Develop New Technologies to Control Climate Changes

A recent editorial in Nature says, “Recent temperature trends show that the climate problem is less urgent.” Although the IPCC’s [Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change] new report argues that natural effects, like La Nina, are causing a hiatus in global warming (Kosaka), we cannot stop controlling climate change because climate sensitivity, which is used to predict future climate change, remains uncertain. Since we are uncertain about the exact pace of climate change, we must prepare for the worst. While governments have pursued ethanol as one potential clean energy source, it remains inefficient. Therefore, governments need to develop new technologies that are cleaner and more efficient.

Scientists who think that the climate problem is less urgent because of the hiatus in global warming ignore an important fact: the metric that scientists use to show climate stabilization remains uncertain. Climate sensitivity is a metric that shows how the global climate system responds to changes in the environment. It is usually defined as the equilibrium global mean surface temperature change when atmospheric CO2 concentration doubles. Clouds are the most important factor in calculating climate sensibility, but scientists are still unsure about their exact effects. Scientists are also still uncertain how aerosols in the air reflect sunlight, making their estimation of climate sensitivity even more inaccurate. (Kosaka) What’s more, there are many other factors affecting the earth’s temperature including non-CO2 greenhouse gasses, internal variability in the climate system, and land use change. (Karl and Trenberth) Due to these uncertainties, I believe we should not rely on the optimistic climate sensitivity data and we should increase our pace to control climate change.



Figure1. All of these processes create a complex climate system. All of these processes affect the calculation of climate sensibility and climate change, so it is really hard to get an accurate prediction of the climate change. Image from here (Karl and Trenberth)

Besides the uncertainty of climate sensitivity, there is another reason for our government to urgently take measures to control climate change. The consequences of modern climate change, including rising sea level, reduced biological diversity and spread of diseases, are fatal. (Karl and Trenberth) We, as humans, don’t want a disaster to happen even if the possibility is small. The most urgent of these problems is the rising sea level. When the global temperature rises, sea water becomes warmer. As it becomes warmer, sea water expands and the sea level rises. The melting Polar ice caps intensify the sea levels’ rise. (Collins) The sea level has risen 4.4cm in the past one hundred years. As a direct consequence, lowlands will flood. For example, the Thames River has risen continuously over the past 20 years; to protect Britain from floods, the British government had to increase the height of their dikes 88 times. One third of the world’s population lives along the coast, and they could forever lose their homelands. Many of the biggest cities in the world, including New York, Tokyo, Shanghai and Hong Kong, could all disappear. The rising sea level has other consequences as well. When sea water goes into land, the salinity in the underground water rises, reducing the supply of drinkable water. Moreover, biological diversity will reduce rapidly. Climate change could change species’ adaptability to the environment, unbalancing ecosystems. (Vitousek) Many species could become extinct, which could even affect agriculture. Global warming could even increase the spread of diseases such as malaria, dengue and cholera. As you can see, government’s actions to control climate changes brook no delays. Despite the apparent hiatus in global warming, we shouldn’t put aside the problem of climate change.

A polar bear lost its home because of global warming. Image from here

Because of these potential consequences, the government should take actions to regulate human influences on global climate changes. Emissions from humans’ energy use are the main factor causing climate change. That’s why the government’s first step should be developing emission–free energy technologies. Ethanol fuel is a good example of the government’s efforts to develop technology to control climate change. According to the data from UNEP [United Nations Environment Program], world ethanol production for transport fuel tripled between 2000 and 2007, from 17 billion to more than 52 billion liters. From 2007 to 2008, the share of ethanol in global gasoline-type fuel increased from 3.7% to 5.4%. Most cars on the road today in the U.S. can run on blends of up to 10% ethanol. If we compare ethanol to gasoline, depending on the production method, we can see that ethanol releases fewer greenhouse gases. (Madson) A National Geographic Magazine overview article (2007) argues that there are 22% less CO2 emissions using corn ethanol compared to using gasoline and a 56% reduction compared to cane ethanol. European climate expert who works for Ford reports a 70% reduction in CO2 emissions with bioethanol compared to petrol for one of their flexible-fuel vehicles.

While burning ethanol is significantly cleaner, producing ethanol fuel emits a large amount of carbon dioxide. The calculation of exactly how much carbon dioxide is produced in the manufacture of ethanol is a complex and inexact process, highly dependent on the method by which the ethanol is produced. (Madson)



UK government calculation of carbon intensity of corn bioethanol grown in the US and burnt in the UK. Image from here, (from Brinkman, N., Halsall, R., Jorgensen, S.W., & Kirwan, J.E).

Coal is the main source of fuel used to process corn into ethanol. As we can see in the chart, however, most of the carbon dioxide emissions are from the coal used to manufacture the ethanol. (Brinkman) Here comes a paradox: we want to produce more ethanol energy to reduce emissions of carbon dioxide, but the process that we use to produce ethanol energy actually causes more emissions. Since we understand the importance of controlling climate change, the government now should start to develop technology that produces ethanol energy with fewer carbon dioxide emissions. If researchers can use other methods instead of coal to produce ethanol energy, ethanol energy could have a far greater impact on greenhouse gas emissions.

While ethanol is a promising technology, there are blueprints for even better energy sources in the future. Car companies are experimenting with compressed air as a fuel source. French automaker PSA Peugeot announced in 2013 that it will build a hybrid gasoline vehicle that can store energy as compressed air. (Coren) Although this technology is not practical now, researchers should continue developing ideas like this. We should face climate change seriously and develop technology actively to protect the earth------our unique home.


Reference

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Gonzales, Alan Dale C. "Overall stocktaking of biofuel development in Asia-Pacific: benefits and challenges." background paper for “Policy Dialogue on Biofuels in Asia: Benefits and Challenges,” Beijing (2008): 24-26.http://e.unescap.org/esd/Energy-Security-and-Water-Resources/energy/dialogue/biofuels/benefit_challenges/documents/Overall%20Stocking%20of%20Biofuel%20Development-Final.pdf

Madson, P. W., and D. A. Monceaux. "Fuel ethanol production." The Alcohol Textbook. Nottingham University Press. Nottingham, Reino Unido (1995): 257-268.
http://www.bioethanol.ru/images/bioethanol/Fuel%20ethanol%20production%20-%20Katzen.pdf

Malte Meinshausen, Nicolai Meinshausen, William Hare, Sarah C. B. Raper, Katja Frieler, Reto Knutti, David J. Frame & Myles R. Allen. “Greenhouse-gas emission targets for limiting global warming to 2 °C” Nature 458, 1158-1162, 30 April 2009
http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v458/n7242/full/nature08017.html

Mat Collins, Soon-Il An, Wenju Cai, Alexandre Ganachaud, Eric Guilyardi, Fei-Fei Jin, Markus Jochum, Matthieu Lengaigne, Scott Power, Axel Timmermann, Gabe VecchiAn, Drew Wittenberg. “The impact of global warming on the tropical Pacific Ocean and El Niño” Nature Geoscience 3, 391 - 397 (2010) Published online: 23 May 2010
http://www.nature.com/ngeo/journal/v3/n6/abs/ngeo868.html

Michael J Coren “What fuels Peugeot's latest car? Air” Scientific American January 03, 2013
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=what-fuels-peugeots-latest-car-air-2013-01

Peter M. Vitousek. “Beyond global warming: Ecology and global change” Ecological Society of America Ecology 75:1861–1876 Volume 75, Issue 7 (October 1994)
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Thomas R. Karl, Kevin E. Trenberth. “Modern global climate change” Science 5 December 2003:ISSN 0036-8075 (print), 1095-9203 (online)
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Yu Kosaka, Shang-Ping Xie. “Recent global-warming hiatus tied to equatorial Pacific surface cooling” Nature (2013) ISSN: 0028-0836 EISSN: 1476-4687
http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/vaop/ncurrent/full/nature12534.html