Lecture 2

Question 1

What are the Annex 1 countries?

Answer 1

Industrialised countries that were part of the OECD in 1992 as well as some countries with economies in transition. They were given responsibility for reducing their emissions

Question 2

What is the correlation for energy consumption and GDP per capita? What doest this mean?

Answer 2

Many countries with a high energy consumption have a high GDP per capita. This means they have a strong economy

Question 3

Apart from the Annex 1 countries what other countries have high power consumption relative to the GDP per capita and when did this start to occur?

Answer 3

Asian countries since 1977

Question 4

What is the main reason for the correlation between high energy consumption and GDP per capita in Annex 1 countries?

Answer 4

Historically they industrialised before everyone else so have had time to develop but also increase their overall emissions.

Question 5

What are 2 main ways of measuring emissions?

Answer 5

Emissions per capita

Carbon intensity as a proportion of economic activity (how much carbon is produced per each economic action?)

Question 6

What happened to carbon intensity as a proportion of economic activity during the financial crisis?

Answer 6

The crash caused economies to decline which lead to decline in carbon emissions of 1%

Question 7

What are the stabilisation wedges?

Answer 7

they represent reductions of emissions in line with the implementation of different technologies

Question 8

What period do the stabilisation wedges apply to?

Answer 8

The technologies refer to reducing emissions by 2125 so that carbon emissions stay at 500ppm

Question 9

How many wedges are there?

Answer 9

7

Question 10

How much are carbon emissions reduced with each wedge relative to what would have been produced under the business as usual scenario?

Answer 10

With linear growth, the total avoided emissions per wedge is reduced 25GtC by 2054

Question 11

What does the arrow at the end of the graph representing stabilisation wedges refer to?

Answer 11

It shows that emissions must decline substantially below 7GtC per year

Question 12

What are some technologies that could be implemented in order to fill up the stabilisation wedges?

Answer 12

1. efficient vehicles
2. reduced use of vehicles
3. efficient buildings
4. gas power substituted for coal power
5. carbon capture and storage
6. substitute renewables
7. reduced deforestation and implement afforestation and conservation
8. conservation tillage

Question 13

Who produced the stabilisation wedges?

Answer 13

Pascala and Socolow (2004)

Question 14

What did Pascala and Socolow (2004) state in regards to the choice humanity would have to make in order to decide our future?

Answer 14

“the choice today is between action and delay”

Question 15

What has happened since Pascala and Socolow (2004) in regards tow hat they said?

Answer 15

We chose ‘delay’ so that emissions are now 9-9.5GtC per year compared to 7GtC in 2000

Question 16

What study followed up Pascala and Socolo (2004)?

Answer 16

Davis et al. 2013

Question 17

What did Davis et al. (2013) state now needed to happen in order to reach the targets set out by Pascala and Socolow (2004)?

Answer 17

We now need to execute near complete decarbonisation in order to meet the lower arrow in their diagram (500ppm by 2125)

Question 18

What did Davis et al. (2013) propose to reach the 2125 target?

Answer 18

More stabilisation wedges: 31 wedges (12 hidden, 9 stabilisation, 10 phase-out)

Question 19

Explain the marginal abatement cost (MAC)?

Answer 19

Initial reductions of greenhouse gas emissions are not that expensive however in order to achieve total decarbonisation we would need really advanced technologies. These technologies have not yet been invented and so it would be expensive to not only implement them but to also create them in the first place. So, the marginal abatement cost increases almost exponentially with time.

Question 20

How might the initial actions to reduce emissions (e.g. efficient lighbulbs) affect the marginal abatement costs?

Answer 20

A more efficient bulb would cost you more initially but over time it would save you money on the electricity bill. This suggests the MAC curve should start below £0 as it can save you money

Question 21

What is a source of complexity in the MAC curve?

Answer 21

The MAC associated with different initiatives and technologies might be interlinked e.g. the cost of charging an electric car might decrease if the energy mix is driven by cheaper energy sources such as renewables. these renewables would also reduce emissions through less pollution.

Question 22

What are some other damaging atmospheric gases?

Answer 22

methane and nitrous oxide.

Question 23

What is a major source of non-atmospheric greenhouse gases in the UK?

Answer 23

Agriculture

Question 24

What percentage does agriculture account for anthropogenic methane and nitrous oxide emissions?

Answer 24

Methane = 52%

Nitrous Oxide = 84%

Question 25

Despite the costs that would be reduced for farmers in implementing different strategies that are designed to reduce emissions why do they not transition?

Answer 25

Because of social norms, and industry complications they perceive

Question 26

What are some possible taxes/regulations that could be implemented to alter farmer behaviour?

Answer 26

taxes on excess fertiliser application
encourage matching the timing of application of fertilised with when the crop will make the most use of it
using organic rather than synthetic fertiliser;
selectively breeding less fertiliser-needing plants

Question 27

What was an example pitfall in the taxing of airlines?

Answer 27

fees associated with flights where no. passengers is below certain level. the airline worked around this by paying people to fly on the airlines where it was cheaper for them to do this than pay a fine

Question 28

What did O’Brien (2018) state?

Answer 28

3 spheres of transformation that need to be considered in order to implement change to reach 1.5oC target: practical (solar installations, reduced meat consumption, upgrading infrastructure); political (systems and structures that facilitate or constrain the practices); personal (subjective beliefs, values and views that influence how people perceive define or constitute systems and structures as well as their behaviour and practices)

Question 29

What did Anderson and Bows (2011) state?

Answer 29

2oC target now represents the threshold between dangerous and extremely dangerous climate change.
extremely dangerous climate change can now only be avoided if economic growth is exchanged at least temporarily for a period of planned austerity within Annex 1 countries

Question 30

What did Dietz et al. (2009) state?

Answer 30

Encourages the implementation of household strategies to reduce emissions as they are also quite easy to enact

Question 31

What did Pascala and Socolow (2004) state in relation to the technologies in their stabilisation wedges?

Answer 31

the technologies have already been implemented at the industrial level and could be scaled up from here

Question 32

What does Davis et al. (2013) state in relation to the work by Pascala and Socolow (2004) that was damaging for emissions reductions?

Answer 32

they made the solution seem easy whilst the problem has since grown

Question 33

What do Davis et al.’s (2013) 12 hidden wedges mean?

Answer 33

represent decarbonisation of energy system

Question 34

What do Davis et al.’s (2013) 9 stabilization wedges mean?

Answer 34

additional mitigation efforts

Question 35

What do Davis et al.’s (2013) 10 phase-out wedges mean?

Answer 35

complete transition from an energy infrastructure emitting CO2 to one that does not

Question 36

What does Davis et al. (2013) believe in regards to the feasibility of wedges technology implementation

Answer 36

the technologies will not be ready soon enough and will be too expensive

Question 37

What does Gilligan et al. (2010) state regarding stabilisation wedges?

Answer 37

technologies in Annex 1 countries can reduce emissions enough to maintain economic development in developing countries. The annex 1 countries would need to reduce emissions by 35%

Question 38

What did Gilligan et al. (2010) state regarding individual action?

Answer 38

individual and household action can reduce emissions lots as the area is responsible for 38% of national (UK) carbon emissions