Joe Romm's Full Global Warming Solution

It would be presumptuous of me to try and improve on what Joe Romm produced at Climate Progress today. It is an update to his "wedges" discussion that shows how we can achieve our climate goals if we only had the political will. Romm lays out The full global warming solution: How the world can stabilize at 350 to 450 ppm. This is how he sets the stage.

Stabilizing atmospheric concentrations of carbon dioxide at 450 ppm or lower is not politically possible today — not even close — but is certainly achievable from an economic and technological perspective, as I and others have said for years.

Humanity has only two paths forward at this point. Either we voluntarily switch to a low-carbon, low-oil, low-net water use, low-net-material use economy over the next two decades or the post-Ponzi-scheme-collapse forces us to do so circa 2030. The only difference between the two paths is that the first one spares our children and grandchildren and countless future generations untold misery (see “Intro to global warming impacts: Hell and High Water” and “A stunning year in climate science reveals that human civilization is on the precipice“)

. If we are serious about being Green, then we need to figure out what to do because one major party denies that there is a problem and the other can't figure out what to do about it.

Coal runs America... into the ground.

If you know much at all about the political strength of the coal industry, this article in the Phoenix Sun will not surprise you, but is till worth the read to reinforce the knowledge that a blatant 19th Century Robber Baron mentality that is still at work in the US, wrapped in the American Flag.

If you have not paid any attention to this, then it is all the more reason for your to spend some time thinking about the ramifications of Massey Energy CEO Don Blankenship addressing a rally in his red, white and blue shirt and introducing pro-coal coloring books into the curriculum for West Virginia's elementary school children.

Several years ago, David Cobb wrote an OpEd for the Eureka Times Standard, commenting on a right wingnut speaker named Holly Swanson whose day job was going around the country railing at all things good and Green. I quote:

Approximately 60 folks attended to hear a diatribe that included an allegation that the Green Party was engaged in a concerted effort to “brainwash” children to respect the earth. Swanson went so far as to accuse the Greens of being just like the Nazi Party of fascist Germany.

Doesn't that sound just like Rush Limbaugh and Glen Beck today, or the tea bagger venting their wrath on Obama as their target of opportunity.

So, here is a big cheer to Dana Silvernail who actually may be Holly Swanson's worst nightmare, a Green who actually won a seat the board of the Northern Humboldt Union High School District. As I wrote in a congratulatory note to Dana, "All you need to do is have students who respect the truth."

The Phoenix Sun article concludes:
> If you want to stay up-to-date with news on the coal front, you’re in luck. Ken Ward, Jr., the dean of American coal reporters, writes a blog for the Charleston (WV) Gazette called The Coal Tattoo. Read it and weep. And then organize.
I keep up to date by following @Jenwardjr on Twitter.

We don't think much about coal in California. The mines we once had (Parkfield, for example) have long since been abandoned. But we do need to think about where this country is headed and how very effective Coal is at controlling what we do. For example, did you know the the Chairman of the House Committee on Natural Resources, Nick Rahall, represents the 3rd District of West Virgina which is truly ground zero for mountain top removal mining. You wonder why we can't get anything done?

You may also wonder why the Democrats are so hesitant to push for a climate change bill, or that the bill currently under consideration in the Senate - known as Kerry-Boxer - has so much provision for the future use of coal? Well, both of the Senators from WV, Robert Byrd and Jay Rockefeller, are Dems and taking away their votes would make sure that an Republican filibuster, already promised by Oklahoma Sen. James Inhofe, would be sustained.

I agree with the Phoenix Sun, Read this and weep. Weep for the mountains that will never be again. Weep for the citizens of Rahall's district who have no other options, whose one last public opportunity to change Coal River Mountain from a toxic cleanup site into a jobs and energy producing windcatcher has been blasted away. Then organize. If you can do nothing else, the next time you feel like a cup of coffee or a soft drink, take the money you would have spent and donate it to the West Virginia Mountain Party.

Front line in the war on the climate

We seem to have declared war on the climate and appear to be winning, for a change. The front line in this war is in West Virginia and Obama is sending all of our troops to Afghanistan.

Please read this post by Bo Webb over at Grist. It tells you what is happening on to the ground. Then call Sen. Boxer's office (202) 224-3553 and tell her that enough is enough.  She put her name on a bill that is supposed to be about stopping climate change.  She even put out a video  to rouse up her supports are some timely house parties.  But, she does not have the guts to tell her fellow Democratic Senators Rockefeller and Byrd that there will be nothing for coal.

Then follow Bo Webb's example and send a message to Obama that he can not represent my country in Copenhagen if he allows this to continue.

This is not an environmental issue.  It is a justice issue: social justice, economic justice, ecological justice.  Boxer has proven that she can count to 60, but she needs to learn to count to 350.

Climate Insurance

They always tell you to follow the money. A good example is the money flow away from AIG and to some of their highly valued employees.

Perhaps the way we will get more public attention on the issues surrounding the climate disruption that we have brought on this planet will come from the outflow of money from insurance companies for losses stemming from extreme weather events and sea level rise.

According to the Wall Street Journal, state insurance regulators will require insurance companies to disclose how climate change is affecting their business.

The officials acted after concluding that climate change threatens insurers in two ways. It increases the risk of extreme weather events such as floods and wildfires, which would boost claims. And it is prompting governments to cap industrial carbon emissions that contribute to global warming -- a move threatens the profits of companies such as coal-fired utilities in which insurers commonly invest.

Click Read more! for the rest... it gets interesting.


If the big guys are worried about what is going to happen with coal fired power plants, what should the rest of us think about. Maybe we need to be on the lookout for public / private partnerships and quasi governmental organizations that will need to be bailed out because they have already sunk funds is a project that can only cost more and never deliver what it promises. Case in point: Treasure Island in San Francisco Bay. I posted the following in a comment at Climate Progress where I first read of this.

There is a major project being planned for Treasure Island in San Francisco Bay. This is property that the City of San Francisco has acquired when the US Navy decommissioned their facilities.
The January 14, 2009 meeting of the TREASURE ISLAND DEVELOPMENT AUTHORITY had this on their agenda.

Their approach leaves much to be desired, including the 36″ sea level rise projection.

The preferred design approach is to achieve finish floor elevations with a free board of six inches in a worse-case scenario (100 year storm event plus 36” inches sea level rise). Perimeter open space areas will having limited, short term ponding at high tide. The geotechnical design approach includes a range of techniques for densifying soil and subgrade materials to mitigate issues associated with liquefaction and settlement.

It will be very expensive and not do the job if all they plan for is a 36 in rise. I wonder how hard it will be for any potential tenant to get insurance. I wonder if those who are already occupying Treasure Island will have recourse against the City for failure to consider the effects of global warming before they started this project. I wonder if the project’s chief cheerleader, Gavin Newsome, gets a pass because he claims to be “green”.

It might be time for San Francisco's Green Supervisor to call for a review of the entire project.

The one San Francisco Supervisor who is on the Treasure Island Development Authority, Chris Daly, has always had a political game going on. He wants to make this the affordable housing solution for San Francisco. This sounds like a typical un-thoughtful project. Sell all the poor people a sinking solution.

Homegrown Greens

The Green Party has always fallen prey to the idea that the only candidate who can win is one that comes in from the outside with a full blown resume and national name recognition. Thus, we had Nader and he did well... for a while. Now, we have Cynthia McKinney who comes in with a reputation that is filled with pluses and minuses. Yes, she has the moxie to stand up and tell the truth when few others will. Yes, she has a tendency to believe, or at least use, all of the conspiracy theories that might help here cause.

In the mean time, a home grown leader has emerged. That is Jesse Johnson. If you did not pay any attention to him during the presidential primary, you really should start doing so now. Jesse is the real leader in the Green Party affiliated Mountain Party of West Virginia. Right now, he is running for governor there and needs all of the support that we can give him. Follow the Read More link and I will give you raft of reasons why.


Jesse Johnson is playing a smart political game. One by one the road blocks that the machine politicians of West Virginia have placed in the way of the Mountain Party are dropping. They went to court to force inclusion in gubernatorial debates, and won. They went to court to get Cynthia McKinney recognized as a proper candidate for President... and they won.

The more that I learn about him, the more I am impressed with both his biography and his actions.

Now, you know that he is making waves when he gains the endorsement of the Sierra Club. In general, they do not endorse candidates other that Democans unless they think that the endorsed candidate has a chance to win. Well, I will give them credit for a few endorsements for Greens when the other two candidates were simply God-awful He also picked up an endorsement via an OpEd by Mike Gravel in the Charleston Gazette.

In fact, Johnson is doing so well that his campaign has gotten the attention of the National Committee of the Green Party long enough to interrupt the everlasting discussion of bylaws and that says a lot. In fact, if he chooses to run, I will support Jesse for President in 2012.

Given that, I am asking California Greens to contribute Jesse's campaign. Click on the Donate Tab at the top of his home page.

Global Warming: Why it all matters

Let me call attention to a couple of different stories today.

The first came to me when I looked at Dave Roberts' Gristmill blog this AM. Dave makes it a Friday Night practice of blogging a particular piece of music that caught his attention. This week, it touches on global warming, Mountain Top Removal in West Virginia and the connection is Coal. In fact, that is the name of the album from which this selection is taken. Coal, by country singer Kathy Mattea.

One might be tempted to take all of this as an intellectual exercise. After all, how many of us have really had much to do with coal mining. I know that my late sister-in-law, Mary Barnes Rolley, had her MS in Coal Geology from the Univ. of Illinois. That is about as close as I got and I am drawing Social Security.

It is often frustrating when we deal with issues like climate change that are so easily abstracted. I remember with some nostalgia my college days when Dylan was just a rumor of some young guy singing great stuff around the coffee houses and The Times They Are A-Changin' had not yet been recorded. There is no coffee house circuit anymore and potential young Dylans want to jump right to the top as an American Idol. But let me call your attention to the way that Mattea's Bend, OR concert was hyped by the local paper, the Bend Bulletin. The story begins this way...

Here’s a depressing little exercise for you to try: Hop on the Internet, visit Google Maps, and search for “Danville, W.Va.” Once you’re in Danville, click over to “Satellite” view and zoom out a little bit.

See that giant, grayish area west of town? That’s where a coal-extraction company has blown off the top of a mountain to make its job easier.

Now, zoom out more, and follow the trail of grayish spots that pockmark the rolling, green hills of the Appalachian Mountains to the southwest of Danville, extending across West Virginia and into eastern Kentucky.

Every one of those spots represents what used to be a mountain. The mountains are now flat, thanks to the extraction method known as mountaintop removal.

I challenge you do do that exercise.

Here is another challenge. Make a contribution to the West Virginia Mountain Party. They are the Green Party affiliate and they have been fighting this battle since the beginning. Anthing helps, even $10.

Real life intrudes

As Greens, we seem to constantly deal with things that have nothing to do with real life. It is as if we become so frustrated with aspects of real life, things we feel powerless to change, that we construct obstacles that we feel there is a chance that we can handle. Maybe that is the reason so many California Greens spend so much energy try to deal with...

• who is really the LA County rep on the CC.
• whether Peter Camejo dissed the SF Green Party.
• is David Cobb really a Demo-Green
  

Then, we get a reminder that that there are those dealing with real life. Mike Ewall, CoCo of the the national Eco Action Committee, sent out a note today in which he directed us to the plight of some Navajo Grandmothers who are acting in opposition to a proposed "dirty" coal plant on the Reservation. This was a subject of a number of my blog posts when PomboWatch was still up.

The basic problem comes because the Navajo Reservation has a lot of coal and a lack of jobs. Therefore, every time a new project comes along, it always has the promise of new jobs for an area the sorely needs them. Coal, however, is never a clean energy source.

The story is told from two sides. The link above gives a good story of those who oppose the new plant. The corporate story is another case. At least, on that site, you can also leave comments on the project by clicking on Comments in the top menu.

California has taken a stand in support of cleaner solutions for electric power. When the State of California told the Mojave Power Generating Station (Laughlin, NV) to clean up its emissions or they would not buy any more power from them, the plant ended up shutting down rather than clean up their act. Governor Schwarzenegger just leaned on the City of Truckee to persuade them NOT to sign a long term contract for power from a Coal fired plant in Utah.

With Pombo gone, we now have to watch what Democrat Nick Rahall does as Chairman of the House Committee on "Natural" Resources, as he wants to rename it. That Committee has oversight responsibility for our Resources and also for the Department of the Interior, Bureau of Indian Affairs. Rahall is from W. Virginia, a major coal state and has a long relationship with the coal industry.

Maybe we should introduce the Raging Grannies to their Navajo counterparts. And remind me not to get on the wrong side of a grandmother.