Carbon Stats Flash, It's a Gas, Gas, Gas

New York City's visual cornucopia of billboards is largely intended to increase awareness of the hottest new TV or Broadway show, the coolest new ride (parking spot in Midtown not included), or fab, gotta-have-it wardrobe addition.

But most likely inspired by the National Debt Clock placed mere blocks away, a new entry to the city's landscape of large-scale advertising instead aims to raise awareness of atmospheric greenhouse gas levels.

And the sponsor of the sign is not any of the major environmental organizations that might leap to mind. No, it's actually Deutsche Bank Group that's bankrolling this initiative.

While the aggregated global levels of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases in the atmosphere are most often presented on a parts-per-million basis — for carbon dioxide, understood to be approximately 280 ppm at the dawn of the Industrial Revolution and which has climbed to about 380 ppm today — the new sign offers total mass in tonnage. It's a big number, which is precisely the point: They want you to pay attention to what they see as both big challenge and big opportunity.

Using the 2007 Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change assessment report as a point of departure, in concert with researchers at MIT, the moving calculation accounts for all greenhouse gases, of which carbon dioxide comprises the largest portion, and as of the launch of the billboard exceeds 3.6 trillion metric tons.

But why would a bank choose to do this?

Three years ago, Deutsche Asset Management identified climate change as one of the mega-trends that would drive the global asset management business for the next generation and beyond. We saw that the rapidly growing level of carbon in the atmosphere meant that the world had to take action now, and that this would require massive capital investment over several decades. That in turn would produce exciting new investment opportunities from which our clients could benefit.

Visit the project's website to learn more about the project's purpose, the methods of calculation and even to download a greenhouse gas counter widget for your computer desktop.