The Youth Voice in the Climate Fight

Justin McCallum / The Tufts Daily

“As youth, we don’t have a voice in this fight. In the sense that, like, there’s no way that I can climb the government ladder and end up in a position of enough political power to save myself now. I’m never going to get that chance. And there are kids who are being born today, or born 10 years ago, they’re not really going to get that chance either, if we don’t start winning in the next couple of years.”

Those are the words of Alli Welton, a 20 year-old college student quoted in an excellent article in Grist by Wen Stephenson (The children: Why a generation is putting itself on the line for the climate). Stephenson’s article, and especially the strong clear words of the youth he interviews, can help us all see through the eyes of today’s youth climate leaders, who grasp the narrowing window of opportunity for strong and effective action on climate change and are mobilizing for fossil fuel divestment, against mountain top removal, and to block the Keystone XL pipeline in growing numbers.

At Climate Interactive, we are as likely to tell a story with numbers and graphs as we are with words. Our new CO2 Timeline Tool corroborates the point made in different ways by each of the young people interviewed by Stephenson; decisions about climate and energy that are being made today will reverberate, for better or worse, through lives of today’s children and youth. The long lifetime of CO2 in the atmosphere guarantees that today’s fossil fuel pollution will warm the Earth for decades to come. And policy that keeps fossil fuels in the ground today, keeps more options open for young people’s futures.

A tenant of systems thinking is that responsibility for important decisions should be given to those who will feel the impacts of the decision. For that reason alone all of us should listen, really listen, to what young people are asking, and, increasingly, demanding. In that sense the CO2 Timeline Tool tells an ethical story, and a story that should make all of us, young and old alike, stop and think about who should have the strongest voice in the climate fight.

CO2 Timeline Tool: A New Tool for Youth Climate Leaders (and all the rest of us too!)

This view from the CO2 timeline tool allows student leaders to show the expected tenure of key administration leaders (in gold) along with possible milestones in the student leaders’ own lives (in blue) on a century-long timeline. The shaded grey bar at the bottom of the graphic shows how much CO2 from a pulse released during thee student’s four years in college remains in the atmosphere throughout the century.

Youth climate leaders rightly argue that it is they – not current-day politicians, executives, and administrators – who will have to live with the consequences of today’s decisions when it comes to fossil fuel use. As these young people mobilize in hundreds of fossil fuel divestment campaigns we are excited to release a new tool designed to help them make their case powerfully, creatively, and rigorously.

• With the CO2 Timeline tool, a first year student making a presentation to a board of trustees can show, with accuracy and confidence, that at the time she reaches the age of retirement around 65% of the CO2 released during her four years in college will still be in atmosphere, by which time the trustees she is addressing will be 90-120 years old.
• Another youth leader could use the tool to find out how much CO2 from his college years will still be in the atmosphere around the time he would start a career (93%) or become a grandparent (70%) and use those benchmarks to explain to his roommate or his uncle why the divestment campaign matters to him.

8 Simulations That Could Chart Paths to Climate Health

Check out this selection of eight simulations that show us pathways to addressing climate change at different scales.

In a world of interacting parts, where one things lead to another, which leads back to the other and off to another, simulations can help us understand the pathways that will address the challenges we face. These tools below complement the simulations we have created at Climate Interactive to see what works in addressing climate change. Thanks to our colleague at MIT’s Climate CoLab, Rob Laubacher, who pulled together this collection. Last year we covered some of these simulations in our popular review of games focused on climate change.

World models

• Living Earth Simulator - An ambitious European project that is starting up, which aims to simulate our global social systems.  http://www.futurict.eu/the-project/proposal
• Fate of the World - A computer game based on the work of Myles Allen at Oxford. The game’s goal is to prevent global warming through actions like bans on certain fuel types or investment in new technologies. http://fateoftheworld.net/

World Energy Exercise: Putting You in Control of Our Energy Future

Climate Interactive has developed the World Energy Exercise to provide a simulation-based experience to help deepen participants’ understanding of potential policy and investment scenarios to address our global energy challenges. Recently, Drew Jones led a version of World Energy for 100 energy graduate students at Stanford University. More on the event is here. The video below summarizes that event.

Climate Pathways App: A Climate Model for your Pocket

In taking our tools to new platforms to help people better understand the complexities of climate change, we have released the Climate Pathways app for the iPhone, iPad, or iPod.  This free app, available at the Apple App Store, enables people to chart a course to a future that limits global warming to 2 degrees. We developed the app with Todd Fincannon who took our C-ROADS simulator and did the heavy lifting to program it for iOS devices. While not as robust as C-ROADS, Climate Pathways shows people that reaching the widely held goal of 2 degrees will require a little more than just leveling off our emissions—a pathway that, while difficult, could still be achievable.

Todd has written up a little bit about the Climate Pathways, which I’ve reposted here:

Visualize Scenarios to 2 degrees: IEA Releases New Tool

The International Energy Agency (IEA) has just put up a great interactive tool which enables people to explore the different elements of three energy scenarios, which lead to 2ºC, 4ºC, and 6ºC temperature change by 2100. The tool provides a great interface for users to navigate through animated data visualization found on three different screens exploring emissions reductions, flows of energy, and the transport sector of the different scenarios.

China-U.S. Collaboration Launches Powerful New Simulation

For over two years Climate Interactive has been working with Tsinghua University in China to create a learning tool to model the climate goals of Chinese provinces. Because of our work with Tsinghua, they have been able to provide the Chinese government with a new easy-to-use tool in order to meet their climate and energy goals.

China has committed to a 40-45% decrease in the carbon intensity of the overall Chinese economy by 2020. In order to meet this goal the Chinese government and provincial leaders set targets for the provinces to adjust their GDP, energy intensity, and fuel mix. To create true engagement from the leaders at all levels, however, there needed to be a shared understanding of how to reach these goals, and methods for calculating progress.

In order to create a tool to track the progress of the Chinese provinces, a team led by Professor Zhang Xiliang at Tsinghua University began using system dynamics models, the technology of which grew out of MIT Sloan School of Management and is behind C-ROADS. The system dynamics models are a contrast from the spreadsheet models that were used to set the targets, which are not geared towards flexible “what if” testing. What they sought was a user-friendly, interactive simulation such as C-ROADS, which has been used by multiple governments as part of the UN climate change negotiations. Professor Zhang’s Low Carbon Economy team had the data, an understanding of the Chinese energy system, and a staff of modelers to create the tool, but their partnership with the Climate Interactive team enabled them to put these elements together to create a successful model.

More updates to C-ROADS version 3

Another release of C-ROADS is available with more new features!

Why the update, so soon after our last? We want to give people, like you, who are using our free tools access to the latest updates and fixes as soon as possible to ensure our tools are helpful to you. The reality is that gone are the days of compiling a long list of updates for each new release. Even further past are the days of releasing CD-ROMs with software updates and mailing them off to users. Today all we have to do is upload the new version of C-ROADS and send you a quick note to let you know about the new features. The new features in C-ROADS v3.005 are listed below and described by Senior Scientist, Phil Price in this video:

You can access a copy of C-ROADS by logging in or if you don’t have a username, requesting one here. If you’ve got a case of nostalgia, we can even mail you a CD-ROM—you’ll have to pay for shipping and handling, however.

Join a Free Webinar – New Features in C-ROADS Climate Simulation

In response to the needs of our users, Climate Interactive has updated the C-ROADS climate policy testing software with a suite of new features and analytic abilities.

In this one-hour webinar, three model developers and analysts from the Climate Interactive team will introduce the new features, from new output windows, to sensitivity testing, to more control over underlying model assumptions. The session will be interactive, with ample time for questions and discussion. Drs. Travis Franck, Phil Rice, and Lori Siegel will lead the webinar.

Title: New Features in C-ROADS 3.0
Date: Tuesday, February 14, 2012
Time: 15:00 GMT (10:00 EST)

Space is limited.
Reserve your Webinar seat now at:
https://www1.gotomeeting.com/register/728788440

After registering you will receive a confirmation email containing information about joining the Webinar.

Attendees will be able to receive a free copy of C-ROADS software.

C-ROADS Update Available – Download version 3.0 today!

Every new release of C-ROADS marks an exciting milestone for the small team here at Climate Interactive that began creating this model three years ago and continue to advance it in a world where the need for better understanding of the dynamics of climate and policy is greater than ever. From Copenhagen to Washington, and most recently, to Durban, C-ROADS has added scientifically-vetted analysis to the conversation and efforts to address climate change.

To build on the successes and address feedback from users, version 3.0 of C-ROADS adds many new features to this already robust simulator. We hope that these additional features and updates improve the effectiveness of your climate change efforts.

With the new version of C-ROADS you can…

• Test the sensitivity of the model results to different parameters under the Sensitivity Tab
• Analyze policies with new types of emissions targets such as emissions per capita
• Adjust GDP and population assumptions
• Examine six new graphs for outputs such as GDP and population
• Facilitate the World Climate role-playing exercise using the new control panel

Please download the new version of C-ROADS by logging into Climate Interactive or requesting access by filling out our download request form. A video tutorial and version release notes are also available on our website to guide you through the new features.

For an online demonstration of C-ROADS and the new features please join us on February 14, 2012 at 15:00 GMT (10:00 EST). Please RSVP to reserve your spot at this web event at https://www1.gotomeeting.com/register/728788440.