Economists and Ecologists: Different Frames of Reference for Global Climate Change

Economists and ecologists, in general, have offered differing opinions about the seriousness of climate change and the need for rapid reductions in greenhouse gas emissions. Economists have tended to urge caution, focusing on the potential for large-scale cutbacks to upset the economy. Ecologists have tended to focus on the potential for catastrophic losses from climate change, and have urged extensive shifts in policy. This paper uses the tools of cost benefit analysis and the decision sciences to examine why members of the two disciplines often reach different conclusions. First, economists and ecologists start from different perspectives about what is the point of reference against which policies should be judged. Second, economists and ecologists tend to apply different discount rates to future impacts of climate change. Third, economists and ecologists are likely to interpret differently the substantive findings and expressed uncertainties of formal cost-benefit analysis. Using a simplified version of the DICE model of climate change, this paper explores how these different viewpoints can be expressed in practice

Temperature dependence of attitude sensor coalignments on the Solar Maximum Mission (SMM)

Results are presented on the temperature correlation of the relative coalignment between the fine pointing sun sensor (FPSS) and fixed head star trackers (FHSTs) on the Solar Maximum Mission (SMM). This correlation can be caused by spacecraft electronic and mechanical effects. Routine daily measurements reveal a time dependent sensor coalignment variation. The magnitude of the alignment variation is on the order of 120 arc seconds (arc sec), which greatly exceeds the prelaunch thermal structural analysis estimate of 15 acr sec. Differences between FPSS-only and FHST-only yaw solutions as a function of mission day are correlated with the relevant spacecraft temperature. If unaccounted for, the sensor misalignments due to thermal effects are a significant source of error in attitude determination accuracy. Prominent sources of temperature variation are identified and correlated with the temperature profile observed on the SMM. It was determined that even relatively small changes in spacecraft temperature can affect the coalignments between the attitude hardware on the SMM and the science instrument support plate and that frequent recalibration of sensor alignments is necessary to compensate for this effect. An alterntive to frequent recalibration is to model the variation of alignments as a function of temperature and use this to maintain accurate ground or onboard alignment estimates. These flight data analysis results may be important consierations for prelaunch analysis of future missions

Final Report: Energy Security in Scenarios for Europe's Future Electricity Supply

In the last few years, a number of studies concerning pathways for the very far-reaching decarbonisation of the European power system were published. These studies have had a considerable impact on both climate and energy policy and on the European energy debate in general, because they all conclude that it is technically possible and probably even economically beneficial to decarbonise the European power sector by 80-100% by 2050 using mainly, or exclusively, electricity from renewable sources in a pan-European, Supergrid, approach, supported by electricity imports from the Middle East and North Africa (MENA). Most of these studies also reach the conclusion that decarbonisation through renewables expansion is secure: that it can maintain or increase European energy security compared to today. The last statement is important, because energy security is a high priority for policy makers. At the same time, there is reason to be worried that the empirical and analytic basis for the security statement is less robust than the statements concerning technical and economic feasibility. In many energy and electricity scenarios, Europe will import a substantial share of it its energy needs, either in the form of fossil or nuclear power plant fuels or, as is the case in Supergrid decarbonisation scenarios, as renewable electricity. However, it is not always clear from which regions or countries these imports originate, or in which setting they will take place. In most cases, "energy security" is not even defined, and it lies at hand that the subject of the security considerations may vary widely across different studies. Generally speaking, the energy security statements in the Supergrid studies are often weakly underpinned or, in some cases, it is not at all clear what the base for such a strong conclusion is. Still, any scenario of the future electricity supply must prove that it is secure, or Europe would be well advised not to pursue policies that support developments in the direction pointed out in the scenario. Finding out whether importing renewable electricity from MENA would be a threat to European energy security was the aim of the project, the results and implications of which are summarised here, together with an overall conclusion. The project was carried out in three parts, all based on novel theoretical, epistemological and methodological approaches, which are described in detail in a series of scientific articles. First, we clarified the concept of energy security from a European policy-perspective, identifying the core components of the concept as they are relevant here. In the second part we explored the political risks, here narrowed down to the frequently discussed issues of dependence and "energy weapon" events on the one hand and terrorism attacks on the other. In the third part we assessed the overall failure risks of electricity scenarios. We describe each of these research tasks and results in section 1-3 of this document, and then in section 4 evaluate, holistically, overall energy security of renewable electricity imports for Europe

Influence of large-scale deployment of concentrated solar power on North African countries: Socio-economic aspects (Conference Paper)

To prevent catastrophic results of climate change, the stabilization of atmospheric concentrations of CO2 below 450 or even 350 parts per million is necessary. The large-scale electricity generation from renewable energy sources is one of possible options to satisfy the world's growing energy demand and to reduce green house gas emissions from electricity generation. Several studies show technical viability of large-scale deployment of concentrated solar power in North African countries and its further transmission to Europe. Political will exists from the side of European Union and North African countries to develop renewable energy sources in the Mediterranean region. The Mediterranean Solar Plan, launched by the French presidency, foresees deployment of 20 GW of new solar facilities in the Mediterranean region by 2020. The European Union has a goal to increase the share of renewable energy sources in final energy consumption by 20% by 2020. Besides, within the EU framework there will be an opportunity for trading renewable energy Guarantees of Origin (GOs), which stimulates import of renewable electricity to Europe. The North African countries introduced ambitious goals of development of renewable energy sources. Based on the Desertec concept, the European industrial enterprises formed a consortium with ambitious goal to develop renewable energy sources in North Africa. The socio-economic development, however, is one of a major concern within the North African countries and international development organizations. In this paper, we present the preliminary results from research conducted in the second half of the year 2009 and the first half of year 2010, as part of the Addressing North African Questions in the Context of Renewable Energy Development (ANORAQ) project, supported by the European Climate Foundation. The project investigates barriers for deployment of renewable energy sources from the perspective of North African policymakers and concerns. Among other issues like security of supply and technical constraints such as water usage, we focus on socio-economic aspects of large-scale deployment of renewable energy sources. What are the likely employment effects of concentrated solar power development? Will it lead to creation of additional work-places? In which areas direct jobs will be created? Will they be created just in operation and management of plants? What will be the ration of local and international jobs in construction of installations and manufacturing of components? What will be a multiplier effect on creation of indirect jobs? Will the jobs created in new sectors compensate for losses of jobs in other sectors? While our subject will be the North African region as a whole, we will particularly focus on two countries, Egypt and Morocco. There are reasons to assume that influence of large scale deployment of renewables will be different on economies of these two countries as their local economic and resource conditions are different. Egypt is characterized by large non-renewable energies reserves as Morocco covers almost all of its energy needs of imports

Education as a determinant of response to cyclone warnings: Evidence from coastal zones in India

Education is often considered a means for enhancing adaptive capacity, based on the consideration that formal education is likely to improve the ability of individuals to evaluate risks and respond to warning information. We explore the relation between the level and nature of education and enhanced ability to respond to tropical cyclone risk. We make a distinction between formal school-based education and nonformal education in the form of traditional knowledge of environmental precursors and conditions that may be associated with tropical cyclone occurrence. We evaluate two possible routes through which education could lead to enhanced ability to respond to tropical cyclone risk; first, education, both formal and nonformal, may lead to a better ability to access, understand, and interpret warning information and hence lead to an appropriate response to the warning; and second, formal education may be associated with greater income levels and socioeconomic status and thus with greater resources for evacuating in response to cyclone warning. We find that the hypotheses regarding the link between formal education and adaptive capacity are actually not well supported by empirical data. On the other hand nonformal education in the form of traditional knowledge of predicting cyclones based on environmental precursors emerged as a significant determinant of the ability to understand and interpret warning information and provides a strong case for preserving and promoting a hazard-specific traditional knowledge base along with formal education

Exclusion Statistics in a trapped two-dimensional Bose gas

We study the statistical mechanics of a two-dimensional gas with a repulsive delta function interaction, using a mean field approximation. By a direct counting of states we establish that this model obeys exclusion statistics and is equivalent to an ideal exclusion statistics gas.Comment: 3 pages; minor changes in notation; typos correcte

Report on uncertainty methods

The issue of uncertainty is critical for climate change science and policy. A great deal of research analysis has gone into identifying the scope and character of uncertainty in climate change itself, in how analysts and assessment teams can and should communicate that uncertainty to policy- and decision-makers, and how policy- and decision-makers can then incorporate nowledge about the sources and magnitude of uncertainty in their choices. The primary purpose of this deliverable is to summarize that literature, and to synthesize it in a manner that is useful for the Mediation project, namely in improving the practice of assessing adaptaion needs and options, and in building a useful decision-support platform or system. The report starts with a user-driven focus, summarizing the literatures on both descriptive and normative models of decision-making under uncertainty, in order to identify the most effective and esential information inputs for each of these models. The report then summarizes some of the main guidance documents on communicating uncertanty, prepared for or in use by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, the United States government, and the Dutch government. Fially, the report synthesizes these previous studies for use in the Mediation project and its users by focusing on three essential characteristics of uncertainty communication: parsimony, personalization, and practicality. It identifies specific strategies for using these three criteria to ensure that assessments for climate adaptation are salient, credible, and legitimate, and thus ultimately construtive inputs into policy- and decision-making