{"id":167,"date":"2009-02-04T12:31:48","date_gmt":"2009-02-04T20:31:48","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.kqed.org\/climatewatch\/2009\/02\/04\/ghg-targets-compared-to-what\/"},"modified":"2009-02-04T12:31:48","modified_gmt":"2009-02-04T20:31:48","slug":"ghg-targets-compared-to-what","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ww2.kqed.org\/climatewatch\/2009\/02\/04\/ghg-targets-compared-to-what\/","title":{"rendered":"GHG Targets: Compared to What?"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a title=\"cooling-tower-small.jpg\" href=\"http:\/\/blogs.kqed.org\/climatewatch\/files\/2009\/02\/cooling-tower-small.jpg\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/blogs.kqed.org\/climatewatch\/files\/2009\/02\/cooling-tower-small.jpg\" alt=\"cooling-tower-small.jpg\" \/><\/a>Setting targets for greenhouse gas reductions has turned into a house of mirrors. It&#8217;s hard to know what anyone means when they talk about an &#8220;80% reduction&#8221; in emissions. Reader Steve Bloom raised this point in response to my <a title=\"CW post\" href=\"http:\/\/blogs.kqed.org\/climatewatch\/2009\/01\/15\/national-cap-and-trade-program-unveiled\/\">January 15 post<\/a>. It&#8217;s an important one.<\/p>\n<p>Most of California&#8217;s targets are based on 1990 levels (also 80% by 2050). On the other hand, The <a title=\"USCAP\" href=\"http:\/\/www.us-cap.org\/\">USCAP plan<\/a> announced last month by a national coalition of business &amp; environmental groups, also aims for an 80% reduction by 2050&#8211;but from <em>2005 levels<\/em>. That 15 years between 1990 and 2005 is hardly trivial. Much of the explosive development in China and India occurred during this time, as U.S. emissions were also rising.<\/p>\n<p>The number that will matter the most is the one that comes out in the federal legislation, which is still being drafted. In his <a title=\"Obama climate video\" href=\"http:\/\/change.gov\/newsroom\/entry\/president_elect_obama_promises_new_chapter_on_climate_change\/\">video address to the Governor&#8217;s Climate Summit<\/a> in November, President (then-elect) Obama appeared to be using California&#8217;s aggressive goal as a benchmark when he promised to &#8220;set us on a course to reduce emissions to their 1990 levels by 2020, and reduce them an additional 80% by 2050.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>We&#8217;re hearing more voices saying that California&#8217;s 2020 target (about 15% from today&#8217;s level) is unobtainable, Stanford researcher Steve Schneider being a recent example (s<a title=\"CW post\" href=\"http:\/\/blogs.kqed.org\/climatewatch\/2009\/01\/30\/ab-32-its-all-about-the-numbersor-not\/\">ee Gretchen Weber&#8217;s post from 1\/30<\/a>). As a practical matter, this would mean cutting California&#8217;s per capita carbon footprint from 14 tons per year, down to about ten.<\/p>\n<p>Lately more people seem to be looking toward the 2050 target of an 80% reduction. But for national policy, the question is still sort of hanging out there: <em>80% of what?<\/em> It&#8217;s one that will have to be answered soon, as <a title=\"AP Waxman - climate bill\" href=\"http:\/\/www.google.com\/hostednews\/ap\/article\/ALeqM5jBOTcbu08QEj4YyeIWat4Eerrk9gD95NNE8O0\">congressional leaders press<\/a> to have a climate bill ready by Memorial Day.<\/p>\n<p>Photo by Reed Galin<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Setting targets for greenhouse gas reductions has turned into a house of mirrors. It&#8217;s hard to know what anyone means when they talk about an &#8220;80% reduction&#8221; in emissions.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":221,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[179,193,256,264,435,575],"coauthors":[],"series":[],"affiliates":[],"programs":[],"collections":[],"interests":[],"class_list":["post-167","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-government-business","tag-economics","tag-emissions","tag-governor","tag-greenhouse-gas-emissions","tag-policy","tag-target"],"acf":{"template_type":"standard","featured_image_type":"standard","is_audio_post":false},"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v20.13 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>GHG Targets: Compared to What? | Climate Watch<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/ww2.kqed.org\/climatewatch\/2009\/02\/04\/ghg-targets-compared-to-what\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"GHG Targets: Compared to What? | Climate Watch\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Setting targets for greenhouse gas reductions has turned into a house of mirrors. It&#039;s hard to know what anyone means when they talk about an &quot;80% reduction&quot; in emissions.\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/ww2.kqed.org\/climatewatch\/2009\/02\/04\/ghg-targets-compared-to-what\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Climate Watch\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2009-02-04T20:31:48+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"http:\/\/blogs.kqed.org\/climatewatch\/files\/2009\/02\/cooling-tower-small.jpg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Craig Miller\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:creator\" content=\"@voxterra\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Craig Miller\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"1 minute\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/ww2.kqed.org\/climatewatch\/2009\/02\/04\/ghg-targets-compared-to-what\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/ww2.kqed.org\/climatewatch\/2009\/02\/04\/ghg-targets-compared-to-what\/\",\"name\":\"GHG Targets: Compared to What? | Climate Watch\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/ww2.kqed.org\/climatewatch\/#website\"},\"datePublished\":\"2009-02-04T20:31:48+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2009-02-04T20:31:48+00:00\",\"author\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/ww2.kqed.org\/climatewatch\/#\/schema\/person\/f7222c517400a6c4b0336fca3652c323\"},\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/ww2.kqed.org\/climatewatch\/2009\/02\/04\/ghg-targets-compared-to-what\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/ww2.kqed.org\/climatewatch\/2009\/02\/04\/ghg-targets-compared-to-what\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/ww2.kqed.org\/climatewatch\/2009\/02\/04\/ghg-targets-compared-to-what\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/ww2.kqed.org\/climatewatch\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"GHG Targets: Compared to What?\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/ww2.kqed.org\/climatewatch\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/ww2.kqed.org\/climatewatch\/\",\"name\":\"Climate Watch\",\"description\":\"\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\/\/ww2.kqed.org\/climatewatch\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":\"required name=search_term_string\"}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/ww2.kqed.org\/climatewatch\/#\/schema\/person\/f7222c517400a6c4b0336fca3652c323\",\"name\":\"Craig Miller\",\"image\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/ww2.kqed.org\/climatewatch\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/dd8f4f4f978df3faac9db4c510939ea0\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/b91661df645e001a9cafe0861fa685f9?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/b91661df645e001a9cafe0861fa685f9?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"caption\":\"Craig Miller\"},\"description\":\"Craig is a former KQED Science editor, specializing in weather, climate, water &amp; energy issues, with a little seismology thrown in just to shake things up. 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