State of Play – January 2011 Edition

(For more on this graphic, go here.)

The venerable Matt Wald at the NY Times reported the other day that CO₂ emissions in the US peaked in 2005 and, according to the latest estimates, we’re not going back to those numbers until ten years down the road.  How come?  In part – and in part only – the recession:  “…a smaller economy, less activity and less energy consumption,” according to the Electric Power Research Institute.  But other factors pertain:

• a rapidly increasing awareness of and deployment of more efficient motors, vehicles and appliances;
• more renewable energy coming on line;
• fewer coal-fired power plants,
• many of which are being replaced by much less carbon-intensive gas-fired plants, particularly because the price of natural gas has been so low – and is expected to stay low – and because the new gas plants are, by and large, much more efficient;

There’s much more to do, clearly, to reduce our GHG footprint, but some of the portents remain quite hopeful.

One other sign is that American utilities may be willing to do a deal along the lines of what the auto industry did in a historic, pathbreaking agreement that left all the stakeholders feeling positive.  Politico reports here that the federal government and the utilities, absent federal legislation, might also try to effect something that will satisfy the private sector and give the planet some of the greenhouse gas reduction it so desperately requires.  Discussions are yet informal, originating in the talks that preceded the Senate climate and energy bill crashing and burning last year, but there does seem to be considerable interest at some pretty high levels of government and industry.  Does this make sense?  Of course!  We would certainly hear quibbling, whining and worse from political and commercial interests from coal states – witness the outcry over the recent barring of a mountaintop removal mining permit – and from the reactionaries in Congress and other assorted climate zombies, but the best bottom line solution for these companies is a clear, graduated path to a low-carbon energy economy.

The global perspective has many similar indications of progress, what UNEP Executive Director Achim Steiner calls “silent momentum on climate change.”  Steiner says that “…the world is witnessing an extraordinary mobilization of national-level projects and policies that are shifting economies onto a low-carbon path.”  He notes also the progress that subnational governments and corporations are making.  This is a hopeful, positive essay, echoing a lot of what I’ve been reporting here.  Steiner makes it plain, nevertheless, that we have to continue to work very hard on “… the transition to a low-carbon, resource-efficient green economy,” plus it’s imperative for the world’s nations and all the other interested parties to continue to plug away at finding the answers on multilateral solutions, through the UN process and outside it as well.