“How can we reconcile our desire to save the planet from the worst effects of climate change with our dependence on the systems that cause it? How can we demand that industry and governments reduce their pollution, when ultimately we are the ones buying the polluting products and contributing to the emissions that harm our shared biosphere?”
These thorny questions are at the heart of Brett Favaro’s new book The Carbon Code (Johns Hopkins University Press, 2017). While he readily concedes there can be no perfect answers, his book provides a helpful framework for working towards the immediate, ongoing carbon emission reductions that most of us already know are necessary.
Favaro’s proposals may sound modest, but his carbon code could play an important role if it is widely adopted by individuals, by civil organizations – churches, labour unions, universities – and by governments.
As a marine biologist at Newfoundland’s Memorial University, Favaro is keenly aware of the urgency of the problem. “Conservation is a frankly devastating field to be in,” he writes. “Much of what we do deals in quantifying how many species are declining or going extinct ….”
He recognizes that it is too late to prevent climate catastrophe, but that doesn’t lessen the impetus to action:
There’s no getting around the prospect of droughts and resource wars, and the creation of climate refugees is certain. But there’s a big difference between a world afflicted by 2-degree warming and one warmed by 3, 4, or even more degrees.”
In other words, we can act now to prevent climate chaos going from worse to worst.
The code of conduct that Favaro presents is designed to help us be conscious of the carbon impacts of our own lives, and work steadily toward the goal of a nearly-complete cessation of carbon emissions.
The carbon code of conduct consists of four “R” principles that must be applied to one’s carbon usage:
1. Reduce your use of carbon as much as possible.
2. Replace carbon-intensive activities with those that use less carbon to achieve the same outcome.
3. Refine the activity to get the most benefit for each unit of carbon emitted.
4. Finally, Rehabilitate the atmosphere by offsetting carbon usage.”
There’s a good bit of wiggle room in each of those four ’R’s, and Favaro presents that flexibility not as a bug but as a feature. “Codes of conduct are not the same thing as laws – laws are dichotomous, and you are either following them or you’re not,” he says. “Codes of conduct are interpretable and general and are designed to shape expectations.”
Street level
The bulk of the book is given to discussion of how we can apply the carbon code to home energy use, day-to-day transportation, a lower-carbon diet, and long distance travel.
There is a heavy emphasis on a transition to electric cars – an emphasis that I’d say is one of the book’s weaker points. For one thing, Favaro overstates the energy efficiency of electric vehicles.
EVs are far more efficient. Whereas only around 20% of the potential energy stored in a liter of gasoline actually goes to making an ICE [Internal Combustion Engine] car move, EVs convert about 60% of their stored energy into motion ….”
In a narrow sense this is true, but it ignores the conversion costs in common methods of producing the electricity that charges the batteries. A typical fossil-fueled generating plant operates in the range of 35% energy efficiency. So the actual efficiency of an electric vehicle is likely to be closer to 35% X 60%, or 21% – in other words, not significantly better than the internal combustion engine.
By the same token, if a large proportion of new renewable energy capacity over the next 15 years must be devoted to charging electric cars, it will be extremely challenging to simultaneously switch home heating, lighting and cooling processes away from fossil fuel reliance.
Yet if the principles of Favaro’s carbon code were followed, we would not only stop building internal combustion cars, we would also make the new electric cars smaller and lighter, provide strong incentives to reduce the number of miles they travel (especially miles with only one passenger), and rapidly improve bicycling networks and public transit facilities to get people out of cars for most of their ordinary transportation. To his credit, Favaro recognizes the importance of all these steps.
Flight paths
As a researcher invited to many international conferences, and a person who lives in Newfoundland but whose family is based in far-away British Columbia, Favaro has given a lot of thought to the conundrum of air travel. He notes that most of the readers of his book will be members of a particular global elite: the small percentage of the world’s population who board a plane more than a few times in their lives.
We members of that elite group have a disproportionate carbon footprint, and therefore we bear particular responsibility for carbon emission reductions.
The Air Transport Action Group, a UK-based industry association, estimated that the airline industry accounts for about 2% of global CO2 emissions. That may sound small, but given the tiny percentage of the world population that flies regularly, it represents a massive outlier in terms of carbon-intensive behaviors. In the United States, air travel is responsible for about 8% of the country’s emissions ….”
Favaro is keenly aware that if the Carbon Code were read as “never get on an airplane again for the rest of your life”, hardly anyone would adopt the code (and those few who did would be ostracized from professional activities and in many cases cut off from family). Yet the four principles of the Carbon Code can be very helpful in deciding when, where and how often to use the most carbon-intensive means of transportation.
Remember that ultimately all of humanity needs to mostly stop using fossil fuels to achieve climate stability. Therefore, just like with your personal travel, your default assumption should be that no flights are necessary, and then from there you make the case for each flight you take.”
The Carbon Code is a wise, carefully optimistic book. Let’s hope it is widely read and that individuals and organizations take the Carbon Code to heart.
Top photo: temporary parking garage in vacant lot in Manhattan, July 2013.
