[GWSG] Plastic fm biochar; Scotch letter; EIS database; gvt. on adapt.; coal vs. CH4; elec. cars; HFC action; British warnings

[Tilley, Al]

1.  Pyrolysis, which produces biochar useful for sequestering carbon, also produces gasses which can replace petroleum products in the manufacture of plastics.  http://news.sciencemag.org/sciencenow/2010/11/a-greener-way-to-make-plastic.html?etoc

2.  Protestant, Catholic, and Islamic leaders in Scotland describe the failure to support poor nations in their attempts to deal with climate change as a “moral outrage” in a letter to the British Prime Minister at the opening of climate talks Cancun. http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-11857143

3.   The Columbia Law School has established two databases of environmental impact studies, one federal and one for California.  http://www.law.columbia.edu/centers/climatechange/resources/eis

4.  The White House Council on Environmental Quality in October released a progress report on a national climate change adaptation strategy.  It is primarily a guide for federal agencies as they develop adaptation plans but provides a process which should be useful to organizations at the local and state level.  Guiding Principles are listed on page 10.  The “Summary of Policy Goals and Recommended Actions for the Federal Government” on the following two pages structures the rest of the report.  A useful graphic representation of the planning process is on page 28.  http://www.whitehouse.gov/sites/default/files/microsites/ceq/Interagency-Climate-Change-Adaptation-Progress-Report.pdf

5.  An unpublished paper by Cornell’s Robert Howarth finds that over a 20 year period natural gas is a much worse greenhouse gas emitter than coal when indirect and fugitive emissions are included.  I assume that after that period, the methane will have converted to CO2 and the difference abates.  While this study has to be stored in brain cells reserved for non-peer reviewed info for the present, I thought it worth presenting now for its new and, if verified, highly significant perspective.  http://www.eeb.cornell.edu/howarth/GHG%20emissions%20from%20Marcellus%20--%20November%202010.pdf  Many utilities are busy converting from coal to natural gas.  If Howarth is right, that strategy must be firmly discouraged.  So much, also, for the natural gas auto.  http://www.nytimes.com/2010/11/30/business/energy-environment/30utilities.html?_r=5

6.  Electric cars save about 2/3 on fuel bills at today’s electricity prices.  Even when the electricity comes from coal, their greenhouse gas contributions are 35-60% lower than a conventional car’s.  http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2010/nov/30/busting-myths-electric-cars

7.   The US, Canada, and Mexico are expected to launch an initiative to curb HFCs as greenhouse gasses, along with black carbon and methane.  http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/11/29/AR2010112905479.html?wprss=rss_nation

8.    The British journal  Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society has published a series of papers on the implications of unmitigated global warming.  One paper estimates that we could see 4° C of warming by 2060, twice the limit of 2° ceiling set at Copenhagen.  http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2010/nov/29/climate-change-scientists-4c-temperature?showallcomments=true  The President of the UK Royal Society warns that it is essential to prepare for the worst effects of climate change.  http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-11867841