By Michael Ricciardi •
September 27, 2009
The appeal of shortwave, geoengineering is in it’s purportedly rapid, remediation impact (although no global experiments have been conducted yet). However, the combined climate impact of GHG increases with a geoengineered reduction in shortwave radiation is not known, but, it is feared, could result in environmental “winners” and “losers”–meaning some regions of the planet could experience severe drought, and even increased conflict over water resources.
By Michael Ricciardi •
August 10, 2009
The legendary glaciers of the Himalayan and Hindu Kush mountain ranges have been losing volume at an increasing rate over the past twenty to thirty years. And over this same time period, much data has piled up confirming the role of increased CO2 emissions in global warming trends. Given this, it would be “natural” to assume that CO2-induced warming was also to blame for the glacial melting. But it turns out that much stronger evidence points to the [...]
This population growth, on the surface, would seem to be a matter of great concern. To be sure, it is indeed a concern in those countries as they seek to insure the survival needs of more and more people. But, as population and economic researchers have shown, population size alone is not the real problem; the real problem is the rate of consumption per capita. Put in this light, we immediately see a dramatic difference between first and third world [...]
“Worldwide, less than 8% of folks are responsible for 50% of emissions”, according to Professor Stephen Pacala of Princeton, co-author of Stabilization Wedges.
This group has a higher annual income than even the average American. But the US has the highest per-capita energy consumption rate of any nation, out-consuming the five most populated nations combined. Quite recent studies have confirmed what many already knew: that more affluent people consume more energy, and generate more green house gas (ghg) emissions. Thus, making significant cuts in ghg (to slow warming trends and mitigate climate change) without big cuts in this group’s ghg emissions is a major challenge.
The impact of greenhouse gases on global warming in the short term, and the possibility of severe climate change in the medium to long term, promise to create significant and lasting hardships for everyone. But these hardships will fall hardest on the world’s poorest, who are the ones least responsible for ghg-induced climate change.
