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Sigmetnow

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Re: UN Climate Agreement - Paris 2015 and beyond
« Reply #350 on: December 01, 2015, 07:18:05 PM »
France to Invest 2 Billion Euros in Africa Renewables
President Hollande Announces Commitment at COP21
Quote
France will invest a total of 2 billion euros in renewable energy in Africa in 2016-20, a 50% increase in comparison with the last five years.
http://newsroom.unfccc.int/financial-flows/france-to-invest-2-billion-euros-in-renewables-in-africa/
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Sigmetnow

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Re: UN Climate Agreement - Paris 2015 and beyond
« Reply #351 on: December 01, 2015, 08:07:00 PM »
Obama offers vulnerable nations $30m for climate risk insurance
Quote
After a clear rebuff from developed countries, island states have dropped demands for compensation. But they are insisting on a separate section in the Paris deal on support to cope with their losses.
...
Insurance is a middle ground. Obama’s $30m forms part of a G7 initiative to extend insurance cover to 400 million people on the frontlines of changing weather patterns.
http://www.climatechangenews.com/2015/12/01/obama-offers-vulnerable-nations-30m-for-climate-risk-insurance/
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Csnavywx

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Re: UN Climate Agreement - Paris 2015 and beyond
« Reply #352 on: December 01, 2015, 08:26:11 PM »
http://endcoal.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/11/Proposed-Coal-Plants-by-Country-Annual-CO2.pdf

If you take out Announced and substitute Construction in for the "Announced+Pre-Permit+Permit" number, there's about 3.9 Gt/a CO2 emissions just baked into coal plant construction over the next few years. Is there a reliable source showing retirements to compare?

AbruptSLR

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Re: UN Climate Agreement - Paris 2015 and beyond
« Reply #353 on: December 01, 2015, 11:43:23 PM »
India plans to rapidly increase its coal consumption over the coming decades unless the West finances faster renewable energy development:

http://time.com/4131236/india-coal-climate-change-paris-summit/


Extract: "India’s aim is to produce 1.5 billion metric tons of the fossil fuel by 2020, up about 600 million tons in 2012. (It currently consumes some 800 million metric tons a year.)
To make this happen, India will need to open the equivalent of a new coal mine every month until the end of this decade. That thirst for coal—the single biggest source of man-made carbon emissions—has made India a country to watch in Paris, where officials from around the world are meeting to try and hammer out a deal to slow rising global temperatures."
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AbruptSLR

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Re: UN Climate Agreement - Paris 2015 and beyond
« Reply #354 on: December 02, 2015, 04:21:07 PM »
I happen to like Rolling Stone articles on climate change, & the linked article makes several good points including that there is no question that CoP21 will achieve something (as it already has achieved something), but whether mankind is responding fast enough to the climate change challenge.

http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/news/john-kerry-on-climate-change-the-fight-of-our-time-20151201

Extract: "The challenge is not whether we'll respond. The question is whether we'll respond fast enough."
“It is not the strongest or the most intelligent who will survive but those who can best manage change.”
― Leon C. Megginson

Sigmetnow

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Re: UN Climate Agreement - Paris 2015 and beyond
« Reply #355 on: December 02, 2015, 05:22:53 PM »
Watch Tesla CEO Elon Musk live From Université Paris [12pm ET – 18h local – 17h UTC]
Quote
While Paris is hosting the COP21 climate change talk, Tesla CEO Elon Musk is at Université Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne to talk about his vision of what we can do to help the world transition to a sustainable future.
http://electrek.co/2015/12/02/watch-tesla-ceo-elon-musk-live-from-universite-paris-12pm-et-18h-local-17h-utc/
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Sigmetnow

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Re: UN Climate Agreement - Paris 2015 and beyond
« Reply #356 on: December 02, 2015, 05:24:15 PM »
I happen to like Rolling Stone articles on climate change....

I do, too.  Thanks for the link!
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Sigmetnow

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Re: UN Climate Agreement - Paris 2015 and beyond
« Reply #357 on: December 02, 2015, 05:51:40 PM »
http://endcoal.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/11/Proposed-Coal-Plants-by-Country-Annual-CO2.pdf

If you take out Announced and substitute Construction in for the "Announced+Pre-Permit+Permit" number, there's about 3.9 Gt/a CO2 emissions just baked into coal plant construction over the next few years. Is there a reliable source showing retirements to compare?

I would like to say "Look at the 'Shelved' and 'Cancelled 2010-2015' columns" for a clue to this -- but, as we've found with renewables, we are at a point where you really can't use the recent past to judge the future.   ;)

Countries may want lots more coal plants, but the pressures against them are high, and rising:

Citi:
http://www.businessinsider.com/citi-peak-coal-in-china-is-coming-2013-9

Goldman Sachs:
http://d35brb9zkkbdsd.cloudfront.net/wp-content/uploads/2013/08/GS_Rocks__Ores_-_Thermal_Coal_July_2013.pdf

Edit: I still like your question: how many coal plants have been/will be retired, globally, soon?  Wish I could find some numbers!
« Last Edit: December 02, 2015, 07:18:29 PM by Sigmetnow »
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AbruptSLR

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Re: UN Climate Agreement - Paris 2015 and beyond
« Reply #358 on: December 02, 2015, 11:53:09 PM »
The linked article discusses some of the challenges associated with trying to curb deforestation:


Jeff Tollefson (2015), "Forests in spotlight at Paris climate talks: Uptick in deforestation in Brazil hints at difficulty of preserving and expanding forests", Nature, doi:10.1038/nature.2015.18934

http://www.nature.com/news/forests-in-spotlight-at-paris-climate-talks-1.18934

Extract: "Brazil has long been a source of hope in the fight against climate change. Since 2004, the country has curbed deforestation in the Amazon by roughly 79%.

But now, as nations gather in Paris to negotiate a new global climate treaty, there are signs that this progress may have stalled — another reminder of just how hard it will be to curb humanity's impact on the planet. On 27 November, the Brazilian government announced that landowners cleared 5,831 square kilometres of forest in 2015, an increase of 16% over the previous year."
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Sigmetnow

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Re: UN Climate Agreement - Paris 2015 and beyond
« Reply #359 on: December 03, 2015, 03:06:48 AM »
$3.4 Trillion: Fossil Fuel Divestment Commitments Break New Record
http://ecowatch.com/2015/12/02/divest-fossil-fuels-cop21/
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Sigmetnow

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Re: UN Climate Agreement - Paris 2015 and beyond
« Reply #360 on: December 03, 2015, 03:09:44 AM »
COP21 Fossil of the Day Winners: IMO and ICAO
   (1-min video)
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Sigmetnow

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Re: UN Climate Agreement - Paris 2015 and beyond
« Reply #361 on: December 03, 2015, 03:12:56 AM »
First small sign of climate accord on 5-year review of carbon cuts
Quote
PARIS, Dec 2 (Reuters) - Climate negotiators in Paris are drawing close to resolving one of the sticking points for a breakthrough emissions pact by favouring a five-year review period on promised greenhouse gas cuts, a top official said on Wednesday.

Regular reviews are seen as a crucial part of any agreement since countries' current pledges to cut emissions - submitted by 185 nations to the United Nations - will fail to prevent temperatures from rising 2 degrees Celsius (3.6 Fahrenheit) above pre-industrial times, seen as a dangerous level.
http://www.trust.org/item/20151202171907-nfsts/
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Sigmetnow

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Re: UN Climate Agreement - Paris 2015 and beyond
« Reply #362 on: December 03, 2015, 03:17:22 AM »
Quote
@350: Germignaga, Italy has a population of 3,809. They had a 3,000-person #ClimateMarch. Wow. https://t.co/Ojjv75HfN3

https://twitter.com/350/status/672233976103370752
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Sigmetnow

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Re: UN Climate Agreement - Paris 2015 and beyond
« Reply #363 on: December 03, 2015, 03:23:35 AM »
Businesses Awaken To The Opportunities Of Action On Climate Change
Quote
More than 1,000 business representatives will be in Paris and most will be supportive of climate action, says Edward Cameron, who represents We Mean Business, a nonprofit coalition that is working with companies on climate change.
...
One gauge of business support for curbing carbon emissions is that more than 150 large U.S. companies have signed a White House pledge to reduce their carbon footprint. The list includes firms like General Motors, General Electric and Wal-Mart.

What's changed, Bakker says, is that businesses now see that the cost of inaction is greater than the cost of acting to curb climate change. That's the case at General Mills, the big food company whose products include Cheerios, Lucky Charms and Yoplait yogurt.

"For us it's not theoretical," says Ken Powell, the company's CEO. "We depend on natural systems. And we depend on healthy environment for the crops and the ingredients that we use."

For that reason, businesses in the agriculture and food sector are among those most interested in curbing carbon emissions. General Mills started by reducing energy use in its facilities.

"We've eliminated about $250 million of energy cost over the last 10 years," Powell says. "So for people who worry that companies are misspending resources to address this issue, our experience has not been that; it's been very positive from a business standpoint."
http://www.npr.org/2015/12/01/458020744/businesses-awaken-to-the-opportunities-of-action-on-climate-change
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AbruptSLR

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Re: UN Climate Agreement - Paris 2015 and beyond
« Reply #364 on: December 03, 2015, 06:17:54 PM »
As I have mentioned before The Economist has published the linked special report on climate change to coincide with CoP21, and while I do not agree with all of their points, the do raise several notable issues including:
1. Until renewables like wind & solar power can be married to storage systems, they will need to be tied to base-load power plants, so that for all the money that Germany has spent on renewables they have had marginal gains on emissions as indicated by the attached image and extract, below.
2. As global warming increases more & more money will be spent on counter-productive adaption such as more air conditioning and refrigeration.
3.  The existing over-built base load power plant capacity will be difficult to eliminate in coming decades.
4.  Loss and damage will be a difficult issue to deal with.

http://www.economist.com/news/special-report/21678951-not-much-has-come-efforts-prevent-climate-change-so-far-mankind-will-have-get

See also:

http://www.economist.com/news/special-report/21678955-renewable-power-good-more-renewable-power-not-always-better-when-wind-blows

Extract: "And because of generous feed-in tariffs for renewables that are guaranteed for 20 years, consumers in Germany are paying high prices for their not especially clean power. In the first half of this year households there paid 0.30 euros for a kilowatt-hour of electricity, whereas the French paid a mere 0.16 euros."
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AbruptSLR

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Re: UN Climate Agreement - Paris 2015 and beyond
« Reply #365 on: December 03, 2015, 08:35:18 PM »
Some may believe that both Robert Scribbler and Pope Francis are being Pollyanna's in the linked article focused on CoP21, but to me, even Kevin Anderson's warnings are erring on the side of least drama:

http://robertscribbler.com/2015/12/01/paris-climate-conference-at-the-limits-of-suicide-commitments-nowhere-near-enough-to-miss-2-c/

Extracted quote from the Pope: "We are at the limits. If I may use a strong word I would say that we are at the limits of suicide.”
« Last Edit: December 03, 2015, 08:43:07 PM by AbruptSLR »
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Sigmetnow

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Re: UN Climate Agreement - Paris 2015 and beyond
« Reply #366 on: December 03, 2015, 09:39:10 PM »
Video of Elon Musk's Paris talk on sustainability (see #355 above) and a brief article:
http://electrek.co/2015/12/03/elon-musk-we-designed-civilization-to-be-super-sensitive-to-climate-change/
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Sigmetnow

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Re: UN Climate Agreement - Paris 2015 and beyond
« Reply #367 on: December 04, 2015, 12:32:08 AM »
Australia's actions so far at COP21: "Very disappointing." 
Video interview.

https://www.facebook.com/denial101x/videos/899179706845286/
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Sigmetnow

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Re: UN Climate Agreement - Paris 2015 and beyond
« Reply #368 on: December 04, 2015, 01:21:31 AM »
India a leading force at climate talks
Quote
On Wednesday, Ajay Mathur, one of India’s lead negotiators, made a shrewd and brilliant pledge: We’ll cut back on our coal use if the rest of the world helps fund our transition to renewables. The lead U.S. negotiator, Todd Stern, joined activist groups in welcoming the comments as productive.
http://www.slate.com/blogs/future_tense/2015/12/03/thankfully_india_is_a_leading_force_at_paris_cop21_climate_talks.html
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Re: UN Climate Agreement - Paris 2015 and beyond
« Reply #369 on: December 04, 2015, 06:00:06 AM »
1. Until renewables like wind & solar power can be married to storage systems, they will need to be tied to base-load power plants, so that for all the money that Germany has spent on renewables they have had marginal gains on emissions as indicated by the attached image and extract, below.

I was against nuclear when Sweden had our "folkomröstning" vote/referendum(?) in 1980. And still is. But Germanys transition away from nuclear right now feels a bit misplaced. Out of two bad things, it's better to select the least bad.

Swedens share through Vattenfall, is to emit 88,4 million tonnes per year abroad and mostly in Germany.
Finland on the other hand, has spent too much on their new plant in Olkiluoto and are loosers in transition towards renewables.

There's no easy way out of this. :(

tombond

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Re: UN Climate Agreement - Paris 2015 and beyond
« Reply #370 on: December 04, 2015, 07:07:47 AM »
France made the transition from fossil fuels to nuclear in just 20 years between 1975 and 1995 by the construction of 60GW of reactors.  Today their emissions from electricity generation are just 40g/kWh.

http://www.rte-france.com/en/eco2mix/chiffres-cles-en

(scroll to the bottom of the page)

Germany is making the transition to a renewable energy economy and to date has installed about 80GW of renewable capacity since 1999.

Today their emissions per kWh are more than 10 times higher than France.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Energy_in_Germany
https://www.iea.org/newsroomandevents/graphics/2015-04-28-carbon-emissions-from-electricity-generation-for-the-top-ten-producer.html

In addition their total CO2 emissions from electricity and heat generation are practically unchanged since 1999 at about 350 million tonnes annually.

http://www.indexmundi.com/facts/germany/co2-emissions

(Scroll down the page to electricity CO2 emissions)

As Hansen keeps saying, we must accept nuclear energy as part of the solution to the climate crisis.

 https://newmatilda.com/2015/12/04/father-of-climate-change-james-hansen-urges-support-for-nuclear-energy-at-cop21-climate-talks/
« Last Edit: December 04, 2015, 09:30:33 AM by tombond »

folke_kelm

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Re: UN Climate Agreement - Paris 2015 and beyond
« Reply #371 on: December 04, 2015, 08:00:46 AM »
You must always ask what is behind the numbers for France and Germany.
Germany´s coal is subsidised to a huge amount. Only for burning 1T of coal the german taxpayer looses 100 Euro to the big coalburning companies E.ON, RWE and Vattenfall. Germany has a surplus of renewable energy which results in cutting off coalplants from the net, but still burning coal inside these plants. Germany´s nuclear plants are old and before shutting down all there was a documented lack of upgrading and service.
Nuclear power stands today for less than 10% of all domestic energyproduction. To make it count it will cost huge amounts of money.

There is an easy way out. Take the money from subsidising fossil fuels and nuclear and invest this money in renewables and a smart net.

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Re: UN Climate Agreement - Paris 2015 and beyond
« Reply #372 on: December 04, 2015, 09:26:57 AM »
Folke, i know that you are much more aware of Germanys situation, as you have mentioned those things before. Do you have any links to those facts about the coal subsidies and maintenance problems of their nuclear plants?

I guess they can't do, or think that they can't do, what you suggest while investing/building smart grids and renewables?

Vattenfalls "easy" solution is to shut down. But they are still waiting for buyers.
Personally, I would vote for a shut down and all of us in Sweden would have to take those costs. Unfortunately the Germans would also loose that capacity.

Tar man fan i båten får man ro honom i land.

Edit; I can see now that SATire has written a lot in here about the Energiewende.
And found this from yesterday: http://www.energypost.eu/energiewende-easily-affordable-dont-go-way/
I'll see if I can find some more about those coal subsidies myself.
« Last Edit: December 04, 2015, 02:31:26 PM by Sleepy »

Sigmetnow

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Re: UN Climate Agreement - Paris 2015 and beyond
« Reply #373 on: December 04, 2015, 01:16:43 PM »
Obama Just Committed $30 Million To Insure Developing Countries Against Climate Threats
Quote
The U.S. contribution will specifically support parametric-risk insurance programs operated by the Pacific Catastrophic Risk Assessment and Financing Initiative (PCRAFI), the Caribbean Catastrophic Risk Insurance Facility (CCRIF), and the African Risk Capacity (ARC). Parametric risk insurance is a type of insurance that issues payout immediately when a specified condition — such as a certain wind speed or rainfall level — is met. These plans can be structured to insure nations against damages caused by extreme weather such as hurricanes, or financial costs associated with prolonged drought. Parametric risk insurance can help developing countries better prepare for the impacts of climate change, as the Center for American Progress discussed in a recent report.
http://thinkprogress.org/climate/2015/12/02/3727056/obama-commitment-climate-risk-insurance/
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folke_kelm

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Re: UN Climate Agreement - Paris 2015 and beyond
« Reply #374 on: December 04, 2015, 03:18:07 PM »
Sleepy,
it´s all in german, send me a pm if i shall translate something.
if you search google with "kohlesubventionen deutschland" you will get much information. This study
https://www.greenpeace.de/sites/www.greenpeace.de/files/Kohlesubventionen_1950-2008_0.pdf
will povide you with many sources and information about subsidies of german coal plants and mining. It is a very traditional business in Germany and has very active lobbyism in the gouvernment. Yhere are not only direct subsidies, but also indirect subsidies like tax reductions, cost partitioning for restoring of environment etc etc, it is a long list. You can be sure that without subsidies there would not be one german coal plant left, not to talk about nuclear.
According to the nuclear plants there is not much available if you do not have insight in construction and maintainace problems of these plants. The main problem is that all pants are constructed under presupposition of a limited number of starts and shutdowns. These presumptive conditions of drift has never been met for any of the german plants. Numbers of starts and shutdowns exceed by far the constructive limits.
Vital components in nuclear power plants are not replaceable, and when you understand, that every mechanical part will fail some day, and that part failure of a series of similar parts follows a gaussian normal curve. This curve has to be very steep in the case ov nuclear plants due to the fact that you can not afford any premature part failure.
Bt this means too, that you must avoid drift longer than the constructive limits allow or drift under unusual circumstances outside the constructive limits (meaning numbers of shutdowns and start ups) because you leave the safe side of the normal curve very fast.
This is in fact a problem most mechanical engineers know about (or should know about).
Before Fukushima the german government decided that german nuclear plants should get a prolonged drift WITHOUT further maintainance or upgrading, this under heavy press from E.ON, RWE and Vattenfall. In my opinin this was a safe recipe for desaster. I my private opinion i am rather sure that Angela Merkel was very pleased about the Fukushima desaster, because it gave her the opportunity to overrule the big companies and force a shutdown of the plants.

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Re: UN Climate Agreement - Paris 2015 and beyond
« Reply #375 on: December 04, 2015, 03:42:00 PM »
Vielen Dank, Folke! Aha, kohlesubventionen were the magic word, think I tried five or six different german words for subsidies. :)
And Ouch, that was a fair bit of reading, I might send you a PM later on.

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Re: UN Climate Agreement - Paris 2015 and beyond
« Reply #376 on: December 04, 2015, 05:47:53 PM »
Maybe this "German"-post is also a bit off-topic, since the German "Energiewende" is not only related to CO2 emissions.
Please keep in mind while judging the transition in Germany, that the first goal here is to get out of nuclear. Hansen does not like it and maybe you do not like it for good reasons, too - but the German people want it that way and German people pay the electricity bill. Without the nuclear-exit people would not have paid for the initial ramp-up of renewables.

Today people are pretty aware that coal (especially lignite - which is extremly CO2 intense compared to black coal) is the next thing to exit. Vattenfall wants to sell its lignite in Germany (but unfortunately not to Greenpeace - they really bidded about 0€ for it). RWE lost 80% of its previous value and is about to split the lignite & nuclear business as E.on did last year. Lignite is the next to die after nuclear. But politics (and communal owners of RWE) try to delay that for various local reasons.

Furthermore keep in mind that we do not need "base load" power stations (basically nuclear and lignite here) anymore. There is not such a thing like "base-load" in a grid with renewables. Consumption minus production from renewables floats between zero and 40 GW - thus only tunable dynamic power plants are necessary. Last comment: High power grids are much more efficient than storage. So an European answer is needed to address fluctuations just because that is easier and cheaper than any local national answers to problems (as allways...).   

Back to Paris: I hope we could start to do what we promised in Rio & Kyoto allready. That was much more than we can hope for this time. Sorry - but it did not work well the last decades for any international agreements.   

AbruptSLR

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Re: UN Climate Agreement - Paris 2015 and beyond
« Reply #377 on: December 04, 2015, 07:42:39 PM »
The linked article discusses evidence that secret trade talks on the Trade in Services Agreement (TiSA), could undermine climate discussions in Paris by outlawing subsidies for renewable energy (carbon pricing would get around this problem):

http://www.theguardian.com/business/2015/dec/03/secret-trade-talks-climate-targets-paris-geneva

Extract: "Secret trade talks in Geneva could outlaw subsidies for renewable energy, undermining climate discussions in Paris that aim to cut greenhouse gas emissions, anti-poverty campaigners have warned.

The Geneva summit involving 22 countries including the US, Mexico, Australia and the 28 EU member states, aim to create a “level playing field”, with the possible consequence that fracking companies could dispute subsidies for solar or wind power."
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AbruptSLR

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Re: UN Climate Agreement - Paris 2015 and beyond
« Reply #378 on: December 04, 2015, 07:48:10 PM »
The linked article discusses the 11 countries that have not submitted INDC's to CoP21:

http://bigstory.ap.org/article/4969171004634cdcae912051bd01287f/11-countries-havent-made-pledges-climate-deal

Extract: "Only 11 countries haven't submitted pledges for the envisioned agreement, including conflict-ridden Syria, reclusive North Korea and socialist Latin American countries who say it's up to the West to clean up the world's carbon pollution."
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Sigmetnow

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Re: UN Climate Agreement - Paris 2015 and beyond
« Reply #379 on: December 04, 2015, 09:20:27 PM »
The World’s Richest People Also Emit The Most Carbon
Quote
On Wednesday, British charity Oxfam released a study that found the richest 10 percent of people produce half of the planet’s individual-consumption-based fossil fuel emissions, while the poorest 50 percent — about 3.5 billion people — contribute only 10 percent. Yet those same 3.5 billion people are “living overwhelmingly in the countries most vulnerable to climate change,” according to the report. According to the data used by the report, individual consumption — as opposed to consumption by governments and international transport — makes up 64 percent of worldwide climate emissions.
http://thinkprogress.org/climate/2015/12/03/3727515/climate-change-economic-inequality-study/
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Sigmetnow

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Re: UN Climate Agreement - Paris 2015 and beyond
« Reply #380 on: December 04, 2015, 09:50:26 PM »
The Lawyers Who Trekked to Paris for Climate Change Talks
Quote
Lawyers said that as political consensus around the need to combat climate change has strengthened, the business community is transitioning from a defensive to an opportunistic mindset.

“Until recently private sector involvement with COPs has focused on, ‘How might this damage my business?’ and ‘How can I make money out of the carbon markets?'” said London-based Tim Baines, Of Counsel at Norton Rose Fulbright who is attending the conference.

“This now appears to be changing dramatically, with a great deal of interest and enthusiasm about renewables in particular, how they can be rolled out and how they can best be financed,”
Baines said.

Aside from new opportunities, the business community has also grown tired of the legal uncertainty created by the international community’s drawn-out debate over climate change, according to Saines.

“The business community likes certainty,” he said. “We’re moving towards a low carbon economy in all corners of the global economy. Doing that with clarity will be helpful to businesses around the world.”

Quote
Bacchus said the key difference in this year’s COP, and the reason so many are optimistic, is a change in approach: While past agreements at Kyoto and Copenhagen have imposed “top-down” targets for emissions reductions, which put caps on the amount of carbon emissions produced by each country, countries are now asked to make reduction “pledges.”

According to Bacchus, there is no official compliance mechanism: the negotiations at COP 21 are about how to “promote transparency, monitoring, reporting, verification, and other ways of making certain that we know what countries have promised they will do.”

“Politically, we’ve reached a decision,” Bacchus said. “We’re not going to be able to come together as a world and agree that every country should cut their emissions by 5 percent next Tuesday, and others by 10 percent by next Wednesday. We’re not going to have that kind of top-down global agreement.”

“They’re trying to create long term enduring agreement that can be a bit flexible with need to revisit targets,” Saines said. “It’s all bottom-up. There’s a new paradigm being forged here.”
https://bol.bna.com/the-lawyers-who-trekked-to-paris-for-climate-change-talks/
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Sigmetnow

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Re: UN Climate Agreement - Paris 2015 and beyond
« Reply #381 on: December 05, 2015, 01:47:49 AM »
World Leaders Met to Save the Planet and the Only Full Public Record Is This Google Doc
http://www.slate.com/blogs/future_tense/2015/12/04/follow_the_paris_cop21_climate_talks_live_via_google_docs.html
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Sigmetnow

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Re: UN Climate Agreement - Paris 2015 and beyond
« Reply #382 on: December 05, 2015, 02:01:59 AM »
See the link for New Republic's report card on big issues at the conference.
Quote
Here’s our progress report on COP21. Blue bars indicate progress toward the goals, compared to yesterday, red bars indicate backward momentum, and gray bars indicate no change....
https://newrepublic.com/article/125128/frantic-scramble-make-headway-paris
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Re: UN Climate Agreement - Paris 2015 and beyond
« Reply #383 on: December 05, 2015, 04:40:18 AM »
Climate Talks Watch: Prospects of a Deal Deteriorate

http://www.bloomberg.com/graphics/2015-COP21-deal-watch/

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Re: UN Climate Agreement - Paris 2015 and beyond
« Reply #384 on: December 05, 2015, 06:19:40 AM »
Thanks SATire, your posts have been very helpful.
There's so much nonsense floating around here in Sweden and I'm not judging Germany, just reaching for a better understanding.

I do judge my own country though. Our old nuclear plants should have been closed a long time ago.


Trying to be a bit more COP21 related:
http://www.english.rfi.fr/general/20151203-Nuclear-not-so-much-dirty-word-Cop21-it-can-barely-be-heard
Quote
"For us nuclear is part of the solution, but it’s not available for everybody because of the technical and technological requirements. The initial cost is high. The electricity produced is affordable," says Poncelet. This is not the inclusive message of Cop21.

Cyrille Cormier of NGO Greenpeace France disagrees. He says that compared to renewables, nuclear is far more costly.

"Every megawatt-hour produced by nuclear energy from an EPR reactor costs about 100 euros. The cost of producing the same amount of renewable energy with wind turbines and solar is already less almost everywhere in the world. For example in France, it’s already 70 euros per MW-hour for big solar farms and wind turbines.”

Despite all of the other problems related to todays nuclear plants, time is maybe the most important aspect. Consider how long it has taken Finland to build Olkiluoto 3 (start 2002) and that they now estimate more than three years until production...
http://www.tvo.fi/news/1661
Quote
3.12.2015
​It will still be more than three years until regular electricity generation in Olkiluoto 3 plant unit will commence. This schedule estimate is made by the plant supplier Areva-Siemens consortium. The next steps towards commissioning are now more accurate.

Today's nuclear is stone dead and ice cold for mitigation purposes, as I see it. Use the ones we have for as long as we dare...
« Last Edit: December 05, 2015, 08:01:03 AM by Sleepy »

Csnavywx

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Re: UN Climate Agreement - Paris 2015 and beyond
« Reply #385 on: December 05, 2015, 03:02:36 PM »
Thanks SATire, your posts have been very helpful.
There's so much nonsense floating around here in Sweden and I'm not judging Germany, just reaching for a better understanding.

I do judge my own country though. Our old nuclear plants should have been closed a long time ago.


Trying to be a bit more COP21 related:
http://www.english.rfi.fr/general/20151203-Nuclear-not-so-much-dirty-word-Cop21-it-can-barely-be-heard
Quote
"For us nuclear is part of the solution, but it’s not available for everybody because of the technical and technological requirements. The initial cost is high. The electricity produced is affordable," says Poncelet. This is not the inclusive message of Cop21.

Cyrille Cormier of NGO Greenpeace France disagrees. He says that compared to renewables, nuclear is far more costly.

"Every megawatt-hour produced by nuclear energy from an EPR reactor costs about 100 euros. The cost of producing the same amount of renewable energy with wind turbines and solar is already less almost everywhere in the world. For example in France, it’s already 70 euros per MW-hour for big solar farms and wind turbines.”

Despite all of the other problems related to todays nuclear plants, time is maybe the most important aspect. Consider how long it has taken Finland to build Olkiluoto 3 (start 2002) and that they now estimate more than three years until production...
http://www.tvo.fi/news/1661
Quote
3.12.2015
​It will still be more than three years until regular electricity generation in Olkiluoto 3 plant unit will commence. This schedule estimate is made by the plant supplier Areva-Siemens consortium. The next steps towards commissioning are now more accurate.

Today's nuclear is stone dead and ice cold for mitigation purposes, as I see it. Use the ones we have for as long as we dare...

This is mostly due to the fact that renewables penetration is still fairly low and the cost of regulation on nuclear is very high. At higher renewables penetration, storage costs invariably come into play, which will rapidly increase the cost. Storage isn't cheap and it's virtually certain -- math-wise -- that trying to eliminate nuclear at the same time as coal and gas for electric generation will result in failing to meet CO2 targets.

Cormier is being pie-in-the-sky and a bit disingenuous by leaving out storage costs and making those kinds of statements about cost competitiveness with nuclear.

Risk-weighting CO2 against nuclear needs to be a valid discussion. I have yet to see a realistic proposal that gets us where we need to be fast enough and not include some sort of nuclear backstop until we can get the storage issue solved.

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Re: UN Climate Agreement - Paris 2015 and beyond
« Reply #386 on: December 05, 2015, 03:12:06 PM »
Climate Talks Watch: Prospects of a Deal Improve

http://www.bloomberg.com/graphics/2015-COP21-deal-watch/

Quote
Prospects improved on Friday after the UN published two draft agreements: one capturing the results of negotiations, and a shorter one containing "bridging proposals" designed to narrow gaps and trim fat from the deal. With envoys prepared to look at the refined document, optimism rose that a more manageable set of outstanding issues will be forwarded to ministers next week.

"What caught my eye?" said Richard Black, director of the Energy and Climate Intelligence Unit in London. "That’ll be negotiators doing what they’re supposed to. As never spotted at Copenhagen," he said, referring to the last, failed attempt to forge a global deal in 2009.

Talks continue in Paris today before a break tomorrow.

Edit: After looking at the draft text -- holy crap with the brackets. Agree with the sentiment of the Bloomberg article not to raise this into the "green". Getting the bridging proposals was a good thing, but we'll need a hurculean effort to get this agreement to truly mean something next week. Too many "outs" left in the brackets. Otherwise, we're going to be left with something only slightly better than CoP15.
« Last Edit: December 05, 2015, 03:26:44 PM by Csnavywx »

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Re: UN Climate Agreement - Paris 2015 and beyond
« Reply #387 on: December 05, 2015, 05:03:02 PM »
Edit: After looking at the draft text -- holy crap with the brackets. Agree with the sentiment of the Bloomberg article not to raise this into the "green". Getting the bridging proposals was a good thing, but we'll need a hurculean effort to get this agreement to truly mean something next week. Too many "outs" left in the brackets. Otherwise, we're going to be left with something only slightly better than CoP15.


For those who want to see a copy of the draft (bracketed) agreement, see the following link(s):

http://unfccc.int/meetings/paris_nov_2015/session/9126.php
&
http://unfccc.int/files/bodies/awg/application/pdf/draft_paris_outcome_rev_5dec15.pdf

See also:
http://edition.cnn.com/2015/12/05/world/global-climate-change-draft-agreement/

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Sigmetnow

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Re: UN Climate Agreement - Paris 2015 and beyond
« Reply #388 on: December 05, 2015, 07:44:55 PM »
Paris climate talks: Democratic senators say they 'will not back down'
Group of 10 lawmakers pledge to defend president’s environmental agenda in Congress, citing ‘promise from the American people to the world’
Quote
Democratic senators staged a show of force at the Paris climate meeting on Saturday, pledging they “had Barack Obama’s back” and would defend his agenda in a Republican-controlled Congress.

The appearance by 10 Democratic senators, days after Congress voted to repeal new power plant rules, was intended to demonstrate solid political support for Obama’s climate plan – despite Republican claims to the contrary.
http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2015/dec/05/paris-climate-change-talks-democratic-senators-obama-cop-21
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AbruptSLR

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Re: UN Climate Agreement - Paris 2015 and beyond
« Reply #389 on: December 05, 2015, 07:54:29 PM »
As tensions mount between developed & developing states, it will be interesting to see what actually gets agreed to as we near the deadline:

http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2015/dec/05/paris-climate-summit-developing-countries-angry-financial-commitments

Extract: "Wealthy nations have come under attack from developing countries over proposed financial commitments designed to help them deal with the effects of global warming."

See also:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/energy-environment/wp/2015/12/04/scientist-this-is-what-doesnt-make-sense-about-the-paris-climate-debate/?postshare=4951449257648898&tid=ss_tw

Extract: "As we get deeper into the Paris climate negotiations, activists are poring over confusing texts full of noncommittal brackets. Upon this, it seems, does the fate of the planet depend.
We don’t know yet which brackets will come off, but at least we’re getting a good sense of the different camps in the negotiations – the developed countries like the U.S., major developing nations (India, China, and so on), highly vulnerable countries including small island states, and so on."
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Sigmetnow

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Re: UN Climate Agreement - Paris 2015 and beyond
« Reply #390 on: December 05, 2015, 09:10:54 PM »
Click on a dot for details.

Quote
@UNFCCC: Pleased to present new interactive website displaying climate funding
announcements: https://t.co/Bzfk88jAuA #COP21
https://t.co/umG0yUP0Xk

https://twitter.com/unfccc/status/673193430638460928
http://climatefundingsnapshot.com/
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Re: UN Climate Agreement - Paris 2015 and beyond
« Reply #391 on: December 05, 2015, 09:13:19 PM »
Our PM was there, NZ even got a Fossil Award, again.
 :(
Cartoon: New Zealand's PM John Key's contribution to gases discussion

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Re: UN Climate Agreement - Paris 2015 and beyond
« Reply #392 on: December 06, 2015, 02:10:28 PM »
Many thorny details are now being worked on by foreign ministers and their counterparts:

http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/projects/cp/climate/2015-paris-climate-talks/climate-talks-split-into-groups-to-tackle-thorny-issues

Extract (from Dec. 6 2015): "On Saturday night, the negotiators for the delegations at the climate talks here formally handed over the working draft of the climate change accord to the French foreign minister, Laurent Fabius, who is serving as the president of the conference.

Mr. Fabius will now shepherd that 21-page text — which remains rife with major unresolved questions — through high-level meetings with his ministerial counterparts from around the world, who begin arriving in Paris today."
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Re: UN Climate Agreement - Paris 2015 and beyond
« Reply #393 on: December 06, 2015, 06:23:51 PM »
Eight-minute video.

Call to Earth - A Message from the World's Astronauts to COP21
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Re: UN Climate Agreement - Paris 2015 and beyond
« Reply #394 on: December 06, 2015, 07:28:25 PM »
What Paris Talks Have Accomplished So Far
By Michael Bloomberg
Quote
The two-week United Nations conference on climate change is halfway over, and no matter what else happens, it has already been a clear-cut success in two critical areas.

As important as a global accord is, the most influential actors on climate change have been cities and businesses, and leaders in both groups made it clear that they will not wait for an agreement that, if it comes together, won’t even take full effect until 2020.

Climate Change

Mayors and officials representing more than 500 cities organized and attended their own summit in Paris (which Paris Mayor Anne Hidalgo and I co-hosted). It was the first time local leaders had ever gathered in such numbers during a UN climate-change conference. They came not only to ensure that their voices were heard by heads of state, but also to express their determination to act on their own, and to learn from one another and share best practices.

Cities account for about 70 percent of global greenhouse-gas emissions, and while some heads of state have been arguing over which countries should do more, cities recognize that reducing their emissions is in their own best interest. After all, when cities cut their emissions, they help their residents live longer, healthier lives. When they improve the energy efficiency of their buildings, they save their taxpayers money. When they invest in modern low-carbon infrastructure, they raise their residents’ standard of living. Taken together, these actions make cities more attractive to businesses and investors. Even if climate change were not a concern, reducing emissions would be smart policy.

City leaders rarely need to be convinced of the benefits of climate-related actions, and in Paris, they committed to doing more. By Saturday, more than 400 cities had signed the Compact of Mayors, which requires them to set bold climate goals, adopt a common measurement system for emissions, and publicly report their progress. If so many cities can agree to these three actions, why not nations?

The Compact of Mayors is the best insurance we have against backsliding by central governments, and it’s the best hope we have -- along with technological innovation -- for accelerating the pace of change in every region of the world over the next five years.
...
http://www.bloombergview.com/articles/2015-12-06/what-paris-talks-have-accomplished-so-far
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Re: UN Climate Agreement - Paris 2015 and beyond
« Reply #395 on: December 06, 2015, 07:41:11 PM »
Financial Industry Faces Daunting Transformation for Climate Deal to Succeed
Business leaders including Michael Bloomberg argue that a carbon-free world can only happen if the global economy leads the move away from fossil fuels.
Quote
PARIS—The crux of the Paris climate talks is as simple as this: to ultimately succeed, they must set in motion a swift transformation of the global energy economy away from fossil fuels and toward clean power.

That tipping point presents substantial opportunities, but also ominous risks in the world of finance.

To help the financial industry get prepared, the Financial Stability Board, an international body that coordinates the work of regulators and central banks around the world, is setting up an industry-led task force on the disclosure of climate-related financial risks.
http://insideclimatenews.org/news/04122015/climate-deal-success-paris-economy-financial-clean-energy-michael-bloomberg-al-gore
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Re: UN Climate Agreement - Paris 2015 and beyond
« Reply #396 on: December 07, 2015, 12:45:58 AM »
The Washington Post has a good write-up on how Obama is keeping the Paris agreement out of Congressional hands.

Trick or treaty? The legal question hanging over the Paris climate change conference
Quote
If a group of senators gets its way, any commitments President Obama makes at the Paris climate summit will be put to a congressional test.

But first, the mainly Republican lawmakers must prove that the product of the Paris meeting is effectively a treaty – and that is a legal hurdle they may not be able to clear.

World leaders are gathering in Paris starting Monday to attempt to seal an international deal to curb greenhouse gas emissions and slow climate change. If given the opportunity, the Republican-led Senate would almost undoubtedly reject such a deal.

President Obama doesn’t plan to give it the chance. Whatever agreement emerges from Paris, he has no intention of submitting it to the Senate for ratification as a treaty. The administration argues that any agreement does not bind the United States to a course of action. Moreover, it says the Clean Air Act and the United Nations Framework on Climate Change signed by former President George H.W. Bush already give Obama the authority he needs to carry out climate commitments.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/powerpost/wp/2015/11/30/trick-or-treaty-the-legal-question-hanging-over-the-paris-climate-change-conference/
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Re: UN Climate Agreement - Paris 2015 and beyond
« Reply #397 on: December 07, 2015, 09:55:36 AM »
Legally binding, but no penalties besides "name & shame":

http://abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory/climate-talks-shift-binding-targets-shame-35618061

Extract: "It's clear at this point that even if the international climate accord being negotiated in suburban Paris becomes legally binding, it won't include punitive measures like trade sanctions or embargoes on straggler countries that fail to meet their commitments.

The only penalty for falling short on efforts to fight global warming would be failing in front of the whole world to achieve their goals."
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Re: UN Climate Agreement - Paris 2015 and beyond
« Reply #398 on: December 07, 2015, 10:11:06 AM »
Thanks SATire, your posts have been very helpful.
There's so much nonsense floating around here in Sweden and I'm not judging Germany, just reaching for a better understanding.

I do judge my own country though. Our old nuclear plants should have been closed a long time ago.


Trying to be a bit more COP21 related:
http://www.english.rfi.fr/general/20151203-Nuclear-not-so-much-dirty-word-Cop21-it-can-barely-be-heard
Quote
"For us nuclear is part of the solution, but it’s not available for everybody because of the technical and technological requirements. The initial cost is high. The electricity produced is affordable," says Poncelet. This is not the inclusive message of Cop21.

Cyrille Cormier of NGO Greenpeace France disagrees. He says that compared to renewables, nuclear is far more costly.

"Every megawatt-hour produced by nuclear energy from an EPR reactor costs about 100 euros. The cost of producing the same amount of renewable energy with wind turbines and solar is already less almost everywhere in the world. For example in France, it’s already 70 euros per MW-hour for big solar farms and wind turbines.”

Despite all of the other problems related to todays nuclear plants, time is maybe the most important aspect. Consider how long it has taken Finland to build Olkiluoto 3 (start 2002) and that they now estimate more than three years until production...
http://www.tvo.fi/news/1661
Quote
3.12.2015
​It will still be more than three years until regular electricity generation in Olkiluoto 3 plant unit will commence. This schedule estimate is made by the plant supplier Areva-Siemens consortium. The next steps towards commissioning are now more accurate.

Today's nuclear is stone dead and ice cold for mitigation purposes, as I see it. Use the ones we have for as long as we dare...

This is mostly due to the fact that renewables penetration is still fairly low and the cost of regulation on nuclear is very high. At higher renewables penetration, storage costs invariably come into play, which will rapidly increase the cost. Storage isn't cheap and it's virtually certain -- math-wise -- that trying to eliminate nuclear at the same time as coal and gas for electric generation will result in failing to meet CO2 targets.

Cormier is being pie-in-the-sky and a bit disingenuous by leaving out storage costs and making those kinds of statements about cost competitiveness with nuclear.

Risk-weighting CO2 against nuclear needs to be a valid discussion. I have yet to see a realistic proposal that gets us where we need to be fast enough and not include some sort of nuclear backstop until we can get the storage issue solved.

Sorry for the late reply, I've been away for the weekend.
I simply don't know France well enough. But I do know that Sweden has been praised and used by many as a green successful western nation using nuclear. Including James Hansen.

The problem; we don't need nuclear here.

We have two major sources here, hydro and nuclear. We have one plant here that was shut down in 1974, it's still sealed... Back in 1972 we actually planned for 24 nuclear plants. Then something happened in 1979 (you all know what) and we had our referendum in 1980. Our plants are now old but generates about 40% of our electricity, those 40% can be replaced by solar and wind. This was shown in 2013 by professor Lennart Söder at KTH in the following paper.
http://kth.diva-portal.org/smash/get/diva2:657544/FULLTEXT01.pdf
Unfortunately it's in Swedish.

We are also on the move here regarding a smarter grid.
http://www.swedishsmartgrid.se/english/
And as SATire commented above (#376), a European solution is needed as well.

This must also be combined with increased energy efficiency. There are a lot of things we can do better here, we are definately not mitigating when you look at our increasing consumption rates or Vattenfalls emissions abroad, but I'm really glad that we don't need to follow Finland or France.

Sigmetnow

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Re: UN Climate Agreement - Paris 2015 and beyond
« Reply #399 on: December 07, 2015, 02:07:26 PM »
Thirteen million health professions call for climate action in the name of public health.
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