MODULE 4: Climate change science

 AGENDA

1. Module 4: Climate change ethics
2. Background
   
   
   

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Background

1. Climate change science
2. Types of solutions
3. What should we do....our ethical questions
4. What are we actually doing?

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Climate change science

The latest science

• IPCC -- Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change -- 2023 report

The greenhouse effect

• Greenhouse effect (NASA)
• Greenhouse gases (US Environmental Protection Agency)

Carbon sinks

• Carbon sinks (Acciona company, 2017)

CO2 and temperature rise

• CO2 and past temperature rise (Figure 4, MIT Primer)
• Current CO2 levels are unprecedented (Figure 10, MIT Primer)
• CO2 rise prediction (fig 12, MIT Primer) 
• Temperature rise prediction (fig 13, MIT Primer)

Future sea level rise

• Greenland's ice cap (Video 4, MIT Primer)
• Sea level rise (Video 7 MIT Primer)
• Picturing our future--watch sea level video at top, scroll down to look at images

Other impacts

• Other US effects (scroll down, NASA)
• Impact around the world and on nature (IPCC 2022 report)

Sources of greenhouse gases

• What's producing all the greenhouse gases? (Our World In Data)
• Who's producing all the greenhouse gases? (Our World in Data)

Do scientists all agree?

• Consensus (NASA)
• Richard Lindzen (emeritus MIT meteorologist)
• His cloud theory
• His colleagues object 

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Types of solutions

The three little pigs

Mitigation -- KILL THE WOLF -- reduce greenhouse gas emissions, thereby preventing temperature rise and all the other impacts -- urgent, global, expensive for us today

• stop burning fossil fuels 
• switch to renewable energy like wind and solar
• switch to electric cars
• avoid cutting down trees
• avoid meat-eating

Adaptation -- BUILD A BRICK HOUSE -- protect ourselves from temperature rise and other impacts; gradual, local, cheaper for us today

• building dikes that protect low-lying areas from flooding
• build inland

Geoengineering -- LET WOLF IN, THEN KILL -- use innovative technologies to undo impact of greenhouse gases -- cheaper than mitigation for us today

Mixed strategy-- some combination of mitigation, adaptation, and geoengineering

Do nothing strategy -- it's not a problem!

Reversal strategy-- undo previous efforts 

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What should we do, ethically?

1. Why is climate ethics especially hard? (Mar 12)
• Dale Jamieson--article about moral and political obstacles
2. What do we owe to future people?  How much should we spend to protect them? (Mar 14, 24, 26)
3. If we should mitigate, how should we divide the burden between nations? (Mar 28)
4. What about geoengineering? (Mar 31)

Philosophical questions...we could explore in a void....but...

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What are we actually doing?

International: The Paris Agreement (2015) -- 196 parties (now 195)

1. Primary strategy: mitigation
2. Goal: keep temperature rise (since pre-industrial age) below 1.5 deg C or 2 deg C.
3. Also supports adaptation and some geoengineering R&D
4. Each nation determines its own contribution to reduction (what should this be?)
5. Nations must ratchet up every 5 years
6. US was original signatory--withdrew 2017, joined in 2021, withdrew in 2025

US: Inflation Reduction Act (2022, Biden) 

• comprehensive climate legislation
• with environmental justice component (Justice 40)

US under Trump 

•  climate change no longer acknowledged
• pursuing the reversal strategy--undoing previous efforts (see below)

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Next time: how the ethics is weird, how politics makes it especially hard

• How could the two US political parties be as far apart as mitigation and reversal?
• Are liberals and conservatives so far apart in other countries?
• Were they always so far apart in this country?
• How can we think about climate change solutions without being over-influenced by politics?

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Changes since Trump's inauguration-- below are highlights from this NYT article

1. Paris Agreement. Trump left Paris Agreement
2. Wind Energy. "Mr. Trump has frozen funds appropriated by Congress for clean energy projects, taking particular aim at wind energy, the country’s largest source of renewable power. He has stopped approvals for wind farms on public land and in federal waters and has threatened to block projects on private land."
3. No climate change talk. "He has fired thousands of federal workers, dismantled programs aimed at helping polluted communities and scrubbed references to climate change from numerous federal websites."
4. Drill baby drill!  "Mr. Trump has declared an energy emergency, giving himself the authority to fast-track the construction of oil and gas projects as he works to stoke supply as well as demand for fossil fuels."
5. Stop California ban on gas-powered cars. "The administration and Republicans in Congress plan to use a legislative maneuver to quickly erase California’s authority to ban the sale of new gasoline-powered cars in the state by 2035."
6. Dismantle EPA. "Mr. Trump has fired thousands of employees at the Environmental Protection Agency, the Interior Department, the Department of Energy, and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, the government’s premiere climate science agency."
7. Deny GHG dangerous. "Lee Zeldin, the administrator of the E.P.A., has recommended that the agency reverse its 2009 finding that greenhouse gas emissions endanger human health and welfare, according to three people familiar with the decision. That would eliminate the legal basis for the government’s climate laws, such as limits on pollution from automobiles and power plants."
8. Stop supporting transition to EVs. "Mr. Trump has directed Congress to eliminate federal subsidies for E.V.s., including tax credits for consumers, which could hurt the sales of Tesla, the electric car company, despite Elon Musk’s central role in the Trump administration’s cost-cutting efforts."
9. Stop supporting transition to EVs. "The Transportation secretary, Sean Duffy, signed an order to loosen fuel economy standards enacted by the Biden administration that were designed to encourage automakers to sell electric vehicles. And the administration moved to freeze $5 billion that Congress approved for the construction of a national network of electric-vehicle charging stations."
10. Stop local efforts. "The administration is also trying to stop states and even cities from enacting their own climate policies."

Also increased logging (NYT article)

1. Endangered Species Act. Bypassing Endangered Species Act
2. More logging. Trying to increase logging on 280 million acres of federal land