Ian Foster

McKinsey Report on Emissions Reduction

A report released by McKinsey, Reducing U.S. Greenhouse Gas Emissions: How Much at What Cost?, concludes that the United States could cut its projected 2030 greenhouse gas emissions by 33% to 50% at modest cost, using energy efficiency and other proven, on-the-shelf technologies. As much as 40 percent of the emission reductions could result from policy measures that more than pay for themselves over their lifetimes.

In one of the report's more notable findings, aggressive application of energy efficiency technology in new and existing homes and commercial buildings could eliminate the need for 80 percent of new electricity generation that would be required to meet new demand in 2030 under a business-as-usual scenario in which no new efficiency improvements are made.

Interestingly, of the many emission reduction methods considered, hybrid cars are by far the most expensive.

Nobel Peace Prize and the Grid

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) and Al Gore have been awarded the Nobel Peace Prize.

A perhaps underappreciated aspect of this award is that (as I have noted previously) the climate model simulation data that underpinned the IPCC analysis was made available to the international community via the Earth System Grid, which itself uses (among other things) Globus software. Thus the Grid and Globus communities could (if they were less modest) claim a tiny little bit of credit for that prize.

The next phase of IPCC will require the analysis of far more data than in the current round, as models become yet more sophisticated and more scenarios are run. The next phase of Earth System Grid will feature a more decentralized, federated structure to enable this analysis.

Back from Africa; CO2 is a pollutant

I returned from South Africa on Sunday. A wonderful trip. More to say later.

Meanwhile a significant development on the climate change front: The US Supreme Court ruled today that "the Environmental Protection Agency has the authority to regulate carbon dioxide from automobile emissions, and has shirked its duty in not doing so." This was in a case brought by Massachusetts and other states. Justice Paul Stevens argued: "E.P.A.'s steadfast refusal to regulate greenhouse gas emissions presents a risk of harm to Massachusetts that is both 'actual' and 'imminent.'"