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Comments 59551 to 59600:

  1. Richard Alley - We Can Afford Clean Energy
    Realist @31, I grew up in mining towns. I know what slag is. I've even played on slag heaps, and worked in smelters and power plants. It is perfectly possible run slag along a channel in its molten state, and run water in pipes above the slag to pick up heat. It would be important to ensure the length of the channel is such that the slag does not solidify before reaching the end of the channel, however, at the end you can run it down a steep channel (so that it continues to fall if solidified) which ends in a drop into water to recover the remaining heat. It may be necessary to use a water spray to ensure the slag is solidifies during the drop. A conveyor "belt" can run through the water to take the solidified waste up out of the water and away for disposal. Hot water in the tank could be circulated to preheat entering the boiler. None of this is technically difficult, and the technical problems are ones which are solved already in disposing of slag, or in using the lumpy solid called "coal" in boilers (and disposing of the even lumpier clinkers that result from burning coal in a boiler). There is a significant question as to whether it is economically feasible, but if it is not, it is only because the cost of the energy going into the slag, and hence to waste, is low.
  2. Richard Alley - We Can Afford Clean Energy
    @33 I don't have the source at hand, but it was based on the population increasing slightly more than 3 fold over the 20th century, and today's growth rate is not far removed from that trend. While I agree it is a higher end estimate, lower estimates are premised on assumptions that circumstances and human behaviour will change. In many ways it's hope for the best and plan for the worst. In that regard carefully monitor the current trend and project at that rate.
  3. Richard Alley - We Can Afford Clean Energy
    Realist - I dont disagree with your general drift but I think you are overly pessimistic. My sources are: UN and US Census. While projection is difficult there is an enormous difference between population increasing by 3B and your estimate of 14B which you still havent provided a source for.
  4. Richard Alley - We Can Afford Clean Energy
    @31 Slag is a lumpy viscous crusty molten mess, a bit like lava, and solidifies on cooling. It's not easy to handle and to attempt to pump it and pass it through heat exchangers would result in an almost instantaneous blockage. Ie cooling means solidifying.
  5. Richard Alley - We Can Afford Clean Energy
    What is the issue with the slag? Why not use it to heat water either to preheat water entering a boiler, or to boil the water initially, and in either way recover the heat for power generation?
  6. Richard Alley - We Can Afford Clean Energy
    Dave123 Probably an easier starting point is the coal to iron ore ratio ie a basic heat and mass balance. It used to be about 2 coal to 1 iron ore, but its about 1 to 1 with modern blast furnaces, depending on many variables. However a credit against the heat in the slag could taken if the slag was used in concrete to reduce cement content.
  7. It hasn't warmed since 1998
    DSL @189, I have not strictly refuted the contention of a strawman argument. It is logically conceivable that when Carter claims the atmosphere is cooling in the quote I provided that he refers only to the period from early 2010 to 2011, ie, to a period featuring a transition from a moderate El Nino to a strong La Nina. What I do show is that Carter has said things which do imply a cooling atmosphere. Without referencing the original article, it is impossible to say whether or not Carter claimed that it was cooling from 1998 to 2006. Of course, without referencing that article, hutch44k has no basis to claim that the OP argues a straw man. Fortunately I have now found Carter's original article, and find that he wrote that "[T]here was actually a slight decrease [in temperature recorded by the HadCRUT3 index], though not at a rate that differs significantly from zero". On the purely technical point, Carter's claim about HadCRUT3 appears to have been wrong in 2006. The warming shown on the trend calculator from 1998-2005 is 0.065 ±0.482 °C/decade (2σ). Of course, that used HadCRUT3v, while Carter refers to HadCRUT3 (which differs slightly), but it appears unlikely that his claim was even technically correct. Even if it where, it shows the extreme nature of his cherry pick, relying not just on a particular temperature index but on a particular version of that index. It also shows he is using an interval in which the error range in calculating the trend is 2.4 times the IPCC predicted trend. No scientist cannot know that such extreme cherry picking, and that data with such large error margins cannot be used to make any valid scientific point.
  8. Richard Alley - We Can Afford Clean Energy
    Scandenp To just quote UN as your source without any specifics is no improvement on my statement and merely pontificating. But the specific number is not the issue, and in any event it is a projection that will deviate from actual. And projections will differ depending on source. So the actual number is rather academic. The issue is that everyone knows or should know that the population will be enormously higher than the present day, but the solutions are invariably based on today's population level. Which is wrong.
  9. It hasn't warmed since 1998
    hutch44k, 1) Do you agree that the trend shown by HadCRUT4 from 1970 to current is 0.172 ±0.033 °C/decade (2σ)? 2) Do you agree that that is a statistically significant warming? 3) Do you agree that the HadCRUT$ trend from 1998 to current is 0.083 ±0.172 °C/decade (2σ)? 4) Do you agree that the 1998 to current temperature trend shows no statistically significant difference from the 1970 to current trend? 5) Do you agree that the 1998 to current trend shows no statistically significant difference from the IPCC prediction for the current decade of 0.2 °C/decade? 6) Do you agree it is incorrect to interpret "no statistically significant warming" as meaning "no warming" given your answers to the above questions? 7) Do you agree that choosing 1998 (or any point in the half decade before 1998) as a start point for a temperature trend, by including a very strong El Nino in the early part of the record, and a sequence of moderate to strong La Nina's in the later part of the record, maximizes the noise relative to the signal and hence constitutes a "cherry pick" if you attempt to draw a conclusion of "no warming" from that data? Given the propensity of fake "skeptics" to simply go silent when their meme is refuted, readers can reasonably interpret your failure to answer the above questions as showing that you have been attempting to sow confusion on this thread.
  10. Richard Alley - We Can Afford Clean Energy
    Dave123 - Talking about the embodied energy of slag is a very strange idea given the normal ways of doing such calculations as was the use of Terawatts (TWh perhaps?). Since it is at odds with reasonable published calculations, I want to see the working. I am easy to find on net - I am Phil Scadden working for GNS Science.
  11. Richard Alley - We Can Afford Clean Energy
    Realist - "population is growing at a greater rate than ever with 14 plus billion to be added in the next hundred years." This is at odds with both UN and US Census projections. To take this seriously, please supply your source.
  12. Climate Scientists take on Richard Lindzen
    Whatever the merits of Holgate's work, it limitations with respect to other papers using much larger no. of guages has been demonstrated here. What climate model has been created with proxy data? They obviously can be validated against proxy data for paleoclimate studies but that's not how models are built. You havent answered the question as to what your preferred method for forecasting is, since using all available physics doesnt seem to be your preference. However, I suggest you reply to this on this thread as it is off-topic here.
  13. It hasn't warmed since 1998
    hutch, your first claim (Carter did not claim cooling) has been refuted by Tom @ 180. Do you acknowledge this? Your second point has been amply responded to: within a specific set of dates, no significant warming (which, as you point out, doesn't mean cooling) can be demonstrated when using a chosen data set for a specific part of the atmospheric system (more specifically the part that doesn't store the greater part of the energy) and using a particular type of analysis that doesn't account for particular types of forcings. What you could possibly use this result for, I can't imagine. Well, I can imagine, but I'd rather give your integrity the benefit of the doubt before going there.
  14. Human CO2 is a tiny % of CO2 emissions
    Well, that's very instructive, just drop a single word (fraction) as hutch44uk did to flip the results upside down. Hopefully this was a honest mistake and hutch44uk will soon understand how biased was his reading of, maybe, just the title.
  15. It hasn't warmed since 1998
    muoncounter, "take out the ENSO noise, and you're once again incorrect". The argument wasn't about warming purely from non-ENSO sources. Stop changing my position please! Dikran, no they're not my statistics. Foster and Rahmstorf chose a 2-sigma error band for statistical signficance, not me. CBDunkerson, it seems you agree with me by admitting it's true. I agree with you too.. this whole argument isn't at all meaningful, as it doesn't prove that CO2 is causing the warming anyway (for another thread)! Thanks for the discussions.
  16. Richard Alley - We Can Afford Clean Energy
    Bernard, I've got a conference paper in preparation with a deadline this week. I can only afford so much diversion, and responding to you requires serious respectful work. I'm more optimistic about some things than others. The part I'm less optimistic about is our ability to move towards self-restraint. Without that neither technical solutions nor population control will suffice.
  17. Richard Alley - We Can Afford Clean Energy
    ScaddenP- My sources cut right into my professional life...which for a variety of reasons I need to keep separated from my interest in climate science. I've corresponded with one party here in a professional capacity, and I have no problem with sharing off list. On list would leave clues. I'm not sure who has my direct contact information, but I'd be happy to share if you care to contact me that way.
  18. Alberta’s bitumen sands: “negligible” climate effects, or the “biggest carbon bomb on the planet”?
    Suggested reading: “U.S. 'dirty oil' imports set to triple” by Steve Hargreaves, CNNMoney Apr 30, 2012. This not particularly good news.
  19. It hasn't warmed since 1998
    hutch44uk: Surface temperatures are but a small portion of the global warming picture. Over 90% of global warming goes into the oceans (amply documented on this website). In addition global warming is itself but the result of a radiative energy imbalance whereby the Earth retains more energy than it emits - the Earth climate system is then forced to warm up to increase emissions to match, as per (as far as I know) undisputed principles of thermodynamics. As long as one can demonstrate the following: (1) There remains a measured top-of-atmosphere energy imbalance (conventionally measured as a forcing in Watts per square metre), and (2) The oceans continue to build up heat energy (conventionally measured as ocean heat content, in Joules), then there is simply no basis to conclude that global warming has in any way stalled or stopped, whatever variations show up in short-term surface temperature data. If you have sources showing both (1) and (2) are no longer operative, please feel free to share. Finally, I should address your accusation of Skeptical Science "moving the goalposts". From a logic standpoint, the fact of the matter is that the "global warming stopped in 1998" claim, whether asserted baldly or on the basis of no satistically-significant warming, is a cherry-pick. As such, dismantling the cherry-pick by including additional relevant information does not IMO constitute a shifting of goalposts.
  20. John Nielsen-Gammon Comments on Continued Global Warming
    Sphaerica - on #1 I covered my butt and noted that a significant volcanic eruption would nullify my prediction. Regarding #2, that would require 3 consecutive years of La Nina conditions, which is very rare. The most recent La Nina appears to be ending right now, in fact. If we enter an El Nino phase within the next few months, that will be perfectly timed to influence 2013 surface temps. I'm not too worried about #3 :-)
  21. CBDunkerson at 03:57 AM on 1 May 2012
    It hasn't warmed since 1998
    hutch, one of the things you are apparently not understanding is the difference between 'true' and 'meaningful'. It is true that there has been no statistically significant trend since 1998... it just isn't at all meaningful. There have been 13 years since 1998. If you look at the entire temperature anomaly record you will find very few (possibly zero) cases where a statistically significant trend occurred over a period of just 13 years. You are citing a period too short to achieve statistical significance as if it told us something about the trend. It does not. Essentially, you are pressing your nose up against a tree (i.e. the statistically insignificant past 13 years) so hard that you cannot see the surrounding forest (i.e. the rising temperature trend) and thus are 'free' to continue pretending it does not exist... [snip]
    Moderator Response: [Dikran Marsupial] Inflamatory snipped.
  22. Dikran Marsupial at 03:55 AM on 1 May 2012
    It hasn't warmed since 1998
    hutch44uk I am not questioning what the trend calculator says. I am pointing out that a particular intepretation often used by skeptics is incorrect. A lack of statistically significant warming does not mean it is not warming, just that you cannot rule out that possibility. If you have a two headed coin and flip it four times and get a head each time (oddly enough) then the usual test for the coin being biased gives the result "no significant". Does that mean the coin is fair? No, of course it doesn't, the coin has a head on both sides! The reason you get a result of "not significant" is that there have been too few coin flips observed to rule out the possibility that the coin is fair (at the usual 95% significance level). BTW if you adopt a statistic to make an argument, then they are your statistics, if only by adoption. You need to be able to defend your use of them, whether you calculated them or not.
  23. muoncounter at 03:51 AM on 1 May 2012
    It hasn't warmed since 1998
    hutch44uk#183: "I do not need answer further questions... " Since your 'first claim' was that this article starts with a strawman - and that is incorrect - you do indeed need answer no questions (none were asked of you). As to your subsequent claim of 'no statistically significant increase in temperature,' take out the ENSO noise and you're once again incorrect. Since you reference Foster and Rahmstorf 2011, perhaps you should note their very clear statement: there is no indication of any slowdown or acceleration of global warming, beyond the variability induced by these known natural factors. Then check Nielsen-Gammon, who also shows a consistent increase in temperatures. Apples to apples comparisons make sense, don't they? But if you insist on comparing el Nino years with la Nina years, why have recent la Ninas been warmer than the prior el Ninos?
  24. Bob Lacatena at 03:43 AM on 1 May 2012
    John Nielsen-Gammon Comments on Continued Global Warming
    Dana, Simply by following the neutral, El Niño and La Niña lines in the graph on this post shows that the only thing that will prevent you from being right are: 1) A large volcanic eruption of the sort that reduces insolation 2) Yet another La Niña (something that can happen, but hasn't happened since 1974-1976 (three successive La Niña years). 3) All of climate science is completely and totally wrong, and you and they, in spite of all of the evidence to the contrary, don't have the faintest clue of what is happening. The other scenarios... even with a quiet sun, high Chinese aerosol emissions, and ENSO neutral conditions suggest that 2013 will certainly be warmer -- amazingly warmer if an El Niño kicks in. So 2013 will be an interesting year. Almost as interesting when 2020 comes around and people are really freaking out, and wondering WTF they were thinking when they were ignoring or denying things in 2010.
  25. Richard Alley - We Can Afford Clean Energy
    Suggested reading: “Taking Action On Climate And Clean Energy In 2012: A Menu Of Effective And Feasible Solutions” by Jason Walsh and Kate Gordon, Climate Progress, Apr 26, 2012
  26. It hasn't warmed since 1998
    My apologies muoncounter, you're right. The period was 1998-2010. By the way this is a misrepresentation of my position: "Given the generally intended meaning is that 1998 was warmer than xxxx". You are all "moving the goal post". I do not need answer further questions when my first claim has not been refuted. I have already shown that there is no significant trend since 1998. Dikran, they are not my statistics, but those of the trend calculator on this site from Foster and Rahmstorf, 2011. I suggest you take it up with them.
  27. John Nielsen-Gammon Comments on Continued Global Warming
    It's worth noting that 1998 had the second-largest El Nino influence, behind 1983. 1983 is an interesting one because it had the competing effects of a whopper El Nino and the El Chicon eruption. The El Nino won out, and it fell right on the long-term El Nino trend line. And 2010 showed that even ENSO-neutral years can be sufficient to match or break the annual temperature record in the current day, thanks to the man-made global warming signal. Which bodes well for my prediction that 2013 will break the record once again.
  28. Bob Lacatena at 02:46 AM on 1 May 2012
    John Nielsen-Gammon Comments on Continued Global Warming
    11, Muon, Yes... but I have a strong feeling that we'll too soon be able to do away with that particular mantra. 1998 will no longer be an acceptable choice, and they'll have to wait at least a few years before they can start saying "But 2013 (or whenever) was the warmest year ever, and temperatures have been dropping since." There's no telling when the next El Niño is going to hit, or how strong it will be, but I'd give it an 80% chance at least of easily topping 1998, 2005, and 2010. The fact is that the globe has warmed, and an even moderate El Niño at this point will do the trick. [Oops! Did I say trick? No, not that kind of trick! It's not a trick! Dang those deniers and their tricks. Aargh! I did it again!] And a whopper of an El Niño is going to silence a lot of people (although they'll try to blame it on natural cycles, and to say that it was just a really big El Niño and has nothing at all to do with global warming in general).
  29. 2012 SkS Weekly Digest #17
    If one considers a thread hijack to be an attempt to pull a thread off-topic, the Comments Policy already cover this and usually more subtle attempts to do so are noted by commenters. If one is instead thinking of spamming a thread with a large mass of comments (or a few extremely long comments), it would depend on why this is done. I assume this is what Michael Whittemore considers to be 'thread bombing' (correct me if I am incorrect, Michael). But it would depend on whether a poster was thread bombing as an initial act or if the poster was responding to a pile-on in the comments.
  30. Dikran Marsupial at 02:22 AM on 1 May 2012
    It hasn't warmed since 1998
    Hutch44UK "no statistically significant warming" doesn't mean that there is no warming. It means that the trend is too small in magnitude relative to the noise that we can't rule out the possibility that it isn't warming. If you want to use a lack of statistical significance to establish that it hasn't been warming then you would need to show that the statistical power of the test was sufficiently high that a statistically insignificant result would be a surprise if the trend actually was of continuing warming at the same rate as before. Alternatively you could try to show that the change in trend since (say) 1998 was statistically significant. Needless to say, skeptics generally don't do this and instead are happy to misuse statistical tests.
  31. muoncounter at 02:14 AM on 1 May 2012
    John Nielsen-Gammon Comments on Continued Global Warming
    Let's not obscure this result with lags and competing averaging periods. This doesn't get much simpler: All three categories are warming at approximately the same rate. The last 4 neutral years are spot on this trend. Even the last two la Ninas are warmer than most of the prior el Ninos. 'Skeptics' need to stop looking at their favorite year (1998) as if that one data point is the whole story.
  32. muoncounter at 02:03 AM on 1 May 2012
    It hasn't warmed since 1998
    hutch#178: "there is no statistically significant increase..." Since you do not specify a time frame, this statement has no meaning. However, it is one that is heard a lot in these parts. Given the generally intended meaning is that 1998 was warmer than xxxx, we have a very good explanation here. If nothing else, that exercise will help you learn how to connect the dots more appropriately.
  33. John Nielsen-Gammon Comments on Continued Global Warming
    The purpose here is to see what effect ENSO had on each annual temperature anomaly. Since the annual temperature anomaly is defined as the average anomaly from Jan through Dec (or sometimes Dec through Nov), we only care about the ENSO influence on those 12-month spans. So while a given year like 2010 may have had a fairly strong El Nino event, the overall effect of ENSO on that year's temeperature may put it in the ENSO neutral category. We could do the analysis defining a year as July through June as zinfan @6 suggests, but annual temperature anomalies are not defined as July through June so this wouldn't be a very useful analysis.
  34. It hasn't warmed since 1998
    hutch44uk @178:
    "Remembering that the radiative effects of extra carbon dioxide occur at the speed of light, and that both the ocean and the atmosphere are currently cooling, just where is this 0.5°C. of "pipeline" heat supposed to be hiding?)."
    (Bob Carter, The Drum, 19th Dec 2011, my emphasis). There is no strawman. Just a misrepresentation of the facts by Carter.
  35. John Nielsen-Gammon Comments on Continued Global Warming
    zinfan94, From Peru - Also note that a 4-month lag of the ENSO state was used, corresponding to the Foster and Rahmstorf lag findings. That, and the use of yearly averaging, need to be taken into consideration when looking at the ENSO/temperature relationship.
  36. John Nielsen-Gammon Comments on Continued Global Warming
    From Peru @7, N-G used annual averages as stated above. Although the early part of 2010 featured a moderate El Nino, the later part featured a strong La Nina. Using annual averages that would cancel out to make a neutral year.
  37. Human CO2 is a tiny % of CO2 emissions
    Hutch: "[Knorr 2009] showed that the rise in airborne CO2 since 1850 is statistically negligible." Knorr said no such thing (see here. Hutch, are you actually reading the articles? Even if you only read the abstract from Knorr, you should understand that what you claim and what he claims are different. He points out that 40% of human emissions stays in the atmosphere. That's significant. Now, is the trend in airborne fraction of human-sourced CO2 increasing? You know what the mass balance argument is, yes? Yes, the natural sinks are trying to absorb the additional CO2, but they're not doing a very good job of it, and, worse yet, they're not going to do a better job in the future, because 1) land use changes will likely involve cutting down carbon-sucking forests and 2) the warmer the oceans get, the less able they are to hold their carbon. We are part of the system, and we are overwhelming the "negative feedback." What ad hominem are you talking about?
  38. Human CO2 is a tiny % of CO2 emissions
    huch44uk @229, the abstract of Kr Knorr's article reads:
    "Several recent studies have highlighted the possibility that the oceans and terrestrial ecosystems have started loosing part of their ability to sequester a large proportion of the anthropogenic CO2 emissions. This is an important claim, because so far only about 40% of those emissions have stayed in the atmosphere, which has prevented additional climate change. This study re-examines the available atmospheric CO2 and emissions data including their uncertainties. It is shown that with those uncertainties, the trend in the airborne fraction since 1850 has been 0.7 ± 1.4% per decade, i.e. close to and not significantly different from zero. The analysis further shows that the statistical model of a constant airborne fraction agrees best with the available data if emissions from land use change are scaled down to 82% or less of their original estimates. Despite the predictions of coupled climate-carbon cycle models, no trend in the airborne fraction can be found."
    The airborne fraction is the increase in atmospheric CO2 as a fraction human emissions. Fortunately for us, as Dr Knorr says, the increase in atmospheric CO2 is currently 40% of total emissions. Where it not for that, CO2 concentrations would not have increased by 100 ppmv since 1850, but by 250 ppmv - with disastrous results. It is widely predicted that as the oceans warm, the airborne fraction will increase, as warm oceans can absorb less CO2. Dr Knorr shows that as yet, evidence of that increase is not yet statistically significant. What he does not show, and does not purport to show, and indeed, explicitly disagrees with, is the claim that "the rise in airborne CO2 since 1850 is statistically negligible". On the contrary, if atmospheric CO2 has increased by 40% of total emissions since 1850 (Knorr's claim), then the increase is about 40% over 1850 values, which is certainly statistically significant. A word to the wise, moderation complaints are normally snipped on this site, and if there is no reason to preserve a comment, moderators will save themselves trouble by simply deleting the entire post. That is particularly the case when the moderation complaint is entirely specious - as yours is.
  39. CO2 increase is natural, not human-caused
    {snip}
    Moderator Response: If you wish to discuss your egregious misinterpretation of Dr Knorr's article, do so in the thread in which you originally raised the point. There is no need to spam multiple threads. This is a first warning.
  40. John Nielsen-Gammon Comments on Continued Global Warming
    The 2009-2010 El Niño (despite being just moderate), was the strongest of the last decade, and instead in 2005 ENSO was just neutral-to warm. Why 2010 is shown as "ENSO neutral"and 2005 as "El Niño"?
  41. John Nielsen-Gammon Comments on Continued Global Warming
    One thing that makes me a little uncomfortable with this analysis, is that most ENSO monitoring organizations consider the NH winter of 2006/2007 and the NH winter of 2009/2010 as El Nino events. Neither El Nino event shows in either analysis above, because the El Nino event impacts were partitioned into the calendar years, thus downgrading each event into the Neutral category. I wonder if annual cycles using July to June would give stronger and more accurate correlations to ENSO events? Or even more accurately, use monthly anomalies, and annualize the trends for each ENSO period (El Nino, La Nina, and ENSO Neutral)... I know this complicates the analysis, but the current analysis is open to criticism for ignoring the two most recent El Nino events.
  42. Daniel Bailey at 00:58 AM on 1 May 2012
    Two Centuries of Climate Science: part one - Fourier to Arrhenius, 1820-1930
    "That you need a citation for Phil Jones most influential work is unexpected, but here you go." Phil Jones has many influential works; you made a vague and subjective referent more laden with snark than fact. Indeed, your "citation" lacks substance as well. Here is a proper citation: Surface air temperature and its changes over the past 150 years Jones et al 1999 REVIEWS OF GEOPHYSICS, VOL. 37, NO. 2, PP. 173-199, 1999 doi:10.1029/1999RG900002 http://seaice.apl.washington.edu/Papers/JonesEtal99-SAT150.pdf Note, for convenience, I included a link to an openly-available copy. "So Daniel still has not answered the question of why the stratosphere's temperature cycle is de-coupled from the troposphere on the seasonal scale which is the point that I have been making the entire time." Your "point" is specious (a straw-man argument) and off-topic. Please constrain your comments to the topic of the OP or I'm sure the moderators will constrain them for you. It is noted that you meticulously avoid answering the questions most inconvenient to your cause.
    Moderator Response: TC: Point well taken. This discussion is of topic, and should be taken to a more suitable thread.
  43. Human CO2 is a tiny % of CO2 emissions
    Dr Knorr from the University of Bristol (http://www.agu.org/pubs/crossref/2009/2009GL040613.shtml) showed that the rise in airborne CO2 since 1850 is statistically negligible, and hence that the oceans are absorbing more CO2 than previously thought. The article here states "While fossil-fuel derived CO2 is a very small component of the global carbon cycle, the extra CO2 is cumulative because the natural carbon exchange cannot absorb all the additional CO2." - well apparently it can, and this is what negative feedback means, when the level of CO2 rises, the 'system' reacts to counteract it. "ad hominem comments will be deleted.", unless they are directed against 'skeptics' it seems.
  44. Richard Alley - We Can Afford Clean Energy
    Moving back more toward the original post, another sewer analogy that is relevant here is that of distributed networking. In population-dense areas it makes sense to connect household waste disposal into a single system. In a more rural region it is far better (that is, both cheaper and more productive) to process human waste with what is really quite basic technology. I've seen more than one sparsely populated local council jurisdiction try to 'modernise', at great expense to everyone and with no practical benefit. Similarly, distributed energy generation has many advantages, especially away from heavily populated areas. Fortunately, this notion is much more widely accepted - and I can't help but wonder how much the modern Western "yuck" response to poo is behind the difference...
  45. Richard Alley - We Can Afford Clean Energy
    Chriskoz. I'm not quite sure what your point is, and I don't have Hadyn's and John's book, so I'd be interested to see you rephrase your posting. However, if your point is that we can keep 7 or 8 billion people on the planet indefinitely, just by promoting behaviours such as separating the recycling and installing low-wattage fluorescents, then sorry, but no hope. The only way that upwards of 7 billion people could live sustainably on Earth (that is, for centuries or longer) would be if the very great majority lived at a subsistence level about that of, say, agricultural "peasants"*. Many workers have demonstrated as much, and it's quite likely that even at this level of resource use we'd need to actually depopulate a little over time, as 20th century fossil carbon use has caused us to overshoot the pre-Industrial Revolution global population four or five times, or so. The "current level of comfort", if you are referring to Western comfort, is not sustainable, even for just the privileged Western population, and even if we somehow had all of our energy requirements replaced with renewables overnight. Of course, you needn't take my word for it. Hang around for thirty or fourty years and see for yourself. [*The disparagement with which "subsistence" agriculture is regarded by the West is a cringeing cultural affectation that will rapidly evaporate in the near future. If there were an index of Western disregard for "peasantry", that index would likely mirror the drop in the future rate of fossil fuel use.]
  46. John Nielsen-Gammon Comments on Continued Global Warming
    Jeff T, read this post and post any further questions in the comment stream that follows the post. Note that there is also an intermediate article in addition to the basic article. Short answer: evaporation > thermal expansion in the short run.
  47. Paul Butler at 00:19 AM on 1 May 2012
    John Nielsen-Gammon Comments on Continued Global Warming
    Jeff T Sea level tends to fall during La Nina. I think this is related to precipitation moving water from the oceans to the land (note, for example the big floods in Australia).
  48. Richard Alley - We Can Afford Clean Energy
    Muoncounter. I absolutely concur that time is of the essence in restructuring the energy/resource use of Western society. And it frustrates me that we're still at the stage of 'debating' the future inevitable trajectories of energy/resource use, as much as denialists have already successfully wrought delay by fomenting a faux debate about the facts of climate physics. There is nothing to say though that we should take our eye off the ball at the other end of the field, whilst we dodge and weave around obstacles in order to reach it. Yes, move to renewables as quickly and as widely as possible. Yes, use nuclear where necessary (but don't imagine that it's a panacæ, any more than renewables are). And at the same time acknowledge that we have to do business differently tomorrow than how we do it today, or we won't be doing much business at all the day after, even though a lot of us might have shiny new PVs on our roofs... Put simply, the 'where' of tomorrow's energy is not mutually exclusive of the 'how much'. What I'm trying to point out is that the problem is greater than just from where we're sourcing our energy. I'm against the use of cherry picking and magical thinking in the denial of 'greenhouse' gas warming. As scientists we have an understanding of the import of climate physics, so we know what looms if the problem is not addressed. And even though trophic cascades - and biosystems dynamics in general - are that much more complex, that same scepticism with which we analyse climatological matters should be applied to the subject of planetary energy use: of ecological thermodynamics as it were. Concentrating only on shifting to renewables, without simultaneously balancing the global energy budget, will simply be akin to building just one bypass on a coast-to-coast highway - the traffic congestion will simply be moved to the next town, and in the case of energy and resource use, that next town is just over the hill. Not accounting for it now is skirting toward the same magical thinking and cherry-picking that we despise in warming deniers, and it won't be many more years into the future before our children, with the benefit of 20/290 hindsight, compare such optimistic sidelining of overall energy use with the current business/government optimism about 'clean coal' - a strategy that allows us too easily to take our eyes away from that ball...
  49. John Nielsen-Gammon Comments on Continued Global Warming
    If a La Nina is distributing heat into the ocean instead of the atmosphere, then sea level should rise more rapidly during a La Nina than during an El Nino. That is, fluctuations of sea level and surface temperature from their long-term trends ought to be anticorrelated; but they don't seem to be. Can someone explain this?
    Moderator Response: (Rob P) See explanation here:Why did sea level fall in 2010?
  50. Michael Whittemore at 23:40 PM on 30 April 2012
    2012 SkS Weekly Digest #17
    Regarding thread bombing, it might just be a judgement call moderators make, that could be done privately with the poster concerned. I tend to comment a lot in some circumstances but would definitely prefer a private message from the moderators, then a public hanging.

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