Week 1: Understanding grand challenges: deep dive on climate change.

Question 1

Grand challenges

Answer 1

• Problems of significant import
• Involve complex, nonlinear relationships in which cause and effect are not readily distinguished
• Problems that are complex, uncertain, and evaluative (different actors perceive and evaluate them differently)
• Solution: coordinated and collaborative effort

Question 2

Grand challenges Examples

Answer 2

• Melting ice and global consequences
• Clouds, circulation and climate sensitivity
• Regional sea level change and coastal impacts
• Water for the food baskets of the world
• Weather and Climate Extremes
• Near-term climate prediction
• Carbon feedbacks in the climate system

Question 3

Planetary Boundaries - Climate Change. Boundaries crossed in 2009, 2015, and 2023

Answer 3

2009: 3 boundaries crossed

1. Biosphere Integrity
2. Climate change
3. Biogeochemical flows

2015: 4 boundaries crossed

1. E/MSY: number of extinctions per million species‐years
2. Climate change
3. Land-system change
4. Biogeochemical flows

2023: 6 boundaries crossed

1. Novel entities
2. Climate change: Radiative forcing and CO2 concentration
3. Biosphere integrity: Genetic and functional
4. Land-system change
5. Freshwater change: Freshwater use (Blue water) and green water
6. Biogeochemical flows (P & N) -(P is phosphorus and N is nitrogen)

Question 4

Planetary boundaries: climate change.
Global Temperature Change from Preindustrial Era (°C)

Answer 4

It’s risen a lot, as shown on the graph. (From about 0 degrees to 1.25 degrees celsius from 1850 to 2010)

Question 5

Climate change: consequences
What would 3+ °C (or 5.4+ °F) of warming mean?

Answer 5

-Arctic sea ice is gone in 2 out of every 3 summers
-50% of insect species lose >50% of their habitat
range
-Drought: 11 months longer
Increase in average drought length
-Area burned by summer wildfires in Mediterranean doubles Compared to today (4 answers)

Question 6

Climate change: consequences

Answer 6

Climate-related disasters cost the world $650 billion between 2016 and 2018. Damages associated with global warming could total over $54 trillion by the time we reach 1.5°C.

Question 7

Climate change: drivers

Answer 7

Atmospheric CO2 is higher than any time in that last 800,000 years, and levels are increasing faster than any time in millions of years.

For millennia, CO2 has never been above this line (graph): 300 parts per million carbon dioxide concentration in 1950. Now, in 2024, it is at about 410 parts per million carbon dioxide concentration

Question 8

Climate change: drivers- CO2 Emissions by Source (graph)

Answer 8

1850 - 1900: Land-use change and coal
1900 - 1950: Land-use change, coal, and slightly oil. A very slight touch of gas near 1950
1950 - 2000: A lot of coal, a lot of oil, decent amount of gas, slight of others (Emissions from cement production and gas flaring), a decent amount of land-use change
2000 - 2018: A lot of coal, a lot of oil, some gas, a little bit of others, a decent amount of land-use change

Question 9

Climate change: drivers - Emissions sources and natural sinks

Answer 9

Current sources: -25% Electricity production, -24% Food, Agriculture & Land Use, -21% Industry, -14% transportation, -6% Buildings, -10% Other Energy-Related Emissions

Current sinks: -59% Remains in the atmosphere, -24% Land sinks, -17% Coastal & Ocean sinks

Question 10

Paul Hawken Quote

Answer 10

We are stealing the future, selling it to the present, calling it GDP

Question 11

Climate Change: Solutions (?) (Graph)

Answer 11

It is estimated that the temperature will increase by 3.3 deg C (5.9 deg F) by 2100.

Our climate goals is that is will rise to 1.5 deg C to 2 deg C

Question 12

Climate change: solutions (?)- The “Energy Transition” Fallacy

Answer 12

• The “energy transition” discourse assumes that new sources of energy will replace older ones through constant technological innovation

For ex; natural gas currently, nuclear, and solfus. It used to be oil, coal, and wood.

Question 13

Climate change: solutions (?)- The “Energy Transition” Fallacy:

Answer 13

• The “energy transition” discourse obscures the exponential growth in total energy use.
• In reality, new energy sources don’t replace old ones; they accumulate and sometimes stimulate older sources! (In graph, 1940 onwards shooting up)

Question 14

Climate change: solutions (?)
Jevons Paradox:

Answer 14

Falling cost of energy use induces increased demand; can lead to increased resource use
rather than decreased use.
Examples: Energy consumption for Lighting, Transportation, etc.

Graphs (y-axis fuel cost, x-axis Travel):

Inelastic Demand: A 20% increase in efficiency causes a 10% increase in travel. The Jevons paradox does not occur.

Elastic Demand: A 20% increase in efficiency causes a 40% increase in travel. Fuel consumption increases and the Jevons paradox occurs

Question 15

Climate change: solutions (?)
Kuznets curve: Is inequality just a temporary byproduct of economic development? (confusing graph)

Answer 15

• A hypothesis initially advanced by economist Simon Kuznets in the 1950s
• Assumes that industrialization first increases, then decreases societal inequality – “inequality will solve itself through economic development”
• Hypothesis contradicted by the rise of inequality since the 1970s!
• Environmental Kuznets Curve = similar hypothesis around environmental degradation, assumes that “the solution to pollution is economic growth.“
• Mixed empirical support; depends at what level we consider the curve (national vs world-level).
  Mechanization of agriculture
  Internal migration from rural to urban areas
  democratization and welfare state