[GWSG] Hansen overview; C tax; dueling reports; ocean acidity; 4th gen UK reactor; record Arctic melt

[Tilley, Al]

1.  In November 2011 James Hansen delivered a 1 hour 44 minute lecture in Sydney describing climate problems and solutions.  There are probably some on this list who do not need an overview, but I am not among them.  Along the way he delivers a strong argument in favor of advanced nuclear technologies and a critique of market approaches to mitigation, such as Amory Lovins’.  Hansen supports a revenue-neutral carbon tax as the only feasible mitigation strategy.  Zenrin recommended the video. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5E5EdbiB4HU

 2.  George Schultz, President Regan’s Secretary of State, is calling for a revenue-neutral carbon tax.  http://news.mongabay.com/2012/0712-shultz-global-warming-is-real.html#<http://news.mongabay.com/2012/0712-shultz-global-warming-is-real.html>

3.  A year ago a study by two Cornell U researches concluded that the use of natural gas did not reduce greenhouse gas emissions.  Now a third Cornell scientist using lower leakage figures and a longer perspective concludes that natural gas is a 40% improvement over coal.  http://www.tulsaworld.com/business/article.aspx?subjectid=49&articleid=20120711_49_E2_Replac891462  My understanding is that time is so short to bring new emissions to a halt, avoiding runaway warming, that natural gas cannot be a useful bridge.

4.  A new study published in Science indicates that ocean acidification from global warming is likely to have a devastating effect on sea life off the West Coast of the US in the next 40 years.  (Other areas were not covered in the study.) The oceans have become 30% more acidic since the industrial revolution.  By 2100 acidity is expected to increase 150% on average.  By 2050 oysters will effectively disappear in the region along with many other life forms.  Oysters in the area are already in trouble; commercially important, they have been a focus of study.  Because ocean circulation patterns take about 50 years to complete, the current difficulties are caused by the atmosphere as it was in the 1950s and 60s.  We may expect that it will take 50 years for any improvements we achieve to begin supporting sea life.  The gloomy implication is that it is already too late to save anything off the West Coast that bears shells or eats those who do (including the phytoplankton at the base of the food chain), though in the future if we get carbon emissions controlled in time it may be possible to restock.  Because shell-forming organisms represent a significant sink for the carbon we are putting into the atmosphere by using gas, oil, and coal, their demise will form a positive feedback: as the shells which sequester the carbon disappear, the carbon will accumulate in the atmosphere and further increase the acidity, speeding the disappearance of sea life.   http://news.sciencemag.org/sciencenow/2012/07/rising-acidity-brings-an-ocean-o.html?ref=em  We need to face squarely the world we are constructing.  Coral reefs, for example, will disappear before the oysters do.  http://www.nytimes.com/2012/07/14/opinion/a-world-without-coral-reefs.html?_r=1&nl=todaysheadlines&emc=edit_th_20120714

5.  The UK is moving toward a fast-neutron reactor which would use nuclear waste as fuel and produce only low level waste.  http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2012/jul/09/nuclear-waste-burning-reactor

6.  A record amount of Arctic sea ice melted in June, with implications for the flow of weather systems in the Northern hemisphere, the ease of drilling for more oil in the Arctic, and the dissolution of the Greenland ice sheet.  http://www.climatecentral.org/news/record-amount-of-arctic-sea-ice-melted-in-june?utm-source=feedburner&utm-medium=feed&utm-campaign=Feed%3A+climatecentral%2FdjOO+Climate+Central+-+Full+Feed
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