Sustainability Freshman Inquiry

Feb. 10, 2010

Jeff Fletcher

Logistics• PSU Recycles Service Project

– Missing Students see me afterwards– How did the sort go?– HW 3

• Due Today– Read Collapse Prologue, Ch. 1 (p. ix - 75)

• Reading guide on Daily Log– Midterm exam

• Read Collapse Ch. 2 for next Wednesday• Today

– Follow-up on Tragedy of the Commons (with prizes!)– Feedback on Carbon Footprints– Wrap up Kolbert– Wrap up other issues

Exercise• Each player starts with $100 and can choose to invest

from $0 to their current balance.• In each round, each member’s investment is subtracted

from each member’s balance• The total of all the investments from the current round

are doubled and then divide evenly among all the players • This gives each player a new balance to start a new

round• We will do several rounds—please do not get ahead of

(or behind) me. I will announce when each round starts and stops

• Player with highest final score wins a prize• There is no communication allowed between players

q, fraction of cooperators in a groupc = cost of cooperation; b = benefit conferred

utility per individual

0 0.5 10

c

b

fitness to a cooperator, wa

fitness to a defector, ws

average fitness, wav

N-Player PD (Tragedy of the Commons)

• Individually rational to defect: ws > wa for all q• Collectively irrational outcome: ws(0) < wa(1)

opponent’s behavior

C

D

actor’s

C

300

0 behavior

D

500

100

Prisoner’s Dilemma (PD)Actor's Fitness (Utility)

• Individually rational to defect• Collectively irrational

Carbon Footprint: Writing

• The overall goal to communicate effectively: think general reader (who hasn’t seen the assignment)

• Abstract is standalone summary of report—including results!

• Intro sets context, gives motivation, and preview of what is coming

• ASK if don’t know how to do something– How to add or remove things from charts, etc.

• Level of detail hard to know—so ask us– Need details on how you made estimates – Do not need details on how you made charts, or how you

actually used carbonfootprint.com website– One gains experience with these things through practice

Carbon Footprint: Writing cont.

• Use of bullets in methods

• Results section needs words that refer to graphs, tables

• Caption and title on tables, graphs,

• Be clear on units, annotate pie chart with values (or at least percentages)

Carbon Footprint: Issues

– Average in class lower than US average. Why?

– Possible explanations:• Lifetime development: affluence = more impact• University lifestyle• Not including everything; miscalculations

– Conclusion: “I’m doing better than US average, so I’m done”?

• Kolbert cake analogy?

– Footprint is a ROUGH estimate

Carbon Footprint: Issues cont.

• Carbon Offsets: This is what these websites are selling and why calculators are provided for free– Choosing carbon offsets (not all equal)– Carbon offset vendors that sell Gold Standard offsets

• Planetair, Less, My Climate, Sustainable Travel International, Climate Friendly, Atmosfair, Pure

• How does burning a gallon of gas (weight 6.3 lbs) produce 20 lbs of CO2?– See: http://www.fueleconomy.gov/feg/CO2.shtml

• Breathing ~ 1 kg of CO2/day– http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?

qid=20080923091421AA830QK– http://www.null-hypothesis.co.uk/science/strange-but-true/profs-

probings/carbon_virgin_earth_climate_breathing

World Electricity Availability

Country

Population w/out access to electricity (Million)

% of world total

Per capita electricity consumption (kWh)

India 579.1 35.44 393

Bangladesh 104.4 6.39 102

Indonesia 98 6 390

Nigeria 76.15 4.66 85

Pakistan 65 3.98 374

Ethiopia 61.28 3.75 24

Myanmar 45.3 2.77 74

Tanzania 30.16 1.85 55

Kenya 27.71 1.7 107

Nepal 19.5 1.19 61

DPR of Korea 17.8 1.09 1288

Mozambique 16.42 1 47

World Total 1634.2 100

http://www.earth.columbia.edu/cgsd/documents/CGSD_India_Modi.pdf

Review: Is The Temperature Rising?

• Raft analogy– Two questions

• How far to waterfall? • When should we get out of the water?

– First question scientific; second political– Problems:

• Skepticism and reluctance to claim facts is inherent to scientific research

– Similar to Evolution: “it’s just a theory”

• Tragedy of the Commons or Prisoner’s Dilemma

Temperature Rising (continued)• Thomas Malthus: “gigantic inevitable

famine”– Lily pond after 100 days

• Need to understand that science is not exact, but sometimes we still need to act– The Lessons of Montreal Protocol (1987) in

dealing with the Ozone Hole• Periodic reviews to adapt to new results• Requirements change if evidence changes

Consumerism

• Story of Stuff– Questions

• Does the video overstate anything?• Can you think of alternative ways of addressing these

issues?

• Critique– Story of Stuff, The Critique Part 3 of 4

• http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AgLrZc7cws8• Does it deal with the central argument of a linear throughput

on a finite earth

– Part 4 of 4• http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8XeW5ilk-9Y&NR=1