Home > Work > Eaarth: Making a Life on a Tough New Planet
21 " more than a decade of human labor per barrel. "
― Bill McKibben , Eaarth: Making a Life on a Tough New Planet
22 " First, said the IEA, production in current oil fields is falling by about 7 percent a year, a figure that will rise steadily to 9 percent over the next few decades. In other words, the level of oil in these giant fields has dropped far enough that we can no longer get as much as we used to. Never mind fueling the growing Asian thirst for oil; simply running in place would mean finding four new Saudi Arabias by 2030. "
23 " Britain’s Exeter University, a scientist named Kevin Anderson took the podium for a major address. He showed slide after slide, graph after graph, “representing the fumes that belch from chimneys, exhausts and jet engines, that should have bent in a rapid curve towards the ground, were heading for the ceiling instead.” His conclusion: it was “improbable” that we’d be able "
24 " short of 650 parts per million, even if rich countries adopted “draconian emissions reductions within a decade.” That number, should it come to pass, would mean that global average temperatures would increase something like seven degrees Fahrenheit, compared to the degree and a half they’ve gone up already. "
25 " in fact American carbon dioxide emissions were expected to fall nearly 5 percent in 2009.47 Which is good news. Just not good enough. To give you an idea of how aggressively the world’s governments are willing to move, in July 2009 the thirteen largest emitters met in Washington to agree on an “aspirational” goal of 50 percent cuts in carbon by 2050, which falls pretty close to the category of “don’t bother. "