#Carbon Market Institute

[icmioneline]

A Critical Tool in Climate Change Mitigation: Understanding Carbon Footprinting

by International Carbon Markets Institute

Carbon footprinting, the process of quantifying the total greenhouse gas emissions caused directly and indirectly by a product, person, organization, or nation, is a critical component in the science and policy of climate change mitigation. Discerning its dimensions, applications, and potential pitfalls can pave the way for more informed decisions and strategies in combating climate change.

Carbon footprinting as a concept is rooted in the principles of life cycle assessment (LCA), an approach that examines the environmental impacts associated with all stages of a product’s life, from raw material extraction to end-of-life disposal. By applying this approach to the domain of greenhouse gases, carbon footprinting offers a comprehensive view of the emissions associated with any activity or entity.

The granularity and scope of a carbon footprint can vary depending on the goal of the assessment. It can encompass the emissions from a single activity or process, such as manufacturing a product or running an office building. Alternatively, it can span the entire supply chain of a product, capturing both direct and indirect emissions. On a larger scale, it can cover the emissions of a whole organization, city, or nation.

While carbon dioxide is often the main focus due to its prevalence and longevity in the atmosphere, a thorough carbon footprint includes all relevant greenhouse gases, such as methane and nitrous oxide. These gases are converted to carbon dioxide equivalents (CO2e) based on their global warming potential, enabling their aggregation into a single metric.

Once established, a carbon footprint provides an empirical foundation for climate action. It enables benchmarking and target setting, informs emissions reduction strategies, and facilitates tracking and reporting progress. It can also guide policy development, investment decisions, and consumer choices, among other applications.

However, the process of developing a carbon footprint is not without challenges. Data collection can be resource-intensive and fraught with uncertainties, especially when it comes to indirect emissions and upstream or downstream stages of the supply chain. Methodological choices, such as system boundaries, allocation rules, and emission factors, can also significantly influence the outcome.

Interpreting and comparing carbon footprints can be equally challenging. A lower carbon footprint does not always equate to a lower overall environmental impact, given the potential trade-offs with other impacts such as water use, land use, toxicity, and biodiversity loss. The context and purpose of the footprint, such as the type of product, the sector, and the geographical location, also need to be taken into account.

Moreover, the effectiveness of carbon footprinting as a tool for climate change mitigation hinges on the transparency, credibility, and relevance of the process. This calls for adherence to recognized standards and protocols, rigorous verification, and meaningful stakeholder engagement. It also calls for continual updates to reflect technological advancements, scientific insights, and evolving societal values.

In tandem with the quantification of carbon footprints, the actual reduction of emissions necessitates concerted efforts at multiple levels. Technological innovations, operational efficiencies, and renewable energy transitions are among the avenues for reduction. Additionally, shifts in consumption patterns, product design, and business models can contribute to a lower carbon intensity.

Lastly, carbon footprinting should be integrated with broader frameworks of sustainability and climate resilience. It should not only serve as an instrument for measuring emissions but also as a catalyst for transformative change towards a low-carbon and sustainable future. As the world grapples with the escalating threat of climate change, understanding and effectively utilizing carbon footprinting is more critical than ever.

Read more at International Carbon Markets Institute.

[shinobicyrus]

Hey, yanno how Climate Change is a real thing that is tangibly, at this moment, affecting our world?

Well it turns out, the wealthy and their investment firms have been seeing the mounting evidence that oil companies have had for decades and are slowly starting to think more long-term about their portfolios in the face of rising sea levels, more extreme weather, and the myriad of ways climate crises are affecting...well. Everything. Maybe this means they invest more into sustainability, green energy, building more resilient infrastructure, or carbon offsets. Some of it, of course, is simple corporate greenwashing, but there are those that are taking this trend and packaging it into something called ESG (Environmental, Social, and corporate Governance).

Now some people would say this is predictable, even sensible. Just the good ol’ Free Market(tm) rationally responding to market forces and a changing world.

But those people would be fools! Insidious fools! For conservative sorcerers have come out with a new cursed phrase to explain this new market trend: Woke Investing.

What makes this investing “woke?” Well, much like how conservatives normally flounder when trying to define a word they stole from black people, “Woke Investing” essentially just means any kind of capital investment that they, the fossil fuel billionaire class and their sycophants, don’t personally profit from.

One of these aforementioned sycophants is Andy Puzder, conservative commentator, fellow at The Heritage Foundation, and former fast-food CEO. He calls this kind of so-called woke investing “socialism in sheep’s clothing,” further explaining in leaked audio of a closed-door meeting:

“My father's generation's challenge was the Nazis, who, by the way, were, of course, very proud socialists[citation fucking needed]. The challenge of my generation was the communists, who were, of course, very committed socialists. The challenge of your generation is ESG investing, and it's more insidious than communism or the Nazis.”(source)

You heard it here first, folks. Not investing as much in fossil fuels is more insidious than the Third Fucking Reich.

As usual, the Heritage Foundation is putting their petro-chemical donor’s money where their mouth is. Bills are being proposed to blacklist banks that don’t invest in key state industries, such as West Virginia coal or Texas oil. Fourteen states have already passed bills to restrict ESG-type investing, with Florida Governor Ron “Bullies Kids for Wearing Masks” Desantis leading the charge.

In other words, Climate Denial has reached such a point that so-called Free Market Conservatives who claim to hate big government are trying to make it illegal for banks, investment firms, and financial institutions to make any financial decisions that acknowledges Climate Change is real.

[wachinyeya]

The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) National Institute of Food and Agriculture (NIFA) announced today an investment of $70 million in seven creative and visionary agricultural projects to transform the U.S. food and agricultural system and sustainably increase agricultural production in ways that also reduce its environmental footprint.

This Fiscal Year 2023 investment is part of the Sustainable Agricultural Systems program area of NIFA’s Agriculture and Food Research Initiative, the nation’s leading and largest competitive grants program for agricultural sciences.

The innovative program focuses on a broad range of needed research, education and Extension solutions – from addressing agricultural workforce challenges and promoting land stewardship to addressing climate change impacts in agriculture and filling critical needs in food and nutrition.

“Agriculture is facing a multitude of complex challenges,” said Dr. Chavonda Jacobs-Young, USDA Chief Scientist and Under Secretary for Research, Education and Economics. “We need all hands on deck developing creative, sustainable and strategic ways to feed, clothe and fuel future generations.”

The $10 million awards are for coordinated agricultural projects (CAPs), which are larger-scale and longer-term investments that integrate research, education and Extension efforts. These projects promote collaboration, open communication, information exchange and reduce duplication efforts by coordinating activities among individuals, institutions, states and regions.

“These research investments support exciting projects that integrate innovative systems-based thinking, methods and technologies to establish robust, resilient, and climate-smart food and agricultural systems,” said NIFA Director Dr. Manjit Misra. “These visionary projects will improve the local and regional supply of affordable, safe, nutritious and accessible food and agricultural products, while fostering economic development and rural prosperity in America.”

Explore the seven projects, which include the following:

At the University of Wisconsin-Madison, Dr. Erin Silva is leading a collaboration with the Great Lakes Intertribal Food Coalition, the Wisconsin Tribal Conservation Advisory Council, and the Menominee Nation on a transdisciplinary project that aims to scale up traditional Indigenous food production practices — practices that for generations have already been climate-smart and sustainable — by expanding production, processing, storage, and distribution systems, as well as education and Extension programs, that are needed to support integrated crop-livestock systems, cover crops, and rotationally-grazed cattle and pastured chickens.

At the University of Maine, Dr. Hemant Pendse is leading an integrated research, education and Extension effort to advance the bioeconomy by developing biorefinery technologies that will make the millions of tons of available low-grade woody biomass – which currently has a very limited market – more commercially viable in both the sustainable aviation fuel and fish feed sectors.

At Texas A&M AgriLife Research, Dr. Muthu Bagavathiannan is leading a project that seeks to transform cotton production in the southern United States into a more sustainable, climate-smart enterprise by applying improved precision management practices to increase carbon sequestration and reduce greenhouse gas emissions; enhance pest control, and nutrient and water management; and address labor challenges while creating new market opportunities.

AFRI, which also makes grants in the Foundational and Applied Sciences and Education and Workforce Development program areas, is designed to improve plant and animal production and sustainability, and human and environmental health. Grants are available to eligible colleges, universities, and other research organizations.

[alanshemper]

There are other reasons why environmentalism might have looked like a bourgeois playground to Said. The Israeli state has long coated its nation-building project in a green veneer – it was a key part of the Zionist ‘back to the land’ pioneer ethos. And in this context trees, specifically, have been among the most potent weapons of land grabbing and occupation. It’s not only the countless olive and pistachio trees that have been uprooted to make way for settlements and Israeli-only roads. It’s also the sprawling pine and eucalyptus forests that have been planted over those orchards, as well as over Palestinian villages, most notoriously by the Jewish National Fund, which, under its slogan ‘Turning the Desert Green’, boasts of having planted 250 million trees in Israel since 1901, many of them non-native to the region. In publicity materials, the JNF bills itself as just another green NGO, concerned with forest and water management, parks and recreation. It also happens to be the largest private landowner in the state of Israel, and despite a number of complicated legal challenges, it still refuses to lease or sell land to non-Jews.

...

The JNF is an extreme and recent example of what some call ‘green colonialism’. But the phenomenon is hardly new, nor is it unique to Israel. There is a long and painful history in the Americas of beautiful pieces of wilderness being turned into conservation parks – and then that designation being used to prevent Indigenous people from accessing their ancestral territories to hunt and fish, or simply to live. It has happened again and again. A contemporary version of this phenomenon is the carbon offset. Indigenous people from Brazil to Uganda are finding that some of the most aggressive land grabbing is being done by conservation organisations. A forest is suddenly rebranded a carbon offset and is put off-limits to its traditional inhabitants. As a result, the carbon offset market has created a whole new class of ‘green’ human rights abuses, with farmers and Indigenous people being physically attacked by park rangers or private security when they try to access these lands. Said’s comment about tree-huggers should be seen in this context.

...

But this only scratches the surface of what we can learn from reading Said in a warming world. He was, of course, a giant in the study of ‘othering’ – what is described in Orientalism as ‘disregarding, essentialising, denuding the humanity of another culture, people or geographical region’. And once the other has been firmly established, the ground is softened for any transgression: violent expulsion, land theft, occupation, invasion. Because the whole point of othering is that the other doesn’t have the same rights, the same humanity, as those making the distinction. What does this have to do with climate change? Perhaps everything.

We have dangerously warmed our world already, and our governments still refuse to take the actions necessary to halt the trend. There was a time when many had the right to claim ignorance. But for the past three decades, since the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change was created and climate negotiations began, this refusal to lower emissions has been accompanied with full awareness of the dangers. And this kind of recklessness would have been functionally impossible without institutional racism, even if only latent. It would have been impossible without Orientalism, without all the potent tools on offer that allow the powerful to discount the lives of the less powerful. These tools – of ranking the relative value of humans – are what allow the writing off of entire nations and ancient cultures. And they are what allowed for the digging up of all that carbon to begin with.

2 June 2016

[ask-a-goldsmith]

In writing my last few posts, I have realized that there is quite a lot of basic(to me) knowledge required to understand most of this stuff. I've done my best to explain as I go, but I think this deserves its own post. So, here we go!

Junior Gemology 101

This post is mostly about diamonds! I am well aware it's called Junior Gemology, but 90% of what I deal with on a day-to-day basis is diamonds. Also, a lot of this applies to coloured stones too, so no need to repeat myself.

What is a diamond, actually?

Diamonds are carbon! That's all there is! Except for inclusions. And coloured diamonds. Those have little bits of other materials in them. And are also a topic for later. I digress. Like always.

Specifically, diamonds are carbon atoms bonded together covalently in a tetrahedral shape. Confusing enough yet? This means that each carbon atom is bonded to 4 other carbon atoms. It's ok if you don't get it, I spent about 3 hours trying to understand diamond structure before things started to make sense. This website has a 3D model of the tetrahedral structure seen in diamonds and is what I used to finally wrap my head around it. The important part is: diamonds are made of carbon atoms connected in a pattern. If the pattern was different, It wouldn't be a diamond! If the carbon was bonded in hexagonal rings, it would be graphite! Same atoms, veeeerrrryyy different result.

What makes diamonds so darn special?

I've told you what a diamond is - so why do people care about this very specific pattern of carbon? The answer is(mostly) that humanity LOVES shiny things, and diamonds are great at being shiny. Why have diamonds become THE shiny thing to have? A combination of some REALLY successful marketing campaigns and some of diamond's unique characteristics. These characteristics include things such as their hardness, brilliance, and fire. I went deeper into these characteristics and what they mean in terms of telling diamonds from other stones in this post, but I'll give you a quick run-down here.

Diamonds are very(and famously) hard. They're a 10 on the Mohs scale, and almost nothing is harder than them. This doesn't mean diamonds are impervious to damage - while they are very hard, diamonds can also be brittle, and a hard smack in the wrong place can chip, crack, or even shatter a diamond. Trust me, I know. I've broken a few by accident.

Brilliance and fire are what give diamonds their characteristic bling. Though they are classified as different things - brilliance being the bright white reflections of light and fire being the rainbow reflections - they're both caused by diamond's Refractive Index. Refractive index(RI) is the measurement of the speed at which light travels through different materials - for our purposes though, think of it as how much a ray of light bends when it moves from one material to another. Diamonds have an RI of 2.42, which causes high brilliance and a medium amount of fire. RI isn't super important for most people to know - it really only comes into the conversation when comparing diamonds to simulant materials.

What are the 4 Cs?

The 4 Cs are the meat and potatoes of diamond basics - Carat weight, Colour, Clarity, and Cut. These four terms are used to describe diamonds worldwide, each describing a different part of a diamond's look.

Carat weight is the weight of a diamond. Pretty self-explanatory. What's not clear is what a carat actually is - no, not a carrot. A carat. A carat is 0.2 grams. Therefore, a 5 carat diamond(good lord) would weigh 1 gram. With me? Why do we weigh diamonds in carats instead of grams like sane people? Because way back yonder, carob seeds were used as a counterweight to weigh diamonds, and language did what language does.

Image from loosegrowndiamond.com

Colour refers to - you guessed it - the colour of the diamond. There are two basic systems that GIA(The Gemological Institute Of America, and the accepted authority of these things in North America) use; the normal colour range and the coloured or fancy diamond range. The normal colour range is used for stones that are colourless, light yellow, or light brown. These are the most common colours of diamond, thus the "normal" colour range. These stones are graded alphabetically D-Z, with D being colourless and Z being quite noticeably yellow or brown. Normal range colour grades are sorted into 5 groups based on the general amount of colour; colourless(DEF), nearly colourless(GHIJ), Faint(KLM), Very Light(N-R), and light(S-Z).

Image from GIA article 4Cs Color

Stones that fall outside this range (stones that are too yellow or brown for the scale or show any colour other than yellow and brown) are graded using the fancy colour grades. Fancy colour grades are an entire thing, but generally pretty self-explanatory. The grade will include 1 or two colours(the more dominant of which goes last) and an intensity descriptor such as light, intense, fancy deep, etc. For example, a stone may be graded as a fancy greyish blue - this means that the stone has a middling amount of colour and is blue with a hint of grey. Easy peasy.

Clarity is how many inclusions are in a stone. Well, technically it's more complicated than that, accounting for placement and contrast and type of inclusion etc etc etc. Really, clarity is how many inclusions you see in a stone. Inclusions are things in the diamond that are not diamond, such as included crystals, or imperfections in the diamond itself, such as cracks(called feathers) or chips.

Clarity grades are, frankly, confusing as fuck. There are 11 grades, broken down into 6 grade groups. From highest to lowest, they are; Flawless, Internally Flawless, Very Very Slightly Included(VVS), Very Slightly Included(VS), Slightly Included(SI), and Included(I). VVS, VS, and SI are each broken into 2 grades - 1 and 2. I is broken down into 3 grades - 1, 2, and 3. The lower the number within a grade, the better the grade - a VS1 stone would be less visibly included than a VS2. You know what'll help? Visuals!!

Images from GIA D&DG Chapter 11. Credit to John Koivula/GIA

The diamond on the left is graded as a VVS2 - the red arrow points to the inclusion that gave it this grade. The diamond on the right is graded as an I2. No red arrows are required - this stone has many highly visible inclusions. If you want a little more info (and examples) of clarity grades, GIA has a lovely little tool that explains it quite well.

Cut refers to the shape of a diamond - specifically, the combination of shape(face-up outline) and cutting style(the arrangement of the facets). A classic round brilliant is what most people think of when they think of a diamond, but there are dozens of different cuts. When talking about cut grade, cut refers to how well executed the cut is. Are the proportions ideal? Is everything symmetrical? Is the polish well done? These determine the cut grade of the stone. Cut grades are as follows, best to worst; Excellent, Very Good, Good, Fair, and Poor.

What are the parts of a cut diamond?

Specifically, the parts of a round brilliant diamond. Round brilliant is the name of the most common cut of diamond. Think of a diamond. Is it round? That's almost definitely a round brilliant. Think I've said round brilliant enough? Round brilliant. Whew. Done with that now. This is best explained with diagrams.

The parts we're most interested in are the table, crown, girdle, and pavilion. The way those 3 parts are shaped and proportioned has a huge effect on the looks and value of a diamond.

Knowledge Check

Let's say you're looking at a 1.01 carat round brilliant diamond - it has a colour grade of F, a clarity grade of SI1, and an excellent cut grade. So, what does this mean to you?

Round brilliant is the cut of the diamond. It has a round outline and a brilliant cutting style. 1.01ct is a fairly large diamond - this one in particular is 6.42 mm in diameter (that's a quarter inch!). This stone is colourless - F is the lowest colour grade in the colourless range, but it is still classified as colourless. The diamond will either have one large or several small inclusions that are easy to see under 10x magnification, but hard or impossible to see while looking through the table of a stone with the naked eye(they may be visible through the pavilion with the naked eye). The diamond will be very well cut - the best cut grade possible, in fact! There will be no visible variation in the girdle outline, and all the facets will be well-placed and symmetrical.

It's up to you to decide if this stone matches your criteria - is SI1 a good enough cut grade for you? Is 1.01ct the right size? How "good" a stone is depends on what you want - there will always be bigger, clearer, more colourless diamonds on the market. What makes a stone "good" is if it's the right fit for you. Another stone may be better quality, but if it's out of your price range, then it's not a good stone for you.

In Conclusion

So, you made it this far! Congrats! Hopefully, I haven't bored you too much. We've really just scratched the surface - this was enough information to give you a good idea of what's going on and allow you to navigate the mysticisms of those strange numbers and letters you see associated with diamonds. All information was taken from the GIA Diamond Essentials 130 and Diamonds and Diamond Grading 230 courses and my 6ish years in the jewelry industry. If you have questions about specific pieces of information or want more resources, send me an ask! I will be delighted to answer.

[probablyasocialecologist]

The vast majority of the environmental projects most frequently used to offset greenhouse gas emissions appear to have fundamental failings suggesting they cannot be relied upon to cut planet-heating emissions, according to a new analysis.

[...]

Overall, $1.16bn (£937m) of carbon credits have been traded so far from the projects classified by the investigation as likely junk or worthless; a further $400m of credits bought and sold were potentially junk.

[...]

“The ramifications of this analysis are huge, as it points to systemic failings of the voluntary market, providing additional evidence that junk carbon credits pervade the market,” said Anuradha Mittal, director of the Oakland Institute thinktank. “We cannot afford to waste any more time on false solutions. The issues are far-reaching and pervasive, extending well beyond specific verifiers. The [voluntary carbon market] is actively exacerbating the climate emergency.”

[rjzimmerman]

Excerpt from this story from Canary Media:

Colorado just got a big boost to help slash planet-warming emissions from commercial buildings.

Last week, the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) announced the state was selected to receive a $20 million grant to help implement its building performance standards — ambitious rules that limit the amount of carbon pollution big buildings can emit. Colorado adopted the policy, which applies to edifices 50,000 square feet or greater, last year.

The funding will be used to help buildings in marginalized communities, whose owners may be less able to afford deep carbon-cutting measures like insulation and heat pumps, meet the state’s building decarbonization targets.

“We’re really excited about this DOE award to ensure the success of Colorado’s building performance standard,” Dominique Gómez, deputy director of the Colorado Energy Office, told Canary Media.

The Colorado award was the largest among the 19 grants to state and local governments announced last week as part of a broader $1 billion Inflation Reduction Act effort to clean up the U.S. building stock. The vast majority of the new round of funding went to helping cities and states design or implement performance standards for buildings, a means of tackling emissions that’s taking root around the country. From New York City’s pioneering Local Law 97 to Seattle’s Building Emissions Performance Standards, these policies set emissions or energy-use intensity caps per square foot in large structures that become more stringent over time.

Building owners have flexibility in figuring out how to meet these standards, whether that’s switching to LED light bulbs, weatherizing, electrifying heating or all of the above. If they fall short, owners face hefty penalties that are designed to exceed retrofit costs, according to Paulina Torres, research manager at global real-estate services firm JLL.

Performance standards are sticks to the policy carrots incentivizing energy efficiency upgrades that, on their own, largely haven’t worked to reduce building sector emissions, said Marshall Duer-Balkind, policy director at the building decarbonization nonprofit Institute for Market Transformation (IMT).

Unlike building energy codes, which generally target new construction, performance standards tackle emissions from existing buildings — a massive source of climate pollution. When you include the electricity they consume, buildings are the largest source of carbon emissions in the country — more than transportation, agriculture, or industry (excluding its buildings), according to the DOE. 

[mariacallous]

How many more U.N. climate conferences will it take for the world to admit that the current climate policy path is at a dead end?

Calls by politicians, activists, and journalists to double down ring increasingly hollow in the face of overwhelming evidence that 2024 will be the first year in which average global surface temperature is likely to be more than 1.5 degrees Celsius (or about 2.7 degrees Fahrenheit) above that of the preindustrial period before 1900. The long-term average increase since that period will pass 1.5 degrees in 2030. Even staying significantly below 2 degrees Celsius—the target that the climate policy community used until 2015 before lowering it in order to galvanize lawmakers—now looks unlikely.

Missing the 1.5 degree target does not mean that we’re all going to boil, bake, and die. Global emissions growth has slowed down enough that the extreme warming scenarios brandished so carelessly in the public debate have become all but impossible. Deaths due to natural disasters, such as floods, droughts, storms, and wildfires, have also declined radically as countries have become richer and more resilient. And economic losses due to climate shocks have decreased fivefold between the 1980s and mid 2000s.

Sticking to an unrealistic temperature target has severe economic and geopolitical effects. Panic over not reaching the target has led to a radical push for an immediate phaseout of fossil fuels, ignoring the fact that they still make up 80 percent of the world’s primary energy supply. That call is being led by rich countries that have become wealthy using fossil fuels and continue to gobble up oil and gas—and which now want to restrict less-developed countries from using these fuels to lift themselves out of energy poverty, a primary reason for their destitution. Development advocates are rightly calling out these unfair policies, enforced through institutions such as the World Bank, as eco-colonialism.

Unrealistic temperature targets combined with continued high consumption of fossil fuels has meant that there is little to no carbon budget available for the poorest countries to grow their energy use. Sticking to the goal of freezing emissions—or even targeting negative emissions to compensate for any overshoot—turns global economic activity into a zero-sum game.

Room for one country to develop, which may require increased use of fossil fuels for the foreseeable future, means that another must shrink its economy. The distribution conflict over emissions rights will be epic and bitter, not just between rich and poor countries but also among poor countries themselves, making any new agreements to reduce emissions even more difficult.

Enter Russia and China, which have made it clear that they will not play by Western rules, including those on climate policy. Since launching the war in Ukraine, the Kremlin has sought to strengthen its ties to OPEC and secure its role in oil and gas markets. China is investing everywhere in resource extraction, including fossil fuels in Africa and the Middle East. The three main Chinese energy companies—CNPC, CNOOC, and Sinopec—have emerged as major investors in Africa’s oil and gas sectors.

Despite these concerns, Western governments refuse to support investments in poor countries’ energy sectors in hopes that starving the developing world of energy will help meet the 1.5-degree target. This has created a huge opening for Russia and China, which they will likely leverage to strengthen autocracy across these regions.

Paradoxically, acknowledging the demise of the 1.5-degree target in 2024 could reduce tensions between rich and poor countries—provided that governments seize the opportunity to reset climate goals. This could be the year when unrealistic temperature goals and endless theoretical fights over a phase-down versus a phaseout of fossil fuels are replaced by a focus on the three positive ideas that came out of the most recent U.N. climate conference, COP28, which concluded in Dubai in December.

In the conference’s outcome statement, nearly 200 signatory countries agreed on the need for transition fuels in poor countries—in other words, their use of fossil fuels will grow faster than their ability to transition away from them. Second, the signatories agreed that countries have different resource endowments and will therefore follow very different trajectories to decarbonize. Third, there was a strong commitment that nuclear energy can be an important source of clean and reliable power.

For the first time, COP28 officially recognized that transition fuels—a euphemism for fossil fuels tolerated to prevent economic collapse and allow development if abundant green energy is not yet available—“can play a role in facilitating the energy transition while ensuring energy security.” COP signatories finally acknowledged, albeit implicitly, that poor countries consume only a tiny fraction of the energy gobbled up by rich countries and desperately need more electricity to power homes, schools, hospitals, and factories.

Indeed, the gap between rich and poor is enormous: The average American consumes about 12,000 kilowatt-hours of electric power per year, whereas the average sub-Saharan African consumes only 130 kilowatt-hours. In other words, an African consumes about as much electricity in an entire year as an American consumes in four days. Or, as Todd Moss of the Energy for Growth Hub illustrated in a chart that went viral, many sub-Saharan Africans consume less electricity per person than the average U.S. refrigerator.

Transition fuels are not only critical for development in poor countries, but also for their adaptation to climate change. Natural gas is the best and cheapest feedstock to produce ammonia-based fertilizers, which in turn improves agricultural yields. Gas-fired power plants provide electricity for homes, schools, hospitals, emergency warning systems, air conditioning, and cold storage systems that prevent food losses. Africa’s vast reserves of natural gas can be harnessed for industrial production as well. Clean cooking fuels such as liquid petroleum gas improve the lives of millions of people who suffer from indoor air pollution as the result of cooking with animal dung or biomass. Gas as a backup fuel source allows countries to add unstable wind and solar to their energy systems.

Demonizing gas—as part of a rushed fossil fuel phaseout in service of an unreachable temperature target—is equal to demonizing development, and that will be true for a very long time. For industrial uses, in particular, the technologies to replace gas aren’t even visible on the horizon.

The COP28 statement also acknowledged that countries have “different national circumstances, pathways and approaches,” building on discussions at last year’s G-7 summit in Hiroshima and G-20 summit in New Delhi. In other words, countries lucky enough to have abundant, cheap, nonintermittent renewable energy sources such as geothermal and hydropower can achieve a lower carbon footprint quickly and cheaply. But for those that rely on coal, oil, or gas, the process of decarbonizing is much harder. The “all of the above” approach endorsed at COP suggests that technologies such as carbon capture and storage have a role in lowering emissions.

This is both pragmatic and inclusive: Countries such as India, China, South Africa, and those in Southeast Asia are heavily dependent on coal for electricity, and they will now have options to address emissions in the near term while shifting toward renewable energy sources in the long term. Carbon capture in heavy industry, for example, could abate continued emissions from sectors indispensable for development, including steel, cement, and chemicals.

COP28 made history by treating nuclear power as equal to other renewable energy sources. A declaration to triple nuclear energy by 2050, signed by more than 20 countries, underscores the importance of nuclear power in reducing greenhouse gas emissions. Rich countries with significant civilian nuclear sectors, such as France, Japan, and the United States, appear on the list of signatories, but so do Ghana, Jamaica, Mongolia, and Morocco, all of which are eager for reliable sources of clean energy to power their growing economies.

New, smaller reactors, the signatories agreed, “could occupy a small land footprint and can be sited where needed, partner well with renewable energy sources, and have additional flexibilities that support decarbonization beyond the power sector, including hard-to-abate industrial sectors.”

Of course, words by themselves don’t mean much. But the declaration includes a call on the shareholders of the World Bank to include nuclear energy in the portfolio of financed projects. If the bank can overcome the objections of a tiny group of rich countries (centered on Germany) that are ideologically opposed to nuclear power, the bank can play an important role by bringing down the cost for poor countries.

Safety is paramount when it comes to nuclear reactors, and the bank’s richest shareholders can help with newer, safer, and more efficient technologies. The United States is at the forefront of building advanced reactors that use better fuels, require less substantial containment, and need fewer redundant safety systems. These smaller, cheaper reactors function better than their larger, more complex predecessors and suffer fewer construction delays.

Japan, too, is an innovator. Tokyo’s so-called green transformation strategy calls for the development of next-generation innovative reactors, including next-generation light-water reactors, small modular reactors, fast reactors, high-temperature gas reactors, and nuclear fusion, all of which could be at the core of a new, more effective global climate policy that looks far beyond wind and solar to decarbonize.

The catastrophism surrounding the impending failure to reach the 1.5-degree target has generated both panic and distrust of climate science. Governments and civil society should abandon today’s ritualized, performative, and highly politicized discourse—and instead concentrate on the full spectrum of technologies to lower carbon emissions while helping poor countries to develop and become more resilient to climate change.

Investments to improve energy access, expand the roster of low-carbon technologies, and generate abundant, clean, and reliable power are a good starting point.

[fatehbaz]

“The freedom to piss on the cement of Empire [...].”

---

The dry semi-desert that is South Africa’s Karoo began as an ice cap on the supercontinent Pangea [...]. The Karoo ice cap was kilometers deep and peaked between 359 and 299 million years ago. [...] Another hundred million years after Pangea split [...], the Karoo became home and then graveyard to dinosaurs of the Jurassic Era [...]. [Then] volcanic extrusions and kimberlite pipes threw skywards the purest form of carbon: diamonds. [...]

The discovery of diamond-bearing rock in the northern Karoo in 1869 propelled the [British] Empire into inventing new aspects of the technosphere, in which metal mining structures, wooden beams, steam engines, long guns, and the muscles and bones and guts of migrant laborers were employed to reconnect the volcanic residues of the Late Cretaceous with the economic and political landscapes of South Africa and Britain. At the time, 90 percent of the world's industrial diamonds on the market came from the region, giving [...] [the British Empire] mastery over geological matter [...]. Profits from the sale of Late Cretaceous diamonds from ninety-one million years ago fed the formation of cities, corporations, and institutions in England and her Cape. [...] [T]he entrepreneur Cecil John Rhodes amassed a personal fortune from the diamond rush, taking control [...] [of] the Big Hole of Kimberley, where the largest kimberlite volcanic pipe extrudes. Appointed prime minister of the Cape Colony in 1890, Rhodes set about establishing a legal infrastructure that favored mining and a social infrastructure that established race-based disenfranchisement, creating a class of black laborers [...]. Black South African land rights were stripped in 1913; black economic activity became largely confined to physical labor, much of which was in the mines.

In the 1900s, the Carboniferous Era from around three hundred million years ago entered South African politics via South African’s coal-fired power stations. In the 1960s, the newly independent Republic of South Africa, [...] [controlled by] an embittered [white] minority, sought [...] to pursue formal policies of race-based segregation [apartheid], and [in order to fund its projects, then] commissioned geological surveys for coal, oil, and uranium. [...]

---

“Colonization=‘thingification’” wrote the postcolonial philosopher Aime Cesaire.

For Cecil John Rhodes, nature was a spectacle that could be kept in a zoo; the university was a project to be “funded from the stomachs of k*firs”; migrant laborers in the diamond mines were required to wait two weeks before leaving, while the contents of their colons were collected and painstakingly searched for ingested gems. Under colonial regimes of extraction of labor and minerals, Africa became a laboratory for the necropolitical: relations of life for relationships of ownership and death. [...] 

His estate set up the University of Cape Town and his statue was erected in 1934: a two-ton bronze effigy of the man set on a concrete plinth in a pose that calls to mind Rodin’s The Thinker. In the view of the statue’s gaze there was Rhodes Highway, Rhodes Drive, Rhodes High School; to the statue's right was Rhodes Memorial, and to its left his zoo; on the far side of the old Cape Colony would be built Rhodes University.

Memorialized thus as the archetypal Reasonable Man, the aura of his realism must have been surreal to those who had suffered under his rule. [...] [I]n 2015, academics, students [...] in and alongside the University of Cape Town found themselves confronting a performance of the execrable on March 9, 2015, when [a] student [...] threw excrement - nightsoil from a shack settlement - over Rhodes’s statue to call for the university’s decolonization. Rhodes’s statue was removed on a flat-bed truck exactly one month later [...].

---

Geologies of morals and morals of geology: the Karoo Ice Age, frozen and global, and Rhodes’s Karoo Age, an era of extractive economy that sacrificed life and created sacrifice zones. One lasted a hundred million years, the other a hundred and fifty. Both changed the relations between geology and life. [...]

Amid the Rhodes statue’s formal removal on April 9, 2015, a construction worker - a deconstruction worker, really - took a moment to piss [...] on the stairs leading up to Rhodes. It was his own moment in a month-long protest [...]. A moment to seize the possibility of vulgarity that breaks the lines of authority, the fountain of piss flagrantly rejoins the flow of water through all bodies and all spheres. The freedom to piss on the cement of Empire asserts that the body of the construction worker and the body of the shack-dweller inhabit the same earth as the Empire, and that cement, ultimately, is a political subject. As is diamond-bearing kimberlite, and gas-bearing shale. [...]

Colonization made predatory claims on the earth’s geological flows and processes without regard to the reciprocities through which they were formed in the earth’s spheres.

---

All text above by: Lesley Green. “The Changing of the Gods of Reason: Cecil John Rhodes, Karoo Fracking, and the Decolonizing of the Anthropocene.” e-flux Journal Issue #65. May 2015. [Bold emphasis and some paragraph breaks/contractions added by me. Italicized first line/heading in this post added by me, quoting Green. Presented here for commentary, teaching, criticism.]

[theculturedmarxist]

China’s path to reducing carbon emissions should be determined by China and not controlled by anyone else, President Xi Jinping told dozens of officials, at the same time as US climate envoy John Kerry is in Beijing seeking consensus on global warming.

Xi was speaking at a two-day national conference on ecological and environmental protection that started on Monday, Chinese state broadcaster CCTV reported on Tuesday night.

“China’s commitments are unswerving, but the path towards the goals as well as the manner, pace and intensity of efforts to achieve them should and must be determined by the country itself, rather than swayed by others,” he said.

“[We should] actively and steadily work toward carbon peaking and carbon neutrality, foster a clean, low-carbon, safe and efficient energy system, accelerate the formation of a new power system and strengthen the country’s capability of guaranteeing oil and gas security.”

Xi also urged the country to safeguard ecological security and nuclear and radiation safety to “ensure that the natural environment and conditions, which are the foundation of survival and development, are not threatened or damaged”.

He asked for a concerted legal, market, technological and policy effort to achieve his goals.

The conference was attended by all seven members of the Politburo Standing Committee, the pinnacle of the party’s decision-making apparatus, as well as a wide range of party and government bodies.

Kerry, whose four-day visit concludes on Wednesday, has met Premier Li Qiang and top diplomat Wang Yi, as he seeks consensus on the fight against climate change.

There are also hopes his trip will add positive momentum to US-China relations, in their worst shape in decades.

Kerry tweeted on Tuesday that he appreciated the opportunity to have “an important discussion” with Li on how the US and China can work together to keep the pledge to limit global warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius about pre-industrial levels – a commitment of the 2015 Paris agreement – alive.

Li called for both sides to stick to climate commitments made in the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change and the Paris Agreement.

Xi promised in September 2020 that China’s carbon emissions would peak by 2030 and become carbon neutral by 2060. In 2021, he said China would tightly control coal consumption and gradually reduce it after 2025.

China has repeatedly emphasised the need to secure its energy security and deliver on its climate commitments.

The most recent government work report to address the issue – submitted to the National People’s Congress, China’s legislature, in March by the previous premier Li Keqiang – said research and development of clean energy was a priority for 2023.

In April, the National Energy Administration announced plans to add 160 million kilowatts of installed wind and solar capacity by the end of this year, boosting the share of wind and solar electricity to 15.3 per cent of society’s energy use.

“Three years after making its carbon-reduction pledge, China’s energy and industrial transitions are still far from complete,” said Ma Jun, director of the Institute for Public and Environmental Affairs, a non-profit environmental research firm.

While China’s renewable energy is increasing, China has approved more coal projects recently, noted Ma. “Due to complex geopolitical changes, China has shifted its focus to energy security,” he said.

A major stumbling block to an agreement between the US and China on climate issues is China’s use of coal power. Washington wants China to reduce its domestic reliance on coal to cut more methane emissions. But Xi has reiterated many times that it is a matter of “energy security”.

There has been a significant increase in approvals for coal power projects within China since last summer’s extreme heatwave, which led to power supply crunches in several southern provinces. The rise in domestic approvals has sparked international concern about China’s ability to deliver on its climate promise.

On Kerry’s last visit to China in August 2021, he asked Beijing to stop funding coal power projects outside its borders. A month later, at the UN General Assembly, Xi announced that China would no longer build new coal power overseas.

Regarding China and US’s differences in climate issues and carbon reduction, Ma said, “What we have to see is what kind of cooperation the two sides are going to go for, and whether they can achieve a win-win situation on what each side is good at.”

[andiatas]

H.M. The King's opening speech at International Union of Forest Research Organization's World Congress 2024

Ministers, Excellencies, Ladies and gentlemen,

I am pleased to welcome you all to the International Union of Forest Research Organizations World Congress 2024. This year hosted by Sweden in collaboration with the Nordic and Baltic countries.

The last time Sweden hosted the congress was in 1929, when my great-grandfather Gustaf V was King. Back then, the forest played a crucial role in fostering stability in rural areas, providing both economic and social security.

The most recent forest conference was held in Brazil in 2019. The difference between boreal forests and the Amazon might seem big. But this week, many examples of similarities as well as common challenges will be discussed too.

To manage forests sustainably, whether they are in boreal forests or the South, we need certain basics in place to create resilient systems. These include stable institutions like government agencies, robust markets, and solid research to help us make smart decisions supporting a greener future.

Ladies and gentlemen,

This conference aims to build bridges between continents and people, addressing common challenges and showcasing forest solutions for a sustainable society.

I have had the privilege to travel across continents during several decades. It is evident how interconnected forests are and how crucial they are for the health of our planet.

As we all know but cannot be emphasized enough: Forests serve as carbon sinks in helping to combat climate change. Protecting and sustainably managing forests is essential to maintaining their role in capturing carbon.

Ladies and gentlemen,

Sweden has a proud tradition of sustainable forestry. This includes family forestry, where families manage forest lands over generations. It also involves the unique right of public access, allowing everyone to enjoy the forests. Our hunting and wildlife management practices help keep ecosystems balanced and diverse, which is crucial for protecting nature.

Sweden has also created a sustainable countryside through long-term ownership and collaboration among forestry stakeholders, industry, and local communities. This has created stable markets for forest products and services, making forestry a vital part of our economy.

Ladies and gentlemen,

I extend my sincere gratitude to the Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences (SLU), which has served as the host organization for this conference. Now, the hosting responsibilities will move on to Kenya and Nairobi.

Finally, I would like to welcome you to the Royal parks at Drottningholm and Hagaparken on Wednesday, where you will experience and discuss forest and individual tree management in urban areas.

Thank you!

Speech held by H.M. King Carl XVI Gustaf at Stockholmsmässan in Älvsjö, Stockholm, on June 24, 2024.

[arrozaurus]

But the biggest problem with this approach is that carbon markets have failed even on their own terms, as markets. In Europe, the problems began with the decision to entice companies and countries to join the market by handing out a huge number of cheap carbon permits. When the economic crisis hit a few years later, it caused production and consumption to contract and emissions to drop on their own. That meant the new emissions market was drowning in excess permits, which in turn caused the price of carbon to drop dramatically (in 2013, a ton of carbon was trading for less than €4, compared to the target price of €20). That left little incentive to shift away from dirty energy or to buy carbon credits. Which helps explain why, in 2012, coal’s share of the U.K.’s electricity production rose by more than 30 percent, while in Germany, as we have already seen, emissions from coal went up despite the country’s rapid embrace of renewable power. Meanwhile, the United Nations Clean Development Mechanism has fared even worse: indeed it has “essentially collapsed,” in the words of a report commissioned by the U.N. itself. “Weak emissions targets and the economic downturn in wealthy nations resulted in a 99 percent decline in carbon credit prices between 2008 and 2013,” explains Oscar Reyes, an expert on climate finance at the Institute for Policy Studies. This is a particularly extreme example of the boom-and-bust cycle of markets, which are volatile and high-risk by nature. And that’s the central flaw with this so-called solution: it is simply too risky, and time is too short, for us to put our collective fate in such an inconstant and unreliable force. John Kerry has likened the threat of climate change to a “weapon of mass destruction,” and it’s a fair analogy. But if climate change poses risks on par with nuclear war, then why are we not responding with the seriousness that that comparison implies? Why aren’t we ordering companies to stop putting our future at risk, instead of bribing and cajoling them? Why are we gambling?

—Naomi Klein, This Changes Everything (2014)

[mightyflamethrower]

Jul262024

Carbon Credits Enable Green Graft

Not all green lunacy can be attributed to an insidious attack on our freedom and standard of living or to the antihuman malice at the root of leftism. Another factor is straightforward greed:

Over the past two decades, so-called “carbon cowboys,” people who set up carbon credit initiatives for financial gain, have launched land preservation projects across the Amazon rainforest, generating carbon credits worth hundreds of millions of dollars and building a thinly regulated market valued at nearly $11 billion worldwide, according to The Washington Post. The Brazilian government’s anti-deforestation policies already safeguarded more than 78,000 square miles of land used for preservation projects before they were claimed for carbon credits, and 29 of the 35 internationally certified projects in the Amazon overlap with public lands, meaning a large percentage of carbon credits overlap with already existent conservation measures. The estimated total value of the offsets sold by these 29 ventures is $212 million, according to an analysis performed by The Washington Post using annual market rates. Multi-billion dollar companies like Netflix, Delta Air Lines, Spotify, PriceWaterhouseCoopers and Boeing are just a few of the major corporations that purchased these credits in order to offset their emissions.

Why would anyone pay a penny to pretend to “offset” harmless carbon emissions? According to energy consultant David Blackmon,

“For the most part, companies buy these credits for the simple fact that they are forced to do so either by wrong-headed government regulations or by ESG demands from green investors and financial institutions.”

Fools and their money are soon parted. Coercive regulations are required for the same reason Democrats are setting the stage for election fraud: not all of us are fools.

Eva Vlaardingerbroek explains how carbon credits can be inflicted at the individual level to impose green neofeudalism:

The new transfer of wealth from the poor to the rich will be Carbon Credit Brokerage.

[probablyasocialecologist]

Politicians on both sides of the aisle and the Biden administration have fallen for carbon offsetting’s simplistic appeal to fund carbon-smart farming practices without new regulations or government programs. But without a mandate to cut climate-warming pollution, buying unregulated carbon credits amounts to little more than misleading green marketing as companies maintain the status quo.

Soil carbon is hard to commodify, and offset sales lack basic market mechanisms. For one, naturally high variations in soil carbon concentration make it hard to generalize how certain practices, like no-till or planting cover crops, increase soil carbon sequestration. Soil carbon offsets also sell a claim to something that’s naturally impermanent – just one major disturbance or change in management practices can quickly release years of accumulated soil carbon.

[...]

Major agribusiness companies like Cargill, Bayer, Corteva, and Nutrien have all launched private programs that purport to pay farmers for sequestering carbon. These projects let agrichemical companies define “climate-smart” agriculture in their image.  

Biodiverse, agroecological, and perennial farming methods have far greater climate and environmental benefits than implementing isolated practices like cover-cropping or no-till agriculture on conventional, monocrop farms. For instance, even by conservative estimates, agroforestry can sequester 10 to 20 times more carbon per acre than no-till or cover-cropping.

Yet virtually all agribusiness-led carbon payment programs only reward farmers for a limited set of practices that can be integrated into the conventional industrial approach to farming: reducing fertilizer use, reducing tillage, or planting cover crops. Bayer has a particular incentive to reward no-till and cover crop practices because most large-scale farms rely on glyphosate, the main ingredient in Bayer’s Roundup, to “knock down” cover crops and control weeds in lieu of tillage. We found that Bayer promotes using glyphosate to support no-till and cover crops.

[...]

Corporate-run carbon contracts also aren’t a fair deal for farmers. While some programs tie payments to carbon-credit sales value, Bayer and Cargill unilaterally set the prices they pay per practice per acre or per ton of carbon sequestered. Carbon contracts are also long-term commitments. Farmers in Bayer’s Carbon Program must sign 10-year contracts with an additional 10-year “retention period,” during which farmers must maintain their new practices to ensure long-term carbon sequestration. This effectively commits farmers to 20 years of new fixed costs with only 10 years of guaranteed pay, at a price set by Bayer.

[rjzimmerman]

Hydrogen has a long way to go, according to a new report. (Heatmap AM)

“Hydrogen-ready” has become a popular moniker for utilities and developers constructing new natural gas plants in an era of climate concern. A new report by the Institute for Energy Economics and Financial Analysis suggests that the term — meant to convey the infrastructure’s capability to transition to carbon-free hydrogen when the fuel becomes more available — may be little more than hot air. It identifies three major barriers: a lack of hydrogen supply, a lack of hydrogen-capable pipelines, and a lack of storage capacity. The authors highlight Duke Energy’s plan to build a “hydrogen-ready” gas turbine at an existing coal plant in Roxboro, North Carolina — a plan that wouldn’t introduce hydrogen into the pipeline until 2035, and even then would start with a mix of just 1% hydrogen to 99% methane. 

Claims of hydrogen readiness, the report concludes, are “little more than marketing designed to obscure the myriad shortcomings and unanswered questions associated with using hydrogen in methane-fired turbines.”

[unpluggedfinancial]

The Bitcoin Bombshell: Analyzing Trump's Hypothetical Move to Make BTC a Treasury Reserve Asset

In the ever-evolving landscape of finance and politics, few scenarios could send shockwaves through the global economy quite like a major policy shift involving Bitcoin. Picture this: Former President Donald Trump announces his intention to advocate for Bitcoin as a US Treasury reserve asset. While purely hypothetical, such a declaration could potentially catapult Bitcoin's price to unprecedented heights and reshape the financial world as we know it. In this blog post, we'll dive deep into the implications of this speculative yet fascinating prospect, exploring why it could lead to a parabolic surge in Bitcoin's value and what it might mean for the future of global finance.

The Power of Political Influence on Markets

Historical precedent shows us that statements from high-profile political figures can significantly impact markets and investor sentiment. Trump, with his substantial following and controversial yet influential persona, has demonstrated the ability to move markets with mere tweets. If he were to endorse Bitcoin as a treasury reserve asset, it would mark a seismic shift in the perception of cryptocurrencies, potentially cementing Bitcoin's status as a legitimate and mainstream financial asset.

Historical Context: From Gold Standard to Digital Gold

To grasp the magnitude of this hypothetical move, let's revisit history. The US once used gold as a treasury reserve asset to back its currency, a system known as the gold standard. This approach solidified gold's status as a valuable and stable asset for decades. A similar endorsement of Bitcoin could position it as "digital gold" for the 21st century, potentially offering a hedge against inflation and economic uncertainty in the digital age.

The Mechanics of a Potential Parabolic Price Surge

Supply and Demand Dynamics: Bitcoin's fixed supply cap of 21 million coins is fundamental to its value proposition. An announcement of this magnitude would likely trigger an unprecedented surge in demand from retail and institutional investors alike, colliding with Bitcoin's limited supply and potentially driving prices to new all-time highs.

Market Psychology and FOMO: The fear of missing out (FOMO) is a powerful force in financial markets. As news of Trump's endorsement would spread, investors might rush to acquire Bitcoin, creating a self-reinforcing cycle of buying pressure and price appreciation.

Institutional Adoption Acceleration: Many institutions have been cautiously observing Bitcoin, hesitant due to regulatory uncertainties. A move like this could be interpreted as a green light for widespread adoption, potentially leading to significant capital inflows from hedge funds, corporations, and even sovereign wealth funds.

Economic and Geopolitical Implications

Impact on the US Dollar: Holding Bitcoin as a reserve asset could potentially strengthen the US dollar by diversifying the country's reserves and providing a hedge against inflation. However, it could also challenge the dollar's status as the world's primary reserve currency.

Global Ripple Effects: Other nations might feel compelled to follow suit, fearing economic disadvantage. This could spark a global race to accumulate Bitcoin, further driving up its price and integrating it deeper into the global financial system.

Regulatory Challenges: Such a move would likely face significant legal and regulatory hurdles. It would require changes to existing laws and could face opposition from traditional financial institutions and some policymakers.

Environmental Considerations

It's important to address the environmental concerns often associated with Bitcoin mining. Any move to make Bitcoin a reserve asset would likely intensify debates about its energy consumption and carbon footprint. This could potentially lead to increased investment in renewable energy sources for mining operations.

Expert Opinions

Dr. Saifedean Ammous, economist and author of "The Bitcoin Standard," states: "While the scenario is hypothetical, it underscores Bitcoin's potential as a neutral, global reserve asset in a world of competing national currencies."

On the other hand, Nobel laureate economist Paul Krugman cautions: "The volatility of Bitcoin makes it a risky choice for national reserves. It could introduce unprecedented instability into the global financial system."

Impact on Other Cryptocurrencies

A Bitcoin-focused treasury reserve policy could have mixed effects on other cryptocurrencies. While it might lend credibility to the broader crypto market, it could also concentrate investment in Bitcoin at the expense of other digital assets.

Conclusion: Navigating the Potential Financial Revolution

While the idea of Trump advocating for Bitcoin as a US Treasury reserve asset remains speculative, exploring this scenario highlights the growing influence and potential of Bitcoin in the global financial landscape. Such a move could indeed send Bitcoin's price on a parabolic trajectory, fueled by increased demand, institutional adoption, and geopolitical dynamics.

However, it's crucial to approach this hypothetical scenario with a balanced perspective. The potential benefits in terms of financial innovation and hedging against inflation must be weighed against regulatory challenges, environmental concerns, and the potential for increased market volatility.

As the world of cryptocurrencies continues to evolve at a rapid pace, staying informed and critically evaluating new developments is more important than ever. Whether this scenario comes to pass or not, it's clear that Bitcoin and blockchain technology will play a significant role in shaping the future of global finance.

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