ENDING GLOBAL WARMING page. ►to Home Page ● to NOAA CO2 Data That Reveals The Opportunity ● to CARMA Power Plant CO2 Data
Ending Global Warming Fast: NOAA & CARMA Numbers This is a difficult concept the first time you encounter it. To help keep things organized, I've color-coded "bad" red, "good" green, "what we can do" blue. (From data (1) and (2), detailed below.)
1. CO2 emissions added to the atmosphere each year: +36.7 Billion Tons of CO2; Net CO2 Surplus: 36.7 Billion Tons of CO2
2. CO2 the Oceans and Biosphere remove each year: -20.4 Billion Tons of CO2; Net CO2 Surplus: 16.3 Billion Tons of CO2
3. Converting Fossil power plants to Nuclear ends: - 11.0 Billion Tons of CO2; Net CO2 Surplus: 5.3 Billion Tons of CO2
4. Ending Tropical Rainforest Deforestation ends: - 4.1 Billion Tons of CO2; Net CO2 Surplus: 1.2 Billion Tons of CO2
It really is possible to END GLOBAL WARMING without disrupting everything.
It's that simple. Check my numbers below. The Starting Point: A simple calculation shows fossil fuel power plants are making at least 68% of the accumulating Global Warming CO2 surplus.
The oceans and biosphere are removing 55% (20.4 billion tons) of all the CO2 (36.7 billion tons) man is making each year. Global Warming comes from the remaining 45% (16.3 billion tons) CO2 surplus. Think obesity: Man is causing the planet to put on 16.3 billion extra tons of CO2 in the atmosphere each year and it's destroying the planet's health.
An inconvenient fact: Power plants are 68% of the CO2 accumulation problem. We also need to persuade some Second and Third world countries to end their deforestation - which is another 25% of the accumulating Global Warming CO2 surplus. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deforestation
Where the NOAA and CARMA numbers came from:
The CO2 Data That Revealed The Opportunity: Top
(1)
NOAA: The world's total accumulating Global Warming
CO2 emissions
The balance sheet "educational cartoon" at the right is copied from the U.S. National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration's (NOAA) "Carbon Tracker" web site and shows the approximate situation for atmospheric carbon (not CO2) in units of 1015 grams of carbon per year. It illustrates an excess of about 4.4 billion tons of additional carbon accumulating in the atmosphere every year. To convert carbon grams to CO2 grams multiply by 3.7. (The atomic weight of carbon is 12, oxygen is 16, so CO2 is 12 + 16 + 16 = 44. This makes CO2 44/12 or 3.7 times as heavy as a lone carbon.) In this case, the table is saying about 16 billion tons of additional CO2 is accumulating in the atmosphere every year. December, 2007, table. For current accurate data see: http://www.esrl.noaa.gov/gmd/ccgg/carbontracker/overview.html
Note that NOAA's atmospheric CO2 account is in GRAMS of CARBON, not CO2, so multiply by 44/12 or 3.7 to get the equivalent CO2 weight. Also, 1x1015 Grams = About 1.1 billion tons →
A second source, the U.S. Energy Information Agency (EIA), says an excess of 3.2 billion metric tons or 3.5 billion short (U.S.) tons. It is less clear that they are talking about just the carbon component that is accumulating each year (it's above their figure 2 on their web page): http://www.eia.doe.gov/oiaf/1605/ggccebro/chapter1.html
CONVERTING NOAA's confusing 1015 GRAMS of CARBON to BILLION TONS of CO2:
Biosphere (Land Plants): -2*3.7*1.1 Billion tons = 8.2 billion tons of CO2 Removed from Atmosphere every year
Oceans: -3*3.7*1.1 Billion tons = 12.2 billion tons of CO2 Removed from Atmosphere every year
Total: = 20.4 billion tons of CO2 Removed from Atmosphere every year
Note: The oceans, absorbing 12.2 billion tons of CO2 annually, will absorb progressively less CO2 as they become CO2 saturated (acidification), so the 12.2 billion tons per year absorption number is becoming progressively smaller as CO2 pollution continues unchecked and will eventually disappear. This is not good at all.
Fossil Fuel Burning: 8*3.7*1.1 Billion tons = 32.6 billion tons of CO2 Added to Atmosphere every year
Deforestation: 1*3.7*1.1 Billion tons = 4.1 billion tons of CO2 Added to Atmosphere every year
Total: = 36.7 billion tons of CO2 Added to Atmosphere every year
Net CO2 Total: 36.7 billion tons - 20.4 billion tons = 16.3 billion tons of additional CO2 accumulating in the world's atmosphere every year.
(2) CARMA: 141,000 Power Plant Units: Their Enormous Contribution To Our Planet's Global Warming CO2. Top
There are 141,000 power plant generating units in the world. Some are small Chinese diesel units for isolated villages. Perhaps 60,000 have boilers, and as such, are candidates for conversion to Coal Yard Nukes even if they happen to run on natural gas or oil instead of coal. The bigger they are, the more likely they are candidates. The IPCC has identified the 5,000 worst offenders and they are all in the 'convertible' category.
Note Well: Natural gas produces 2/3 as much CO2 per kWh as coal, oil as much CO2 as coal, so don't regard either natural gas or oil power plants as being anything close to "naturally clean." Data Source: http://tonto.eia.doe.gov/FTPROOT/environment/co2emiss00.pdf The DOE-EIA web page (Table 4) saying 1.3 pounds of CO2 per kiloWatt hour (kWh) is made by natural gas-burning power plants. Coal makes about 2.0 pounds of CO2 per kWh.
Data from CARMA ( www.CARMA.org )
CARMA stated in December, 2007, that world annual electricity consumption was 16.76*1015 Watt hours causing 11.0 billion tons of CO2 to be produced.
CARMA is the current source of my data for CO2 from power plants. I'm confident the data they have gathered is of the same quality as NOAA.
CARMA states some emission numbers might reflect data as old as the year 2000 and that there may be some missing data.
Like the power plant CO2 data I developed in the past for this web site and have now removed from use, CARMA's data probably understates today's CO2 emission levels by some small amount.
CARMA makes some thoughtful projections for future electricity growth that, from a CO2 standpoint, can only be viewed with grave concern. Please visit their web site.
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Are we stupid or what?
The pie chart to the right shows that about 10% of the world's electricity is generated by burning OIL.
Most of these plants are in the mid-east.
The IPCC says 12 Exajoules (about 2 billion barrels a year) or 1/15 of the world's 30 billion barrels per year production of oil.
These plants should be very high on everyone's hit list for conversion to nuclear. The oil market is very sensitive to both supply and demand. A case could be made that all the nuclear power plants coming on line in the worldwide energy market during the 1980 to 1995 period drove the cost of oil down during the good economic times of the 90s.
It is in the interests of every country in the world to minimize the burning of oil.
There are 1,500 water desalination plants in the mid-east that are also burning large amounts of oil when they could just as well be running on nuclear heat.
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This web site is a David vs. Goliath effort and isn't worth a damn if I don't get everything right. I make mistakes of one sort or another every day.
If I have something wrong, or you have better quality information
or ideas, either here about CO2 or about this web site in
general, please let me know. -- JH
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Fossil fuel electricity is the biggest unnecessary source of man-made CO2.
World automobiles make about 15% (perhaps 2 billion tons per year) of the world's CO2. It's a shame they are taking the rap for power plants in the public's mind.
Hopefully, there will be more Global Warming Mega-Mitigation paths like this uncovered and publicized in the coming years.