[TheClimate.Vote] March 15, 2020 - Daily Global Warming News Digest

[Richard Pauli]

/*March 15, 2020*/

[Some good news]
*Coronavirus could cause fall in global CO2 emissions*
Responses to outbreak also show how government policy and behavioural 
changes can have impact
- -
US author and environmentalist Bill McKibben wrote that no 
environmentalist should welcome a crisis, but they could learn from it: 
"Completely apart from the human toll, economic disruption is not a 
politically viable way to deal with global warming in the long term, and 
it also undercuts the engines of innovation that bring us, say, cheap 
solar panels."

But McKibben is more optimistic about the demonstration that people can 
change. "It's worth noting how nimbly millions of people seem to have 
learned new patterns. Companies, for instance, are scrambling to stay 
productive, even with many people working from home.

"The idea that we need to travel each day to a central location to do 
our work may often be the result of inertia, more than anything else. 
Faced with a real need to commute by mouse, instead of by car, perhaps 
we'll see that the benefits of workplace flexibility extend to 
everything from gasoline consumption to the need for sprawling office 
parks."
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/mar/10/coronavirus-could-cause-fall-in-global-co2-emissions


[More positive news]
Changes in building and construction have great potential to slow global 
warming
Most of us spend a large chunk of our lives in one building or another, 
but have you ever stopped to consider the greenhouse gases linked to the 
construction of these buildings?

One way to reduce greenhouse gases is the use of recycled and more 
environmentally friendly building materials.

The United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) International Resource 
Panel has just published a recent report titled Resource Efficiency and 
Climate Change: Material Efficiency Strategies for a Low-Carbon Future. 
Commissioned by the G7 countries, it shows that natural resource 
extraction and processing account for more than 90 per cent of global 
biodiversity loss and water stress, and around half of global greenhouse 
gas emissions.

The findings point to opportunities to reduce these impacts through 
material efficiencies in homes and cars.

According to the Panel's modelling, emissions from the material cycle of 
residential buildings in the G7 and China could be reduced by at least 
80 per cent in 2050 through a series of material efficiency strategies...
- -
Measures with the highest impact and lowest cost include getting greater 
use out of buildings for more hours per day and extending the lifetime 
of buildings (the Panel says up to 70 per cent savings could be achieved 
by 2050 in the G7).

Improved recycling could reduce greenhouse gases by 14 to 18 per cent in 
2050 in the G7. Overall, cumulative savings in the period 2016–2050 from 
these strategies in the G7 would amount to 5 to 7 gigatonnes of CO2 
equivalent, says the report.

Looking at the whole building life cycle, material efficiency strategies 
could reduce emissions in 2050 from the construction, operations and 
dismantling of homes by 35 to 40 per cent in the G7. Analogous savings 
could be up to 50 to 70 per cent in China and India.

"Virgin material taxation and removal of virgin resource subsidies 
should be key options for policymakers," says Otto. The Global ABC 
Roadmaps 2020–2050 provide targets and timelines to achieve 
zero-emissions, efficient and resilient buildings and construction.

The world must immediately begin to deliver faster greenhouse gas 
emission cuts to keep global temperature rise to 1.5C, says the November 
2019 edition of UNEP's Emissions Gap Report.

"To achieve this goal, we will need to use the full range of emission 
reduction options. We need progress in all sectors: energy, industry, 
agriculture, forestry, transportation and buildings, better integration 
across sectors, and urban planning and design to meet this target," says 
Otto.
https://www.unenvironment.org/news-and-stories/story/changes-building-and-construction-have-great-potential-slow-global-warming

- - -

[here is the full report]
Resource Efficiency and Climate Change - Material Efficiency Strategies 
for a Low-Carbon Future
https://www.unenvironment.org/resources/report/resource-efficiency-and-climate-change-material-efficiency-strategies-low-carbon
Consice Summary PDF 
https://www.resourcepanel.org/file/1417/download?token=WlRbhmYm



[Washington Post]
The demise of the polar vortex could spell weather surprises this spring 
from The Washington Post
https://www.washingtonpost.com/weather/2020/03/14/polar-vortex-spring-weather/



[Digging back into the internet news archive]
*On this day in the history of global warming  - March 15, 1999 *

The paper "Northern Hemisphere Temperatures During the Past
Millennium: Inferences, Uncertainties, and Limitations," by Michael E. 
Mann, Raymond S. Bradley and Malcolm K. Hughes, is published in the 
journal Geophysical Research Letters. The paper features the "hockey 
stick" graph that makes Mann a target of unrelenting rhetorical and 
legal assaults by supporters and representatives of the fossil fuel 
industry.

http://www.meteo.psu.edu/holocene/public_html/shared/research/ONLINE-PREPRINTS/Millennium/mbh99.pdf 


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