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Reuters, 11 September 2009 – The time it takes for clean technologies to spread globally must be halved by 2025 to meet greenhouse gas reduction targets by 2050, a report by London-based think tank Chatham House said on Friday.
The report found that innovations in wind and solar power, biomass to electricity, cleaner coal technologies and carbon capture have taken 20-30 years to reach the mass market.
Intellectual property rights can influence the speed at which a particular technology might spread, the report found.
For example, the lag in the spread of clean technology is mirrored by the time it takes for a patent to become widely used in inventions — an average 24 years across the sectors.
“Markets will deliver the technology we need, but it takes too long,” said Bernice Lee, research director for energy, environment and resource governance at Chatham House.
“A patent portfolio is a form of currency that can be used to attract venture capital, facilitate entry into strategic alliances, provide protection against litigation and create opportunities for mergers and acquisitions,” Chatham House said.
International cooperation is needed to double technology diffusion rates. Currently, cooperation on innovation is mainly on a national, not international, basis.
When world leaders meet in Copenhagen this December to set a new global climate pact, they should focus on stepping up joint venture companies, cross-licensing agreements and joint manufacturing programmes, the think tank recommended.
Removing bottlenecks from patent registration, introducing incentives for open innovation and improving technology standards bodies could all accelerate diffusion.
The report also recommended greater collaboration between countries on research and development, more public funding for high-risk technologies such as carbon capture and a global licensing database to speed up patent registration.
Countering climate change will require a far higher technology deployment rate than the greatest ever annual rate of any given clean energy technology, the think tank found.
“In all cases, the proposed (climate) targets far exceed the current rate of deployment,” the think tank said.
The report is entitled “Who Owns Our Low Carbon Future? Intellectual Property and Energy Technologies” and is part of a project on ‘Trade, Finance and Climate Change: Building a Positive Agenda for Developing Countries’, funded by the United Kingdom Department for International Development (DFID) and managed by the Energy, Environment and Resource Governance research team at Chatham House.
The State of Climate Change Science & Policy: Copenhagen Climate Congress Releases Synthesis Report
by Matthew McDermott, New York, NY on 06.18.09
Back in March the University of Copenhagen and the International Alliance of Research Universities hosted the Copenhagen Climate Congress, whose goal was to sort of fill in the gaps and update everyone on the science of climate change, since the last IPCC report. At the end of the conference an interim summary was produced, but now the final synthesis report has been released. It has six key messages:
1. Climate Changes We’re Observing Go Beyond Natural Variability
Recent observations show that greenhouse gas emissions and many aspects of the climate are changing near the upper boundary of the IPCC range of projections. Many key climate indicators are already moving beyond the patterns of natural variability within which contemporary society and economy have developed and thrived. These indicators include global mean surface temperature, sea-level rise, global ocean temperature, Arctic sea ice extent, ocean acidification, and extreme climatic events. With unabated emissions, many trends in climate will likely accelerate, leading to an increasing risk of abrupt or irreversible climatic shifts.
2. Temperature Increase Beyond 2°C Will Be Very Difficult to Cope With
The research community provides much information to support discussions on “dangerous climate change”. Recent observations show that societies and ecosystems are highly vulnerable to even modest levels of climate change, with poor nations and communities, ecosystem services and biodiversity particularly at risk. Temperature rises above 2°C will be difficult for contemporary societies to cope with, and are likely to cause major societal and environmental disruptions through the rest of the century and beyond.
3. Weak Initial Emission Reduction Increases Risk of Catastrophe
Rapid, sustained, and effective mitigation based on coordinated global and regional action is required to avoid “dangerous climate change” regardless of how it is defined. Weaker targets for 2020 increase the risk of serious impacts, including the crossing of tipping points, and make the task of meeting 2050 targets more difficult and costly. Setting a credible long-term price for carbon and the adoption of policies that promote energy efficiency and low-carbon technologies are central to effective mitigation.
4. Preventing Climate Change Must Be Linked With Improving Social Equity
Climate change is having, and will have, strongly differential effects on people within and between countries and regions, on this generation and future generations, and on human societies and the natural world. An effective, well-funded adaptation safety net is required for those people least capable of coping with climate change impacts, and equitable mitigation strategies are needed to protect the poor and most vulnerable. Tackling climate change should be seen as integral to the broader goals of enhancing socioeconomic development and equity throughout the world.
5. Inaction is Inexcusable
Society already has many tools and approaches – economic, technological, behavioural, and managerial – to deal effectively with the climate change challenge. If these tools are not vigorously and widely implemented, adaptation to the unavoidable climate change and the societal transformation required to decarbonise economies will not be achieved. A wide range of benefits will flow from a concerted effort to achieve effective and rapid adaptation and mitigation. These include job growth in the sustainable energy sector; reductions in the health, social, economic and environmental costs of climate change; and the repair of ecosystems and revitalisation of ecosystem services.
6. How to Meet the Challenge
If the societal transformation required to meet the climate change challenge is to be achieved, then a number of significant constraints must be overcome and critical opportunities seized. These include reducing inertia in social and economic systems; building on a growing public desire for governments to act on climate change; reducing activities that increase greenhouse gas emissions and reduce resilience (e.g. subsidies); and enabling the shifts from ineffective governance and weak institutions to innovative leadership in government, the private sector and civil society. Linking climate change with broader sustainable consumption and production concerns, human rights issues and democratic values is crucial for shifting societies
towards more sustainable development pathways.
Those wanting to dig into some more specifics on each of these key messages should download the report: Synthesis Report — Climate Change: Global Risks, Challenges & Decisions [PDF]
Lloyd’s List, June 17, 2009 – Shipping and logistics companies are embracing green innovations partly to save money through lower fuel bills, partly to comply with international regulations, including those covering ballast water management and wastewater discharges, and partly because of customer demand.
And, on a more altruistic level, some owners, including French liner boss Jacques Saadé, are embracing green innovations to ensure a sustainable environment for future generations.
But whatever the motivation, green innovations are coming to the fore as an increasing number of shipping and logistics outfits are assessing their impact on the environment and attempt to improve their environmental credentials.
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The report, carried out by Cap Gemini and Georgia Tech, showed just 51% of the logistics companies surveyed thought there would be a positive return on investments in green innovations. A further 35% were undecided and 14% thought there would not be a positive return. At the same, less than half of their customers were optimistic about using environmental criteria in the selection of companies.
The study also showed the gap between what logistics companies’ customers considered what was most important that logistics operators should be doing and what logistics companies were actually doing. Asked what was most important to improve their green credentials, 77% of customers answered that improvements in transportation efficiencies including effective shipment consolidation, routing and mode were important. By comparison, 31% of customers said their logistics companies were actually making efficiency improvements.
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On a more local level, firms are also seizing the initiative as witnessed by the move by Orient Overseas Container Line to be included in a guide on how to reduce emissions produced by Hong Kong’s Climate Change Business Forum in partnership with the Hong Kong General Chamber of Commerce.
The guide details the steps companies should take to reduce emissions and outlines the resulting business opportunities, return on investments and bottom line savings.
Commenting on its involvement, OOCL chief executive Philip Chow said: “We believe every business in every industry must work proactively to reduce harmful emissions and business leaders should encourage sustainable economic development through innovative and voluntary measures. This guide provides a comprehensive starting point and excellent information source on the challenges we are all facing.”
Because I have recently focused much of my research on the Water and Wastewater sector in Canada, I have created another blog to share this specific information with a broader community. The new blog, called Water in the Works, is hosted by wordpress at waterintheworks.wordpress.com . Stop in sometime and say hi 
Michelle
Value Chain Approaches to a Low-Carbon Economy: Business and Policy Partnerships was prepared in support of a workshop at the World Business Summit on Climate Change (Summit) on leveraging value chains to reduce climate impacts and build a low-carbon economy.
It is widely acknowledged that making significant progress on mitigating the impact of climate change depends on reducing the impacts of supply chains.
A recent McKinsey study shows that 40 to 60 percent of companies’ total carbon footprints reside upstream in their supply chains, suggesting the scale of the opportunity. Fundamental changes in consumer behavior, supply chain structure and management, and business models are needed for long-term success.
The scope of this challenge is reinforced by a current knowledge gap: most suppliers do not track or report carbon emissions data; buyers do not control suppliers’ emissions or have access to accompanying data, and there is disagreement on how to measure and apportion responsibility for supply chain emissions.
The paper aims to illuminate the development of value chain approaches that address current challenges and unlock opportunities to capture value.
First, it describes the economic and environmental pressures on existing value chain models. It is clear that the economic and policy conditions under which extended supply chains emerged in the past quarter-century are changing rapidly as a result of climate, and that these trends may accelerate soon. In this light, the ongoing viability of current supply chain models can no longer be assumed.
Second, the report outlines the distinct elements of the value chain model, to illustrate how climate change will impact all links in the value chain, from product development to assembly to distribution to end-of-life. The paper suggests that companies look at both the full lifecycle of their products and services, and individual elements of the value chain, to identify the opportunities for greatest impact.
Third, it identifies promising examples of innovative action that—in collaboration with others along the value chain—are beginning to tackle the monumental challenges we face.
Finally, the paper raises questions about policy implications. Businesses face a parallel challenge of remaking their internal processes while engaging with public officials differently, to support the development of policy frameworks that can support the creation of value chains that will thrive and shape the low-carbon economy.
Web Site:http://www.bsr.org/
Dimas: Europe Will Outperform Kyoto Goals
Reuters / May 29, 2009
European Union environment commissioner Stavros Dimas said on Friday that the trade bloc was on track to beat Kyoto emissions goals for 2012. Weather has played a big role, however.
Stavros Dimas, the European Union’s environment commissioner, said on Friday that E.U. nations covered by the Kyoto climate treaty are on track to exceed a collective goal to slash emissions by 8 percent by 2012 compared with 1990 levels.
“We are sure that we are going to overshoot” the target, Mr. Dimas told a press conference in Brussels. The results showed a third consecutive year of declines and was further evidence that Europe was successfully decoupling its economic growth from emissions growth, he said.
Mr. Dimas gave his assessment while describing figures that showed emissions among 15 nations fell by 1.6 percent in 2007 compared to 2006. During the same period, output had grown 2.7 percent.
The figures were compiled by the European Environment Agency.
Mr. Dimas acknowledged that much of the drop in 2007 was attributable to favorable weather conditions, which cut energy use, rather than to structural changes in the economy. The drops in emissions in 2006 and 2005 were 0.6 percent and 0.9 percent respectively.
Mr. Dimas also acknowledged that gases from refrigeration and air conditioning rose in 2007, and he said that the drop in emissions in 2007 could have been even more extensive if emissions in some E.U. countries were not still rising.
Emissions in Spain rose 2.1 percent between 2006 and 2007 while emissions in Greece rose 2.9 percent over the same period.
Those countries could be obliged to buy credits, or offsets, from other parts of the world to reduce the size of their carbon footprints, and they could be forced to pay financial penalties, Mr. Dimas said. The European Commission could recommend imposing such sanctions as soon as 2010 if emissions in those countries remained excessive, he said.
The numbers presented on Friday are different from figures released earlier this month on the Emissions Trading System, which covers emissions by heavy industry and excludes emissions from sources like transport and homes.
That system showed a sharp drop in emissions last year compared with 2007 – largely because of the economic downturn.
Link Water, Energy and Climate in Global Talks, Business Urges
Istanbul, 19 March 2009 – Business leaders from some of the world’s biggest companies today called for water, energy and climate change to be linked in global negotiations, such as the international climate talks due to culminate in Copenhagen in December.
The business leaders were speaking at the launch of a report by the World Business Council for Sustainable Development at the 5th World Water Forum in Istanbul. The forum is expected to produce a ministerial statement calling for proactive policies on water issues.
“Water is everybody’s business. It is used to generate energy, and energy is used to provide water. Climate change will affect the use and availability of both. It is important that we get the policies right,” said Björn Stigson, president of the WBCSD.
“The World Water Forum in Istanbul has done a lot to focus attention on water, energy and climate change. But there is still a significant gap in addressing all three together at a global level. We must link them in the climate negotiations to have any real hope of finding a solution.”
The report, Water, Energy and Climate Change: A contribution from the business community ( 1.8 MB), says water, energy and climate change are inextricably linked.
“Water plays a central role in many of the world’s most pressing issues, among them climate change, energy security and the need to spur economic growth. The time has passed for commitment alone – we must act,” said Steve R. Loranger, CEO of ITT Corporation and co-chair of the WBCSD Water Project.
The paper lists five important policy recommendations from business to climate negotiators and policy-makers. These are:
- Provide reliable climate change risk data, models and analysis tools.
- Integrate water and energy efficiency in measurement tools and policy.
- Bring water issues into the mainstream, and ensure that water authorities and institutions have staff trained to deliver common management practices, education and awareness raising.
- Integrate and value ecosystem services (the benefits that nature provides to society, such as water and forest products) into cross-border decision-making.
- Encourage best practice through innovation, appropriate solutions and community engagement.
It also includes 25 case studies showing how business is already linking water, energy and climate across their operations.
From the Economist via LN Publisher – April 9, 2009
Water shortages are a growing problem, but not for the reasons most people think
THE overthrow of Madagascar’s president in mid-March was partly caused by water problems—in South Korea. Worried by the difficulties of increasing food supplies in its water-stressed homeland, Daewoo, a South Korean conglomerate, signed a deal to lease no less than half Madagascar’s arable land to grow grain for South Koreans. Widespread anger at the terms of the deal (the island’s people would have received practically nothing) contributed to the president’s unpopularity. One of the new leader’s first acts was to scrap the agreement.
Three weeks before that, on the other side of the world, Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger of California declared a state of emergency. Not for the first time, he threatened water rationing in the state. “It is clear,” says a recent report by the United Nations World Water Assessment Programme, “that urgent action is needed if we are to avoid a global water crisis.”
Local water shortages are multiplying. Australia has suffered a decade-long drought. Brazil and South Africa, which depend on hydroelectric power, have suffered repeated brownouts because there is not enough water to drive the turbines properly. So much has been pumped out of the rivers that feed the Aral Sea in Central Asia that it collapsed in the 1980s and has barely begun to recover.
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Two global trends have added to the pressure on water. Both are likely to accelerate over coming decades.
The first is demography. Over the past 50 years, as the world’s population rose from 3 billion to 6.5 billion, water use roughly trebled. On current estimates, the population is likely to rise by a further 2 billion by 2025 and by 3 billion by 2050. Demand for water will rise accordingly.
Or rather, by more. Possibly a lot more. It is not the absolute number of people that makes the biggest difference to water use but changing habits and diet. Diet matters more than any single factor because agriculture is the modern Agasthya, the mythical Indian giant who drank the seas dry. Farmers use about three-quarters of the world’s water; industry uses less than a fifth and domestic or municipal use accounts for a mere tenth.
The other long-term trend affecting water is climate change. There is growing evidence that global warming is speeding up the hydrologic cycle–that is, the rate at which water evaporates and falls again as rain or snow. This higher rate seems to make wet regions more sodden, and arid ones drier. It brings longer droughts between more intense periods of rain.
Climate change has three big implications for water use. First, it changes the way plants grow. Trees, for example, react to downpours with a spurt of growth. During the longer droughts that follow, the extra biomass then dries up so that if lightning strikes, forests burn more spectacularly. Similarly crops grow too fast, then wilt.
Second, climate change increases problems of water management. Larger floods overwhelm existing controls. Reservoirs do not store enough to get people or plants through longer droughts. In addition, global warming melts glaciers and causes snow to fall as rain. Since snow and ice are natural regulators, storing water in winter and releasing it in summer, countries are swinging more violently between flood and drought. That is one big reason why dams, once a dirty word in development, have been making a comeback, especially in African countries with plenty of water but no storage capacity. The number of large dams (more than 15 metres high) has been increasing and the order books of dam builders are bulging.
Third, climate change has persuaded western governments to subsidise biofuels, which could prove as big a disaster for water as they already have been for food. At the moment, about 2% of irrigated water is used to grow crops for energy, or 44km3. But if all the national plans and policies to increase biofuels were to be implemented, reckons the UN, they would require an extra 180km3 of water. Though small compared with the increase required to feed the additional 2 billion people, the biofuels’ premium is still substantial.
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The world might also be better off, at least in terms of water, if trade patterns more closely reflected the amount of water embedded in traded goods (a concept called “virtual water” invented by Tony Allan of King’s College London). Some benign effects happen already: Mexico imports cereals from America which use 7 billion cubic metres (m{+3}) of water. If it grew these cereals itself, it would use 16 billion m{+3}, so trade “saves” 9 billion m{+3} of water. But such beneficial exchanges occur more by chance than design. Because most water use is not measured, let alone priced, trade rarely reflects water scarcities.
Water is rarely priced in ways that reflect supply and demand. Usually, water pricing simply means that city dwellers pay for the cost of the pipes that transport it and the sewerage plants that clean it.
Basic information about who uses how much water is lacking. Rainwater and river flows can be measured with some accuracy. But the amount pumped out of lakes is a matter of guesswork and information on how much is taken from underground aquifers is almost completely lacking.
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As is often the way, business is ahead of governments in getting to grips with waste. Big drinks companies such as Coca Cola have set themselves targets to reduce the amount of water they use in making their products (in Coke’s case, by 20% by 2012). The Nature Conservancy, an ecologically-minded NGO, is working on a certification plan which aims to give companies and businesses seals of approval (a bit like the Fairtrade symbol) according to how efficiently they use water. The plan is supposed to get going in 2010. That sort of thing is a good start, but just one step in a long process that has barely begun.
Oct 6th 2008
From Economist.com
The world will soon know more about carbon dioxide
SINCE the start of the industrial age, the concentration of carbon dioxide in earth’s atmosphere has increased by about 25%—from about 280 parts per million to over 370 parts per million. As concerns over climate change increase, scientists are being asked difficult questions about the extent to which carbon is being put into, and taken out of, the atmosphere. Precise answers to questions like these are necessary to reliably forecast changes in earth’s climate. But massive gaps remain in our understanding of what happens to carbon dioxide after it has been produced.
Unfortunately, essential data on the geographic distribution of CO2 does not yet exist. Currently, the Carbon Dioxide Information Analysis Center, based in the United States, monitors emissions from a global network of ground-based sites. But there are not enough stations to give the kind of resolution that climate modellers need. Consequently, the processes that regulate the exchange of CO2 between the oceans, atmosphere and biosphere are poorly known. This is a problem. For example, current measurements from ground stations suggest that only half of the CO2 released into the atmosphere has remained there. There rest has been absorbed by the oceans and land-based ecosystems, but understanding where, how and why this happens is difficult without more data.
NASA
Artist’s impression of the Orbiting Carbon Observatory
Artist’s impression of the Orbiting Carbon ObservatoryWhat is needed, then, is a high-resolution global map of CO2. And one may now be forthcoming, thanks to a planned new NASA satellite, the Orbiting Carbon Observatory (OCO), scheduled for launch on January 15, 2009 and discussed this week at the International Astronautical Congress in Glasgow.
The OCO’s mission, for the next two years, is to map in detail where carbon is being produced and where it is being lost. It will help to document the natural processes and human activities that regulate the abundance and distribution of this important greenhouse gas. Surprisingly, these will be the first space-based measurements of CO2.
During the OCO’s mission, it will fly in an orbit that allows it to observe most of the earth’s surface at least once every sixteen days. It will also fly in a loose formation with a series of other earth-orbiting satellites known as the Earth Observing System Afternoon Constellation, or the A-train. This formation flying will allow data from the OCO to be compared with those obtained by other earth-observing satellites.
And like that data, the OCO’s will have to be “ground truthed”—meaning it will have to be checked to ensure that they accurately measure what is happening on the ground. Scientists have to make sure that satellites that detect things such as forest, grassland, water vapour and CO2, are really seeing these things. To do this, scientists at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) need to overcome some steep challenges.
Because the satellite measurements are essentially an average in a column of gas, it is important to know as much as possible how that measurement relates to the actual gas from the ground to the upper atmosphere. But this is where it gets tricky: while measurements can be regularly taken on the ground, and using airline flights, how do you regularly, and reliably, get into the high atmosphere?
Enter a project that seeks to take tourists into space using a high-altitude aircraft to carry a rocket of thrill seekers to 110km. The high-altitude aircraft, known as White Knight Two, will start its test flights this year. It will regularly fly above 50,000 feet, and as of next year will be carrying a series of experiments designed to support the OCO, which will allow scientists to profile the atmosphere of more than 90% of the atmospheric column.
The OCO heralds an important new era of climate change research. And this is relevant to all of us because climate change will likely affect everyone. Some places will warm but others could well cool. Jet streams, ocean currents and rainfall patterns may change. Understanding what might happen is essential. Even if we don’t like the answers.
The Global Carbon Project (GPC) released its Climate Trends 2007 update, and there’s some sobering news within the latest update.
- The concentration of carbon dioxide (CO2) in the atmosphere was 383 parts per million (ppm) in 2007, 37% over pre-industrial revolution concentrations (280 ppm), higher than any concentration over the last 650,000 years, and “probably” higher than any concentration in the last 20 million years.
- Actual emissions of CO2 over the period of 2000-2007 are higher than the highest (worst-case) IPCC emissions scenario.
- Growth in emissions from cement and coal power plants in developing nations (mostly India and China) now account for more than 50% of all CO2 emissions and a related stagnation in carbon intensity (amount of GDP per unit of carbon).
- The amount of CO2 extracted from the air by natural carbon sinks is rising, but slower than CO2 emissions. In addition, natural carbon sinks have lost efficiency over the last 50 years.
- The GPC concludes that all of the above combine to produce stronger CO2-driven climate forcing, and sooner than the IPCC estimates.
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