9 ms·

“Energy in the Future”: a time capsule of energy concerns from 1953

72 points by herogreen 5y ago

drdrey 5y ago
It's amazing how long we have known about the impact CO2 would have on the climate. We're now talking about human lifetimes, and yet look at where we are in the public debate. We are still mostly ignoring the issue or debating its reality.
- melling 5y ago
  14 years ago Google started a project to make renewables cheaper than coal. https://www.forbes.com/sites/williampentland/2014/11/30/why-google-stopped-trying-to-make-renewable-energy-cheaper-than-coal/ https://www.forbes.com/sites/williampentland/2014/11/30/why-... It feels like this slow train wreck will have to get worse before we do enough, giving us more time to advance technology. The United States is no longer the biggest emitter. Now we need more global coordination. Of course, the sooner we started addressing the problem, the longer we could have delayed the problem. Fusion by 2050?
- vkou 5y ago
  There's two reasons for that. 1. Trillion-dollar fortunes are built on pumping CO2 into the atmosphere. We, as humans have committed genocide against entire cultures over less money. 2. The wealth of industrialized societies is not built on money, or labour. It is built on energy. All of their wealth is derived from energy. Fossil fuels are an incredible source of energy. Cost-effective competitors to them had limited potential to replace them, for a large number of technical and political reasons.
- Iv 5y ago
  Who is "we"? The IPCC was created in 1988, at the alarmed demand of the Weather and Environment offices of the UN. In 1997 the Kyoto protocol was signed by 184 countries, recognizing the urgency and the need for CO2 reduction. Only in the US is there a political debate about climate change denialism. Thanks to you it is coming to other countries, but before GWB it was a fringe position everywhere.
  - dredmorbius 5y ago
    My read of OP's point was that the fundamental science has long been known. The problem was recognised at a global scale both publicly and at high levels of government by the 1960s. Denialism is strong in the United States, but as with other recent (and ongoing) global crises, also prevalent elsewhere. For a timeline of awareness of the problem we can go back over 200 years for early insights: 1800-1870: Level of carbon dioxide gas (CO₂) in the atmosphere, as later measured in ancient ice, is about 290 ppm (parts per million). Mean global temperature (1850-1870) is about 13.6°C. First Industrial Revolution. Coal, railroads, and land clearing speed up greenhouse gas emission, while better agriculture and sanitation speed up population growth. 1824: Fourier calculates that the Earth would be far colder if it lacked an atmosphere. 1859: Tyndall discovers that some gases block infrared radiation. He suggests that changes in the concentration of the gases could bring climate change. 1896: Arrhenius publishes first calculation of global warming from human emissions of CO₂. 1897: Chamberlin produces a model for global carbon exchange including feedbacks. 1870-1910: Second Industrial Revolution. Fertilizers and other chemicals, electricity, and public health further accelerate growth. 1914-1918: World War I; governments learn to mobilize and control industrial societies. 1920-1925: Opening of Texas and Persian Gulf oil fields inaugurates era of cheap energy. 1930s Global warming trend since late 19th century reported. Milankovitch proposes orbital changes as the cause of ice ages. 1938: Callendar argues that CO₂ greenhouse global warming is underway, reviving interest in the question. 1939-1945: World War II. Military grand strategy is largely driven by a struggle to control oil fields. 1945: US Office of Naval Research begins generous funding of many fields of science, some of which happen to be useful for understanding climate change. 1956: Ewing and Donn offer a feedback model for quick ice age onset. Phillips produces a somewhat realistic computer model of the global atmosphere. Plass calculates that adding CO₂ to the atmosphere will have a significant effect on the radiation balance. 1957: Launch of Soviet Sputnik satellite. Cold War concerns support 1957-58 International Geophysical Year, bringing new funding and coordination to climate studies. Revelle finds that CO₂ produced by humans will not be readily absorbed by the oceans. 1958: Telescope studies show a greenhouse effect raises temperature of the atmosphere of Venus far above the boiling point of water. 1960: Mitchell reports downturn of global temperatures since the early 1940s. Keeling accurately measures CO₂ in the Earth's atmosphere and detects an annual rise. 1962: Cuban Missile Crisis, peak of the Cold War. 1963: Calculations suggest that feedback with water vapor could make the climate acutely sensitive to changes in CO₂ level. 1965: Boulder, Colo. meeting on causes of climate change: Lorenz and others point out the chaotic nature of climate system and the possibility of sudden shifts. 1966: Emiliani's analysis of deep-sea cores and Broecker's analysis of ancient corals show that the timing of ice ages was set by small orbital shifts, suggesting that the climate system is sensitive to small changes. 1967: International Global Atmospheric Research Program established, mainly to gather data for better short-range weather prediction, but including climate. Manabe and Wetherald make a convincing calculation that doubling CO₂ would raise world temperatures a couple of degrees. 1968: Studies suggest a possibility of collapse of Antarctic ice sheets, which would raise sea levels catastrophically. 1969: Astronauts walk on the Moon, and people perceive the Earth as a fragile whole. Budyko and Sellers present models of catastrophic ice-albedo feedbacks. Nimbus III satellite begins to provide comprehensive global atmospheric temperature measurements. 1970: First Earth Day. Environmental movement attains strong influence, spreads concern about global degradation. Creation of US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, the world's leading funder of climate research. Aerosols from human activity are shown to be increasing swiftly. Bryson claims they counteract global warming and may bring serious cooling. 1971: SMIC conference of leading scientists reports a danger of rapid and serious global change caused by humans, calls for an organized research effort. Mariner 9 spacecraft finds a great dust storm warming the atmosphere of Mars, plus indications of a radically different climate in the past. 1972: Ice cores and other evidence show big climate shifts in the past between relatively stable modes in the space of a thousand years or so, especially around 11,000 years ago. Droughts in Africa, Ukraine, India cause world food crisis, spreading fears about climate change. 1973: Oil embargo and price rise bring first "energy crisis". 1974: Serious droughts since 1972 increase concern about climate, with cooling from aerosols suspected to be as likely as warming; scientists are doubtful as journalists talk of a new ice age. 1975: Warnings about environmental effects of airplanes leads to investigations of trace gases in the stratosphere and discovery of danger to ozone layer. Manabe and collaborators produce complex but plausible computer models which show a temperature rise of several degrees for doubled CO₂. 1976: Studies show that CFCs (1975) and also methane and ozone (1976) can make a serious contribution to the greenhouse effect. Deep-sea cores show a dominating influence from 100,000-year Milankovitch orbital changes, emphasizing the role of feedbacks. Deforestation and other ecosystem changes are recognized as major factors in the future of the climate. Eddy shows that there were prolonged periods without sunspots in past centuries, corresponding to cold periods . 1977: Scientific opinion tends to converge on global warming, not cooling, as the chief climate risk in next century. 1978: Attempts to coordinate climate research in US end with an inadequate National Climate Program Act, accompanied by rapid but temporary growth in funding. 1979: Second oil "energy crisis." Strengthened environmental movement encourages renewable energy sources, inhibits nuclear energy growth. US National Academy of Sciences report finds it highly credible that doubling CO₂ will bring 1.5-4.5°C global warming. World Climate Research Programme launched to coordinate international research. 1981: Election of Reagan brings backlash against environmental movement to power. Political conservatism is linked to skepticism about global warming. http://www.aip.org/history/climate/timeline.htm http://www.aip.org/history/climate/timeline.htm
api 5y ago
Solar power and batteries have come a long way, but there's still little political will to change things. Nuclear power could progress a lot further too, but again no political will. There's no economic forcing function either since coal and gas remain on average the cheapest and easiest to deploy and manage sources of energy, and that won't change unless there's enough investment in alternatives to get them over the mass adoption hump. The worst fears about fossil fuel depletion have so far not manifested, which might be a bad thing long term. We may have enough fossil carbon to cause truly catastrophic climate change if we actually burn a significant fraction of it. I wonder though if the economic structural problem isn't even harder to solve. The entire financial system relies on eternal growth. Number must always go up or everything breaks. Even if we put an end to most fears about supply side limits to growth by cracking fusion or developing super cheap utility scale batteries, there would still be demand side limits to growth from things like stabilizing populations and diminishing marginal utility of wealth. Mere stability without significant growth would bring about the collapse of the financial system and the economy as we know it, and probably quite a lot of political turmoil since we don't have a really great replacement sitting in the wings. (No, planetary migration won't keep GDP growth going any time soon. Humans could settle on the Moon or Mars but they're too far away to contribute much to our Earthly GDP. They'd be mostly isolated economies of their own.)
- baron_harkonnen 5y ago
  Why in the world is this comment being downvotes? There is nothing in this comment that I see is incorrect, and if you’re going to vigorously down vote because “I don’t like things that make me feel bad!” you at least ought to comment as to what could be wrong here.
  - Retric 5y ago
    It’s not a question of political will solar is now cheaper than coal in the vast majority of the world. It’s one of the reasons why coal went from 39% in 2014 of US generation down to 19.3% in 2020 with a lot more scheduled for decommissioning over the next 5 years. Even when Trump was making many pro coal speeches, industry viewed coal as a dead end. China is often mentioned as adding new coal power plants, but even there coal fell from 80% of electricity generation in 2010 to 57.7% in 2019. Natural gas on the other hand has become more popular, but it also produces significantly less CO2 per kWh.
cosmic_shame 5y ago
Given how long these problems have been staring us in the face, it's truly hard not to be totally pessimistic about the future. If we haven't changed yet, do we even have the capacity to do so?
- ThomPete 5y ago
  Problems are solved by optimists. Dont be pessimistic, we will solve problems as they arise. If you are truly worries about your future the best way is to get into the trenches.
  - rdiddly 5y ago
    I admire the spirit of this comment but can't quite get onboard, because "the trenches" can be kind of a demoralizing place, especially when you're not winning the war. I've spent 30 years bike-commuting for example and have been car-free for much of that time. The lifestyle has many liberating aspects but it strongly encourages without quite requiring, that you forgo or reduce certain things, like day-trips, sightseeing, shopping for furniture or other large items, other kinds of shopping, social outings, playing drums in a band, fishing? I dunno, any location- or gear-intensive hobby. Consumption overall (not just on transportation) tends to go down, so it's great for saving money. But do I feel like a hero for all the fuel I saved, the carbon I didn't emit, the road space I freed up? Do I feel like I made a difference? No, all I did was make it easier for others to do those things, and boy did they ever continue doing them, in increasing numbers, the entire time. Even my so-called people, transportation reform "activists," bend over backward not to "shame" each other for buying cars, and buying cars to replace the cars they bought before. So I feel more like a sucker than a hero when I consider all that. In the end it has to be about just getting outside and enjoying the fresh air.
    - nitrogen 5y ago
      Sounds like a great experiment and a lifestyle choice that should be available to those who want it. But individual action will always be trumped by invention. The fully optimistic way forward isn't self sacrifice, it's developing the things -- neighborhoods, vehicles, fuels, whatever -- that make it possible for everyone to do more stuff with less energy, and enjoy doing it.
jdblair 5y ago
If you're interested in learning more about the big picture connection between our human society and energy, I recommend "Energy and Civilization: A History," by Vaclav Smil. My biggest takeaway from his book is that transitioning a society to affluence requires, at minimum, 22.6 megawatt hours of energy per capita per year. High energy societies like the United States use far more. To de-carbonize, we have to plan new energy sources that provide at least this much energy for every person on the planet. Otherwise, people will understandably turn to carbon-based energy sources to meet their energy needs. Producing this much energy from renewables is possible, but it is hard! Fossil fuels provide an exceptionally compact (in terms of land area) and effective energy source. [edited to correct typo in the energy figure, what I originally wrote as 2.6 mw/h is 22.6 mw/h]
- exporectomy 5y ago
  That's surprisingly low. 2.6 megawatt hours per year is 300 watts per person which is almost the same order of magnitude of what the human body can produce.
  - jdblair 5y ago
    Arggh... I made a typo. It is 22.6 megawatt hours per capita per year, so an order of magnitude higher.
    - XorNot 5y ago
      ~60 kwH per day...that's actually pretty much inline with a normal household (also about the average of what my rooftop solar achieves).
      - jdblair 5y ago
        But this number is per capita energy use across the whole society, including manufacturing and transportation. Not just household use. France only reached this level in the 1960s, Japan in the 1970s. China reached this level in 2012.
- 5y ago
burlesona 5y ago
This strikes me as a very defeatist and Malthusian take on the world, and, frankly, too US-centric. While the US hasn’t managed the political will for significant climate reform, we are far from the majority of the world, and even if we magically had a green revolution and became the worlds first zero-emission nation, it’s unlikely that this would be enough to avert climate change. The developing world wants modern life, and if they have to burn fossil fuels to catch up, they will. There are really only a few situations that lead to radical global change: 1. Severe crisis, such as a nation-ending war. 2. Extraordinary visionary leadership in the right place at the right time... which often leads to serious crises such as nation-ending wars. Otherwise, progress comes from the chaotic, messy evolution of humanity. Perhaps we will innovate our way out of climate disaster, perhaps the ecology will gradually change and we’ll be forced to adapt, or (my guess) perhaps some of both. The good news is we actually have a lot of the technology we need, and more is being developed all the time. I for one am optimistic that between innovation and adaptation the future will continue to be bright.
- credit_guy 5y ago
  > even if we magically had a green revolution and became the worlds first zero-emission nation, it’s unlikely that this would be enough to avert climate change. It's actually quite likely that it would go a long way towards averting climate change. Sure, the US contributes only about 6 GT of greenhouse gases of the 50 GT emitted by the whole world annually, so it first seems that zeroing out this would still result in 44 GT worth of emissions left. But going from 6 GT to zero cannot be done without huge innovation. Technological innovation, innovation in policy, oversight, enforcement. These pieces of innovation can (and will) be shared with the rest of the world. When the price of solar panels went down, it went down globally. If the US Navy implements a way to scrub CO2 out of seawater and make fuel out of it [1], others can use the method too. Even if the US won't share the technology outright, just knowing it can be done will let others know the idea is worth investing in. [1] https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2020/07/200715123120.htm https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2020/07/200715123120.h...
  - Spooky23 5y ago
Iv 5y ago
Jules Verne was talking about coal depletion in the 19h century (albeit with a more positive note) In the 60s France started switching to nuclear power because it worried about the depletion of oil wells in the areas it controlled. It is wrong to say nuclear power can't power more than 10% of a country.
- dredmorbius 5y ago
  Somewhat more substantively, so were William Stanley Jevons, in The Coal Question (1857),[1] and earlier by John Williams, a mineral surveyor, in Natural History of the Mineral Kingdom (1789).[2] Thing is that since the time of Jevons, the only energy sources added to our knowledge are nuclear fission, nuclear fusion, and the rather improbable prospect of antiatter annihilation (an energy carrier rather than energy source). Solar PV has emerged as an energy conversion technology, first discovered as the photoelectric effect in the late 19th century and scientific theory identified by Einstein. We've seen considerable technical improvements to technologies known since the 1950s, but also clear limitations (fission and fusion most especially, but also maximal efficiencies of PV and battery storage). Efficiencies have improved, toward the bound of theoretical limits, and costs fallen. But we're still largely living in the world of 1857 in terms of the options available to us. ________________________________ Notes: 1. Jevons: https://archive.org/details/TheCoalQuestion https://archive.org/details/TheCoalQuestion 2. Referenced by Jevons. Available at https://archive.org/details/naturalhistorym00millgoog https://archive.org/details/naturalhistorym00millgoog
erentz 5y ago
> “Based on present knowledge, it does not appear likely that the fission of uranium or thorium could ever support more than 10 to 20 per cent of the energy system of the United States patterned as at present.” I think he was clearly too pessimistic about the potential of nuclear. > Today, the US gets about 8 percent of its total energy from nuclear power... Note this is of all energy including the gas in your car. Obviously we are reliant on electrification if our transport system to tackle that, which doesn’t seem considered here. Possibly he didn’t foresee the potential to electrify transport hence the pessimism. No one is expecting solar, wind, or nuclear powered cars. They’re expecting solar, wind, and nuclear powered electricity grid charging batteries in cars, third rails, and overhead catenary. Nuclear is ~20% of all electricity output on that grid today in the USA. And in France it’s ~70%. It’s clear it can go to much higher.
actinium226 5y ago
Well hello Mr. Malthus! https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Robert_Malthus https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Robert_Malthus Back to seriousness - the author claims there are limits to nuclear, wind, and solar, but does not state what those limits are. The limit on nuclear is not clear to me - France gets something like 75% of its energy from nuclear. It seems the main limit on nuclear has been public sentiment, which must be weighed with public sentiment on climate change.
- _acco 5y ago
  Interesting, right? If we believe the Titanic is sinking, why are we being picky about the lifeboat? Anything beyond averting disaster is an over-optimization.
  - ncmncm 5y ago
    We just closed Diablo Canyon and Indian Point nukes, not a moment too soon. Money wasted propping up those ramshackle contraptions can now go into solar and wind construction, at a better marginal return on new construction than we got just operating them. But they will unfortunately drain another billion dollars just being decommissioned.
- 1970-01-01 5y ago
  Back in the 50s, nuclear was being treated as the magic that would solve all energy problems. There were ideas for making fission cars, trains, planes, etc. But since then, civilization has only benefited from nuclear reactors via power plants, naval ships, RTGs, and depending on how you see it, bombs. The magic of nuclear fission never provided the complete revolution it was setup to do. Just as we weren't responsible enough to plan for fission's partial failure back then, we are not able to envision the same partial failure with solar and wind. Fusion is the only thing I can think of that still has a chance to be the magic it is hyped to be. But that is only because its another 50 years away. And that is just too late to stop climate change in its accelerating state. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ford_Nucleon https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ford_Nucleon https://www.ans.org/news/article-109/army-offroad-nuclear-train-1958/ https://www.ans.org/news/article-109/army-offroad-nuclear-tr... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Convair_NB-36H https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Convair_NB-36H
_acco 5y ago
The very last sentence sums up this general ethos quite well: > Agriculture may have set us humans on an unsustainable path, but fossil fuels broadened that path to a superhighway. We need to put the "agriculture was our biggest mistake" trope to bed. Sustainability is an illusion. Nothing is sustainable in the cosmos, it just looks that way when you constrict the time horizon enough. Pre-agriculture, Homo Sapiens were on the constant brink of extinction, just like every other animal. The earth provides no safe comfort to any being. (The fact that we've created a society which provides for me to type this screed without glancing over my shoulder once is a miracle.) Humans are unique, and agriculture was a monumental step in our epic journey. Without agriculture, the dunes of Mars would crumble in darkness and countless stars would radiate for no conscious creature to marvel at and wonder. Fossil fuels were a tremendous gift: cheap energy. Without it, who knows how far behind our society would be? We almost certainly wouldn't yet have commercial air travel, 4+ billion people globally connected on the internet, or mRNA vaccines. Yes, no gift comes for free. But let's not treat this like some deal with the devil. It is up to us to manage the costs (and they are real!) We don't master plan this stuff, but I'll bet on humans to figure it out every time. So, is it any surprise that someone that calls agriculture "the biggest planning failure in human history" would have this conclusion? > Without planning, this is what will most likely happen: we’ll fail to produce enough renewable energy to power society at the level at which we want it to operate. So, we’ll continue to get most of our energy from fossil fuels—until we can’t, due to depletion. Then, as the economy crashes and the planet heats, the full impacts of our planning failure will finally hit home. If you're going to be a doomsaying pessimist (which, mind you, every era of history has had in droves), at least put some effort into it.
visualradio 5y ago
> But let’s assume there is indeed enough time, and that we suddenly get serious about planning. What should we do? In the United States public planning is typically limited to figuring out how to prop up the private financial system for one more quarter. In the U.S. most money is created through real estate mortgages. Although people like to talk about gold, crypto, consumers, producers, and government spending the mainstream financial system in charge of allocating the resources is really a mortgage based system. Suppose someone has an estate with buildings and structures with replacement cost of $200,000. A broker says the estate has a comparable sales price of $600,000. In a loose money system we just trust the banks and brokers to do all of the planning, publicly guarantee mortgages at the reported $600,000, and have federal reserve buy assets to prop up prices at whatever number private finance has fixed upon. In a slightly tighter system, we might cap real estate loan guarantees at 200% of replacement cost of non-land fixed capital. So if property has buildings and fixtures worth $200,000 public loan guarantees max out at $400,000 even if broker says property is worth $600,000. In order to write up price to $600,000 the owner would need to install $100,000 more in fixed capital, the effect of which is to redirect a larger share of the money created through mortgages to other sectors of economy. How to use this to promote green energy investment? Suppose instead of a replacement cost cap of 200% there was a replacement cost cap of 150% for normal capital and 250% for green capital. Then in order to take out a property loan for $600,000 the owner would have to install at least $400,000 of normal capital (structures, fixtures, equipment) or at least $240,000 of green capital (solar panels, wind turbines, lifted mass storage systems), regardless of how high the land values in the location had been written up. In our current system the incentive of brokers is really just to write up asset prices as high as possible until the financial system collapses in order to generate some nice asset gains during credit bubbles. We can take advantage of this greed and use it to promote green energy investment by tightening up rules for lending against speculative land values using fixed capital replacement cost caps, which are slightly looser for fixed capital which is green.

72 points by herogreen 5y ago

It's amazing how long we have known about the impact CO2 would have on the climate. We're now talking about human lifetimes, and yet look at where we are in the public debate. We are still mostly ignoring the issue or debating its reality.

melling 5y ago
14 years ago Google started a project to make renewables cheaper than coal. https://www.forbes.com/sites/williampentland/2014/11/30/why-google-stopped-trying-to-make-renewable-energy-cheaper-than-coal/ https://www.forbes.com/sites/williampentland/2014/11/30/why-... It feels like this slow train wreck will have to get worse before we do enough, giving us more time to advance technology. The United States is no longer the biggest emitter. Now we need more global coordination. Of course, the sooner we started addressing the problem, the longer we could have delayed the problem. Fusion by 2050?
vkou 5y ago
There's two reasons for that. 1. Trillion-dollar fortunes are built on pumping CO2 into the atmosphere. We, as humans have committed genocide against entire cultures over less money. 2. The wealth of industrialized societies is not built on money, or labour. It is built on energy. All of their wealth is derived from energy. Fossil fuels are an incredible source of energy. Cost-effective competitors to them had limited potential to replace them, for a large number of technical and political reasons.
Iv 5y ago
Who is "we"? The IPCC was created in 1988, at the alarmed demand of the Weather and Environment offices of the UN. In 1997 the Kyoto protocol was signed by 184 countries, recognizing the urgency and the need for CO2 reduction. Only in the US is there a political debate about climate change denialism. Thanks to you it is coming to other countries, but before GWB it was a fringe position everywhere.
- dredmorbius 5y ago
  My read of OP's point was that the fundamental science has long been known. The problem was recognised at a global scale both publicly and at high levels of government by the 1960s. Denialism is strong in the United States, but as with other recent (and ongoing) global crises, also prevalent elsewhere. For a timeline of awareness of the problem we can go back over 200 years for early insights: 1800-1870: Level of carbon dioxide gas (CO₂) in the atmosphere, as later measured in ancient ice, is about 290 ppm (parts per million). Mean global temperature (1850-1870) is about 13.6°C. First Industrial Revolution. Coal, railroads, and land clearing speed up greenhouse gas emission, while better agriculture and sanitation speed up population growth. 1824: Fourier calculates that the Earth would be far colder if it lacked an atmosphere. 1859: Tyndall discovers that some gases block infrared radiation. He suggests that changes in the concentration of the gases could bring climate change. 1896: Arrhenius publishes first calculation of global warming from human emissions of CO₂. 1897: Chamberlin produces a model for global carbon exchange including feedbacks. 1870-1910: Second Industrial Revolution. Fertilizers and other chemicals, electricity, and public health further accelerate growth. 1914-1918: World War I; governments learn to mobilize and control industrial societies. 1920-1925: Opening of Texas and Persian Gulf oil fields inaugurates era of cheap energy. 1930s Global warming trend since late 19th century reported. Milankovitch proposes orbital changes as the cause of ice ages. 1938: Callendar argues that CO₂ greenhouse global warming is underway, reviving interest in the question. 1939-1945: World War II. Military grand strategy is largely driven by a struggle to control oil fields. 1945: US Office of Naval Research begins generous funding of many fields of science, some of which happen to be useful for understanding climate change. 1956: Ewing and Donn offer a feedback model for quick ice age onset. Phillips produces a somewhat realistic computer model of the global atmosphere. Plass calculates that adding CO₂ to the atmosphere will have a significant effect on the radiation balance. 1957: Launch of Soviet Sputnik satellite. Cold War concerns support 1957-58 International Geophysical Year, bringing new funding and coordination to climate studies. Revelle finds that CO₂ produced by humans will not be readily absorbed by the oceans. 1958: Telescope studies show a greenhouse effect raises temperature of the atmosphere of Venus far above the boiling point of water. 1960: Mitchell reports downturn of global temperatures since the early 1940s. Keeling accurately measures CO₂ in the Earth's atmosphere and detects an annual rise. 1962: Cuban Missile Crisis, peak of the Cold War. 1963: Calculations suggest that feedback with water vapor could make the climate acutely sensitive to changes in CO₂ level. 1965: Boulder, Colo. meeting on causes of climate change: Lorenz and others point out the chaotic nature of climate system and the possibility of sudden shifts. 1966: Emiliani's analysis of deep-sea cores and Broecker's analysis of ancient corals show that the timing of ice ages was set by small orbital shifts, suggesting that the climate system is sensitive to small changes. 1967: International Global Atmospheric Research Program established, mainly to gather data for better short-range weather prediction, but including climate. Manabe and Wetherald make a convincing calculation that doubling CO₂ would raise world temperatures a couple of degrees. 1968: Studies suggest a possibility of collapse of Antarctic ice sheets, which would raise sea levels catastrophically. 1969: Astronauts walk on the Moon, and people perceive the Earth as a fragile whole. Budyko and Sellers present models of catastrophic ice-albedo feedbacks. Nimbus III satellite begins to provide comprehensive global atmospheric temperature measurements. 1970: First Earth Day. Environmental movement attains strong influence, spreads concern about global degradation. Creation of US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, the world's leading funder of climate research. Aerosols from human activity are shown to be increasing swiftly. Bryson claims they counteract global warming and may bring serious cooling. 1971: SMIC conference of leading scientists reports a danger of rapid and serious global change caused by humans, calls for an organized research effort. Mariner 9 spacecraft finds a great dust storm warming the atmosphere of Mars, plus indications of a radically different climate in the past. 1972: Ice cores and other evidence show big climate shifts in the past between relatively stable modes in the space of a thousand years or so, especially around 11,000 years ago. Droughts in Africa, Ukraine, India cause world food crisis, spreading fears about climate change. 1973: Oil embargo and price rise bring first "energy crisis". 1974: Serious droughts since 1972 increase concern about climate, with cooling from aerosols suspected to be as likely as warming; scientists are doubtful as journalists talk of a new ice age. 1975: Warnings about environmental effects of airplanes leads to investigations of trace gases in the stratosphere and discovery of danger to ozone layer. Manabe and collaborators produce complex but plausible computer models which show a temperature rise of several degrees for doubled CO₂. 1976: Studies show that CFCs (1975) and also methane and ozone (1976) can make a serious contribution to the greenhouse effect. Deep-sea cores show a dominating influence from 100,000-year Milankovitch orbital changes, emphasizing the role of feedbacks. Deforestation and other ecosystem changes are recognized as major factors in the future of the climate. Eddy shows that there were prolonged periods without sunspots in past centuries, corresponding to cold periods . 1977: Scientific opinion tends to converge on global warming, not cooling, as the chief climate risk in next century. 1978: Attempts to coordinate climate research in US end with an inadequate National Climate Program Act, accompanied by rapid but temporary growth in funding. 1979: Second oil "energy crisis." Strengthened environmental movement encourages renewable energy sources, inhibits nuclear energy growth. US National Academy of Sciences report finds it highly credible that doubling CO₂ will bring 1.5-4.5°C global warming. World Climate Research Programme launched to coordinate international research. 1981: Election of Reagan brings backlash against environmental movement to power. Political conservatism is linked to skepticism about global warming. http://www.aip.org/history/climate/timeline.htm http://www.aip.org/history/climate/timeline.htm

api 5y ago

Solar power and batteries have come a long way, but there's still little political will to change things. Nuclear power could progress a lot further too, but again no political will. There's no economic forcing function either since coal and gas remain on average the cheapest and easiest to deploy and manage sources of energy, and that won't change unless there's enough investment in alternatives to get them over the mass adoption hump. The worst fears about fossil fuel depletion have so far not manifested, which might be a bad thing long term. We may have enough fossil carbon to cause truly catastrophic climate change if we actually burn a significant fraction of it. I wonder though if the economic structural problem isn't even harder to solve. The entire financial system relies on eternal growth. Number must always go up or everything breaks. Even if we put an end to most fears about supply side limits to growth by cracking fusion or developing super cheap utility scale batteries, there would still be demand side limits to growth from things like stabilizing populations and diminishing marginal utility of wealth. Mere stability without significant growth would bring about the collapse of the financial system and the economy as we know it, and probably quite a lot of political turmoil since we don't have a really great replacement sitting in the wings. (No, planetary migration won't keep GDP growth going any time soon. Humans could settle on the Moon or Mars but they're too far away to contribute much to our Earthly GDP. They'd be mostly isolated economies of their own.)

baron_harkonnen 5y ago
Why in the world is this comment being downvotes? There is nothing in this comment that I see is incorrect, and if you’re going to vigorously down vote because “I don’t like things that make me feel bad!” you at least ought to comment as to what could be wrong here.
- Retric 5y ago
  It’s not a question of political will solar is now cheaper than coal in the vast majority of the world. It’s one of the reasons why coal went from 39% in 2014 of US generation down to 19.3% in 2020 with a lot more scheduled for decommissioning over the next 5 years. Even when Trump was making many pro coal speeches, industry viewed coal as a dead end. China is often mentioned as adding new coal power plants, but even there coal fell from 80% of electricity generation in 2010 to 57.7% in 2019. Natural gas on the other hand has become more popular, but it also produces significantly less CO2 per kWh.

cosmic_shame 5y ago

Given how long these problems have been staring us in the face, it's truly hard not to be totally pessimistic about the future. If we haven't changed yet, do we even have the capacity to do so?

ThomPete 5y ago
Problems are solved by optimists. Dont be pessimistic, we will solve problems as they arise. If you are truly worries about your future the best way is to get into the trenches.
- rdiddly 5y ago
  I admire the spirit of this comment but can't quite get onboard, because "the trenches" can be kind of a demoralizing place, especially when you're not winning the war. I've spent 30 years bike-commuting for example and have been car-free for much of that time. The lifestyle has many liberating aspects but it strongly encourages without quite requiring, that you forgo or reduce certain things, like day-trips, sightseeing, shopping for furniture or other large items, other kinds of shopping, social outings, playing drums in a band, fishing? I dunno, any location- or gear-intensive hobby. Consumption overall (not just on transportation) tends to go down, so it's great for saving money. But do I feel like a hero for all the fuel I saved, the carbon I didn't emit, the road space I freed up? Do I feel like I made a difference? No, all I did was make it easier for others to do those things, and boy did they ever continue doing them, in increasing numbers, the entire time. Even my so-called people, transportation reform "activists," bend over backward not to "shame" each other for buying cars, and buying cars to replace the cars they bought before. So I feel more like a sucker than a hero when I consider all that. In the end it has to be about just getting outside and enjoying the fresh air.
  - nitrogen 5y ago
    Sounds like a great experiment and a lifestyle choice that should be available to those who want it. But individual action will always be trumped by invention. The fully optimistic way forward isn't self sacrifice, it's developing the things -- neighborhoods, vehicles, fuels, whatever -- that make it possible for everyone to do more stuff with less energy, and enjoy doing it.

jdblair 5y ago

If you're interested in learning more about the big picture connection between our human society and energy, I recommend "Energy and Civilization: A History," by Vaclav Smil. My biggest takeaway from his book is that transitioning a society to affluence requires, at minimum, 22.6 megawatt hours of energy per capita per year. High energy societies like the United States use far more. To de-carbonize, we have to plan new energy sources that provide at least this much energy for every person on the planet. Otherwise, people will understandably turn to carbon-based energy sources to meet their energy needs. Producing this much energy from renewables is possible, but it is hard! Fossil fuels provide an exceptionally compact (in terms of land area) and effective energy source. [edited to correct typo in the energy figure, what I originally wrote as 2.6 mw/h is 22.6 mw/h]

exporectomy 5y ago
That's surprisingly low. 2.6 megawatt hours per year is 300 watts per person which is almost the same order of magnitude of what the human body can produce.
- jdblair 5y ago
  Arggh... I made a typo. It is 22.6 megawatt hours per capita per year, so an order of magnitude higher.
  - XorNot 5y ago
    ~60 kwH per day...that's actually pretty much inline with a normal household (also about the average of what my rooftop solar achieves).
    - jdblair 5y ago
      But this number is per capita energy use across the whole society, including manufacturing and transportation. Not just household use. France only reached this level in the 1960s, Japan in the 1970s. China reached this level in 2012.
5y ago

burlesona 5y ago

This strikes me as a very defeatist and Malthusian take on the world, and, frankly, too US-centric. While the US hasn’t managed the political will for significant climate reform, we are far from the majority of the world, and even if we magically had a green revolution and became the worlds first zero-emission nation, it’s unlikely that this would be enough to avert climate change. The developing world wants modern life, and if they have to burn fossil fuels to catch up, they will. There are really only a few situations that lead to radical global change: 1. Severe crisis, such as a nation-ending war. 2. Extraordinary visionary leadership in the right place at the right time... which often leads to serious crises such as nation-ending wars. Otherwise, progress comes from the chaotic, messy evolution of humanity. Perhaps we will innovate our way out of climate disaster, perhaps the ecology will gradually change and we’ll be forced to adapt, or (my guess) perhaps some of both. The good news is we actually have a lot of the technology we need, and more is being developed all the time. I for one am optimistic that between innovation and adaptation the future will continue to be bright.

credit_guy 5y ago
> even if we magically had a green revolution and became the worlds first zero-emission nation, it’s unlikely that this would be enough to avert climate change. It's actually quite likely that it would go a long way towards averting climate change. Sure, the US contributes only about 6 GT of greenhouse gases of the 50 GT emitted by the whole world annually, so it first seems that zeroing out this would still result in 44 GT worth of emissions left. But going from 6 GT to zero cannot be done without huge innovation. Technological innovation, innovation in policy, oversight, enforcement. These pieces of innovation can (and will) be shared with the rest of the world. When the price of solar panels went down, it went down globally. If the US Navy implements a way to scrub CO2 out of seawater and make fuel out of it [1], others can use the method too. Even if the US won't share the technology outright, just knowing it can be done will let others know the idea is worth investing in. [1] https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2020/07/200715123120.htm https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2020/07/200715123120.h...
- Spooky23 5y ago

Iv 5y ago

Jules Verne was talking about coal depletion in the 19h century (albeit with a more positive note) In the 60s France started switching to nuclear power because it worried about the depletion of oil wells in the areas it controlled. It is wrong to say nuclear power can't power more than 10% of a country.

dredmorbius 5y ago
Somewhat more substantively, so were William Stanley Jevons, in The Coal Question (1857),[1] and earlier by John Williams, a mineral surveyor, in Natural History of the Mineral Kingdom (1789).[2] Thing is that since the time of Jevons, the only energy sources added to our knowledge are nuclear fission, nuclear fusion, and the rather improbable prospect of antiatter annihilation (an energy carrier rather than energy source). Solar PV has emerged as an energy conversion technology, first discovered as the photoelectric effect in the late 19th century and scientific theory identified by Einstein. We've seen considerable technical improvements to technologies known since the 1950s, but also clear limitations (fission and fusion most especially, but also maximal efficiencies of PV and battery storage). Efficiencies have improved, toward the bound of theoretical limits, and costs fallen. But we're still largely living in the world of 1857 in terms of the options available to us. ________________________________ Notes: 1. Jevons: https://archive.org/details/TheCoalQuestion https://archive.org/details/TheCoalQuestion 2. Referenced by Jevons. Available at https://archive.org/details/naturalhistorym00millgoog https://archive.org/details/naturalhistorym00millgoog

erentz 5y ago

> “Based on present knowledge, it does not appear likely that the fission of uranium or thorium could ever support more than 10 to 20 per cent of the energy system of the United States patterned as at present.” I think he was clearly too pessimistic about the potential of nuclear. > Today, the US gets about 8 percent of its total energy from nuclear power... Note this is of all energy including the gas in your car. Obviously we are reliant on electrification if our transport system to tackle that, which doesn’t seem considered here. Possibly he didn’t foresee the potential to electrify transport hence the pessimism. No one is expecting solar, wind, or nuclear powered cars. They’re expecting solar, wind, and nuclear powered electricity grid charging batteries in cars, third rails, and overhead catenary. Nuclear is ~20% of all electricity output on that grid today in the USA. And in France it’s ~70%. It’s clear it can go to much higher.

actinium226 5y ago

Well hello Mr. Malthus! https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Robert_Malthus https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Robert_Malthus Back to seriousness - the author claims there are limits to nuclear, wind, and solar, but does not state what those limits are. The limit on nuclear is not clear to me - France gets something like 75% of its energy from nuclear. It seems the main limit on nuclear has been public sentiment, which must be weighed with public sentiment on climate change.

_acco 5y ago
Interesting, right? If we believe the Titanic is sinking, why are we being picky about the lifeboat? Anything beyond averting disaster is an over-optimization.
- ncmncm 5y ago
  We just closed Diablo Canyon and Indian Point nukes, not a moment too soon. Money wasted propping up those ramshackle contraptions can now go into solar and wind construction, at a better marginal return on new construction than we got just operating them. But they will unfortunately drain another billion dollars just being decommissioned.
1970-01-01 5y ago
Back in the 50s, nuclear was being treated as the magic that would solve all energy problems. There were ideas for making fission cars, trains, planes, etc. But since then, civilization has only benefited from nuclear reactors via power plants, naval ships, RTGs, and depending on how you see it, bombs. The magic of nuclear fission never provided the complete revolution it was setup to do. Just as we weren't responsible enough to plan for fission's partial failure back then, we are not able to envision the same partial failure with solar and wind. Fusion is the only thing I can think of that still has a chance to be the magic it is hyped to be. But that is only because its another 50 years away. And that is just too late to stop climate change in its accelerating state. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ford_Nucleon https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ford_Nucleon https://www.ans.org/news/article-109/army-offroad-nuclear-train-1958/ https://www.ans.org/news/article-109/army-offroad-nuclear-tr... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Convair_NB-36H https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Convair_NB-36H

_acco 5y ago

The very last sentence sums up this general ethos quite well: > Agriculture may have set us humans on an unsustainable path, but fossil fuels broadened that path to a superhighway. We need to put the "agriculture was our biggest mistake" trope to bed. Sustainability is an illusion. Nothing is sustainable in the cosmos, it just looks that way when you constrict the time horizon enough. Pre-agriculture, Homo Sapiens were on the constant brink of extinction, just like every other animal. The earth provides no safe comfort to any being. (The fact that we've created a society which provides for me to type this screed without glancing over my shoulder once is a miracle.) Humans are unique, and agriculture was a monumental step in our epic journey. Without agriculture, the dunes of Mars would crumble in darkness and countless stars would radiate for no conscious creature to marvel at and wonder. Fossil fuels were a tremendous gift: cheap energy. Without it, who knows how far behind our society would be? We almost certainly wouldn't yet have commercial air travel, 4+ billion people globally connected on the internet, or mRNA vaccines. Yes, no gift comes for free. But let's not treat this like some deal with the devil. It is up to us to manage the costs (and they are real!) We don't master plan this stuff, but I'll bet on humans to figure it out every time. So, is it any surprise that someone that calls agriculture "the biggest planning failure in human history" would have this conclusion? > Without planning, this is what will most likely happen: we’ll fail to produce enough renewable energy to power society at the level at which we want it to operate. So, we’ll continue to get most of our energy from fossil fuels—until we can’t, due to depletion. Then, as the economy crashes and the planet heats, the full impacts of our planning failure will finally hit home. If you're going to be a doomsaying pessimist (which, mind you, every era of history has had in droves), at least put some effort into it.

visualradio 5y ago

> But let’s assume there is indeed enough time, and that we suddenly get serious about planning. What should we do? In the United States public planning is typically limited to figuring out how to prop up the private financial system for one more quarter. In the U.S. most money is created through real estate mortgages. Although people like to talk about gold, crypto, consumers, producers, and government spending the mainstream financial system in charge of allocating the resources is really a mortgage based system. Suppose someone has an estate with buildings and structures with replacement cost of $200,000. A broker says the estate has a comparable sales price of $600,000. In a loose money system we just trust the banks and brokers to do all of the planning, publicly guarantee mortgages at the reported $600,000, and have federal reserve buy assets to prop up prices at whatever number private finance has fixed upon. In a slightly tighter system, we might cap real estate loan guarantees at 200% of replacement cost of non-land fixed capital. So if property has buildings and fixtures worth $200,000 public loan guarantees max out at $400,000 even if broker says property is worth $600,000. In order to write up price to $600,000 the owner would need to install $100,000 more in fixed capital, the effect of which is to redirect a larger share of the money created through mortgages to other sectors of economy. How to use this to promote green energy investment? Suppose instead of a replacement cost cap of 200% there was a replacement cost cap of 150% for normal capital and 250% for green capital. Then in order to take out a property loan for $600,000 the owner would have to install at least $400,000 of normal capital (structures, fixtures, equipment) or at least $240,000 of green capital (solar panels, wind turbines, lifted mass storage systems), regardless of how high the land values in the location had been written up. In our current system the incentive of brokers is really just to write up asset prices as high as possible until the financial system collapses in order to generate some nice asset gains during credit bubbles. We can take advantage of this greed and use it to promote green energy investment by tightening up rules for lending against speculative land values using fixed capital replacement cost caps, which are slightly looser for fixed capital which is green.