US Emissions To Drop 9% In 2020, Putting Country Back On Track For Paris Commitment (greentechmedia.com) 106
An anonymous reader quotes a report from Greentech Media: The U.S. economy is on track to reduce greenhouse gas emissions 9 percent in 2020 compared to 2019, BloombergNEF reported Thursday. It's a sign of the impact that COVID-19 shutdowns and the ensuing recession have had on life in the U.S. When workers stayed home and the streets emptied out, it reduced emissions from transportation, which accounted for the largest decline at 4 percent of economywide emissions. The power sector drove another 2.8 percent decline, while reduced industrial activity lowered emissions by another 1.6 percent.
The drastic reduction in planet-warming emissions did not result from concerted action on climate change, so much as an unprecedented and deadly pandemic. Without the COVID-19 crisis, the U.S. would have released just 1 percent less carbon than in 2019, BNEF estimated. The mandated cessation of activities to stop the spread of coronavirus led to the additional reduction of 8 percent. Still, the absolute numbers make 2020 the "greenest" year on record, BNEF analysts Tom Rowlands-Rees and Melina Bartels noted. "The economic disruption of 2020 has inadvertently put the U.S. back on track to meet the commitments it made under the 2016 Paris Agreement, prior to President Trump taking the country out of that pact," they wrote. The latest drop in greenhouse gas emissions doesn't take into account the effects of the record wildfire season. "The fires burned enough plant matter to release the equivalent of 2.8 percent of 2019 economywide emissions," the report says. "Accounting for that means 2020 nets out at a 6.4 percent decline in overall U.S. emissions."
The drastic reduction in planet-warming emissions did not result from concerted action on climate change, so much as an unprecedented and deadly pandemic. Without the COVID-19 crisis, the U.S. would have released just 1 percent less carbon than in 2019, BNEF estimated. The mandated cessation of activities to stop the spread of coronavirus led to the additional reduction of 8 percent. Still, the absolute numbers make 2020 the "greenest" year on record, BNEF analysts Tom Rowlands-Rees and Melina Bartels noted. "The economic disruption of 2020 has inadvertently put the U.S. back on track to meet the commitments it made under the 2016 Paris Agreement, prior to President Trump taking the country out of that pact," they wrote. The latest drop in greenhouse gas emissions doesn't take into account the effects of the record wildfire season. "The fires burned enough plant matter to release the equivalent of 2.8 percent of 2019 economywide emissions," the report says. "Accounting for that means 2020 nets out at a 6.4 percent decline in overall U.S. emissions."
Re: See?! (Score:4, Informative)
The synopsis also leaves out that US emissions have dropped for the last few years since dropping out of the accords.
Not only that, but the other participants in the accords did not meet their goals and are unlikely to reach them by 2030. In the mean time, the accords do allow China to increase their emissions at current rates until 2030 and only nominally flatten out by 2050.
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The accords were never about reducing emissions and slowing global warming. They were about allowing China unchecked expansion of its reckless environmental policy as a "developing nation."
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This is the propaganda. In real life on the other hand, each country set both the goals and the enforcement mechanisms, which is why any limits in CO2 in Paris Accords are irrelevant in case of nations who will choose not to enforce. I could go in detail on history of how China and "enforcing rules that harm China and benefit foreigners" work, but if you don't know that at this point in history, you're beyond help.
The real thing in Paris Accords however was the money transfer in an effort to finance poor na
Re: See?! (Score:4, Interesting)
In real life on the other hand, each country set both the goals and the enforcement mechanisms, which is why any limits in CO2 in Paris Accords are irrelevant in case of nations who will choose not to enforce.
Because countries just love to cede their sovereignty to global bodies...
The Paris Accords were never going to be anything but virtue signalling and shaming. Nobody would have agreed otherwise.
But if you're genuinely thinking that Paris Accords will reduce CO2 emissions, you're living in la-la land.
But you are wrong here. Paris Accords are helping to solve the problem anyway. Without them things would be worse.
(The rest of your post is just gibberish.)
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What exactly is "the problem" in your estimation?
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I didn't ask about the article. I specifically asked about your estimation, because the reply you made doesn't appear to be in line with what the article is talking about. Therefore, either "the problem" you're talking about is something different from what was being talked about so far, or you're ignorant.
Hence, the question to find out if former is true before dismissing you as the latter.
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But if you're genuinely thinking that Paris Accords will reduce CO2 emissions, you're living in la-la land.
Paris Accords are helping to solve the problem anyway.
And you can't tell what 'the problem' is?
There was a third option.
It's not hard to tell which of us is the ignorant one.
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>And you can't tell what 'the problem' is?
No, I cannot read your mind. Shocking in today's world, where everyone likes to claim they can do so over the internet, I know.
So would you like to spell it out or not?
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But if you're genuinely thinking that Paris Accords will reduce CO2 emissions, you're living in la-la land.
Paris Accords are helping to solve the problem anyway.
Try reading it slowly? Google the words you don't understand perhaps?
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Ignorant and afraid to submit his opinion to scrutiny. Thank you. No further information is necessary.
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No further information was necessary.
You're welcome I guess?
You don't have to answer this, I'm sure you're too busy. And have moved on elsewhere.
But what other possible interpretation could there have been? Apart from the obvious one? Am I missing something in all this?
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You're missing the obvious fact that I tried to give you a genuine chance to explain yourself in good faith, and all you did was bitch about me not being a mind reader. But considering your pointed refusal to submit your views to scrutiny by outlining them specifically, as I note above, the conclusion does indeed suggest ignorance combined with fear of having ignorance being demonstrated.
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That's quite a lot of words to say 'I couldn't think of any'...
Unsurprising though. There never was any real doubt as to my meaning.
Or your intentions...
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Even if that were the case, how does pulling out of the accords do anything to change this in any way? With an accord, they at least have some constraints. Without, there is nothing to limit what they do.
Lies, damn lies and statistics (Score:3)
The emissions dropped due to an increase in fracking (a one off), Covid-19, and some land use issues.
The goals were so light as to be laughable.
The sort of long term reductions that are required will require actual input from the Federal government, and will cost real money.
Not just minor one off changes to how we burn carbon done because it happens to be cheaper.
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Fracking isn't a one off, but an enduring progress that enabled US to basically render coal uneconomical. And burning methane emits about half of CO2 per energy generated compared to coal.
It also helps propagation of intermittents to some extent, as CCGTs can function as spinning and cold reserve for larger installations of wind and solar.
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Slow day for China related news to troll?
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I imagine bringing the manufacturing to the US where the environmental protection rules and laws are actually enforced do help to reduce the pollution.
Not that the orange man is actually doing it, but doing what he said he would do is actually quite a good way to cut on emissions, as not only you get the aforementioned advantages, as you also reduce all that shipping from china to US
And yet... (Score:1)
France didn’t.
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France's emissions dropped in 2018 and 2019, although not at a pace sufficient to meet its goals by 2030. That's not surprising. The accords were signed in 2016, so you wouldn't expect to see any change until around 2019, and then only modest. You can't conjure replacements for power plants, vehicles, and buildings overnight.
As for this year, France has had relatively low levels of COVID until October, so you wouldn't expect to see a COVID-driven drop in the statistics we have so far.
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The problem areas are those nations that are STILL GROWING, esp. when they are large.
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The important part is Trump was right and we don't need to kill the USA.
While we had fewer cars, we had a lot of cities burning and forest fires. That put a great deal of CO2 into the atmosphere.
Paris agreement was just a big money grab. A great big bill to the USA and didn't accomplish anything.
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Until we require that ALL NATIONS DROP THEIR EMISSIONS, and not allow them to grow it, we will NOT be able to solve this problem.
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France's emissions dropped in 2018 and 2019, although not at a pace sufficient to meet its goals by 2030. That's not surprising. The accords were signed in 2016, so you wouldn't expect to see any change until around 2019, and then only modest. You can't conjure replacements for power plants, vehicles, and buildings overnight.
Sure, that doesn't happen overnight but that assumes France hasn't been trying to lower emissions until the day they signed the Paris Climate Accords. France has been a party to a number of CO2 reduction treaties prior to the Paris Climate Accords. France, and so many other nations, have had policies in place to lower CO2 emissions for perhaps decades prior to 2016. Failure to lower CO2 emissions until 2019 is not so easily excused.
Calling France's failure to keep pace with the Paris Climate Accord goals
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France's emissions are tiny because they generate around 3/4 of their electricity from nuclear plants. That's zero to near zero (for anti-nuclear fanatics) CO2 emissions from those sources.
And it's hard to reduce from zero emissions sources.
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France's emissions are tiny because they generate around 3/4 of their electricity from nuclear plants. That's zero to near zero (for anti-nuclear fanatics) CO2 emissions from those sources.
At the best, CO2 emissions from nuclear are lower than anything but hydro power. But at the worst, they are higher than anything but hydro power (which can be the worst of all.) In the median, nuclear is defeated by wind.
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Yes, anti-nuclear fanatics like this. Thank you for providing an example.
In real world on the other hand, Denmark with its hilarious investment in wind that is backed by Swedish and Norwegian hydro as much as possible has about double to triple the CO2 emitted per electricity generated.
https://www.eea.europa.eu/data... [europa.eu]
But let's pretend really hard that wind is the solution and nuclear is really high in CO2 emissions. Klimatdiktatur banzai.
Re: And yet... (Score:2)
Cherry picking is bullshit. You have proven nothing except your poor faith.
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I did the exact opposite of cherry picking. I directly compared a nation priding itself in being the most advanced in terms of adapting wind among developed world vs a nation that is priding itself in being most nuclear powered nation among developed world.
Apples to apples direct comparison. Which strips away the narrative for the raw numbers. And as a result, demolishes the religious views expressed above.
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I did the exact opposite of cherry picking. I directly compared a nation
You chose one nation and think you're not cherry picking? Nice work there.
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Basic mathematics states that to prove a mathematically true statement, we choose the best possible edge case. In case of wind generation, that would be Denmark which invested massively into wind for over a decade now while being an island nation sitting on a fairly high wind intensity area of the globe, and that backed where possible by overabundance of Swedish and Norwegian hydro. It's the best case scenario due to geography.
I do understand this goes against your religious belief, and as a result you reje
That was easy. (Score:3)
We did it literally without even trying.
Kyoto (Score:3)
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That's not an accident. It is a reflection of America's diplomatic and economic power. Because of American soft power no administration has ever had to negotiate conditions that would be hard for us.
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The first virus to get a Nobel. (Who was the first Nobel to get the virus?)
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In part that's because the goals are fairly easy to hit. In part, it's because individual states and cities committed to continuing their anti-global-warming plans set up when we were part of the Paris agreement as though we had never left.
Re: That was easy. (Score:2)
Companies, too. The auto industry had already committed to reducing emissions and competing with EVs. Likewise, there has been quite a bit of investment in solar and wind.
Obama provided the right carrots and sticks to send industries down a path they would become committed to because of their investments. Relaxing environmental regulations had a negative effect, but not enough to reverse the course major industries had already committed to.
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Companies, too. The auto industry had already committed to reducing emissions and competing with EVs. Likewise, there has been quite a bit of investment in solar and wind.
Obama provided the right carrots and sticks to send industries down a path they would become committed to because of their investments. Relaxing environmental regulations had a negative effect, but not enough to reverse the course major industries had already committed to.
What were those "carrots and sticks" that Obama used to lower CO2 emissions?
What I found as totally hypocritical from Obama was taking credit from the CO2 reductions from natural gas fracking. He did everything he could to prevent natural gas drilling, and for the low CO2 emission transport of natural gas by pipeline. I also recall a lot of bad deals in investments into electric vehicles. Then there's the "cash for clunkers" program that quite possibly made things worse by destroying working vehicles. T
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Right of center Forbes credits Obama with supporting natural gas production. [forbes.com]
I recall one failure in like 2 dozen investments. Links please.
Even larger modern cars emit less CO2 than the cars replaced under cash for clunkers.
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We have dropped a number of coal plants. [scientificamerican.com]
Even without covid, America STILL would have dropped. As a SWAG, probably 1-4%.
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Well, we did it with a pro-business president in the white house, sure. I think what this really shows is that (a) people want cleaner living and greener technologies, and (b) industry will respond. Take a look at the automotive industry ... it has never been the case of the industry telling consumers "You'll drive your gas guzzlers and you'll like it!". Gas powered vehicles have simply been more affordable and functional than any alternative. Now that electrics are near mainstream (prices almost to the
Not a great argument (Score:5, Interesting)
If you're trying to get others on board maybe "Like COVID... but even less activity " is not going to appeal. If anything the impression it gives is "Wait we nearly shut everything down and stayed home to only get 10%?!!". That's just going to make carbon reduction seem impossible.
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That's because it is. It's already to late. Shutdown American, the world will still burn. Shifting to electric cars and trucks will help and if we all start eating vegan that would probably help to.
We might do the electric car/truck thing over the next decade but people are not going vegan that don't already WANT to go vegan or otherwise have so many health problems they have to go vegan.
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Saying that, I agree with the rest. It's too late, the world will burn. But we should still try to do something, stretch it out if possible.
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It would be easy enough to spin this in the other direction: "Look: if a disease is all it takes to meet the Paris commitment, even after we rolled back so many [washingtonpost.com] environmental policies, think what we could do if we actually tried."
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if a disease is all it takes to meet the Paris commitment, even after we rolled back so many environmental policies, think what we could do if we actually tried.
Yeah. SARS-CoV-3 won't be ready before its little brother falls to vaccines. We're gonna have to pursue a man-made alternative.
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This was my thought exactly. I've put some ridiculously small fraction of miles on my car this year. Zero plane trips. No heated pools, a bunch of the places I used to go are lights off for good. I'm probably leaving out a bunch of other stuff I didn't do that creates emissions.
And with all of that, and feeling like crap for the whole year, we're only down a measly 9%... going bigger in perpetuity is going to be a hard sell. Not saying we don't still need to do it, but a hard sell.
Oh, man ... (Score:2, Interesting)
US Emissions To Drop 9% In 2020, Putting Country Back On Track For Paris Commitment
This is really going to burn the Republican petrochemical state, using-fossil-fuels-is-patriotism, crowd to the bone since there is nothing they can do about it.
.... Schadenfreude**
**Mmmmm
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Petrochem has simply been the most efficient and cheapest power source available. Its not some evil plot. Electrics are proving that they can be affordable, and industry will respond with a tectonic shift. It has happened before, it will happen again.
Sure, I mean, companies made rich and powerful want to continue being rich and powerful ... so they are obviously going to lobby for things that continue their business models. But this is no different than, say, George Soros or the Koch brothers ... approa
Trump was right! (Score:1, Funny)
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Biden won and has already either dropped the restrictions he said he would do, is ignoring his scientific advisors and saying he will not do what they say, or is following the steps that Trump setup.
But really, do you think biden could score even a 70 if he did an IQ test? They have post sign all around him on what he is supported to say and even then he has issues reading them.
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But really, do you think biden could score even a 70 if he did an IQ test? They have post sign all around him on what he is supported to say and even then he has issues reading them.
Even if what you say is true, how does that differentiate him from Trump, who fails completely and has to resort to stalling when his teleprompter is down?
Just watch ... (Score:2)
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Once COVID is under control, say another eighteen months, they probably will. At the same time, the power generation sector is going green at a good clip and EVs are finally beginning to make an impact. In four years, I could see US emissions finally begin an unrelenting decline.
I say this as someone who just happened to be listening to The Energy Transition podcast when this story was posted. Five years ago, I was pretty doom and gloom RE CO2 emissions, but that podcast's coverage of energy market trends
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Even California is still getting 43% of its energy from natural gas [ca.gov], and that's a state with good weather, fairly consistent winds and a strongly anti-fossil fuel regulatory atmosphere.
While it's true that natural gas generation has decreased by 60% over 5 years from peak [ca.gov], most of it is being replaced by solar. That means the trend would not continue at its current trajectory for much longer, since sunlight gets blocked by Earth at night and storage has not gotten any cheaper.
Your optimism is a bit like arr
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That means the trend would not continue at its current trajectory for much longer, since sunlight gets blocked by Earth at night and storage has not gotten any cheaper.
Except storage has gotten cheaper. Every part of it except the land it's on and the copper (which can be subbed out, with some care) has come down in cost.
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It's true that lithium batteries have gotten cheaper, but that's irrelevant because they're not cheaper than lead-acid batteries. The goal here is large scale bulk storage so there's no point looking at anything besides the cheapest option. Lead prices haven't come down.
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Flooded batteries take up 2+ times as much space, weigh 2+ times as much, are 2+ times as numerous meaning more interconnects, require more maintenance (although the maintenance is not that arduous, as it can be done with a quick fill system, but that in turn costs more money) ... And ultimately have lower charge and discharge rates even when ganged to make up for their lower usable capacity.
Flooded batteries beat the hell out of AGM in any application where not spilling is not an issue, but when it comes t
remember The Aliso Canyon gas leak? (Score:1)
More storage means more leakage in most cases. Tanks leak gasses and liquids. Batteries leak charge and chemicals. Are these insurmountable? No one has start to climb Olympic Mons. It's definitely a challenge. Maybe someone will get there.
Trump even failed at being Trump (Score:1)
n/t
Accord (Score:2)
So do Honda have an electric version of the Accord coming out?
How about a plug in hybrid?
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Yep, I just paid off my 2013 Honda Civic and I'm thinking about getting out of it while it still maintains a respectable re-sale value. I've short-listed the Honda Clarity and the Nissan Leaf Plus as possible replacements. They are similarly priced - however, the Honda Clarity is a plug-in hybrid with a short range. Alternatively, the Nissan Leaf Plus has an amazing range for an all-electric vehicle.
My case may be anecdotal, but I think fall into a demographic - I want to switch to all-electric but the rang
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My current car's ~1700 lbs is basically untouchable without jumping to an SUV. Much as I dislike them, perhaps I should be looking more into the larger hybrid crossovers.
They're making a fair selection of full-size trucks that are all-electric with 400 mile ranges, which is amazing. So maybe the price point on one of those trucks will drop to something reasonable in the next ten years.
This post got me thinking, and now I'm hunting classic cars that aren't running and thinking about throwing an electric conversion kit on it! Double nerdy
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How about plug-in hybrid with V2G?
All part of (Score:2, Informative)
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Even if you think Covid-19 was a planned event, why are you so sure it came from a lab in China? It could as easily have come from a lab in some other country, and have been released there so as to make China look like assholes.
physics says: (Score:2)
A point about the CA wildfires (Score:2)
Yes, it obviously moved more carbon dioxide into the atmosphere, but trees are all "surface" carbon. The wildfire CO2 will eventually be absorbed by the plant life back to earth. The really bad carbon is petroleum, because that's taking sequestered carbon deep in the earth, and releasing it into the atmosphere. That keeps adding more carbon to the atmosphere, which means more to remove.
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In the record what we see is warming, then CO2 increases. That is, as it warms up life happens. CO2 isn't the cause, it's the symptom. The real scientific models using the actual scientific data show this. The fake ones that change the 1930s so they weren't so hot show CO2 is the cause.
Seriously, the co2 thing is fake. A volcano can dwarf what man puts out and that's not "surface" carbon - new term I haven't heard before. LOL More confusion I suppose.
Reducing emissions in 2020 was easy (Score:1)
we can do better (Score:2)
If we just kill another 50% of the economy, we can drop GHG tremendously, and really arrest glowball warming in its tracks.
China will be so shamed, they will cut their economy by 75% just to show they are better than us.