Climate Solutions Friday: Green Consumerism

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In the past decade or so there has been an explosion of products labeled “green” or “sustainable” which promise to reduce your environmental impact without sacrificing your way of life. Neither of these labels is a protected term so there is little meaning to either of them, particularly in a consumer setting. The evidence that these green products are less harmful for the environment is not extremely strong, and arguably they may actually be worse for the envirnoment in the long run by encouraging more consumption.

You see, overconsumption is the root of our environmental crises. Simply put, we cannot consume our way out of this crisis, because consumption is the problem. But these marketing campaigns give some of us the illusion that we’re living “sustainably” because we’re using “sustainable” products. This is called greenwashing.

Now, sometimes these green labels are accompanied by third-party standards like the Rainforest Alliance. Theoretically, this is a good thing because it means at least someone is creating a standard and doing an audit of the product to make sure it meets that standard. I’m not an expert on the labels and I’m in no position to evaluate their efficacy. That being said, no amount of green standards is going to alter the fact that we’re consuming too many resources to have a sustainable civilization.

When I was growing up, we were taught to limit our ecological impact by following the three “Rs”: Reduce, Reuse, Recycle. Now, I didn’t know this at the time, but those three are listed by their relative importance. Reduce comes first because it’s the most important and the most impactful, followed by reuse and then recycle. In our society we tend to put most of the emphasis on recycling, because, just like with “sustainable products” it doesn’t require us to make any material changes to our daily lives. Recycling sounds like a good idea, but in many instances it’s little more than greenwashing.

So where does that leave us? What is the opposite of hyper consumption? Minimalism.

Now, we live in a society without a state religion, but consumption is damn near the de facto official American faith. Just think about Black Friday. Thanksgiving is meant to be a day of giving thanks, of reflecting on what we have, on reconnecting with family or friends, and showing gratitude. Yet, before Thanksgiving is even over, we immediately transition into Black Friday, which starts on Thursday, and symbolizes the insane, hyper consumption at the heart of the American ethos.

So, when I say we should cut our consumption, I’m fully aware of just how un-American it sounds. I’m also aware that it may go over like a lead balloon. I don’t care.

I think deep down, most of us realize that this hyper consumption isn’t making us any happier and it isn’t making our lives better. Americans never score well on happiness indices, and having lots of unnecessary stuff doesn’t really increase our quality of life.

That’s not to say that wealth and things do not increase happiness at all. Far be it from me, a comfortable, privileged white cisgender American man to preach that wealth and comfort don’t bring happiness. It’s just that, once our material necessities are met (this includes things like internet access, entertainment, and education, as well as food, water, shelter, etc) more consumption doesn’t really make us happier.

My question then is, what is the point of all this consumption if it doesn’t make us happier and it’s killing our environment?

If we want to change our lives for the better and reduce our ecological footprint, then we need to change our consumption habits. As famed organizer Marie Kondo frequently asks, “does this spark joy?” When thinking about our possessions and about things we might buy, we should stop and think how much joy this thing will bring. If we’re not sure, we should see if we can test it out. Of course that won’t always be possible, but, just as with plant-based eating, the more we reduce our consumption, the better it is for the environment. Over time we may find that we really don’t need all of these “things” in our lives, and if it makes us happier, we’re turn it into a habit.

However, as I’ve said before, if we really want to change American consumption habits, we must look at policy changes. In the near term, it is good for each of us to evaluate our own choices and habits, but durable, long-term solutions are only achieved through collective action, cultural change, and policy.

Book Review – How to Prepare For Climate Change

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How to Prepare for Climate Change by David Pogue is a reference guide for dealing with the changing climate. Rather than single narrative structure, it is more of a reference book. You may find that you don’t need to read it from cover to cover to get the full value from the book.

The overwhelming sense you get is one of inevitability. Pogue acknowledges that life will not go back to the way it was, and he tries to give us tools to help us deal with the coming changes. He admits in the beginning that each chapter is a fairly high level look at each topic, and that it would make sense for the reader to delve deeper into the topics that are relevant to them.

Pogue starts with an overview of the changes we can expect, and makes it clear that things are going to get worse before they get better. He then covers a basic overview of climate science before getting into the heart of the book. Each chapter covers a different climate topic from the perspective of an individual. Largely written for a suburban homeowner, if you’re a renter or an urban resident you may find some of the content a little irrelevant (unless, like me, you plan to move out to the suburbs at some point in the future).

The focus of the book in on personal resilience, in fact the first chapter covers mental resilience. I like this apporoach because I do think that mental resilience is the bedrock of physical and financial resilience.

Chapter 3 is an interesting look at the geography (in the United States) of climate change impacts. He speculates which areas of the country will be the most insulated from climate change. He starts with two simple rules: move away from the coasts, and move north. He concludes that the Great Lakes and Pacific Northwest are going to be the most livable areas in the country by mid century. Pogue presents a future where people are leaving cities like Houston, Phoenix, Atlanta, and Las Vegas for climate havens like Cleveland, Buffalo, Milwaukee, and Detroit, essentially a reversal of the previous 70 years of US internal migrations.

But, of course pulling up stakes and moving is a pretty serious endeavor and not everyone can or is willing to do it. After all, not everyone fled the Dust Bowl for California. For those who plan to shelter in place, Pogue offers advice on improvements they can do to their homes to make themselves more resilient. Again, this is largely targeted at homeowners. Renters can’t exactly install a new water storage and filtration system, or completely replace their insulation. He goes through a number of extreme weather events that are forecasted to increase over time, like droughts, floods, storms, and especially heat waves. Of course, not all areas will be equally effected by these events and the reader is welcome to pick and choose the chapters they read.

For these subsequent chapters, the discussion is cursory at best. However, it is very useful to think about these various impacts and decide which ones are worth a deeper look (using other books and resources). I learned a lot from the chapter on water storage and filtration, I had never really thought about water but Pogue convinced me that I probably should. I think for people who are not in the sustainability or construction fields, Pogue’s chapters will be digestible and informative. After all, most of us won’t be doing these improvements ourselves, so maybe we don’t need to do a deep dive on how solar panels work or the R factor of various insulation materials.

Pogue ends with a discussion of the social chaos he expects to see. Of the topics discussed, this one is the most difficult to predict. To be honest, this part did not interest me as much. I think we’ve all learned over the past 18 months what to expect in a crisis, and we can probably predict how things will go if there is a water shortage or persistent heat waves.

Overall, I’d say this book is worth having on your bookshelf, especially if you live in the suburbs. Many of the improvements are probably cost effective and you can make them incrementally over time. The chapter on climate geography is especially enlightening and Pogue offers a number of helpful resources for determining just how vulnerable your property is. He gives links for government sites that show projected sea level rise, flood susceptibility, and other events. Even if you don’t plan to move, then you can at least try to prepare for the most likely disasters.

If you plan to live in an apartment for the next few decades, then I’m not sure how useful this is.

Overall, I think Pogue accomplished what he set out to do, and I would recommend adding How to Prepare for Climate Change to your reading list.

Climate Solution: Plant-Based Eating

~ climate2021steve ~ 1 Comment

It often feels like there is nothing we can do about climate change. It seems like our individual actions are kind of meaningless in the face of such a huge problem. It’s true that none of us, on our own, is going to solve this problem. It will take policy and collective action. However, that doesn’t mean there’s nothing we can do as individuals to move our society forward. Collective action is really just a group of individuals making individual actions. And, while I’ve said over and over that policy is the best approach for solving these issues, I still think we as individuals can and should examine our own habits. We should try to lower our own carbon footprint, because ultimately that’s what it’s going to take to get where we need to go. So I’d like to present you with a series of personal actions we can take to lower our own emissions. Let’s start with one of the easiest and quickest things we can do: eat more plants, aka “plant-based eating.”

Your first thought when you hear “plant-based eating” might be vegetarianism or even veganism. Your second thought is probably something like “no thanks” or “don’t tell me what to eat.” There’s no denying that most people love meat and dairy, and we live in a society that prides itself on a meat-heavy diet. We see it as a symbol of wealth, abundance, masculinity, even patriotism. No generation in the history of the world has had such easy and cheap access to meat.

Meat and dairy both have a huge environmental impact. Red meat in particular (beef and lamb) has the highest impact. Beef production is the leading cause of deforestation and biodiversity loss on the planet. Meat production is also subsidized both explicitly through feed subsidies, and implicitly through regulations that allow for animal and worker abuse, pollution, and other impacts to be externalized.

The government should step in and stop subsidizing meat immediately. Cheap meat is generally a bad thing for the planet and for our health. That being said there are obviously equity issues. For most of human history, the rich ate whatever they wanted and common people were limited to meat on special occasions or not at all. We don’t want to return to this stratified way of eating.

However, the amount of meat that we consume is simply unsustainable. The research on this is overwhelming so I won’t belabor it here, but given existing technology, there is no way we can continue to eat meat on this scale without destroying our own ecosystem. Fortunately, cutting meat and dairy consumption in rich countries is fairly easy. If you want to reduce your carbon footprint (along with your general ecological footprint) the easiest thing to do is cut your meat and dairy consumption.

But for most of us, eating without meat might seem hard. Won’t you still be hungry? Will you get enough nutrients? What about protein? Will it even taste good without meat? Maybe you don’t know how to cook without meat, or maybe you don’t cook at all and there are now vegetarian restaurants nearby. Rest assured, it’s probably a lot easier than you think.

There are at least two strategies you can try. First, you can simply reduce the meat or dairy portion sizes. If you order a hamburger at a restaurant, cut it in half and save half for later. Stretch that burger into two meals. Or make smaller portions if you cook at home. Rather than making meat the centerpiece, think of it as compliment or side dish, with vegetables front and center. This way of cooking is common, even in advanced countries like Italy, France, South Korea, and Japan. You can think of this as an opportunity to learn new cuisines.

My preferred method, however, is to simply eat vegetarian most of the time. It’s easy, you don’t need to measure anything or weigh your meat portions, and it’s structured. I eat meat once or twice a week. I don’t change my portion sizes and I don’t feel guilty about eating it. I usually eat meat on Friday or Saturday, when I’m out with friends. To be honest, I don’t miss eating meat every day. I know I can have a hamburger or a steak or whatever whenever I want, so I don’t feel pressure to get one. Further, I’ve spent years learning how to cook and order vegetarian dishes so I have a large repertoire of options to choose from. I also live in a place where it’s easy to find vegetarian options at restaurants, which I know isn’t true of everyone. And I have the income to buy whatever fresh fruits and vegetables I need, which again is not true of everyone.

I recognize that I have privilege here. I also don’t expect everyone to cut their meat consumption by 70+% the way I have. But, any effort to cut your meat consumption is worth doing, even if it’s only once a week.

The process can either be immediate or gradual. We all live very hectic, stressful lives and completely changing the way we eat and cook overnight would be pretty hard to do. Fortunately, it’s not necessary to change everything right away. My advice is to think about how often you eat meat. Is it daily? Is it multiple times a day? Is it with every meal?

Then think about the meals you enjoy (if any) that are vegetarian. What do you like about them? How often could you eat them?

Next, start exploring similar meals. Try to switch out one meal per week from omnivorous to vegetarian (or vegan if you’re feeling ambitious). Perhaps you can try something new every week, whether you order it from a restaurant or make it at home. You’re not going to like everything, and that’s fine, just keep trying new things.

If you feel even more ambitious, maybe try to cooking with something you’ve never used before, like tofu or tempeh. If you have used them before, then start exploring more dishes and more ways to cook them. We are awash in Youtube videos and cookbooks that can teach us how to cook with these ingredients.

Over time, you can build up a rotation of meals that you (and hopefully your family) enjoy eating. Be ruthless about it, if they don’t like something, then don’t make it again, but keep trying.

Over time you get more and more comfortable cooking without meat, or discovering what restaurants have vegetarian options you enjoy. Like I said, gradual change is totally fine.

And you don’t have to eat like me. Even replacing one meal a week is good, two meals is great. If you get to a point where most of your meals are vegetarian, then that’s wonderful. If you think about it, you could eat meat every day for one meal and 2/3 of your diet would be vegetarian. The average American eats about 6.3 oz of meat per day, that’s almost two recommended servings. If you cut it to one 3.5 oz serving, you’d be eating barely half the average. If everyone did that it would have a huge positive impact.

Also, you shouldn’t think about it as a sacrifice, I certainly don’t. The goal is not to punish yourself for eating meat, you should think of it as an opportunity to explore new flavors and new ingredients. For almost all of human history, most people were vegetarian a majority of the time. Over the centuries, we have invented myriad delicious meals with little or no animal protein. And we live in a time of great recipe abundance.

I personally enjoy getting cookbooks from the library and testing them out. For major cookbooks like Mark Bittman’s How to Cook Everything there are often vegetarian versions like this one. Sweet Potato Soul is good book offering vegetarian versions of classic Southern cooking. I’m currently using The Vegetarian Silver Spoon for my Italian recipes. The list of books is almost endless. Eating should be a joy, a celebration of flavor. Meat isn’t necessary to have a wonderful taste experience.

If you’re concerned about nutrition, then there are good resources out there (beware though, a lot of “plant-based” writing is very biased. Stick with neutral nutrition and science-based organizations like medical schools or dieticians). In reality, while plant-based diets are usually healthier than the typical American diet, for some people they may not be healthy. Everyone is unique and so are our nutritional needs.

If you’re just not interested in having smaller portions or going without meat a few times a week, then you can still reduce your diet’s carbon footprint. Cutting red meat is the next best thing. Going pescatarian would be even better, as fish and especially shellfish have much lower carbon footprints than land-based meats. Smaller fish like sardines and anchovies have a smaller footprint than big fish like tuna or salmon. Bivalve shellfish like oysters, clams, mussels, and scallops are probably the most sustainable animal protein on the planet.

One way or the other, our diets will have to change. No matter who you are or where you live, you can make a difference by eating a little less meat. You can feel good about it, knowing that not only would it have climate benefits, but it will also benefit a plethora of other ecological issues like deforestation, biodiversity loss, ocean acidification, marine dead zones, and others.

News Roundup – August 16

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Europe Sets Heat Record – The temperature in Floridia, Sicily hit 124 degrees, the highest ever recorded in Europe. That means the highest temperatures ever recorded in Europe and North America happened barely a month apart. Unfortunately, I doubt either record will last very long.

Study says “blue hydrogen” may be worse than Natural Gas – Many people believe hydrogen will be an essential zero-carbon fuel. There are a few ways of producing hydrogen, the most common is called “gray” hydrogen and it involves using natural gas. Blue hydrogen was supposed to be better for the environment, but a new study concludes it might be worse than just using natural gas directly. That leaves only “green” hydrogen as a viable path. Green hydrogen involves using renewable energy to power electrolysis machines that separate water into hydrogen and oxygen. In order for this to make financial sense, the cost of renewable energy and electrolysis must come down significantly.

Attribution Science Powers IPCC Report – Between the last IPCC report in 2014 and today, something called attribution science has gotten much more sophisticated. This new knowledge allows us to attribute individual weather events to climate change. For many years, we simply could not attribute weather events with a changing climate, making it very hard to convince people. Some bad faith commentators would often point out (correctly) that we could not blame climate change or a certain hurricane or fire, and then they’d argue that we shouldn’t worry about climate because of this. That was a stupid argument then, but it makes less sense now. Since we can actually make that attribution. This is one of several new scientific tools developed over the past year that have removed any lingering doubts about our role in a changing climate.

The Next 3 Months

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I’m not exaggerating when I say that the next 3 months may be the most important months of our lives. They may determine once and for all if we will contain the climate crisis or if we let it roar onward. 3 months from today, we’ll know if the COP26 climate conference was a success. But in order for that to happen, we must take care of business here at home.

Right now is crunch time for climate action in the United States. Democrats control the House, Senate, and White House for the first time since 2011. Based on historical patterns, the Republicans are likely to capture one or both houses of Congress next year, and most of 2022 will be focused on re-election campaigns rather than legislation. At this moment, there is a concerted push by President Biden to pass both his Bipartisan Infrastructure Plan, and his partisan reconciliation bill. Republicans continue to show zero interest in combatting the climate crisis, and I don’t think that’s going to change anytime soon. So our best hope for action lies in these two parallel pieces of legislation.

The BIP, while not directly related to climate, does have a number of climate-friendly features, including the largest federal investment in Amtrak and mass transit in history, billions for the electrical grid and electric vehicle charging, along with money to modernize infrastructure in the face of extreme weather.

The reconciliation package is where the meat of President Biden’s climate agenda is, and it would represent by far the largest federal investment in climate action in US history. It sets a goal that the power sector will be 80% “clean” (meaning solar, wind, hydro, and nuclear at the least) electricity and the economy see a 50% reduction in carbon emissions by 2030. Some of the highlights include:

  • Direct payments to utilities that are moving away from fossil fuels, and penalties for those moving too slowly.
  • A Clean Energy Technology Accelerator designed to advance needed low-carbon technologies.
  • Extension of clean energy tax credits
  • Decarbonize the federal building portfolio and vehicle fleet
  • Money for using agriculture and forestry to sequester carbon

The policy of direct payments to utilities is the centerpiece. Under the reconciliation rules, Congress cannot pass a “clean electricity standard” which would mandate that a certain percentage of our power come from clean electricity. The next best thing is this series of payments and penalties to utilities, which is what the Biden admin is proposing.

Simply put, the BIP and the reconciliation bill dwarf any previous federal action on climate, and if the president can get them passed this year, and if he wins reelection in 2024, he would have 7 years in which to implement the spending. Scientists say we need to cut our greenhouse gas emissions 50% by 2030, so President Biden has a chance to put us on course for that.

If he’s successful, it will set a number of industries on near-irreversible paths towards a low carbon future. If car companies spend the next 7 years investing and marketing EVs, it’s unlikely they will switch back to internal combustion engines. If every coal plant in America goes out of business, then it’s unlikely anyone will build new coal plans (at least here). I write a lot about “tipping points”, usually as a warning, but there are also positive tipping points. Decarbonizing the entire economy is slow and plodding, a bit like turning a supertanker, but once we start making the turn, our momentum will make it hard to stop.

Of course, there is always the possibility that the reconciliation bill will lose its climate provisions. This would be a catastrophe. We simply cannot allow that to happen.

The other part of the equation is the COP26 in Glasgow, (“COP” stands for “Conference of Partners”, it isn’t a very good name). You may remember the “Paris Climate Agreement” from 2015. That was a product of COP21 in Paris. COP26 is the first such conference since President Trump, a noted climate denier, left office. The US essentially abandoned climate policy during the Trump years, and the rest of the world moved on.

But things aren’t moving fast enough. America’s absence has been a problem and much of the world no longer takes us seriously as a global leader. If the Biden Administration wishes to be taken seriously at COP26, then he will need to pass major climate legislation before then. A failure to pass such legislation, particularly during a year where the climate crisis has beaten us over the head since February, would be a devastating blow to US credibility.

Robust climate legislation will increase our chances of a strong COP26 summit, but an embarrassing US failure to legislate would likely doom the whole endeavor to irrelevance.

And this opportunity may not come again. If the GOP wins the midterms next year, they may hold on to one or both houses of Congress for several cycles (after winning the House in 2010, they held on to at least one house of Congress for 10 years until the 2020 election). I’ve learned through much bitterness to never overestimate the average voter. I have very little hope voters will punish the GOP for its idiotic anti-climate shenanigans. 10 more years of business as usual would quite literally exhaust our carbon budget. Of course, it’s never too late to do something but the goal here is to minimize the damage.

If President Biden can get these packages passed without too much compromise on climate, then I will rest easy for the time being, knowing we’re finally on the right path. If he fails, I’ll buy myself an expensive bottle of whiskey and toast to what could have been.

I have been pleasantly surprised by President Biden’s commitment to climate action, and I think he deserves the benefit of the doubt for now. Even if he is successful, there will still be an enormous amount of work to do, but at least we’ll have a fighting chance.

News Roundup – Aug 9

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The news this week is pretty bleak. There is no positives spin to put on this, we just need to turn things around and prepare for what’s to come.

Biden Sets Electric Vehicle Goal – President Biden announced a plan for EV’s to comprise at least 50% of new US auto sales by 2030. As of this year, EV’s make up barely 2% of all new vehicle sales. Biden’s announcement coincided with a number of major car dealers announcing plans to be fully electric between now and 2050.

Important Atlantic Currents on Verge of Collapse – The Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation (AMOC) are a collection of ocean currents that transport warm water from the Tropics to the North Atlantic. This system is what keeps Europe warm (New York City is roughly the same latitude as Madrid, Spain) and also transfers heat away from the Tropics. A new study shows that this system is the weakest it has been in over 1,000 years and that a full collapse could happen at any time. The timeframe for such a system is pretty long and “any time” could mean sometime after 2100, but that’s not guaranteed. If we keep emitting greenhouse gases, the system will eventually collapse with catastrophic consequences for the weather.

New IPCC Report Warns of Dire Consequences – The first installment of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change’s Sixth Assessment Report was released today, and the news is dire. The IPCC science assessment removes any doubt that humans are causing climate change, stating that some of this summers heat waves have a “near zero” probability of happening without human-induced climate change. It warns that the heat waves and other extreme weather seen this summer are only the beginning. It estimates that the climate would stabilize 20-30 years after we stop emitting emissions, that means that if we reach net zero in 2050, the climate wouldn’t stabilize until roughly my 90th birthday. Stabilize in this context does not mean “return to the climate of 1950” it means thing would stop getting worse, but we’d still have an additional 50-60 years of damage, on top of the damage we’ve already done.

Our Three Options

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Our options for dealing with climate change fall into three broad categories: mitigation, adaptation, and retreat. The amount of mitigation we do will determine whether we adapt or retreat. It’s quite simple, the more mitigation we do in the near term, the less retreating we’ll have to do. Whether we choose to stay or not, we will be spending a great deal of time and energy on adapting to the changes.

Mitigation is the first option. It’s what most people think of when they think of “climate action”. It’s what we should have been doing for the past 50 years rather than burning an ever-increasing amount of fossil fuels. Mitigation means reducing our greenhouse gas emissions, until we reach carbon negativity (drawing more carbon from the atmosphere than we emit). If this were 1980, I’d advocate for throwing all our resources into this option. Back then we still had time for this approach.

While we should obviously still put resources into mitigation, after all the more carbon we emit, the worse things will get, we can no longer put all our eggs in this basket. As I’ve said, climate change is already here. The weather is already weird and getting weirder, and it’s too late to stop things from getting worse in the near term. Mitigation should remain our top priority, especially since global carbon emissions continue to increase. The sooner we cap our emissions and begin drawing them down, the better.

The second option is adaptation. This is already happening in many places. This means building resilience, it means changing our society in order to deal with the new reality. Adaptation can take many forms, here are just a few interesting examples:

In low-lying places like Bangkok and the Netherlands, they have designed parks that double as huge rainwater collection systems. These parks are designed to flood when it rains and divert water from homes and businesses. However, they also serve as recreational areas when the water level is lower. Increasing green space and building resilience against flooding.

Inspired by the “Victory Gardens” during World War II, people have begun planting “Climate Victory Gardens” which serve as both mitigation and adaptation. These gardens reduce our dependence on fossil fuels and build resilience against disruptions to the food supply chain.

Residents in California have begun fireproofing their homes in anticipation of increased and unrelenting wildfire activity now and in the future.

There are many more examples of adaptation. Some of them are being done by a city or state governments, others are being implemented by non-profits, individuals, and even businesses. However, adaptation is not always the answer. Once must way the cost of adapting against the likelihood of success.

That brings us to the final option: retreat. This means, quite simply, abandoning places that are no longer suitable for human activity. This is by far the most controversial and difficult of the three options. In reality, a lot of people live in places that are not overly suitable for human habitation, like flood plains, deserts, fire zones and the like. It didn’t make sense when people first moved to these places, and it will make even less sense in the future.

Some places will simply become uninhabitable. For example, Southeast Texas has been hit by five so called “500 year floods” since 2014. While a major city like Houston is probably not going anywhere (they will be taking the “adaptation” approach), there are certainly smaller and poorer towns that won’t be able to cope with the flooding. Their homes may become uninsurable, the government may use eminent domain, or the people may simply get tired of rebuilding.

This is true of several regions around the country, including the majority of costal areas and towns. NOAA projects that the best case scenario is 12 inches of sea level rise by 2100. Under a business as usual scenario, that projection rises to eight feet which would be catastrophic for nearly every coastal community on Earth. Sea level rise is only one of the factors coming for coastal areas, they’re also highly vulnerable to the bigger, stronger, and wetter storms that we’re already seeing. Storms that are going to get worse.

In other parts of the country, the issue will be lack of water, or fires, or mudslides. Big, rich communities may be able to adapt, but other communities will simply waste away. Surely much of this retreat will be involuntary, but we may also begin retreating proactively, this is called managed retreat. It allows government programs to assist with relocation, and ideally it saves lives, both literally and financially.

Managed retreat is obviously a controversial topic, especially in a country that prides itself on giving its own government the middle finger as often as possible. But, unfortunately, it’s already becoming necessary. Private insurance is refusing to insure properties in a growing number of disaster-prone areas, and I expect that trend to accelerate in the future. It would be very bad policy for the government to swoop in and insure these properties rather than just helping people move (and ideally purchasing the property for a fair price).

Which of these three options we choose will depend on a great number of factors. Of course, mitigation remains supremely important, but we’re past the point where we can simply mitigate and expect things to stay the same. We need to determine which places are worth protecting and which places are simply too costly for us to remain.

Unfortunately, many of the states that are most at risk have chosen to elect leadership that barely acknowledges climate change, and is unlikely to doing anything proactive. This means that it is incumbent upon each of us to evaluate the risks that we face due to climate change, and determine our own best course of action. If we think we live in an area that will become uninsurable, it makes sense to leave sooner rather than later. If we think we handle what’s to come, then it makes sense to begin adapting, whatever that means.

Of course, I realize that many people simply don’t have the resources to adapt or to move. And others may not really care because they don’t expect to live long enough for it to matter. For those of us who expect to be here for another 40-50 years or more, these decisions will be critical for our long-term safety and prosperity.

News Roundup – August 2, 2021

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Bipartisan Infrastructure Bill Advances – The bill moved forward in the Senate with every Democrat and 17 Republicans voting yes. The bill contains numerous climate-related investments like mass transit and rail infrastructure, but falls far short of President Biden’s climate goals. A second, partisan measure is also making its way forward. While many Democrats in both the House and the Senate have said they won’t vote for the former without the latter, some Republicans have indicated they may not vote for the bipartisan bill if the partisan bill is voted on at the same time.

Form Energy Announces Long-Duration Storage Breakthrough – The company, which is based in Somerville, MA, announced that their long-duration storage product is an iron-air battery, that has 100 hours and costs $20/kWh. If these numbers are true, it would represent a major breakthrough. Cheap, long-duration storage made from common materials is essential for decarbonizing the economy. Form’s product appears to check all those boxes. Of course, it’s unlikely that one long-duration storage product will meet all of our needs, and even if Form’s claims are accurate, we would need to scale up production on a massive scale.

Earth Overshoot Day Moved Up – The anti-holiday, which marks the point when human society has used up a year’s worth of renewable resources, fell on July 29, up three weeks from last year. This date has been moving in the wrong direction for years, and last year it temporarily moved back because of the pandemic-induced economic recession.

Greenland Ice Sheet Experiences Massive Melting – On Wednesday, July 28 the Greenland Ice Sheet experienced its third largest single-day ice loss since 1950 (the top two came in 2012 and 2019). On that single day, it lost enough ice to cover the state of Florida in 2 inches of water. The Greenland Ice Sheet the second largest on Earth and its melting is one of several climate “tipping points.” The more the ice melts, the more vulnerable it becomes to more melting.

16 of 31 Planetary Vital Signs Hit New Lows – A new study identified 31 planetary “vital signs” such as greenhouse gas concentrations, ocean acidification, and others that are critical for the future of life on our planet. Of these, they found that 16 had hit worrying new levels. Many or all of these vital signs may have their own tipping points, and it’s difficult to tell when we’ve crossed them.

Energy Basics: Nuclear Power

~ climate2021steve ~ Leave a comment

To many people, nuclear power is a terrifying force that threatens our very existence. To others, it’s the only power source that can possibly meet our climate goals. I think it’s safe to say that no single technology divides climate activists more than nuclear power.

Unfortunately, most of the commentary around nuclear is extremely hyperbolic, and for lack of a better word, “partisan”. It probably doesn’t surprise you that I am something of a “centrist” when it comes to nuclear. Let’s look at the arguments.

First, there are two types of nuclear power. Nuclear fusion involves merging two light elements into a single, slightly heavier element. In practice, this means merging two hydrogen atoms into a single helium atom. Nuclear fission involves splitting a very heavy atom (typically uranium) into a lighter atom.

Nuclear fusion is the process that powers our sun and all other stars. There are billions of dollars being spent to develop nuclear fusion reactors. Unfortunately, they remain science fiction. There are no working commercial nuclear fusion reactors and given the timelines involved, it’s very unlikely that fusion will have an appreciable impact on climate change mitigation.

Every nuclear power plant every built uses fission. Fission releases an enormous amount of energy, but also creates radioactive waste. And we all know that fission reactors can melt down, as we’ve seen in Chernobyl and Fukushima. So, why would someone support nuclear fission if it seems so dangerous? Well, actually, fission is safer than any other kind of energy, including wind and solar. There are fewer deaths per megawatt of energy produced than for any other source. Nuclear also offers some very important benefits for climate. It doesn’t produce any air pollution or carbon emissions. It offers continuous, reliable and stable power, even at night and even when the sun is not shining, or the wind is not blowing. It’s the only scalable power source that offers the reliability of fossil fuels with the climate benefits of renewables.

It’s because of these reasons that fission has a small but very passionate group of advocates. However, in many cases, these advocates overemphasize the benefits and downplay the negatives for nuclear. The two most significant hurdles for nuclear power are cost and perceived safety. In order to build and site enough nuclear power plants to significantly lower our carbon emissions, we would need to convince hundreds of millions of people worldwide to let us build a nuclear plant near their homes.

Nuclear as I’ve said is very safe, but the perception is what matters. I don’t think we have enough time to convince enough people to let us build enough nuclear plants. I might be wrong, in this. But remember, we only have a couple of decades, and building, permitting and commissioning nuclear plants takes years, even if the local population is supportive. I suspect we would see the mass mobilization of people against building new nuclear plants unless there was a highly effective and widespread education campaign.

But even then, we would still be dealing with the cost issue. Nuclear is extremely expensive and renewables are exceptionally cheap (as is natural gas). If we built an entire fleet of nuclear plants, average electricity prices would almost certainly increase. Meanwhile, renewables and energy storage are both getting cheaper.

Fortunately, we don’t need to choose. Actually, nuclear and renewables can compliment one another. It makes no sense to choose a single power source for every situation. Regulators and investors should be allowed to choose the zero-carbon energy source that makes the most sense for their individual needs. Whether that’s wind in the Midwest or solar in the Southwest, or nuclear in places that make sense.

Earth Day 2021

~ climate2021steve ~ Leave a comment

My message for this day is pretty simple and maybe a little counterintuitive. The best way to “protect” the Earth, is by investing in people. Investing in systems that represent our needs and our interests, that don’t privilege a tiny minority at the expense of the masses. We need systems that eliminate bigotry, prejudice and inequality in the system if we’re really going to create a sustainable world.

We can’t just invest in technology and hope for the best. We must invest in the people on the ground who are facing the brunt of the damage. If you care about the Amazon, invest in Brazilian people. If you care about the Serengeti, invest in Tanzanians and Kenyans.

I post about climate change every week, but there are so many other issues facing our environment, and they’re all interconnected. They’re intertwined not only with other environmental issues, but with social and cultural issues. We can’t protect our environment if our governments aren’t representative, or our news sources are misleading. We can’t protect our environment by dumping all our toxins on disadvantaged communities. There is no separating environmental issues from social issues.

We have to respect indigenous rights. Root out racism. Eliminate bigotry. Fix democracy. And annihilate the absurd inequalities in our society. We also need to empower kindness and selflessness, while combatting greed and selfishness. There is no protecting our environment without empathy.

Last but not least, the Earth is not in danger. Nothing we can do as humans can “destroy” the Earth. The only danger to the Earth is our Sun, which will eventually destroy it. WE are in danger. WE are vulnerable. WE are the ones who face catastrophe.

I believe wholeheartedly that we are capable of solving these issues. The challenges are enormous but we have the ingenuity, the flexibility and resourcefulness to solve them, we just need the determination.