The tenth most effective way to draw carbon back to the earth is ROOFTOP SOLAR in the book “Drawdown” by Paul Hawken.

Ranking and Results by 2050

• 24.6 gigatons of reduced CO2
• $453.1 billion net cost
• $3.46 trillion net savings

The first solar array appeared on a rooftop in New York City in 1884! It was installed by Charles Fritz, who believed “photoelectric” modules would wind up competing with coal-fired power plants. The first plant based on these “photoelectric” modules was brought online by Thomas Edison in 1882, also in New York City.

Today, solar is replacing electricity generated by coal, natural gas, and kerosene and diesel generators. The sun’s light continually strikes the surface of the earth with an energy more than 10,000 times the world’s total use. Small scale photovoltaic systems, typically sited on rooftops, are playing a significant role in harnessing that light, the most abundant resource on earth. When photons strike the thin wafers of silicon crystal within a vacuum sealed solar panel, they knock electrons loose and produce an electrical circuit. These subatomic particles are the only moving parts in a solar panel, which requires no fuel.

While solar photovoltaics provide less than 2% of the world’s electricity at present, PV has seen exponential growth over the past decade. Rooftop modules are spreading around the world because of their affordability. Falling costs and government incentives has helped accelerate it’s development, as well as financing.

The advantages of solar far exceed the price. Producing solar panels has some emissions , but in operation solar panels do not emit any air pollution or greenhouse gases. Grid-tied systems avoid grid transmission losses, and benefit the customer with “net-metering” arrangements where the grid acts as the battery and any excess is paid back to the customer. By having solar energy part of their energy-generation portfolio, utilities can avoid capital costs of additional coal or gas plants, and customers can avoid paying these fees.

Jobs created by the solar industry benefit all countries, as in Bangaladesh alone, solar has created 115,000 direct jobs on 3.6 million home solar systems.

With producer and user under one roof, energy gets democratized. As soon as a homeowner flips the switch on their roof-top solar system, it is 10 years for cash paid in full customers and 12 years for most financed customers that the system has paid for itself and electricity is then virtually free.

— from Paul Hawkens book “Drawdown”

Silvopasture is nestled under the FOOD section of Drawdown’s book of one hundred ways to pull CO2 back into the earth, and it is the ninth most effective way to accomplish this.

Ranking and Results by 2050

• 31.19 gigatons reduced CO2
• $41.6 billion net cost
• $699.4 billion net savings

Silvopasture is the integration of trees and pasture or forage into a single system for raising livestock, from cattle and sheep to deer and ducks. Rather than seeing trees as a weed to be removed, silvopasture integrates them into a sustainable and symbotic system. It is one approach within the broader umbrella of agroforestry and revives an ancient practice, now common on over 350 million acres worldwide. Trees, animals, forage, and soil are required. It is the soil that is the essential component for mitigating climate change.

The animals sequester carbon under food into the soil by walking and running. Silvopasturing sequesters carbon not only in the soil, but in the biomass above ground. Silvopasture also benefits the animals and trees. Livestock function as weed control, and manure provides natural fertilizer. It can also help farmers and livestock adapt to erratic weather and drought. Trees create cooler climate and moderate water availability. Silvopasture is a climate win-win!

— from “Drawdown” by Paul Hawken

Nested under the category of ENERGY is the eighth most effective form of drawing carbon back to the earth, SOLAR FARMS.

Ranking and Results by 2050

• 36.9 gigatons reduced CO2
• -$80.6 billion net cost
• $5.02 trillion net savings

A massive ramp-up of of solar power is part of any scenario for drawing CO2 back into earth, simply because it makes sense. The sun shines every day providing a virtually unlimited, clean, and free fuel at a price that never changes. Small clustered and distributed panels are conspicuous , where large scale arrays are more obvious and can contain hundreds, sometimes thousands, and even in some cases millions of panels generating huge capacities of energy, even in the tens or hundreds of megawatts. When their full lifespan is taken into consideration, solar farms curtail 94% of the carbon emissions that coal plants emit, and completely eliminate emissions of sulfur and nitrous oxides, mercury, and particulates. Beyond the ecosystem damage that these pollutants do, they are major contributors to outdoor air pollution and are responsible for 3.7 million premature deaths in 2012.

Compared to rooftop solar, solar farms enjoy lower installation costs per watt, and their efficiency in turning sunlight into electricity (known as their efficiency rating) is higher. When their panels are made to rotate to make the most sun efficiency, generation improves dramatically. Although, the solar panel production time is during the day, peaking between 10 am and 2pm, and electrical demand usually peak after 5pm . Therefore, complimentary renewables, such as geothermal and wind that have different generation rhythms are integral to a flexible and intelligent grid.

According to the International Renewable Energy Agency , solar energy already is credited to saving 220 to 330 million tons of carbon dioxide from entering our earth’s atmosphere each year, and photovoltaics is less than 2% of the global electricity mix at the present moment. Some Oxford researchers predict solar will provide 20% of global energy needs by 2027! Thanks to government interventions and market progress, there are many promising signs: costs reaching “grid parity” with fossil fuel generation and dropping, the typical solar factory churning out hundreds of megawatts of solar capacity each year, and panels lasting easily for 25 years, if not decades more. Italy, Germany, and Greece are leaders in the solar revolution. Blessings!

— from Paul Hawkens book “Drawdown “

Nestled in the category of Women and Girls is the number seven way to draw carbon back to earth, Family Planning! ❤

Ranking and Results by 2050

• 59.6 gigatons of reduced CO2
• Inappropriate to monetize a human right

For women to have children by choice rather than chance and to plan their family size and spacing is a matter of autonomy and dignity. The ability to choose contraception is not available to everyone, and results in 74 million unintended pregnancies each year. In the US, 45 % of all pregnancies are unintended. We need to secure the right to voluntary, high quality family planning services around the world. This would have powerful impacts on the health, welfare, and life expectancy of women and their children. Family planning can also have a huge impact on drawing down greenhouse gas emissions.

Paul Ehrlich and John Holdren developed the now famous equation known as “IPAT” in the early 1970’s. Impact = Population x Affluence x Technology. It argues that the impact humans have on the environment is a function of number, level of consumption, and the kind of technology used.

The world currently falls short $ 5.3 billion dollars for providing the access to reproductive healthcare that women want to have. This is about freedom and opportunity for women and the recognition of basic human rights. Currently, family planning programs receive just about 1 % of all overseas development assistance. That number could easily double, with low income countries aiming to match it – a moral move that happens to have meaning for the planet.

— from Paul Hawken and his book “Drawdown”

I work as an independent solar consultant as Transformation Solar Consulting LLC on a platform of sellers, installers, financing, roofers and designers called Powur, who is the general contractor, and  provides training and mentoring.

https://powur.com/susan.george/solar

 

Nestled under the Women and Girls category, ranking and results by 2050:

• 5.6 gigatons reduced CO2
• See impact below

Girl’s education has a dramatic bearing on global warming. Women with more years of education have fewer, healthier children and actively manage their reproductive health. If all nations adopted a similar rate of 100 percent enrollment of girls in primary and secondary schools, by 2050 there would be 843 million fewer people worldwide than if stats remained as they are today. The difference between a woman with no years of schooling and one with 12 years of schooling is almost 4 to 5 children per woman! It is precisely those areas of the world where population growth is the highest that are hardest for women to get educated.

“One child, one teacher, one book, one pen, can change the world.” — Malala Yousafzai, Nobel laureate and girl’s education advocate

Education also shores up resilience in terms of climate change impacts, since there is a strong link between women and natural systems at the heart of family and community life. Women are stewards and managers of food, soil, trees, and water. Educated women can bring into play new disease control and altered seed sowing times, and whatever ways of evaluating changing environmental factors required to sustain themselves and those who depend on them.

A 2013 study found that educating girls is “the single most important social factor associated with a reduction in vulnerability to natural disasters.”

Today, 62 million girls are denied the right to attend school. We need to make schools more affordable, closer to home, more girl friendly, better in quality, and more helpful with overcoming health barriers.

Nurture the promise of each girl!

— from Paul Hawkens book “Drawdown”

Ranking and Results by 2050

• 61.23 gigatons reduced CO2
• Global cost and savings too variable to be determined

Labeled under the section LAND USE, is the fifth most effective means of drawing down carbon to our earth. Tropical forests are those located within 23.5 ° north or south of the equator. They have suffered extensive clearing, burning, and degradation in recent decades, especially this year. Once covering 12% of the world’s landmass, they now cover just 5 %. Even tho destruction still continues, restoration, both passive and intentional, is now a growing trend.

With tropical flora and fauna returned, interactions between organisms and species revive, and the tropical forest regains it’s multidimensional roles. A wonderful discovery is that our forests are more resiliant than we originally thought! In a median time of 66 years, tropical forests can recover 90 % of the biomass that old growth landscapes contain. Regrowth can be passive or active. We can either stop cutting down and just let what’s there regrow, or we can actively plant and cultivate native seedlings.

The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) has a forest landscape restoration (FLR) framework, making restoration a collaborative process that starts and ends on the ground. Active forest restoration can cost $400 to $1,200 per acre. Restoring 865 million acres of forest between now and 2030 could cost $350 billion and as much as $1 trillion. Because forest restoration is such a potent solution, commitments and funding need to be a global priority. We need to respect land rights and tenure, especially those of indigenous people. We need to ensure effective enforcement of strong policies and be well equipped and technically adept.

— from Paul Hawken’s book “Drawdown”

Ranking and Results by 2050

• 66.11 gigatons reduced CO2
• Global savings and cost too variable to be determined

“Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants. ” –Michael Pollan

The production of meat and dairy contributes many more CO2 emissions than producing vegetables, fruits, grains, and legumes. 15% more in direct emissions and 50% more with a direct and indirect emission combination.

Only 15% of our daily caloric intake needs to come from protein. A diet primarily of plants can meet that threshold. A groundbreaking study at the Universuty of Oxford in 2016 found that emissions could be cut by 70% per year by adopting a vegan diet and by 63% through adopting a vegetarian diet (includes cheese, milk, and eggs).

The study also found that global mortality would drop by 6% to 10% with the adoption of a vegan or vegetarian diet. As well, $1 trillion in health care costs would be saved and $ 30 trillion saved in relation to accounting for value of lives improved. Companies such as Beyond Meat and Impossible Foods are creating plant based products to assist our meat-centric taste buds and palate. Omnivorous chefs are making the case for eating widely and with pleasure without meat. These chefs include ; Mark Bittman , journalist and author of “How to Cook Everything Vegetarian ” and Yotam Ottolenghi , restauranteur and author of “Plenty”.

We are as a culture reframing meat. Eating with a lighter footprint is a win-win, both reducing emissions and improving health. It will also do less damage to our freshwater resources and ecosystems by eliminating bulldozed forests. This solution is most powerful, as it is as close to us as our dinner plate.

— from the book “Drawdown” by Paul Hawken

Ranking and Results by 2050

• 70.53 gigatons reduced CO2
• Global cost and savings too variable to be determined

More than one third of the world’s labor force is responsible for growing and producing our food. Creating food is a miraculous alchemical process, from the seed, sun, and soil to the human beings carrying out the whole process.

Still, one third of the food produced on our planet does not make it to the table. Hunger is a condition for nearly 800 million people worldwide. Wasted food also produces 4.4 gigatons of carbon dioxide yearly, nearly 8% of total green house gas emissions.

Both high and low income countries contribute, from rejecting food based on bumps and shape and color to lack of refrigeration and storage. Kitchen efficiency has become a lost art.

— from Paul Hawken’s book “Drawdown”

Ranking and results by 2050

Reduced CO2 84.6 Gigatons, Net cost $1.23 trillion, Net savings $7.4 trillion

A very interesting fact is by the uneven heating of the earth’s surface and the planet’s rotation , air is drawn from areas of higher pressure to lower pressure creating tides of air or wind.

In essence, the wind energy of just three states — Kansas, North Dakota, and Texas — would meet all our electrical needs cost to coast. However, weather is inconsistent and wind does not always move the turbines . Interconnected wind and solar grids could overcome the fluctuations of each other.

Wind generated power also does not have adequate government subsidies, and this detracts from it’s cost competitiveness. Currently the International Monetary Fund estimates that the fossil fuel industry received more than $5.3 trillion in direct and indirect subsidies in 2015, and the U. S. wind energy industry has received $12.3 billion in direct subsidies TOTAL since the year 2000. As this changes, wind will be the least expensive source of installed electrical power over the course of the next decade.

– From Paul Hawken’s book “Drawdown”