UPDATE COMING SOON -- 03-03-2007 I was not thinking clearly -- actually, if shipping 90% of the worlds goods only emits twice the CO2 then the 10% that are shipped on airplanes, this is a very good number. I will be taking a second look at the numbers and reporting back in a day or two...
Think that airplanes are a primary contributer of CO2? Think again, their output is dwarfed by the worlds fleet of ocean-going freighters and tankers. From The Guardian:
CO2 output from shipping twice as much as airlines
Carbon dioxide emissions from shipping are double those of aviation and increasing at an alarming rate which will have a serious impact on global warming, according to research by the industry and European academics.
Separate studies suggest that maritime carbon dioxide emissions are not only higher than previously thought, but could rise by as much as 75% in the next 15 to 20 years if world trade continues to grow and no action is taken. The figures from the oil giant BP, which owns 50 tankers, and researchers at the Institute for Physics and Atmosphere in Wessling, Germany reveal that annual emissions from shipping range between 600 and 800m tonnes of carbon dioxide, or up to 5% of the global total. This is nearly double Britain's total emissions and more than all African countries combined.
And this little tidbit:
Carbon dioxide emissions from ships do not come under the Kyoto agreement or any proposed European legislation and few studies have been made of them, even though they are set to increase.
Aviation carbon dioxide emissions, estimated to be about 2% of the global total, have been at the forefront of the climate change debate because of the sharp increase in cheap flights, whereas shipping emissions have risen nearly as fast in the past 20 years but have been ignored by governments and environmental groups. Shipping is responsible for transporting 90% of world trade which has doubled in 25 years.
Emphasis mine. The proposed legislations for warming are specifically targeted at the nations with successful dynamic economies. This is counter-intuitive as the majority of the problem will be arising from the third-world nations as they develop without the available money to do so in an environmentally effective way. We could do a lot more REAL work by sponsoring micro-level projects like solar cookers for tropics, good kitchen stoves for areas that use wood or dung fires for cooking, the widespread intelligent use of DDT against Malaria which is still killing two million people per year. This would not impact the CO2 emissions as much as killing the top 10% of the worlds economies but it would make the world a lot better place to live for everyone concerned.
