{"id":7822,"date":"2015-05-04T06:05:28","date_gmt":"2015-05-04T11:05:28","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/olduvai.ca\/?p=7822"},"modified":"2015-05-04T06:05:28","modified_gmt":"2015-05-04T11:05:28","slug":"how-much-would-zero-emissions-cost","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/?p=7822","title":{"rendered":"How Much Would Zero Emissions Cost?"},"content":{"rendered":"

How Much Would Zero Emissions Cost?<\/a><\/h3>\n

In 2014 global carbon emissions\u00a0totaled<\/a>\u00a032 gigatonnes (Gt). If you\u2019re counting, that\u2019s roughly 32 Gt too many. Yes, zero, near-zero, or net-zero is what we want, and soon is when we need it. Failure to achieve such goals by the end of the century will irreparably damage our planet and leave us dangerously susceptible to new and harsher climate conditions, at least\u00a0according<\/a>\u00a0to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). The United Nations\u00a0agrees<\/a>, though several countries openly\u00a0reject<\/a>\u00a0the target. Paris 2015 should produce some positive momentum, but anything legally binding is unlikely to materialize.<\/p>\n

In an effort to better understand the zero goal, let\u2019s try to put a price on it. More specifically \u2013 and for simplicity \u2013 how much would it cost for the world\u2019s highest per capita emitter, the United States to achieve zero or near-zero emissions? To be clear, the following focuses on energy-related gas emissions, which are mostly CO2 and\u00a0account for about 84 percent<\/a>\u00a0of the country\u2019s total greenhouse gas emissions.<\/p>\n

Related:\u00a0This Development Could Revolutionize Renewable Energy<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

Last year, US energy-related CO2 emissions\u00a0were<\/a>\u00a05.4 Gt \u2013 relatively\u00a0unchanged<\/a>from the year before, though up 2.5 percent since 2012. By\u00a0sector<\/a>: electric power is responsible for roughly 38 percent of total emissions; transportation is second at 34 percent; and residential, commercial, and industry emissions account for 28 percent. By fuel: Petroleum is tops at 42 percent, followed by coal and natural gas at 32 and 26 percent respectively.<\/p>\n

Of course, there is no simple solution to the problem at hand, but there is a simple idea: remove fossil fuels from the picture, and across all sectors. Note: that includes point-source systems equipped with carbon capture and storage, which \u2013 while not without their merit \u2013 are an unnecessary stopgap. It also means saying goodbye to petroleum-powered transportation as we know it.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

How Much Would Zero Emissions Cost? In 2014 global carbon emissions\u00a0totaled\u00a032 gigatonnes (Gt). If you\u2019re counting, that\u2019s roughly 32 Gt too many. Yes, zero, near-zero, or net-zero is what we want, and soon is when we need it. Failure to achieve such goals by the end of the century will irreparably damage our planet and […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,4],"tags":[113,141,147,328,349,369,386,5161,440,588,822,826,5160],"class_list":["post-7822","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-energy-2","category-environment","tag-carbon-emissions","tag-climate-change","tag-coal","tag-fossil-fuels","tag-gas","tag-global-warming","tag-greenhouse-gases","tag-intergovernmental-panel-on-climate-change","tag-ipcc","tag-oil","tag-un","tag-united-nations","tag-zero-emissions"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7822","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=7822"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7822\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7823,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7822\/revisions\/7823"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=7822"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=7822"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=7822"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}