Greenhouse Gas Emissions: Past, Present and Future

Republished From: Cooling the Curriculum; Author: Neil Leary

Initial Publication Date: April 29, 2016

Summary

Summary of the Session: What are the human drivers of change? During this session we will work through exercises using online resources for students to examine trends in greenhouse gas emissions for the world and selected countries, analyze their relation to population growth, income growth, and technological change using online databases, and discuss climate policy implications of cross-country differences in trends of these drivers. We will also examine alternative scenarios of future economic growth and technological change, their implications for future greenhouse gas emissions, and corresponding projections of climate change.

Background: This 90-minute session is part of a four-day workshop that brought together faculty from multiple colleges and diverse disciplines to work collaboratively on developing new and revised courses, explore engaged learning pedagogies, and add to their knowledge for interdisciplinary teaching about climate change within a liberal arts curriculum. The workshop was held twice on the campus of Dickinson College, first in summer 2010 and again in summer 2011. Participants came from more than 20 colleges and universities and with expertise in disciplines that span the sciences, social sciences and humanities. The workshops are part of a NASA supported project Cooling the Liberal Arts Curriculum, A Campaign for Climate Change Education (https://www.dickinson.edu/info/20052/sustainability/2471/climate_education_and_research/4).

Also see Teaching Materials.


Learning Goals

  • Gain literacy about greenhouse gas emissions sources, trends, future projections, and effects on global climate.
  • Become familiar with the World Resource Institute's Climate Analysis Indicators Tool (CAIT) for exploring international data on GHG emissions. [Note: CAIT was taken offline due to technical difficulties with the database. CAIT was still down as of June 2013. WRI is working to restore the database and make CAIT available to the public soon.]
  • Create student exercises that use CAIT to develop quantitative literacy about GHG emissions and stimulate inquiry about differences across countries, underlying causes, responsibilities for causing climate change, and implications for climate policy.
  • Learn how to decompose growth in energy related CO2 emissions into population, income, energy intensity, and carbon intensity effects and use decompositions of emissions growth to analyze past trends and future projections.

Context for Use

See attachment.

Description and Teaching Materials

A summary of a faculty workshop session, with accompanying powerpoint and assignments for teaching about demographic, economic and technological drivers of greenhouse gas emission trends.

Session 5: Greenhouse Gas Emissions - Past, Present and Future
GHGs_past_present_future.pdf (Acrobat (PDF) 1.5MB Nov30 15)

GHG Assignment #1
GHG_assignment_1.pdf (Acrobat (PDF) 79kB Nov30 15)

GHG Assignment #2
GHG_assignment_2.pdf (Acrobat (PDF) 77kB Nov30 15)

Powerpoint: GHG Emissions - Past, Present and Future
Session_5_GHG_Presentation_2011.pdf (Acrobat (PDF) 6.4MB Nov30 15)

Teaching Notes and Tips

See attachment.

References and Resources

See attachment.

Citation

Leary, N. (2014). Greenhouse Gas Emissions: Past, Present and Future. Retrieved from http://www.camelclimatechange.org/view/teachingunit/51cbfbbc7896bb431f6c043f