Environmental Health Center
Climate Change UpdateJuly/August 1999
Climate Change Update
A major business lobbying group, The Business Roundtable, consisting of CEOs of many of the nation’s largest corporations, is backing an approach to speed development and commercialization of technology to help address global climate concerns.
The organization, which says it maintains its “firm position in opposition to the Kyoto Protocol in its current form,” says that it “finds great promise and truly exciting opportunities” for addressing global climate change concerns in virtually every key sector of the economy – information management, transportation, manufacturing, building technologies, and electrical generation.
“In the long term, carbon sequestration technologies in agricultural, geological and physical removal or ‘scrubbing’ all hold potential,” says a new Roundtable’s report, The Role of Technology in Responding to Concerns about Climate Change. (The full text of the 80-page report is available online as a PDF file, readable with Acrobat Reader, at http://www.brtable.org/document.cfm/302.)
Calling technological process “the core of both the 20th century American success story and the 21st century’s promise,” the Business Roundtable’s Environmental Task Force said virtually all climate change proposals address the role of new and emerging technologies for producing and using energy. The group said spread of more energy-efficient technologies and development of new ones “constitute the most effective responses to concerns” over potential climate changes.
Task Force Chairman Robert N. Burt, chair and CEO of FMC Corporation, said fostering promising technologies “is the most efficient response to address concerns about climate change, even though it is clear there will be considerable time before we understand the range of potential impacts from greenhouse gases.”
In highlighting what it characterizes as promising technologies across the economy, the report says that:
The Roundtable report backs efforts to accelerate development of new technologies by fine-tuning “well defined but complex barriers” involving basic federal research funding; public/private applied research partnerships; “cost and risk sharing at the precommercial phase,” and conflicting regulations and hidden disincentives in, for instance, tax policies.
It proposes studying ways to remove barriers to technological advances, and it proposes a partnership with government to help speed-up development and commercialization of promising technologies, in part through a “national summit on technology transfer in the 21st century.”
Future issues of this newsletter will report on some of the more detailed sector-by-sector findings and recommendations in the Roundtable report.
An automaker funding basic science on global warming?
Not likely, you’d think.
Think again.
A basic understanding of the vast flow of carbon dioxide through Earth’s atmosphere — where it comes from and where it goes — remains one of the most poorly quantified parts of the climate puzzle. Now Ford Motor Co. is funding academic researchers who are looking for answers.
North from Detroit, at the top of Michigan’s Lower Peninsula (15 miles from the Mackinac Bridge), there is a tract of forest known as the University of Michigan Biological Station (UMBS). Rising far above the highest trees is a tower bristling with instruments that looks like something out of a science fiction movie.
The tower is just one in a worldwide network of stations trying to measure more precisely the flow of carbon between Earth and the atmosphere. The American part is called the AmeriFlux network.
Why does this matter? Because estimates of future human-induced greenhouse warming depend on the rate at which human carbon emissions build up to higher concentrations in the atmosphere. Billions of tons of carbon circulate between the atmosphere and the oceans and land each year. These amounts dwarf human emissions, but they are normally in balance on time scales we care about. Better estimates of the rates at which carbon is released to or removed from the atmosphere will mean better predictions about how fast the human emissions will raise CO2 concentrations.
Trees and plants breathe in CO2 during photosynthesis, storing it as wood and tissue. But plants and animals also breathe oxygen in and breathe CO2 out as waste during respiration. When they die and decompose, they become part of the soil, and eventually return to the atmosphere as CO2. Knowing just how much CO2 is involved requires some educated guesswork — especially because the ecosystems involved are so complex and diverse.
The 150-foot tower examines this process in a column rising from the forest floor to the open sky. Instruments at different levels measure sunlight, heat, wind, humidity, air gases, and other variables, and record them constantly in computerized form.
At the base of the tower is a laboratory building. At and below ground level other studies probe plants, trees, and soil. Glass cylinders sunk five feet deep into the soil allow miniature video cameras to record root growth, and part of the lab is a 120-foot underground tunnel, with 36 windows looking straight into the soil.
Although it is too early for researchers to have definite results, James A. Teeri, Ph.D., who heads UMBS, says they are investigating the hypothesis that soil and soil organisms play a key role in controlling the exchange of carbon. He thinks hair-thin roots, which are constantly growing and decaying, possibly play a “major, major role” in locking up carbon in the soil. Further research may bring scientists closer to finding the so-called “missing sink” which takes carbon out of the atmosphere.
After five years of discussions with UMBS, Ford decided to fully fund one part of the project — to the tune of $100,000 per year for three years. Teeri says the funds are an “unrestricted grant,” meaning the University of Michigan retains full control over the research.
It is hardly surprising that Ford, a Detroit automaker, should collaborate with the University of Michigan, whose main campus is in nearby Ann Arbor. What is new is to see an auto-maker taking the CO2 issue seriously. All parties to the global warming dialogue seem to agree that better responses to the problem are likeliest to come from better science.
The day is here that you can be washing and drying your clothes in Energy Star® compliant appliances…
…crunching numbers and networking via Energy Star compliant computers…
…and communicating via compliant fax and photocopier machines.
All the while, of course, snacking from a compliant refrigerator and tuning-in to a compliant stereo. Or perhaps catching a flick on a compliant video cassette recorder.
You can be doing it all, in fact, from a home that meets Energy Star criteria.
In all, there are more than 25 home and office products eligible to carry the joint brand aimed at helping energy-conscious consumers more easily find energy-conserving products.
And now, for the first time and under a newly expanded Energy Star initiative, it’s possible also for workers to work in an Energy Star compliant commercial office building.
Just a few dozen commercial office buildings nationwide currently earn that distinction, but that number surely will increase steadily, given that the top one-quarter of the nation’s energy-efficient office buildings ultimately could qualify.
“Every year, U.S. businesses pour $25 billion of profits down the drain in the form of wasted energy from inefficient buildings,” EPA Administrator Carol M. Browner said in announcing the first Energy Star buildings. “Energy-efficient buildings not only conserve millions of dollars in savings for businesses, they can also protect the health and environment for all Americans by reducing the pollution that contributes to global warming.”
The heart of the Energy Star is an Internet-based tool (at http://www.epa.gov/buildings) that catalogs a building’s energy uses, calculates energy intensity, and benchmarks energy performance. Building owners and managers compare and determine their building’s performance compared with similar-use buildings and using a scale of 0-100.
Buildings scoring 75 or more on the benchmarking tool next are verified by a licensed professional engineer to compare with industry indoor environment standards. Once verified by the Energy Department, the building can be included as an Energy Star-compliant building and awarded a plaque for display.
Those buildings qualifying — meaning they are among the top 25 percent in their category in the U.S. — can post their Energy Star plaque as testimony to their “strategic energy management, smart business, and environmental responsibility.”
“This new tool will help businesses cut costs by promoting energy efficiency in the workplace,” Energy Secretary Bill Richardson said of the initiative.
Having named a charter list of 20 buildings nationwide as warranting the Energy Star designation, Energy Star managers now are seeking applications for the next round of qualifying office buildings. Interested building owners and operators can learn more about the program and begin the application process by visiting the Web site address above or by visiting www.epa.gov/buildinglabel.
For more information on the new program, contact Ms. Maria Tikoff-Vargas at EPA at (202) 564-9178.
Motorola’s Semiconductor Products Sector (SPS) apparently was underwhelmed with an agreement by companies producing more than 90 percent of the world’s semiconductors to reduce emissions of perfluorocompounds (PFCs) by at least 10 percent below 1995 levels by the year 2010 (See May/June 1999 issue of EHC’s Climate Change Update, page 6).
The ink was barely dry on that announcement involving the World Semiconductor Council when Motorola SPS announced it plans to achieve a 50 percent absolute emission reduction by 2010 “compared with 1995 emissions which have been defined as the industry’s standard baseline.”
“This level of reduction is particularly aggressive when you consider the relatively small amounts of these gases used by Motorola SPS in 1995, and the high growth rate of the industry,” said Bill Walker, senior vice president for Motorola SPS’s order fulfillment organization. Walker said the reductions “will be achieved across all of SPS manufacturing facilities worldwide.”
Motorola in a press release appeared to go out of its way to contrast its approach with that just previously announced by the World Semiconductor Council.
“Compared with the average industry reduction goals announced in the past year,” Motorola said its own plans “call for an absolute reduction that is not tied to production levels. Motorola’s PFC emissions will be reduced despite anticipated growth in production levels over time.”
Motorola said that efforts over the past five years have led to development and evaluation of “state-of the-art” PFC emissions reduction technology. It pointed in particular to a collaboration with Applied Materials, a semiconductor equipment supplier, on a “Remote Clean” ™ technology that it said “Is expected to reduce PFC emissions from chemical vapor deposition (CVD) manufacturing processes by 99 percent.”
Motorola describes itself as the world’s largest producer of embedded processors, and it points to global semiconductor sales of $7.3 billion in 1998.
Two major corporations – one an energy producer and the other an appliances manufacturer – recently outlined their experiences with the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s Energy Star® partnerships for a Capitol Hill audience.
Fred C. Schoeneborn, manager of global energy management for Mobil, and Doug Ringger, director of product planning for Maytag Appliances, Maytag Corporation, were among speakers at an Environmental and Energy Study Institute (EESI) briefing in the Cannon House Office Building. (See related issue on this briefing in the May/June 1999 issue of this newsletter.)
Schoeneborn said Mobil’s interest in the partnership program was prompted by an internal 1989 operating costs study showing utility expenses as “the easiest place to control costs.” At the same time, he said, there was a “general lack of enthusiasm to address those expenses” in part because of institutional barriers.
The Green Lights approach to energy efficiency “just made so much sense,” Schoeneborn said, and the company moved quickly to update interior lighting, initially in several “showcase buildings.” He said Mobil in three years reduced lighting energy by 54 percent and saved more than 14 million kilowatt hours. He pointed to a return on investment of 52 percent – about $2.17 saved on every $1.13 invested in the program and said the company’s Green Lights initiative drew special coverage in Mobil’s 1994-1995 annual report.
After developing an Energy Star Buildings guide for analyzing energy efficiency options in its office buildings, Schoeneborn said, the company committed to going beyond just its office buildings to also include its other properties. He said the company estimates savings of $103 million between 1992 and 1998 in its office and plant buildings as a result of energy management and conservation efforts.
“At the power plant,” those savings, according to Schoeneborn, amount to nearly 435 million pounds in carbon dioxide reductions; 3.2 million pounds in sulfur dioxide reductions; and 1.4 million pounds in oxides of nitrogen reductions.
He pointed to savings of more than $2 million annually as a result of service stations’ lighting upgrades and said participating Mobil service stations now sport a logo decal championing their role. More importantly, Schoeneborn said, the service stations realize a payback on their up-front investment during the first year of operation.
Maytag – the first manufacturer to partner with the Energy Star program and the first to label qualifying products with the Energy Star logo – says it has confirmed overall water savings of 38 percent and energy savings of 56 percent through use of an energy saving “Neptune” front-loading clothes washer.
Maytag’s Ringger says the company uses the Energy Star logo on labels attached to eligible products and uses it also in promotional brochures and on its Web site. The company has encouraged the Federal Trade Commission to require that qualifying appliances use the logo on the federal energy labels attached to washers, dishwashers, and refrigerators.
You may have missed some recent media buzz suggesting that more acid rain might be the cure for global warming. To coal-burning electric power utilities, that might sound like good news.
But for some messengers, there’s a common mantra: “Never let the facts get in the way of a good story.” Does it apply here?
The sulfur dioxide gas produced by burning coal changes chemically into sulfate ions once it gets into the atmosphere. Some of those emissions combine with hydrogen in the atmosphere to become sulfuric acid (acid rain). The tiny droplets and particles actually form a thin shade preventing some sunlight from reaching Earth’s surface. Microscopic particles floating in the air are called aerosols.
Scientists have known for decades that aerosols high in the atmosphere can cool Earth. The eruption of a volcano in 1816, for instance, spewed enough dust particles into the stratosphere to produce the famous “year without a summer.” The eruption of Mt. Pinatubo in 1992 also produced cooler weather for a year or two. A 1992 supplement to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change’s scientific assessment factored aerosols into existing climate models.
A July article in Electricity Daily by David Wojick put forth the thesis that “Cutting sulfur dioxide emissions may amplify climate change in the U.S.” He attributed the idea to a June study by the respected climatologist Tom Wigley, funded by the Pew Center on Global Climate Change.
It was hardly a major point in Wigley’s review of the state of climate science. Wigley acknowledged that the cooling effect of aerosols “may partly offset the warming effect of greenhouse gases.” Nothing new there. But taken out of context, simplified and distorted, it might have sounded like music to the ears of utilities feeling burdened by the Clean Air Act.
Wigley’s paper, it turns out, said a lot more.
While the effect of greenhouse gases is global and long-term, Wigley noted, the effect of aerosols tends to be regional at most and short-term. As Wigley pointed out, the warming effect of greenhouse gases is larger than the cooling effect of aerosols — so the net effect is still global warming.
Wigley’s account of the science doesn’t address the policy question — whether limiting further efforts to cut sulfur dioxide emissions is a good idea. Several ways of cutting SO2 emissions, such as increasing energy-efficiency or switching to sulfur-free fuels like methane, in fact also reduce emissions of the greenhouse gas carbon dioxide.
Any answer to the question of sulfur dioxide emissions policy would have to weigh also the benefits of reducing sulfur dioxide emissions and acid rain — such as effects on human and forest health. A little knowledge, in the end, may be a dangerous thing.
| September 20, 1999 | | Disclaimer/Policy |