Ozone holes and climate change
Before we begin, I should point out that the ozone hole and the greenhouse effect are totally different. A lot of people get confused about that, and I’m about to talk about both phenomena, so I’d hate to contribute to that confusion.
In 1980, scientists examining satellite measurements of the atmosphere over Antarctica noticed that a lot of data were missing. Checking through their FORTRAN code, they found that a data integrity check that tossed numbers that were improbably low was removing data from most of the southern polar region. In 1987, the nations of the world agreed to phase out the use of the chemicals that had been destroying ozone. And now:
A new study using NASA and National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) data finds consistent evidence that Earth’s ozone layer is on the mend. …
“These results confirm the Montreal Protocol and its amendments have succeeded in stopping the loss of ozone in the stratosphere,” Yang said. “At the current recovery rate, the atmospheric modeling community’s best estimates predict the global ozone layer could be restored to 1980 levels– the time that scientists first noticed the harmful effects human activities were having on atmospheric ozone — some time in the middle of this century.”
The example of ozone depletion can give us insight into the ways that climate change can be managed. When the Montreal Protocol was approved, and the world ended its use of CFCs, many people predicted economic travail. Indeed, recent industry estimates place the cost of implementing the treaty at $40 billion worldwide (PDF), other estimates go as high as $235 billion, or $23.5 billion per year.
Yet no one seems to be complaining.
The same phenomenon is on display whenever someone suggests a way of restricting emissions of atmosphere warming gases.
In response to California’s experiment in limiting carbon emissions, concerns about cost are being floated. The cost of Kyoto is estimated at $60 billion, and scaling that down to the size of California’s economy puts the cost at around $9 billion per year. The question is whether those costs can be offset somehow.
One part of the answer came to me while flipping through the latest issue of Business 2.0. I was draw in by the headline: “Blogging for dollars,” but learned more from the article on “The greenest office in America.” Adobe managed to cut its power consumption by 35–41% by retrofitting their existing building. It cost $1.1 million to renovate, and they save a million bucks a year. The biggest single change and one you can do all on your own, is a switch to compact fluorescent bulbs.
They spent a few hundred dollars to replace their existing lightbulbs with compact fluorescents, and save hundreds of thousands every year. The bulbs last longer and produce less heat, giving more light per unit of electricity.
Environmental Defense has a lot more information about the benefits of compact fluorescent bulbs. Take the pledge and replace a few bulbs in your own life.
This is what I don’t understand about the entire debate about carbon dioxide. The simplest thing we could do to reduce emissions of warming gases would be to reduce energy use. Replacing energy sources is a good goal also, but cutting energy use is easy. It saves money. It’s smart.
So why do people fight tooth and nail against these ideas? Why do people still bother buying incandescent bulbs? Why don’t people add more insulation to their homes? Why is it so hard to encourage people to drive more efficiently. None of this requires you to give anything up, and it saves you money in the end.
Could it add up to nine billion dollars a year? Who knows. Given how easily we absorbed the costs of banning CFCs, it hardly seems like any of this would matter anyway. Most of the costs would be up-front costs, and the savings would persist indefinitely.
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I went to (evil?) Walmart this past weekend, specifically looking for
CFL for those candelabra (small diameter screw fixtures), this was the only place I’d ever found them. In any case they had a rack of 74cent
CFL bulbs. At that price the cost per megawatt saved is surprisingly low. And yet I bet at least 70% of bulbs being sold are still Tom Edison’s 120 year old design.
Now Tom was my idol growing up, but we clearly need to move on past his ancient design!
If we simply gave away a dozen of these bulbs to all poor families
(who are much more likely to make the mistake of saving a buck today,
but incurring repeated costs tomorrow (i.e. save $.25 and buy an incandescant bulb)), think of how many power plants we wouldn’t need to build…and in some small way we’d be helping the poor.
Well, off the top of my head, CFs have: (1) higher cost, (2) limited form factors, (3) slow on-time, (4) unpleasant spectrum.
(1) is supposedly offset by longer life, but that hasn’t quite been true in my experience. (4) is obviously subjective.
I’m not saying there aren’t good reasons for CFs, but they’re not hands down better in all respects. I have a mix of bulbs in my own house, and have even replaced a couple of CFs that previous owner was using with incadescents (primarily due to reason (3)).
If you have problem with slow on-time you are buying the wrong CF:s, Eric. The ones have are more or less indistinguishable from lightbulbs in on-time and spectrum. The only reason I still have lightbulbs is your reason 2, I have some old lamps where CF:s won’t fit. The cost isn’t just offset by longer lifetime but by a lowered electricity bill, and this is even more significant if you, unlike me, live in an area where you use air conditioning. Then you have to pay once more to cool away the extra heat generated by a lightbulb.
Now I’m just waiting for white LED:s to become better. Then you get another boost in efficiency and can forget all about form factors and on-time. Switching to LED:s in traffic lights where you want colored light anyway has given a significant gain for years.
Central cooling is another area where I think California should be able to save lots of energy. Don’t put individual air conditioning units in buildings. Get the cold via heat exchangers from the sea and pump it around in cities like LA.
Blair, why do you blame the scientists? Why not the military or the politicians who made the decisions, the engineers who built the bombs, the mine workers who dug up the uranium or the taxpayers who funded it? I’ve always been fascinated of how scientists seem to be held by some higher moral standard so that if new technology is abused it is their fault.
I suspect that ozone depletion has done more damage than nuclear tests, and I’m most definitely sure it would have had not scientists discovered it and the connection with CFC:s in reasonably good time.
Just as a service, and to maybe motivate people a little, as of 2006, you can get a tax credit from the IRS for adding insulation, replacing windows, or buying certain energy saving appliances.
You can find the details starting on page 8 of IRS publication 553. See link:
http://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-pdf/p553.pdf
In short, you may get a tax credit of 10% of the amount paid for qualified energy improvements. Limited to a total of $200 for windows and $500 total credits. You can find more details from the link above. (There are other changes too, so it’s a good publication for everyone to read even if you aren’t interested in tax credits.)
Of course, you have to spend the money in 2006 to get the tax credit. So if you are planning on replacing some windows or insulating anyway, you may want to consider doing it before January.
Cheers,
-Flex
P.S. BTW, Blair is clearly a troll. After the first Blair post I saw, I congratulated Blair for meeting all the earmarks of a classic troll by changing the subject drastically, attacking a group of people unmentioned in the original post, and making irrelevant accusations. This last comment doesn’t quite reach the same heights of innanity as the previous one. I’m disappointed, the quality of the trolling has dropped significantly. 🙂 ‑F
The four reasons above are all less true than they once were. The cost of bulbs has dropped, and continues to. You can get a discount on orders through this link. And as others have noted, the lifetime energy savings more than cover the costs up front, that’s how Adobe is saving 100 times what they spent on the CFLs.
Limited form factors are a problem, but at least the bulbs are getting smaller, so that you can use the CFL in most of the settings a regular bulb fits into.
As for spectrum, the Environmental Defense link I offered earlier says this:
The issue of start time has also largely disappeared. Older bulbs did have that problem, but I’ve never noticed it with the CFLs I use.
If governments didn’t help build nuclear weaapons, there would be no danger of the nuclear destruction of the human race, no matter what the politicians did.
That is why the governments are responsible.
No more kibble for you Blair/Goldstein.
Or one better.…
If governments didn’t help build nuclear weaapons, there would be no danger of the nuclear destruction of the human race, no matter what the scientists did.
That is why the governments are responsible.
Don’t feed the troll(s).
It would be nice if the prediction about the ozone layer being on the mend was true… but it isn’t — this years southern antarctic ozone hole is already comparable to 2005 and it’s size seems to be limited by dynamics rather than the availability of chlorine in the stratosphere.
It’s nice of the press to help maintain the illusion that fluorcarbon production is being controlled but this is not true either. China and India are both producing increasing quantities and we haven’t even begun to consider the effect of teflon.
Kyangadac: I think that stopping the expansion of the hole is a good first step, and the NOAA/NASA study I cited at the beginning says that the ozone hole is on the mend. I’m curious about your source of information.