Policy Options for Reducing Energy Use and Greenhouse Gas Emissions from U.S. Transportation Special Report 307 (2011) / Chapter Skim
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Appendix Scientific Concern over Greenhouse Gas Buildup
Appendix Scientific Concern over Greenhouse Gas Buildup
Pages 209-214
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From page 209... ...
. International policy goals for limiting climate change were established in 1992 under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, in which the United States and more than 190 other nations set the goal of "stabilization of GHG concentrations in the atmosphere at a level that would prevent dangerous anthropogenic interference with the climate system." Subsequent scientific research has sought a better understanding and quantification of the links among GHG emissions, atmospheric GHG concentrations, changes in global climate, and the impacts of those changes on human and environmental systems.
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The uncertainties in scientific understanding of the world's climate system render exact relationships between GHG atmospheric concentrations and temperature changes impossible to define. Linking global temperature change with a target GHG concentration involves a number of physical processes that are not fully understood, and thus there is uncertainty surrounding this linkage.
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From page 211... ...
emissions be 4 These estimates are based on a "least cost" model calculation for distributing emissions reduction burdens among countries. The question of what constitutes a fair share of emissions reductions for the United States involves numerous economic, scientific, political, and ethical considerations.
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Even today, as one of the largest individual emitters of GHGs, the United States cannot substantially reduce global emissions. The EMF-22 results indicate that atmospheric GHG concentrations can only be kept below 450 ppmv CO2-eq if the United States and other high-income countries, along with China, India, and many other low- and middle-income countries, take aggressive mitigation measures.
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From page 213... ...
2007. Contribution of Working Group II to the Fourth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.
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