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Hear Noelle Selin discuss air pollution in China on Danish Radio. (Interview in Danish)

How costly are the health damages from air pollution in China?

China has experienced unprecedented development over the past three decades, but this growth has come at a substantial cost to the country’s environment and public health. China is notorious for extremely high levels of air pollution. As the country faces continuous environmental challenges that mirror its continuing development, there is a need to measure the health impacts of air pollution.

A recent study released by the MIT Joint Program on the Science and Policy of Global Change quantifies the damage to the Chinese economy caused by a lack of air-quality control measures between 1975 and 2005. Not surprisingly, the MIT researchers found that air pollutants produced a substantial socio-economic cost to China over the past three decades.

What makes this study unique is that researchers looked at long-term economic impacts that arise from health damages, and how pollution-induced morbidity and mortality cases may have had ripple effects on the Chinese economy beyond the time period when those cases actually occurred. This method creates a comprehensive picture of the cumulative impacts of air pollution on a dynamic, fast-developing country.

“This study represents a more accurate picture than previous studies of the air-pollution damages associated with rapid economic development in China,” says Noelle Selin, an assistant professor of engineering systems in MIT’s Engineering Systems Division, with a joint appointment in atmospheric chemistry in the Department of Earth, Atmospheric and Planetary Sciences. “A major advantage of this study over previous work is that it links state-of-the-art atmospheric modeling tools with a comprehensive global economic model incorporating health and economic damages from pollution.”

To observe how changes in pollutants, and their associated health impacts, have historically affected the Chinese economy, the MIT researchers modeled the number of cases of health incidences caused by air pollution — such as restricted-activity days, respiratory hospital admissions and asthma attacks, to name a few examples — given a pollution level and the number of people exposed. Then the model calculated the summed costs of these incidences — i.e., payments for health services and medicine, loss of labor and productivity from time off work, loss of leisure time needed for healing — to estimate the total change in available labor supply.

The study focused on two major air pollutants: particulate matter and ozone. Levels of particulate matter, which causes respiratory and cardiovascular diseases and accounts for a large fraction of damage to human health, are extremely high in China. In the 1980s, particulate matter concentrations were at least 10-16 times higher than the World Health Organization’s annual guidelines. Even in 2005, after significant improvements in Chinese air quality, concentrations were still about five times higher than the guidelines.

China has only recently begun monitoring levels of the second air pollutant, ozone. Chinese ozone data does not exist between 1970 and 2005, the period considered in this study. In fact, most air pollution studies of China omit the pollutant completely due to lack of data. However, the MIT study incorporates historical ozone levels over the past three decades as simulated by GEOS-Chem (a chemical transport model) and MIT’s Integrated Global Systems Model, thus significantly improving on previous studies of pollution damage.

The researchers found that, although the magnitude of air pollution in China decreased over the three decades, damages associated with the pollutants created a substantial burden on the Chinese economy. “The results clearly indicate that ozone and particulate matter have substantially impacted the Chinese economy over the past 30 years,” Selin says.

When comparing historical pollution levels and the associated impacts with a counterfactual scenario in which pollutants were restricted to background levels, or the best attainable air quality standards, China experienced an increasing loss in welfare — from $22 billion lost in 1975 to $122 billion lost in 2005 — from pollution-related health impacts.

There are two main reasons for the increasing loss in welfare, despite reduced levels of pollution between 1975 and 2005. First, rapid urbanization and growth increased the number of people exposed. Second, productivity of labor increases over time so that costs from lost labor are higher in recent times than in periods in the past. These factors outweigh the small improvements in air quality.

If a modest, feasible level of air-pollution control measures had been implemented over the time period, China would have reaped an increasing benefit in welfare — potentially growing from $18 billion gained in 1975 to $80 billion in 2005.

Similar studies conducted by the World Bank have found that air pollution in China caused damages equal to 4-5 percent of the Chinese GDP between 1995 and 2005. However, these estimates are based on static measurements that do not measure the cumulative, long-term impacts of health damages. The MIT study found a significantly higher level of damage, equaling 6-9 percent of the Chinese GDP. The dynamic, cumulative method used in the MIT study may be particularly applicable to developing countries that are experiencing rapid growth.

The MIT study looked at the benefits of air-quality controls on health damages in China, but did not calculate the costs of implementing such policies. Future work will focus on the costs of pollution controls so that a complete cost-benefit analysis can be developed.


Related documents: Health Damages from Air Pollution in China

Press Release:
Top economist will work with experts around the world to address global food issues
May 24, 2011 (MILAN) – John M. Reilly, Co-Director of the MIT Joint Program on the Science and Policy of Global Change, is now the newest member of the Barilla Center for Food and Nutrition (BCFN) Advisory Board, a panel of top health, food, environment, economy and medical experts around the world. Dr. Reilly will collaborate with other BCFN experts and Board members to analyze and develop proposals on pressing global food and nutrition issues.

The BCFN is a think tank established to gather global knowledge on food, analyze it and propose solutions to negotiate the challenges of the future. It aims to encourage general well-being through a healthy and sustainable approach to food. Over the last three years, the BCFN has published 11 works on the subjects of environmental sustainability, relationship between food and health in adults and children, access to food resources and cultural value of food.

“An integrated look at the food system considering the nutrition and health of consumers, the environmental sustainability of the production system, and its potential vulnerability to climate and environmental change is much needed as we look ahead to a growing world population and increased threats of environmental change,” Dr. Reilly said. “I look forward to working with the BCFN on these topics and expect to learn as much as I contribute given the outstanding group of experts the center has assembled to support their work.”

Dr. Reilly, an energy, environmental and agricultural economist, focuses on understanding the role of human activities as a contributor to global environmental change and the effects of environmental change on society and the economy. A key element of his work is the integration of economic models of the global economy as it represents human activity with models of biophysical systems, including the ocean, atmosphere and terrestrial vegetation.

“Our board members are the best in their fields, and we are excited to have Dr. Reilly join us,” said Guido Barilla, BCFN Chairman. “His experience and research on energy systems and the intersection of the economy and the environment will be key to our future research on the sustainability issues of the food and nutrition industry.”

The BCFN Advisory Board ensures that the most advanced knowledge and foremost professional capacities are used to address the BCFN’s specific themes and to enhance and refine the quality of its work. The members identify topics of interest, develop distinctive and scientifically valid content and make proposals and recommendations. Dr. Reilly will join the current members:

• Barbara Buchner, Director of the Climate Policy Initiative of Venice
• Mario Monti, President of the Università Bocconi of Milan
• Gabriele Riccardi, Professor of Endocrinology and Metabolic Pathologies at the Università degli Studi of Naples
• Camillo Ricordi, Professor of Surgery, Medicine, Biomedical Engineering, Microbiology and Immunology at the University of Miami
• Claude Fischler, Directeur de Recherche at CNRS
• Umberto Veronesi, Scientific Director of the European Institute of Oncology of Milan

About the Barilla Center for Food and Nutrition
The Barilla Center for Food & Nutrition is a multidisciplinary think tank focusing on issues of food and nutrition and their relations to economics, medicine, diet, sociology and the environment.

The work of the Barilla Center for Food & Nutrition is backed by an authoritative Advisory Board composed of Barbara Buchner, Director of the Climate Policy Initiative of Venice; Jean-Paul Fitoussi and Mario Monti, economists; Gabriele Riccardi, endocrinologist; Camillo Ricordi, surgeon and scientist; Claude Fischler and Joseph Sassoon, sociologists; and Umberto Veronesi, oncologist.

by James Ott
Aviation Week, May 20, 2011

A report from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) should be required reading for environmental policymakers. “The Impact of Climate Policy on US Aviation” was issued this week by the Transportation Research Board. It is an independent assessment and takes no prisoners in the sometimes strange world of environmental protection.

The policy in question is the proposed American Clean Energy and Security Act of 2009 [H.R. 2454], also known as the Waxman-Markey bill. It looked like a sure winner for a while and prompted the study. But the plan to curtail greenhouse gas emissions failed in the Senate. Yet cap-and-trade programs are likely to come up again, says Niven Winchester, an MIT research scientist, so the conclusions of the report are connected to a likely future.

 Based on traffic growth forecasts from the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO), emissions from aviation, if the law was passed, are estimated to increase between 97-122% between 2012 and 2050. This compares with 130% growth without a policy. The proposal would have affected all U.S. industries as the targets were refineries that would have been required to purchase allowances for each potential ton of carbon dioxide emissions. Aviation would have been heavily affected by this cap-and-trade deal because fuel represents 26% of total costs, and it is hard to make a shift to other sources. Other industries can shift relatively easily from coal to electricity, for example.

 The study concludes that abatement options for aviation are costly relative to mitigation options in other sectors. In addition to increasing fuel price, the study indicates that the law would reduce fleet efficiency, “as increased air fares reduce demand and slow the introduction of new aircraft.”

 An unsettled and contentious issue is how one nation’s climate policy will affect foreign carriers flying to and from that nation, the report said. The Air Transport Association of America (ATA) filed a suit, challenging the legality of requiring U.S. airline flights to and from the European Union to purchase allowances under the law there. It’s always interesting when one nation’s plans interfere with those of another.

 The study was carried out by MIT’s Partnership for AIR Transportation Noise and Emissions Reduction, a center of excellence backed by the FAA, NASA and Transport Canada. A key conclusion compares favorably with the ATA’s concerns over the bill’s impact on profitability. ATA estimated that the fuel bill would increase airline costs by $5 billion in 2012 and $10 billion in 2020. The report cited 10 previous papers on the subject of environmental policy, largely using the EU experience. The latest is one of two related to U.S. environmental policy. The partnership’s web site is http://www.partner.aero

Joint Program Report 198: The Impact of Climate Policy on US Aviation


Aviation CO2 emissions in the reference and policy scenarios, 2066-2050

by John Reilly with Henry Jacoby, Ronald Prinn, and Richard Schmalensee
Huffington Post, May 20, 2011

Recent research has shown that over the next few decades an effective U.S. climate policy to significantly reduce greenhouse gas emissions would rely on extensive reductions in energy use and substitution of natural gas for coal in power generation. The second pathway -- gas-for-coal -- is premised on the fact that natural gas, when combusted, produces 50 percent lower CO2 emissions than coal.

 A recent paper by Cornell Professor Robert Howarth and others in Climatic Change Letters calls the gas-for-coal solution into serious question, suggesting that natural gas power generation is twice as greenhouse gas (GHG) intensive as coal. Howarth bases this conclusion in part on his assessment of methane leakage in the production stages of natural gas, with a specific focus on new methods to produce unconventional shale gas.

 Natural gas is primarily methane. There are methane leakages at different stages of the production process, as well as CO2 emissions when natural gas is burned to generate electricity. Methane is a powerful GHG but, unlike CO2, which resides in the atmosphere for over a century, methane lives in the atmosphere for around a decade.

 The Howarth study raises some legitimate questions about the uncertainties surrounding associated estimates of methane emissions -- but Howarth's conclusions depend on a couple of unsound assumptions.

 First is the metric Howarth used to compare the warming impact of methane to that of CO2. This can be a complex calculation, because there are several different kinds of GHGs with different life spans and varying impacts on the climate.

 To make a comparison among these different GHGs, whose lifetimes can range from a few to thousands of years, the "global warming potential" (GWP) concept was developed in the 1990s. In general, policymakers have focused on GWPs calculated over a 100-year period, although the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) also calculated GWPs over 20- and 500-year periods.

 The choice between 20-, 100-, or 500-year GWPs comes down to whether one wants to measure the near-term impacts of global warming or the longer-term impacts. Choosing an index based on 20 years, as Howarth has done, largely ignores serious longer term risks of climate change, masking the urgent need to immediately start controlling those GHGs that will remain in the atmosphere for hundreds to thousands of years.

 Howarth's choice threatens to tilt critical policies away from some of the more dangerous risks we face in the longer term, focusing us instead on near-term and largely manageable gas production methane leakage. For these reasons, his choice of the 20 year GWP is outside the norm -- indeed, EPA, DOE, the California Air Resources Board, and others routinely use the 100 year GWP in their policy analysis.

 Howarth also assumes a gas power generation efficiency as low as 28 percent. That figure can be misleading, because it applies not to the "base-load" generation units that would compete with coal to meet the consistent daily electricity demand of consumers, but to "peaking units" which help meet variable demand in electricity. Peaking units have relatively low efficiencies, in the range suggested by Howarth.

 Natural gas base-load units have efficiencies in the 40-54 percent range, compared to 30-35 percent for the current fleet of coal plants. The higher the efficiency, the less CO2 is emitted for every kilowatt hour of electricity produced.

 Recalculating the gas-coal comparison using Howarth's methane emissions figures -- but sticking with the 100-year GWP and more accurate gas unit efficiencies -- shows roughly 50 percent lower greenhouse gas emissions from natural gas generation compared to coal generation.

 Finally, it is important to recognize that methane leakage from natural gas production is wasted product with economic value: gas producers have a financial incentive to capture this methane. And ideally, climate policy through a GHG price would penalize methane leakage, providing producers with additional incentives for capturing methane.

 Reduced energy use and coal-to-gas substitution could provide a bridge to a low carbon future, enabling us to move forward on climate change mitigation while we continue critical research on other more advanced technologies. Energy alternatives require close scrutiny for their range of impacts on the environment -- the environmental effects of shale gas are no exception. 

It would, however, require much more compelling evidence and analysis to persuade us that we should actually use more coal and less natural gas power generation, a logical conclusion from Howarth's paper. Calculations that test conventional wisdom are important in driving further scrutiny. The preponderance of the evidence, however, continues to support the conclusion that substitution of gas for coal in power generation is an important component of a sensible and effective near-term climate change policy.

New York Times, May 18, 2011
By DAVID LEONHARDT

Michael Greenstone and Adam Looney, economists at The Hamilton Project, are releasing a new paper Wednesday on the costs of American energy policy. They argue:

For example, Mr. Greenstone and Mr. Looney estimate that a coal plant must spend 3.2 cents to produce a kilowatt hour of electricity (and consumers then pay slightly more than this). This price appears to be a bargain, the economists write, but the true costs — once health costs, military costs and the like are taken into account — are more than twice high: 8.8 cents per kilowatt hour.

The paper calls for four steps that will be familiar to anyone who follows climate policy: a carbon tax or cap-and-trade system; more money for research and development; more efficient regulations; and negotiations with foreign countries over similar steps elsewhere. In the foreseeable future, all these steps all seem to be an enormous long shot. But the climate problem is not going away.

In addition to being the director of the Hamilton Project, Mr. Greenstone is an M.I.T. professor and one of the country’s leading environment economists. More from the paper follows:

Full text pdf available here: A Strategy for America’s Energy Future

Projections of World Energy Consumption (EIA 2010)

‘Under the Dome’ showcases discovery and innovation; first open house in decades.
Emily Finn, MIT News Office
April 30, 2011

The Joint Program on the Science and Policy of Global Change participated in Saturday's Open House with exhibits in the Energy, Environment and Sustainability Tent

Approximately 20,000 people descended on campus Saturday for “Under the Dome,” MIT's first open house in more than 30 years, where visitors of all ages got an up-close and often hands-on view of MIT’s cutting-edge work.

During the 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. event, virtually every segment of the Institute, from cancer research to aeronautics to the performing arts, opened its doors with demonstrations, lectures and activities to engage the community. Of the makeup of the diverse crowd, MIT President Susan Hockfield said, “We’ve seen lots of families and lots of young people. Some of them are MIT students-to-be — I hope today holds enough interest and excitement to fuel your passion for the kind of things we do here.”

Dan Coleman of Mobile, Ala., who came to MIT with his 16-year-old son, was impressed by the accessibility of the event. “People have this idea that stuff at MIT is all over their heads, but [this event] brings it down to a level much closer to what they see every day,” he said.

Look up, look down, look all around
At precisely 11 a.m., twin Black Hawk helicopters flew over the Charles River, circled Simmons Hall and touched down in Briggs Field, kicking up dust over a delighted crowd. Their pilots, from the National Guard and MIT Army ROTC, descended from the choppers to explain aspects of the Black Hawks’ design and function and pose for photos.

But the helicopters were just the beginning for flight enthusiasts. Many of the day’s events had visitors looking up — while piloting a basketball-sized SPHERES satellite in the Space Systems Lab, or observing the trajectories of model airplanes they had built with their own hands. There were demonstrations of how aircraft can be flown using everything from computers to robots to iPhones.

While some craned their necks skyward, others bent over magnifiers, peering through lenses to examine carbon nanotubes or biology’s tiny “water bear” organisms. “They really do look like bears,” said 11-year-old Andrea Burke of Cambridge, raising her eyebrows as she peered through a microscope.

“There’s been a lot of interest; it’s great to see people from all different backgrounds and ages come out and actually ask really smart questions,” said Andrew Kopeikin, a graduate student in aeronautics and astronautics, who was running a station where visitors could fly unmanned aerial vehicles.

Meg Krench, a graduate student in brain and cognitive sciences, echoed Kopeikin’s sentiments as she held one end of a rope demonstration designed to simulate the actions of neurons. “I’ve been fascinated by the number of kids that have come by that have been so well versed in neuroscience,” she said.

Robots, glass art and contests — oh my!
Many of the day’s activities carried a competitive component. A blimp contest, hosted by former astronaut Jeff Hoffman, Professor of the Practice in Department of Aeronautics and Astronautics, featured several heats of student-built remote-controlled blimps racing around a track set up in the Johnson Athletics Center. “[The team] ‘Nerdy Blimp Domination’ had a pretty awesome finish,” according to 8-year-old Elias Hyde of Cambridge.

Hockfield herself announced the winner of the blimp competition when she took the stage at 1 p.m. in Johnson to deliver a welcome speech.

“I want to thank you all for being right here, right now, because I know there are about 2,000 other things you could be doing all around campus,” she said, before ceding the stage to the Department of Mechanical Engineering’s much-anticipated 2.007 robot competition.

Robots were indeed a theme throughout the day. There were robots made from LEGOs, robots that could chase a moving light, and robots that could scuttle up the sides of buildings. The ground floor of the Stata Center played host to a vast array of engineering demonstrations that captivated young and old alike.

When asked what her favorite activity was, Daniela Ronga, an 11-year-old from Pelham, N.H., was deciding between robots that could pick up tennis balls, a rope-system rescue demonstration ascending the wall of Building 3, and glass blowing.

"I don’t know. There’s been a lot of cool things here,” she said with a smile.

Sharing the stage
Even amid a heavy science focus, MIT arts claimed a slice of the spotlight, as student music groups regaled visitors with a steady stream of performances outside the Stratton Student Center, as well as inside Kresge Auditorium and a nearby tent.

“I came for the science, but I guess I didn’t realize how much arts there are here,” said Amanda Garcia, a 14-year-old from Bedford, Mass., over the sounds of a nearby bagpipe.

Some activities even bridged art and science, like a math-inspired origami project that showed visitors how to create infinitely interlocking Sonobe units, or a Media Lab demonstration that had guests making music with pencils. Art installations across campus that were part of the MIT150 Festival of Art + Science + Technology (FAST) attracted plenty of attention, with guests pausing to smile and frown at the MIT Mood Meters — camera software that can detect facial expressions — installed in high-traffic corridors.

The entrepreneurial spirit also had a strong showing, with a startup showcase at the MIT Sloan School of Management and a lecture by Nobel Prize-winning economist Peter Diamond. “It’s great to show people what we do. I don’t know if this is more fun for them or for us!” said linguistics graduate student Kirill Shklovsky, who was luring participants with the promise of Mexican chocolate if they could solve puzzles in a rare Mayan language.

Delighting the senses
Meanwhile, tucked away in the northwest corner of campus, audience members donned “holographic diffraction glasses” as plasma scientists turned off the lights to reveal the distinct rainbow patterns — due to differing energy levels — produced by incandescent bulbs, compact fluorescent lamps and pure mercury. The demonstration even made use of everyday substances such as nail polish and pickles to light the room.

Across Massachusetts Avenue, visitors donned headphones — to block out the 120-decibel sound levels — and entered MIT’s Wright Brothers Wind Tunnel, where hair and loose clothing flapped wildly as they were subjected to winds that, according to 8-year-old Christian Gray of Cambridge, “felt much stronger than 30 miles per hour.”

t least one activity was not on the event’s official schedule. At noon, visitors in and around Lobby 7 were treated to a flash mob performance that began with five dancers and grew to a crowd of more than 100 MIT students, faculty and staff dancing in choreographed unison. Once the group reached a critical mass, it spilled out across Massachusetts Avenue, where police stopped traffic and more members of the MIT community — including some senior administrators — joined the dancers as they made their way across the street, many of them waving various nations’ flags above their heads. MIT mascot Tim the Beaver escorted Hockfield to the top of the steps, where she smiled and waved to the crowd.

“So, what do you think: Should we do this more often?” Hockfield asked a few minutes later, during her welcome speech. (Saturday’s event was MIT’s first open house since 1978.) The crowd’s enthusiastic cheers gave her the answer.

Nuclear power is poised to grow quickly in some parts of the world and could grow significantly here in the United States. Key decisions are pending, however, on how to structure that growth. MIT has completed a 3-year study on the Future of the Nuclear Fuel Cycle to address two overarching questions: (1) What are the long-term desirable fuel cycle options and (2) What are the implications for near-term policy choices?

On Tuesday, April 26, the study co-chairs - Professor Ernest J. Moniz, Director of the MIT Energy Initiative (MITEI) and Professor Mujid Kazimi, Director of the MIT Center for Advanced Nuclear Energy Systems - as well as Dr. Charles Forsberg, Executive Director of the MIT Fuel Cycle Study, and other members of the study group will discuss the findings and recommendations and respond to questions. The final report will be available both at the briefing and on the MITEI website after the event. The report is aimed principally at US government, industry, and academic leaders, but the study is carried out from an international perspective.

The press conference at which the study was released was webcast and can be viewed here. A summary of the report’s conclusions had been released earlier in September in a press conference held at the Center for Strategic and International Studies which can be viewed here.

Plug-in hybrid electric vehicles (PHEVs) can make a significant contribution towards reducing ozone levels. That's according to a study by US researchers who modelled the effect of different charging scenarios for PHEVs on ozone levels over the state of Texas, US.

Many regions of Texas fail to meet national air quality standards for ozone. Tammy Thompson and her colleagues from the University of Texas wanted to find out what effect the introduction of PHEVs would have on the levels of this pollutant.

A previous study had looked at night-time charging of PHEVs using electricity generated by coal-fired power stations. Although the researchers found that the overall ozone concentration would decrease by up to 8 ppb in a few highly populated areas, the work also showed that ozone concentrations, and those of other pollutants, might actually increase in certain highly localized areas (like those close to the power plant, for example), leading to an overall worsening of air quality. This suggests that the overall impact of PHEVs will be complex.

"We wanted to expand on this and look at different charging scenarios, and also model the Texas power grid to take into account the different sources of electricity," Thompson told environmentalresearchweb.
The researchers examined the impact of replacing 20% of gasoline-powered vehicle miles travelled (VMT) with electric VMT by the year 2018 in four major Texas cities. This involved first modelling the Texas power grid and the different electricity generation units that will be online in 2018 – including nuclear, coal, natural gas, biomass and wind energy plants.

Using this data, the researchers then modelled the different levels of ozone precursors, such as nitrogen oxides (NOx), that would be emitted by these power stations when the PHEVs are being charged. They used three different charging scenarios – night-time charging; charging to maximize battery life; and charging to maximize driver convenience. "Using this data to then model ozone levels is not straightforward because ozone is formed via a photochemical reaction when NOx, carbon monoxide and volatile organic compounds (VOCs) react in the atmosphere in the presence of sunlight," said Thompson. "For our modelling, we selected four days in 2018. These days were selected to represent four varying wind patterns, each blowing the emissions from power plants into or away from the cities being modelled."

The calculations showed that day-time ozone levels were reduced in most cases and were mainly due to the fact that there were fewer gasoline-powered cars on the roads. The different charging scenarios all produced similar amounts of ozone, with the night-time charging scenario deemed the most environmentally friendly.

"Ozone levels drop during the night because sunlight drives the production of ozone," said Thompson. "But Texas has more installed wind power than any other state and that wind blows strongly at night, which opens up the prospects for emissions-free charging of some portion of electric vehicles."

However, Texas experiences many episodes of high ozone concentrations and Thompson warns that "it is going to take a lot more than just a few PHEVs to significantly change the ozone levels over Texas for the better".

The researchers published their research in Environmental Research Letters (ERL).

Photo credits: Justin Knight

U.S. chief climate negotiator, MIT panel examine the science and policy of global warming

Signing a legally binding treaty that would force emissions reductions throughout the world is not likely in the near future, according to U.S. State Department Special Envoy for Climate Change Todd Stern, who visited MIT last week. But that shouldn't stop the United States from moving forward in addressing climate change issues, he said.

Stern's talk on Thursday, April 22, was part of the Earth Week Colloquium sponsored by the MIT Energy Initiative (MITEI) and the Joint Program on the Science and Policy of Global Change.

In his speech, Stern said work on an international treaty would inevitably hit a “dead end,” primarily because of a flaw in the first major global climate treaty signed nearly two decades ago. In 1992, 194 parties signed the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, a non-binding agreement between countries to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. The treaty set no mandatory limits, but it did draw a distinction between developed and developing countries. Ever since, Stern said, there has been a “firewall” at the negotiating table, with developing countries such as China arguing that the United States and other developed nations should bear the brunt of greenhouse gas reductions. [More... ]

Climate change, from past to future

Following Stern’s talk, a panel of MIT experts discussed scientific developments in climate change over the past 150 years, and made projections for the next 100 years, based on climate models and on-the-ground action to address global warming effects.

The panel was moderated by John M. Reilly, co-director of the MIT Joint Program on the Science and Policy of Global Change. Participants included Kerry Emanuel, the Breene M. Kerr Professor of Atmospheric Science; Christopher Knittel, the William Barton Rogers Professor of Energy Economics; MITEI Director Ernest Moniz, the Cecil and Ida Green Professor of Physics and Engineering Systems; Ronald Prinn, the TEPCO Professor of Atmospheric Science; and Sarah Slaughter, MITEI's associate director for buildings and infrastructure.

Emanuel looked back at the history of climate change, noting that hundreds of thousands of years ago, the very site where the panel was held — Wong Auditorium — would have been buried under a massive sheet of ice. Emanuel pointed out that volcanic activity and other natural phenomena may explain temperature spikes during the Earth’s early history, but “there aren’t any other culprits” aside from humans to explain the warming trends seen in the past 150 years.

Prinn, who discussed the next 100 years, described a “new dimension to climate science,” with climate modelers working with social and political scientists to examine patterns of human activity related to global warming. Prinn said science is already revealing alarming signs of climate change, including shrinking summer sea ice in the Arctic, a harmful rise in ocean acidity and increased destructiveness of hurricanes.

Knittel brought an economist’s perspective to the panel, noting that “what we really want is a global price on carbon dioxide.” Setting a fee for carbon-polluting technologies would serve as an incentive to develop alternative energy sources. While a carbon price is unlikely, Knittel pointed to actions by some U.S. states, including California, to set emissions standards for state transportation and electricity sectors.

Following Knittel’s talk, Moniz outlined existing low-carbon technologies and their challenges. He said, “De-carbonizing … really is the big game-changer … but there’s enormous pressure to provide energy services for nine to 10 billion people by mid-century.” Moniz said setting emissions standards would eventually squeeze out high-carbon energy sources such as coal and natural gas, leaving a huge energy gap to fill. “We better have a bridge to somewhere,” Moniz said. “And that somewhere is ultimately zero-carbon sources like nuclear, carbon sequestration and renewable energy.”

Slaughter rounded out the panel with a look at action on the ground to address climate change. She noted that “even if we could magically stop greenhouse gas emissions right now,” global temperatures would continue to rise. She and other faculty members at MIT have partnered with a number of organizations to identify ways to transform transportation and building infrastructure to be more energy efficient and environmental-disaster resilient.

But Slaughter ended the climate discussion on an optimistic note: “Rather than repaving or simply moving the things we have now ... we actually have an incredible opportunity to build the world we want to live in.”

In MIT visit, Lisa Jackson discusses how technology can affect government regulations.

Technological innovations have the ability to change environmental policies just as much as those policies can affect innovation, U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Administrator Lisa P. Jackson said during a visit to MIT on Friday, Apr. 15. In delivering the annual Henry W. Kendall Memorial Lecture, Jackson urged students and faculty at the Institute to look for sustainable solutions to environmental problems.

Jackson, a chemical engineer, addressed the relationship between science and environmental policy, and spoke about the chicken-and-egg nature of her job. “How do we implement the laws we have, and try to make sure we don’t stifle innovation … but also ultimately realize we need legislation to get there?” she said.

She noted that environmental policies often act as incentives for scientists to develop new technologies. At the same time, new inventions can spur changes in environmental laws. “We catalyze each other,” she said.

A symbiotic relationship between science and environmental policy is especially crucial for the issue of climate change, Jackson said. Earlier this month, members of Congress drafted measures that would have prevented the EPA from regulating carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases under the Clean Air Act, a “fairly draconian move,” according to Jackson. The Senate failed to pass the measures, and President Barack Obama has said he would veto any similar bills in the future.


Photo credit: Manohar Balagatte Srikanth

But the issue is likely not dead, Jackson said, and when it comes time for Congress to draft the federal budget for 2012, “we’ll probably see this battle played out again.” In the meantime, provided the EPA’s authority remains intact, the agency will start to set milestones for industries — the energy sector in particular — to curb greenhouse gas emissions, she said. Looking ahead, Jackson said she would like to see the conversation on climate change shift from politics to science, to focus on developing technologies to minimize greenhouse gas emissions. Such innovations, she hopes, could ultimately push climate change policy forward.

“I think we do have policy cobwebs all over the place right now,” Jackson said. “I will admit I have a bias that leads me to believe — partly as an engineer — that we have to not settle for standards that are not progressive enough.”

[More... ]