the greenhouse effectthe greenhouse gases the pollutants that cause global warming have been...

STAPPA - PRIMER draft 1 July 17, 19981

The Greenhouse Effect

I. SUMMARY AND OVERVIEWa

This chapter examines what is variously called “climate change,” “global warming” and the“Greenhouse Effect.” These are all names for the same phenomenon: an increase in the Earth'stemperature when heat is trapped near the surface. Most of this trapping is due to naturalconstituents of the air—water vapor, for example. But air pollutants also can trap heat, and astheir concentrations increased so, too, can the Earth's temperature.

Energy enters the Earth's atmosphere as sunlight. It strikes the surface, where it isconverted into infrared radiation. Although the atmosphere is largely transparent to the visibleradiation spectrum—sunlight—it is not to the infrared range. So heat that would other radiateinto space is instead trapped in the atmosphere.

That heat-trapping effect is good fortune for humanity and other life currently on Earth,because it raises the average temperature roughly 33 degrees Celsius above what it otherwisewould be, making life as we know it possible.1

Over time, the energy entering the air has reached equilibrium with the energy leaving,creating Earth's current climate and, with it, the weather with which we are familiar on a day-to-day, week-to-week or year-to-year basis. With a Greenhouse Effect either greater or less thanwhat has prevailed for millennia, the Earth would be quite different. In the absence of aGreenhouse Effect, the Earth would be ice covered. What it would be like with an enhancedGreenhouse Effect is the subject of this discussion.

Weather versus climate

The fundamental distinction between “weather” and “climate” is time span: climate is theaverage weather, including seasonal extremes and variations, either locally, regionally, or acrossthe globe. In any one location, weather can change very rapidly from day to day and from year toyear, even within an unchanging climate. These changes involve shifts in, for example,temperatures, precipitation, winds, and clouds, all of which make it a challenge to predict whatwill happen next.

In contrast to weather, climate is generally influenced by slow changes in features like theocean, the land, the orbit of the Earth about the sun, and the energy output of the sun.2 Climatedoes not vary monthly, daily or even yearly. Because climate is controlled by the long-termbalance of energy of the Earth and its atmosphere, changes occur over decades or even centuries.

a Much of this summary discussion is drawn from United Nations Environment Program andWorld Meteorological Organization, “Common Questions About Climate Change,”http://www.gcrio.org.ipcc.qa. “Common Questions” was written and reviewed by scientists whoparticipated in the IPCC process, and it attempts to answer some of the most commonly askedquestions about these issues, based upon information contained in the IPCC reports.


Natural events. Natural events cause temporary changes in climate. For example, largevolcanic eruptions put tiny particles in the atmosphere that block sunlight, resulting in a surfacecooling of a few years' duration. Variations in ocean currents change the distribution of heat andprecipitation. El Nino events (periodic warming of the central and eastern tropical Pacific Ocean)typically last one to two years and change weather patterns around the world, causing heavy rainsin some places and droughts in others.

Permanent changes in climate—at least permanent from the perspective of living things—occur over much longer time spans, hundreds of thousands of years. Natural changes in thegeographical distribution of energy received from the sun and the amounts of greenhouse gasesand dust in the atmosphere have caused the climate to shift from ice ages to relatively warmerperiods, such as the one we are currently experiencing.3

The Impact of Human Activity

Human activities also change the climate. Some of the gases that trap heat are natural—water vapor, for example. Other gases are created by both natural and human activities. Carbondioxide, for example, is created when coal and oil are burned, as well as when plants and animalsrot. Still other gases—methyl bromide and other chemicals containing chlorine, bromine andiodine, for example—either don't occur in nature at all or in vanishingly small amounts.

The atmospheric amounts of many greenhouse gases, especially carbon dioxide, areincreasing. The concentrations have carbon dioxide have jumped by roughly 30 percent over thelast 200 years, and at current trends pollution levels will double sometime in the next century.4 Except for some of the chlorofluorocarbons, the family of chemicals that destroy stratosphericozone, concentrations of almost all other human-generated greenhouse gases are also rising. These include methane (more commonly known as natural gas), tropospheric ozone (smog), andnitrous oxide (laughing gas).

Temperature increases. As releases and concentrations of Greenhouse Gases have risen,so too has the Earth's temperature, according to the World Meteorological Organization. It statesthat the globally averaged temperature of the air at the Earth's surface has warmed between 0.3and 0.6 degrees Celsius (about 0.5 and 1 degree Fahrenheit) since the late nineteenth century.5

The four warmest years on record since 1860 have all occurred since 1990. The warminghas been greatest at night over land in the mid-to-high latitudes of the northern hemisphere. Thewarming during the northern winter and spring has been stronger than at other seasons. In someareas, primarily over continents, the warming has been several times greater than the globalaverage. In a few areas, temperatures have actually cooled, e.g., over the southern MississippiValley in North America.6

Other effects. Other evidence of global temperature increases since the nineteenth centuryincludes—

• a rise in sea level of 10 to 25 centimeters (about 4 to 10 inches);

• the shrinkage of mountain glaciers;7


• a reduction of northern hemisphere snow cover (1973 to present); and,

• increasing sub-surface ground temperatures.8

Data, derived from measurements of tree rings, shallow ice cores, and corals, and fromother methods of indirectly determining climate trends, suggest that global surface temperaturesare now as warm as or warmer than at any time in the past 600 years.9

Because higher temperatures lead to higher rates of evaporation and precipitation, globalwarming increases frequency of snow and rain storms, as well as other very heavy and extremeprecipitation events. Although analyses of observed changes in precipitation intensity have beenconducted only for a few countries, scientists have documented increases in North America,Australia, and South Africa.10

The observed increases in global temperature are larger than those that would be causedby solar cycles, volcanic eruptions or other natural variables. However, the increases are similarin size and timing to those predicted by models that take into account the combined influences ofhuman factors and solar variability. Also, the patterns of temperature change—that is, not onlychanges at the Earth's surface, but those in vertical sections through the atmosphere—areconsistent with model predictions.11

The Greenhouse Gases

The pollutants that cause global warming have been reasonably well identified, togetherwith their principal sources. They include the following:

Carbon dioxide. Carbon dioxide is produced when coal, oil, and natural gas (fossil fuels)are burned to produce energy used for transportation, manufacturing, heating, cooling, electricitygeneration, and other applications. The use of fossil fuel currently accounts for 80 to 85 percentof the carbon dioxide being added to the atmosphere.12

Land use changes are responsible for 15 to 20 percent of current carbon dioxideemissions. Clearing land for logging, ranching, and agriculture releases carbon contained in thevegetation contains carbon. Conversely, re-growth of long-lived vegetation such as trees andshrubs removes carbon dioxide from the air and stores it.13

Tropospheric ozone (smog). According to some calculations, ozone in the troposphere,that is, in the lower part of the atmosphere, is the second largest contributor to global warming.However, because it is created naturally as well as by human pollution and because the humanshare it is difficult to assess in rural areas, it is usually excluded from inventories.

Methane. Methane (natural gas) is the second most important of the greenhouse gasesresulting from human activities. It is produced by rice cultivation, cattle and sheep ranching, andby decaying material in landfills. Methane is also emitted during coal mining and oil drilling, andby leaky gas pipelines. Human activities have increased the concentration of methane in theatmosphere by about 145% above what would be present naturally.14

Nitrous oxide. Nitrous oxide is produced by various agricultural and industrial practices.


It is also emitted by catalytic converters. Human activities have increased the concentration ofnitrous oxide in the atmosphere by about 15% above what would be present naturally.15

Chlorofluorocarbons. Chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs) have been used in refrigeration, airconditioning, and as solvents. However, the production of some CFCs is being eliminated underexisting international agreements because they deplete the stratospheric ozone layer. Otherfluorocarbons that are also greenhouse gases are being used as substitutes for CFCs inrefrigeration and air conditioning.16

Impacts of Greenhouse Gases

Based on computer models developed over the past two decades and study of previousperiods of warming, scientists have reached a consensus on some of the consequences ofincreasing pollution by Greenhouse Gases. Much of this information has been either accumulatedby The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), an international effort cosponsoredby the United Nations Environment Program and the World Meteorological Organization.

Made up of over 2000 scientific and technical experts from around the world, the IPCCpublished its First Assessment Report in 1990 and a Second Assessment Report in 1996. TheSecond report contains over 10,000 references and is over 2,000 pages long. It representshumanity's best effort at developing a comprehensive, scientifically authoritative understanding ofclimate change, its potential impacts on humans and the natural environment and the technologycurrently available to reduce human influences on climate.

Barring a change in human activity, the Earth's average surface temperatures are projectedto increase another 1 to 3.5 degrees C (about 2 to 6 degrees F) by the year 2100. This warmingwill be faster than any in civilized history.17

As warmer ocean waters expand and ice covers melt, sea levels are projected to riseanother 15 to 95 cm (about 6 to 37 inches) by the year 2100.18

These changes will not be uniform over time and space:

• It will be hotter over land than oceans, and the largest temperature increases will beduring Arctic winters.

• Temperatures will increase more at night than day.

• The number of summertime very hot days will increase at mid-latitudes—most of NorthAmerica, Europe, and parts of South America—while the number of wintertime very cold dayswill drop.19

Other weather patterns will also change:

• Warmer waters will evaporate more rapidly, yielding more frequent and violent extremeweather events such as storms.

• In Europe and North America winter, increased precipitation will fall as rain rather than


snow. Winter soil moisture and runoff will rise, while summer levels are likely to drop, increasingthe likelihood and severity of droughts.20

• Exactly how hurricanes, typhoons, and cyclones will be affected is uncertain, partiallybecause of the limitations of computer models. However, because between half and three-quarters of the world's population lives in coastal areas, rising sea levels, more frequent andviolent storms and storm surges and generalized flooding can have devastating impacts.21

Climate change is also likely to affect human infrastructure, including transportation,energy demand, human settlements (especially in developing countries), the property insuranceindustry, and tourism.22

Surprises. These predictions all assume that global climate will change gradually, eventhough some previous some previous events have been marked by rapid and abrupt alterations. These abrupt transitions raise the possibility of what scientists euphemistically refer to as“surprises” as the world warms. There is evidence that previous warming periods have triggeredsudden continental scale ice ages in Europe, perhaps through a reversal of ocean currents.23

Computer models. These predictions rely on computer-based simulations that have beenrefined for over two decades. Current computer models used to predict future events can, whenused retrospectively, reproduce many changes that have been actually observed over the lastcentury, including—

• global mean surface warming of 0.3 to 0.6 degrees C (about 0.5 to 1 F);

• reduction in temperature differences between day and night;

• cooling in the atmosphere above about 14 km (about 9 miles);

• precipitation increases at high latitudes;

• intensification of precipitation events in some continental areas; and,

• rise in sea level.

Moreover, after the 1991 volcanic eruption of Mt. Pinatubo in the Philippines, a climatemodel has correctly both the globally averaged surface cooling and subsequent rebound intemperatures.24

The major weakness of models is their inability to represent some of the key smaller-scaleprocesses that affect climate, especially the details of the formation and dissipation of clouds. So,approximations are used. The approximation of cloud behavior is a major source of whatuncertainty that may be inherent in current in climate models.25

Beyond uncertainties attributable to models, however, are others that are a product of afundamental lack of understanding of the interplay between so many simultaneously changingvariables. With some temperatures rising and others falling, concentrations of trace gaseschanging, ranges and densities of plant and animal populations shifting, all precipitation patterns


and intensities altering, all in the context of other stresses such as stratospheric ozone depletion,doubled levels of rural tropospheric ozone, increased concentrations of heavy metals andpersistent organic chemicals, declining stocks of fisheries and global spread of invasive plants andanimals species, the possibility of non-linear change greatly increases.


II. THE GREENHOUSE EFFECT

The potential impacts of the Greenhouse Effect have led some scientists and scientificinstitutions to use uncharacteristically dire language. Consider, for example, the following:

We are pushing our climate and environment—thesurroundings in which we live, work, and play—into a regionliterally unexperienced during the history of homo sapiens .... Weare reluctant to accept a reassuring forecast for a warmer globebecause of imponderables. We know that major changes are likelyto produce major unforeseen consequences—indeed theunforecasted Antarctic ozone hole may be just such an example ofan unforeseen consequence of changes acting on a complexsystem.

National Academy of Sciences,Current Issues in Atmospheric Change,

198626

A. Theory

1. In general

The principle of global warming is fairly straightforward: Earth's atmosphere is transparentto radiation in the visible specturm, but not to that in the infrared range. Therefore, sunlightarriving at the Earth passes through the air until it collides with the ground and is transformed intoheat energy, or infrared radiation, that is then reflected toward space.

Instead of returning through the atmosphere back into space, however, the infraredradiation is blocked by a variety of natural and man-made chemicals. Some of these, such aswater vapor, occur naturally. Others are created by both natural and human activities, while stillmore—principally halogenated compounds like chlorofluorocarbons—do not exist in nature at all. Scientists have coined a number of phrases to describe this phenomenon. Because the mechanicsseem to resemble those of a greenhouse, it is sometimes called the Greenhouse Effect. Because itraises the Earth average temperature, it's also called global warming. And because an increase inEarth's average temperature triggers a cascade of other events, ranging from droughts to storms,some call it global climate change.

None of these terms is entirely satisfactory. For purposes of this document, thephenomenon will usually be referred to as the Greenhouse Effect and the pollutants that cause itas Greenhouse Gases (GHGs).

a. Origin

The first scientist to postulate that the Earth is warmer than it otherwise would be becauseof a so-called “Greenhouse Effect” was Svante Arrhenius, a 19th Century Swede.27 The bestevidence of the effectiveness of the Greenhouse Effect on Earth is the existence of life: scientistscalculate that natural greenhouse gases such as water vapor increase the earth's temperature byroughly 33 degrees C.28 Without the natural Greenhouse Effect, the Earth would be ice-


covered.29

Arrhenius concluded that the largely invisible gases that form Earth's atmosphere are byand large transparent to the sun's radiation. Having travelled 90 million miles, sunlight reaches theEarth where it either passes through or is absorbed by the atmospheric envelope surrounding theplanet, then strikes the surface. The impact warms the surface, which radiates this heat skywardin the form of infrared radiation.

But the gases that are transparent to solar radiation instead trap the infrared radiated fromthe surface. Some of this trapped heat is reflected groundward, and some is radiated towardsspace, warming the wispy thin air of the stratosphere.30 The most powerful of the GreenhouseGases is water vapor, sometimes omitted from lists of such gases because it occurs naturally. Theother gases are present in the atmosphere at vanishingly small concentrations, ranging from partsper million for carbon dioxide to parts per trillion for the chlorofluorocarbons.31

The Greenhouse Effect is not theoretical speculation. The effects of the trace gases arewell established from laboratory measurements. Satellite observations clearly show that the tracegases are, in fact, absorbing radiation at the predicted wavelengths.32 Observations of twocontrasting planetary environments, Venus and Mars, demonstrate two potential extremes ofGreenhouse Effect. Mars, an arid and barren planet, has no heat-trapping atmosphere at all. Venus, on the other hand, is blanketed with a heat-trapping atmosphere of methane that raisestemperatures to 800 degrees F.

Even sharp critics of the Greenhouse Effect concede the fundamental correctness of thetheory. One of the most persistent critics of global warming, for example, has been the Washington, D.C. based Marshall Institute. In its widely circulated 37-page criticism of globalwarming science, Scientific Perspectives on the Greenhouse Problem, the Marshall Instituteconceded that—

The basic statement that carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases warm aplanet is not in doubt. Venus, for example, has an enormous amount of carbondioxide in its atmosphere—60,000 times more than the earth—and the surface ofVenus is oven-hot, with an average temperature greater than 800 degrees F. Acalculation of the greenhouse effect produced by the dense carbon dioxide onVenus indicates that this effect can explain the soaring temperatures. No otherexplanation known to planetary sciences is adequate to account for these hightemperatures.

Mars also has carbon dioxide in its atmosphere; in fact, the Martianatmosphere, although relatively thin, is composed almost entirely of thisgreenhouse gas. As in the case of Venus, calculations of the greenhouse effect onMars show that it is warmed by just the amount that would be expected as aconsequence of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere.33

Although there is agreement that the Greenhouse Effect is real and that it is operatingto make life as we know possible on Earth, anything beyond this is the subject of disagreement. One the one side of that disagreement are most of the world's governments and scientificinstitutions. On the other are a relative minority of scientists, whose views are cited by some


industries and governments, most of which have a connection to the fossil fuel industries. Ofcourse, neither being in the minority nor being cited by industries with a vested interest in theoutcome of the debate does not mean that these scientists are incorrect, but it should be clear thatthey do not represent the scientific mainstream. The principal disagreements are examined in detaillater in this paper.

2. The role of human activity

Natural events cause changes in climate. For example, large volcanic eruptions put tinyparticles in the atmosphere that block sunlight, resulting in a surface cooling of a few years'duration. Variations in ocean currents change the distribution of heat and precipitation. El Ninoevents (periodic warming of the central and eastern tropical Pacific Ocean) typically last one totwo years and change weather patterns around the world, causing heavy rains in some places anddroughts in others. Over longer time spans, tens or hundreds of thousands of years, naturalchanges in the geographical distribution of energy received from the sun and the amounts ofgreenhouse gases and dust in the atmosphere have caused the climate to shift from ice ages torelatively warmer periods, such as the one we are currently experiencing.34

Human activities can also change the climate. Directly or indirectly, virtually allhuman activities potentially affect the climate by increasing concentrations of Greenhouse Gasesor other pollutants that can alter climate. The atmospheric amounts of many GreenhouseGases, especially carbon dioxide, are increasing. Carbon dioxide levels have risen 30 percent overthe last 200 years, primarily as a result of changes in land use (e.g., deforestation) and of burningcoal, oil, and natural gas (e.g., in automobiles, industry, and electricity generation). Althoughcarbon dioxide current contribute the most to global warming, it is only one of several such gases. They include the following, which are listed with their Global Warming Potential (GWP), or theirheat trapping effect compared to that of carbon dioxide, which has a GWP of 1.

a. The major gases

Carbon dioxide (CO2): CO2 is produced naturally by living organisms and by theburning of fossil fuels. Carbon accounts for the largest share of US greenhouse gas emissions. In1990, the CO2 emissions were approximately 85 percent of the total, although the carbon sinks inforested lands offset CO2 emissions by about 8 percent. Worldwide carbon emissions have grownby about 27 percent since the industrial revolution.

Nitrous Oxide (N2O): Naturally occurring, N2O is also produced by fuel burning,fertilizer manufacture and use, and as a byproduct of catalytic converters. In 1990, N2Oaccounted for about 2.5 percent of U.S. GHG emissions. Global Warming Potential (GWP): 310times greater than CO2.

Methane: Methane comes from coal formations and from landfills, livestock digestiveprocesses, decomposing waste, and wetland rice cultivation. In 1990, methane accounted foralmost 12 percent of the U.S. GHG total emissions. Global warming potential: About 21 timeshigher than that of CO2.

Hydrofluorocarbon gases (HFC): These gases were developed largely as an alternativeto ozone-damaging chlorofluorocarbons (CFC) banned under the 1987 Montreal Protocol. HFCs


do not damage the ozone layer, but they do contribute to global warming. They are used largelyin refrigeration and as in semi-conductor manufacturing. Global warming potential: 140 to11,700 times that of CO2.

Perfluorocarbons (PFC): Result as a by-product aluminum smelting, and uraniumenriching. Also are manufactured to replace CFCs in making semi-conductors. Global warmingpotential: 7,400 times CO2.

Sulphur Hexafluoride: Largely used in heavy industry to insulate high-voltageequipment and to assist the manufacturing of cable cooling systems. Global warming potential:23,900 times that of CO2.

There are other Greenhouse Gases not listed above. These include methyl bromide, a soilfumigant, and hydrochlorofluorocarbons (HCFCs). The HCFCs were formerly considered CFCs,but renamed in the early 1990s and thus allowed to continue in use, even though they bothdestroy ozone and contribute to global warming.

B. Evidence

A wide variety of actual changes in measures of climate—globally averaged surfacetemperatures, for example—are consistent with model predictions. These include the following:

Atmospheric temperatures. The four warmest years on record since 1860 have alloccurred since 1990. The warming has been greatest at night over land in the mid-to-highlatitudes of the northern hemisphere. The warming during the northern winter and spring has beenstronger than at other seasons. In some areas, primarily over continents, the warming has beenseveral times greater than the global average. In a few areas, temperatures have actually cooled,e.g., over the southern Mississippi Valley in North America.35

1. Indications of global warming

a. Increase in atmospheric temperatures

There are two separate sets of data maintained, one by the British Meteorological Office,the other by the Goddard Institute for Space Studies, which is an arm of the U.S. NationalAeronautics and Space Administration. Both are based on data from different sets of temperaturestations located throughout the world, and both agree that five of the hottest years on record wereduring the decade of the 1980's. Record highs continued into 1990 and 1991 but were interruptedby the cooling effect from the massive 1991 explosion of Mount Pinatubo in the Philippines.36 Itinjected huge amounts of dust in the upper atmosphere where it cooled the Earth by reflectingsunlight. When the dust settled out, the warming trend resumed: 1995 was the hottest year onrecord and 1991–95 was hottest five-year period ever, despite Pinatubo's cooling effect.37

b. Increase in soil temperatures

As the Earth's surface warms, the warmth bleeds slowly downward, gradually heating thesubsurface as well. The temperature of solid stone, frozen tundra or other impermeable materialschanges only through conductance, unlike permeable soils which can be warmed or cooled as


water percolates through. If temperature rises beneath permafrost or in granite, it's because thesurface air is warmer.

In the unpopulated wilderness of the Alaskan Arctic where thousands of oil and gasexploration wells have been drilled, Arthur H. Lachenbruch of the U.S. Geological Survey officein Menlo Park, California found that ground temperature had jumped sharply.38 Lachenbruch'sfirst measuring station was South Barrow Number Three, roughly 13 miles from Point Barrow,the northernmost point in North America. There he found a 2 to 4 degree centigrade warming inthe last century. “It's ripping along,” said Lachenbruch of the warming.39

When Lachenbruch reported his pioneering work in 1986, it set off a global inquiry thathas raged most intensely in North America at depths ranging up to 3,000 meters. In the past tenyears, findings on increased subsurface soil temperature have come from boreholes in Cuba,Australia, Greenland, Russia, France, Finland, Italy, Africa, China, New Zealand, Central Europe,Albania—“just about everywhere,” in the words of David Deming of the University ofOklahoma.40

c. Increase in ocean temperatures

Gregoria Parrilla, an oceanographer with the Spanish Institute of Oceanography inMadrid, and a team of other scientists measured temperature, salt content and other variety ofother factors at 115 different sites in areas that had been surveyed in 1981 and 1957 as well. Theocean had not only “consistently warmed,” but the warming was “remarkably uniform (and)surprisingly deep,” they reported. The maximum warming, found at 1,100 meters depth, wasoccurring at a rate of 1 degree C per century, which the research team called “broadly consistentwith model predictions of climate change due to increases in atmospheric CO2 concentration.” Parilla also found that the salt content of the water column had changed and the isotherm, whichis the barrier between colder and warmer waters, had shifted.41

Nathan Bindoff of the Cooperative Research Center for Antarctic and Southern OceanStudies in Hobart, Tasmania compared temperatures in 1989 and 1990 with measurements taken22 years earlier in the Pacific Ocean between Australia and New Zealand. He found “warmingthroughout most of the water column,” with the largest increase of more than 0.4 degree C at adepth of about 3,000 decibars. In another study, Bindoff found a similar rise in temperatures ofthe southwestern Pacific.42

In April, 1994 scientists with the Transarctic Acoustic Propagation Experiment blasted 13low frequency pulses of sound—which travels faster in warm water—from Spitsbergen, Norway to receivers at about 900 and 1600 kilometers away (600 and 1050 miles) at Camps Narwhal andSimi. The pulses arrived an average of 2 seconds before they had been expected based the U.S.-Russian-Canadian team was able to determine that the Arctic Ocean temperatures between 100and 500 meters had jumped 0.5 degrees C, compared to decade-old temperature data gathered byships and submarines. Oceanographer Peter Mikhalevsky of Science Applications InternationalCorp. in McLean, Virginia called the temperature increases “very startling.” Mikhalevsky saidthey were “major changes that up to now we didn't believe were possible in the Arctic.”43 Measurements taken five months later by a combined U.S.-Canadian icebreaker expedition founda one-degree increase—“clear evidence the Arctic is warming,” said Canadian scientist EdCarmack.44 Five months later, scientists at the Scripps Institute of Oceanography in La Jolla,


California sent a single blast racing across the Pacific as a test of the system and found that it alsoshowed a .5 degree increase along the pulse's 6,500 thousand mile path to New Zealand.45

d. Rise in global sea levels

Altogether, sea levels have risen by 10 to 20 centimeters over the last century, accordingto the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. These measurements are based on tidalgauges some of which, in the North Sea, are over three centuries old.46 Because tidal gauges areclose to shore, they can be influenced by factors other than global warming.

e. Reduction in sea ice

Researchers at the Nansen Environmental and Remote Sensing Center in Bergen, Norwayused satellite-based microwave measurements to confirm not only that sea ice is melting, but therate has nearly doubled recently. Their measurements found an annual loss of 2.5 percentbetween 1978 and 1987, but the rate of yearly decline increased to 4.5 percent between 1987 and1994.47

f. Reduction polar ice covers

As ice flows down the frozen flanks of the Antarctic mountains and reaches the sea, itforms massive shelves that constitute roughly 11 percent of the continent's area. Floating in thefrigid ocean exposed to both air and water, these shelves are extremely sensitive to even slightchanges in temperature.48

In the last 50 years as the Antarctic temperature has climbed 2.5 degrees C, four Antarcticice shelves have collapsed: the Wordie ice shelf measured 2,000 square kilometers in the 1940s,but has shrunk by two-thirds; the Prince Gustav has disappeared altogether.49 The mostdramatic of these collapses was easily that of the Larsen Ice Shelf in January, 1995. As satelliteimaging radar provided detailed images to the world's scientists, the Larsen shelf disintegratedover the span of roughly five days.50 At one point a slab of ice 48 miles by 22 miles (77 kilometerby 35 kilometer)—larger than Rhode Island—shattered free and floated away.

Warming has also occurred at the North Pole, where University of Washingtonoceanographer Knut Aagaard and a team of British and American scientists found a 1 degree Cincrease in subsurface water temperatures. Starting at the Bering Strait, they crossed the NorthPole in a first-ever voyage by icebreaker, emerging between Spitzbergen and Greenland. Theycollected temperature data en route and compared it to earlier information from Russian icestations and other voyages. They found a layer of warmer water roughly 1,000 feet thick, theupper part of which, roughly 200 meters deep, had warmed the most.51

g. Stratospheric cooling

As temperatures closer to the Earth's surface have climbed as heat was trapped there,those in the stratosphere have been dropping steadily. Since the 1970s, stratospherictemperatures have fallen by roughly .4 C and are now at an all time low.

h. Increase in extreme weather events


The hotter the oceans and air become, the stronger and more are the storms they produce. While no particular hurricane, drought, blizzard or wildfire can be blamed on global warming,there is no question that the past few years have witnessed sharp increases violent weather. Evidence of increasing numbers of catastrophic weather events is provided in part by insurancepayouts. From 1966 to 1987, the insurance industry paid no claims over $1 billion. But sincethen, there have been 15 catastrophes with losses higher than $1 billion. Four 1990 storms inEurope cost $10.4 billion, while Hurricane Andrew's 1992 toll in Florida amounted to $20billion.52

Researchers at the National Climatic Data Center in Ashville, N.C. examined extremes inheat, cold, drought and wetness, all of which are projected to be changed by global warming. They compared recent measurements with those dating back to 1910. They concluded that therehad, indeed, been increases in severe weather events, and that the statistical probability that thesewere due to global warming was 95 percent.

i. Reduction in glacier coverage

Australian glacier expert Jim Peterson of Monash University in Melbourne, Australia,together with Geoff Hope of Australian National University in Canberra, surveyed tropical Asia'sonly permanently ice-capped mountain, Indonesia's 16,023 foot Puncak Jaya Kesuma (MountJaya). Comparing aerial photographs of Mount Jaya from 1936 and maps drawn in 1962 withtheir own surveys in 1971, 1993 and 1994, they found that its glacial ice cover, which oncecovered 7.7 square miles, has shrunk to only one square mile.53

Mark Meier, a glaciologist at the University of Colorado's Institute of Arctic and AlpineResearch has collected a century of data from hundreds of glaciers across the world, andconcluded that the Earth's total glacier mass had shrunk by 11 percent, while that of the EuropeanAlps has declined an one-half. A separate study at the Russian Academy of Science's Institute ofGeography reached similar conclusions. It found that the melting of the Earth's half-million smallglaciers had contributed to the global sea level rise of 0.4 inches over the last century.54

j. Shifts in animal and plant populations

Bays and oceans are so complex that attributing change to any single cause isextraordinarily difficult. Nevertheless, some scientists have linked warming with documentedpopulation shifts. For example, in Monterey Bay, California, J.P. Barry of the Monterey BayAquarium Research Institute found “profound” changes compared to 1931–33, related totemperature increases. In 1930 W.G. Hewatt of Stanford University had anchored brass bolts inbedrock to provide survey points for a 108 yard (98.8 meter) transect of the intertidal zone, whichis the area that is periodically covered and exposed by the tide's ebb and flow. Barry re-established Hewatt's original one yard square plots and examined 35 in detail, identifying 58,000specimens. The researchers found that of nine species that preferred warmer waters, eight hadincreased significantly. For example, Serpulorbis squamigerus, a sessile aggregating gastropod,had not been found at all in 1931–33 and had been rarely encountered in a mid-1960s survey, butwas “common” in 1993–94.55 In contrast, animals preferring colder waters declined sharply. During the same 60-year time span, average temperature at the shoreline rose by 0.75 degreesCentigrade, while summertime highs averaged 2.2 degrees hotter.56


Analogous change appears to be occurring at terrestrial sites as well. During the summerof 1992, Georg Grabherr of the University of Vienna's and others inspected summit conditions on26 Swiss and Austrian Alps higher than 3,000 meters and compared them to records from 90years earlier. They found plants moving skyward as fast as 12 feet per decade, appearing in areashistorically so cold and hostile that they were heretofore devoid of plant life.57 “There is no doubtthat even moderate warming induces migration processes,” commented Grabherr, “and thisprocess is underway.”58

In Rwanda, Michael Loevinsohn, of the International Development Research Center inNew Delhi, India, reported that during the 1980s, the incidence of malaria in Rwanda increased2.5-fold and spread into areas where it previously had been rare or absent altogether. Studyingthe connection between temperature increases and the incidence of malaria in Rwanda becausegood records of both are available, Loevinsohn found that since the early 1960s as temperatureclimbed nearly one degree C, the malaria rate had increased 2.5 fold nationwide. Among childrenand those living in high altitude areas, the increase was more than five fold, as the disease spreadinto areas where it had previously been “rare or absent,” says Levinsohn. The key factor seemedto be nighttime warming, since cooler evening temperature inhibit spread of both the anophelesmosquito and the plasmodium parasite that it transmits.59 Epidemics of malaria also occurredduring the late 1980s in Botswana, Madagascar, Swaziland, and Zambia, all countries withtemperature and geography similar to Rwanda.60

2. Inconsistencies and doubts

(1) Insufficient warming

Some scientists have criticized the general circulation models, or GCMs, which are usedto simulate Earth's climate system, including the complex and incompletely understoodinteractions between land, ocean, and atmosphere. They argue that because the earlier versions ofthe models projected temperature increases significantly greater than those actually observed, themodels are inherently unreliable.

The usual response is that since those early models were deployed researchers haveincorporated changes that reflect the confounding role played by other human pollutants. Included in these refinements are changes to reflect the cooling effect of the sulfate and other fineparticle aerosol found over industrialized areas. This effect is especially pronounced in themid-latitudes of the Northern Hemisphere, where the industrial centers of Europe, North Americaand Asia are found. Still, this explanation failed to satisfy some critics, who respond that sulfateaerosol particles represented in GCMs cannot, by themselves, account for the failure of theprojected warming to manifest itself. They further criticize the GCMs for not being able todemonstrate how heat is distributed throughout the atmosphere over a 24-hour period.61

(2) Satellite measurements

Skeptics also cite an apparent inconsistency between the land-based measurements oftemperature reported by British and American researchers and the observations from satellites. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's (NOAA) researchers reported that, the 11warmest years since historical records have been kept have occurred in the past two decades, with


1990 and 1997 among the warmest. At least some of this warming, they have concluded, ishuman-induced.

InterGovernmental Panel on Climate Change

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

We are certain of the following:• there is a natural greenhouse effect which already keeps the Earth warmer than it would otherwise be.

• emissions resulting from human activities are substantially increasing the atmospheric concentrations ofthe greenhouse gases: carbon dioxide, methane, chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs) and nitrous oxide. Theseincreases will enhance the greenhouse effect, resulting on average in an additional warming of theEarth's surface. The main greenhouse gas, water vapor, will increase in response to global warming andfurther enhance it.

We calculate with confidence that:• some gases are potentially more effective than others at changing climate, and their relative effectiveness

can be estimated. Carbon dioxide has been responsible for over half the enhanced greenhouse effect inthe past, and is likely to remain so in the future.

• atmospheric concentrations of the long-lived gases (carbon dioxide, nitrous oxide and the CFCs) adjustonly slowly to changes in emissions. Continued emissions of these gases at present rates would commitus to increased concentrations for centuries ahead. The longer emissions continue to increase at presentday rates, the greater reductions would have to be for concentrations to stabilize at a given level.

• the long-lived gases would require immediate reductions in emissions from human activities of over 60%to stabilize their concentrations at today's levels; methane would require a 15–20% reduction.

Based on current model results, we predict:• under the IPCC Business-as-Usual (Scenario A) emissions of greenhouse gases, a rate ofincrease of global mean temperature during the next century of about 0.3°C per decade (with an uncertaintyrange of 0.2°C to 0.5°C per decade); this is greater than that seen over the past 10,000 years. This will resultin a likely increase in global mean temperature of about 1°C above the present value by 2025 and 3°C beforethe end of the next century. The rise will not be steady because of the influence of other factors.

• under the other IPCC emission scenarios which assume progressively increasing levels of controls, ratesof increase in global mean temperature of about 0.2°C per decade (Scenario B), just above 0.1°C perdecade (Scenario C) and about 0.1°C per decade (Scenario D).

• that land surfaces warm more rapidly than the ocean, and high northern latitudes warm more than theglobal mean in winter.

• regional climate changes different from the global mean, although our confidence in the prediction of thedetail of regional changes is low. For example, temperature increase in Southern Europe and centralNorth America are predicted to be higher than the global mean, accompanied on average by reducedsummer precipitation and soil moisture. There are less consistent predictions for the tropics and thesouthern hemisphere.

• under the IPCC Business as Usual emissions scenario, an average rate of global mean sea level rise ofabout 6 centimeters per decade over the next century (with an uncertainty range of 3–10 centimeters perdecade), mainly due to thermal expansion of the oceans and the melting of some land ice. The predictedrise is about 20 cm in global mean sea level by 2030, and 65 cm by the end of the next century. Therewill be significant regional variations.


On the other hand, satellite instruments, which have been measuring the conditions of theatmosphere in a deep column above the surface over the past 15 years, fail, say skeptics, to reflectwarming.

The usual response to the statement that satellites have failed to detect a warming trend isthat to compare the ground-based measurements with those from satellites is inappropriate. Atface value in may appear that satellites are failing to detect a warming, trend, but this is actuallynot so.

First, satellites are measuring the temperature through a depth of the atmosphere -typically between 1 and 8 km above the Earth's surface - and not the surface air temperaturewhich the meteorological stations are measuring. When the satellite records are corrected forknown variations, they produce a similar trend to the surface records.

Second, when the effects of ENSO events and volcanic eruptions are removed from thesatellite and surface records, the trend agreement between 1979 and 1995 is good -+0.09�C/decade for the satellite record and +0.17�C/decade for the surface. This implies thatmid-troposphere and surface temperatures are affected differently by ENSO and volcaniceruptions - a fully understandable notion. Comparison with model results must proceed withcaution here, since models do not simulate the effect of volcanoes - and only imperfectly the effectof ENSO. The fact that surface and mid-troposphere temperature trends agree much moreclosely when these two effects are eliminated from the respective records is a result in line withmodel simulations.

(3) Heat islands

Non-climatic influences such as urbanization can increase localtemperatures because brick, concrete and asphalt retain heat. This so-called “heat island” effect isblamed by some scientists for the observed increases in temperatures on grounds that as citieshave grown they have surrounded measuring stations that were once isolated.

The usual response to this criticism is that this uncertainty, together with many others, hasbeen taken into account in the scientific quality assurance process. Land stations with strongurban warming influences have been removed from the record and the remaining bias due tourbanization has been estimated at no more than 0.05 degrees C over 100 years. Moreover, heatislands could not explain away the ocean, subsurface and other temperature measurements thatshow increases.

3. Is a warming human induced by humans?

Even if the Earth is warming, a remaining question—some would say the question—iswhether that temperature increase is due to human activity.

Climate changes caused by human activities are superimposed on, and to some extentmasked by, natural climate fluctuations. Natural changes in climate result from interactions suchas those between the atmosphere and ocean, referred to as internal factors, and from externalcauses, such as variations in the sun's energy output and in the amount of material injected into


the upper atmosphere by explosive volcanic eruptions.62

Because there have been historic warming as well as cooling periods, there is no disputethat the Earth undergoes natural temperature cycles. Moreover, based on the record oftemperature variation, the Earth at or near the end of a period of cyclical warming. Moreover, itis well known that a variety of other natural events also effect climate. Thus, this particularperiod of warming might be attributable to sunspots, solar cycles, or natural variability.

Because of these alternative explanations, a considerable amount of scientific work hasfocused on “attribution.” That is, linking the observed warming to specific cause in a persuasiveway. Studies that aim to identify human influences on climate attempt to separate ahuman-caused climate-change factor (the signal) from the background noise of natural climatevariability. Such investigations usually consist of two parts: detection of an unusual change, andattribution of all or part of that change to a particular cause or causes.63 To do this, scientistshave parsed the average increase in surface temperatures, so they could identify specific patternsin time and space—the latitudes, altitudes, times of day, seasons and amounts of temperaturechanges, for example. Some of this information included the following:

• Magnitude of the globally averaged increase. Early work on climate-change detectionexamined changes in the globally averaged surface temperature of the Earth over the last century. Most studies of this type concluded that the observed increase of roughly 0.5 C (about 1 degreeF) was larger than would be expected as a result of natural climate variability alone.

• Patterns of temperature increase. Warming caused by cyclical increases in solarradiation would cause even warming, both globally and at different heights in the atmosphere, andthe observed patterns aren't even at all. Areas of North America, for example, for been cooling,just as computer models predict, because of chilling effect of industrial pollution, which reflectssunlight.

• Linkages to events. Warming caused by solar cycles would be tied to some sort of solaractivity, such as sun spots and volcanic-induced climate changes would be linked to eruptions, butthat is not the case with observed warming.

• Validation of models. If the observed warming were attributable to some cause otherthan human activity, then the computer models predicting the increases would, by definition, beflawed. However, when the models have been tested against real world situations, they havecorrectly predicted outcomes. For example, when Mt. Pinatubo erupted, models correctlypredicted a roughly five-year period of cooling, followed by a return to warmer temperatures. Inaddition, when data from previous climatic periods was entered into models, the accuratelypredicted the changes which, in fact, occurred. Finally, they now accurately project the currentpatterns of warming, even though they are uneven spatially, geographically and temporally.

Thus, when the roughly 2,000 scientists who participated in the Intergovernmental Panelon Climate Change examined these facts, they concluded not only that the Earth's temperaturehad increased, but that there was a “discernable” human influence.

C. Effects of Global Warming


The array of direct impacts of global warming was summarized by theNational Academy of Sciences in 1986, and that remains fundamentally valid today. TheAcademy's summary of direct effects was as follows:

• Large Stratospheric Cooling (virtually certain)

Reduced ozone concentrations in the upper stratosphere will lead to reduced absorption ofsolar ultraviolet radiation and therefore less heating. Increases in the stratospheric concentrationof carbon dioxide and other radiatively active trace gases will increase the radiation of heat fromthe stratosphere. The combination of decreased heating and increased cooling will lead to a majorlowering of temperatures in the upper stratosphere.64

• Global-Mean Surface Warming (very probable)

For a doubling of atmospheric carbon dioxide (or its radiative equivalent from all of thegreenhouse gases), the long-term global-mean surface warming is expected to be in the range of1.5 to 4.5°C. The most significant uncertainty arises from the effects of clouds. Of course, theactual rate of warming over the next century will be governed by the growth rate of greenhousegases, natural fluctuations in the climate system, and the detailed response of the slowlyresponding parts of the climate system, i.e., oceans and glacial ice.65

• Global-Mean Precipitation Increase (very probable)

Increased heating of the surface will lead to increased evaporation and, therefore, togreater global mean precipitation. Despite this increase in global average precipitation, someindividual regions might well experience decreases in rainfall.66

• Reduction of Sea Ice (very probable)

As the climate warms, total sea ice is expected to be reduced.67

• Polar Winter Surface Warming (very probable)

As the sea ice boundary is shifted poleward, the models predict a dramatically enhancedsurface warming in winter polar regions. The greater fraction of open water and thinner sea icewill probably lead to warming of the polar surface air by as much as 3 times the global meanwarming.68

• Summer Continental Dryness/Warming (likely in the long term)

Several studies have predicted a marked long-term drying of the soil moisture over somemid-latitude interior continental regions during summer. This dryness is mainly caused by anearlier termination of snowmelt and rainy periods, and an earlier onset of the spring-to-summerreduction of soil wetness. Of course, these simulations of long-term equilibrium conditions maynot offer a reliable guide to trends over the next few decades of changing atmosphericcomposition and changing climate.69

• High-Latitude Precipitation Increase (probable)


As the climate warms, the increased poleward penetration of warm, moist air shouldincrease the average annual precipitation in high latitudes.70

• Rise in Global Mean Sea Level (probable)

A rise in mean sea level is generally expected due to thermal expansion of sea water in thewarmer future climate. Far less certain is the contribution due to melting or calving of land ice.71

These impacts are relatively obvious. Aside from them, enhancement of the GreenhouseEffect by human activity will lead to a wide variety of other changes that are less apparent. Forexample, an important consideration is not merely that the temperature will increase but that itwill do so at an unprecedented rate. The average rate of warming of the Earth's surface over thenext hundred years will probably be greater than any that has occurred in the last 10,000 years,the period over which civilization developed.72 Such increases will shift the ranges of plants andanimals, and in some cases the movement of temperatures will likely be faster than the speed atwhich life can migrate.

Greater warming is expected to occur over land than over the oceans. The maximumwarming is expected to occur in the Arctic in winter. Nighttime temperatures are expected toincrease more than daytime temperatures. In general, there will probably be an increase in thenumber of very hot days at mid-latitude locations in summer, such as in most of North America,Europe, and parts of South America, with a decrease of very cold days in the same locations inwinter.73

Extreme events such as heavy rains and droughts are the most destructive forms ofweather, and the frequency and duration of these events are likely to increase as the climatecontinues to change. Increases in the global averages of both evaporation and precipitation areexpected. In winter at mid-latitudes, higher surface temperatures are expected to cause anincreased portion of the precipitation to fall in the form of rain rather than snow. This is likely toincrease both wintertime soil moisture and runoff, leaving less runoff for summer. In spring, fastersnow melt is likely to aggravate flooding. In the summer, increased heating will lead to increasedevaporation, which could decrease the availability of soil moisture needed both for naturalvegetation and agriculture in many places, and increase the probability of severe drought.Droughts and floods occur naturally around the world, for example in association with El Ninoevents, but are likely to become more severe, causing water management to become an even morecritical problem in the future.74

3. Uncertainties and feedbacks

The overall warming trend, both in the atmosphere and the oceans, is virtually certain totrigger a cascade of other changes. Some of these will be global, while others will be continental,subcontinental or even local scale. There is widespread agreement among scientists that too littleis known to predict with confidence what these changes will be, much less whether they will bebeneficial or harmful.

There is, however, general agreement that the some of the secondary and tertiary changestriggered by overall warming will act as feedbacks that could amplify, reduce or alter the climate


change signal. Some of these potential feedbacks deserve special mention.

a. Negative feedbacks

(1) Water Vapor and Clouds.

Possibly no single uncertainty has given rise to as much controversy as the role of watervapor and clouds. Water vapor is the most important of the Greenhouse Gases, so by changingthe amount and location of water vapor that global warming could have some of its most far-reaching impacts. Water vapor also is an important mechanism for transporting energythroughout the globe. Winds move warm, moist air upward and poleward from the tropicalsurface and move cold, dry air downward and toward the equator from higher altitudes andlatitudes. The contrasts in heating, together with the winds, also drive ocean currents.75

Concentrations of water in the atmosphere are expected to change in response to changesin concentration of other greenhouse gases. For example, as increases in carbon dioxide warm thesurface and atmosphere, more water evaporates from the surface and remains in the atmosphere. In fact the amount of water vapor that can be held increases exponentially with temperature. Because water vapor is such a strong greenhouse gas, this increase traps more longwaveradiation, further warming the surface and troposphere and thus amplifying the initial warming. This feedback is so significant that it can increase the original perturbation by as much as a factorof two in the absence of other feedbacks.76 Yet water vapor might have the opposite effect aswell, because evaporated water forms clouds, some of which can have a cooling effect.77

Clouds. The understanding of clouds is so rudimentary that no one knows whetherchanges in the clouds will dampen or amplify a warming trend. The possibility that clouds mightaccelerate global warming brings a special urgency to the ancient problem of understanding theclimatic importance of clouds.78


Clouds both cool and heat the planet, even as their own properties are determined by thecooling and heating. The cooling properties are readily visible: the minute water or ice particlesin clouds reflect between 30 and 60 percent of the sunlight that strikes them, giving them their

Tertiary Effects of Global Warming

The increased temperatures and sealevels resulting from global warming wouldspawn a wide range of third-order changes, according to most scientists. These wouldinclude—

Tropical storms: Warmer oceans would increase the number and strength ofhurricanes and other tropical storms. “Low-lying regions of the world...would be subjectedto increased frequency and intensity of tropical cyclones,” predicts Donald De Sylva of theUniversity of Miami's Rosenstiel School of Marine and Atmosphere Sciences.

Coastal Flooding: Nearly one third of all humans live within sixty kilometers of acoastline. A large rise in sea levels would inundate most of the world's most important portsand cities.

Diseases and parasites: “Parasites are good at solving problems and because theyreproduce so quickly, they will always win,” said Andrew Dobson of the University ofRochester, who believes infectious diseases now restricted to tropical zones would spreadinto the densely populated temperate regions.

Agriculture: Pests such as locusts, aphids and moths become more active andnumerous as temperature or humidity increased. Higher temperature might allow theseplant-eating insects to complete two life cycles during a single growing season, “meaningsome crops will get hammered twice,” said Princeton University researcher DavidRubenstein. While warmer temperatures and the fertilizing effect of carbon dioxide mightallow new regions to be put into production, “carbon dioxide fertilization favors weedyplants, “ cautioned Boyd Strain of Duke University. “So the world will become weedier.” Some existing regions such as the U.S. Midwest, “could become a dry, desert-like area,” saidKen Hubbard, an associate professor at the University of Nebraska's Lincoln Center forAgricultural Meteorology and Climatology, “Plants would grow, but not wheat. And you'dhave to irrigate any agricultural product you wanted to grow.”

Species: Roughly 20 percent of all animal species, scientists warn, would beeliminated, the greatest species loss since the extinction of the dinosaurs 65 million yearsago. Some animals might adapt by moving, but mountains, oceans and other barriers woulddoom slow-moving plants and animals. Because sex ratios amongst some species aredetermined by temperature, (at high temperatures, lizards and alligators produce mostlymales, while turtles produce mostly females), “we could end up with a total absence of onesex or incredible skews in the sex ratio,” said Princeton's Rubenstein.


bright, white appearance. A cloudless earth would absorb nearly 20 percent more heat from thesun than the present earth does. To be in radiation balance the earth would have to be warmer byabout twenty-two degrees Fahrenheit. Conversely, clouds cool the planet by reflecting sunlightback into space, much as they chill a summer's day at the beach.79

The cooling effect is largely offset, however, by a blanketing effect: clouds reduce theamount of heat that radiates into space by absorbing the heat rising from the surface andreradiating some of it back down. The blanketing effect warms the earth by some thirteen degreesFahrenheit. Thus the net effect of clouds on the climate is to cool the surface by about ninedegrees. But what happens to the radiation balance if, as part of the climatic response, the cloudsthemselves change?80 Some—call them optimists—believe that altered clouds will cool the Earth,offsetting global warming. Others—call them pessimists—believe that altered clouds will warmthe Earth, accelerating global warming.

The earliest attempts to predict how changes in cloud cover would affect greenhousewarming concluded that they would have no net effect. That conclusion was based on the beliefthat any change that made clouds better at cooling would also make them more efficient atretaining heat near the surface.81

Critics of global warming charge that scientists have under-estimated the cooling effectthat clouds will have. In its report, Scientific Perspectives on the Greenhouse Problem, theWashington, D.C.-based Marshall Institute charged that—

Clouds create a problem for the greenhouse forecaster because the naturalcooling effect they produce is ten times as large as the entire man-madegreenhouse warming projected for the middle of the next century.82

Clearly, clouds can have an off-setting cooling effect. Observations made during the 1987El Niño show that in the upper range of sea surface temperatures, the greenhouse effect increaseswith surface temperature at a rate which exceeds the rate at which radiation is being emitted fromthe surface. In response to this ‘super greenhouse effect’, highly reflective cirrus clouds areproduced which act like a thermostat, shielding the ocean from solar radiation. The regulatoryeffect of these cirrus clouds may thus limit sea surface temperatures.83

The quest for more data about clouds and climate continues in parallel with the refinementof climate models, but it is a slow-going process, leading one commentator to express thesomewhat morose sentiment that “one must hope that the model building and data collection willlead to an understanding of climatic change before that change comes to pass.”84

(2) CO2 fertilization

Robert Balling, director of the climatology program at Arizona State, argues not only thatglobal warming is exaggerated by other scientists but that if warming does occur, it will benefitthe environment by boosting plant growth. This thesis has proved so appealing to industryopponents of action to curb global warming that they have turned it into a video, The Greeningof Planet Earth, and distributed 20,000 copies to Congress, the press, and coal industryexecutives.85


b. Positive feedbacks

(1) Liberation of stored carbon

Roughly half of the carbon dioxide known to be released by human activity ought to be inthe Earth's atmosphere, but isn't. Scientists are unsure what happens to this “missing” CO2. Itmay be taken up by the oceans or perhaps by forests.86 Whatever the answer, the identity of thismissing “sink” for CO2 remains one of the major unanswered questions regarding the role ofcarbon dioxide.87

The nature and identity of this sink are important because they could mask increases incarbon dioxide resulting from plant respiration, especially from microscopic plants and soils. There is about twice as much carbon in the top meter of soil as in the atmosphere. Therefore, oneeffect of global warming could be to accelerate the decomposition of soil organic matter, therebyreleasing CO2 and methane, also a Greenhouse Gas, to the atmosphere, which would furtherenhance the warming trend.

Such a feedback mechanism could be quantitatively important, One group of scientistshas calculated that world temperatures rose by 0.03 °C yr-1 (the increase considered as most likelyby the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change), the additional release of CO2 from soilorganic matter over the next 60 years would be roughly one-fifth of the CO2 that will be releasedby combustion of fossil fuel during that period.88

(2) Tropospheric ozone

Tropospheric ozone, or “smog” is itself a powerful Greenhouse Gas. It isformed when oxides of nitrogen and hydrocarbon react in the presence of sunlight. There is adirect, linear relationship between ambient temperatures and the formation of ozone: the hotter itgets, the larger the amount of smog. So, if temperatures climb, smog levels can be expected tofollow. Increases could be even sharper in cities because of the so-called “heat island” effect.89

Although tropospheric ozone is usually thought of as an urban pollutant, there has been alittle-noticed global doubling of this pollutant over the last century. One observer has said thisdoubling is “as remarkable as the observation of a hole in the stratospheric ozone layer over theAntarctic and potentially is just as consequential.”90 Aside from their impacts on human health,increases in concentrations of tropospheric ozone are troubling for two other reasons:

• Because ambient levels of ozone already hover close to the toxicity threshold for manyplants and animals, further increases could trigger a cascade of damages to natural ecosystems,especially forests and forest ecosystems.

• Because ozone is itself a Greenhouse Gas and because its formation is linerarally liked totemperature, increases could establish a continuous loop of warming in which higher temperaturecreated more ozone and more ozone led to further warming.

(3) Interruption of the oceanic “conveyor belt”

Deep water in the world's oceans flows predominantly from the northern North Atlanticinto the Pacific, slowly upwelling on the way to become part of the upper warm-water circulation,


then returns to the North Atlantic. This “conveyor belt” as it is often called by scientists movesnutrients from the Antarctic to the Pacific, warm water from the South Atlantic to the North, thenreturns to its Antarctic racetrack, where the giant currents once again circle the ice-bound polarregions.

In the North Atlantic, cold dry arctic winds sweep over the oceanic conveyor belt,draining it of energy and freshwater. Blowing due east, they warm Europe from London toMoscow with rain and warmth. Cooler and saltier, the waters sink into the oceanic depths andbegin another century-long journey toward the Antarctic.

Although heat fuels this global conveyor belt if the waters warm too much, they may failto sink, thus halting the pattern of circulation that transports fresh water, warmth and nutrientsthroughout the globe. Hydrographic observations and measurements of the concentrations ofchlorofluorocarbons (CFCs) have suggested that the formation of Greenland Sea Deep Water, anessential part of the conveyor, slowed down considerably during the 1980s. The decreases beganin 1972.91

III. INTERNATIONAL RESPONSES

A. Pre-1988

With the revelation in the mid-1980s of an ozone “hole” over the Antarctic—a zoneof stratospheric ozone depletion roughly the size of North America and the height of MountEverest—international action to curb emissions of ozone-destroying chemicals gatheredmomentum. At the same time, the scientific community was beginning to issue warnings of globalwarming. Not surprisingly, as nations met in international arenas to hammer out the details ofactions to curb stratospheric ozone depletion, they began to lay the groundwork for study ofglobal warming.

Montreal Protocol on Substances that Deplete the Ozone Layer

This 1987 protocol was developed by Parties to the Vienna Convention, and includesextensive binding provisions to freeze levels of consumption and production of controlledchemical substances such as chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs) at 1986 levels, with scheduled decreasesbeginning in 1993. It was amended in 1992 to require complete phaseout of production andconsumption of these chemicals by industrialized countries by 1996, and complete phaseout by allcountries by the year 2010. It recognizes the special situation of developing countries: allowsdelays for them in certain circumstances, and encourages technical assistance.

The Montreal Protocol, and the events that led to it, marked the first instance of nationsthroughout the world collaborating in both research and action to respond to a globalenvironmental threat. The scientists and policy makers involved in the issues of ozone depletionwere, in many respects, the same individuals charged with responsibility for dealing with globalwarming. To probe the nature, extent and causes of stratospheric ozone depletion, nationslaunched joint campaigns of research and exploration that were said to be the largest peacetimeexpeditions in history. Yet the efforts required to demonstrate that destruction of the ozone layerwas caused by human activity were small in comparison with the scientific challenges of globalwarming.


Creation of the IPCC

To meet these challenges, and to lay the foundation for future United Nations negotiationson a climate change convention/treaty, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC)was created in November, 1988 under the auspices of two United Nations organizations, theWorld Meteorological Organization (WMO) and the Environment Programme (UNEP). Thisnew organization was charged with assessing the “scientific information... related to the variouscomponents of the climate change issue” and formulating “response strategies for themanagement of the climate change issue.”92

The IPCC divided its tasks among three Working Groups, which submitted their initialfindings to the full IPCC in June 1990, which assembled them into the First Assessment Report. It was, in turn, presented to and adopted by the U.N. General Assembly at the Second UnitedNations World Climate Conference in August, 1990. This would form the basis for futureinternational negotiations on a framework convention on climate change.93

In resolutions adopted on December 6, 1988 and December 22, 1989, the U.N. GeneralAssembly had declared that “climate change is a common concern of mankind.” After receivingthe IPCC's first report, the Assembly, established an Intergovernmental Negotiating Committee(INC), supported by WMO and UNEP, to prepare a “framework convention on climate change,”in time for its consideration at a June, 1992 U.N. Conference on Environment and Development(UNCED) in Rio de Janiero, Brazil.94

The Intergovernmental Negotiating Committee opened negotiations in February 1991, inChantilly, Virginia, just a few miles outside Washington, D.C. Fifteen months later, thenegotiations concluded at the INC's fifth session, held in New York City where the text of aso-called “Framework Convention on Climate Change (FCCC)” was finalized.95

The FCCC divided the nations of the world into different categories, assigning themdifferential responsibilities:

• So-called “Annex I” countries includes nations that are economically developed orindustrialized, as well as “other parties,” which meant the former centrally-plannedeconomies of communist Eastern Europe then in transition to market-based economies.

• “Annex II” Countries are economically developed countries with additional responsibilitiesunder FCCC, such as providing fiscal and technological assistance to economicallydeveloping countries for the purpose of helping them meet their commitments under theFCCC. All Annex II Countries are also Annex I Countries.

• All remaining nations “Non-Annex I” parties, considered to be Economically DevelopingCountries (EDCs).96

With the background having been laid, the nations of the world were now ready to takethe first truly major step towards addressing global warming at what, until that time, was thelargest gathering of heads of state in history for the purpose of addressing an environmentalthreat. This was the meeting that came to be called on press, radio and television the “Earth


Summit.”

B. The “Earth Summit” [Convention on Climate Change]

The United Nations Conference on Environment and Development (UNCED), knownpopularly as the “Earth Summit,” was held in Rio de Janeiro in June 1992. It was the largestgathering of heads of state in history at that time, and resulted in an extensive “action plan” forthe 21st Century for integration of environment and economic activity called “Agenda 21.”

The Convention on Climate Change.

The Convention on Climate Change, a treaty opened for signature at the 1992 EarthSummit, established commitments for nations to take measures to limit emissions of greenhousegases. The treaty set a non-binding goal of reducing greenhouse gases to 1990 levels by the year2000, but did not establish binding targets and timetables. The United States played an active rolein negotiation of this treaty and was one of the first nations to ratify it and become a Party.

The convention was perhaps the “crowning achievement” of the Earth Summit, in thewords of the U.S. Department of State, in Rio was the adoption of the United NationsFramework Convention on Climate Change (FCCC). This Convention represented a sharedcommitment by nations around the world to reduce the potential risks of a major globalenvironmental problem. Its ultimate objective is to: “[A]chieve stabilization of greenhouse gasconcentrations in the atmosphere at a level that would prevent dangerous anthropogenic [human]interference with the climate system.” Such a level was to be achieved within a time framesufficient to allow ecosystems to adapt naturally to climate change, to ensure that food productionwas not threatened, and to allow economic development to proceed in a sustainable manner.b

It quickly became apparent that the goals of the Earth Summit would not be met neithersoon nor readily. When the world's nations met for the first time after Rio, at the FirstConference of Parties to FCCC (usually called COP-1) held March 27 to April 6, 1995 in Berlin,Germany, the highest item on the agenda was the development of a mechanism to make thecommitments made in Rio stick.

Although presidents, prime ministers and other heads of state were by and large absentfrom Berlin, their secretaries or ministers of the environment attended.97

Seeking grounds for a uniform approach toward climate protection, some COP-1 in Berlinvoiced concern about the ability or willingness of nations to meet their commitments under

b Also agreed to at the Earth Summit were an Earth Charter of fundamental principles, and astatement of forest principles, entitled “Non-Legally Binding Authoritative Statement of Principlesfor a Global Consensus on the Management, Conservation and Sustainable Development of AllTypes of Forests.” All of these documents, approved by consensus at UNCED are legallynon-binding and reflect approaches that, although recommended, do not constitute commitmentsto any particular actions. The United Nations General Assembly established a U.N. Commissionon Sustainable Development (CSD) that meets annually to review implementation of variousaspects of Agenda 21.


FCCC. The parties adopted a U.N. ministerial declaration now known as the “Berlin Mandate.”

The Berlin mandate established a 2-year “Analytical and Assessment Phase (AAP)”, tonegotiate a “comprehensive menu of actions” from which countries could pick and choose optionsto address climate change which for them, individually, made the best economic andenvironmental sense. A uniform approach to reporting emissions inventories and projections wasalso adopted. During AAP that followed, FCCC parties discussed the elements of possibleamendments and protocols and whether numerical aims, such as targets and timetables, binding ornon-binding agreements, or technology-related goals, alone, might be “adequate” for climateprotection.98

In addition, COP-1 parties addressed an issue that would continue to plague negotiatorsthrough the meeting in Kyoto: the nature of the commitments being made by developingcountries. Complaints were beginning to be heard that the distinctions between developed anddeveloping nations was “an arbitrary division between Annex I and Developing countries.” Someof the newly industrializing countries (NICs), such as Brazil, India, and China would continue toenjoy exemptions under the Berlin Mandate—including exemption from possible future, legallybinding emissions reduction agreements—even they collectively stood to become the world'slargest emitters of greenhouse gases by about the year 2015.99

Three months after the Berlin meeting, in July 1995, the U.S. Department of State issuedClimate Change: Next Steps, a “non-paper,” with the goal of establishing guidelines for, and aninterpretation of, how future negotiations on climate protection might proceed more credibly andeffectively. The United States maintained that it would neither issue a formal protocol, nor seekformal negotiations toward a protocol, until the completion of the Analytical and AssessmentPhase. With the conclusion of the AAP in February, 1997, negotiations for a protocol began inApril 1997.

Before that, however, a second Conference of the Parties was held in July, 1996 inGeneva, Switzerland. By this time, the IPCC's Second Assessment Report, together with itsconclusion that human activities were having a “discernable” impact of climate, had been releasedand widely discussed. This first-ever scientific conclusion that global warming had, in fact, begun,caused the ministers at COP-2 to adopt what became known as the “Geneva Declaration.” TheDeclaration—

• Strongly endorsed the IPCC conclusions, rejecting complaints by some industry lobbyistsand OPEC countries.

• Confirmed the findings of the IPCC that the continued rise in GHG concentrations “willlead to dangerous interference with the climate system”. This was highly significantbecause the Climate Convention commits Parties to the objective of avoiding “dangerous”climate change.

• Finally, it called for “legally binding” objectives for emission limitations and “significant”reductions (binding targets and timetables).

Australia lodged a formal reservation and New Zealand “a formal expression of concern”to the language on legally binding emission limits, but the Declaration constituted a consensus of


the more than 100 nations attending the meeting. It also laid the groundwork for the thirdConference of the Parties in Kyoto.

During the Second Conference of the Parties, the United States began to depart from thepath being followed by Canada, most European nations and those most threatened by globalwarming. The U.S. said any new agreement should include three main elements. These weredescribed by the U.S. Department of State as—

[A] realistic and achievable binding target (instead of the hortatory goals andnonbinding aims of the existing Convention), flexibility in implementation, and theparticipation of developing countries.

In the months leading up the December, 1997 meeting in Kyoto, interests in the UnitedStates were pushing in two opposite directions. On the one hand, the coal, oil, utility and autoindustries were lobbying for an outcome that would allow continued, unfettered use of fossil fuels. On the other hand, environmental groups were pressing for a U.S. commitment to agree to abinding timetable and limits for reductions in Greenhouse Gases.

Those opposed to binding limits pressed their views in the Congress, where they foundvaluable allies. Senators Robert C. Byrd (D.WVa) and Chuck Hagel (R.NE), together with 64co-sponsors, introduced S.Res. 98, which passed the Senate by a vote of 95-0 on July 25, 1997.The resolution expressed the sense of the Senate that the United States not be a signatory to anyagreement in Kyoto in December 1997, “unless the protocol or other agreement also mandatesnew specific scheduled commitments to limit or reduce greenhouse gas emissions for DevelopingCountry Parties within the same compliance period,” or if it would “result in serious harm to theeconomy of the United States.”

C. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change

1. IPCC 1996 Report

Working Group I: Science

Drafted by more than 350 scientists and reviewed by another 500, the Working Group Ireview of the science of global warming is 572 pages long. It is drafted as a sort of pyramid, witha 526-page foundation titled “Climate System: an overview, which is overlaid by a 40-page“Technical Summary,” then capped by a 6-page “Summary for Policymakers.”100 Of all theconclusion contained in the massive scientific undertaking, that which attracted the most attentionwas easily the Working Group I statement that—

there is a discernible human influence on global climate.101

The Second Assessment is the most recent in a series of international assessments ofclimate change that date back a quarter century or more. The First Assessment was published in1990 and a Third is scheduled for the turn of the century. The relative youth of research in thisfield is demonstrated by the fact that the Mauna Loa measurements of carbon dioxideconcentrations in the atmosphere started in 1957, which was the International Geophysical Year. The first international research programs on the greenhouse issue did not emerge until the early


1970s. And the results of so-called “general circulation models” attempting to predict the globalconsequences of increasing concentrations of Greenhouse Gases began to appear in the scientificliterature only in 1975.102

Aside from its conclusion that human influence on the global climate had becomediscernable, perhaps the most notable aspect of the Working Group I report is, as one observercommented, “not its specific findings but the depth and extent of the scientific consensus thatunderlies them.”103

The technical chapters of [a] 1978 assessment were written by 40 authors from 11countries, while the technical chapters prepared ... for the 1985 Villach assessmentdrew on only 22 authors from 7 countries. The IPCC process, by contrast, hassubstantially broadened the pool of scientists contributing to climate change

Working Group IThe Climate Science

• Human activities are changing the atmospheric concentrations and distributions ofgreenhouse gases and aerosols.

• Global average temperatures have increased about 0.3-0.6 degrees C (about 0.5-1.0 F)over the last century.

• The ability of climate models to simulate observed trends has improved--although there isstill considerable regional uncertainty with regard to changes.

• The balance of evidence suggests there is a discernible human influence on global climate.

• Aerosol sulfates (a component of acid rain) offset some of the warming by greenhousegases.

• The IPCC mid-range scenario projects an increase of 2.0 C (3.7 F) by 2100 (with a rangeof 1.0-3.5 C (about 1.8-6.3 F).

• The average global warming projected in the IPCC mid-range scenario is greater than anyseen in the last ten thousand years.

• Sea level is projected to rise (due to thermal expansion of the oceans, and melting ofglaciers and ice sheets) by about 50 centimeters (20 inches) by 2100, with a range of15-95 centimeters (about 6-38 inches).

• Even after a stabilization of greenhouse gas concentrations, temperatures would continueto increase for several decades, and sea level would continue to rise for centuries.


assessments, with 350 authors from more than two dozen countries contributing toThe Science of Climate Change.104

These scientists summarized their own conclusions as follows:

1. Greenhouse gas concentrations have continued to increase.2. Anthropogenic aerosols tend to produce negative radiative forcings.3. Climate has changed over the past century.4. The balance of evidence suggests a discernible human influence on global

climate.5. Climate is expected to continue to change in the future.6. There are still many uncertainties.105

The Working Group projects that by the year 2100, barring some change, human pollutionmay raise the mean global air temperature about 2 C, compared to its 1990 value (which alreadyreflects an increase of about 0.5 C). The scientists emphasize that “in all cases the average rate ofwarming would probably be greater than any seen in the last 10,000 years.” The key findings ofthe Working Group include the following:106

• The atmospheric concentrations of greenhouse gases carbon dioxide (CO2), methane(CH4) and nitrous oxide (N2O) have grown by about 30 percent, 145 percent, and 15percent, respectively since about 1750. These trends are due largely to human activities,mostly fossil fuel use, land—use change and agriculture. There is evidence thattropospheric ozone concentrations in the Northern Hemisphere have increased since pre—industrial times because of human activity and that this has resulted in a positive radiativeforcing. This forcing is not yet well characterized, but it is estimated to be about 0.4, orroughly 15 percent of that from the long—lived greenhouse gases.

• Tropospheric aerosols (microscopic airborne particles) resulting from combustion of fossilfuels, biomass burning and other sources have led to a negative direct forcing of about 0.5as a global average, and possibly also to a negative indirect forcing of a similar magnitude.

• Global mean surface air temperature has increased by between about 0.3 and 0.6 C sincethe late 19th century. Recent years have been among the warmest since 1860, despite thecooling effect of the 1991 Mt Pinatubo volcanic eruption. Night—time temperatures overland have generally increased more than daytime temperatures. Regional changes are alsoevident. For example, the recent warming has been greatest over the mid—latitudecontinents in winter and spring, with a few areas of cooling, such as the North Atlanticocean. Precipitation has increased over land in high latitudes of the Northern Hemisphere,especially during the cold season.

• On regional scales there is clear evidence of changes in some extremes and climatevariability indicators (e.g., fewer frosts in several widespread areas; an increase in theproportion of rainfall from extreme events over the contiguous states of the USA).

• Global sea level has risen by between 10 and 25 cm over the past 100 years and much ofthe rise may be related to the increase in global mean temperature.


• Average sea level is expected to rise as a result of thermal expansion of the oceans andmelting of glaciers and ice sheets. Models project an increase in sea level of about 50 cmfrom the present to 2100. Sea level would continue to rise at a similar rate in futurecenturies beyond 2100, even if concentrations of greenhouse gases were stabilized by thattime, and would continue to do so even beyond the time of stabilization of global meantemperature.107

• There will be greater surface warming of the land than of the sea in winter; a maximumsurface warming in high northern latitudes in winter, little surface warming over the Arcticin summer; an enhanced global mean hydrological cycle, and increased precipitation andsoil moisture in high latitudes in winter. All these changes are associated with identifiablephysical mechanisms.108

• In addition, most simulations show a reduction in the strength of the north Atlanticthermohaline circulation and a widespread reduction in diurnal range of temperature. These features too can be explained in terms of identifiable physical mechanisms. Thedirect and indirect effects of anthropogenic aerosols have an important effect on theprojections. Generally, the magnitudes of the temperature and precipitation changes aresmaller when aerosol effects are represented, especially in northern mid—latitudes. Notethat the cooling effect of aerosols is not a simple offset to the warming effect ofgreenhouse gases, but significantly affects some of the continental scale patterns of climatechange, most noticeably in the summer hemisphere. For example, models that consideronly the effects of greenhouse gases generally project an increase in precipitation and soilmoisture in the Asian summer monsoon region, whereas models that include, in addition,some of the effects of aerosols suggest that monsoon precipitation may decrease. Thespatial and temporal distribution of aerosols greatly influences regional projections, whichare therefore more uncertain.109

• A general warming is expected to lead to an increase in the occurrence of extremely hotdays and a decrease in the occurrence of extremely cold days. Warmer temperatures willlead to a more vigorous hydrological cycle; this translates into prospects for more severedroughts and/or floods in some places and less severe droughts and/or floods in otherplaces. Several models indicate an increase in precipitation intensity, suggesting apossibility for more extreme rainfall events. Knowledge is currently insufficient to saywhether there will be any changes in the occurrence or geographical distribution of severestorms, e.g., tropical cyclones.110

• Sustained rapid climate change could shift the competitive balance among species andeven lead to forest dieback, altering the terrestrial uptake and release of carbon. Themagnitude is uncertain, but could be between zero and 200 GtC over the next one to twocenturies, depending on the rate of climate change.111

Of course, all this begs the question whether these changes have been caused by humanactivity or whether they might be the result of natural variability. The scientists of WorkingGroup I found a “discernable” human influence and concluded that “the observed warming trendis unlikely to be entirely natural in origin” for a variety of factors.112

• Change induced by human activity would conform to certain patterns, and the changes


that have been observed fit these geographic, seasonal and vertical patterns of atmospherictemperature change.113

• Similarly, change induced by natural factors such as solar or volcanic forcing would fitother patterns, and the changes that have been observed do not.114

• If the observed changes were due to human activity, the correspondence between themand the predicted patterns would increase as pollution and other human influencesintensified, and that has happened.115

Working Group II

Working Group II, composed of 119 scientists from 32 countries, was charged with what,in many respects, was the most challenging and difficult tasks of the IPCC: assessing not only theimpacts of human-induced climate change but also possible strategies for responding to thatchange.116

The average increases in temperatures predicted by Working Group I would be the resultof extreme increases in some regions, seasons and times of the day, combined with actualdecreases in others. What could be catastrophic for, say, wheat farmers in Montana might beboon to sugar cane growers in Brazil, or vice versa. Similarly, bankruptcy for over-extendedinsurance firms or hard-hit agri-businesses might boost profits for banks.117

In an effort to unravel these complexities, the Group examined nine “natural” ecosystemsand ten “managed” systems. For each, the Group assessed the probable impacts the climatechange projected by Working Group I by summarizing each system's—

• general status and function;• sensitivity to climate change, as well as other environmental and human-induced changes;• adaptability to actual or projected climate change; and,• overall vulnerability (a function of both sensitivity and adaptability).118

The various summaries expresses the degree of assurance that the Group places in itsmajor conclusions by ranking them as high, medium, or low confidence.119

The overall conclusion is that most natural ecological systems, socioeconomic systems,and human health are—

• sensitive to human-induced climate change of the magnitude and rate expected (that is, atemperature increase in average global temperature ranging from 1 to 3.5 degreescentigrade, coupled with an rise in sea level of 15 to 95 centimeters);120 and,

• change will put the most stress on those systems that are already affected by pollution,increasing resource demands, or non-sustainable management practices.121

Forests

As a consequence of possible changes in temperature and water availability under doubled


equivalent C[O.sub.2]-equilibrium conditions, a substantial fraction (a global average of one-third,varying by region from one-seventh to two-thirds) of the existing forested area of the worm willundergo major changes in broad vegetation types - with the greatest changes occurring in highlatitudes.Climate change is expected to occur rapidly relative to the speed at which forest speciesgrow, reproduce, and reestablish themselves. For mid-latitude regions, an average global warmingof 1-3.5 [degrees] C over the next 100 years would be equivalent to shifting isotherms polewardapproximately 150-550 km. . . . This compares to past tree species migration rates on the order of4-200 km per century. Entire forest types may disappear, and new ecosystems may take theirplaces.122

Coastal Zones and Small Islands

Climate change clearly will increase the vulnerability of some coastal populations toflooding and erosional land loss. Estimates put about 46 million people per year currently at riskof flooding due to storm surges. In the absence of adaptation measures, a 50 centimeter rise insea-level would increase this number to about 92 million; a 1 meter rise would raise it to 118million. Small islands and deltas are at the greatest risk. Estimated land losses range from 0.05percent for Uruguay, 1 percent for Egypt, 6 percent for the Netherlands, and 17.5 percent forBangladesh, up to about 80 percent for the Majuro Atoll in the Marshall Islands. Large numbersof people are also affected—for example, about 70 million each in China and Bangladesh. Manynations face lost capital value in excess of 10 percent of their gross domestic products.123

Human Health

Temperature increases in colder regions should result in fewer cold-related deaths, butthese will be offset by higher mortality and illness because of heat waves that are worse, longerand more frequent. An increase in extreme weather would cause a higher incidence of death,injury, psychological disorders, and exposure to contaminated water supplies. Indirect effects ofclimate change include increases in the potential transmission of vector-borne infectious diseases(e.g., malaria, dengue fever, yellow fever, and some viral encephalitis) resulting from extensionsof the geographical range and season for vector organisms such as mosquitoes. Models projectan increase in malaria cases of 50 to 80 million annually, compared to a current background of500 million cases.

Agriculture

The Working Group concluded that, on the whole, global agricultural production could bemaintained, but access to and availability of food for specific local and regional populations mightbe severely disrupted. “At broader regional scales, subtropical and tropical climate areas - hometo many of the world's poorest people - show negative consequences more often than temperateareas,” the group reported. People dependent on isolated agricultural systems in semi-arid andarid regions face the greatest risk of increased hunger due to climate change. In all the scenariosexamined, climate change leads to substantial net declines in cereal production in the developingworld (which are offset by increases in the developed world only when there is extensiveadaptation). In all the simulations, world market prices rise at the same time developing countriesare forced to import more cereals. As a result, the number of malnourished people increases in 11of the scenarios examined. The number of people affected ranges from several hundred million to2 billion, depending on the particular assumptions made.124


Adaptation

The Working Group II report has been criticized by some for failing to devote moreattention to adaptation. As one commentator said—

As environments change, all forms of life adjust, adapt, and evolve in ways thatreduce their vulnerability. Humanity responds to environmental changes in bothconscious and unconscious ways and can even anticipate those changes in adistinctive fashion. For this reason, the notion of adaptation figures prominentlyin the second volume's title and section headings, but, alas, it does not play amajor role in the content .... Of its 728 pages of substantive text (the remaining150 pages are summaries, background pieces, and appendices), almost two-thirdsare devoted to the impacts of climate change, one-third to mitigation strategies,and only 32 pages (less than 4 percent of the total) to adaptation.125

Mitigation

It is clear from the tenor of the Working Group II report that its authors believe theprospects for mitigation—that is, reducing emissions and enhancing sinks of Greenhouse Gases—are significant. As the report states—

Significant reductions in net greenhouse gas emissions are technically possibleand can be economically feasible. These reductions can be achieved by utilizingan extensive array of technologies and policy measures that acceleratetechnology development, diffusion and transfer in all sectors including theenergy, industry, transportation, residential/commercial and agricultural/forestrysectors. By the year 2100, the world's commercial energy system in effect will bereplaced at least twice, offering opportunities to change the energy systemwithout premature retirement of capital stock; significant amounts of capitalstock in the industrial, commercial, residential and agricultural/forestry sectorswill also be replaced. These cycles of capital replacement provide opportunitiesto use new, better performing technologies.126

The Working Group reached this conclusion after conducting a thorough review of a widevariety of technologies and practices, ranging new ways of generating electricity from fossil fuelsto changes in settlement patterns. Some critics have derided the mitigation strategies suggestedby the Working Group as requiring “heroic efforts.”127 The new technologies and practicesreviewed by the Working Group are examined in detail elsewhere in this report.

Working Group III

Working Group I faced a formidable challenge in assessing the complexities of the scienceof climate change, while Group II was confronted by the enormous breadth of its assignment. Butof the three, Working Group III encountered what was, far and away, the greatest task in terms ofovercoming the biases and other frailties of its individual members in reaching a consensus. Indeed, it is remarkable that this Group was able to reach agreement at all given its compositionand the almost impalpable nature of its charge: namely, to assess the social and economic aspects


of climate change. As one commentator wrote—

Unlike the natural sciences, the social sciences share neither a commonoutlook nor a common methodology. Social scientists squabble among themselvesabout the purpose, meaning, and relevance of their labors. Consequently, theynever agree about what role to play in the policy process and they do not send auniform message to the policymakers who must formulate a response. Forexample, in many parts of this volume, the authors make a distinction between aprescriptive (normative or ethically loaded) approach to analysis and adescriptive (rationalistic or analytically focused) interpretation of issues, such asthe selection of a discount rate or the significance of an equity matter. But theynever give the reader any guidance about which of these two competing points ofview should take precedence .... [A] host of political interests try to manipulatethe evidence to suit their needs and clients.... The result is a permanent struggleto maintain some variant of the status quo and to keep from giving away too muchto the world's most disadvantaged.128

Working Group III was charged with conducting “technical assessments of the socio-economics of impacts, adaptation and mitigation of climate change over both the short and longterm and at the regional and global levels.” Unfortunately, the Group was beset by controversyand hindered somewhat by the divisions in its membership. For example, of the 32 reviewersfrom the United States, at least nine represented not only industry interests, but some segmentsthat are among the most strident in their attacks on both the science of climate change andpolicies to respond to its threats.129 Indeed, there were more purely industry-related members onWorking Group III than on the other two Groups combined.

What attracted most public attention, however, was a decision by some of the drafters toincorporate an unequal valuation of life for purposes of their calculations: the life of one human inthe North was valued at 15 times that of lives in the South. The criticism of the methodology,approach and conclusions was led by the U.K.-based Global Commons Institute. At first itattempted to persuade the authors of the chapter to reassess their positions and calculations and,failing that, took its case to the governments and members of the WG3.130

The GCI did its own calculations and showed that the costs could by as high as 12 to 130percent of the global world product as a result of adverse climate change, as against the 1.5 to 2.0percent estimate of the seven authors.131

Working Group III responded to its official charge from the IPCC by stipulating in itswork plan that it would place the socio-economic perspectives in the context of sustainabledevelopment and, in accordance with the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change(UNFCCC), provide comprehensive treatment of both mitigation and adaptation options whilecovering all economic sectors and all relevant sources of greenhouse gases and sinks.132

The WG III report assesses a large part of the existing literature on the socio—economicsof climate change and identifies areas in which a consensus has emerged on key issues and areaswhere differences exist. The chapters are arranged to cover key issues.133

First, frameworks for socio—economic assessment of costs and benefits of action and


inaction are described, with particular attention given to the applicability of cost—benefit analysis,the incorporation of equity and social considerations, and consideration of intergenerational equityissues.

Second, the economic and social benefits of limiting greenhouse gas emissions andenhancing sinks are reviewed.

Third, the economic, social and environmental costs of mitigating greenhouse gasemissions are assessed.

Fourth, generic mitigation and adaptation response options are reviewed, methods forassessing the costs and effectiveness of different response options summarized and integratedassessment techniques discussed.

Finally, the report provides an economic assessment of policy instruments to combatclimate change.134

The Group was unable to make specific policy recommendations, however, concludingthat—

[A] prudent way to deal with climate change is through a portfolio of actionsaimed at mitigation, adaptation and improvement of knowledge. The appropriateportfolio will differ for each country. The challenge is not to find the best policytoday for the next 100 years, but to select a prudent strategy and to adjust it overtime in the light of new information.135

The Conferences of the Parties

Parties to major conventions generally meet periodically in “Conferences of the Parties”(COP), which discuss implementation of these treaties and consider scientific findings related tothe problems it addresses; at these meetings additional protocols, annexes, or amendments areconsidered and may be adopted.

The Precedent of the Montreal Protocol

Montreal Protocol on Substances that Deplete the Ozone Layer

Because the 1987 Montreal Protocol marked the first truly global agreement to respond toa planetary environmental threat, many negotiators saw its provisions as a precedent for some ofthe specific requirements for global warming. The Protocol, for example, includes extensivebinding provisions to freeze levels of consumption and production of controlled chemicalsubstances at 1986 levels, with scheduled decreases beginning in 1993. As proposals weredeveloped for an agreement to deal with global warming, comparable requirements wereproposed. It was suggested, for example, that 1990 be established as a baseline year, againstwhich mandatory emissions limits would be measured. Similarly, the Montreal Protocol providesdifferent requirement for developing and developed nations and this, too, was taken as aprecedent for global warming in many proposals.


The Kyoto Protocol

The Third Conference of Parties (COP-3) to the U.N. Framework Convention on ClimateChange (FCCC), ended on December 11, 1997 in Kyoto, Japan, when the text of a protocol wasadopted by over 160 FCCC parties. The Kyoto Protocol on Climate Change was opened forsignature by the United Nations Climate Secretariat on March 16,1998.

The Protocol calls for most industrialized nations, and some central European countrieswith economies in transition, to reduce greenhouse gas emissions an average of 6 to 8 percentbelow 1990 levels by the years 2008-2012. Despite this fundamental agreement, the Conferenceadjourned in fundamental conflict over what commitments should be made by developing nations,especially China and India. In an attempt to resolve these and other, another meeting, COP-4,will be held in November, 1998 in Buenos Aires, Argentina.

Issues

Congressional opposition

For the Kyoto Protocol to become binding on the United States, it must be ratified by theU.S. Senate. Then, even though the House of Representatives has no Constitutional role in theratification of treaties, their implementation almost invariably requires implementing legislation,appropriations of money or other action by the Congress as a whole. Thus, the key unansweredquestion in the United States is whether the Kyoto Protocol will be accepted by the Congress,particularly the Senate.

The key obstacle seems to be the role that developing nations will play in curbing globalwarming. Before the meeting in Kyoto, the Senate passed unanimously the so-called “Byrd-Hagel” resolution, which expressed opposition to a protocol that failed to include binding andmeaningful commitments from developing nations.

The Senate reiterated its concerns about domestic implementation of provisions of theKyoto Protocol prior to U.S. ratification in S.Con.Res.86. It remains unclear whether the KyotoProtocol can muster enough support in the U.S. Senate for ratification, even if agreements can bereached with developing countries, either within the Conference of Parties or through a series ofbilateral negotiations.

Dates and limits

Coverage of gases

At the outset of negotiations in Kyoto, a key item of disagreement was how many globalwarming gases should be subject to an international agreement: three, as urged by many Europeannations? Or six, which was the position of the United States? Ultimately, the parties agreed tocover six gases. This agreement still leaves some major human sources of global warminguncovered, especially tropospheric ozone, or smog, which may be second only to carbon dioxidein its warming effect. Tropospheric ozone is excluded from coverage supposedly because it isdifficult to measure and occurs naturally, but the same can be said of other gases that included,such as carbon dioxide and methane.


Of the six gases, CO2 is the most common. While others are not currently produced inlarge quantities as large as CO2, their emissions have increased significantly in the last 10 years.

The U.S. proposal included three gases that were excluded from the proposals of someother countries. HFCs, PFCs, and SF6 have very high “global warming potentials” becausemolecule for molecule they trap much more heat in the atmosphere than CO2 and because theyhave extremely long atmospheric lifetimes. They are also important because of their relativecontribution to causing the problem - especially the length of time these gases will stay in theatmosphere. Some of these chemicals are hundreds to thousands of times more effective attrapping heat and will remain in the atmosphere for hundreds to thousands of years.

The relative importance of these three gases is expected to grow substantially by the year2010, due primarily to the growth in these chemicals as they become substitutes for the CFCsbeing phased out under the Montreal Protocol. These gases together accounted for less than 2percent of the total U.S. emissions in 1990. Without actions to control greenhouse gas emissions,however, U.S. negotiators warned that the three could become 6 to 10 percent of the totalemissions by 2010.+++

Carbon dioxide (CO2): CO2 is produced naturally by living organisms and by theburning of fossil fuels. Carbon accounts for the largest share of US greenhouse gas emissions. In1990, the CO2 emissions were approximately 85 percent of the total, although the carbon sinks inforested lands offset CO2 emissions by about 8 percent. Worldwide carbon emissions have grownby about 27 percent since the industrial revolution.

Nitrous Oxide (N2O): Naturally occurring, N2O is produced by fuel burning and infertilizer manufacturing. In 1990, N2O accounted for about 2.5% of US emissions. GlobalWarming Potential (GWP): 310 times greater than CO2.

Methane: Methane comes from coal formations and from landfills, livestock digestiveprocesses, decomposing waste, and wetland rice cultivation. In 1990, methane accounted foralmost 12 percent of the US total emissions. Global warming potential: About 21 times higherthan that of CO2.

Hydrofluorocarbon gases (HFC): These gases were developed largely as an alternativeto ozone-damaging chlorofluorocarbons (CFC) banned under the 1987 Montreal Protocol. HFCsdo not damage the ozone layer, but they do contribute to global warming. They are used largelyin refrigeration and as in semi-conductor manufacturing. Global warming potential: 140 to11,700 times that of CO2.

Perfluorocarbons (PFC): Result as a by-product aluminum smelting, and uraniumenriching. Also are manufactured to replace CFCs in making semi-conductors. Global warmingpotential: 7,400 times CO2.

Sulphur Hexafluoride: Largely used in heavy industry to insulate high-voltageequipment and to assist the manufacturing of cable cooling systems. Global warming potential:23,900 times that of CO2.

Carbon dioxide. Carbon dioxide accounts for the largest share of U.S. greenhousegases--approximately 85 percent--although the carbon sinks in forested lands offsetCO2 emissions by about 8 percent. During 1990-95, greenhouse gas emissionscontinued to rise in the United States, with CO2 increasing approximately 6percent, methane approximately 4 percent, N2O nearly 10 percent, and HFCsapproximately 7 percent. Fossil fuel combustion accounts for 99 percent of total U.S.CO2 emissions. (Chapter 3 of this report explains the use of MMTCE inconverting emissions of greenhouse gases to carbon equivalents.)

Methane. Although methane emissions are lower than CO2 emissions, methane'sfootprint is large: in a 100-year time span it is considered to be twenty-one times more effectivethan CO2 at trapping heat in the atmosphere and is responsible for about 10 percent of thewarming caused by U.S. emissions. In addition, in the last two centuries alone, methaneconcentrations in the atmosphere have more than doubled. Emissions of methane are largelygenerated by landfills, agriculture, oil and natural gas systems, and coal mining, with landfillscomprising the single largest source of the gas. In 1995, methane emissions from U.S. landfillswere 63.5 MMTCE, equaling approximately 36 percent of total U.S. methane emissions.Agriculture supplied about 30 percent of U.S. methane emissions in that same year.

Nitrous oxide. Nitrous oxide is also emitted in much smaller amounts than carbondioxide in the United States and is responsible for approximately 2.4 percent of the U.S. share ofthe greenhouse effect. However, like methane, it is a more powerful heat trap--310 times morepowerful than carbon dioxide at trapping heat in the atmosphere over a 100-year period. The mainanthropogenic activities producing nitrous oxide are agriculture, fossil fuel combustion, and theproduction of adipic and nitric acids. Figures from 1995 show the agricultural sector emitting 46percent of the total (18.4 MMTCE), with fossil fuel combustion generating 31 percent.

Hydrofluorocarbons (HFCs). Hydrofluorocarbons (HFCs) are among the compoundsintroduced to replace ozone-depleting substances, which are being phased out as a result of theVienna Convention and its Montreal Protocol on Substances That Deplete the Ozone Layer, andthe Clean Air Act Amendments of 1990. Because HFCs have significant potential to alter theEarth's radiative balance, they are included in this inventory. Many of the compounds of thisnature are extremely stable and remain in the atmosphere for extended periods of time, whichresults in a significant atmospheric accumulation over time. U.S. emissions of these gases haverisen nearly 60 percent as they are phased in as substitutes for gases that are no longer allowedunder the Montreal Protocol--a rate of growth that is not anticipated to continue. Currently,HFCs account for less than 2 percent of U.S. radiative forcing.

The Climate Change Action Plan

Following its embrace of the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (FCCC) atthe Rio “Earth Summit,” the Bush Administration adhered to a “no regrets” policy, withoutactually committing to CO2 targets and timetables, in an attempt align U.S. policy, in principle,with a majority of industrialized nations whose governments pledged to stabilize their respectiveemissions of CO2 by the year 2000. This was a basic tenet of the U.S. position during internationalnegotiations toward attaining a 1992 UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (FCCC).136 However, President Clinton announced in his April 1993, Earth Day speech, that the UnitedStates would undertake voluntary measures to stabilize U.S. emissions of greenhouse gas


emissions at 1990 levels by the year 2000.

Implementing this commitment, on October 19, 1993 President Clinton released his“Climate Change Action Plan” (CCAP), which features domestic measures that might be taken toattain greenhouse gas emissions stabilization goals as outlined under the terms of the U.N. FCCC,and which reflected the President's own emissions goals. The CCAP relies on a comprehensivesuite of voluntary actions by industry, utilities and other large-scale energy users, including thefollowing:

• Energy-efficiency upgrades through new building codes in residential and commercialsectors, and other energy-efficiency improvements in generic energy generating or usingtechnologies.

• Large-scale tree planting and forest reserves to increase carbon dioxide sinks and conserveenergy.

• Increased utilization of hydroelectric power sources including upgrading of existingfacilities.

• Encouragement of public transportation.

• Adoption of environmental controls on methane in landfills and exploitation of wastemethane as a fuel source.

• New controls on emissions of nitrous oxide and unregulated hydrochlorofluorocarbon(HCFC) byproducts believed to be contributing to global warming.137

A fundamental premise of the Plan was that it would reduce U.S. emissions of greenhousegases, while guiding the economy toward environmentally sound economic growth into the nextcentury. It was an attempt to stimulate actions that are both profitable for individualprivate-sector participants as well as beneficial to the environment. Currently, more than fortyprograms are in effect, combining efforts of the government at the federal, state, and local levelswith those of the private sector. The CCAP has five goals: preserving the environment, enhancingsustainable growth environmentally and economically, building partnerships, involving the public,and encouraging international emission reductions.

Carbon dioxide emissions constitute the bulk of U.S. greenhouse gas emissions. CCAPrecognizes that investing in energy efficiency is the most cost-effective way to reduce theseemissions. The largest proportion of CCAP programs contains measures that reduce carbondioxide emissions while simultaneously enhancing domestic productivity and competitiveness.Other programs seek to reduce carbon dioxide emissions by investing in renewable-energy andother low-carbon, energy-supply technologies, which will also provide longer-term benefits, suchas increased efficiency and related cost-savings and pollution prevention. A smaller number ofprograms are targeted at methane, nitrous oxide, and other greenhouse gases.

A review and update of the CCAP was initiated in 1995, involving a federal governmentinteragency review process and a public hearing and comment period. Revisions to the CCAP(and to the calculation of the effects of its measures) were initiated in light of comments received


during this process and are reflected in this document. In addition, as called for under FCCCreporting guidelines, the projections of the effects of measures taken are extended to the year2020, with the understanding that uncertainties become greater in more distant years.

One of the principal products of the review was an assessment of the effectiveness of theCCAP programs, which were rated to be successful at reducing emissions. Currently, more than5,000 organizations are participating in programs around the United States. Thepollution-prevention benefits of these innovative programs are beginning to multiply rapidly inresponse to the groundwork laid and the partnerships made. In all, the programs are expected toachieve a large portion of the reductions projected in the CCAP. In fact, it is estimated that theseprograms will result in energy cost savings of $10 billion annually in 2000.

However, the review has also made clear the significantly reduced impact to be expectedfrom the programs as a result of the nearly 40 percent reduction of CCAP funding by Congressfrom the amount requested by the President, higher-than-expected electricity demand, andlower-than-expected energy prices. In addition, before the programs' implementation, CCAPprogram managers could not always anticipate the impacts of projected climate change emissionreductions. Information available from the first tranche of activity was considered in developingthe current projections.

A second product of the review was the identification of several measures that have sincebeen added to the CCAP portfolio. The most significant of these is the EnvironmentalStewardship Initiative, which greatly expands activities already included in the CCAP, and focuseson reducing the emissions of extremely potent greenhouse gases from three industrialapplications--semiconductor production, electrical transmission and distribution systems, andmagnesium casting. The expanded initiative is anticipated to reduce emissions by an additional 6.5MMTCE by 2000, and 10.0 MMTCE by 2010. Other programs include improving energyefficiency in the construction of and supply of energy to commercial and industrial buildings,expanding residential markets for energy-efficient lighting products, and providing information onrenewable energy to reduce barriers to the adoption of clean technologies.

The analysis of individual actions is integrated with revised forecasts of economic growth,energy prices, program funding, and regulatory developments to provide an updatedcomprehensive perspective on current and projected greenhouse gas emission levels. This analysisinvolved an updating of the baseline calculation in light of new economic assumptions regardingenergy prices, economic growth, and technology improvements, among other factors. In 1993,the first U.S. submission projected year 2000 baseline emissions to be 106 MMTCE above their1990 levels; with current program funding, emissions are now projected to exceed 1990 levels by188 MMTCE. Two principal factors are responsible: The analysis used to develop CCAPsignificantly underestimated the reductions that would be needed by programs to return emissionsto 1990 levels by the year 2000. This was due to several factors, including lower-than-expectedfuel prices, strong economic growth, regulatory limitations within and outside of CCAP, andimproved information on emissions of some potent greenhouse gases. In addition, diminishedlevels of funding by Congress have affected both CCAP programs and other federal programs thatreduce emissions, limiting their effectiveness.

Another “flexible policy response” proposed by the Clinton Administration in order toachieve what it sees as less costly emission reduction seeks to reduce greenhouse gas emissions,


taking into account where they occur and when such reductions would be economically feasible. In concert with the when and where policy, the Clinton Administration supports so-called “jointimplementation” (JI) projects, in which U.S. businesses team with foreign partners to eitherreduce CO2 emissions elsewhere or, more often, sequester CO2 by preserving forests. Thisapproach allows U.S. polluters to take credit for non-U.S. reductions or sinks, thus avoiding theneed to themselves install new technologies or policies.138

While neither the measures initiated in 1993 nor the additional actions developed sincethen and included in this report will be adequate to meet the emissions goal enunciated by thePresident, they have significantly reduced emissions below growth rates that otherwise wouldhave occurred. Based on current funding levels, the revised action plan is expected to reduceemissions by 76 MMTCE in the year 2000--or 70 percent of the reductions projected in theCCAP. Annual energy cost savings to businesses and consumers from CCAP actions areanticipated to be $10 billion (1995 dollars) by the year 2000. Even greater reductions areestimated from these measures in the post-2000 period: reductions of 169 MMTCE are projectedfor 2010, and 230 MMTCE for 2020. Annual energy savings are projected to grow to $50 billion(1995 dollars) in the year 2010.

A separate component of this chapter addresses the U.S. Initiative on JointImplementation. Projects undertaken through this initiative allow private-sector partners to offsetemissions from domestic activities through reductions achieved in other countries. The ClimateConvention established a pilot program for joint implementation at the first meeting of theConference of the Parties. Guidelines for reporting under the pilot program were established bythe Subsidiary Body for Scientific and Technological Advice at its fifth session in February 1997.This report uses those guidelines to report on project activity.

Climate Change Technology Initiative (CCTI)

On February 2, 1998, President Clinton unveiled a $6.3 billion Climate ChangeTechnology Initiative (CCTI) in his FY1999 budget. The Initiative would provide tax incentivesto businesses and individuals who purchase energy efficient products, and research anddevelopment tax credits for U.S. businesses that develop environmental technologies, enabling theUnited States to ramp up to compliance with requirements under the Kyoto Protocol, if it isratified.

Research and Development

The U.S. government has dedicated significant resources to research on global climatechange. U.S. research efforts (some of which include the private sector) are divided into severalgeneral categories, including prediction of climate change, impacts and adaptation, mitigation andnew technologies, and socioeconomic analysis and assessment. In addition, U.S. scientists activelycoordinate with research and capacity-building efforts in other countries.

The principal vehicle for undertaking climate change research at the federal level is theUnited States Global Change Research Program. The multi-agency program was funded in fiscalyear 1997 at approximately $1.8 billion. A significant portion of the Research Program's activitiesis targeted at improving capabilities to predict climate change, including the human-inducedcontribution to climate change, and its implications for society and the environment. The United


States also is committed to continuing programs in research and observation, with the aim ofdeveloping the information base required to improve predictions of climate change and itsrepercussions, as well as the ability to reduce emissions while sustaining food production,ecosystems, and economic development.

Extensive efforts also are being made to understand the consequences of climate change,regional impacts, and the potential for adaptation. Another area being explored by researchers isthe development of technologies that would enable the United States to supply energy, food,water, ecosystem services, and a healthy environment to U.S. citizens, while simultaneouslyreducing greenhouse gas emissions. These efforts have been divided into short- and longer-termprojects involving the private sector, as well as government-sponsored research.

Perhaps most notable in the international component of the research effort is U.S.participation in IPCC work. U.S. scientists participated in the preparation and review of nearly allof the more than 100 chapters of the over 2,000-page report. Researchers also participated in thecollection and analysis of the underlying data through programs as varied as the World ClimateResearch Program, the Human Dimensions of Global Environmental Change Program, theInternational Geosphere-Biosphere Programme and an impressive array of bilateral scientific andtechnical work.

Training and Outreach

Global climate change education, training, and outreach are intrinsically interwoven withthe latest in technology and scientific discoveries. The Education, Training, and Outreach chapterhighlights representative programs in each of these areas.

That training and education are critical is self-evident. The engagement of futuregenerations of scientists will be integral to the nation's understanding of climate change and thepossible mitigation of its effects. The education and training of today's citizens and leaders willenable informed choices to be made in the current policy environment and will help to provide themeans to implement proposals when they are adopted.

The U.S. program includes a strong education component. Federal legislation over thepast several years has led to the funding of important programs related to climate change,including the creation of teaching materials, resource guides, and fact sheets, which are widelydistributed both nationally and internationally. Students are encouraged to join special sessionsthat foster the development of theoretical and applied engineering skills, and the growth in thenumber of doctoral and postdoctoral students in fields related to climate change has beensignificant.

Outreach activities disseminate information about global climate change, its impact, andthe need for behavioral changes to the widest possible audience. Effective messages can becommunicated both directly (e.g., through global climate change exhibits at museums) andindirectly (through outreach programs created by public-private partnerships, such as incentivesfor fuel-efficient vehicle purchases).

The U.S. government supports a number of Internet sites on climate change, the regularholding of roundtables and public workshops and seminars at which climate change and mitigation


actions are described, and an extensive state and local outreach effort. Nongovernmentalorganizations and the press are also crucial to U.S. outreach efforts. Each plays a pivotal role inhelping to inform the public about the climate change problem and possible solutions.

The links between these topics and the more specific policies and measures being taken tomitigate climate change are clear. The United States must have educated citizens and decisionmakers to develop and establish new policies. It must have training to implement climateprograms and policies. And it must have outreach programs to help inform its citizens about theconsequences of both action and inaction and to help policymakers decide whether and how totrain and educate the next generation of citizens.

EPA activities

EPA Greenlights and Energy Star Programs

U.S. EPA's Greenlights and Energy Star Programs are voluntary, non-regulatory programsaimed at promoting energy efficiency. EPA has teamed with the private sector in developingcutting-edge, voluntary partnerships. By encouraging the production and use of energy-efficientequipment, energy usage and GHG emissions can be drastically reduced. The primary purpose ofthe Green Lights Program is to encourage U.S. organizations to install energy-efficient lighting.

Taking Green Lights a step further, is the comprehensive Energy Star Buildings program,which addresses heating, cooling, and air handling in commercial buildings. Manufacturers ofoffice equipment throughout the world have joined the Energy Star Office Equipment program toproduce thousands of energy-efficient models of computers, printers, fax machines, and copiersfor both the corporate and home markets.

[For more information about the Energy Star Programs Call Toll Free: (888) STAR-YES]

DOE activities

Department of Energy Climate Challenge

The Climate Challenge program is a joint initiative of the Department of Energy (DOE)and the electric utility industry to reduce GHG emissions. The Program consists of voluntarycommitments by electric utilities to undertake actions to reduce, avoid or sequester GHGemissions. Commitments are formalized in individual utility “Participation Accords” for largeutilities and through “Letters of Participation” for utilities having less than 50,000 customers. DOE provides technical information and support, reports on the progress of the program, andprovides public recognition to utility participants. As of February, 114 participants representing577 utilities have signed on to the program. Climate Challenge participants report their GHGemissions annually according to the guidelines established under Section 1605(b) of the EnergyPolicy Act (described above).

[Additional information: http://www.eren.doe.gov/climatechallenge/ccap.htm.]

Energy Information Administration Voluntary Reporting of Greenhouse Gases


Section 1605(b) of the Energy Policy Act of 1992 directs the Energy InformationAdministration (EIA) to establish a system for the voluntary reporting of information on annualreductions of GHG emissions and carbon fixation efforts. Corporations, government agencies,households, and voluntary organizations can report to the program. An excess of 140organizations have filed reports describing more than 900 projects that either reduced GHGemissions or sequestered carbon. More than 80 percent of current reporters are electric utilities. Data were first reported in 1995.

The Public Use Database (i.e., all nonconfidential reports) is available from the program'sinternet site (ftp://ftp.eia.doe.gov/pub/oiaf/1605/cdrom). Additional background on the programis available from its website: http://www.eia.doe.gov/oiaf/1605/frntend.html.

Other

The Country Studies Program

Perhaps none of the U.S. programs is as well known as the U.S. Country StudiesProgram. The program is currently assisting fifty-five developing countries and countries witheconomies in transition to market economies with climate change studies intended to build humanand institutional capacity to address climate change. Through its Support for National ActionPlans, the program is supporting the preparation of national climate action plans for eighteendeveloping countries, which will lay the foundation for their national communication, as requiredby the FCCC. More than twenty-five additional countries have requested similar assistance fromthe Country Studies Program.

The United States is also committed to facilitating the commercial transfer ofenergy-efficient and renewable-energy technologies that can help developing countries achievesustainable development. Under the auspices of the Climate Technology Initiative, the U.S. hastaken a lead role in a task force on Energy Technology Networking and Capacity Building, theefforts of which focus on increasing the availability of reliable climate change technologies,developing options for improving access to data in developing countries, and supporting expertsin the field around the world. The United States is also engaged in various other projects intendedto help countries with mitigation and adaptation issues.


1. Daniel L. Albritton, “What We Know; What We Don't Know”, EPA Journal, March/April 1990, pp. 4–7.

2. United Nations Environment Program and World Meteorological Organization, "Common Questions AboutClimate Change," http://www.gcrio.org.ipcc.qa.


4. Scientists began making precise measurements of the total amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere atMauna Loa, Hawaii, and at the South Pole in the late 1950s. They have since expanded their observations to manyother locations. Their data show convincingly that the levels of carbon dioxide have increased each yearworldwide. Furthermore, these increases are consistent with other estimates of the rise of carbon dioxide emissionsdue to human activity over this period. United Nations Environment Program and World MeteorologicalOrganization, "Common Questions About Climate Change," http://www.gcrio.org.ipcc.qa.



7. Many cities between depend on these alpine glaciers natural reservoirs for their water supply. For example, inLima, Peru, the entire water supply for 10 million people depends on the summer melt from a glacier that is now inrapid retreat, for reasons that may or may not be related to global climate change. In the future, climate changecould also lead to shifts in river flow and water supply, with serious implications for human settlements andagriculture.





12. Ice buried below the surface of the Greenland and Antarctic ice caps contains bubbles of air trapped when theice originally formed. These samples of fossil air, some of them over 200,000 years old, have been retrieved bydrilling deep into the ice. Measurements from the youngest and most shallow segments of the ice cores, whichcontain air from only a few decades ago, produce carbon dioxide concentrations nearly identical to those that weremeasured directly in the atmosphere at the time the ice formed. But the older parts of the cores show that carbondioxide amounts were about 25 percent lower than today for the ten thousand years previous to the onset ofindustrialization, and over that period changed little. United Nations Environment Program and WorldMeteorological Organization, "Common Questions About Climate Change," http://www.gcrio.org.ipcc.qa.


14. Direct atmospheric measurements of other human-produced greenhouse gases have not been made in as manyplaces or for as long a period as they have for carbon dioxide. However, existing data for these other gases do show


increasing concentrations of methane, nitrous oxide, and chlorofluorocarbons over recent decades. In addition, icecore data are available for methane and for nitrous oxide that demonstrate that the atmospheric concentrations ofthese gases began to increase in the past few centuries, after having been relatively constant for thousands of years.Chlorofluorocarbons are absent from deep ice cores because they have no natural sources and were notmanufactured before 1930. United Nations Environment Program and World Meteorological Organization,"Common Questions About Climate Change," http://www.gcrio.org.ipcc.qa.












26. Board on Atmospheric Sciences and Climate, Commission on Physical Sciences, Mathematics, and Resources,National Research Council, Current Issues in Atmospheric Change: Summary and Conclusions of a WorkshopOctober 30–31, 1986, National Academy Press, 1987.

27. Svante Arrhenius, “On the Influence of Carbonic Acid in the Air Upon the Temperature of the Ground,”Philosophical Magazine, 1896. A chemist and physicist, Arrhenius also won the Nobel Prize.

28. Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, Policymakers Summary of the Scientific Assessment of ClimateChange, p. 4, United Nations Environment Programme/World Meteorological Organization (1990).

29. Daniel L. Albritton, “What We Know; What We Don't Know”, EPA Journal, March/April 1990, pp. 4–7.

30. Board on Atmospheric Sciences and Climate, Commission on Physical Sciences, Mathematics, and Resources,National Research Council, Current Issues in Atmospheric Change: Summary and Conclusions of a Workshop


October 30–31, 1986, National Academy Press, 1987.



33. Robert Jastrow, William A. Nierenberg, and Frederick Seitz, Scientific Perspectives on the GreenhouseProblem, p. 4, George C. Marshall Institute, Washington, D.C., 1989.



36. Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, 1992 IPCC Supplement, p. 7 (United Nations EnvironmentProgramme/World Meteorological Organization, 1992).

37. William K. Stevens, “'95 the Hottest Year on Record As the Global Trend Keeps Up,” p. A1, The New YorkTimes, Jan. 4, 1996.

38. Arthur H. Lachenbruch, “Warming of Permafrost in the Alaskan Arctic,” presented at Preparing for ClimateChange, the Climate Institute, Oct. 27–29, 1987, Washington, D.C.

39. Personal communication.

40. John Sass, “Climate plumbs the depths,” Nature, p. 458, Feb. 7, 1991 and personal communication, ArthurLachenbruch, July 8, 1996.

41. Gregoria Parrilla, et. al., “Rising Temperatures in the Subtropical North Atlantic Ocean Over the Past 35Years,” pp. 48–51, Nature, May 5, 1994.

42. Tim Thwaites, “Are the Antipodes in Hot water?” p. 21, New Scientist, Nov. 12, 1994. Bindoff reported that“On the basis of measurements made 22 years apart of full-depth temperature sections in the Pacific Oceanbetween Australia and New Zealand, we show here that there has been a depth-averaged warming of 0.04�C and0.03�C at 43�S and 28�S, respectively, throughout most of the water column below the mixed layer. Thesea-level rise caused by expansion between a depth of 300 m and the ocean floor is 2-3 cm, consistent with theobserved rate of global sea-level rise 2 . In the main thermocline there is a coherent cooling and freshening ondensity surfaces, consistent with surface warming in the Southern Ocean where these waters originate. Similarobservations in the North Atlantic 3 show comparable changes in the thermal structure and water-massvolumes....” Nathaniel L. Bindoff and John A. Church, “Warming of the water column in the southwest PacificOcean,” Nature______.

43. Personal communication July 9, 1996 and “Listen Up! The World's Oceans May be Starting to Warm,”Science, June 9, 1995.

44. “Taking a Bottom-to-Sky Slice of the Arctic Ocean,” p. 1947, Science, Dec. 23, 1994.

45. “Listen Up! The World's Oceans May be Starting to Warm,” Science, June 9, 1995.


46. Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, IPCC First Assessment Report, Volume I, p. 3.

47. “Arctic Sea Ice Melting 'Accelerated',” Greenwire, July 18, 1995, citing the Sydney Australian.

48. “Antarctic Warmth Kills Ice Shelves,” p. 108, Science News, Feb. 17, 1996.

49. “Climate Change: Melting Ice Shelves Prompt Concern,” Greenwire March 28, 1995, based on reports fromthe London Guardian, Newsweek and the London Independent.

50. Mark Fahestock, “An Ice Shelf Breakup,” Science, p. 775, Feb. 9, 1996.

51. Personal communication with Knut Aagaard July 12, 1996.

52. Debora MacKenzie, “Stormy Weather for Insurers,” Tomorrow, April/June 1993, 32.

53. Helen Goss, “Meltdown Warning as Tropical Glaciers Trickle Away,” p. 18, New Scientist, June 24, 1995.

54. “Climate Change: Glaciers Have Shrunk 11 % in 100 Years,” Greenwire, July 12, 1995, citing the RockyMountain News.

55. J.P. Barry, et. al., “Climate-Related, Long-Term Faunal Changes in a California Rocky Intertidal Community,”pp. 672–75, Science, Feb. 3, 1995.

56. J.P. Barry, et. al., “Climate-Related, Long-Term Faunal Changes in a California Rocky Intertidal Community,”pp. 672–75, Science, Feb. 3, 1995. Other reports of rapid biological change perhaps related to warming come fromtiny Macquarie Island, which lies at the center of the most rapid temperature increases on Earth. Isolated in thefrigid waters of the southern Tasman Sea, roughly halfway between mineral-rich Tasmania and the frozenAntarctic continent, the island's air and water temperatures are climbing at roughly twice the global average. Uninhabited except for a research station and roughly 800 miles from the heart-shaped Australian state ofTasmania, Macquarie is immune from the usual woes of development and tourism. Nevertheless, its seal, penguin,bird and other populations are collapsing, a “clear signal that something big is happening in the Southern Ocean,”according to one observer. Roughly 100,000 elephant seals—half the island's population of the five-ton animals—have disappeared, and the population of rock hopper birds has dwindled by the same amount. Scientists blame thedeclines on sea surface temperature increases, which they believe have caused a collapse in stocks of krill, tinyshrimp-like animals that form the base of the Antarctic marine food chain. “Climate Change: Macquarie's WoesLinked to Rising Temps?” Greenwire, Jan. 24, 1996, citing the Jan. 13. Sydney Morning Herald.

57. Georg Grabherr, et. al., “Climate Effects on Mountain Plants,” Nature, June 9, 1994 and Carol Kaesuk Yoon,“Warming Moves Plants Up Peaks, Threatening Extinction,” p. C4, The New York Times, June 21, 1994.

58. Georg Grabherr, et. al., “Climate Effects on Mountain Plants,” Nature, June 9, 1994 and Carol Kaesuk Yoon,“Warming Moves Plants Up Peaks, Threatening Extinction,” p. C4, The New York Times, June 21, 1994.

59. Michael Loevinsohn, “Climatic Warming and Increased Malaria Incidence in Rwanda,” pp. 98–101, TheLancet, March 19, 1994.

60. Michael Loevinsohn, “Climatic Warming and Increased Malaria Incidence in Rwanda,” pp. 98–101, TheLancet, March 19, 1994.

61. Michael Simpson, “Global Climate Change: Research and Development Provisions in the President's ClimateChange Technology Initiative,” Congressional Research Service, Library of Congress, Washington, D.C., 28 April1998.

62. United Nations Environment Program and World Meteorological Organization, "Common Questions About


Climate Change," http://www.gcrio.org.ipcc.qa.


64. No reference.

65. No reference.

66. No reference.

67. No reference.

68. No reference.

69. No reference.

70. No reference.

71. No reference.




75. William B. Rossow, “Who Knows Where the Clouds Go?”, Sciences, May/June 1991, pp. 36–41.

76. R. L. Jones and J. F. B. Mitchell, “Is water vapor understood?”, Nature, September 19, 1991, Vol. 353, p. 210.

77. The transformations plays an important role in global heat transport. When surface water evaporates, the heatrequired to change liquid water into vapor is absorbed from the surface and carried along with the vapor into theair. When water vapor condenses into a cloud and falls as rain, it releases that heat, known as latent heat, into theair. William B. Rossow, “Who Knows Where the Clouds Go?”, Sciences, May/June 1991, pp. 36–41.





82. Robert Jastrow, William A. Nierenberg, and Frederick Seitz, Scientific Perspectives on the GreenhouseProblem, p. 7, George C. Marshall Institute, Washington, D.C., 1989.

83. V. Ramanathan and W. Collins, “Thermodynamic regulation of ocean warming by cirrus clouds deduced fromobservations of the 1987 El Niño”, Nature, May 2, 1991, Vol. 351, pp. 27+.

A major effort is under way, as part of the World Climate Research Program, to gather better information


about clouds and their radiative effects. Supplementing the efforts to collect and analyze global data are moredetailed and intensive field experiments conducted from airplanes and balloons and on the surface.

A thorough study of all those data will take many years, but the investigations have already provided freshinsights into how clouds might change with the climate. Study of low stratus clouds has suggested that a change inair pollution could alter the physical makeup of clouds, changing the way they reflect sunlight.

The new global data sets show that clouds typically cover about 60 percent of the planet, some 10 percentmore than had been thought. Oceans are significantly cloudier than land masses. Roughly 67 percent of the skyover water is cloudy, and more than half of that area is densely overcast. Just under half of the total land area isusually covered with clouds and only 15 percent is thickly blanketed. Conversely, almost a third of the continentalsurface, but only 8 percent of the ocean surface, is unbroken blue sky. Clouds on average are about 35 degreesFahrenheit colder than the surface, and they reflect between 20 and 30 percent more sunlight.

The tops of ocean clouds are generally about a kilometer lower than the tops of clouds over land, andocean clouds reflect about 10 percent less sunlight.

The cloudiest regions are the tropics and the temperate zones; the subtropics and the polar regions havebetween 10 and 20 percent less cover. High-latitude clouds have been found to be almost twice as reflective asother clouds.


85. Personal communication with Ned Leonard, manager of communications and governmental affairs for theWestern Fuels Association, July 18, 1996.

86. See, e.g., J. L. Sarmiento & E. T. Sundquist, “Revised budget for the oceanic uptake of anthropogenic carbondioxide”, Nature, April 16, 1992, Vol. 356, pp. 589–592.

87. See, e.g., P. D. Quay, B. Tilbrook, C. S. Wong, “Oceanic Uptake of Fossil Fuel CO2: Carbon-13 Evidence”,Science, April 3, 1992, Vol. 256, pp. 74–78. See also J. L. Sarmiento & E. T. Sundquist, “Revised budget for theoceanic uptake of anthropogenic carbon dioxide”, Nature, April 16, 1992, Vol. 356, pp. 589–592.

88. D. S. Jenkinson, D. E. Adams & A. Wild, “Model estimates of CO2 emissions from soil in response to globalwarming”, Nature, May 23, 1991, Vol. 351, pp. 304–306.

89. National Academy of Sciences, Rethinking the Ozone Problem, pp. 413–24, National Academy Press,Washington, D.C., 1992. “There is an empirical relationship between worsened air quality and highertemperatures .... (H)igh temperature is generally a necessary but not sufficient condition for the occurrence of highozone concentrations.”

90. A. Volz and D. Kley, “Evaluation of the Montsouris Series of Measurements Made in the NineteenthCentury,” Nature 332 (1988), pp. 240–43. See also S.A. Penkett, “Atmospheric Chemistry: IncreasedTropospheric Ozone,” Nature 332 (1988), p. 204.

91. Peter Schlosser, Gerhard Bönisch, Monika Rhein, Reinhold Bayer, “Reduction of Deepwater Formation in theGreenland Sea During the 1980s: Evidence from Tracer Data”, Science, March 1, 1991, Vol. 251, pp. 1054–1056.


93. Michael Simpson, “Global Climate Change: Research and Development Provisions in the President's ClimateChange Technology Initiative,” Congressional Research Service, Library of Congress, Washington, D.C., 28 April


1998.







100. Climate Change 1995: The Science of Climate Change, Contribution of Working Group I to the SecondAssessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, Intergovernmental Panel on ClimateChange, (Cambridge, England: Cambridge University Press, 1996).

101. Climate Change 1995: The Science of Climate Change, Contribution of Working Group I to the SecondAssessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, Intergovernmental Panel on ClimateChange, (Cambridge, England: Cambridge University Press, 1996), 39.

102. William C. Clark and Jill Jager, “The Science of Climate Change,” Environment, 1 November 1997, 23.






108. Climate Change 1995: The Science of Climate Change, Contribution of Working Group I to the SecondAssessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, Intergovernmental Panel on Climate


Change, (Cambridge, England: Cambridge University Press, 1996).








116. Climate Change 1995: The Science of Climate Change, Contribution of Working Group II to the SecondAssessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, Intergovernmental Panel on ClimateChange, (Cambridge, England: Cambridge University Press, 1996).










125. Robert Kates, “Impacts, adaptations, and mitigation,” Environment, 1 November 1997, 29.


127. Robert Kates, “Impacts, adaptations, and mitigation,” Environment, 1 November 1997, 29.

128. Timothy O'Riordan, “Economic and social dimensions,” Environment, 1 November 1997, 34.

129. The companies or industry segments represented included two industry associations created specifically tolobby on global warming, The Climate Council and the Global Climate Coalition; the three industry trade groupsmost actively opposed to action on global warming, the Edison Electric Institute, the American Petroleum Instituteand the National Mining Association; and, three individual energy companies, Amoco, ARCO and SouthernCompany Services.

130. Chakravarthi Raghavan, “Environment: “Social Costs” Controversy To Cause Rome Hangover,” Inter PressService English News Wire, 11 November 1995.

131. Chakravarthi Raghavan, “Environment: “Social Costs” Controversy To Cause Rome Hangover,” Inter PressService English News Wire, 11 November 1995.

132. Climate Change 1995: The Science of Climate Change, Contribution of Working Group III to the SecondAssessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, Intergovernmental Panel on ClimateChange, (Cambridge, England: Cambridge University Press, 1996).






AppendixNon-Federal Initiatives

IV. State and local governments

A. State Initiatives (more to come)

There is currently no federal program requiring states to reduce GHGs. The federalgovernment offers a partnership through EPA's State and Local Climate Change Program, whichsupplies states with planning guidelines to create strategies to reduce GHG emissions. If stateschoose to join the Climate Change program, EPA encourages the following actions:

• Set up a task force to develop a strategy to address climate change and GHG emissions;

• Create a GHG emissions inventory and projections of future GHG emission levels;

• Identify potential GHG reduction targets, and identify and select policy options, with finalrecommendations to be presented as the State Action Plan; and

• Include mitigation policies with final recommendation (designed to compensate for thepotentially negative financial effects of the changes, e.g., tax credit for home owners whopurchase more expensive energy-efficient building materials).

Thirty states throughout the nation are participating to varying degrees in the ClimateChange Program. Of those 30 states, 15 have completed inventories. None of the northeaststates is actively implementing policy changes that result in GHG reductions.

The following are brief descriptions of the status of planning in eight northeast states.

State Planning

Connecticut & Rhode Island

Neither Connecticut nor Rhode Island is involved in the Climate Change Program.

Maine

According to EPA, Maine has completed its emissions inventory and its mitigation policiesare in progress. In October 1997, Maine submitted a draft of its Climate Change Action Plan toits task force and is awaiting comment. Policymakers identified the following areas as beingpotential GHG reduction targets:

Energy - heat pumps, natural gas conversion, wood chip and solar heating;Conservation - land clearing, lawn conversion, offset trading markets;Industry - building standards, carbon tax, tradable emission credits.

Massachusetts


Massachusetts has completed its inventory. It has just formed a task force and isbeginning to develop the State Action Plan. The Energy Facility Siting Board (EFSB) has set aprecedent for requiring CO2 offsets for new electricity generating facilities built in theCommonwealth.

New Hampshire

New Hampshire has joined the Climate Change Program: EPA reports that NewHampshire's inventory, and its planning of the mitigation policy report and the State Action Planare in progress. According to state officials, the state is considering policy changes for the “lowhanging fruit” (low cost or no cost projects or projects with multiple benefits). Their next step isto set up a task force.

New Jersey

New Jersey has completed the emissions inventory and is developing a state Action Plan. It is also undertaking planning of a GHG “emissions bank” in support of the protocols establishedat Kyoto. On March 17, 1998, Robert Shinn, Commissioner of the New Jersey Department ofEnvironmental Protection, signed Administrative Order 1998–09 which outlined the coordinationof the NJDEP, other state agencies, international bodies and countries such as the Netherlands toexplore the implementation of emission banking concepts.

The emissions banking system is being developed to quantify and credit certain voluntarygreenhouse gas emission reductions by New Jersey companies. New Jersey's goal is to reduce thelevel of emissions of six major greenhouse gases to 3.5% below 1990 emission levels by the year2005.

New York

EPA reports that New York has completed its emissions inventory. No furtherinformation has been made available to the public.

Vermont

After completing the emissions inventory and mitigation policy report, Vermont publishedits Greenhouse Gas Action Plan summary for public review in September 1997. According toVermont, the following are targeted areas facing potential policy change in order to reduce GHGemissions:

• Renewable sources - wind power, solar power, and hydrogen;

• Alternative transportation fuels - reformulated gas, gasohol, natural gas, LPG, electricity;

• Energy technologies - co-generation, combustion turbines, combined-cycle plants;distributed generation, energy storage technologies, and fuel cells;

• Energy use - reflecting full cost of energy use in energy prices, including external costs,and competition and restructuring in the electric utility industry.


At the local level, one city in the Northeast is focused on reducing GHG emissions. Aspart of the International Council of Local Environmental Initiatives (ICLEI), Burlington, Vermonthas become active in seeking ways to reduce GHGs. ICLEI offers technical assistance and grantsto help create opportunities for economic development in conjunction with programs to reducelocal CO2 emissions.

Burlington Electric Department (BED) is developing a cogeneration project to capture thewaste heat from the McNeil generating plant by piping steam from that plant to the localuniversity, hospital, and municipal buildings, to act as a substitute for their current heating system.

Burlington estimates that the cogeneration project will result in a savings of approximately30,000 tons of CO2 per year. This is the equivalent of burning more than 3 million gallons ofgasoline, or more than 47 million miles of auto travel.

NESCAUM Greenhouse Gas Emissions Trading Demonstration Project

The NESCAUM GHG project is a multi-stakeholder, consensus-based effort to clarifyissues related to GHG trading. The concept of the effort is predicated on NESCAUM's previousemission trading demonstration project for ozone precursor pollutants, an effort that was widelyviewed as successful for two reasons: 1) the actual NOX and VOC emission reductions achieved;and 2) for the insights into open market trading that emerged. As with the ozone demonstrationproject, the GHG demonstration project will rely on the private sector, environmental advocatesand state and federal regulators to work cooperatively to reach consensus on the potential pitfallsand necessary features of a successful GHG trading program.

Track 1 of the project will examine specific issues faced by the participating companies inanticipation of a “carbon-constrained” future. Each company will propose an evaluation that isrelevant to its unique circumstances. Whether developing a GHG emission inventory or assessingtheir competitive position under a GHG emission cap, companies will bring information to theproject that clarifies their concerns about GHG reductions and trading.

Track 2 of the project will review specific GHG emission reduction strategies beingimplemented by participating organizations. Case studies will be developed for each strategy,explaining the nature of the emission reduction action and quantifying the reductions achieved.

Based on the information gathered in both tracks, the project will produce a final reportsummarizing the group's experience, drawing conclusions and making recommendations about anenvironmentally and economically effective GHG emission trading system.

[For additional information on the project, contact Charla Rudisill, NESCAUM.]

B. Local Initiatives (more to come)1. The International Council for Local Environmental Initiatives

The International Council for Local Environmental Initiatives has launched a “Cities forClimate Protection” (CCP) program that encourages cities to reduce local emissions of carbondioxide, other greenhouse gases and related air pollutants. To date, 186 municipalities


throughout the world have joined the campaign and their number is growing. They range fromAbu Dhabi in the United Arab Emirates to Zomba, Malawi.c

The CCP operates a variety of technical assistance projects that focus on innovativeapproaches to financing and implementing energy-efficiency measures in municipal andcommercial buildings, reducing greenhouse gas emissions through effective waste managementprograms and land-use planning, and developing strategies and programs to reduce emissions inthe transportation sector.

[For additional information on ICLEI and CCP, visit the ICLEI website:http://www.iclei.org.]

V. Non-governmental initiatives (more to come)

A. Foundations

1. David Suzuki Foundation's Climate Change Project

The David Suzuki Foundation has adopted a wide variety of strategies to raise awarenessof and promote solutions to global climate change (GCC). The Suzuki Foundation hasestablished a member-based Climate Change Action Team (CCAT). Members of CCAT are partof a coordinated national alliance of more than 800 people working to inform Canada's policymakers and opinion leaders about global warming. In addition, the Suzuki Foundation authored aClimate Change Briefing kit and a Climate of Change report series offering ordinary citizens achance to become informed and personally involved in the creation of a sustainable future. Theeducational kit was developed to inform Canadian communities, organizations and decision-makers. The eight part kit, presents both the challenges and opportunities that taking action onclimate change can bring.

The David Suzuki Foundation and the Pembina Institute for Appropriate Developmenthave proposed an emissions reduction action plan which identifies fifteen basic measuresgovernments should implement to reduce Canada's greenhouse gas emissions. A second versionof the plan, Canadian Solutions-Meeting Our Kyoto Commitment: Climate Action Basics for c U.S. members of ICLEI include Albuquerque, New Mexico; Ann Arbor, Michigan; AspenColorado; Atlanta, Georgia; Austin, Texas; Berkeley, California;Boulder, Colorado; BrowardCounty, Florida; Burien, Washington; Burlington, Vermont; Chicago, Illinois; Chittenden County,Vermont; Chula Vista, California; Dade County Florida; Delta County Michigan; Denver,Colorado; Durham, North Carolina; Fort Collins, Colorado; Hillsborough County, Florida; LittleRock, Arkansas; Los Angeles, California; Louisville, Kentucky; Maplewood, New Jersey;Memphis, Tennessee; Mesa, Arizona; Miami Beach, Florida; Milwaukee, Wisconsin; Minneapolis,Minnesota; Missoula, Montana; Mount Rainer, Maryland; Newark New Jersey; Oakland,California; Olympia, Washington; Orange County, Florida; Overland Park, Kansas; Petersburg,Pennsylvania; Pittsburg, Pennsylvania; Portland, Oregon; Saint Paul, Minnesota; Salt Lake City,Utah; San Diego, California; San Francisco, California; San Jose, California; Santa Fe, NewMexico; Santa Monica, California; Sarasota County, Florida; Schenectady County, New York;Seattle, Washington; Takoma Park, Maryland; Tampa Florida; Toledo, Ohio; Tucson, Arizona;and, West Hollywood California.


Canada. to be release in fall 1998, will provide detailed implementation strategies and detailedestimates of the economic and environmental benefits of taking action.

[Additional information is available from the foundation's website:http://www.davidsuzuki.org.]

2. Pew Center on Global Climate Change

The Pew Charitable Trusts recently announced a $5 million endowment for the PewCenter on Global Climate Change to inform the public about climate change issues and promotemarket-based efforts to reduce GHG emissions (e.g., emissions trading). The Center is under thedirection of Eileen Claussen, former U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for Oceans andInternational Environmental and Scientific Affairs.

Participants in the effort include 13 Fortune 500 companies: American Electric Power Co.,Boeing Co., British Petroleum, Enron, Intercontinental Energy Corp., Lockheed Martin, Maytag,Sun Co., 3M Co., Toyota, United Technologies, U.S. Generating Co., and Whirlpool Corp.

The Center's efforts fall within four categories: 1) development and work of the BusinessEnvironmental Leadership Council. The Council will explore how companies can contribute tosolutions at home and abroad through their own products, practices and technologies; 2) aneducation program aimed at increasing public understanding in the U.S. and abroad of the science,impacts and economics of climate change; 3) development of a wide range of studies and policyanalyses that will add new facts and perspectives to the climate change debate in key areas such aseconomic and environmental impacts and equity issues; 4) international effort designed to increasethe global understanding of market mechanisms, and to work with developing countries to assessemission reduction opportunities.

[Additional information is available from the Center's website:http://www.pewclimate.org.]

3. The Heinz Center Global Climate Change Projects

The Board of Trustees of The Heinz Center has formed a Steering Committee composedof leaders from industry, government, academia, and the environmental community. This multi-sector Steering Committee will guide The Heinz Center's specific global change projects andformulate an overall strategy for further studies. Robert M. Friedman is a Senior Fellow and VicePresident for Research

The Heinz Center's current domestic climate change policy studies focus on two areas: 1)design of several options for a domestic control program—all based on emissions trading—tomeet the Kyoto target and 2) evaluation of complementary technology policies to help lower thecosts and accelerate the development and adoption of new technologies for lowering emissions.

The first policy study, Limiting Greenhouse Gas Emissions Through Emissions Trading,focuses on the complex issue of designing a domestic emissions reduction program. By analyzinghow different potential trading systems will work under realistic conditions, the study will provideadvice to Congress and the Administration on the fairness, effectiveness, and cost-effectiveness of


the major options.

The Center's second project, Evaluation of Technology Policies to Help Lower Emissionsof Greenhouse Gases, looks at technology policies—for example, government research orprocurement—as opposed to environmental policies considered in the first study. Environmentalpolicies, such as regulatory standards or marketable emission permits, can have a major impact onthe development and adoption of new technologies, but the question remains whether these willbe sufficient. Technology policies are not substitutes, but rather complementary tools to ease theburdens from environmental policies that may be adopted to lower emissions of greenhouse gases.

B. Business and industry (more to come)

1. Global Climate Coalition

The Global Climate Coalition, established in 1989, is an organization of business tradeassociations and private companies whose mission is to “coordinate business participation in thescientific and policy debate on the global climate change issue.” The Coalition has been in thenews most recently as a result of key losses in membership. Both Royal Dutch/Shell Group andthe Association of International Automobile Manufacturers decided not to renew theirmembership in the organization. Mark Moody-Stuart, the incoming chief executive of Shell, saidthat the company decided not to renew its membership in the GCC because Shell supportsratification of the Kyoto treaty.

The guiding principles of the organization include: 1) the issues relating to global climatechange are serious ones that must be addressed comprehensively and equitably by all nations; 2)science must serve as the foundation for overall global climate policy decisions and enhancedscientific research must be the first priority; 3) even if all of the scientific uncertainties wereresolved, sound policy decisions would still have to consider the economic and social impacts ofalternative policy choices; 4) the United States can make important contributions to improving theglobal environment and conditions for development by encouraging technology transfer todeveloping nations, Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union; and 5) the Coalition has encouragedmembers of the business community and trade associations to commit voluntarily to “GuidingPrinciples for Business” that are consistent with good business practices and are technicallyfeasible and economically practicable.

The GCC supports voluntary measures to reduce the emissions of greenhouse gases andaccuses the Clinton administration of trying to use unrelated laws and policies to implement theKyoto Protocol under the guise of electric restructuring legislation. According to GCC PresidentGail McDonald, “these matters [cap on NOX, renewable portfolio requirements, and CO2 cap andtrade provisions] have nothing to do with deregulation; they have no place in the deregulationdebate.” McDonald goes on to say that the Kyoto Protocol is “fatally flawed” and risks jobs andprosperity without doing anything for the environment.

[Additional information is available from the GCC website: http://www.globalclimate.org.]

C. Public sector (more to come)

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