It’s another beautiful December day in Washington.
And Rep. Henry Waxman, ranking Democrat on the House Energy and Commerce Committee, has sent his 21st letter requesting a hearing on climate change, this time on a report by PricewaterhouseCoopers that says we are on our way to a four degree centigrade world, and possibly six, instead of the two degree warming that governments hoped could be achieved. Find the other 20 letters here.
“It’s time to plan for a warmer world,” the report said. “We have passed a critical threshold.”
The PwC Low Carbon Economy Index 2012, called, “Too Late for Two Degrees?” estimates that the global economy would have to improve carbon intensity against a target budget by 5.1 percent every year from now until 2050 to limit warming to a tolerable two degrees. The best that has ever been achieved is 0.8 percent. “Governments’ ambitions to limit warming to 2 degrees C appear highly unrealistic,” the report said.
Waxman notes that despite the enormous costs of limiting carbon dioxide emissions, it would be a lot cheaper than a catastrophic warming.
A World Bank report, “Turn Down the Heat” issued this month said scientists are now “nearly unanimously predicting” a four degree world, which the report describes in vivid detail. World Bank president Jim Yong Kim wrote in the forward, “It is my hope that this report shocks us into action.”
See comrade Peter Fimrite’s report today on Humboldt squid showing up far north of their range.
Humboldt squid in Santa Cruz