Fact File

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Plan B 4.0

Excellent work thus far. You seem to have run out of steam! 85 JC
It take 1,000 tons of water to produce 1 ton of grain

70% of world water use devoted to irrigation

2.2 billion tons of carbon released into atmosphere annually from shrinkage of forests in tropical regions

75 million children worldwide not in school

Chap 5
  1. Texas leads the nation with 7,900 megawatts of wind generating capacity online.
  2. The sunlight striking the earth in one hour is enough to power the world economy for one year.
  3. By 2008, world-wide installations of solar cells doubles every two years.
  4. 70 countries now utilizing wind resources

Chap 4
  1. If conditions remain the same, annual carbon emissions from burning fossil fuels could double to 14 billion tons.
  2. It is estimated there are 4.7 billion light socket in the United States
  3. The energy saved by replacing a 100-watt incandescent bulb with an equivalent CFL over its lifetime, is sufficient to drive a Toyota Prius from New Your to San Fransisco.
  4. Combined gains from retrofitting energy efficient lighting and appliances alone could enable the world to avoid building 1,410 new coal-fired power plants between now and the year 2020.
  5. In the United States, commercial and residential buildings account for 72 percent of electricity use and 38 percent of CO2 emissions.

Chap. 3
  1. Earth’s average temperature projected to rise from 2 to 11 degrees Fahrenheit within the current century. Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC)
  2. If atmospheric CO2 climbs from 385 ppm to 450-600 ppm, the world will face irreversible dry-season rainfall reduction in severe regions of the world.
  3. Average sea level will rise 23 feet, if the Greenland ice sheet were to melt entirely.


Chap. 2
  1. The world's irrigated area tripled from 1950 to 2000, but has stabilized since then as aquifers in some countries are depleted by over-pumping.
  2. Nigeria, Africa's most populous country, is losing 867,000 acres of range-land and cropland to desertification each year.
  3. Irrigated area in California shrank 10 percent between 1997 and 2007, as farmers sold their irrigation water to cities.
  4. India's 100 million farmers have drilled more than 21 million wells, investing some $12 billion in wells and pumps.



Chap. 1 Good start. JC

  1. For each 1 degree Celsius rise in temperature above the norm during the growing season, farmers expect a 10-percent decline in wheat, rice, and corn yields.
  2. Since 1970, the earth's average surface temperature has increased by 0.6 degrees Celsius, or roughly 1 degree Fahrenheit.
  3. From 1950 to 1996 the world fish catch climbed from 19 million to 94 million tons, when growth then came to a halt, having reached the maximum capacity of the oceans to provide.
  4. A 2002 study by the U.S. National Academy of Sciences concluded that humanity's collective demands first surpassed the earth's regenerative capacity around 1980. As of 2009, global demands on natural systems exceed their sustainable yield capacity by nearly 30 percent. This, the author asserts, has set the stage for systemic collapse when these assets are depleted.