Climate Change, Energy History, and Fossil Fuel Formation

Review from Last Time

  • Carbon Emissions and Sinks

Today's Notes

  • Predictions for future climate
  • Energy's history
  • Coal formation and location
  • Oil formation, location, and extraction

Climate Change: The Physical Science Basis

  • IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change)
    • First Assessment Report: 1990
    • Sixth Assessment Report: 2021
  • Key Areas of Assessment:
    • Understanding Human influence on climate
    • Energy budget (inputs, outputs, and retained energy)
    • Sea level budget (sum of contributions = observed sea level rise)
    • Observations
      • Global warming since the late 1800s: 0.3-0.6°C (First Assessment), 0.95-1.20°C (Sixth Assessment)
      • Land surface temperature: data from 1887 stations (1861-1990) in the first assessment, up to 40,000 stations (1750-2020) in the sixth assessment.
      • Geological records: Temperature (15 million years), sea level (5 million years), CO₂ (160,000 years) in the first assessment vs. Temperature (65 million years), sea level (50 million years), CO₂ (450 million years) in the sixth assessment.
      • Global ocean heat content: 1955-1981 (two regions) in the first assessment, 1871-2018 (global) in the sixth assessment.
      • Satellite remote sensing: Temperature, snow cover, Earth radiation budget in the first assessment vs. Temperature, cryosphere, Earth radiation budget, CO₂, sea level, clouds, aerosols, land cover, and many others in the sixth assessment.
  • Categories of Assessment:
    • Suspected
    • Established fact
    • Open (inconsistent estimates)
    • Closed

Climate Models

  • Global Models:

    • General circulation models
    • Earth system models
    • Typical model resolution: 500 km, 100 km

  • Regional Models:

    • High-resolution models
    • Typical model resolution: 25-50 km

  • Major Elements:

    • Circulating atmosphere and ocean
    • Radiative transfer
    • Land physics
    • Sea ice

Current Models

  • Coupled Model Intercomparison Project Phase 6 (CMIP6)
  • URL: https://pcmdi.llnl.gov/CMIP6/
  • Diversity of modeling centers contributing to CMIP and CORDEX. Climate models are often developed by international consortia.

Predicting Scenarios

  • How will nature respond?
  • Uncertainty of the consequence?
  • 1992: IS92 Scenarios
  • 2018: SR1.5 Database of Scenarios
  • GtC emissions

Emissions Scenarios and Uncertainties

  • SSP = Shared Socioeconomic Pathways
  • RCP = Representative Concentration Pathway

Momentum Factor

  • Air temperature responds within years
  • Ocean lags for centuries
  • Atmosphere CO2 (ppm)

Predictions for Nature's Response

#1 Temperature Increases

  • Global mean temperature increase since 1850-1900 (°C)
  • Historical observations shown with human-induced warming estimate and assessment. Assessed TCRE (Transient Climate Response to cumulative Emissions) range.
  • Scenarios:
    • SSP1-1.9
    • SSP1-2.6
    • SSP2-4.5
    • SSP3-7.0
    • SSP5-8.5
  • Cumulative carbon dioxide emissions since 1850 (GtCO2)

#1 Temperature Scenarios and Uncertainties

  • Global surface temperature relative to 1850-1900 and 1995-2014
  • Historical context: LGM (Last Glacial Maximum), LIG (Last Interglacial)
  • Near term, Mid term, Long term
  • Interconnected consequences
    • Global temperature change
    • September Arctic sea ice area
    • Global mean sea level change

#2 Precipitation Increases

  • Global land precipitation change

#2 Precipitation Should Increase, But Not Evenly

  • In some regions, drought is expected to increase under future warming.
  • Simulated change at 1.5°C global warming
  • Simulated change at 2°C global warming
  • Simulated change at 4°C global warming
  • Relatively small absolute changes may appear as large % changes in regions with dry baseline conditions
  • Drier vs. Wetter

#3 Regions Are Predicted to Be Affected Differently

  • Climate belts continue to shift

#4 Biologic Migration and Extinction

  • Loss of biodiversity
  • Cumulative extinctions as % of IUCN-evaluated species
    • Mammals
    • Birds
    • Vertebrates
    • Other vertebrates

#5 Emissions From Melting Permafrost

  • Natural emissions from Permafrost as it melts

#6 Extremes Are More Extreme

  • sea level
  • sea level

#7 Sea Level Rise

  • https://coast.noaa.gov/slr/#/layer/slr/1/-9585261.955160584/5116896.444822153/5/satellite/none/0.8/2050/interHigh/midAccretion

#7 Rising Sea Level Scenarios

  • Sea level scenarios. What will Antarctica do?
  • Recent and future change in ice sheets
  • Greenland and Antarctic ice sheets
  • SSP3-7.0
  • SSP1-2.6
  • GMSL rise (m)

#8 Ocean Acidification Amplifies

  • Global surface ocean pH
  • The last time global surface temperature was sustained at or above 2.5°C was over 3 million years ago
  • 2011-2020 was around 1.1°C warmer than 1850-1900
  • The world at +1.5°C
  • The world at +2°C
  • The world at +3°C
  • The world at +4°C
  • Global warming level (GWL) above 1850-1900
    • Annual hottest-day temperature change
    • Annual mean total column soil moisture change
    • Annual wettest-day precipitation change
    • Risk of species losses
    • Heat-humidity risks to human health
    • Food production impacts

Today’s Energy Transition

  • Develop low-carbon energy sources.
  • Goal is to improve quality of life for all people, and remove reliance on greenhouse gas production

Most Energy We Consume Is From Hydrocarbons

  • Hydrocarbons
  • Combustible C-H compounds from dead organic matter that stores energy and can be used as fuel
  • Section 16.2 in Text

Photosynthesis Traps Fossil Sunlight

  • 6CO₂ + 12H₂O + Light = 6O₂ + C₆H₁₂O₆ + 6H₂O

Burning Wood

  • CH + O₂ + fire = CO₂ + H₂O + C (soot) + Heat

#1 Coal

  • Photosynthesis traps carbon in plants
  • Coal formation begins in anoxic environments
  • Plant material is buried and C content becomes richer
  • Peat still looks like plant material (~35% C)

Evolution of Coal

  • Lignite is soft and brown, shallow burial (~40% C)
  • Bituminous Coal is dull and black (~70% C)
  • Anthracite coal is black and shiny and hard (~90% C)
  • Graphite and diamond are 100% C, but not useful for energy
  • Coal deposits occur as sedimentary strata
  • Coal mining as strip mines or tunneling

#2/3 Oil and Natural Gas

  • These always form together and are found together
  • Oil and Petroleum are synonyms
  • Organic Carbon from dead algae and plankton
    • Step #1: Settle to ocean floor and are buried by muds
    • Step #2: Mud compacts to soft C-rich shale, the Source Rock
    • Step #3: Burial and heating converts C to waxy Kerogen
    • Step #4: Kerogen converts to oil at temperatures >90 C
    • Step #5: Oil converts to natural gas at temperatures >160 C
    • Conversions reduce chain length of polymers
    • Step #6: Buoyant oil and natural gas try to escape to surface
    • Step #7: Oil and natural gas may be trapped in reservoirs
    • Reservoirs have (1) porosity and (2) are sealed
  • Reservoirs are sedimentary basins
  • Reservoirs are measured in barrels of oil
    • 1 barrel = 42 gallons
  • Consumption of 100,000,000 barrels a day (2 hours @Niagra)
  • Anticline and Fault Traps
  • The Hunt for Traps
  • Geologists look for special environments have the correct characteristics to make, store, and trap

Exploration

  • #1 Correlating Exploration Wells
  • #2 Seismic Reflection

Extraction: Drilling, Fracking, Pumping, Piping

  • Active Oil Wells 2009 - U.S. States and World Countries
  • Success Rates in the U.S.A.
    • Development wells
    • Exploratory Wells
    • True Wildcat wells
  • Frac Sand
  • Earthquakes
  • Oil production: USA
  • Oil production: Globally

Today’s Take Home

  • Coal from land plants
  • Oil from ocean plants
  • Oil extraction