9 ms·

“Carbon Bombs” – Mapping key fossil fuel projects

111 points by julosflb 4y ago

nosianu 4y ago
Here is a pretty good Guardian article about the study, where I found this a few days ago: https://www.theguardian.com/environment/ng-interactive/2022/may/11/fossil-fuel-carbon-bombs-climate-breakdown-oil-gas https://www.theguardian.com/environment/ng-interactive/2022/... The study is linked at around the middle of the article. It has a few supporting articles at the bottom under "More on this story", for example one headlined "Climate chaos certain if oil and gas mega-projects go ahead, warns IEA chief"
paganel 4y ago
Of course that the West would label everything as a "carbon bomb" right now, i.e. everything that doesn't fit its socio-political biases. Labelling nuclear power-plants the same would be met with derision, even though in our day and age the price of energy and the price of "stuff" is pretty well correlated, and seeing as nuclear power-plants are pretty damn expensive then it means that's lots and lots of energy that has been "incorporated" into them. But because there's no black smoke getting out of those nuclear power-plants then it means it's all "in our heads" or something. The same goes for most of the subsidised "green" energy.
- NoraCodes 4y ago
  ...is the argument you're making here that somehow a nuclear plant or solar farm is somehow equally polluting as a coal-fired power plant? Everything costs time, materials, and money to produce, but only coal plants continue to actively pollute after construction...
  - shadowgovt 4y ago
    And regarding the type of pollution created, more radioactive material has been released into the atmosphere from the world's fleet of coal plants than the world's fleet of nuclear plants. That includes the two with significant containment breaching meltdowns. It turns out, when you burn a bunch of rocks, You release as gas all the stuff in those rocks.
- montalbano 4y ago
  If I understand correctly, what you're describing is often called 'embodied carbon' or 'embedded emissions' [0]. Many people spend their lives estimating embedded emissions and, more importantly, the time it will take for any emission-reducing technology (e.g. electric cars) to amortise away the CO2e emissions required to produce it. For instance, it's been estimated that a Tesla Model 3 "needs to be driven for 13,500 miles (21,725 km) before it does less harm to the environment than a Toyota Corolla" [1] [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Embedded_emissions https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Embedded_emissions [1] https://www.reuters.com/business/autos-transportation/lifetime-carbon-emissions-electric-vehicles-vs-gasoline-cars-2021-06-29/ https://www.reuters.com/business/autos-transportation/lifeti...
  - ben_w 4y ago
    > it's been estimated that a Tesla Model 3 "needs to be driven for 13,500 miles (21,725 km) before it does less harm to the environment than a Toyota Corolla" Huh, that’s a factor of 5-10 less miles than I was expecting. Good to know.
    - mrpopo 4y ago
      This also depends a lot on the electricity source mix that you're powering your car with today and in the next 10 years. As a matter of fact, electric cars would be more efficient than ICE cars even with a very high-carbon electricity mix, because thermal power plants are much more efficient than ICE engines (due to size + available cooling source), and the power transmission/battery/electric engines are optimized enough that they don't gobble all the efficiency gains. Electric cars are better CO2-wise, no question. But it will not reduce emissions enough. People who can afford not having a car should do so, and public authorities should develop public transportation. Of course, people who can't do so will be better off with an electric car, but environmentalists are worried that a push to full-electric will undermine needed efforts to reshape society towards a less energy-hungry world.
fny 4y ago
I hate to say it, but if energy prices keep rising this perspective is going to be disposed of rapidly. High energy prices mean rampant inflation and social unrest. With crude and natural gas prices skyrocketing, developing nations will again turn to coal as an energy source. Developed nations will return (see Germany) to coal as a heating source. Green energy will be thrown to the wayside for the sake of social stability give the tumult we've observed to this point. For the short run, there is unfortunately no viable alternative without enduring 5-10 years of pain. Over the long run, I hope we get more nuclear reactors online.
- Retric 4y ago
  Why would you spend more money on coal than you can spend on other options? Power companies aren’t building Wind/PV because it’s green they are building it because it’s cheap. Yes, higher inflation means higher interest rates, but it also means higher payments from customers over time.
  - shadowgovt 4y ago
    It's cheap and it's liberating. Once you go with solar or wind, you're actually harvesting the "fuel" at point of consumption, which completely changes your transportation story. They still need a transportation grid for repair and replacement parts, but that need is worlds away from the need of a coal plant supplied with continuous burnable fuel, or a natural gas plant at the end of a pipe. Renewables are a more flexible technology for a world of more change.
- matthewdgreen 4y ago
  You know what else causes social unrest? Starvation induced by crop failure. We’re already seeing the first signs with recent extreme weather and the megadrought. Wait just a short few years until it really gets moving.
  - downsidesabound 4y ago
    That too will cause social unrest, indeed. But we won’t suffer social unrest today just to make tomorrow easier, however wise that might be. We’ll kick the can.
hedora 4y ago
Is there a web accessible way to query projects by state / district? I'd like to reach out to local politicians about any local carbon bombs.
hettygreen 4y ago
The actual map: https://ars.els-cdn.com/content/image/1-s2.0-S0301421522001756-gr1_lrg.jpg https://ars.els-cdn.com/content/image/1-s2.0-S03014215220017...
CodeWriter23 4y ago
Funny how all these studies completely ignore methane emissions from abandoned wells.
- marcosdumay 4y ago
  Everybody seems to willfully ignore every kind of methane leakage on the fossil fuels production chain. But this one study is about projected growth, so old wells are really not the point.
qwertox 4y ago
I was interested in knowing the reason for Saudi Arabia's high emissions and found a site [0] which has information which could explain it a bit. Some information, like the one from Saudi Arabia, is relatively outdated (2018), but informative nonetheless. [0] https://www.climate-transparency.org/countries/africa/saudi-arabia https://www.climate-transparency.org/countries/africa/saudi-...

111 points by julosflb 4y ago

Here is a pretty good Guardian article about the study, where I found this a few days ago: https://www.theguardian.com/environment/ng-interactive/2022/may/11/fossil-fuel-carbon-bombs-climate-breakdown-oil-gas https://www.theguardian.com/environment/ng-interactive/2022/... The study is linked at around the middle of the article. It has a few supporting articles at the bottom under "More on this story", for example one headlined "Climate chaos certain if oil and gas mega-projects go ahead, warns IEA chief"

paganel 4y ago

Of course that the West would label everything as a "carbon bomb" right now, i.e. everything that doesn't fit its socio-political biases. Labelling nuclear power-plants the same would be met with derision, even though in our day and age the price of energy and the price of "stuff" is pretty well correlated, and seeing as nuclear power-plants are pretty damn expensive then it means that's lots and lots of energy that has been "incorporated" into them. But because there's no black smoke getting out of those nuclear power-plants then it means it's all "in our heads" or something. The same goes for most of the subsidised "green" energy.

NoraCodes 4y ago
...is the argument you're making here that somehow a nuclear plant or solar farm is somehow equally polluting as a coal-fired power plant? Everything costs time, materials, and money to produce, but only coal plants continue to actively pollute after construction...
- shadowgovt 4y ago
  And regarding the type of pollution created, more radioactive material has been released into the atmosphere from the world's fleet of coal plants than the world's fleet of nuclear plants. That includes the two with significant containment breaching meltdowns. It turns out, when you burn a bunch of rocks, You release as gas all the stuff in those rocks.
montalbano 4y ago
If I understand correctly, what you're describing is often called 'embodied carbon' or 'embedded emissions' [0]. Many people spend their lives estimating embedded emissions and, more importantly, the time it will take for any emission-reducing technology (e.g. electric cars) to amortise away the CO2e emissions required to produce it. For instance, it's been estimated that a Tesla Model 3 "needs to be driven for 13,500 miles (21,725 km) before it does less harm to the environment than a Toyota Corolla" [1] [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Embedded_emissions https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Embedded_emissions [1] https://www.reuters.com/business/autos-transportation/lifetime-carbon-emissions-electric-vehicles-vs-gasoline-cars-2021-06-29/ https://www.reuters.com/business/autos-transportation/lifeti...
- ben_w 4y ago
  > it's been estimated that a Tesla Model 3 "needs to be driven for 13,500 miles (21,725 km) before it does less harm to the environment than a Toyota Corolla" Huh, that’s a factor of 5-10 less miles than I was expecting. Good to know.
  - mrpopo 4y ago
    This also depends a lot on the electricity source mix that you're powering your car with today and in the next 10 years. As a matter of fact, electric cars would be more efficient than ICE cars even with a very high-carbon electricity mix, because thermal power plants are much more efficient than ICE engines (due to size + available cooling source), and the power transmission/battery/electric engines are optimized enough that they don't gobble all the efficiency gains. Electric cars are better CO2-wise, no question. But it will not reduce emissions enough. People who can afford not having a car should do so, and public authorities should develop public transportation. Of course, people who can't do so will be better off with an electric car, but environmentalists are worried that a push to full-electric will undermine needed efforts to reshape society towards a less energy-hungry world.

fny 4y ago

I hate to say it, but if energy prices keep rising this perspective is going to be disposed of rapidly. High energy prices mean rampant inflation and social unrest. With crude and natural gas prices skyrocketing, developing nations will again turn to coal as an energy source. Developed nations will return (see Germany) to coal as a heating source. Green energy will be thrown to the wayside for the sake of social stability give the tumult we've observed to this point. For the short run, there is unfortunately no viable alternative without enduring 5-10 years of pain. Over the long run, I hope we get more nuclear reactors online.

Retric 4y ago
Why would you spend more money on coal than you can spend on other options? Power companies aren’t building Wind/PV because it’s green they are building it because it’s cheap. Yes, higher inflation means higher interest rates, but it also means higher payments from customers over time.
- shadowgovt 4y ago
  It's cheap and it's liberating. Once you go with solar or wind, you're actually harvesting the "fuel" at point of consumption, which completely changes your transportation story. They still need a transportation grid for repair and replacement parts, but that need is worlds away from the need of a coal plant supplied with continuous burnable fuel, or a natural gas plant at the end of a pipe. Renewables are a more flexible technology for a world of more change.
matthewdgreen 4y ago
You know what else causes social unrest? Starvation induced by crop failure. We’re already seeing the first signs with recent extreme weather and the megadrought. Wait just a short few years until it really gets moving.
- downsidesabound 4y ago
  That too will cause social unrest, indeed. But we won’t suffer social unrest today just to make tomorrow easier, however wise that might be. We’ll kick the can.

hedora 4y ago

Is there a web accessible way to query projects by state / district? I'd like to reach out to local politicians about any local carbon bombs.

hettygreen 4y ago

The actual map: https://ars.els-cdn.com/content/image/1-s2.0-S0301421522001756-gr1_lrg.jpg https://ars.els-cdn.com/content/image/1-s2.0-S03014215220017...

CodeWriter23 4y ago

Funny how all these studies completely ignore methane emissions from abandoned wells.

marcosdumay 4y ago
Everybody seems to willfully ignore every kind of methane leakage on the fossil fuels production chain. But this one study is about projected growth, so old wells are really not the point.

qwertox 4y ago

I was interested in knowing the reason for Saudi Arabia's high emissions and found a site [0] which has information which could explain it a bit. Some information, like the one from Saudi Arabia, is relatively outdated (2018), but informative nonetheless. [0] https://www.climate-transparency.org/countries/africa/saudi-arabia https://www.climate-transparency.org/countries/africa/saudi-...