grid, combined, will make a significant difference.<\/p>\n

Who knows if it\u2019s enough?<\/p>\n

But even Bill Murray\u2019s Meatballs<\/em> crew stuck around to compete after his \u201cIt Just Doesn\u2019t Matter\u201d speech the night before the big competition with Camp Mohawk.<\/p>\n

And like his beloved Chicago Cubs, Murray\u2019s Camp North Star finally prevailed in the end.<\/p>\n

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Old Things New<\/h2>\n

It\u2019s not a classic film by any stretch.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s marred by weak casting decisions. Not even Dwight Schultz of The A-Team<\/em> fame in his first cinematic role or the star power of Paul Newman in the central roles of Dr. J. Robert Oppenheimer and Gen. Leslie Groves, respectively, could render it iconic.<\/p>\n

It also includes an uncharacteristically poor contribution from Ennio Morricone, whose score here simply doesn\u2019t measure up to the work that earned him international notice \u2014 the haunting music he wrote for Sergio Leone\u2019s \u201cMan With No Name Trilogy\u201d \u2014 A Fistful of Dollars<\/em>, For a Few Dollars More<\/em>, and The Good, the Bad and the Ugly.<\/em><\/p>\n

But all this recent activity at the Oak Ridge National Laboratory and the Los Alamos National Laboratory had me thinking about Roland Joff\u00e9\u2019s 1989 retelling of the Manhattan Project, Fat Man and Little Boy.<\/em><\/p>\n

Fresh off managing the construction of the Pentagon, Gen. Groves is tasked, to his dismay, with leading the Allied effort to beat the Germans to the creation of an atomic bomb.<\/p>\n

Joff\u00e9, who also co-wrote the script, gets the basic arc of the history right. There\u2019s plenty of coverage of Oppenheimer\u2019s politics and personal relationships and Groves\u2019 relentless drive.<\/p>\n

He also incorporates an unfortunate \u201ceveryman\u201d character in the person of John Cusack\u2019s \u201cMichael Merriman,\u201d a composite of two individuals who did indeed die after \u201cTickling the Dragon\u2019s Tail\u201d and being exposed to the \u201cDemon core\u201d as part of the Manhattan Project.<\/p>\n

This story device smacks of presentism \u2014 evaluating the past based on current ideas of right and wrong. Of course, we can now understand the horrors of nuclear war. Perhaps that\u2019s why, for all of our human foibles, we\u2019ve been able to avoid their use for going on 72 years now.<\/p>\n

Fat Man and Little Boy<\/em> is flawed, but it does get you to Oppenheimer\u2019s \u201cI am become death\u201d moment at the Trinity site on July 16, 1945, while providing as much dramatization as such an intellectual journey allows.<\/p>\n

Smart Investing,<\/p>\n

David Dittman
\nEditorial Director, Wall Street Daily<\/i><\/p>\n

The post Why the Paris Climate Change Agreement Means Nothing<\/a> appeared first on Wall Street Daily<\/a>.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By WallStreetDaily.com Even if all 197 countries that agreed to the emissions-limiting treaty do what they\u2019ve said they\u2019ll do, we\u2019re on track for a 2.9 to 3.4 degrees Celsius average increase in global temperature. It just doesn\u2019t matter. The Paris Agreement \u2014 a deal driven by the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change \u2014 […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-97723","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","no-post-thumbnail"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.investmacro.com\/forex\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/97723","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.investmacro.com\/forex\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.investmacro.com\/forex\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.investmacro.com\/forex\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.investmacro.com\/forex\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=97723"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.investmacro.com\/forex\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/97723\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":97728,"href":"https:\/\/www.investmacro.com\/forex\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/97723\/revisions\/97728"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.investmacro.com\/forex\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=97723"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.investmacro.com\/forex\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=97723"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.investmacro.com\/forex\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=97723"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}