----- Original Message -----
From: "James Annan" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Newsgroups: gmane.science.general.global-change
To: <[email protected]>
Sent: Saturday, April 07, 2007 5:27 PM
Subject: [Global Change: 1393] Re: What are they thinking?
>
> Don Libby wrote:
>>
>> The emissions scenarios in the TAR agree on a consensus of sorts:
>> stabilization by 2100 cannot be achieved without at least six times more
>> nuclear power plants than exist today. That seems to me to be more than
>> "a
>> small part" of the answer, although I quite agree that it is not the
>> whole
>> answer: it is a necessary but not sufficient condition for stabilization.
>
> While I'm not saying the conclusion is necessarily wrong, note the SRES
> did not attempt to consider stabilisation scenarios, or indeed any
> direct CO2 mitigation effort at all (IMO a very disappointing decision
> which I hope they overturn for the next set of scenarios). So deliberate
> efforts to curb demand growth and promote renewables might achieve
> more than is suggested in the scenarios.
>
> James
True, the scenarios do not represent deliberate policies to achieve
stabilization. Never the less, some of the scenarios do achieve
stabilization by 2100. Those that do are distinguished from those that do
not by the extent to which nuclear power production increases (among other
things).
You and Gerhaus are correct to point out that the scenarios do not exhaust
all possible future emission trajectories. The SAR had an interesting "coal
intensive" stabilization scenario that relied entirely on permanent
sequestration of GHG emissions. Voluntary deprivation (or involuntary)
could reduce fossil fuel consumption too.
Some scenarios are more reasonable than others: "least cost" and
"cost-effective" numbering among the more reasonable in my opinion. The
SRES scenarios have reasonable assumptions about population and economic
growth trends. Given those boundary assumptions, the substitution of
nuclear power for coal power is a key stabilizing factor.
Today's headline: "TXU Sheds Coal Plan, Charts Nuclear Path" _Wall Street
Journal_ April 10, 2007. Now that's what I call a "tipping point"!
-dl
--~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups
Global Change ("globalchange") newsgroup. Global Change is a public, moderated
venue for discussion of science, technology, economics and policy dimensions of
global environmental change.
Posts will be admitted to the list if and only if any moderator finds the
submission to be constructive and/or interesting, on topic, and not
gratuitously rude.
To post to this group, send email to [email protected]
To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
For more options, visit this group at
http://groups.google.com/group/globalchange
-~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
