Focus on Change: A Closer Look at Change Impacts in the Northeast

A synthesis of the June 27, 2012 conference held at Pace’s Schimmel Theater in downtown Manhattan

This synthesis has been drafted by the staff of the Pace Energy and Climate Center and is not a word-for-word transcript of the event. Any errors or omissions are the responsibility of Pace and the text should not be used for quotations or direct attribution to speakers without the speaker's permission.

What’s at Stake? Bill McKibben & 350.org

The sprawling nature of the is a bright light to emphasize before focusing on the grimmer stuff. People of all kinds are trying to do something about , the greatest problem that we have ever faced. CNN has called the climate movement the “most widespread political activity in the history of the planet.” 350.org has organized 20,000 rallies in 192 countries, every nation save North Korea. Still, the fight against climate change is being lost.

The level of carbon in the atmosphere is increasing, and worse, the temperature is increasing. Just this spring, researchers in the Arctic recorded CO2 concentrations of more than 400 parts per million (ppm), which is well above the 350 ppm that scientists have determined is the highest safe CO2 concentration and from which 350.org takes its name. Within 18 months, the rest of the world will catch up to the

Arctic CO2 concentration, which is the highest level recorded in 800,000 years. From these sobering statistics we take renewed determination.

We have warmed the air, acidified the oceans, and changed the basic hydrology of the planet. The atmosphere is more than four percent wetter than it was forty years ago, which is probably the best indicator that our long era of stable climate has ended. Because of negative anthropomorphic climate effects, we have loaded the dice for , heat waves, and other catastrophic weather effects, not just in the United States, but across the world. Almost fittingly, some of the worst effects have been felt in the American southwest, home of Oklahoma’s infamous climate denier James Inhofe. Such recent severe climatic events provide ample evidence of God reminding us that this is not what a hoax feels like.

Meanwhile, the atmospheric water is coming down in extreme events, flooding twenty million people out of their homes in Pakistan, submerging Thailand’s capital and economy to the equivalent of 18% of the nation’s GDP, and requiring emergency levee repair to save entire cities from ruin. Rainfall records are falling not by tiny margins, but by 25% or 30%. Rain currently falls on a different planet than those previous records were set on.

Here are a few points on climate change we should all bear in mind:

A) An ethical dilemma hangs over us because the most damage occurs in the nations that least created the problem of climate change; B) We are only at the beginning of the damaging effects of climate change, experienced at one degree of temperature increases. Unless we act quickly to curtail emissions, the effects will get much, much worse, beyond the certain degradation that is to come on account of the damage that we already have done, but the consequences of which we have not yet felt; C) Geology can’t save us. We have been speculating for oil, gas, and coal to absurd depths across the globe. The earth has been ripped apart, which has created our current problem; D) We need to get tougher, and we need a movement. Movements are hard to build, forged by trial and error, built along the way, but they can create differences. Responding to NASA’s foremost climatologist’s assertion that burning the oil in the Canadian tar sands would prove “game over for our climate,” 350.org encouraged a civil disobedience movement to stop the

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Keystone pipeline. People of all types came to Washington to get arrested on behalf of the climate, and more than 1,200 protesters were arrested in a very civil manner. This one movement has created at least a temporary victory, which is the only kind environmentalists ever win, but we demonstrated the will to take on this large money machine. E) Challenging one pipeline at a time isn’t sustainable and it isn’t enough. Consequently, 350.org is starting a campaign to support Congressional efforts to pull away the industry’s $113 billion in federal subsidies over the next decade. Revoking these subsidies is a bi-partisan issue of agreement that doesn’t even address the subject of fossil fuel producers not paying for carbon emissions… but it is a start. F) The most important message is to remind people that demanding a healthy planet is not radical. It is radical to get up every day, go to work, and enrich yourself by changing the chemical composition of the atmosphere. We must fight against labeling environmental concerns as radical.

We may not win this fight, but we will fight it, shoulder to shoulder.

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From a Thousand Feet: Art DeGaetano, Director, Northeast Regional Climate Center & Professor, Cornell University

Responding to Franz Litz’s probing Inside the Actor’s Studio-style questioning, Art begins by announcing that his favorite color is green, he prefers beer over wine, and he referees soccer.

The steps on the stairs of a global temperature over time graph are leading up, more than half a degree Celsius over the past decade. There are variations on the staircase, but the clear indication is that global temperatures are increasing, and human activity is the source. The Northeast shows greater variability, but follows the escalating pattern of global temperature changes. Canada’s temperature changes have all been increases.

Framing the true impacts of climate change requires looking past averages to focusing on extremes. Among selected cities in the Northeast and Canada, the incidence of days above 90 degrees has steadily increased over the past several decades. Extreme impacts are not limited to temperature, but also are linked to precipitation. Though average precipitation has increased as a whole in the Northeast and Canada, a precipitation dichotomy has formed in the Northeast: increased in the winter, and decreased during summer. The severity of precipitation (days with more than one inch of rainfall) has nearly doubled in the past decade, with the effects increasing with northern latitude. This phenomenon can be seen in the case of the once-in-a lifetime storm – in the current climate, a 100-year storm is predicted to occur every 66 years. The atmosphere is getting moister, and it has been released in heavier rainfall events.

Models for temperature changes consistently show a steady increase within a relatively narrow range; similar models for precipitation changes yield much larger variations and predictions. However, increases in both temperature and precipitation by the end of the century are more predictable in the Northeast. Precipitation will increase as a whole, but summer months are just as likely to see droughts as to see heavy rains. The largest increases will be felt farther north and away from coast (7˚F and 10”), though will still be easily felt along the coast (5˚F and 4”). Cold extremes (days below 10˚F) will be lessened considerably in the northern Northeast, and warm extremes (days above 95˚F) will increase considerably in the southern Northeast.

Climate change impacts will continue predictably over the next several decades due to climatic inertia. Under nearly all scenarios, the effects through approximately 2050 are very similar. The real difference we can make now will be slowing the inertia towards the second half of the century.

Flooding is hard to predict, and though precipitation patterns will be more extreme, it is hard to say how flooding will impact the Northeast. Similarly, we can predict that the sea level around New York City will rise by at least one to two feet, but under heavy emissions and impact scenarios, the sea level could rise by up to four feet. Sea level impacts will extend beyond the coast; Troy, a neighbor of Albany, is situated upon the Hudson and could suffer from the same rises.

To summarize, changes in temperature will likely impact:

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 Human Health  Ecosystems  Energy Demand  Agricultural Practices

Changes in precipitation will likely impact:

 Water Resources  Transportation  Agriculture  Ecosystems

Changes in snowfall will likely impact:

 Water Resources  Ecosystems, particularly in rural communities

Changes in sea level will likely impact:

 Urban areas  Coastal Ecosystems

Q&A:

 Based off recent measurements, where are our current emissions relative to projected scenarios? o Higher is the relevant word. The recent economic downturn has helped reduce emissions in the short term, but in spite of this temporary reprieve, we are still on track at the higher end of the emissions scenarios.  How did calculations account for an increase in water versus thermal expansion? o ClimAid1 projections for sea level rise included thermal expansion, melting, changes in ocean currents, and more. The majority increase in sea level comes from thermal expansion.

1 http:// www.nyserda.org/ClimAID

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Zooming In: Impacts on the Rural Environment

Moderator: Morgan Ellis, Climate Planner, Division of Energy & Climate, Delaware Department of Natural Resources and Environmental Control

Ecosystems: David Wolfe, Professor, Cornell University

Winters are getting warmer, and hardiness zones for plant life are shifting. The climate is always changing, but the rapid pace of today’s climate change is new within the past tens of thousands of years. The new temperatures across regions affect what crops can be grown, what trees populate a forest, which insect pests and how many live in a habitat.

Temperature data are not the only indicators of climate change. Historical records of bloom dates show that plants are blooming earlier than in the past half century, as do birds and plants. As each species responds uniquely, how will each adjust? How will ecosystems as a whole adjust? Will pollinators be ready when flowers bloom earlier, for instance?

Perhaps counter-intuitively, freeze and frost damage have created severe agricultural damage as premature blooms suffer from lingering frosts. By the end of the century under a higher emissions scenario, snow cover lasting more than 30 days will retreat to only patches of its current range. Ice cover dates in lakes have arrived consistently later over the past century, with most incidences of a lack of total cover coming in the past two decades.

Animal habitats will be altered on account of changing snow and ice cover. Lake trout, which are cold water fish, will lose habitat as their water warms. Deer will gain habitat as snow cover recedes, exposing vegetation to sustain their numbers throughout the winter. Some hardwood trees thrive in a higher CO2 atmosphere, though increasingly frequent droughts could strip any benefit these trees would receive. And somewhat frightfully, weeds such as poison ivy grow like gangbusters in high CO2 environments and require much more herbicide to combat them. Warmer weather is rapidly increasing the habitable range of the incredibly invasive kudzu, and pests such as the hemlock wooly adelgid are beginning to flourish and spread throughout the Northeast and during milder winters.

The shift in forest habitability will result in an altered landscape of tree compositions. How should we proceed? Should we try to keep the forest’s current composition, or facilitate the change? With the rate of change in ecosystems, invasive species will likely alter the landscape before people can influence the process.

Adaptation Strategies for Natural Ecosystems:

 Minimize other stressors (e.g. invasive species, acid rain, etc.)  Manage to maintain ecosystem function and biodiversity (rather than trying to keep ecosystems static)  Facilitate natural adaptation (provide routes and corridors for inevitable species spread)  Institutionalize a coordinated monitoring and data-sharing effort with associated decision support tools

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Health & Food Security: Lewis Ziska, Research Plant Physiologist, USDA, Maryland

Lewis directly informs the crowd that kudzu has now crossed the border into Canada, a gift to our northern neighbors.

Rising CO2 concentrations will have a direct effect on human health through the altered interactions with plant life. Toxic plants and weeds will increase dramatically in CO2-rich environments, though we can’t say how the actual toxic substances will respond. Additionally, access to natural medicines will be diminished, disease-carrying animal habitats may shift, and the use of pesticides will increase in warmer temperatures.

Warming temperatures will result in reduced food security. Our food’s nutritional content, growth rate, and resistance to disease will all be reduced by warmer temperatures. Industrial-scale farming and a lack of crop diversity weaken crops’ ability to adapt to climate change. Shortages of water and fertilizer, combined with the spread of monocultures, suggest an imminent food scarcity. Hunger already kills more people than any of the world’s infectious diseases, and the climate is shifting towards reduced access to food.

Increasing atmospheric CO2 will also bolster the production and potency of common allergens. Sites of

CO2 measurement are typically distant from cities, where large populations would feel the effects of climate change. CO2 concentrations are generally higher in cities, meaning that the effect of allergies is already greatly heightened. This phenomenon has particular significance for the Northeast, which is a highly urbanized environment. High urban CO2 concentrations may also enable us to observe the predicted effects of climate change today.

The length of allergy seasons is extended by frost-free days, and warming effects are the most pronounced at the higher latitudes. Therefore, northern regions such as Canada and the farther north areas of the Northeast may experience longer allergy seasons.

Water Resources: Pierre Baril, Executive Director, Ouranos, Quebec

The impacts of climate change are already apparent in Canada, which has seen about a degree of warming in the past fifty years. The Thousand Island River, near Montreal, has experienced lows in water flow not seen over the past century, which has jeopardized hundreds of thousands of nearby residents’ access to drinking water. In Nunavik, northern Quebec, the permafrost is melting and roads and houses are becoming unstable. Loss of ice cover is accelerating erosion along the St Lawrence Bay. Consequently, development is slowing and shifting because environmental risks are too high.

The coming precipitation extremes will necessitate a reevaluation of infrastructure. Dams, dikes, roads, and many other types of infrastructure that are affected by water flow will have a much shorter lifespan due to the increased strength of precipitation. New and continuing designs, adaptations, and investments in storm water networks will see increased importance due to the impacts of climate change.

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Temperatures are rising and precipitation patterns are shifting, but the extent of change relies on many factors. Understanding and overcoming uncertainty in projections is a necessary prerequisite to making informed decisions about climate change. Accounting for multiple water indicators (high flow, water quality, etc.) in models enables water managers to form an accurate assessment of water uses and needs. Natural resources will be strained in some places, particularly when resources serve multiple uses. Integrating opinions of regional experts on health, hydropower, and recreation will encourage proper distribution of water supplies as precipitation patterns shift.

Such processes can be extended to land use management and electricity production. For example, precipitation is projected to increase during the autumn in parts of Quebec, so water managers must anticipate and mitigate the dangers of flooding, as well as prepare to take advantage of the increased water flow for electricity. Accurate predictions have led Quebec to invest in projects in areas that are projected to experience increases in wind and water volume.

Climate change is occurring at a global, national, and regional scale. Regional impacts have already become apparent. Climate change inertia is a certainty, and the effects will undoubtedly become more severe. We must adapt, but we must also know how to adapt, and we must respond intelligently, yet quickly. By selecting adaptation measures, we can also implement more sustainable practices and more sustainable modes of life, which will offer benefits beyond merely mitigating climate change impacts.

Q&A:

Morgan Ellis, to David Wolfe, asking about mitigation strategies to complement adaptation strategies:

Conservation of forests and soils is an important mitigation step. Wolfe is focusing on corn production systems to save energy in farming practices, as well as carbon and nitrogen emissions reduction strategies. The biggest emission issue in the United States and Canada comes from nitrous oxide from fertilizers, and it may be the lowest hanging fruit for agricultural mitigation.

Audience to Lewis Ziska, about the USDA’s messaging upon updating the plant hardiness map:

The USDA is politically lagging behind the research and doesn’t really address the issues associated with the map of changing plant hardiness areas. (Ziska pointedly reiterates that this is his own personal opinion, not that of the USDA.)

David Wolfe jumps in to add that USDA is involved with funding and research on climate change mitigation and adaptation.

Audience to panel, has the movement to stop farming subsidies gained any traction? What are your opinions?

David Wolfe asserts that he thinks the Farm Bill was just passed with some change in subsidies, but it was not a terribly dramatic change. Economic incentives and new policies would be a helpful change, but subsidies are not the answer. Payouts from crop insurance and a heavy reliance on nitrogen

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Lewis Ziska laments that most subsidies benefit the largest industrial-scale farmers with monocultures that won’t adapt to climate change. These subsidies don’t encourage mitigation, or even adaptation. Hopefully, the extreme precipitation patterns of the past year and the associated high food costs will encourage skeptics to prepare for, and fund, climate change mitigation and adaptation strategies. (Again, this is Ziska’s personal opinion and does not reflect the position of the USDA.)

Ziska and Wolfe bring up examples of new strategies, such as supporting multi-cultures and profitably re-coupling animal and crop production systems, which would get farming on the right track to respond to climate change. There are many different solutions, but we need to communicate them and find the will to try them.

Audience, to panel, on seed producers trying to find varieties that can adapt to changing conditions:

Lewis Ziska reiterates the four basic plant needs: water, CO2, light, and nutrients. Atmospheric CO2 has increased by 25% since 1960, but no breeders have experimented with adapting crops to benefit from higher CO2 levels. He has been part of a few studies with rice to accomplish the task, but he is astonished by the oversight and slow response of breeders to respond to CO2 levels.

David Wolfe adds that breeders have accommodated other factors, such as and high temperature tolerance, but breeding efforts alone won’t solve food security issues.

Audience to Pierre Baril, asking for his estimates of sea level rise over the next century:

Sea level is rising slowly in the St Lawrence Gulf, but the hydrostatic sinking movement of the continent could be responsible. Models indicate that a higher sea level will create damage on the northern coast of the Gulf within twenty years, but the upstream cities along the St Lawrence River will be protected. The lack of ice will compound the erosion damage.

Audience, to David Wolfe, would like elaboration on what managing ecosystems for function would look like from a practical standpoint:

The practice involves managing one ecosystem in relation to another. For example, farmland upstate can be managed to store good quality water that would benefit downstream users in New York City. Biodiversity is an important management tool to protect against invasive species, preserve varied seed types, and enable humans to harvest natural resources (timber, syrup, etc.). The function of a forest could be interpreted as carbon storage, and in that case the loss of a forest would mean that it would no longer function as a .

Audience, to panel, asking why hydrofracking’s water consumption is not used as an argument against the practice, particularly in the face of increasing precipitation uncertainty due to climate change:

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Pierre Baril asserts that there is no water shortage in Quebec, so management and protection of water is not robust or strict. With coming extremes, management will have to improve to manage negative water impacts.

Lewis Ziska can’t comment on fracking’s water consumption, but can say that water uncertainty is a growing basis for conservation. Bill McKibben successfully lobbied against the Keystone Pipeline by appealing for the safety of the Ogallala Aquifer.

David Wolfe thinks that water should be brought up more in the fracking debate, and particularly in the context of water quality. Many fracking sites are located in regions where homes rely on groundwater and wells, and the lack of consensus on fracking and water quality effects indicates that this may be a real problem.

Audience, to Pierre Baril, would like to know more about public sentiment in Canada about the extraction of tar sands:

There are two worlds in Canada: the West and the East. Quebec has been more sensitive about climate change for decades than the West, and with the abundance of hydropower, the East does not favor extracting oil from the tar sands. The West likely feels differently, but awareness is growing, and they will likely encounter a serious water management problem if they pursue extraction.

Audience, to the panel, wondering whether there is a disconnect between the level of expertise in the field of climate change and the ability to be furious about the impacts:

David Wolfe recalls the journalist Elizabeth Colbert’s insight that many scientists hold more privately dour expectations for climate change impacts than they advertise in public. The politicization of the science creates a difficult position if an expert wants to be heard, but science should have a seat at the table in climate change discussions. Even informed farmers would rather deal with climate change as it comes rather than submit to policies they distrust, such as a . Communication to eradicate misinformation or willful ignorance is a worthy challenge, but Wolfe himself can only push so hard.

Pierre Baril tells of his idealistic engineering background that came to be tempered by his later experience working in government and its limitations. His switch to a hard science career has lessened his hope, and he foresees serious impending climate change consequences.

Lewis Ziska emphasizes the tenuous position of scientists, who cannot appear to be overly enthusiastic or too passive. These complex issues are being presented to distracted Congressional staff with too much to handle. Framing the issue is frustrating and perplexing and can be personally taxing.

David Wolfe adds that most scientists focus on areas of consensus, which are often the less terrifying aspects of climate change. The rigorous standard of certainty means that many of the most dramatic climatic possibilities are not discussed, even though they may be highly likely to occur.

Audience, to Lewis Ziska, on the nexus of climate change and public health – what can we do to mitigate the rise of asthma in urban areas?

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It’s not a question of the science, which is established. Pressure must be applied on polluting industrial groups in the vein of a McKibben campaign. Education, passion, and the effective communication of the science in particular are important components of applying such pressure. We cannot, however, ignore adaptation; climate change inertia has progressed steadily, so we must combine adaptation measures with mitigation measures.

Morgan Ellis, to panel, asks for the one question on climate change that is not being asked, but should be:

David Wolfe has recently focused on the communication of the issue. He used to believe that a country’s ability to adapt revolved around economic capacity, but a recent study has shown that culture and belief systems play a bigger role. Communicating effectively across cultural barriers to convince skeptics of valid science is an area that needs further emphasis.

Pierre Baril wonders if watershed managers have integrated information sufficiently to plan and manage a changing ecosystem. If water is not appropriately managed today in a stable environment, how will managers cope effectively with future instability?

Lewis Ziska thinks that the issue of species diversity and the response to a changing environment needs more attention. A handful of species respond well to increased CO2 concentrations, but most don’t, resulting in a great loss of species diversity. We don’t know what the subtle and intricate effects of such a loss will be.

Morgan Ellis channels her inner Lipton and asks which animal, insect, or plant the panelist would like to be:

David Wolfe quickly hypothesizes that he would prefer to be a plant that is highly adaptable to climate change. Pierre Baril agrees with Wolfe’s forward thinking, and Lewis Ziska specifies that kudzu, as an incredibly successful invasive species, would be the best option.

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Shifting Focus: Impacts on the Urban Environment

Moderator: Lois New, Director of Climate Change Office, New York State DEC

Urban Vulnerabilities: Cynthia Rosenzweig, Senior Research Scientist, NASA

Only very recently has discussion of climate change in urban environments come to the fore. Cities, however, are uniquely relevant to climate change because they:

 Suffer already from multiple environmental stresses;  Contain most of the global human population;  Serve as important economic hubs;  Most commonly are sited on coasts or rivers that will endure severe climate change impacts.

Cities are also at the fore of climate change impacts in both cause and effect of climate change. Urban areas account for nearly two thirds of global energy demand, a figure which is expected to rise in the coming decades, and more than half of GHG emissions. Climatic effects that will affect cities include heat waves, extreme precipitation events, and a heightened risk and severity of flooding. In the Northeast, GHG emissions per capita vary greatly, but as a whole are relatively high.

Urban areas are already quite vulnerable to extreme weather patterns, such as:

 The effect stores heat within cities;  Impervious surface cover exacerbates flooding from intense rainfall;  High population density facilitates the spread of diseases;  The poor and elderly are among demographic groups that are vulnerable to high temperature extremes. A variety of factors contributes to these groups’ vulnerability, including shortages of material resources, lifelines (e.g. cars and trains), infrastructure, and information, as well as the susceptibility of age, both the very young and very old.

Vulnerability is an important theme for cities, extending into citywide sectors. Increased energy demand during high extreme temperatures places a strain on the energy sector, whereas water demand will be strained by shortages of water, as well as contamination from extreme precipitation events. Both extreme heat and precipitation can adversely affect infrastructure such as roads and railways.

Cities are also uniquely situated to mitigate and adapt to climate change impacts. These environments already adeptly juggle multiple stresses, so climate change impacts will simply exacerbate these stresses. Cities already have experience dealing with such stresses, and so will be well equipped to respond to any changes. Northeastern cities are among the leaders of the country, if not the world, in preparedness for climate change impacts. Many cities in the region have already constructed climate change action plans, which are being shared and circulated.

Both nationally and internationally, cities are responding to climate change impacts, which contrasts starkly with international governments and agencies’ glacial pace. Urban leaders have taken initiatives to organize, such as the international “C40 Cities Climate Leadership Group” and the “World Mayors

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Council on Climate Change” that has produced voluntary emissions reductions targets from participating mayors. The greatest successes from Rio+20 came from urban leaders’ efforts to organize and to promote actionable pledges to reduce emissions.

Urban areas are intimately wrapped up with climate change’s causes and particularly vulnerable to the effects. These areas have experience mitigating and adapting to environmental stresses, and their leaders have been proactive in resisting the climatic heightening of such stresses. Therefore, cities must be at the forefront of research, organization, and the implementation of measures to combat climate change.

Transportation: Projjal Dutta, Director of Sustainability Initiatives, MTA

The 100-year flood, now slated to occur every 66 years, when combined with the predicted four-foot sea level rise will almost completely flood New York’s tunnels. Managing storm water is not part of a transportation company’s purview, but the task has fallen to the MTA because the authorities in charge of conveying storm water have not met the full challenge. This became evident after August of 2007, when a heavy storm inundated New York’s streets and subway system.

In four of the most flood-prone areas, the MTA raised or paved over gratings, added raised steps to entry ways, and in some cases installed mechanical shutters. The total cost of these projects came to $34 million. The same expenditure would have purchased 20 subway cars or 60 new buses; the added expense of storm water management limits the MTA’s ability to meet its core function of reliable transportation.

Accounting for the full life cycle analysis, transportation accounts for 43% of GHG emissions. The United States’ transportation emissions percentage contrasts sharply with other nations’ at more than quadruple those of China and India and nearly double those of Germany. The MTA provides an enormous reduction by providing two thirds of daily commutes at only 3% of the city’s energy consumption. As a basis of comparison, the five boroughs of New York City use about half the total energy per capita as used by Germany, which is two and a half times less than New York State as a whole and five and a half times less than the whole of Texas.

An energy analysis of two office buildings, one in New York City and the other in Albany, yield nearly identical figures with one notable exception: the transportation energy consumption for the suburban building in Albany is five times that of the urban building in New York. Transportation emissions are about equivalent to a building’s operational emissions in an urban environment on a per person basis, but greatly exceed the building’s operational emissions in a suburban environment. This phenomenon represents a major component of the climate change discussion that is being overlooked.

Efficiency and “decarbonization” are popular, but ineffective, new ideas to combat climate change. People will simply drive more, and therefore emit more GHGs, if cars are more efficient and require less gas. It is called the rebound effect, and has been proven across many sectors. The carbon can’t be taken out of a car, but rather the car must be taken out of carbon.

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Human health conditions are also linked to transportation use. Vehicle miles traveled in the United States have increased dramatically over the past two decades, as has the incidence of obesity. National rates of alternative (not using cars) transportation are inversely correlated with national obesity rates.

As an exercise in profitability, the MTA decided to monetize its net carbon emissions. The MTA emitted approximately 2.1 billion tons of carbon in 2011, but saved nearly 17 billion tons of carbon from being emitted. Valuing carbon at $30/ton from international energy markets, the MTA actually earns $500 million from emissions savings, which is not currently recognized or compensated. Recognition and compensation for environmental benefits would encourage and enable transportation initiatives not only in New York, but across the nation and the world.

Public transit successes are not limited to New York – the success is derived from a universal set of principles that can work anywhere. The common erroneous assumption is that density begets transit, but looking back at the recent history of urban development, transit begets density. New York grew densely because of its investment in transit, whereas other cities with failed transportation policies, such as Cincinnati, grew in a sprawling manner reliant on cars.

In summary, as societies develop, their energy needs rise. Transportation emerges as a major consumer of energy, with a wasteful and unsustainable reliance on automobile and accompanying urban sprawl wasting the positive benefits of “green” technologies and practices. Sustainable urban growth must rely on mass transit and urban density, and the right carbon-constraining system may enable this transition.

Health: Theo Spencer, Senior Advocate, NRDC

2011 was a year of extremes, suffering from 14 “billion dollar” events that included extremes in heat, drought, floods, snow, and wind. This will not be a fluke, but is part of a trend: the decade between 2000 and 2010 was the warmest ten-year period on record, and the hottest individual years in more than a century were 2005 and 2010.

Climate impacts largely focus on agriculture, transportation, etc., but do not focus enough on health. Climatic changes are likely to adversely affect:

 Allergies (covered in depth by Lewis Ziska)  Infectious Diseases o Dengue fever has been spreading throughout the Southeast as temperatures rise, and reports of the illness are beginning to creep into the Northeast  Heat Stress o Deaths have ranged from hundreds to tens of thousands during heat waves in the past decade o A million people were left without electricity, while tens of thousands of cattle and more than half a million chickens died during the 2006 California heat wave o Deaths from summer heat could double by 2050  Air Pollution & Asthma

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o Air alert days, instances when the air quality is so poor that going outdoors is inadvisable, are increasing o California and Texas have recently exceeded 200 air-alert days per year o Ground ozone levels rise as temperature rises, so ozone standard exceedance days will increase, particularly in the southern Northeast and Mid-Atlantic  Waterborne Diseases o Two thirds of all U.S. waterborne disease outbreaks followed extreme precipitation events . The largest increase in extreme precipitation events in the past 50 years has occurred in the Northeast, with incidences of more than 3 inches of rainfall exceeding a 50% increase in that time o Excess storm water can result in sewage backup and contaminated drinking water – this happened in Chicago in the 1990s, leading to several deaths

Though concerns over our built environment harbor the lion’s share of attention, health costs are seldom considered. These costs will be real, quantifiable costs. Using current costs and incorporating projected increases in extreme weather events, the NRDC can estimate the health costs of climate change. For example, just six severe weather events in the past decade resulted in $14 billion in health- related costs. Projecting forward, these costs will spiral upwards.

There are two strategies for climate solutions: Mitigation and Preparedness (Adaptation). The EPA has undertaken mitigation actions, since Congress won’t, by proposing and beginning to set emissions standards for new power plants under the Clean Air Act. The comment period for this rule elicited nearly triple the number of comments ever submitted about a proposed EPA rule; the main motivator for the outburst of comments was public health.

Health messaging is an effective communication strategy. Given a choice, would people prefer to protect polluters, or their children and parents? When confronted, would a Congressman support asthma in children or the industry that created the asthma? Framing the climate change debate around public health can out-duel the standard opposition refrain that environmental measures kill jobs.

Q&A:

Lois New, to the panel, on what they perceive as their “Aha!” moments on what climate change means, economically, to health, and globally:

Cynthia Rosenzweig had worked extensively on climate change and agriculture, but the Columbia Earth Institute took her to breakfast and invited her to lead the Metro East Assessment. She realized that responding to climate change meant responding in one’s own region and took the new opportunity. Climate change response begins at home.

A colleague of Theo Spencer’s spoke to the police commissioner of Chicago about the projected increase in heat waves. The commissioner replied that on any day in excess of 90˚F, he takes an all-hands-on-

14 deck approach due to the exponential rise in crime and other emergencies on those days. Climate change will tangibly impact sectors that we haven’t even considered.

Projjal Dutta expresses his apprehension over the expanse of time that has seen complete inaction as Rio+20 draws to a close. One fifth of a century is long enough to conclude that what we are doing is not working. Focusing on the supply side of energy has been unproductive and has not achieved the balance necessary for a sustainable solution. We should embrace the demand side of energy and aim to create sustainable human habitats. As humans, we are hard-wired for frugality, but we have lost our way since the Second World War, and we must return to reduced demand and smart, sensible standards.

Audience, to the panel, on where funding comes from to support social vulnerability impacts from climate change, and if current funding streams are just, when so much of climate change relates to urban environments:

Cynthia points to the ClimAid report from NYSERDA, which accounted for social vulnerability as a theme. Social vulnerability should be included in every aspect of climate projection. New York City is undertaking a neighborhood approach to rolling out its climate plan, which reflects the necessity of a bottom-up approach by cities.

Theo Spencer recalls that recent legislation to limit emissions at a federal level failed in spite of the large amounts of money spent to lobby for it. With the environmental community searching for new outlets to promote, funders are beginning to realize that cities are heavy emitters, suffer heavily from those emissions, and can experience enormous climatic impacts. Consequently, funding streams are beginning to shift towards cities and social vulnerability projects, correcting for previous funding oversights to urban areas.

Projjal Dutta perceives funding streams as inconstant – money doesn’t come from anywhere, it has to come from within. He borrows a concept from The Emperor of All Maladies, a book on surviving cancer that claims that any movement must have three Ms: a message, a messiah, and a miracle. The autobahn network, Eisenhower, and the gas tax were the three respective Ms of the movement towards automobile dependence. The infrastructure for driving was created from within by taxing driving; in order to alter the cycle, those vectors must be reversed. Emitters paying to clean up their waste would provide the miracle for the GHG mitigation movement, which would lead to the message of sustainable and clean, livable communities.

Dick Ottinger, to Theo Spencer, on more effective messaging on the public health concerns over climate change in the vein of conservative dramatization over health care:

A Republican pollster wrote a memo to George W. Bush in 2000 admitting defeat over scientific accuracy on climate change, instead recommending a path of sowing confusion and uncertainty among the public. The success of this tactic has made funding difficult and helped sink federal climate legislation. However, recent EPA regulations have enabled NRDC and other environmental groups to focus on public health themes, such as advertisements against Scott Brown’s Massachusetts campaign

15 to strip environmental regulations. Polling shows that the advertisements were successful and that the messaging works. The environmental movement has to borrow from the opposition’s successful hardball tactics, but it has shown a willingness to do so, and funders are ready to finance such campaigns.

Lois New, to the panel, asking for sound bites that advocate changing policy direction in favor of climate change mitigation and adaptation:

 Cynthia, affirming her optimistic perspective: “Cities are leading the way in climate change.”  Theo: “Polluting should not be free, and polluters should pay for protecting our health, our environment, and our built environments.”  Projjal, rebutting Margaret Thatcher’s assertion that people over 30 on a bus are failures: “Ride the bus, save the world.”

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Gavin Schmidt, Leading Climate Scientist, NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies

As a convener of diverse climate change scientists, it is important to ensure that everybody is on the same page and that conversations are substantive, rather than arguing over terminology or misunderstandings. As a result of bringing scientists together, a new career was born of speaking and communicating the science to everybody. What follows are the lessons learned that Mr. Schmidt would like to share.

The public discourse on climate change lacks clear communication. Why is that? Climate change has become a politicized science. Politicized science occurs when a scientific result appears to impact political, ethical, or moral interests. Most people’s understanding of science is quite naïve, so scientific results can become politicized quite easily. Once politicization has occurred, new results are only perceived through the lens of politics, ethics, or morality. This response is universal, though only in the United States has climate change become politicized. Politicized science can lead to “scientized” politics, in which advocates with a tenuous grasp on the scientific principles appear to debate the science as a proxy for advancing their underlying political, ethical, or moral positions. This phenomenon has nothing to do with real scientific debate, but rather relies on “science-iness.”

The murky mixture of science and politics can result in positive outcomes for individuals, such as publications or media coverage, but generally creates negative results for society. Facts are distorted, scientists get pulled into the ugly world of politics, and inaccuracy and sensationalism result. Consequently, public understanding of the true science diminishes and trust in that science erodes. This false debate over the science hinders serious discussion over the science AND the underlying politics.

Facts aren’t enough to present a cogent point on climate change. The basic school principle of the Five W’s still applies:

 Who are you talking to? Scientists, policy makers, or industry, for example?  What are you trying to communicate? What do you want people to know?  How will you communicate effectively? What tools and methods are best?  When will particular climatic effects be realized? What is the timeframe?  Why are you talking about this? What are you trying to accomplish?

Convening a meeting of scientists revolves around how climate science works, but practice is separate from deciding what to do about climate change. These two issues should be independent, but science should inform the actions, and not the reverse.

Conducting climate science can be a great, romantic story. Photos with people measuring the field data, juxtaposed with obvious climate change impacts, can be a great way to demonstrate how science is conducted and what the results will mean to the earth. By contrast, most people don’t understand how to really look at graphs or understand the truths behind them. Professionals who are accustomed to dealing with graphs don’t always appreciate that the public needs help with interpretation. Photos demonstrating change, such as glacial retreat, are more effective means of communication.

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Real, tangible climate impacts connect with audiences. The Colorado River has experienced a greater demand from human consumption while simultaneously getting less water fed into it. Consequently, the river and Lake Powell are drying up, and this trend is likely to get worse. Erosion in Antarctic buildings and the ravages of pine beetles provide similarly relatable examples. Charismatic megafauna capture our imagination and our attention, but smaller and less photogenic species will have a greater climate change impact. Pine bark beetles breed more quickly in warmer winters, and have already extended throughout the Midwest, devastating forests as they spread. Current wildfires in Colorado are the result of beetles, not drought.

Explaining science can be difficult for a number of reasons. Media have created the expectation that science and scientists have all the answers; many people don’t understand that provisional nature of scientific theories. The smallest disagreement among scientists can be interpreted as a lack of scientific certainty. This phenomenon can be seen in colloquial demands for proof of a theory, as opposed to learning the scientific meaning of “proof.” The demand for proof can come forth as a facet of politicized science. Similarly, the concepts of models and theories are commonly misunderstood.

Basic misunderstanding of science, particularly when placed in a political context, can create terrible media and public understanding of a subject. A paper on whether methane production from trees should be counted towards carbon credits was interpreted by major media outlets as identifying trees as major GHG emitters and causes of climate change. A report predicting sea level rise by 2100 elicited bombastic headlines about underwater cities and Antarctica crumbling into the sea, which was not supported by the original report. Separating a report and public misconceptions can be one of the biggest challenges for a scientist.

In order to get the results we want, we must ask the right questions. For example, looking at average winter snowfall and occurrences of heavy winter snowfall events and where they will take place will elicit different responses. Water managers and infrastructure providers will look at the second map with much more scrutiny than the first.

Projecting uncertainty comes in three main forms and differs in importance over time:

1. Scenario Uncertainty (technology, economy, etc.) grows over time 2. Initial Condition Uncertainty (weather patterns) is large initially, but quickly diminishes, though the effect is heightened in local projections 3. Model Uncertainty (varying assumptions within a model) is enormous initially, but the effect is reduced over time when compared with Scenario Uncertainty

In summary, these pointers will benefit us in our attempt to say something useful about climate change:

 Use projections to assess possible vulnerabilities. Include uncertainty in projections, absolute predictions are not possible.  Global mean temperature changes are useful indicators and benchmarks, such as predicting impacts associated with a particular temperature rise.

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 A full complement of models will provide the best guide. A single model that can explain everything associated with climate change simply will not exist.  Use fine-grained local knowledge to heighten the specificity of models. Global modelers have no sense of local influences and impacts, so local contributions can make a big difference.  We must not neglect the complex and myriad ways that humans are changing the world and understand how climate change interacts with all these other uncertainties.

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Financial Implications of Climate Change: Mark Way, Senior Vice President, Head of Sustainability America, Swiss Re

Kevin Murray, New York State Deputy Comptroller, introducing his work and Swiss Re:

Swiss Re talks the talk and walks the walk when it comes to unifying economic development and social and environmental needs, earning recognition as 2011’s sustainability leader in the insurance industry. New York State pensions and Swiss Re understand that a stable economy requires a stable relationship with ecological systems; risks like climate change pose real threats to economic development over long periods of time. The New York State Comptroller has instituted a strategy of requesting investment partners to take steps to mitigate their climatic risks and has invested in companies that work towards lowering carbon use and intensity.

We ask polluting firms to reduce their contribution to climate change risks, and for governments around the world to formulate policies to mitigate the contributions towards climate change. This effort will require the creative engagement of all citizens, scientists, and policy makers. Swiss Re has worked towards creating a safe environment and a stable investment climate, and Mark Way represents the potential individuals have to make a difference, having coordinated sustainability and climate change mitigation efforts throughout the world.

Mark Way:

Re-insurance is insurance for insurers – it helps protect against volatility, and more specifically insurance against colossal payouts for catastrophic events. Swiss Re operates around the world and has a stake in global economic development, though the largest segment of its revenue comes from the United States.

The scale of natural disasters is much larger than most people realize, particularly in relation to other events. Weather-related insurance damages exceed non-climatic natural disasters such as earthquakes by at least an order of magnitude, and the economic disaster wrought by the World Trade Center attacks created less of an insurance loss than several single hurricanes in the past two decades. It is important to note that insurance losses only represent a fraction of total economic losses, which is particularly true for years of high hurricane and climatic damages. The trend of weather related impacts is clearly increasing, as is the deficit between insured losses and total economic losses. Developing nations suffer the hardest from uninsured losses.

Over the past forty years, 80% of the forty most costly insurance loss events were weather-related events. Hurricanes tend to draw the most attention, but tornado events often cause greater damage; the Joplin tornado insured losses were 40% greater than Hurricane Irene insured losses. Floods also cause catastrophic damages, in the United States and throughout the world.

From the re-insurance perspective, the Northeast presents risks and exposures, particularly with high, tightly concentrated populations and property values. Insurance risks are likely to grow in the region due to rising population density and property values irrespective of climate change impacts. The same storms that hit half a century ago would create much higher losses due to property and population

20 factors. The combination of these factors and the probability that climate change will deliver stronger weather impacts creates elevated regional uncertainty and risk. Four of the six states with the highest coastal property values are located within New England.

The 1938 Long Island Express Hurricane, which devastated southeastern New England, resulted in losses of $308 million – the same storm today would expose more than $3 trillion in property values. Going beyond values, how would several million people be evacuated in advance of the storm? How long would it take to rebuild such a densely populated area? Would people return? What would happen to New England? These questions plagued New Orleans before Katrina and linger to this day, and we must think critically about similar circumstances in order to be prepared.

Resilience can help allay the dangers of risk. Hurricane Irene exposed the Northeast’s vulnerability, which is demonstrative given that the storm winds were not particularly strong. Nevertheless, power outages were rampant across New England, with life in Connecticut coming to a standstill as vast swaths of the states lost power for more than a week. The area must be able to respond better to extreme weather conditions to reduce the risk of catastrophic financial losses.

The most effective way to manage climate risks is to combine risk prevention and risk reduction. What can the insurance industry do to help mitigate climate change and reduce climate risks?

 Assess, quantify, and price : o The insurance industry is perhaps better qualified than any other to put a price on concepts that are difficult to quantify. A pricing mechanism would encourage improved risk management through aversion to high insurance premiums.  Engage in relevant research and advise decision-makers about managing climate risks, including responding to the following questions: o How can we adapt to climate change in a cost efficient manner? o How can we deal with climate change uncertainties and imperfect knowledge? o How should we prioritize the numerous adaptation options, particularly in the current budget constrained world? . Adaptation necessitates a local perspective. Narrowing down to specific regions in projecting scenarios helps determine the areas of risk, how best to prevent losses, how to adapt to climate change, and how to do all of these things efficiently. Portfolios of adaptation measures provide the greatest benefits to local and regional areas. . Cost benefit analyses show what can be e accomplished inexpensively relative to the projected impact of risk reduction, giving a guide to the most efficient projects. Many projects’ benefits in risk reduction outweigh the implementation costs, resulting in a net benefit to society.  Transfer risk to the insurance and capital markets: o Risk transfer, which in this case is another word for insurance, is simply a way to protect against extreme weather events. Risk transfer won’t stop an extreme weather event from happening, but it can alleviate the losses caused by the event.

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Economically attractive adaptation measures can avert loss. Swiss Re estimates that Florida can prevent between 40% and 68% of its total losses by undertaking adaptation projects that result in net benefits. Other localities produce even higher results, with China and the United Kingdom able to prevent a greater percentage of losses at economically and socially enviable costs. Many of these locations could avert nearly all losses, but the profound social and economic costs of some projects warrant them unlikely. However, nearly all cases showed a varying residual loss that could not be averted with adaptation measures – only mitigation efforts will prevent these losses.

Q & A:

 How do pricing mechanisms affect industrial development in the Arctic? o Most companies self-insure, so the impact is not very great. However, the principle of pricing risk still applies. The insurance industry in the United States is heavily regulated, so the risk-appropriate price is not always applied.  Today’s presentations have centered heavily on scientists’ need to communicate better with the public. Given the insurance industry’s knowledge and involvement with climate studies, wouldn’t Swiss Re be a strong and effective voice in communicating climate science and strategy? o Yes, and Swiss Re does exactly that, having produced many publications, including a report on the economic justification for a cap and trade system. Swiss Re is an involved advocate for intelligent mitigation and adaptation measures and participates in international environmental negotiations, such as the COPs2. Whereas the insurance industry in the United States is constrained by the politicized science of climate change, Swiss Re can and does speak out openly and often about climatic risks.  When were the studies for moderate scenarios used in your projections conducted, and have you incorporated scenarios with more severe impacts? o The scenarios were conducted in 2008 and 2010, and all scenarios had low and high projections. Swiss Re chose the moderate projections in the interest of neutrality and balance.  Can Swiss Re’s history of involved data analysis enable the company to observe changes in weather patterns and determine if altered weather patterns contribute more to economic losses than other factors? o Individual weather events cannot be attributed to climate change, so gauging the impacts of climate change on individual losses is difficult. Picking out the individual weather signal is not possible, though some competitors may claim that they can. Losses due to weather can be assumed and are incorporated into models, but Swiss Re can’t say specifically that climate change contributed to specific damages.  Along the same lines, Swiss Re has done some terrific work in Tanzania, but very little is said about the project. Please share more on that project with the audience, and please share more of your great work with the world.

2 The Conference of the Parties is an annual meeting of the parties that have signed on to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change.

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o The specific project involves offering Tanzanian farmers the option of working additional hours to build sustainable infrastructure in exchange for an insurance policy. The sustainable infrastructure, such as water reserves, serves as an insurance policy against unfavorable weather events such as drought. Additionally, Swiss Re insures the worth of the farmers’ crops against poor harvests to pay for their labor. The project has attracted interest from potential partners including the World Food Bank and OxFam.  Is there a point, because regulation prevents American insurance agencies from charging the true prices for risk, that a re-insurer would not insure such agencies? o That has happened in some instances, as evidenced by state-run schemes in many states. Many insurance companies have pooled their collective risks together, but that does not solve the political issue of artificially low rates. States and federal government don’t have enough capital reserves to respond to insurance needs, so the responsibility should slowly be turned over to the private sector to correct for the market inefficiency and the potential governmental financial shortfall. State schemes place the burden on individual tax payers, which is not equitable.

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Looking Ahead: A Vision for a Climate Stable Future: Jigar Shah, Founder of SunEdison, First CEO of the Carbon War Room

Fred Zalcman, Managing Director of Regulatory Affairs, SunEdison, introducing Jigar Shah:

Having known one another for a long time, Mr. Zalcman can attest to Mr. Shah’s insatiable appetite for progress. While Mr. Shah’s colleagues were comfortable with a double-digit PV (photovoltaic) growth rate, Mr. Shah saw that the traditional business model did not fit the customer’s perspective. Taking this into account, he adopted a new perspective based on the idea that solar power should be viewed as an easily acquired service rather than a complex piece of equipment. In 2003, Jigar Shah founded SunEdison, which has now become the world’s leading solar energy service provider. SunEdison, under Mr. Shah’s guidance, pioneered the Power Purchase Agreement Model, which has become the industry standard.

Not content to rest comfortably with his success, Mr. Shah left SunEdison in 2009 to serve as the first CEO of the Carbon War Room, founded by entrepreneur Richard Branson to help save the world from climate change. Mr. Shah helped transform the Carbon War Room into an organization of global importance, and has moved on to become CEO of Jigar Shah Consulting. In this role, he confers with thought leaders and policy makers to disseminate climate solutions.

Jigar Shah:

Today’s presentations have framed climate change impacts in frightening and daunting terms, but that perspective is only part of the story. There will undoubtedly be extreme amounts of suffering in the world to come, just as women suffered before the 1970s and Apartheid created suffering for the majority of South Africans. An extraordinary number of people will see their ways of lives displaced.

We all appear to suffer from a disconnect between what climate change models predict and what we all can do about it. When society decided to modernize in the 1950s, electric generators and water systems were installed throughout the nation and infrastructure was rapidly developed. Therefore, we all have a notion that policy in this country is a way in which governments can mandate and finance outcomes. Corporations push this model and request government funding for socialized outcomes, such as nuclear plants or water desalinization facilities that serve communities. The challenge with the current model is that the vast majority of capital resides within the private sector, which wasn’t true when the current model was developed following the Second World War. Governments hold less than 18% of the world’s capital, while the rest is held by businesses, banks, and individuals.

The question remains, what is it that you, the public concerned with climate change, want to do?

 Are there discrete projects or sectors, such as improving agriculture, solving urban markets, or securing energy independence, that the country should prioritize? Should we pursue the current model of government policy mandating outcomes? Many people would say that this strategy failed in 2010 with the death of the already weak climate bills.

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 Has the divide between political parties rendered us incapable of achieving our goals? For perspective, consider Europe’s probability of achieving a 90% emissions reduction by 2050. Government mandated outcomes just may not work – look no further than Europe’s price signal of $4 per ton carbon during this recession. How will that price mandate cleaner fuels?  How about a European carbon reserve, with a fictitious Alan Greenspan issuing reports on carbon futures and setting credit limits? Do you think that Europe will achieve this goal when it can’t stabilize the Euro?

Efforts to price carbon have failed, and Europe’s legacy shows that it might not have worked anyway. We are now left with a world where we are asking growing economies to mitigate their emissions, even as India fights to expand its energy supply because half of its population has no electricity.

The investments made during the 1970s have created the technologies that will enable us to achieve our climate goals. We know which alternative fuels work in cars and how to get cars to travel sixty miles per gallon. We actually produce and can use electric and hybrid vehicles right now. Germany can currently produce up to half of its energy from solar power alone. Would the U.S. grid handle that high of a renewable input? The fact that we don’t know represents the challenge that we face. Several analyses, such as the famous McKinsey cost curves, demonstrate that we can achieve the reductions that we want by 2020, but nobody seems to know how to actually get there. If we, the climate concerned, don’t know how to achieve those reductions, what are we trying to accomplish? What are we asking for from industry and government?

There are a tremendous number of current technologies that can help reduce emissions. Many of us don’t know what those technologies actually are, but even if we did, how would we integrate them into policy? Would incorporating new technologies subvert the food shortages caused by oil price increases? Would pricing carbon eliminate structural failures within markets and policies? The holy grail of carbon pricing has led to dedication to a failed policy and intellectual laziness.

Climate change is a difficult experiment because human beings are anecdotal – we won’t respond to climate impacts until we are confronted with unavoidable, unmistakable evidence. This has led to an errant emphasis on less impactful measures, such as prioritizing electric vehicles over heavy duty trucks. Regulating heavy trucks and reducing their emissions would be simple, easy, and efficient, but this solution does not capture our imaginations, so nobody pushes for it. The same disconnect occurs with agriculture, forests, and other sectors.

The challenge is to figure out how to get people to work together. We know, for instance, that dual fuel engines reduce fuel consumption and diesel prices, but the technology is not mandate for trucks. We have technologies to achieve our goals, but we haven’t changed our policies around them. Here is a process that can help us actually achieve our goals:

1. Approach policies by sector, because we understand climate change and energy policy by sector. 2. We get ferocious. SunEdison earned its success because the company stood up for itself. Even though utilities are consistently rated as the most hated companies, nobody challenges them

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because people don’t like being confrontational. SunEdison challenged the utilities and succeeded. Even though investment companies with climate goals invest in risky natural gas and oil exploration ventures, nobody gets upset. 3. In order to create change, people must show up and be heard, not merely click on a website link in support of a cause. We must practice forms of civil disobedience to move forward. We have to show outward support for our views.

To fight the current economic malaise, we have to fight the two causes of the economic malaise, being 1) climate change, and 2) severe natural resource constraints. The proposed solutions will provide the largest economic opportunity of a generation. We are aligned with politicians to create jobs and opportunities to fight these causes, but the current climate scare tactics and unconvincing adaptation measures aren’t inspirational messages that will stir people to action. We have the numbers to turn the tide against climate change, but the people on our side think that intellectual banter can solve the problem. Discussion will not be enough.

Q & A:

 How do we change minds on a more personal level when environmentalists don’t practice what they preach, such as driving short distances instead of walking or taking public transit? o We have to stop thinking that little things actually matter. 49% of all fresh water is used by the coal and natural gas industry, and 42% is used by agriculture – shutting off the tap when you brush your teeth is irrelevant. It would take one hundred million Prius’ to reduce one gigaton of carbon emitted. The point is that available consumer choices should all be more efficient, you can use them however you choose. Approximately 84 corporations are responsible for 90% of the world’s emissions, and those corporations aren’t seated in the auditorium concerned about emissions reductions.  Are we too negative in discussing climate change? How do we discuss the earth’s future with children who have done nothing to create the dismal forecasts? o Students who graduate with environmental expertise have better placement ratings and professional prospects. Climate change presents a challenge and inspires kids to prevent negative impacts. Mitigating climate change is an opportunity for future generations to explore their passions and make a difference. Even people who don’t work in climate change are interested in the solutions.  How do we who understand climate change science counteract well-funded corporate campaigns to spread misinformation about climate change? o We can’t fight the propaganda because we are weak. BP has succeeded because it fought to rise to the top in a hard business. Opponents have been too lazy to stop corporate aims. Nobody is fighting large oil companies, or even large factory farmers, at permitting hearings or other public venues. We don’t need the general public; we just need a passionate 10%. According to Yale, we have 19% of the population on our side.

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 Corporate interests fund the Marshall Institute, the Cato Institute, and other organizations that lend their perspectives legitimacy and work against the climate community. We need similar organizations to be present at the public hearings. o Franz Litz, Executive Director at the Pace Energy & Climate Center, helpfully informs the audience that Pace accepts donations. o Donations to organizations are important, but ultimately financial clout is not the determining factor in this battle. We have resources, but we simply can’t marshal them effectively. Everybody loves complaining, and the feeling appears to be that the other side will be persuaded by a simply stated argument. This simply isn’t true, and we have to win every battle by effectively organizing and focusing our efforts at the local level. We don’t have to match the opposition dollar for dollar, and frankly we can’t, but we can still win these battles.  Dick Ottinger, Dean Emeritus at the Pace School of Law, suggests that Mr. Shah run for president: o Mr. Shah recuses himself of the task because he was born in India, and in his opinion he wouldn’t be the right material.

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