Jim Yong Kim Promises To Factor In Global Warming “With Every Investment We Make And Every Action We Take.”

You may recall the shocking World Bank Climate Report from November that concluded: “A 4°C [7°F] world can, and must, be avoided” to avert “devastating” impacts.

What impacts? The must-read report warns that “we’re on track for a 4°C warmer world marked by extreme heat-waves, declining global food stocks, loss of ecosystems and biodiversity, and life-threatening sea level rise.”

Now World Bank President Jim Yong Kim has a strong WashPost op-ed that warns “we need to get serious fast” to avoid the looming “climate catastrophe.” He explains:

The signs of global warming are becoming more obvious and more frequent. A glut of extreme weather conditions is appearing globally. And the average temperature in the United States last year was the highest ever recorded….

If there is no action soon, the future will become bleak. The World Bank Group released a reportin November that concluded that the world could warm by 7.2 degrees Fahrenheit (4 degrees Celsius) by the end of this century if concerted action is not taken now.

A world that warm means seas would rise 1.5 to 3 feet, putting at risk hundreds of millions of city dwellers globally. It would mean that storms once dubbed “once in a century” would become common, perhaps occurring every year. And it would mean that much of the United States, from Los Angeles to Kansas to the nation’s capital, would feel like an unbearable oven in the summer.

What does the physician and anthropologist recommend we do?

The world’s top priority must be to get finance flowing and get prices right on all aspects of energy costs to support low-carbon growth. Achieving a predictable price on carbon that accurately reflects real environmental costs is key to delivering emission reductions at scale. Correct energy pricing can also provide incentives for investments in energy efficiency and cleaner energy technologies.

A second immediate step is to end harmful fuel subsidies globally, which could lead to a 5 percent fall in emissions by 2020. Countries spend more than $500 billion annually in fossil-fuel subsidies and an additional $500 billion in other subsidies, often related to agriculture and water, that are, ultimately, environmentally harmful. That trillion dollars could be put to better use for the jobs of the future, social safety nets or vaccines.

Kim certainly talks to the talk when it comes to the implications of the climate crisis for the Bank itself:

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By Tina Casey Via Clean Technica

Researchers at the University of Michigan have come up with a low-cost way to manufacture high-grade silicon, based on a concept familiar to anyone who has tried to make rock candy at home. If the breakthrough can be translated into a commercially viable process, it would make ultra-cheap solar tech like V3Solar’s Spin Cell (which we were just raving about the other day) even cheaper.

Ironically, funding for the research project came from the American Chemical Society Petroleum Research Fund, but maybe they know something we don’t.

Cooking Up a Batch of Low-Cost Silicon

Silicon is the key component of conventional solar cells. It comes from silicon dioxide, aka sand, which is one of the cheapest and most abundant materials on Earth, but converting sand into high grade silicon is a high cost, energy intensive process with a pretty significant carbon footprint.

As described by U of Mich writer Kate McAlpine, the new process works at just 180 degrees Fahrenheit, which is a far cry from the 2,000 degrees needed for conventional silicon manufacturing.

The method basically consists of covering a liquid gallium electrode (gallium is a soft whitish metal that has a melting point around room temperature) with a layer of a solution based on silicon tetrachloride (a colorless, flammable liquid).

As in conventional silicon processing, electrons from the metal convert the silicon tetrachloride into raw silicon. The new twist is that by using soft metal with a low melting point, the research team was able to get the raw silicon to form crystals without exposing the solution to additional heat.

A Ways to Go for Low Cost Silicon

The team has observed films of silicon crystals forming on the liquid gallium electrodes, but so far the individual crystals are only about 1/2000th (yes that’s 1/2000th) of a millimeter in diameter.

There is still a long way to go before the process jumps from the lab into commercial viability, and the next steps include experimenting with other metal alloys that have low melting points.

Meanwhile, other routes to low-cost silicon based solar power are at or near commercial development, and they could go even lower if the U Mich research pans out.

One approach, illustrated by the aforementioned V3Solar Spin Cell (which by the way began life as Solarphasec), is to squeeze more power out of conventional solar cells by reconfiguring the solar module.

The Spin Cell reboots the typical flat solar panel into a 3-D cone. Along similar lines, MIT researchers have come up with a solar “tower of power” that takes advantage of 3-D angles.

The 3-D concept can also be internalized, as demonstrated by a company called (what else) Solar3D.

On a completely different note, the Obama Administration is also focusing on lowering the “soft costs” of solar power, which typically account for half the cost of a completed solar installation.

The Petroleum Research Fund

Well, here’s hoping. In any case, the really interesting part of the story is the involvement of the Petroleum Research Fund, which states at the top of its home page that its mission is to support “fundamental research directly related to petroleum or fossil fuels.”

In its vision statement following that declaration, the Fund waxes a little more expansive, describing itself as dedicated to “significantly increasing the world’s energy options,” though directly after the following note appears: “Proposals will no longer be considered in solar power, which includes photovoltaics and solar cells.”

Apparently the U Mich project got in under the wire, but it shouldn’t be surprising that a grant-making organization with roots in the petroleum industry was at least once open to solar power research.

Solar power has long been used as an economical way to provide energy to remote oil fields, where grid connections would be difficult if not impossible.

Given the energy intensity of harvesting unconventional oil, most notably from Canada’s tar sands, low-cost power in any form would be a welcome development for the petroleum industry.

– Tina Casey, reprinted from Clean Technica with permission

Next week the Senate is expected to take up and pass the House’s version of a disaster relief package for areas affected by Hurricane Sandy, which passed on January 15. The relief has been a long time coming: It has been nearly three months since the superstorm devastated coastlines from Maryland to Massachusetts.

First, action was stalled by November’s election, and then House Speaker John Boehner (R-OH) refused to bring a Senate-passed bill to a vote before the clock ran out on the 112th Congress, prompting highly critical responses even from members of his own party, such as New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie (R), and Rep. Peter King (R-NY). Their anger was justified: By comparison, it took Congress just days to send emergency funding to the Gulf Coast after Hurricane Katrina.

But chronology and delays aside, the bill has plenty of flaws in its content as well. In particular, for a package intended to help coastal communities rebuild, it is remarkably light on funding for the federal agency most closely linked to our coastal communities: the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

The House disaster relief legislation actually came in two parts—an initial $17 billion outlay, which was then amended by adding a subsequent $33.7 billion package offered by Rep. Rodney Freylinghausen (R-NJ). His initial proposal wasn’t all bad for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. It included $476 million for the agency—just a bit less than the $486 million in the Senate-passed bill and the $493 million requested by the Obama administration. But after the House voted on amendments to Freylinghausen’s bill, the agency’s funding fell to just $326 million.

In the wake of a storm that shifted sands and wrecked infrastructure from Maryland to Massachusetts, rebuilding and even reconceiving management of coastal landscapes must be a priority. In fact, about 80 percent of the money the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration requested for Sandy relief was for coastal restoration and land acquisition.

After the Senate passed its bill, which included $150 million for coastal restoration and another $47 million for land acquisition under the Coastal and Estuarine Lands Conservation Program, Rep. Freylinghausen put $150 million into his bill for coastal restoration efforts. But instead of following the lead of the Senate and funneling the money through National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration programs, he eliminated all funding for land acquisition and designated the restoration funding specifically for “regional ocean partnerships”—collaborative coalitions of neighboring states that help coordinate and streamline management of their shared ocean space and resources.

So now, unless the Senate opts to delay the bill’s passage further by amending it and sending it back over to the House, the Sandy relief package that lands on President Obama’s desk will include not a penny for the programs the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration identified as its highest priorities.

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The legacy of the confusion and misinformation spread by Bjorn Lomborg and Ruport Murduch’s Wall Street Journal is delay. In this case, it’s a potentially fatal delay in responding to a purely preventable, but nonetheless existential threat to modern civilization, a betrayal of “our children and future generations,” as Obama put it — JR.

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit denied the White House a review of an earlier decision striking down major Environmental Protection Agency rules to cut soot- and smog-forming power plant emissions that cross state lines. [The Hill]

A federal court won’t reconsider a decision that nullified major Environmental Protection Agency rules to cut soot- and smog-forming power plant emissions that cross state lines.

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit denied the Obama administration’s request for en banc, or full court, review of an August 2012 ruling that struck down the Cross-State Air Pollution Rule.

A three-judge panel ruled 2-1 in August to toss out the rule, and on Thursday the court announced that a majority on a wider panel of judges voted against a full-court rehearing.

“EPA is disappointed that the Court did not grant EPA’s petition for rehearing. The agency is reviewing the decision and will determine any appropriate further course of action once the review is complete,” EPA said in a statement late Thursday afternoon.

According to Munich Re, the world’s biggest reinsurance company, Global crop insurance claims for 2012 were the highest ever due to droughts reducing yields in the U.S., historically the biggest grower of corn and soybeans. [Bloomberg]

At one point yesterday, the price of emitting one ton of carbon under the European Union’s emission trading scheme crashed 40 percent, hitting a record low. [The Guardian]

In light of GOP opposition in Congress, Rep. Henry Waxman (D-Calif.) and Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-R.I.) put forward a slate of climate change actions yesterday that President Obama could execute under his own authority. [The Hill]

Regulators in the Northeast are forcing utilities to update their electrical grids, communications, and preparations for storms in the wake of Hurricane Sandy. [WSJ]

133 billion to 233 billion barrels of shale oil has been discovered in central Australia, potentially worth trillions of dollars. Though it remains unclear how commercially realistic it will be to actually access the oil. [The Telegraph]