Category: Energy/Environment

The Ants Answer to Global Warming

(p. C4) While experts search for ways to cope with excessive atmospheric carbon, the world’s ants may have had a solution all along.
A new paper reports that ants radically accelerate the breakdown of some important minerals into chemicals that suck carbon dioxide–a byproduct of burning fossil fuels–out of the atmosphere to form new rocks.
. . .
Ants are so effective at promoting this process that they might have played an unheralded role in cooling the planet over millions of years, the author writes, adding that if we can figure out how they do it, we could investigate how to emulate them to sequester atmospheric carbon ourselves.

For the full story, see:
DANIEL AKST. “R AND D; Are Ants Cooling the World?” The Wall Street Journal (Sat., Aug. 16, 2014): C4.
(Note: ellipsis added.)
(Note: the online version of the story has the date Aug. 15, 2014.)

The paper on the ant solution to global warming is:
Dorn, Ronald I. “Ants as a Powerful Biotic Agent of Olivine and Plagioclase Dissolution.” Geology 42, no. 9 (Sept. 2014): 771-74.

Pause in Global Warming Invalidates Climate-Change Models

(p. A13) When the climate scientist and geologist Bob Carter of James Cook University in Australia wrote an article in 2006 saying that there had been no global warming since 1998 according to the most widely used measure of average global air temperatures, there was an outcry. A year later, when David Whitehouse of the Global Warming Policy Foundation in London made the same point, the environmentalist and journalist Mark Lynas said in the New Statesman that Mr. Whitehouse was “wrong, completely wrong,” and was “deliberately, or otherwise, misleading the public.”
We know now that it was Mr. Lynas who was wrong. Two years before Mr. Whitehouse’s article, climate scientists were already admitting in emails among themselves that there had been no warming since the late 1990s. “The scientific community would come down on me in no uncertain terms if I said the world had cooled from 1998,” wrote Phil Jones of the University of East Anglia in Britain in 2005. He went on: “Okay it has but it is only seven years of data and it isn’t statistically significant.”
If the pause lasted 15 years, they conceded, then it would be so significant that it would invalidate the climate-change models upon which policy was being built. A report from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) written in 2008 made this clear: “The simulations rule out (at the 95% level) zero trends for intervals of 15 yr or more.”
Well, the pause has now lasted for 16, 19 or 26 years–depending on whether you choose the surface temperature record or one of two satellite records of the lower atmosphere. That’s according to a new statistical calculation by Ross McKitrick, a professor of economics at the University of Guelph in Canada.

For the full commentary, see:
MATT RIDLEY. “OPINION; Whatever Happened to Global Warming? Now come climate scientists’ implausible explanations for why the ‘hiatus’ has passed the 15-year mark.” The Wall Street Journal (Fri., Sept. 5, 2014): A13.
(Note: the online version of the commentary has the date Sept. 4, 2014.)

The article mentioned above by economist McKitrick is:
McKitrick, Ross R. “HAC-Robust Measurement of the Duration of a Trendless Subsample in a Global Climate Time Series.” Open Journal of Statistics 4 (2014): 527-35. http://dx.doi.org/10.4236/ojs.2014.47050

For a possible deeper explanation of the McKitrick results, you may consult:
McMillan, David G., and Mark E. Wohar. “The Relationship between Temperature and CO2 Emissions: Evidence from a Short and Very Long Dataset.” Applied Economics 45, no. 26 (2013): 3683-90.

Modelers Can Often Obtain the Desired Result

(p. A13) After earning a master’s degree in environmental engineering in 1982, I spent most of the next 10 years building large-scale environmental computer models. My first job was as a consultant to the Environmental Protection Agency. I was hired to build a model to assess the impact of its Construction Grants Program, a nationwide effort in the 1970s and 1980s to upgrade sewer-treatment plants.
The computer model was huge–it analyzed every river, sewer treatment plant and drinking-water intake (the places in rivers where municipalities draw their water) in the country. I’ll spare you the details, but the model showed huge gains from the program as water quality improved dramatically. By the late 1980s, however, any gains from upgrading sewer treatments would be offset by the additional pollution load coming from people who moved from on-site septic tanks to public sewers, which dump the waste into rivers. Basically the model said we had hit the point of diminishing returns.
When I presented the results to the EPA official in charge, he said that I should go back and “sharpen my pencil.” I did. I reviewed assumptions, tweaked coefficients and recalibrated data. But when I reran everything the numbers didn’t change much. At our next meeting he told me to run the numbers again.
After three iterations I finally blurted out, “What number are you looking for?” He didn’t miss a beat: He told me that he needed to show $2 billion of benefits to get the program renewed. I finally turned enough knobs to get the answer he wanted, and everyone was happy.
. . .
There are no exact values for the coefficients in models such as these. There are only ranges of potential values. By moving a bunch of these parameters to one side or the other you can usually get very different results, often (surprise) in line with your initial beliefs.

For the full commentary, see:
ROBERT J. CAPRARA. “OPINION; Confessions of a Computer Modeler; Any model, including those predicting climate doom, can be tweaked to yield a desired result. I should know.” The Wall Street Journal (Weds., July 9, 2014): A13.
(Note: ellipsis added.)
(Note: the online version of the commentary has the date July 8, 2014.)

“Malthus Was Wrong”

(p. 20) The biggest problem with Malthusiasm, as Mayhew addresses at length, is that Malthus was wrong. He thought England was nearing the limits of its ability to provide for its growing population. But as that population continued to grow in the 19th century, the country proved more than able to feed itself by increasing agricultural productivity and importing food that it could easily pay for with its industrial wealth. And toward the end of the century, birthrates began falling and population growth slowed.
. . .
There is evidence enough in this book for a pretty withering attack on Malthusianism, if not on Malthus. Mayhew, however, prefers the role of calm and evenhanded guide. At the end he’s even hinting that today’s Malthusian prophets of environmental doom are on to something. They may be: Just because Malthus was wrong about nature’s limits in 1798 doesn’t prove we won’t ever hit those limits. Past performance is no guarantee of future results. Still, you’d think it would put more of a damper on people’s Malthusiasm.

For the full review, see:
JUSTIN FOX. “Head Count.” The New York Times Book Review (Sun., Aug. 3, 2014): 20.
(Note: ellipsis added.)
(Note: the online version of the review has the date Aug. 1, 2014. )

The book being reviewed is:
Mayhew, Robert J. Malthus: The Life and Legacies of an Untimely Prophet. Cambridge, MA: Belknap Press, 2014.

The Great Lakes Return to Greatness

(p. 16) But after reaching historic lows in 2013, water levels in the Great Lakes are now abruptly on the rise, a development that has startled scientists and thrilled just about everybody with a stake in the waterfront, including owners of beach houses, retailers in tourist areas and dockmasters who run marinas on the lakeshore.
Lakes Michigan, Huron and Superior are at least a foot higher than they were a year ago, and are expected to rise three more inches over the next month. Lake Ontario and Lake Erie are seven to nine inches higher than a year ago.

For the full story, see:
JULIE BOSMAN. “Creeping Up on Unsuspecting Shores: The Great Lakes, in a Welcome Turnaround.” The New York Times, First Section (Sun., JUNE 29, 2014): 16 & 20.
(Note: the online version of the review has the date JUNE 28, 2014.)

The Process Innovation Called “Fracking”

(p. B1) I have come to North Dakota to observe the fracking of the Irene Kovaloff 11-18H, a well on the southern edge of the Bakken Shale. It is one of one hundred wells that will be fracked in the U.S. on this particular day in October 2012, 10 in North Dakota alone.
. . .
(p. B2) The hydraulic heart of fracking is the liquid pumped into the well. Almost all of it is water: snowmelt from the upper Rockies. In the Bakken and elsewhere, companies transform the water into a viscous liquid designed to carry sand deep into the new fractures. As it heats up underground, the gel reverts to a watery state. This change allows the sand to drop out and remain in the fractures, holding them open like pillars in a coal mine. The water flows back out.
. . .
Water and guar make up about 99.1% of the liquid; the chemicals are the rest.
. . .
The next night, the 30th frack of the Irene Kovaloff is completed. It takes three hours longer than expected, but otherwise the well is a success. Soon came light, sweet Bakken crude mixed with the water. On its first full day, it produced 800 barrels of crude–a good, but not great, result. By early 2013, Marathon had pulled 20,000 barrels of crude from the well. Considering that the oil had been locked away until the frack, it was good enough.

For the full article, see:
RUSSELL GOLD. “Book Excerpt: A Look Inside America’s Fracking Boom.” The Wall Street Journal (Tues., April 8, 2014): B1-B2.
(Note: ellipses added.)
(Note: the online version of the article has the date April 7, 2014, and has the title “Book Excerpt: A Look Inside America’s Fracking Boom.”)

Gold’s article was excerpted from his book:
Gold, Russell. The Boom: How Fracking Ignited the American Energy Revolution and Changed the World. New York: Simon & Schuster, 2014.

Lynas Apologizes for Organizing Anti-GM (Genetic Modification) Movement

(p. 115) More than a decade and a half since the commercialization of first-generation agricultural biotechnology, concerns about transgenic crop impacts on human and environmental health remain, even though the experience across a cumulative 1.25 billion hectares suggests the relative safety of first-generation genetically engineered seed. The risks posed by agricultural biotechnology warrant continued attention, and new transgenic crops may pose different and bigger risks. Weighing against uncertain risks are benefits from increased food production, reduced insecticide use, and avoided health risks to food consumers and farm workers. At the same time, adoption is shown to increase herbicide use while reducing herbicide toxicity, save land by boosting yields while also making previously unfarmed lands profitable. Adoption benefits food consumers and farmers but also enriches seed companies that enjoy property right protections over new seed varieties. The (p. 116) balance of scientific knowledge weighs in favor of continued adoption of genetically engineered seed, which may explain why some longtime critics have reversed course. For example, Lord Melchett, who was the head of Greenpeace, has been advising biotechnology companies on overcoming constraints to the technology (St. Clair and Frank forthcoming). Mark Lynas, a journalist and organizer of the anti-GM (genetic modification) movement, publicly apologized for helping start the movement in his “Lecture to Oxford Farming Conference” (2013).
Agricultural biotechnology remains regulated by regimes developed at the introduction of the technology. Whereas precaution may have been appropriate before the relative magnitudes of risks and benefits could be empirically observed, accumulated knowledge suggests overregulation is inhibiting the introduction of new transgenic varieties. Regulation also discourages developing-country applications, where benefits are likely greatest. In the future, new genetic traits may promise greater benefits while also posing novel risks of greater magnitudes than existing traits. Efficient innovation and technology adoption will require different and, perhaps, more stringent regulation in the future, as well as continued insights from researchers, including economists, in order to assess evolving costs and benefits.

Source:
Barrows, Geoffrey, Steven Sexton, and David Zilberman. “Agricultural Biotechnology: The Promise and Prospects of Genetically Modified Crops.” Journal of Economic Perspectives 28, no. 1 (Winter 2014): 99-120.

Climate Models Allow “the Modeler to Obtain Almost Any Desired Result”

Integrated assessment models (IAMs) are the commonly-used models that attempt to integrate climate science models with economic effect models. In the passage quoted below, “SCC” stands for “social cost of carbon.”

(p. 870) I have argued that IAMs are of little or no value for evaluating alternative climate change policies and estimating the SCC. On the contrary, an IAM-based analysis suggests a level of knowledge and precision that is nonexistent, and allows the modeler to obtain almost any desired result because key inputs can be chosen arbitrarily.

As I have explained, the physical mechanisms that determine climate sensitivity involve crucial feedback loops, and the parameter values that determine the strength of those feedback loops are largely unknown. When it comes to the impact of climate change, we know even less. IAM damage functions are completely made up, with no theoretical or empirical foundation. They simply reflect common beliefs (which might be wrong) regarding the impact of 2º C or 3º C of warming, and can tell us nothing about what might happen if the temperature increases by 5º C or more. And yet those damage functions are taken seriously when IAMs are used to analyze climate policy. Finally, IAMs tell us nothing about the likelihood and nature of catastrophic outcomes, but it is just such outcomes that matter most for climate change policy. Probably the best we can do at this point is come up with plausible estimates for probabilities and possible impacts of catastrophic outcomes. Doing otherwise is to delude ourselves.

For the full article, see:
Pindyck, Robert S. “Climate Change Policy: What Do the Models Tell Us?” Journal of Economic Literature 51, no. 3 (Sept. 2013): 860-72.

Conserving Whales by a Market in Whale Shares

(p. 218) Ben A. Minteer and Leah R. Gerber propose “Buying Whales to Save Them.” “Under this plan, quotas for hunting of whales would be traded in global markets. But again, and unlike most ‘catch share’ programs in fifisheries, the whale conservation market would not restrict participation in the market; both pro- and antiwhaling interests could own and trade quotas  . . . . Conservation groups, for example, could choose to buy whale shares in order to protect populations that are currently threatened; they could also buy shares to protect populations that are not presently at risk but that conservationists fear might become threatened in the future.” “Despite the widely acknowledged failure of the IWC [International Whaling Commission] moratorium to curtail unsustainable whaling, the whale conservation market idea has proved to be wildly controversial within conservation and antiwhaling circles.  . . . Many critics of the idea are also plainly not comfortable with the ethics of putting a price on such iconic species–that is, with using contingent market methods for what they believe should be a categorical ethical obligation to preserve whales. On the other hand . . . the vulnerable status of many whale populations and the failure of the traditional regulatory response to halt unsustainable harvests call for a more innovative and experimental approach to whale policy, including considering unconventional proposals, such as the whale conservation market.” Issues in Science and Technology, Spring 2013, http://www.issues.org/29.3/minteer.html.

Source:
Taylor, Timothy. “Recommendations for Further Reading.” Journal of Economic Perspectives 27, no. 4 (Fall 2013): 211-18.
(Note: italics, ellipses, and bracketed words, in original.)

Required Recycling Can Waste Resources

(p. 215) Cato Unbound offers four essays on “The Political Economy of Recycling.” In the lead essay, Michael Munger asks: “Recycling: Can It Be Wrong, When It (p. 216) Feels So Right?” “There are two general kinds of arguments in favor of recycling. The first is that ‘this stuff is too valuable to throw away!’ In almost all cases, this argument is false, and when it is correct recycling will be voluntary; very little state action is necessary. The second is that recycling is cheaper than landfilling the waste. This argument may well be correct, but it is difficult to judge because officials need keep landfill prices artificially low to discourage illegal dumping and burning. Empirically, recycling is almost always substantially more expensive than disposing in the landfill. Since we can’t use the price system, authorities resort to moralistic claims, trying to persuade people that recycling is just something that good citizens do. But if recycling is a moral imperative, and the goal is zero waste, not optimal waste, the result can be a net waste of the very resources that recycling was implemented to conserve.” There are sharp and lively comments from Edward Humes, Melissa Walsh Innes, and Stephen Landsberg. June 2013, at http://www.cato-unbound.org/issues/june-2013/political-economy-recycling.

Source:
Taylor, Timothy. “Recommendations for Further Reading.” Journal of Economic Perspectives 27, no. 4 (Fall 2013): 211-18.
(Note: italics in original.)