Notes

The ‘Clean Air Act,’ 1990
50% reduction of SO2 in 1980s could prevented 17000 death per year
•$24 million annual value of recreational fishing, $800 million timer, $700 million crop grains
•Acid-resistant paints on new automobiles with an extra costs of 5-6$

Ways to Correcting Market Failure
How can the inefficiency be remedied?
• An emission standard: legal limit to emission
• An emission fee: charge levied from each firm
• Tradeable emissions permits
• Recycling (‘Regulating multiple solid wastes’
//////////////////
- Club of Rome, “Limits to Growth”, 1972
- 1985: A hole found in Ozone Layer
- USA might have double per capita Carbon dioxide emission than China but China has 4 times more population! So ain’t the developing nations doubly irresponsible?

That is why Kyoto Protocol, 2005 (reduce emissions by 5% of the 1990 levels for developed nations in 5 years). Emerging economies were given more time.
Paris Agreement, 2015: Individual nations set their own plans. Goal: Restrain global warming to 2 C from industrial revolution era.

Senior Bush did not attend the Earth Summit.
Junior Bush walked out of the Kyoto Protocol.
Trump withdrew from Paris agreement.

Positive American Politics:
Al Gore in Clinton’s government
Obama
Biden

Montreal Protocol 1987 sought to reduce the emissions of CFCs: 50% reduction in 11 years.

Lack of access to clean water and sanitation: 15% of deaths among children under the age of 5 (about 3 lakhs) due to diarrhea.

- Polluted air => chronic respiratory diseases and cancer
- Too much lead in the air due to vehicular pollution leads to loss of some IQ

//////////////////
The three steps in short: Awareness and Acceptance → Intention → Problem Solution

What Is Permafrost?
Permafrost is any ground that remains completely frozen—32°F (0°C) or colder—for at least two years straight. These permanently frozen grounds are most common in regions with high mountains and in Earth’s higher latitudes—near the North and South Poles.

- New layers compress lower layers into ice, but still tiny air bubbles remain, even thousands of meters deep into glacial ice. Each bubble is a tiny sample of the atmosphere at the time that snow fell.
- We learn about ancient temperatures by comparing oxygen isotopes (atoms of different mass) in these air samples.
– In cold years, water molecules containing slightly lighter oxygen atoms evaporate more easily than water with slightly heavier atoms. By comparing the proportions of heavier and lighter oxygen atoms, climatologists can reconstruct temperatures over time

As the temperature increases, the peak of the emissions spectrum as a function of the wavelength moves toward left, i.e., the peak occurs at lower wavelengths

Wien’s Displacement Law: 𝜆max = 2897/T 𝜇𝑚, where 𝑇 is the temperature in Kelvin

Stefan-Boltzmann Equation:
P/a = 𝜎𝑇^4 (sigma*T^4)
where, P/a is the power emitted per unit surface area (power emitted in Watts)
𝜎(sigma) = 5.67× 10^−8 W(m^-2)(K^-4)

Sun generates a power of PSUN = 3.8×1026 Watts
Earth is at a distance of Re,s = 150 million km from the Sun

T^4 = (S(1-a)(n+1))/4*sigma, where
a=alpha = albedo (The Earth’s albedo 𝛼 = 0.3, i.e., a fraction 1 − 𝛼 of the incident photons are absorbed by the Earth)
n=The number of layers 𝑛 represents the amount of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere

GtC: Giga-tonnes of Carbon

Approximate cycling times of the carbon molecule:
• Land biosphere = 20 years
• Mixed layer of the ocean (upper 100 meters)= 5 to 6 years
• Deep ocean = 371 years
• Atmosphere-land-ocean biosphere to/from the rock reservoir: 424140.1= 424,140 years


/////////////////////////////////
Celestial Equator, Celestial North Pole (CNP) and Celestial South Pole (CSP)
– These are extensions of the Earth’s equatorial plane, and the Earth’s NP and SP in the imaginary sphere in the outer sky surrounding the Earth
• Ecliptic – The plane in which the Sun appears to be orbiting around the Earth
• Curious Observation 2: – The angle 𝜀 between the celestial equator and the ecliptic equals the angle 𝜃𝑇 = 23.5

Direct Ray of Sun (DRS)
Oblique Ray of Sun (ORS)
East-North-Up (ENU) coordinate system

- DRS remains focused on the surface of the Earth and transfers a high packet of energy

*Solar irradiance* is the power per unit area received from the Sun in the form of electromagnetic radiation as measured in the wavelength range of the measuring instrument. The solar irradiance is measured in watt per square metre (W/m2) in SI units.

Vernal Equinox: 21st March -> Sun positioned on the Earth’s equatorial plane; the DRS is received on the equator
Summer Solstice: 21st June -> Sun positioned at the highest point on its orbit around the Earth – the DRS is received at the Tropic of Cancer
Autumn Equinox: 21st September -> Sun positioned on the Earth’s equatorial plane; the DRS is received on the equator
Winter Solstice: 21st December -> Sun positioned at the lowest point on its orbit around the Earth; – The DRS is received at the Tropic of Capricorn


Methane produced by
1. livestock (cattle, goats, sheep, whose digestive systems produce methane which gets released into the atmosphere by both the ends of the animal)
2. Bacterial processes in the landfills and other waste dumps
3. Emissions from rice farms (again through bacterial processes)
4. From petrochemical industry, natural gas wells, geological coal mines
5. Burning of forests and other biomass at insufficient temperature


Radiative Forcing (RF) is defined as the change in 𝐸𝑖𝑛 − 𝐸𝑜𝑢𝑡. Denote the delta change by the symbol ∆.
• 𝑅𝐹 = ∆ 𝐸𝑖𝑛 − 𝐸𝑜𝑢𝑡 = ∆𝐸𝑖𝑛 − ∆𝐸𝑜𝑢
E -> energy received from sun to particular planet


Biomass energy
– Ethanol – a corn-based fuel – is already used in the Western countries
– The corn uses photosynthesis to grow, which takes 𝐶𝑂2 out from the atmosphere, which would be released
back to the atmosphere when this biofuel is burnt, thereby causing no net surplus of the greenhouse gases
– Problems: agricultural land area requirement would become massive if adopted on a large scale. Also, this can
cause the food shortages. Finally, the supplementary processes may make this a non-net-zero emission
technique

Carbon Capture and Storage (CCS)
– Current technology can capture nearly 80 to 90% of the generated 𝐶𝑂2 by, say, a coal-fired plant
– However, this technology still is not deployed on a mass scale and it is an expensive technology that can
raise the cost of electricity

Several other technologies:
• Solar Radiation Management (increase the Earth’s Albedo by injecting Sulphur compounds in the air)
• 𝐶𝑂2 removal from the air: direct air capture or DAC

Atantic Meridian Overturn Circulation (AMOC),