2007 Fall Lecture 7 SCIE 103 Life Sciences 1 2007 Fall Lecture 6 SCIE 103 Life Sciences 1

2007 Fall Lecture 7 SCIE 103 Life Sciences 12007 Fall Lecture 6 SCIE 103 Life Sciences 1


The 21st Centuryclimate challenge

“One generation plants a tree; the next generation gets the shade.”

Chinese Proverb

“You already know enough. So do I. It is not knowledge we lack.

What is missing is the courage to understand what we know

and to draw conclusions.”Sven Lindqvist


The world has less than a decade to avoid dangerous climate change that could bring unprecedented human development reversals

Climate change is a threat to humanity as a whole. But it is the poor, a constituency with no responsibility for the ecological debt we are running up, who face the most immediate and most severe human costs

The Human Development Report 2007/2008 calls for a ‘twin track’ approach that combines stringent mitigation to limit 21st Century warming to less than 2 degree centigrade, with strengthened international cooperation on adaptation

The forthcoming conference of the parties in Bali is a unique opportunity to put the interests of the world’s poor and future generations at the heart of climate change negotiations


The 21st Century climate challenge

Three distinctive characteristics:

It is cumulative The effects are irreversible Large time lags – today’s emissions

are tomorrow’s problems It is global


Rising CO2 emissions are pushing up stocks & increasing temperatures In the past 100 years the

earth has warmed 0.70C

Atmospheric concentrations of CO2 are increasing at 1.9 ppm each year. It reached 379 ppm in 2005

Between 2000 and 2005 an average of 26 Gt of CO2 was releases into the atmosphere each year


The Global carbon account

Defining dangerous – keeping within 2°C

Establishing a 21st Century carbon budget

Defining a sustainable emission’s pathway

The problem of inertia– the case for adaptation


The 21st Century carbonbudget is set at 1,456 Gt CO2to avoid dangerous climate

change


The 21st Century carbon budget is set for early expiry


Charting a course away dangerous climate changeThe sustainable emissions pathway is as follows

The world – cuts of 50 percent by 2050 with a peak by 2020

Developed countries – cuts of 80 percent by 2050

Developing countries – cuts of 20 percent by 2050 with respect to 1990


Halving emissions by 2050 could avoid dangerous climate change


Some people walk more lightly than others

The UK (population 60 million) emits more CO2 than Egypt, Nigeria, Pakistan and Vietnam (total population 472 million)

The state of Texas (population 23 million) has a deeper footprint than the whole sub-Saharan Africa (720 million people)

The 19 million people living in New York have a deeper footprint than the 766 million people living in the 50 least developed countries

The distribution of current emissions points to an inverse relationship between climate change vulnerability and responsibility



How many planets?

The 21st century carbon budget amounts to around 14.5 Gt CO2 per year

Total CO2 emissions in 2004 stood at 29 Gt

If every person living in the developing world would have the same carbon footprint than an average person in the US or Canada, we would need the equivalent to nine planets to absorb the CO2


Climate shocks:risk and vulnerability

in an unequal world

“The countries most vulnerable are least able to protect themselves. They also contribute least to the global emissions of greenhouse

gases. Without action they will pay a high price for the actions of others.”

Kofi Annan

“Like slavery and apartheid, poverty is not natural. It is man-made and

it can be overcome and eradicated by the actions of human beings.”

Nelson Mandela


Risk and vulnerability

Climate risk is an external fact of life for the entire world

Vulnerability is a measure of capacity to manage climate hazards without suffering a long-term potentially irreversible loss of well-being.

The state of human development shapes the process by which risk is converted into vulnerability


Disaster risk is skewed towards developing countries• 1 in 19 people are

affected in developing countries

• The corresponding number is 1 in 1,500 in OECD countries

A risk differential of 79


The human development backdrop

Poverty, child mortality and malnutrition

There are still around 1 billion people living on less than a dollar a day.

Around 28 percent of children in LDCs are underweight or stunted.

Only 32 countries (of 147) are on track to achieve the MDG on child mortality

Inequality

More than 80 percent of the world’s population lives in countries where income differentials are widening

Underlying inequalities act as a barrier for early recovery after shocks


Low human development traps

The potential human costs of climate change have been understated

Climate related risks force people into downward spirals of disadvantage that undermine future opportunities

In Ethiopia, children exposed to a drought in early childhood are 36 percent more likely to be malnourished five years later – a figure that translates into 2 million additional cases of child malnutrition

Indian women born during a drought or a flood in the 1970s were 19 percent less likely to ever attend primary school


Five human development tipping points Reduced agricultural productivity Heightened water insecurity Increased exposure to extreme

weather events Collapse of ecosystems Increased health risks


Climate change will hurt developing country agriculture


Heightened water insecurity – glacial melting

Glacial melting posses threats to more than 40 percent of the world’s population.

In the arid cost of Peru, 80 percent of fresh water originates from glacial melt.

The flow of the Indus, could decline as much as 70 percent

In Central Asia, losses of glacial melt into Amu Darya and Syr Darya rivers could restrict water for irrigation and hydroelectric power


Extreme weather events The number of additional people experiencing coastal

flooding could range from 134 to 332 million for a 3o- 4o increase in temperature.

Tropical storms could raise the figure to 371 million by the end of the 21st century

Possible consequences of one meter rise in sea level

In Lower Egypt, 6 million people displaced and 4,500 kms2 of farmland flooded

In Vietnam, 22 million people displaced In Bangladesh, 18 percent of land area could be inundated

affecting 11 percent of the population In the Maldives, more than 80 percent of land area is less

than 1 meter above sea level


Avoiding dangerous climate change:

strategies for mitigation

“We shall require a substantially new manner of thinking if mankind is to survive.”

Albert Einstein

“Speed is irrelevant if you are going in the wrong direction.”

Mahatma Gandhi

“Alone we can do so little; together we can do so much.”

Helen Keller


Avoiding dangerous climate change – strategies for mitigation Setting mitigation targets:

current problems Pricing carbon: the role of

markets The role of public policy:

regulation and research & development


Problems setting emission reduction targets Insufficient ambition

Insufficient urgency

Inaccurate indicators

Inadequate sectoral coverage

Inconsistent base years

Targets are de-linked from policies


Pricing carbon emissions

Market failure: Polluters do not suffer the worse consequences of their own pollution

Immediate challenge: to push the price of carbon to a level consistent with the sustainable emissions pathway

Ways to do it: taxation and cap-and-trade and trade


Where should the price of carbon be set?

How should the price be generated?

Under carbon taxation emitters are required to pay for each tone of CO2 they produce

Under cap-and-trade, the government sets an overall emissions cap and issues tradable allowances to allow business the “right to emit”

Taxation versus cap-and-trade


The relative merits of taxation and cap-and-trade

Administration

Price predictability

Revenue mobilization

The differences can be exaggerated


The critical role of regulation and government action

The energy mix

The residential sector

Vehicle emission standards

R&D and deployment of low carbon technologies


The Energy Mix

Currently energy mix is dominated by fossil fuels

Renewable energy is not competitive with coal-fired power – price of carbon and incentives for predicable markets can play a role

Germany’ Renewable Sources Act – fix price for 20 years

Spain – wind power satisfies around 8 percent of total electricity demand. In 2005 saved 19 million t CO2 emissions

Denmark – tax breaks on capital investments. In two decades wind has increased the share in electricity generation to 20 percent


Residential Sector

Low cost mitigation

In OECD residential accounts for 35-40 percent of national CO2 emissions

Appliances alone produce roughly 12 percent

Policies on building and appliances could save up to 29 percent emissions (3.9 Gt CO2) by 2020 equivalent to three times current emissions of India

Average European household could save 200 to 1000 Euros annually through energy efficiency

The best efficiency standards of electrical appliances could save 322 million t CO2 by 2010 equivalent to 100 million cars off the road (all cars from Canada, France and Germany)


Vehicle Emission Standards Personal transportation is the largest consumer of

oil

In OECD the automobile sector accounts for about 30 percent of total greenhouse gas emissions

Improvements in the United States regulatory standards would represent cuttings equivalent to France’s total emissions


Increased coal efficiency could cut CO2 emissions


Adapting to the inevitable: national action and

international cooperation

“If you are neutral in a situation of injustice, you have chosen the side of the oppressor.”

Archbishop Desmond Tutu

“An injustice committed against anyone is a threat to everyone.”

Montesquieu


By mid-2007, actual multilateral financing delivered through UNFCCC amounted to US$ 26 million

This is equivalent to one week spending in floods defences in the UK

Amounts are not the only problem. Timing and fulfillment of pledges present further limitations

Towards adaptation apartheid?Developed country investments dwarf adaptation funds


Investing in adaptation up to 2015

Additional financing needs for climate proofing infrastructure and building resilience are estimated to be at least 86 billion by 2015- Climate proofing infrastructure- Social protection- Strengthening disaster response


The Human Development Report underscores that: The poor are suffering and will suffer more with climate

change. They are at greatest risk to face human development reversals leading to low human development traps.

Climate change is an urgent matter. We need to act now. Both mitigation and adaptation are needed to truly fight

climate change and the threats it poses to humanity. Rich countries must cut emissions by 30% by 2020 and

80% by 2050. International cooperation on finance and technology

transfer is needed. The report argues for the creation of a Climate Change Mitigation Facility.

Extreme inequalities in adaptation capacity exist. International cooperation has been slow to materialize. Adaptation plans needs need to be part of wider strategies of poverty alleviation.


The HDR 2007/2008 will be launched 27 November

2007

http://hdr.undp.org

2007 Fall Lecture 7 SCIE 103 Life Sciences 39

MDG – Millenium Development Goals















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2007 Fall Lecture 7 SCIE 103 Life Sciences 1 2007 Fall Lecture 6 SCIE 103 Life Sciences 1