Q2. What have the authors stated for future works in "Depletion of fossil fuels and anthropogenic climate change – a review" ?
Consequently, examining likely and possible trajectories of the future energy systems are vital for understanding future climate change caused by mankind. As a result, SRES ( 2000 ) contains a set of scenarios not compatible with the possibility that the implied recoverable volumes and extraction rates of fossil fuels are physically unreasonable or even unachievable. It can be noted that these projections are notable smaller than IEAs historical CO2 emission trends as seen in Figure 4. It can be argued that SRES underestimated emission trends, but van Vuuren and O ’ Neill ( 2006 ) also show that global CO2 inventories can differ by more than 15 % depending on source and methodology.
Q3. What is the main contributor to mankind’s release of greenhouse gases?
Mankind’s energy production is the principal contributor to mankind’s release of greenhouse gases (GHG), in particular CO2, to the atmosphere with fossil fuel combustion as the key factor.
Q4. What are the main assumptions used to estimate future climate change?
Various future pathways for society, its energy system and the associated release of greenhouse gases are a cornerstone in the estimation of future climate change.
Q5. What is the largest contributor to the global energy system after fossil energy?
Combustible biomass and waste (10.2%), nuclear power (5.8%) and hydroelectric dams (2.3%) are the largest contributors to the global energy system after fossil energy, but they account for only a minor share of the global primary energy supply (IEA, 2011).
Q6. What are the cornerstones of the assessment of future climate change caused by mankind?
Projections of how the global energy system will develop over the next century are cornerstones in the assessment of future climate change caused by mankind.
Q7. What are the specific drivers for CO2 emissions?
Four specific drivers for CO2 emissions, namely population; economic activity (gross domestic product or GDP) per capita; energy intensity (primary energy consumption per unit of GDP); and carbon intensity (CO2 emissions per unit of energy) are identified by the IPCC (Pielke et al. 2008).
Q8. What is the importance of better handling of coal?
Especially a better handling of coal is crucial, as it accounts for both the largest amounts of remaining fossil fuels as well as the largest CO2 emissions.
Q9. How much CO2 did they find to be consistent with current estimates of the needed levels of CO?
The CO2 concentration ended up around 450 ppm for these scenarios and they were found to be largely consistent with current assessments of the cumulative 21st century emissions needed to stabilize atmospheric CO2 at 450 ppm even after factoring in carbon cycle feedbacks.
Q10. What are the implications of the combination of declining oil production and austerity measures?
The combination of declining oil production (and thus oil priced high enough to cause recessions), high taxes, austerity measures, more restrictive credit conditions and demographic shifts have the potential to severely constrain the financial resources required for a transition to alternative energy sources.
Q11. What is the reason why the absence of likelihoods in SRES triggered critique?
The absence of likelihoods in SRES triggered critique (Schneider, 2001; 2002; Webster et al., 2002) highlighting that decision-makers and policy analysts necessitate probability estimates to be able to assess the risks of climate change impacts resulting from these scenarios.
Q12. What was the main idea of the 1995 review of the old emission scenarios?
The 1995 IPCC review of the old emission scenarios recommended that the full range of scenarios should be used as an input rather than just a single scenario.
Q13. What was the first time William Stanley Jevons foresaw limits to the growth of British?
Later on, William Stanley Jevons (1856) foresaw limits to the growth of British coal production as a consequence of limited availability of workable coal.
Q14. How many countries have already passed their maximum production levels of oil?
In hindsight, empirical observations show that nearly 60 countries have already passed their maximum production levels of oil (Sorrell et al., 2010).
Q15. What are the main concerns raised over the SRES projections?
Since SRES was published in 2000, there have been a number of critical concerns raised over the fossil fuel production outlooks built in to the emission scenarios.
Q16. What is the way to forecast the future of the world’s fossil fuels?
Energy forecasting on a global perspective sometimes overlooks constraints which occur on a smaller geographical level, necessitating more detailed models to better capture the reality of the world’s fossil fuel production.
Q17. What is the illustrative scenario of a particular storyline?
Marker scenarios are another form of scenario, which is considered by the SRES writing team to be the most illustrative scenario of a particular storyline.