Monday, March 16, 2009

Global Warming and Peak Oil/Coal

A while back, I posted about a lengthy essay from the head of CalTech's Engineering department, in which he argued that the amount of coal and oil left in the ground for humans to burn is actually several times lower than is assumed in the IPCC's predictions as to global warming. Since then, I've often looked for a direct refutation, i.e., either a proof that oil and coal reserves are several times higher than what the CalTech scientist estimated, or a proof that dramatic global warming would still occur even if carbon emissions from coal and oil are several times lower.

So far, I haven't found such a refutation, but this recent article summarizes the (apparently very few) academic articles that analyze global warming while taking into account the limited supplies of fossil fuels. It reaches the not-very-comforting conclusion that "we might well suffer for both effects: lack of fuels and global warming."

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