Mike Thinks: Parameters: What Parameters are in play to meet Climate Change Challenges?

Photo by Joao Marcelo Marques on Unsplash

The main push back toward transitioning toward the Green New Deal is the massive shift in resources, infrastructure, and investment. Incorporating clean (renewable) energy into the economy while phasing out fossil fuels is a promising aspect as the cost of technology drops over time. Although, there are parameters that need to be addressed which stand as obstacles in the transition over time. What are these parameters?

Reporting by Politico outlined parameters which would be in play to reach zero emissions by 2050:

The authors warned against betting on technological fixes alone, because these ideas have not been deployed at scale and come with high costs and limited social acceptability.

"While it’s clear that some [carbon dioxide removal] is needed, it is really a policy choice which actions we want to go through," said Joeri Rogelj, another of the report's authors and a researcher at the Austrian International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis.

Avoiding over-reliance on carbon removal requires the world to peak carbon dioxide emissions "well before" 2030. This in turn has huge implications for the energy sector.

By 2050 renewables will have to produce 70 percent to 85 percent of power.

Coal will have to be phased out, and gas will have a limited role — generating only 8 percent of global electricity, and only as long as it's used in combination with carbon capture and storage technology.

An area ranging from 1 million to 7 million square kilometers — the size of Egypt and Australia respectively — will have to be dedicated to growing crops used to generate energy.

Because of the competition with food crops, this transition will have to be "carefully managed," but is indispensable, according to authors, especially as biofuels are the only alternative to fossil fuels in high-emission sectors like aviation and shipping.

"Only if we find technologies that can decarbonize air transport or freight, it would be possible to eliminate bioenergy," said Skea.

Similarly, under all scenarios compatible with 1.5 degrees, the contribution of nuclear power increases.

The U.N. report, commissioned by governments in Paris in 2015, will feed into the discussions at December's COP24 climate summit in Katowice, Poland.

EU environment ministers are meeting on Tuesday to discuss the bloc's position for the summit, and green groups are calling on them to increase the EU's 2030 target of cutting greenhouse gas emissions from 40 percent to "well beyond 45 percent," said Wendel Trio, director of NGO Climate Action Network Europe.

Available land is just one of the major parameters in play in the transition toward renewable energy. Space is needed to grow crops used as biofuels. Enormous amounts of land as highlighted above. This will create competition with land which is used to grow food. Freight and air transport alone will require large amounts of land. How does that land balance against the amount of land required to grow food for consumers in the United States? How are we going to feed the world?

The largest parameter is society's acceptance of the transition toward renewable energy. Political will is the name for society's acceptance of any transition and is by far the largest influence in the transition toward renewable energy by Our nation. Although, other countries are gaining influence while making the transition. While the United States is standing by and watching the progress being made in the transition toward renewable energy. How long will the citizens of the United States stand by and let this happen? We need the political will to move the greater part of the United States toward the transition into a renewable (clean) energy future.

The parameters here do not even include another very important parameter. How does climate change impact national security? Last month, I included written testimony of past Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel on the link between national security and climate change into a blog post.

The time to invest large sums and influence in the transition toward renewable energy is now. Other countries have shown that such an investment is worthwhile. The parameters listed above help us understand the difficulties in the transition. It is up to us to push our elected politicians toward embracing the transition toward renewable energy. The time for action is now.

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