Dirty habit: Our refining and use of oil is polluting enough, but liquid coal-based substitutes will spell even worse news, researchers say.
Credit: Walter Siegmund
SAN FRANCISCO: The demise of the world's oil supply could worsen future climate change, researchers have warned.
The fear is that upon our exhaustion of oil supplies, liquefied coal will take over as a primary source of fuel, accelerating the rise of global temperatures.
Dirty energy
"There's a focus on coal because it's the most abundant of the three fossil fuels by far... [But it's] also the dirtiest, in the sense that it releases the most greenhouse gas [per] unit of energy delivered," said Pushker Kharecha, a U.S. climate researcher with NASA's Goddard Institute for Space Studies in New York.
Kharecha presented the research findings at a recent meeting of the American Geophysical Union in San Francisco, California.
Replacing oil with coal-derived liquid fuels would increase average global warming by two degrees Celsius by the year 2042, three years sooner than currently expected, said climatologist Ken Caldeira, from the Carnegie Institute for Science in California, who also presented at the meeting.
Cut the coal
"Most future climate change will be a result of burning coal," he said. But replacing declining oil with wind, solar, or nuclear power could push the two-degree increase date back by 11 years, postponing the rise to 2056.
Given the exacerbated global warming effect of coal and coal-derivatives, Kharecha said, and in order to keep the end-of-century atmospheric concentration of carbon dioxide below 350 parts per million, "[all] coal emissions will need to be phased out proactively by 2030."
In the meantime, he said, "unconventional fossil fuels and coal-to-liquids must not be used as large-scale substitutes for oil and gas, unless all emissions are captured and stored."
Peak Oil?
The assumption peak oil is here, is just that, an assumption dressed up as fact. For instance, peak oil in the US came as the Atlantic, Pacific, and a third of the Gulf of Mexico was put off limits to drilling. Not to mention Alaska, and most domestic land sites. Peak oil has been announced several times already yet the price today is 34$ a barrel with OPEC demanding a 2.5 million barrel production cut. Brazil discovered an estimated 33 billion barrels off it's coast in April(don't you have to ask yourself, isn't it better Brazil burn oil instead of burning the rain forest to raise sugar cane?) The recent run up might have been peak production, not peak oil.
The end of oil.
There are assumtions here that fly in the face of reality. The "End of oil" have been predicted since the 1800's. Check out old issues of Scientific American. I totally agree that burning coal is not good for the environment, but, personally, I would rather have my energy from dirty coal than to starve and freeze in the dark. Coal needs to be cleaned up, but it has to be an evolution, not a revolution. Nothing this big happens overnight. I am confident that we can devise some method of getting clean energy, it has to happen, but in it's own time, not driven by the agenda of the wacko's.
Massage Conspiracy
It's an utter outrage! We Masseurs are losing business- no oil to satify our coustomers, and we can no longer afford to purchase the expensive brands! This demise in oil is costing us more than the Climate!! Especially those of us who specialised in this occupation- the majority of us are unequipped with the qualifications necessary to surivive unemployment! Who would hire an ex-Massuer who has no qualifications?! It's a disgrace to the business!
Climate change? None of us has enough time to worry about the climate- we're too busy trying to survive! And these critical scientists- who are adament that this will destory the planet- dare to tell us we are inferior?! This will not go unheeded!!!!
Coal Burning Causing Climate Change
It is accepted as a fact by most scientists and especially politicians who probably wouldn't know anyway that burning fossil fuels is causing the planet's temperatures to rise. What is moost astounding is that these so called smart politicians refuse to look at the only fuel for the future is nuclear. Eek! That scary word. Nuclear power has been and is being proven as clean, abundant, safe and inexpensive and will not run out for aeons. The trouble is that conservationists have the Governments ear and they will not even consider nuclear because of a couple of accidents caused by human negligence. More people have died and become ill from coal pollution, plus hundreds of underground miners trapped and killed through cave-ins than there has been from nuclear use. Nuclear must be seriously considered and until it is we are going to be paying escalating costs for electricity for ever and also destroying the planet we all have to live on.
I HOPE we are at peak oil!
I HOPE we are at peak oil: I fear what we will do to the planet if our insane reliance on oil continues. The introduction of small, inexpensive internal combustion cars like the Tata Nano in super-dense population markets like India ought to be giving us nightmares. And as for coal -- it has to go. We cannot afford possible increases in average temperature of 3-4 degrees Celsius in places like the British Isles by 2080, as recent studies would indicate, and that's what's coming if we don't change course!
Above all, DON'T believe ANYTHING the coal industry tells you on this subject!