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JON QUEEN’S ENVIRONMENTAL ARTICLES AND PUBLICATIONS
Alternative energy and biofuels represent the world’s future power and energy supply. Facing finite fossil fuel reserves and a growing cost of climate change effects, nations increasingly turn to these new clean and renewable means to power their commerce and industry. Many governments now use market incentives such as “Green Tariffs” and carbon credit trading to promote domestic investment and capacity development in this area. As a result, the alternative energy and biofuels sectors – especially ones in emerging market economies – are becoming progressively more attractive to the financial markets.
Jon Queen is an alternative energy and climate change businessman, consultant and policy advisor. A lawyer and financial services professional by training, Mr. Queen assists the Foundation for the Development of Environmental and Energy Markets (www.fdeem.org.ua) to provide companies with advice and commercial or legal analysis related to Ukraine’s and other European carbon offset and project markets.
Jon is a member of the American Bar Association and he has participated in over 40 Kyoto Protocol transactions and alternative energy deals. He specializes in structuring projects that generate emissions credits under the Kyoto Protocol’s Clean Development Mechanism as well as voluntary credits under the WWF’s Gold Standard and the Voluntary Carbon Standard.
Prior to becoming involved in the carbon, environmental and energy markets, Jon was a lawyer at Latham & Watkins LLP and a registered financial services representative for John Hancock. He also worked briefly on Capitol Hill for the House Banking and Financial Services Committee during the Clinton administration.
Jon has an Economics Degree from Cornell University and a Law Degree from the University of Pennsylvania, as well as a Certificate of Study in Business & Public Policy from Wharton Business School. In addition to English he has proficient French and basic Russian language skills.
Jon M. Queen: Global Warming and Air Travel
Kyoto Protocol pundit and clean energy businessman Jon M. Queen is one among the many interested in the impact of aviation on the environment. An article by Ars Technica’s John Timmer reports a study that reinforces that impact of planes results from where they burn the fuel, not the mere fact that they burn it.
Long under fire for their potential contributions to global warming and climate change, aircrafts have always been powered by the combustion of significant amounts of fossil fuel to stay aloft. New journal Nature Climate Change suggests, however, that the clouds currently being generated by air travel take the lion’s share of the environmental impact, dwarfing the effects of cumulative emissions of all aircraft ever flown.
Like most scholars, experts, and individuals, Jon M. Queen was engaged in the authors’ discussion of aviation’s many ecologically detrimental effects, which include the emissions of particulates high in the atmosphere, the production of nitrogen oxides, and the direct production of clouds through contrail water vapor. Over time, these “contrail cirrus” clouds remain within the atmosphere, their sublinear features and high-altitude location leading to insulation, which enhances global warming.
The authors simulated the genesis of aircraft-induced cirrus clouds using an existing climate model and found hot spots of the clouds over the US, Europe, and the North Atlantic travel corridor, with smaller effects in East Asia and the northern Pacific, and a 10 percent peak in central Europe in part because the output in the North Atlantic had drifted into that direction. A calculation showed that on their own, aircraft-generated cirrus clouds produce a global climate forcing of about 40 milliwatts per square meter.
Jon M. Queen: Global Warming and Air Travel
Kyoto Protocol pundit and clean energy businessman Jon M. Queen is one among the many interested in the impact of aviation on the environment. An article by Ars Technica’s John Timmer reports a study that reinforces that impact of planes results from where they burn the fuel, not the mere fact that they burn it.
Long under fire for their potential contributions to global warming and climate change, aircrafts have always been powered by the combustion of significant amounts of fossil fuel to stay aloft. New journal Nature Climate Change suggests, however, that the clouds currently being generated by air travel take the lion’s share of the environmental impact, dwarfing the effects of cumulative emissions of all aircraft ever flown.
Like most scholars, experts, and individuals, Jon M. Queen was engaged in the authors’ discussion of aviation’s many ecologically detrimental effects, which include the emissions of particulates high in the atmosphere, the production of nitrogen oxides, and the direct production of clouds through contrail water vapor. Over time, these “contrail cirrus” clouds remain within the atmosphere, their sublinear features and high-altitude location leading to insulation, which enhances global warming.
The authors simulated the genesis of aircraft-induced cirrus clouds using an existing climate model and found hot spots of the clouds over the US, Europe, and the North Atlantic travel corridor, with smaller effects in East Asia and the northern Pacific, and a 10 percent peak in central Europe in part because the output in the North Atlantic had drifted into that direction. A calculation showed that on their own, aircraft-generated cirrus clouds produce a global climate forcing of about 40 milliwatts per square meter.
A brief selection of Jon Queen’s environmental articles and publications appears here. For more information about Jon Queen as well as more recent articles, please visit Jon’s blog at http://jon-m-queen.blogspot.com.
