Michael P Totten, Conservation International, presentation at the California Academy of Sciences on February 3, 2009, on the new book, A Climate for Life. Presents wide range of positive mitigation options for address threat of climate catastrophe, species extinction, and mass poverty. Roughly 50 slides, 6 Mb pdf file.

1. A Climate for Life
Presentation
at the
California Academy
of Sciences
by
Michael Totten
Conservation
International
mtotten@conservation.org
February 3, 2009
www.aclimateforlife.org/

2. 4 TRENDS – Inextricably Interwoven
EXTINCTION SPASM
CLIMATE CATASTROPHE
FOOD & WATER SHORTAGES MASS POVERTY

3. Humans put as much CO2 into the atmosphere every 44 hours
1991 Mount Pinatubo eruption in Philippines

5. $2.5 trillion
almost a quarter of
the US economy
is at risk from the large forest wildfires have tripled and area burned increased >5-fold since
weather the 1980s, burning 5x longer, and wildfire season has lengthened 2/3rd.

6. Unintended Consequences – Geo-engineering
A significant fraction of CO2 emissions remain in the
atmosphere, and accumulate over geological time spans of
hundreds of thousands of years, raising the lurid, but real
threat of extinction of humanity and most life on earth.

7. Cost-Benefit Analysis (CBA) Misleading
… a more illuminating and constructive analysis would be
determining the level of quot;catastrophe insurancequot; needed:
quot;rough comparisons could perhaps be made with the
potentially-huge payoffs, small probabilities, and
significant costs involved in countering terrorism,
building anti-ballistic missile shields, or neutralizing
hostile dictatorships possibly harboring weapons of
mass destruction
…A crude natural metric for calibrating cost estimates of
climate-change environmental insurance policies might be
that the U.S. already spends approximately 3% [~$300
billion] of national income on the cost of a clean
environment.quot;
MARTIN WEITZMAN. 2008. On Modeling and Interpreting the Economics of Catastrophic Climate Change. REStat FINAL
Version July 7, 2008, http://www.economics.harvard.edu/faculty/weitzman/files/REStatFINAL.pdf.

8. Right-Sizing Humans’ CO2 Footprint
2008
now 45GtCO2
2050
reduce to
<10 GtCO2
2100
reduce to
<4 GtCO2
Contraction & Convergence “ . . . the logical conclusion of a rights-
based approach.” IPCC Third Assessment - June 2000

9. yr yr
/ /
2% 3% x
7x 19

10. The Virtuous Cycle
of Green Innovation
Noel Parry et al., California Green Innovation Index 2009, Next 10, www.next10.org/

11. Wedges Scenario for 21st Century CO2 Reductions
oil gas coal forests
geothermal agriculture Assumes:
1% 2% 1% 5%
biomass1% 5%
10% 1) Global
economic
bldgs EE
growth 2-3%
15%
per year all
wind century long;
15%
2) sustaining
3% per year
efficiency
gains;
transport EE
15%
3) Combined
solar carbon cap &
15% carbon tax
industry EE
15%

12. “Leasing” CO2 Mitigation Services
Gigatons global CO2 emissions per year
5 billion tons CO2 per year in
Billion tons CO2
mitigation services available in
25
poor nations, increasing their
revenues by billions of dollars
20
annually ; and saving well-off
nations billions of dollars.
15
10 US
GHG
5
levels
0
Fossil fuel emissions Tropical land use
13 million hectares burned each year
IPCC LULUCF Special Report 2000. Tab 1-2.

13. 6th largest extinction – 1000 times the natural background rate

14. Direct yields from tropical lands
converted to farming, including
proceeds from the sale of timber
are:
equivalent to less than $1 per
ton of CO2 in many areas
currently losing forest, and
usually well below $5 per ton.
Sir Nicholas Stern
Avoided Deforestation offers one of the most cost-effective, immediately
available, large-scale carbon mitigation and adaptation options.
Unchecked, deforestation could increase atmospheric concentrations of CO2
by as much as 130 ppm this century.
For example: it will require $40 billion to capture and store
1 billion tons of CO2 from coal plants.
The same amount of money would prevent the release of 8 times
this amount of CO2 through avoided deforestation.

15. U.S. Fossil- fueled
Geological storage (CCS) vs
Electricity Carbon Offset
Ecological storage (REDD)
cost nationally annually
Carbon Mitigation Cost
(2.4 GtCO2 in 2007)
$ per ton CO2
Carbon Capture & Storage (CCS)
$50
$45
~$100 billion
$40
~3 ¢ per kWh
$35
$30
$25 Reduced Emissions
Deforestation & Degradation
$20
(REDD)
$15
$10
~$18 billion
$5
~0.5 ¢ per kWh
$-
CCS REDD
Source: Michael Totten, REDD is CCS NOW, December 2008

18. Madagascar Makira Reserve - Protecting & restoring
wilderness, while helping people, species & climate

20. Ecuador collaborative offset projects
Preserve habitat for threatened
Andean Spectacled Bear,
Howler Monkey, and Northern
Naked Tailed Armadillo

21. FCCB
Forest Restoration
for Climate, Community and Biodiversity

23. DOZEN CRITERIA
Desirable attributes of a Smart Energy system
1. Economically affordable including poorest of the poor and cash-strapped?
2. Safe through the entire life cycle?
3. Clean through the entire lifespan?
4. Risk is low and manageable from financial and price volatility?
5. Resilient and flexible to volatility, surprises, miscalculations, human error?
6. Ecologically sustainable no adverse impacts on biodiversity?
7. Environmentally benign maintains air, water, soil quality?
8. Fails gracefully, not catastrophically adaptable to abrupt surprises or crises?
9. Rebounds easily and swiftly from failures low recovery cost and lost time?
10. Endogenous learning capacity intrinsic new productivity opportunities?
11. Robust experience curve for reducing
negative externalities and amplifying
positive externalities scalable innovation possibilities?
12. Uninteresting target for malicious
disruption off the radar of terrorists, military planners?

24. Uninteresting military target
A Defensible Smart Energy Robust experience curves
Criteria Scoring Endogenous learning capacity
Rebounds easily from failures
Fails gracefully, not catastro
Promote
Environmentally benign
CHP + Ecologically sustainable
biowastes
Resilient & flexible
Secure
Clean
Safe
Economically Affordable
Efficiency BIPV PV Wind CSP CHP Biowaste Geo- Nat Bio- Oil Coal Coal Coal to Tar Oil nuclear
power thermal gas fuels imports CCS no liquids sand shale
CCS

25. KEY POLICY – UTILITY DECOUPLING
Align utility and customer financial interests
to capture the vast pool of end-use efficiency,
onsite and distributed energy and water
service opportunities.
Dr. Art Rosenfeld Amory Lovins Ralph Cavanagh

26. USA Efficiency gains 1973-2005 Eliminated 75
ExaJoules of Energy Supply
$700 billion per year in energy bill savings
Envision 18 million coal railcars
that would wrap around the world
seven times each year.
Or, imagine 8,800 Exxon Valdez oil
supertanker shipments per year.
Only 2 nations consume > 75 EJ per year: USA and China.

27. CURRENT GLOBAL ENERGY CONSUMPTION ~ 475 ExaJoules (15 TW-yrs)
BUSINESS-AS-USUAL TRAJECTORY 200 times this amount over 100 years –
113,000 EJ (3600 TW-yrs). Fossil fuels will account for 75% of this sum.
SMART ENERGY SERVICES (EFFICIENCY) can deliver 57,000 EJs (1800
TW-yrs). Save >$50 trillion. Avoid several trillion tons CO2 emissions.
Envision eliminating the need this century for:
OR 10,000 giant OR 6,700 large OR 17 million
13.8 billion
offshore oil nuclear LNG tanker
coal railroad
platforms. reactors. shipments.
cars.

28. In the USA, cities and residences cover 56 million hectares.
Every kWh of current U.S. energy requirements can be met
simply by applying photovoltaics (PV) to 7% of this area—on
roofs, parking lots, along highway walls, on sides of
buildings, and in other dual-use scenarios.
Experts say we wouldn’t have to appropriate a single acre of
new land to make PV our primary energy source!

29. Solar Photovoltaics (PV) satisfying 90% of
total US electricity from brownfields
90% of America’s current electricity
could be supplied with PV systems
built in the “brown-fields”— the
estimated 2 million hectares of
abandoned industrial sites that
exist in our nation’s cities.
Cleaning Up
Brownfield
Sites w/
PV solar
Larry Kazmerski, Dispelling the 7 Myths of Solar Electricity, 2001, National Renewable Energy Lab, www.nrel.gov/;

30. Economics of Commercial BIPV
Building-Integrated Photovoltaics
Net Present Values (NPV), Benefit-Cost Ratios (BCR)
& Payback Periods (PBP) for ‘Architectural’ BIPV
(Thin Film, Wall-Mounted PV) in Beijing and
Shanghai (assuming a 15% Investment Tax Credit)
Material Economic
Beijing Shanghai
Replaced Measure
NPV ($) +$18,586 +$14,237
Polished BCR 2.33 2.14
Stone PBP (yrs) 1 1
NPV ($) +$15,373 +$11,024
BCR 1.89 1.70
Aluminum
PBP (yrs) 2 2
SunSlate Building-Integrated
Photovoltaics (BIPV) commercial
building in Switzerland
Byrne et al, Economics of Building Integrated PV in China, July 2001, Univ. of Delaware, Center for Energy and Environmental Policy, Twww.udel.edu/ceep/T]

31. Economics of Commercial BIPV
Reference costs of facade-cladding materials
BIPV is so economically attractive because it
captures both energy savings and savings from
displacing other expensive building materials.
Eiffert, P., Guidelines for the Economic Evaluation of Building-Integrated Photovoltaic Power Systems, International Energy Agency PVPS Task 7:
Photovoltaic Power Systems in the Built Environment, Jan. 2003, National Renewable Energy Lab, NREL/TP-550-31977, www.nrel.gov/

32. Commercial New Construction Green Building Feebate
Proposed policy for adoption by Portland, OR, Jan. 2009

33. Vehicle-to-Grid
Connecting the 1 TW Grid with the nearly 3 TW Vehicle fleet
Convergences & Emergences

34. Vehicle-to-Grid PHEVs
Electric vehicles with onboard battery storage
and bi-directional power flows could stabilize
large-scale (one-half of US electricity) wind power
with 3% of the fleet dedicated to regulation for
wind, plus 8–38% of the fleet providing operating
reserves or storage for wind.
Kempton, W and J. Tomic. (2005a). V2G implementation: From stabilizing the grid to supporting large-scale renewable energy. J.
Power Sources, 144, 280-294.

35. Pacific NW National Lab 2006 Analysis Summary
PHEVs w/ Current Grid Capacity
ENERGY POTENTIAL
U.S. existing electricity infrastructure has sufficient available capacity to fuel
84% of the nation’s cars, pickup trucks, and SUVs (198 million), or
73% of the light duty fleet (about 217 million vehicles) for a daily drive of 33
miles on average
ENERGY & NATIONAL SECURITY POTENTIAL
A shift from gasoline to PHEVs could reduce gasoline consumption by 85 billion
gallons per year, which is equivalent to 52% of U.S. oil imports (6.5 million
barrels per day).
OIL MONETARY SAVINGS POTENTIAL
~$240 billion per year in gas pump savings
AVOIDED EMISSIONS POTENTIAL (emissions ratio of electric to gas vehicle)
27% decline GHG emissions, 100% urban CO, 99% urban VOC, 90% urban NOx,
40% urban PM10, 80% SOx; BUT, 18% higher national PM10 & doubling of SOx
nationwide (from higher coal generation).
Source: Michael Kintner-Meyer, Kevin Schneider, Robert Pratt, Impacts Assessment of Plug-in Hybrid Vehicles on Electric Utilities and
Regional U.S. Power Grids, Part 1: Technical Analysis, Pacific Northwest National Laboratory, 01/07, www.pnl.gov/.

36. Area to Power 100% of U.S. Onroad Vehicles
Solar-battery
Wind turbines
ground footprint
Wind-battery
turbine spacing
Cellulosic ethanol
Corn ethanol
Wind & Solar experts
Solar-battery and Wind-battery refer to battery storage of these intermittent renewable
resources in plug-in electric driven vehicles
WEB CALCULATOR- VISUALIZER – COMPARISON OF LAND
NEEDED TO POWER VEHICLES
Mark Z. Jacobson, Wind Versus Biofuels for Addressing Climate, Health, and Energy, Atmosphere/Energy Program, Dept. of Civil & Environmental Engineering, Stanford University, March 5,
2007, http://www.stanford.edu/group/efmh/jacobson/E85vWindSol

37. Food, Fuel, Species
Tradeoffs?
By 2100, an additional 1700 million ha
of land may be required for
agriculture.
Combined with the 800 million ha of
additional land needed for medium
growth bioenergy scenarios, threatens
intact ecosystems and biodiversity-
rich habitats.

38. Global
Web Mesh

39. Gathering Data
& Harvesting
Collective
Intelligence

40. Global Wired Mesh Resources
http://www.shirky.com/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/
www.wikinomics.com/
The_Wealth_of_Networks
And incredible video at:
And incredible video at:
http://web2expo.blip.tv/file/
www.youtube.com/watc
855937/
h?v=NgYE75gkzkM

41. 5000 days ago Pre-Web
Pre-Commercial Internet

42. “the mostly read only Web” “the wildly read write Web”
collective
intelligence
published
content
published user user
content generated generated
content content
45 million global users 1 billion+ global users

43. The WIKIPEDIA MODEL:
In 6 years and with only 6 paid employees,
Catalyzed a value-adding creation now 10 times larger than
the Encyclopedia Britannica,
Growing, Updated, Corrected daily by 80,000 volunteer
editors and content authors,
Translating content into 150+ languages, and
Visited daily by some 5% of worldwide Internet traffic.

44. Clay Shirkey’s Cognitive Surplus
Large-scale distributed
work-force projects are
impractical in theory,
but doable in reality.
http://calacanis.com/2008/04/30/clay-shirky-cognitive-surplus-talk-at-web-2-0/
100 million hours to create Wikipedia – same as
hours Americans watch TV ads each weekend.
The Internet-connected population worldwide
watches roughly a trillion hours of TV a year.
www.shirky.com/herecomeseverybody/2008/04/lo
oking-for-the-mouse.html
One per cent of that is 100 Wikipedia projects per
year worth of peer participation.

45. Web3.0+
Semantically-linked RW web
Collective
1 trillion sites
intelligence
Smart Grid
published User generated
content content
3 billion global users
2010-2012

46. 5000 days ago Pre-Web
5000 days from now Global Cloud Network
Pre-Commercial Internet

47. Harnessing Collective Intelligence to:
Prevent Climate Catastrophe
Avert Mass Species Extinction
Promote Green Prosperity & Well-being

48. LEED Certified Green Buildings
GREEN BUILDING, Laura Ingall Commercial Green Building Manager, SF Environment

49. CA

51. Waste as Nutrient – Information Bitstream

53. Denver Neighborhood solar smart mini-grids – City Park West

54. Denver Neighborhood solar smart mini-grids – City Park West

55. Smart Grid Web-based Solar Power Auctions
Smart Grid Collective intelligence design based on digital map algorithms
continuously calculating solar gain. Information used to rank expansion of solar
panel locations.

56. 95% of U.S. terrestrial wind resources in Great Plains
Figures of Merit
Great Plains area
1,200,000 mi2
Provide 100% U.S. electricity
400,000 2MW wind turbines
Platform footprint
6 mi2
Large Wyoming Strip Mine
>6 mi2
Total Wind spacing area
37,500 mi2
Still available for farming
and prairie restoration
90%+ (34,000 mi2)
CO2 U.S. electricity sector
40%

57. Wind Farm Royalties – Could Double
farm/ranch income with 30x less land area
Although agriculture controls about
70% of Great Plains land area, it
contributes 4 to 8% of the Gross
Regional Product.
Wind farms could enable one of the
greatest economic booms in
American history for Great Plains
rural communities, while also
enabling one of world’s largest
restorations of native prairie
ecosystems
How?
The three sub-regions of the Great Plains are: Northern Great Plains = Montana, North Dakota,
South Dakota; Central Great Plains = Wyoming, Nebraska, Colorado, Kansas; Southern Great Plains
= Oklahoma, New Mexico, and Texas. (Source: U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis 1998, USDA 1997 Census of Agriculture)

58. Wind Royalties – Sustainable source of
Rural Farm and Ranch Income
US Farm Revenues per hectare
Crop revenue Govt. subsidy
Wind profits
non-wind farm
windpower farm
$0 $50 $100 $150 $200 $250
windpower farm non-wind farm
$0 $60
govt. subsidy
$200 $0
windpower royalty
$50 $64
farm commodity revenues
Williams, Robert, Nuclear and Alternative Energy Supply Options for an Environmentally Constrained World, April 9, 2001, http://www.nci.org/

59. Potential Synergisms
Two additional potential revenue streams in Great Plains:
1) Restoring the deep-rooting, native prairie grasslands that absorb and store soil
carbon and stop soil erosion (hence generating a potential revenue stream from
selling CO2 mitigation credits in the emerging global carbon trading market);
2) Re-introducing free-
ranging bison into these
prairie grasslands --
which naturally co-
evolved together for
millennia -- generating a
potential revenue stream
from marketing high-
value organic, free-range
beef.
Also More Resilient
to Climate-triggered
Droughts

60. Thank you !

61. StarApple
Mesh

62. Current Public R&D Priorities Do Not Represent
Customer-focused, Retail-driven Solutions
Retail-driven Scenario
Status Quo
USA Energy expenditures 1975-2000 2007-2030
• Lower energy
costs
• Lower price
DOE
$8 trillion
Environmental/
volatility
budget
losses price
$325
health
volatlity
• Lower
externalities
billion
$10+ trillion
2/3 Environmental
Dept of
efficiency & Health
Energy
$25 trillion solar, wind
externalities
energy costs biofuels
Military/
• Lower military
Security
4% for all & security
externalities
$10+ trillion
efficiency & 5%
externalities
all renewables
Outcomes Priorities Outcomes
Priorities
Oil industry High energy costs Consumers • Shift of capital from utility
Utility industry Volatile Prices Retailers sector to retail sector
Coal industry Security vulnerability Suppliers • Greening supply chain out
Natural gas industry Higher pollution levels Manufacturers of avoided utility costs
Nuclear industry Long-term environmental Natural resource • Tax-free reductions in air &
Large Hydro industry damage sector water pollution

63. A Decade of Immense Financial Loss,
Human Tragedy & Time Squandered