FPIF 60-Second Expert |
Talking Points for the Time-Crunched
Global Warming: A Viable Strategy
Hoff Stauffer | October 4, 2006
Editor: John Feffer, IRC
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The debate in the United States on global climate change is shifting from whether to do something about the problem to what to do. The conventional wisdom focuses on "cap and trade," also known as tradable emissions permits. The Kyoto protocol, for instance, has instituted a cap-and-trade system for greenhouse gases (GHGs).
But this conventional focus on cap and trade is inhibiting progress on combating global warming. It is extremely difficult to figure out the economic and environmental effects of an economy-wide cap-and-trade system for GHGs. To avoid negative economic impact, most such cap-and-trade proposals are extremely modest and thus would likely accomplish very little. Also, cap and trade would not work well on a global basis.
A more viable strategy relies on performance standards for new sources of GHG emissions. These standards would strictly regulate the pollutants from direct sources of emissions such as power plants and autos. They would also mandate greater efficiency for new capital such as appliances and buildings that rely on fossil fuel combustion for the generation of electricity, heating, and cooling.
The United States should take the first steps by:
- Setting a performance standard on all new coal-fired power plants permitted after the date the legislation is signed into law. This standard would require at least 85% removal of CO2.
- Setting performance standards for average annual new car fleet efficiency that become more stringent over time.
- Setting efficiency standards for new household appliances, new buildings, and industrial processes and updating them at least once every three years.
For the full article, go to A New Standard for Preventing Global Warming.
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Published by Foreign Policy In Focus (FPIF), a project of the Institute for Policy Studies (IPS, online at www.ips-dc.org). Copyright © 2008, Institute for Policy Studies.
Recommended citation:
Hoff Stauffer, "Global Warming: A Viable Strategy," 60-Second Expert (Silver City, NM and Washington, DC: Foreign Policy In Focus, October 4, 2006).
Web location:
http://fpif.org/fpiftxt/3565
Production Information:
Author(s): Hoff Stauffer
Editor(s): John Feffer, IRC
Production: Chellee Chase-Saiz, IRC |
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| Name: |
Brad Arnold |
Date: Oct 05, 2006 |
| Current global climate models are bias toward predicting gradual linear change. Instead, ice core samples prove that when forced, the climate changes abruptly from one stable state to another. It is predictable that within a decade or two the earth's thermostat will be raised 10C.
With a growing world population, and a growing per capita energy usage, it is unrealistic to expect dramatic cuts in emissions. Furthermore, a warming earth will cause carbon sinks to become carbon emitters big time.
I suggest the only solution is to remove the CO2 from the air after it has been emitted. Nature already does this, but we are overwhelming her ability to cope. I suggest improving an organism with genetic engineering, and seeding it into the ocean.
With a business as usual senario, it is predictable that less than one billion people will be alive by the end of this century. Heatwaves and droughts will cause agriculture to be impossible on the majority of the land.
Slowly reducing our emissions is not sufficient, particularly because by 2030 the earth will only be able to absorb 70% of the CO2 that is does today. |
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| Name: |
ROBERT MACELVAIN |
Date: Oct 05, 2006 |
| NATURAL SOLUTION TO GLOBAL WARMING
In the year 1905, Nobel physicist, Albert Einstein, published his E=mc˛ EQUATION, which opened the door to THE WORLD OF THE PROTON GENIE, the door to all of the abundant energy that Earth will ever need. But, nobody looked or listened except the Energy Cartel, which stood to lose its enormous wealth and power if Einstein's EQUATION should ever become implemented.
Many have attempted to implement Einstein's EQUATION, but even the most promising successful efforts are routinely thwarted.
In brief review, “E=mc˛” provides the basis for extracting and fusing PROTONS from ordinary, pure water, which will ultimately make everybody on Earth so idly rich and content from the benefits of this clean, virtually-free, and inexhaustible energy supply that nobody should ever again have to worry about pollution, war, or poverty, and Mother Nature will once again regain total control of any Climate Changes.
The Atomic Doomsday Clock reads, "7 minutes until Doomsday, and counting!"
Is it too late? Or, will some ordinary, individual Tinkerer (maybe just an average high school student) rise to the occasion, connect the dots, and construct a simple physical demonstration of Einstein’s EQUATION so that the entire World Population can become enlightened to the prospect of a new future of peace, contentment, and prosperity? Anything less will fail to uncork the PROTON GENIE for the benefit of mankind because "The Special Energy Interests" have sufficient resources to block any individual efforts to provide Cheap Power.
Please encourage your correspondents to link to this blog, and help spread Einstein's great-inspired VISION, "A Free-Energy Paradise On Earth."
http://howtosavecivilization.blogspot.com/ |
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