Our ChoiceAl Gore

Assigned Chapters

• Introduction

• Chapter 1: What Goes Up Must Come Down

• Chapter 2: Where Our Energy Comes From and Where It GOES

• Chapter 14: Changing The Way We Think

• Chapter 16: Political Obstacles

• Chapter 18: Our Choice

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Introduction

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• Serious damage, but we probably still do have time for recovery

• The solution: to make our choice to act now!

• The book “proposes” a solution to the climate crises

• Note that the solution is not easy!

• Need “will” if we choose to solve the climate crises

• Positive “spillovers” for too many countries?

• Associated positive economic outcomes.

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Carbon DioxideBurning of carbon-based fuels since the industrial revolution has rapidly increased concentrations of carbon dioxide, increasing the rate of global warming and causing anthropogenic climate change

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• Need joint effort: households and businesses

• They add up and they reinforce commitment

• Role of active players

• The signs of the change we need are now beginning to appear all around us…. Can you name few?

• Dependency on “foreign oil”!

• Oil Peack?Al Gore: Our Choice6

• Security crises

• Climate crises

• Economic crises

• “our dangerous over-reliance on carbon based fuels is at the core of all three of these challenges

• Obama’s steps toward building a renewable energy infrastructure

• Conflict?Al Gore: Our Choice7

• Need to promote required incentives

• “in practical terms, the rescue of future generations must start right now”

• Next…. CH 1

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WHAT GOES UP MUST COME FOWNCH. 1

• Human civilization and environment are colliding!

• Deterioration of out atmosphere

• It is global and affecting every part of the earth

• The source of global warming

• The reflective problem

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Main Sources of global warming

1. Carbon dioxide (CO2): 43%

2. Methane (CH4): 27%

3. Black Carbon: 12%

4. Other sources: 19%

• All are emitted from many human activities: transportation, farming, heating…

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1. Carbon Dioxide

• The biggest global warming cause

• Mainly from burning of coal (heat and electricity), burning of oil-based products (gasoline, diesel, jet fuel…)

• Most discussions of how to solve the climate crises tend to focus on producing energy that do not produce CO2

• Another source (comes after fossil fuel) is land use changesland use changes

• Deforestation, burning of trees,…

• Try to reduce burning od fossil fuel and reduce deforstation Al Gore: Our Choice12

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deforestation

Wild fires

Soil erosion

2. Methane

• Although is smaller that CO2, over a 100 period, methane is more than 20 times strong as CO2 in its ability to trap heat in the atmosphere.

• Watch “What Goes Up: Greenhouse Gases”

• 50% occur in agriculture

• In agriculture most methane comes from livestock, livestock waste

• The remaining comes from oil and gas production…

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3. Black Carbon

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Watch: The Menace of the Brown Cloud

Black Carbon• Why it causes a particular threat

to India and China?

• More than 30% of black carbon comes from burring of fossil fuels (mainly diesel truck!)

• In areas with long dry seasons with no rainfall, black carbon concentration is high

• Watch and read: Cleaning the Air after the Great Smog of 1952

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• The solution to global warming is as easy to describe as it is difficult to put into practice

• Emissions of the 6 kinds of air pollutants causing the problem must all be reduced

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Next: Ch 2Where Our Energy Comes From and Where it Goes