J. Lee Scott, Jr. – Walmart’s President and CEO stood before the executives from his supply chain and announced that if they wished to continue to do business with Walmart, they would have to meet Walmart’s sustainability standards. Few, if any, single pronouncements could have had the impact on American society that Lee Scott produced.

I applaud his courage, dedication and foresight. He actions represent true leadership and I trust, he is the kind of man that will work tirelessly to fulfill his vision. We need more leadership of this kind.

What is it that has to be done? How big is the problem?

What we need to do is match Lee Scott’s vision with the real figures and then to intelligently order our priorities.

In an article titled: Carbon’s New Math, Bill McKibben wrote in National Geographic’s October 2007 issue. He summarized and illustrated the fundamental research done by Robert Socolow and Stephen Pacala at Princeton.

The goal was stated as “cutting CO2 emissions by 50% in 50 years.”
Sounds easy, and it sounds like we could do much better than that.

Think again!

Listed bellow are Socolow and Pacala’s meticulous calculations transformed into real-world actions:

EFFICIENCY AND CONSERVATION

• Improve fuel economy of the 2 billion cars expected on the road by 2057 to 60 mpg from 30 mpg.

• Reduce miles traveled annually per car from 10,000 to 5,000.

• Increase efficiency of heating, cooling, lighting, and appliances by 25%.

• Improve coal-fired power plant efficiency to 60% from 40%.

CARBON CAPTURE AND STORAGE

• Introduce systems to capture CO2 and store it under ground at 800 large coal fired plants or 1600 natural gas fired plants.

• Use capture systems at coal derived hydrogen plants producing fuel for a billion cars.

• Use capture systems at coal derived synthetic fuel plants producing 30 million barrels a day

LOW-CARBON FUELS

• Replace 1,400 large coal fired power plants with natural gas fired plants

• Displace coal by increasing production of nuclear power to three times today’s capacity

RENEWABLES AND BIOSTORAGE

• Increase wind generated power to 25 times current capacity

• Increase solar power to 700 times current capacity

• Increase wind power to 50 times current capacity to make hydrogen for fuel-cell cars

• Increase ethanol bio-fuel production to 50 times current capacity

• Stop all deforestation.

• Expand conservation tillage to all cropland.

I have reproduced these recommendations almost verbatim in the hope that as you re-think the lifestyle we must re-order, you will do so armed with the realities of “Carbon’s New Math.”

Terry Wellman

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