How Does Black Carbon Change the Climate Debate? [ PDF ]

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A Message from the President

John C. Topping Jr., President and CEO, Climate Institute

The past three years have seen a cascade of findings suggesting that climate change may be happening far faster than any of us had anticipated, and that it may be feeding on itself much as a cancer devastates a previously healthy body. However, thanks to recent enterprising work by climate scientists, perceptive analysts, and leaders of small island states, humanity may have an opportunity to prevent catastrophic climate change.

In March 2008, Ramanathan and Carmichael published an article indicating that black carbon, a key component of soot from incomplete combustion of fossil fuels and biomass, plays a very powerful role in the radiative forcing driving the climate change that we are now experiencing. Refining the calculations used by the IPCC in its Fourth Assessment Report published in early 2007, they estimated that the warming caused by atmospheric black carbon between 2000-2003 was equivalent to 55% of the warming caused by atmospheric CO2 over the same period. Even 55% may underestimate black carbon’s total effect, as it does not allow for the changed albedo from deposition of black carbon on Himalayan, Andean and other glaciers and on snow and ice across the planet.

In June 2008, Dr. Michael MacCracken, the Climate Institute’s Chief Scientist for Climate Change Programs, wrote a landmark paper proposing North-South reciprocal climate action. Under this plan, richer countries would move on all fronts toward climate stabilization while industrializing countries would focus on reducing emissions of black carbon and short-lived greenhouse gases such as methane, as well as implementing win-win CO2 control measures such as ending deforestation and increasing energy efficiency. Working with Frances Moore, Dr. MacCracken has proposed a Lifetime Leveraging Framework that would enhance incentives to achieve near- and medium-term reductions. These would include establishing a value for black carbon in emissions trading and related credit systems and moving toward a shorter time period, perhaps 20 years rather than 100, to calculate Global Warming Potential (GWP).

Already, much greater attention is being paid to the need for accelerated reductions of black carbon. The Pacific island nation of Micronesia, working closely with the Institute for Governance and Sustainable Development, has managed to include discussions of black carbon reductions in the ongoing climate negotiations. The United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) has launched a concerted effort to assess how black carbon reductions might play a role in climate stabilization. The United Nations Foundation, already committed to a clean cookstove initiative to save lives, now sees this effort as having added value in reducing the radiative forcing that is driving much of the current warming, melting polar ice, and threatening island states and coastal regions alike.

There is a huge win-win potential if we can get this right. About 26% of black carbon comes from the residential sector - essentially from incomplete combustion in cookstoves that burn fossil fuel and biomass. The health and climate benefits of transforming the world’s stove culture are enormous. Over 1.9 million people worldwide, roughly 85% women and children, die annually from indoor air pollution from stoves. Technologies already exist that can make a difference at manageable costs even if applied to the roughly 780 million traditional cookstoves across the planet: about $100 will buy a solar oven that achieves 100% black carbon reductions, and $25 buys a more efficient burner of biomass or fossil fuel that can achieve 80% reductions. Besides saving millions of lives over the next decade and freeing women from much of the drudgery in biomass gathering, the potential climate benefits are startling. Eliminating all black carbon emissions from cookstoves over 20 years would be roughly equivalent to changing every car and light truck on Earth to a zero carbon dioxide emitter. About 19% of black carbon emissions globally are attributable to the transportation sector (from inefficient two stroke engines, diesel particulates, etc.) and about 8% to the industrial sector. Together with residential sector emissions, these are a major factor in the outdoor air pollution that claims about 800,000 lives each year.

An innovative strategy to slash black carbon may have many elements:
• Establish a value for black carbon in greenhouse trading systems;
• Build black carbon into a life cycle analysis of greenhouse drivers being developed for an ISO that may shape investment patterns;
• Move GWPs to a shorter time frame to encourage more near-term reductions in radiative forcing;
• Foster experimentation with strategies that combine climate and air quality protection (already several states in Central Mexico that hope to have a regional emissions agreement in place before COP 16 seek to include black carbon);
• Highlight benefits of black carbon reductions in reducing particulate deposition in regions such as the Himalayas and thus slowing glacial melt that affects future water supplies;
• Develop a cookstove transformation that engages the ingenuity of grassroots NGOs, entrepreneurs and communications media; and
• Remove barriers to recycling of industrial waste heat for electricity.

It is short-sighted to view black carbon as a problem only for developing countries. In the US, per capita emissions are slightly above the global average. Reductions are underway in the transportation sector due to tougher diesel particulate standards and fleet turnover. Still, archaic anti-competitive rules inhibit energy recycling. Not only do these rules squander low cost reductions of carbon dioxide, they also forego large potential additional reductions in black carbon emissions. A concerted effort in countries North and South alike would not only save many lives but also give hope to the people of the Maldives and Micronesia that they may have a future in the 22nd century.

Autumn 2009 Climate Alert

How Does Black Carbon Change the Climate Debate? [ PDF ]

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