There is agreement approaching consensus that a successful program of action on climate change must support two objectives—stabilizing atmospheric greenhouse gases (GHGs) and maintaining economic growth. Achieving both these aims will require a tenfold increase in “carbon productivity,” the amount of GDP produced per unit of carbon equivalents (CO2e) emitted. The economic costs of this “carbon revolution” are likely to be manageable at some 0.6–1.4 percent of global GDP by 2030.

The “carbon revolution” that is necessary is comparable in magnitude to the labor productivity increases of the Industrial Revolution but will have to be achieved in one-third of the time if the world is to maintain current growth levels while meeting commonly discussed abatement targets.

There are five areas on which we should focus. First, boosting energy efficiency could cut global energy demand by 20-24 percent of projected 2020 demand. Second, to reduce emissions by one-fifth of current levels by 2020, the carbon productivity of energy sources must increase by two-thirds. Third, additional investment in R&D and incentives to boost innovation will be necessary. Fourth, companies and governments can do more to educate consumers on “green” behavior. Fifth, forestation and avoided forestation offer the largest abatement lever at 25 percent of the global total under €40 per ton.

I would quote from the other links. However, the problem is the sam as the link for Swedish smelting. The links are for thinktank general scenario compilations. Which makes JC’s comment of “”Are you a journalist? I’m only asking because you seem to be making the mistakes a generalist reporter makes when they are given a specialist topic for the first time and are up against a deadline (and of course while the subs can correct your writing they don’t have time to go over the accuracy of your content). You know the sort of mistakes…scanning a document hoping to pick the eyes out of it rather than reading it and ending up missing what the author actually says. Anyway, just curious.”" humorous. These linked do not give the type of information needed nor in a real sense can they.

Consider the discussion of the Jevons Paradox. It is proposed to avert this. How? Your guess is as good as any. These are position papers, not papers with ROI, expected lifetime/depreciation, MTBF (mean time between failure), present cost/future worth calculations, etc. No lifetime cycle studies, etc. Though please note such difficult goals such it requires a 10 fold increase in carbon productivity in an area where 10% increase in effecicensy in say a natural gas boiler would mean a ROI as little as a year depending on cost per decatherm. But the claim is made that there are all these opportunities. Not really, they assume technologicl advances. A good asssumption but hard to quantify. Not a problem here because the basis of the quantification are not given. No mention of incremental cost or incremental changeover costs, even though economy of scale is mentioned. How about the lifetime of enegy sources is presenty 20+ years. Where is the detail showing the loss of revenue or the adjusted costs for energy source changeovers that occur for current energy sources built recently or schedued to be built?

And we’ve just come off 127 litres of water per person per day in SEQ up to 155. Nobody died. Showers were had. The washing got done…. sheeshhhh !!! And a long way from the profligate waste of 300 per day.

Pull the other ones Cohers. And take your pinky off the scales.

http://jennifermarohasy.com/blog/2008/11/wind-power-exposed-the-renewable-energy-source-is-expensive-and-unreliable/?cp=all

The pear’s effort is astounding; this

“In developing scenarios for the future, it is appropriate to assume that people will seek higher levels of comfort and amenity, but these trends have upper limits. For example… the length of a shower is constrained by the need to go to work or the tendency for skin to shrivel up.”

Not to worry, this urge for uber cleanliness can be countered by “aggressive mandatory energy efficiency standards” and “education and information programs”; how very Orwellian. All this talk about efficiency has the imprimatur of ascetism and puritanical stoicism. It begs the question; why do we have to be more efficient? Peak oil? Environmental degradation? Greed and selfishness are bad? Because its moral to be thrifty not profligate? Saving the planet? Self-discipline is good for the soul? Whatever, just don’t pretend its AGW.

Looks to be another La Nina starting up. Of course, this would fit into the ~30 year interval for PDO. Sorry about that you CO2 enthusiasts. Back to back La Ninas should start stretching your hallucinations nicely!!

http://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/products/analysis_monitoring/lanina/enso_evolution-status-fcsts-web.pdf

Tim, you will never get Luke’s email address – they guy has serious personality disorders and I doubt that his appelation “Luke Walker” is real as well.

Now let’s waity for the next torrent of Lukian Bilge.

Gavin: of course I overlooked that Cap’n Cook sailed up the Congo in c1776 – not to mention the Limpopo, Zambezi, and Upper Nile taking temps all along the way and then mailing them, post-dated – to GISS, with its remarkable data base of global temps from the beginning of time.

In your post where you talked about Alan Pear’s paper you wrote:

“he also highlights something which I was aware of, but had forgotten, and this really does go to the heart of what is possible. And that is that energy efficiency in specific instances doesn’t tend to lead to a less energy intensive economy”

and you went on to write “So efficiencies don’t lead to an overall decrease in emissions. They tend to lead to increases in emissions in other areas”.

Graham, thats what Alan Pears refers to across his paper as the Rebound Effect and in the literature it goes by that name as well as a number of others e.g. Jevons Paradox. Its a well known and complex topic but in reading Alan Pear’s paper and making comments about it you neglected to refer to what he said about it. This is some of what he said:

“when considering this form of rebound effect, it is more appropriate to look at the issue as an outcome of cultural values” (page 4) under the topic he called, Technological/cultural rebound.

Going on further with what he wrote under the heading he called Economic Rebound Pears wrote,

“The point of discussing these various possible outcomes of improving energy efficiency is to
highlight the fact that they can vary from large rebound effects to large amplification effects.” (page 5).

What “specific instances” are you referring to when you wrote that post above (let alone contradicting yourself), if they are the one Alan Pears refers to shouldn’t you acknowledge him or were you thinking of other ones?. Pears disagrees with you what you wrote in your post yet your post makes no mention at all of this.

Then your post finished with you writing something very confusing about Pear’s paper…..

You wrote:

“The bottom line of Pears’ paper is that the only way you can actually significantly cut national emissions is to substitute non-carbon based fuel sources, or reduce standards of living by an amount commensurate with the reductions desired”

Now that is completely at odds with what what Alan Pears actuallywrote in his conclusion which included this:

“aggressive pursuit of energy efficiency offers an exciting opportunity to reduce total energy costs
and greenhouse gas emissions while improving quality of life and business productivity.” (page 17).

How did you arrive at that?

Are you a journalist? I’m only asking because you seem to be making the mistakes a generalist reporter makes when they are given a specialist topic for the first time and are up against a deadline (and of course while the subs can correct your writing they don’t have time to go over the accuracy of your content). You know the sort of mistakes…scanning a document hoping to pick the eyes out of it rather than reading it and ending up missing what the author actually says. Anyway, just curious.

I understand an apology is in order. So. Louis Hissink it was a mistake on my part to lump you in with Graham Young. I will be more careful in the future.

BTW Jennifer I am making my way slowly through the Yale ESI stuff. Its interesting.

Anyway its good night from London