Energy and Industry

American Enterprise Institute (AEI) - A neo-conservative think tank promoting free enterprise and limited government – closely associated with the recent Bush administration. 

Barrel of Oil = 42 U.S. gallons

BEV - Battery-Electric Vehicle

CDM: Stands for Clean Development Mechanism. The CDM was established under the Kyoto Protocol through which developed (See Annex B) countries would be able to finance greenhouse gas emission reduction or emission removal projects in developing (See Non-Annex B) countries. Through this mechanism Annex B countries would receive credit for financing these projects that they could then apply toward meeting the mandatory limits on their own emissions.

CHP - Combined Heat and Power; Cogeneration: At thermal electricity generation plants otherwise wasted heat is utilized. The heat from steam turbines or hot fl ue gases exhausted from gas turbines may be used for industrial purposes, heating water or buildings or for district heating.

CH4 - Methane

CO2eq: Carbon dioxide equivalent. The amount of Co2 emission that would cause the same radiative forcing as an emitted amount of a greenhouse gas or of a mixture of greenhouse gases, all multiplied by their respective global warming potentials, which take into account the differing times they remain in the atmosphere. See also global warming potential.

Crysophere - Mountain glaciers and icecaps,floating ice shelves and continental ice sheets, seasonal snow cover on land,frozen ground, sea ice, and lake and river ice.

CSE - Cost of Saved Energy

CSP - Concentrating Solar Power

Equilibrium Climate Sensitivity (ECS) - The eventual increase in global annual average surface temperature in response to a doubling of atmospheric CO2 concentration (Nature, Vol 5, May 2014 449 Daniel J. A. Johansson et al.)

Eutrophication (Greek: eutrophia—healthy, adequate nutrition, development; German: Eutrophie) or more precisely hypertrophication, is the ecosystem response to the addition of artificial or natural substances, such as nitrates and phosphates, through fertilizers or sewage, to an aquatic system

EV - Electric Vehicle

EWS- Early Warning System

FCV - Fuel-Cell Vehicles

Fracking: Short for Horizontal Hydraulic Fracturing. Fracking is an "extreme extractive process" for withdrawing natural gas from small pockets in the Earth's crust. The process entails drilling up to several miles downward into the ground before drilling up to several miles horizontally. Once the well has been drilled up to 30 millions gallons of water mixed with thousands of tons of sand and chemical mixture containing up to 700 different chemical agents is used to pressure bomb the Earth in order to open up cracks in the geologic formation being extracted from. The resulting waste is not currently able to be cleaned effectively removing the water used from the water cycle altogether. Fracking is currently exempt from the Clean Air Act, Clean Water Act, and Safe Drinking Water Act.

GCM - (General Circulation Model; Global Climate Model)

Ice-Albedo Feedback - Warming melts ice and snow revealing dark ground which absorbs more light and causes more warming; cooling spreads more snow and ice which reflects more sun causing more cooling

IFG - International Forum on Globalization

IPCC: Stand for Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. The panel was established in 1988 by two United Nations member organizations: The World Meteorological Organization (See WMO) and the United Nations Environment Programme (See UNEP). The IPCC collates research submitted voluntarily by thousands of scientists and experts from which it compiles reports for consideration by policy makers and in support of the United Nations Framework Convention of Climate Change (See UNFCCC). 

kBTU (1,000 BTU) - The most common U.S. unit for overall energy use. One BTU is roughly the energy contained in one kitchen match. It takes about 2,000 BTU, the energy contained in about two cubic feet of natural gas, to make a pot of coffee. In 2010, the entire U.S. used 98 quadrillion (10 to the 15th) BTU or "quads" of primary energy or 65 quads of delivered energy.

LCA: Stands for Life Cycle Assessment. A tool used to establish the environmental impacts over the life cycle of a material good, activity, or process; from the initial extraction of raw materials through their processing, travel, and eventual disposal.

Levelized Energy Cost (LCE or LCOE) - The price at which electricity must be generated from a specific source to break even over the lifetime of the project

LLCP - Long-lived climate pollutants

Mbbl/d = millions of barrels [of oil] per day

Mha - Million hectares. Hectare = 2.2 acres

MUC - Molecularly Uncharacterized Component

NOAA: National Oceanic and Atmospherics Administration

ODT - Oven dried tonnes. Used when talking about crop yields, i.e. bioenergy

OHC - Ocean Heat Content. 

Overburden - Earth; the material/area that lies between the surface and an area of economic interest, i.e. the part of the Earth's crust between the surface and an oil deposit.

Passivhaus ("passive house") - A design standard (launched in Germany but now spreading rapidly in Europe and entering North America) for superefficient buildings that need no traditional heating and cooling equipment yet have similar construction cost to traditional buildings

Pg (Petagram) - 1,000,000,000,000,000 grams (roughly 1,000,000 grams to a ton) [1 billion tons]

PHEV - Plug-in Hybrid Electric Vehicles

PPM: Parts per million. Used in reference to concentrations of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere.

Probability Density Function (PDF) - A function that describes the relative likelihood for this random variable to take on a given value

R-value - A measurement of resistance to heat flow through a piece of material (only 1/20th as much heat flows through an R-20 material as an R-1 material). Building scientists often use the reciprocal unit, U=1/R, to measure the rate of heat flow through a given area, driven by a given temperature difference.

SLCP - Short-lived climate pollutants

SMEs - Small- and Medium-sized Enterprises

SRES - Special Report on Emissions Scenarios

SRM - Sunlight-reflection methods or solar-radiation management or short-wave climate engineering. Method of geoengineering where the Earth's energy balance is modified to maintain an average surface temperature within some acceptable range by increasing planetary albedo (reflectivity) to reduce absorption of incoming short-wave radiation.

UNFCCC: United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change. In 1992, countries joined an international treaty, the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, as a framework for international cooperation to combat climate change by limiting average global temperature increases and the resulting climate change, and coping with impacts that were, by then, inevitable. From

UNISDR - United Nations International Strategy for Disaster Reduction

VMT - Vehicle Miles Traveled

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