A Middle Ordovician crinoid from the beach gravels of Ristna Cape,Hiiumaa Island,Estonia

Reworked fossils may be exotic, but more typically are locally derived. Echinoderms have only rarely been identified from beach clasts; most commonly, these are Upper Cretaceous echinoids from the Chalk. A pebble collected from a beach in Estonia has yielded a moderately well preserved specimen of the crinoid stem, Baltocrinus (col.) antiquus (Eichwald). This species is typical of the Baltic region, only being known from the Middle Ordovician (Darriwilian) of Estonia, but is exotic because the local outcrop is Upper Ordovician to Silurian.     

Incremental CH4 and N2O mitigation benefits consistent with the US Government's SC-CO2 estimates

Benefit–cost analysis can serve as an informative input into the policy-making process, but only to the degree it characterizes the major impacts of the regulation under consideration. Recently, the US, amongst other nations, has begun to use estimates of the social cost of CO₂ (SC-CO₂) to develop analyses that more fully capture the climate change impacts of GHG abatement. The SC-CO₂ represents the aggregate willingness to pay to avoid the damages associated with an additional tonne of CO₂ emissions. In comparison, the social costs of non-CO₂ GHGs have received little attention from researchers and policy analysts, despite their non-negligible climate impact. This article addresses this issue by developing a set of social cost estimates for two highly prevalent non-CO₂ GHGs, methane and nitrous oxide. By extending existing integrated assessment models, it is possible to develop a set of social cost estimates for these gases that are consistent with the SC-CO₂ estimates currently in use by the US federal government.Policy relevanceWithin the benefit–cost analyses that inform the design of major regulations, all Federal agencies within the US Government (USG) use a set of agreed upon SC-CO₂ estimates to value the impact of CO₂ emissions changes. However, the value of changes in non-CO₂ GHG emissions has not been included in USG policy analysis to date. This article addresses that omission by developing a set of social cost estimates for two highly prevalent non-CO₂ GHGs, methane and nitrous oxide. These new estimates are designed to be compatible with the USG SC-CO₂ estimates currently in use and may therefore be directly applied to value emissions changes for these non-CO₂ gases within the benefit–cost analyses used to evaluate future policies.     

Benchmark-based allocations in EU ETS Phase 3: an early assessment

Phase 3 of the European Union Emissions Trading Scheme (EU ETS; 2013–2020) sees the introduction of new rules governing the free allocations of emissions allowances given to energy-intensive industries. In contrast to Phases 1 and 2, allocations will be based on historical production multiplied by best available emissions technology benchmarks. This article exploits an original database to provide a first analysis of the distributional and economic efficiency implications of the new rules. It is shown empirically that the new allocation rules reduce the scope for windfall gains by EU ETS firms while also effectively mitigating carbon leakage risks, even assuming optimistic forecasts of Phase 3 carbon prices. The example of the cement sector is used to show that benchmarking significantly improves the harmonization of the levels of free allocations to competing firms throughout the EU compared to Phase 2. However, it is also found that the use of ex ante output levels to determine allocations still leaves considerable scope for windfall gains and possible distortions of the internal market.     

US public opinion on climate change issues: implications for consensus-building and policymaking

While the Conference of the Parties wrangle at an international scale with climate policy, a quiet set of policies and measures is being implemented at a local scale by municipalities across the globe. This study examines the motivation municipalities have for undertaking policies to reduce their greenhouse gas emissions, when the theory of free-ridingwould predict that local administrations should find it difficult to unilaterally reduce their emissions for the benefit of the global climate. Through interviews with officials and/or staff in 23 municipalities in the United States enacting climate policy, data are gathered that suggest local government abatement policies are primarily a top—down decision based on what officials or staff members believe to be “good business” or rational policy choices. They are primarily driven by the potential for realised or perceived cost savings and co-benefits rather than by public pressure. Economic data from some dozen municipal projects are analyzed, finding, while municipalities lack sophisticated accounting techniques, some justification for the often-disputed claim that at least initial reductions in emissions can be made at cost savings. In the United States, with the lack of national abatement policies, it is municipalities that are leading the way in beginning to implement mitigation strategies, even if only for initial reductions.     

What causes the spread of model projections of ocean dynamic sea-level change in response to greenhouse gas forcing?

Sea levels of different atmosphere–ocean general circulation models (AOGCMs) respond to climate change forcing in different ways, representing a crucial uncertainty in climate change research. We isolate the role of the ocean dynamics in setting the spatial pattern of dynamic sea-level (ζ) change by forcing several AOGCMs with prescribed identical heat, momentum (wind) and freshwater flux perturbations. This method produces a ζ projection spread comparable in magnitude to the spread that results from greenhouse gas forcing, indicating that the differences in ocean model formulation are the cause, rather than diversity in surface flux change. The heat flux change drives most of the global pattern of ζ change, while the momentum and water flux changes cause locally confined features. North Atlantic heat uptake causes large temperature and salinity driven density changes, altering local ocean transport and ζ. The spread between AOGCMs here is caused largely by differences in their regional transport adjustment, which redistributes heat that was already in the ocean prior to perturbation. The geographic details of the ζ change in the North Atlantic are diverse across models, but the underlying dynamic change is similar. In contrast, the heat absorbed by the Southern Ocean does not strongly alter the vertically coherent circulation. The Arctic ζ change is dissimilar across models, owing to differences in passive heat uptake and circulation change. Only the Arctic is strongly affected by nonlinear interactions between the three air-sea flux changes, and these are model specific.

     

Death, Disease and Deformity; Using Outbreaks in Animals as Sentinels for Emerging Environmental Health Risks

In "Airs, Waters and Places, " Hippocrates taught aspiring physicians that, to understand their patient's illness, they needed to understand their patient's environment. He recognized that people's well-being was linked to their environment. Hippocrates instructed his readers to use observations of the seasons, the water and the orientation of a city to classify the major health problems of the inhabitants. While his causal framework for explaining the pathogenesis of disease may seem rudimentary and misguided in light of today's medical understanding, Hippocrates knew that many health problems arose from our interactions with the environment and he tried to do what we continue to want to do today: to predict the occurrence of disease in order to better care for his patients.     

Thermal processing and crystallization of amorphous Mg‐Ca silicates

The structural evolution of sol–gel‐produced amorphous Mg_(x)Ca_(1–x)SiO₃ silicates is investigated. Mid‐IR Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy and synchrotron X‐ray diffraction are used to confirm the amorphous nature of the as‐prepared silicates, while subsequent in situ synchrotron X‐ray powder diffraction measurements are used to study the evolution of crystalline mineral phases as a function of annealing temperature. Multiple silicate phases, including diopside, enstatite, forsterite, and SiO₂, are identified, while Rietveld (i.e., structure) refinement of the diffraction data is used to quantify phase change relationships. Investigated as possible analogs for the refractory dust grain materials likely to have been present in the early solar nebula, the likely relevance of these investigations to the observed silicate compositions of chondritic meteorites and cometary bodies and the processing of their precursor materials is discussed.     

Measurement requirements for a Near-Earth Asteroid impact mitigation demonstration mission

A concept for an Impact Mitigation Preparation Mission, called Don Quijote, is to send two spacecrafts to a Near-Earth Asteroid (NEA): an Orbiter and an Impactor. The Impactor collides with the asteroid while the Orbiter measures the resulting change in the asteroid's orbit, by means of a Radio Science Experiment (RSE) carried out before and after the impact. Three parallel Phase A studies on Don Quijote were carried out for the European Space Agency: the research presented here reflects the outcomes of the study by QinetiQ. We discuss the mission objectives with regard to the prioritisation of payload instruments, with emphasis on the interpretation of the impact. The Radio Science Experiment is described and it is examined how solar radiation pressure may increase the uncertainty in measuring the orbit of the target asteroid. It is determined that to measure the change in orbit accurately a thermal IR spectrometer is mandatory, to measure the Yarkovsky effect. The advantages of having a laser altimeter are discussed. The advantages of a dedicated wide-angle impact camera are discussed and the field-of-view is initially sized through a simple model of the impact.