Greater carbon dioxide emission challenges ahead

Washington, Apr 6 (UNI) In the coming years the global carbon dioxide emissions are going to pose much dangerous challenges than the society believes.

The researchers from University of Colorado have claimed that the technological challenges of reducing CO2 emissions at the current level are significantly underestimated, Science Daily reported.

The study, ''Dangerous Assumptions,'' concludes that the Inter Governmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) is overtly optimistic in assuming that, even without action by policymakers, society will develop and implement new technologies to dramatically reduce the growth of future emissions.

''In the end, there is no question whether technological innovation is necessary--it is,'' wrote the authors in the Nature magazine commentary.

''The question is, to what degree should policy focus explicitly on motivating such innovation,'' said the lead researcher adding, ''The IPCC plays a risky game in assuming that spontaneous advances in technological innovation will carry most of the burden of achieving future emissions reductions.'' ''Recent changes in 'carbon intensity'--CO2 emissions per unit of energy consumed--already are higher than those predicted by the IPCC because of rapid economic development,''lead author Roger Pielke Jr.

of the University of Colorado said.

''In Asia, for instance, the demands of more energy-intensive economies are being met with conventional fossil-fuel technologies, a process expected to continue there for decades and eventually move into Africa,'' he added.

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