Using ICT to “adapt” rather than “mitigate” Global Warming

1. Using ICT to “adapt” rather than “mitigate” Global Warming Bill St. Arnaud Bill.st.arnaud@gmail.com Unless otherwise noted all material in this slide deck may be reproduced, modified or distributed without prior permission of the author

2. We need a new nuclear plant per day to keep stabilization at 2C Source: Roger Pielke Jr

3. How fast can decarbonization occur? • The honest answer no one knows • Historical rates of 1-2% have occurred in developing countries – mostly by outsourcing manufacturing to China • For short periods some countries have achieved rates > 2% e.g. France nuclear program • US need to achieve 17% reduction while maintaining modest economic growth which requires rates of decarbonization of >5% per year • Need to shut down over 20 coal plants per year to meet this target

4. Climate Forecasts • MIT report predicts median temperature forecast of 5.2°C • 11°C increase in Northern Canada & Europe • http://globalchange.mit.edu/pubs/abstract.php?publication_id=990 • Last Ice age average global temperature was 5-6°C cooler than today • Most of Canada & Europe was under 2-3 km ice • Nearly 90 per cent of new scientific findings reveal global climate disruption to be worse, and progressing more rapidly, than expected. • http://www.skepticalscience.com/pics/Freudenburg_2010_ASC.pdf MIT

5. Future Droughts • Palmer Drought Severity Index, or PDSI. • The most severe drought in recent history, in the Sahel region of western Africa in the 1970s, had a PDSI of -3 or -4. • By 2030 Western USA could see -4 to -6. Drought in Texas clearly caused by global warming: http://goo.gl/QjHRS • By 2100 some parts of the U.S. and Latin America could see -8 to -10 PDSI, while Mediterranean areas could see drought in the -15 or -20 range. http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/39741525/ns/us_news-environment/

6. Utilities biggest source of CO2 http://www.oecd-ilibrary.org/docserver/download/fulltext/5k9h2q8v9bln.pdf?expires=1327005403&id=id&accname=guest&checksum=DFE9FB35608FEA0C67713C58F2952625

7. New Challenge: Climate Adaptation • Obama’s National Science Advisor John Holdren “Mitigation alone won’t work, because the climate is already changing, we’re already experiencing impacts….A mitigation only strategy would be insanity,”   • Equal emphasis given to adaptation – avoiding the unmanageable, and adaptation – managing the unavoidable.” • Obama’s Climate Adaptation Executive Order • http://www.stumbleupon.com/su/1tU8go/www.good.is/post/obama-s-secret-climate-adaptation-plan/

8. We need to get off the electrical grid • Biggest source of CO2 emissions because of coal plants – even in places that use hydro and wind e.g. Quebec and Denmark • Coal plants will be most likely targets of protestors and governments • If Germany and Switzerland are willing to shut down nuclear plants then someday they will realize coal plants are much worse for health, safety and environmental reasons • A good adaptation strategy can also be a good mitigation strategy • Adaptation strategy means using only distributed renewal resources disconnected from the grids • Will most likely survive severe weather events • Will not be subject to outages when governments are forced to shut down coal plants • But how do you reliable and robust telecommunications and Internet when only sources of power are intermittent and unreliable wind and sun?

9. OpenFlow Follow the wind/Follow the sun European GSN Domain Canadian GSN Domain Export VM Notify EU Cloud Manager Cloud Manager Cloud Manager Internet Dynamically Configure IP Tunnel Host Resource Network Manager Host Resource • Shudown VM • Copy Image • Update VM Context • Start VM Mantychore2 Shared storage VM VM Shared storage VM Lightpath Optical switch Optical switch Cloud Proxy Host Cloud Proxy Host

10. AMD, HP & Clarkson U GreenCloud

11. National GreenCloud Vision

12. Let’s Keep The Conversation Going E-mail list Bill.St.Arnaud@gmail.com Blogspot Bill St. Arnaud http://green-broadband.blogspot.com Twitter http://twitter.com/BillStArnaud