Abstract
Combinations of efficient use of energy (EUE) and renewable energy sources (RES) can contribute to finding solutions (S) to problems of large-scale environmental change. Therefore, developing technological existence proofs of solutions to the “energy equation”, EUE+RES →S, is important. However, for solutions to be viable a wide range of non-technical issues has to be addressed, such as perceptions of the modus operandi of natural systems, risk-philosophy aspects, cultural acceptability of large-scale ecological engineering, and obstacles in the process of linking science with policy. In particular, awareness and management of the above facets and tensions will grow increasingly important as interest in harnessing qualities of natural systems expands. This paper briefly explores and exemplifies some of these aspects, in certain cases drawing on challenges and opportunities facing environmental and energy systems in Sweden.
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Notes and References
Cf.,e.g., the Brundtland Report statement “Those looking for success and signs of hope can find many: Infant mortality is falling; human life expextancy is increasing; But the same processes that have produced these gains have given rise to trends that the planet can no longer bear.” (The World Commission on Environment and Development (1987) Our Common Future, Oxford University Press, Oxford.) Earlier energy demand scenarios for the year 2020, published in the early 1980s, have been countered by other energy analysts with statements such as: “Meeting the global demand levels projected in the IIASA [International Istitute of Applied Systems Analysis] and WEC [World Energy Conference] studies would require monumental effects to expand energy supplies” cf. Goldemberg J., Johansson T.B., Reddy A. K.N. and Williams R.H. (1987) [Energy for a Sustainable World, World Resources Institute, Washington], who also detail some of “hidden costs of conventional energy”, such as global insecurity, Middle-East Oil supplies in times of crisis, global climatic change and fossil fuel use, linkages between nuclear weapons proliferation and nuclear power. As for the ongoing debate related to whether or not there is consensus with respect to scientific issues in the work in the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) (cf. IPCC Policymakers Summary of the Scientific Assessment of Climate Change, Report Prepared for IPCC by Working Group I, June 1990)
see, e.g., Kerr R.A. (1990) New greenhouse report puts down dissenters, Science 249, 481–482 and the subsequent responses from R.S. Lindzen, W.A. Nierenberg, and A.R. Solow, in turn responded to by R.A. Kerr (Science 249, 1093–1094)].
Cf.,e.g.: “most ‘future’ studies postulate smooth trends or equilibrium conditions in interactions between development and environment and then seek to identify likely, possible, or even optimal ways to alter them. But history shows that discontinuities, thresholds, and — more generally — surprises are more the rule than the exception in such interactions, exerting a major influence on their outcome” see Toth F.L., Hizsnyik E. and Clark W.C. (1989), Scenarios of Socioeconomic Development for Studies of Global Environmental Change, International Institute of Applied Systems Analysis, RR-89–4, June 1989. Also: “The centerpiece of an international agreement to protect the world’s climate should be a global budget for cumulative carbon releases between now and 2100.
This budget should be based on a policy of risk minimization” Krause F., Bach W. and Koomey J. (1990) Energy Policy in the Greenhouse — from Warming Fate to Warming Limit, Earthscan Publications Ltd, London.
For instance, whether or not somewhere in the far-distant future there could exist a new global equilibrium climate (resulting from an anthropogenic contribution to the greenhouse effect) with overall favourable implications for humankind is not a pertinent issue. This is because the path towards such potential global climates, i.e. the rate of change and the consequences of the rate of change (including changes in the magnitude and frequency of extreme events), is what matters. Global climate change due to alterations of atmospheric properties involves a time-constant of around 100 years (cf., e.g., U.S. National Academy of Sciences (1975), Understanding Climate Change — a Program for Action; Washington D.C.; p. 22). One century also corresponds to about one or two generations of human beings, or of trees.
Such as acidification, changing climate mechanisms and patterns, threatened biotopes and species fundamental to man.
For an account of this controversy [involving, among other things the role of oceanic dimethylsulphide-releasing plankton in climate regulation, and the so-called Gaia or geophysiology hypothesis] cf., e.g., Wiman B.L.B. (1991) Implications of environmental complexity for science and policy, Global Environmental Change (accepted).
Also: Wiman B.L.B., Unsworth M.H., Lindberg S.E., Bergkvist B., Jaenicke R. and Hansson H.-C. (1990) Perspectives on aerosol deposition to natural surfaces: interactions between aerosol residence times, removal processes, the biosphere and global environmental change, Journal of Aerosol Science 21, 3, 313–338.
The term “stability” domain is used here to indicate the capability of a system to withstand stress; if stress exceeds this capacity, with respect to absolute magnitude and/or with respect to the rate at which it is applied onto the system, the system will be forced into a new behaviour. As an example, given certain combinations of sunlight, hydrocarbons and nitrogen oxides, not only will smog be switched on but new atmospheric-chemical pathways will also be initiated. The underlying definitions of “stability” in systems theory are dealt with in, e.g., Wiman B.L.B. and Holst J. (1982) Ekologisk tolerans [Ecological Tolerance]; the Swedish Committee on Natural Resources and the Environment, Swedish Ministry of Agriculture, Stockholm (in Swedish); cf. also Wiman B.L.B. (1991), op. cit., Ref 5.
Cf, e.g., Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change: Policymakers Summary of the Formulation of Response Strategies. Report prepared for IPCC by Working Group III, June 1990; WMO/UNEP.
Cf., e.g., Hammond K.R., Mumpower J., Dennis R.L., Fitch S. and Crumpacker W. (1983) Fundamental obstacles to the use of scientific information in public policy making. Technological Forecasting and Social Change 24, 287–297.
A comparison between the following two approaches (“hard” versus “soft”) to the implications of surprising behaviour of systems is instructive: Holling C.S. (1986) The resilience of terrestrial ecosystems: local surprise and global change, in W.C. Clark and R.E. Munn (eds.) (1983) Sustainable Development of the Biosphere, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, pp. 292–317;
Brooks H. (1986) The typology of surprises in technology, institutions, and development, in W.C. Clark and R.E. Munn (eds.) (1986) Sustainable Development of the Biosphere, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, pp. 324–346.
Cf. Wiman I.M.B. (1990) Expecting the unexpected — some ancient roots to current perceptions of Nature, Ambio 19, 62–69.
Also: Schwarz M. and Thompson M. (1990) Divided We Stand. Redefining Politics, Technology and Social Choice, Harvester Wheatsheaf, New York.
See, e.g., Kerr R.A. (1989) Hansen vs. the world on the greenhouse threat. Science 244, 1041–1043.
See, e.g., Stavins R.N. (1989) Harnessing market forces to protect the environment. Environment 31, 4–7.
Cf., e.g., Wiman I.M.B. (1990), op. cit., Ref 10; Holling C.S. (1986); op. cit., Ref 9; Schwarz M. and Thompson M. (1990), op. cit., Ref 10.
Safe fail can be conceived as a strategy allowing for soft-landing if unpleasant surprise and failure occur; this in contrast to fail-safe, invoking the idea that a system could be designed so as to prevent any failure or surprise to happen. As an example, consider the implications of responding the climate challenge through “engineering the unknown — i.e. Nature — out of the equation” cf. Holling C.S. and Clark W.C. (1975) Notes towards a science of ecological management, in W.H. van Dobben and R.H. Lowe-McConnell (eds.) (1975) Unifying Concepts in Ecology, Dr W. Junk B.V. Publishers, The Hague.
Cf. Toth F.L., Hizsnyik E. and Clark W.C. (1989), op. cit., Ref 2.
The concept of “available futures” does not imply any deterministic statement; rather, if one takes the view that there is sufficient scientific rationale for decelerating the rate of global warming it follows that within a given time-span there will exist a maximum global temperature regime to comply with. Compare the statement: “What kind of planet do we want? What kind of planet can we get?” Clark W.C: (1989) Managing planet Earth, Scientific American, September 1989, 19–26.
Whether or not anthropogenically driven global warming is already occurring is, in a sense, of little consequence to the indisputable fact that major scientific, policy, and public concerns and debate have, indeed, changed the old environmental agenda into a fundamentally new one. Therefore, the climate-change era is here in at least a psychological sense. Cf. also the following statement: “We are certain of the following: there is a natural greenhouse effect which already keeps the Earth warmer that it would otherwise be; emissions resulting from human activities are substantially increasing the atmospheric concentrations of the greenhouse gases These increases will enhance the greenhouse effect, resulting on average in an additional warming of the Earth’s surface. The main greenhouse gas, water vapour, will increase in response to global warming and further enhance it.” IPCC Policymakers Summary of the Scientific Assessment of Climate Change, Report Prepared for IPCC by Working Group I, June 1990.
World Commission on Environment and Development (1987); op. cit., Ref 1.
For a discussion, see, e.g., Lele S.M. (1989) Sustainable Development — a critical review, submitted to World Development.
Also: Svedin U. (1987) The challenge of sustainability — the search for a dynamic relationship between ecosystem, social and economic factors, Contribution to the International Workshop on Ecological Sustainability of Regional Development, Vilnius, USSR, June 22–26, 1987.
See, e.g., Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (1990) Policymakers Summary of the Scientific Assessment of Climate Change, Report prepared for IPCC by Working Group I, June 1; Krause F., Bach W. and Koomey J. (1990), op. cit., Ref 2;
Lashof D. A. and Ahuja D.R. (1990) Relative contributions of greenhouse gas emissions to global warming, Nature 344, 529–531;
Ramanathan V., Cicerone R.J., Singh H.B. and Kiehl J.T. (1985) Trace gas trends and their potential role in climate change, Journal of Geophysical Research, Vol 90, No D3, 5547–5566.
These are mainly the greenhouse gases: water vapour, carbon dioxide, methane, chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs), a number of the substitutes for CFCs, and nitrous oxide. To this should be added intricate greenhouse effects of tropospheric ozone, of carbon monoxide, and of stratospheric ozone. Further, the contribution of aerosols should not escape notice, although their net effect on global albedo reamins an open question; cf., e.g., Wiman et al. (1990), op. cit., Ref 5; and Hansen J.E. and Lacis A.A. (1990) Sun and dust versus greenhouse gases: an assessment of their relative roles in global climate change. Nature 346, 713–719.
Including due consideration of life-times, warming potential per molecule, or per kg, and other pertinent factors; cf. Lashof D.A. and Ahuja D.R. (1990); op. cit., Ref 20.
Lashof D.A. and Tirpak D.A. (eds.) (1989) Policy Options for Stabilizing Global Climate, U.S. Environment Protection Agency, Washington D.C.
Also: Trexler M.C., Mintzer I.M. and Moomaw W.R. (1990) Global warming: an assessment of its scientific basis, its likely impacts, and potential response strategies, Background Paper no. 6 to the Workshop on the Economics of Sustainable Development, Washington, DC, January 23–26, 1990.
See the Appendix.
See, e.g., Bodlund B., Mills E., Karlsson and Johansson T.B. (1989) The challenge of choices: technology options for the Swedish electricity sector, in T.B. Johansson, B. Bodlund and R.H. Williams (eds.) (1990) Electricity: Efficient End-Use and New Generation Technologies, and Their Planning Implications, Lund University Press, Lund, 883–947
Cf. The Federal Environment Agency (1989) Responsibility Means Doing Without, (Umweltbundes Amt), Berlin August 1989.
This is not necessarily a value-laden assumption. Currently, much less effort is devoted to analysing the constraints and opportunities for the solar option than is directed towards researching the nuclear options. The aspect of combining various measures to manage the environmental dilemmas is exemplified by, e.g., “Living in the greenhouse”, The Economist, March 11, 1989; 97–100.
Controlled fusion as an energy source can hardly be expected to contribute to commercial energy supply within the time-frame where response to minimizing risks for climate change is needed, and is therefore excluded from this particulardiscussion on the energy equation.
For fission to earn a significant and global place in the equation a number of breakthroughs with respect to public, security and environmental acceptability probably must first occur, such as for: inherently-safe reactor technology, proliferation-resistant fuel cycles, fully-viable waste management technology, diversion-resistant institutional demands and criteria. Opinions differ as to whether such breakthroughs will occur, and if so, when (cf., e.g., Haefele W. (1990) Energy from nuclear power, Scientific American, September 1990;
Williams R.H. and Feiveson H.A. (1990) Diversion-resistance criteria for future nuclear power, Energy Policy July/August 1990). It may be observed that global annual nuclear grid connections are rapidly decreasing (from about 31 GW in 1985 to about 12 GW in 1989/90) [IAEA: Nuclear Power Reactors in the World, 1989]. The present geopolitical situation, and the ongoing debate on the future of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, in particular highlight the proliferation aspects [cf. “NPT in serious trouble”, Nature 347, 213–214]. Further, following the 1980 referendum in Sweden on the future role of nuclear power in the Swedish energy system the parliament decided that nuclear power be phased out by the year 2010; the time-profile for the phase-out has, however, not been settled. These and other observations would make it reasonable to exclude also fission from this particular discussion of the global energy equation. Nation-specific characteristics of the equation may differ, of course.
Which degree of consensus should be the relevant guideline is, of course, in itself an issue subject to debate. Dissenting attitudes must never be overlooked as they can be the first indicators of paradigmatic shifts being on their way; cf., e.g., Wiman B.L.B. (1988) Att vidmakthdlla naturresurserna [Maintaining Natural Resources], Allmänna Förlaget and Institute for Futures Studies, Stockholm.
Cf. Weinberg C.J. and Williams R.H. (1990) Energy from the sun. Scientific American, September 1990.
Wiman I.M.B. (1990) Expecting the unexpected — some ancient roots to current perceptions of Nature, Ambio 19, 62–69.
Wiman B.L.B. (1990) Natur under päverkan: Gaia eller Kaos? [Nature under stress — gaian or chaotic response?] In L.J. Lundgren (ed.) (1990) Vad tåil naturen? [Tolerance limits of Nature]. Swedish Environment Protection Board, Report 3738, Stockholm; pp. 13–42 (in Swedish; extended summary in English]; see also Wiman B.L.B. (1991), op cit, Ref 5.
See, e.g., Schwarz M. and Thompson M. (1990) Divided We Stand. Redefining Politics, Technology and Social Choice. Harvester Wheatsheaf, New York.
Odum E.P. (1962) Relationships between structure and function in the ecosystem. Japanese Journal of Ecology 12, 3, 108–119.
Cf. Wiman I.M.B. (1990); op. cit., Ref 10.
Cf. note 5.
Cf. note 6 on the stability-domain concept.
For an account, cf., e.g., Wiman B.L.B. (1991); op. cit., Ref 5.
Steven E. Lindberg, Oak Ridge National Laboratory, U.S.A. (personal communication).
Cf. Jäger et al. (1988) Developing Policies for Responding to Climatic Change. WMO/TD-No. 225; WMO/UNEP. Note that Jäger et al. state the that the choice of such targets as a temperature change less than a given value per decade “would be based on observed historic rates of change that did not put stress on the environmment or society”. One might add that such a concept will have to be scrutinized from a far-reaching assessment of the Man-Nature relationships because ecological systems will not move as units if climate regimes change sufficiently rapidly. Instead, the set-up of the systems will change with respect to species distribution, food-webs, energy chains, hydrology, etc. — that is, with major alterations with regard to, for instance, renewable resources (such as biomass, hydro-power, wind power). Whether human societies can cope with rapid climate changes is thus not only a question of the vulnerability of societal infrastructures to the merely physical manifestations of climate change (settlements endangered by sea-level rise, etc.) but also a question of whether a changing composition of ecological systems disrupts the linkages between societies and their dependency on those systems. Moreover, globally oriented targets of the above type could look very differently when they are translated to regional sensistivity to the rate of change.
It is of interest in this context to note how the scientific community chose to address this type of uncertainty-management already two decades ago when — as we now know — there were substantially less data and insight with respect to climate change: “We attach great importance to the identification of the appropriate international forums in which there can be a continuing assessment of those activities of man which may have a serious impact globally or in large geographic regions. Through these forums agreements should be sought for common national policies and programs that will avoid or reduce the impacts which may jeopardize the globe or large regions.” (Emphasis added) (Inadvertant Climate Modification. Report of the Study of Man’s Impact on Climate (SMIC), Sponsored by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, hosted by the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences and the Royal Swedish Academy of Engineering Sciences; the MIT Press, Cambridge, Massachusetts, 1971.)
Goldemberg et al. (1988); op. cit., Ref 1.
Bodlund B. et al. (1989); op. cit., Ref 25. Cf. also Buderi R. (1990) Utilities see the green light, Nature 343, 399.
Goldemberg J., Johansson T.B., Reddy A.K.N. and Williams R.H. (1985) Basic needs and much more, with one kilowatt per capita. Ambio 14, 4–5, 190–200.
Cf., e.g., Kahane A. (1989) Conference report: Sweden’s energy path. Energy Policy, December 1989.
Cf., e.g., Goldemberg et al. (1988), op. cit., Ref 1; Fickett A.P., Gellings C.W. and Lovins A.B. (1990) Efficient use of electricity, Scientific American, September 1990.
Goldemberg et al., (1988); op. cit., Ref 1. See also Bodlund et al. (1989); op. cit., Ref 25.
Evan Mills, Department of Environmental and Energy Systems Studies; personal communication; see also Mills E. (1990) Sweden’s acid test: planning for economic growth, the nuclear phase-out, and reduced CO2 emissions. Invited paper for Enhancing Electricity’s Value to Society, Canadian Electrical Association, Toronto, Canada, October 22–24,1990.
Bodlund et al. (1989); op. cit., Ref 25.
The term carbon implies carbon equivalents. This puts, implicitly, a strong constraint on the supply strategies. For instance, energy forests managed through high-level nitrogen fertilization would be geared to nitrous oxide emissions potentially offsetting some part of the gain in CO2 reductions in the supply mix.
It should be noted that freezing CO2 emissions can only be a first step for Sweden in meeting the challenge by the Working Group I of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC WG I, June 1990, op. cit.); stating that: “the longlived gases would require immediate reductions in emissions from human activities of over 60% to stabilise their concentrations at today’s levels; methane would require a 15–20% reduction”. (Note, that stabilizing the concentrations of greenhouse gases does not imply climate stabilization.) Cf. also Kelly M. (1990) Halting global warming. In J. Legget (1990) Global Warming. The Greenpeace Report. Oxford University Press, Oxford; pp. 83–112.
Wright D.H. (1990) Human impacts on energy flow through natural ecosystems. Ambio 19, 189–194.
See, e.g., Reaid W.V. and Miller K.R. (1989) Keeping Options Alive. World Resources Institute, Washington D.C.
E.G., Sedjo R.A: (1989) Forests — a tool to moderate global warming? Environment 31, 1, 15–20. Consult also the appendix going into some detail on this point.
Wiman et al. (1990); op. cit., Ref 5.
CF. Weinberger C.J. and Williams R.H. (1990); op. cit., Ref 29.
Cf., e.g., Wiman I.M.B. (1990); op. cit., Ref 10.
Cf., e.g., Winterbottom R. and Hazlewood P.T. (1987) Agroforestry and sustainable development: making the connection. Ambio 16, 100–110.
The Board of Science and Technology for International Development (BOSTID), linked to the US NAS has recently produced a set of papers on the theme “tools for fixing a broken planet”.
Cf. “The vanishing jungle”, The Economist, October 15, 1988; 25–28.
Cf. Wiman I.M.B. (1990); op. cit., Ref 10.
Hughes J.D. (1975) Ecology in Ancient Civilizations. University of New Mexico Press, Albuquerque.
In order to get an idea of the current technical limitations (i.e. regardless of cultural, ecological, economic and other constraints, including climate modifications that could be induced) in harnessing the “prodigious” rate of solar input to the Earth’s atmosphere consider the following thought experiment. The area of the Saharan desert is around 5⋅108 hectare. If used for a photovoltaic power plant this area could generate around 100 TW, or about a ten times the current output from anthropogenic energy systems but only a very minor fraction (less than 0.06%) of the solar energy input to the atmosphere.
This comparison (14% versus 75%) is not wholly compatible, however; a major fraction of Sweden’s use of domestic energy sources relates to digester liquors and refuse, with only a small fraction emanating from direct input of energy from wood fuels.
Houghton R.A. (1990) The future role of tropical forests in affecting the carbon dioxide concentration of the atmosphere. Ambio 19, 204–209.
Firor J. (1988) Public policy and the airborne fraction. Climatic Change 12, 103–105. (Guest Editorial) In particular (according to Firor’s idea) the “helping hand” offered by the physicochemical absorption of CO2 by the oceans should be studied much more closely. One point in Firor’s reasoning is that his concept will only work for low excess-carbon concentrations in the atmosphere (the relative oceanic sink rate for carbon diminishes with increasing atmospheric CO2-concentrations). He therefore concludes that “negative fossil fuel growth scenarios should be carefully studied both by those who model the carbon cycle and those who are concerned with policy analysis.”
For instance, as an order-of-magnitude exercise, assuming a 25% efficient solar panel, about 4 to 5 square meters would suffice to provide the domestic, electrical needs (excluding space heating) of an average Swedish household per year.
Cf., e.g., Akbari H., Huang J., Martien P., Rainer L., Rosenfeld A., and Taha H. (1988) The impact of summer heat islands on cooling energy consumption and global CO2 concentration. Paper presented at the ACEEE Summer Study on Energy Efficiency in Buildings, Asilomar CA, August 1988.
Krause F., Bach W. and Koomey J. (1990) Energy Policy in the Greenhouse. From warming Fate to Warming Limit. Earthscan Publications Ltd, London.
Cf., e.g., Nilsson J. and Grennfelt P. (eds.)(1988) Critical Loads for Sulphur and Nitrogen. UNECE and the Nordic Council of Ministers.
Cf. Goodman G.T. (1987) Biomass energy in developing countries: problems and challenges. Ambio 16, 111–119.
Cf. Holling C.S. (1986); op. cit., Ref 9.
Cf., e.g., Toth F.L. (1988) Policy exercises. Objectives and design elements. Simulation and Games 109, 235–255.
Cf., e.g., Hammond K.R., Mumpower J., Dennis R.L., Fitch S. and Crumpacker W. (1983) Fundamental obstacles to the use of scientific information in public policy making. Technological Forecasting and Social Change 24, 287–297.
See, e.g., Hendersson-Sellers A. (1990) Australian public perception of the greenhouse issue. Climatic Change 17, 69–96.
Brewer G.D. (1986) Methods for synthesis: policy excercises. In W.C. Clark and R.E. Munn (eds.) (1986) Sustainable Development of the Biosphere. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, pp. 455–475.
Cf., e.g., Smith K.S. and Ahuja D.R. (1990) Toward a greenhouse equivalence index: the total exposure analogy. Climatic Change 17, 1–7.
Cf. Ravetz J. (1990) Knowledge in an uncertain world. New Scientist 22 September, 1990.
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Wiman, B.L.B. (1991). The World of Perceptions Versus the World of Data: Notes Towards Safe-Failing the Energy Equation. In: Takeuchi, K., Yoshino, M. (eds) The Global Environment. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-662-01085-3_14
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