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Douglas Grandt answerthecall@icloud.com


Susan Avery, Adaptation and 1.5C Aspiration
January 26, 2017 at 3:03 PM
Darren W. Woods Darren.W.Woods@ExxonMobil.com
William (Bill) M. Colton William.M.Colton@ExxonMobil.com, Suzanne M. McCarron Suzanne.M.McCarron@ExxonMobil.com,
Max Schulz max.schulz@exxonmobil.com

Dear Darren Woods,


.

Congratulations and thank you for naming Susan Avery as the person to fill the vacancy on the Board of Directors.
Ms. Avery has very impressive credentials and titles, and her experience seems appropriate for ExxonMobils Board.
I see a bright future for ExxonMobil actually initiating global leadership in support of the COP21/22 "1.5C aspiration."
The world is looking to you for bold courageous leadership implementing effective actions to reduce CO2 emission.
.

When I read the announcement last night, I immediately begin googling to learn about Susans achievements.
.

Wikipedia is the only comprehensive bio and includes Selected editorials, letter, statements, talks, interviews:
.

Its been a privilege to lead WHOI: Statement to WHOI, June 29, 2015
Presentation to the WHOI Board and Corporation (The Pillars of WHOI), May 21, 2015
Sea Stories: Presentation to the WHOI Board of Trustees, May 20, 2015
Wenju Cai, Susan K Avery, Margaret Leinen, Kenneth Lee, Xiaopei Lin, Martin Visbeck: Commentary:
Institutional coordination of global ocean observations: Nature Clim. Change, 5, 4-6 (2015)
Research Independence and Integrity, May 25, 2014
Congressional Testimony: Driving Innovations through Federal Investments, April 29, 2014
Congressional Testimony: Deep Sea Challenge: Innovative Partnerships in Ocean Observing, June 11, 2013
Remarks on the Occasion of the Christening of the R/V Neil Armstrong, Anacortes, WA, March 29, 2014
Letter to U.S. House and Senate Leadership: Fiscal Cliff Impacts, December 26, 2012
The Titanic: Seeing is Knowing: Boston Globe Online, April 13, 2012
World Ocean Day Statement: The Importance of Looking Closer to Home, June 8, 2010
Deepwater Horizon Oil Statement, May 26, 2010
World Climate Summit, Ocean Day: Changing Climate, Changing Ocean, 2009
Congressional Testimony: How the Mission and Related Research of NOAA Contribute to the National Science
Program, 2009
Strategic Actions for the next Administration: Preparing the Nation for Climate Change, 2008
Index of the Massachusetts Innovation Economy, Massachusetts Technology Collaborative, Feature Editorial Creative
Collaborations to Sustain Momentum, 2008.
The Oceans and Us, TEDx Boston talk, August 13, 2010
WCAI Living Lab interview, WHOI begins search for new leader, November 17, 2014
WCAI Living Lab interview, A Tour of 2012's Science Highlights, December 31, 2012
WCAI Living Lab interview, The Politics of Science Funding, October 15, 2012

One caught my eye: Strategic Actions for the next Administration: Preparing the Nation for Climate Change, 2008.
But, the title left me a bit unsettled it does not even allude to the urgency for action to curtail greenhouse gas emissions:
.

Preparing the Nation for Climate Change

The first three paragraphs clearly spell out the dangerous impacts of climate change on humanity and society:
.

The United States, and indeed the world, has become increasingly vulnerable to the
environmental impacts from continuing population growth, climate change, and other forces. The
stresses on our land and ocean ecosystems are accelerating; in upcoming decades, we may well
reach tipping points that will trigger economic, public health, and national security consequences
that will affect nearly every citizen.
.
At risk are such basic human necessities as water, food, and shelter. All human endeavors, from
farming to transportation, hinge on weather and climate, and these are changing. The combination
of environmental and population stresses threatens water supplies, energy resources, agriculture,
fisheries, and populated coastlines. Those stresses have amplified the risks and repercussions from
natural disasters such as hurricanes, tsunamis, earthquakes, foods, droughts, wildfires, mudslides,
heat waves, and coastal erosion. Climate change and pollution also alter the spread [of] vectorborne and pathogenic diseases such as malaria, dengue fever, and cholera.
.
Beyond the human toll, all these can spur a cascade of grave economic, political, and military
instability: expensive disaster relief, migration of large segments of the population, and conflicts
over resources. The distinct possibility of an ice-free Arctic Ocean within decades, for example,
rearranges not only the literal landscape, but also the landscape for energy resources,
transportation, and national security.
.

The fourth paragraph begins emphatically:

The stakes call for quick and effective action.


.

The next two sentences in paragraph four are a shift from the emphatic need for action to something less:

The challenges are to balance the often coflicting needs of our environment, economy, and
energy systems. With these challenges, however, come opportunities to develop new technologies
and strategies to support sustainable development, advance renewable energy systems, mitigate
costly disasters, protect human life, and manage ecosystems.
What Susan then said gave away what had been disguised, and it is clearly a segue to adaptation without serious attempts to
forestall accelerating emissions and actually reduce combustion of petroleum fuels as advocated by the likes of Dr. James
Hansen (Bit.ly/HansenPLOS) and the German Advisory Counsel on Global Change (Bit.ly/WBGU-2009):
.

What we need is a high-level, coordinated, national effort that elevates the mission of preparing to
adapt to impending environmental changes.
.

The rest of Ms. Averys paper are details for organization of observation programs, research and data gathering to monitor the
impacts of climate change, and the dissemination of data, with the goal stated in the final sentence:
.

This will enhance the expedient delivery of user-friendly scientic information to attack many
critical problems faced by society, including the availability of water and food; the development
of carbon-free energy; natural hazard mitigation, and national security.
.

Nothing in the paper addresses or alludes to the need to quickly curtail carbon emissions and sequester carbon through
agricultural and forests land and soil management. Granted, the paper is dated 2008, so I hope Ms. Averys knowledge and
activism have increased since then. I would certainly like to be a fly on the wall at her first Board meeting and hear what she has
to say.
.

I have written you many times before about aligning the ExxonMobil 2017 Energy Outlook with the COP21/22 "1.5C aspiration
because, in its present state, it is directly opposite to the efforts required to reduce petroleum fuel production, refining and
combustion. The entire website (Bit.ly/ExxMob2017EO) is so large and filled with a mixture of assumptions and conclusions, that
the only clear hint at what is buried or unstated in all the text, appears on the Energy Efficiency Chart (Bit.ly/ExxMobEO2017Eff)

the only clear hint at what is buried or unstated in all the text, appears on the Energy Efficiency Chart (Bit.ly/ExxMobEO2017Eff)
which shows continuing growth rather than decline of fuel combustion.
.

The dashed curve that I have inserted onto your "Global efficiency limits demand growth chart is the required trajectory.
.

I hope that you, Bill Colton and Susan Avery will commiserate very soon on the need to retract your 2017 Energy Outlook as
published, and rework the assumptions and explore a variety of "what if scenarios in order to solve for the actions that will bring
your work into compliance with the COP21/22 "1.5C aspiration and all that it implies.
.

The time for action is now. We do not have the luxury to wait for precise and exact predictions of what may or may not happen as
a result of climate change. To continue analyzing data puts us into the paralysis by analysis syndrome when the observed
impacts are clearly getting more frequent and more devastating.
.

You, your Management team, and Board of Directors at ExxonMobil have a unique opportunity to take a leadership role. Take it.
Sincerely yours,
.

Doug Grandt

Preparing the Nation for Climate Change


Strategic actions for the next Administration
The United States, and indeed the world, has become increasingly vulnerable to
the environmental impacts from continuing population growth, climate change,
and other forces. The stresses on our land and ocean ecosystems are accelerating;
in upcoming decades, we may well reach tipping points that will trigger economic,
public health, and national security consequences that will affect nearly every citizen.
At risk are such basic human necessities as water, food, and shelter. All human
endeavors, from farming to transportation, hinge on weather and climate, and these
are changing. The combination of environmental and population stresses threatens
water supplies, energy resources, agriculture, fisheries, and populated coastlines.
Those stresses have amplified the risks and repercussions from natural disasters such
as hurricanes, tsunamis, earthquakes, floods, droughts, wildfires, mudslides, heat
waves, and coastal erosion. Climate change and pollution also alter the spread vectorborne and pathogenic diseases such as malaria, dengue fever, and cholera.

Woods Hole
Oceanographic
Institution
The Woods Hole

Beyond the human toll, all these can spur a cascade of grave economic, political,
and military instability: expensive disaster relief, migration of large segments of the
population, and conflicts over resources. The distinct possibility of an ice-free Arctic
Ocean within decades, for example, rearranges not only the literal landscape, but also
the landscape for energy resources, transportation, and national security.
The stakes call for quick and effective action. The challenges are to balance the often
conflicting needs of our environment, economy, and energy systems. With these
challenges, however, come opportunities to develop new technologies and strategies
to support sustainable development, advance renewable energy systems, mitigate
costly disasters, protect human life, and manage ecosystems. What we need is a highlevel, coordinated, national effort that elevates the mission of preparing to adapt to
impending environmental changes. The next Administration can lead changes in the
executive branch to marshal the resources to accomplish the mission. These include:
n

Establish a directorate within the Office of Science and Technology Policy,


with a Deputy Director for Climate, to integrate planning and budgets for
climate research and for sustained climate observations (which are now
widely dispersed among several agencies) and launch a focused research,
observation, and services effort that maximizes results.

Oceanographic Institution
is dedicated to research
and education to advance
understanding of the

with the Earth system,


this understanding for
the benefit of society.

Constructing an integrated Earth System Observatory network


Reinvigorate, expand, and establish sustaining support for the nations
technological infrastructure to collect and integrate the measurements of our
planets land, atmosphere, oceans, ice, and ecosystems, which are essential for
assessing and comprehending environmental changes.

ocean and its interaction


and to communicating

Creating an executive-branch-level Climate Research Office

Building a National Climate Services


Develop clear information on climate change and impacts that is valuable for
addressing societal problems and a system to deliver it expediently to a broad
variety of stakeholders and decision- and policy-makers.

For more information, visit www.whoi.edu/report/climate

Creating an executive-branch-level Climate Research Office


Earths climate is an integrated system of complex interactions among the
atmosphere, ocean, ice, land, and ecosystems. Yet the responsibilities, assets, and
budgets for studying climate change and assessing its impacts traditionally have been
divided into separate federal agencies (eg. NOAA, NASA, USGS, EPA, DOE and
NSF), with each focusing only part of the puzzle.
As a result, planning, budgeting, coordinating, and assessing national strategy for
climate research in an integrated way is nearly impossible. We urgently need a new
structural approachan entity that can transcend agency boundaries, but without
the overhead of attempting to create an entirely new agency.
A first step is the re-elevation of the director of the Office of Science and Technology
Policy (OSTP) to a special assistant to the President and the establishment of a new
Deputy Director for Climate, on par with the two other OSTP directorates (science
and technology). This will ensure that OSTP can supply expertise and advice in
the fundamental policy decisions of the executive branch. This new OSTP climate
directorate must lead interagency program development, foster integrated budgets,
assess progress on these plans, and adjust them as needed to meet the nations
strategic goals for climate research, observations, predictive capabilities, assessments,
and ecosystem management.

Constructing an integrated Earth System Observatory network


Major gains in understanding the climate system will require a systems approach to
study the land, ocean, ice, atmosphere, and ecosystems and their vulnerabilities to
changeincluding better integration of Earth and ecosystem modeling, global Earth
observations, and policy/planning. Only in this way will we be able to understand
the climate impacts on socio-economic structures and balance economic and
environmental sustainability.
The Deputy Director for Climate should focus first on developing a robust global
Earth observation program that is highly capable, in continuous operation, affordable,
and integrated with partnerships with other countries. This includes reinvigorating
the nations Earth satellite program, which is now on the brink of observational
collapse right at the time when we will need to make important societal decisions. It
also includes a network of in-situ observing systems for the atmosphere, ocean, and
terrestrial systems, which are now only in infant stages of development.

Building a National Climate Services


A robust Earth System Observatory network offers enormous opportunities to
develop products and information that explicitly provide societal benefits in the
form of enhanced capabilities to simulate future scenarios for the Earth system
and ecosystem response; improved decision-making; and support for adaptation
and mitigation strategies and policies. Pilot programs (e.g. the NOAA RISA
program) already are providing a rich set of best practices for active interaction
among researchers, users, and providers of climate information. This will enhance
the expedient delivery of user-friendly scientific information to attack many
critical problems faced by society, including the availability of water and food; the
development of carbon-free energy; natural hazard mitigation, and national security.

For more information, visit www.whoi.edu/report/climate

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