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muoncounter at 22:40 PM on 13 July 2010What's in a trend?
#7 should have readAs for "
but apparently the text interpreter thought it is! -
muoncounter at 22:32 PM on 13 July 2010What's in a trend?
#6, CBD: "a massive block which endured year after year and served as a 'plug' forcing most of the younger / thinner ice to remain in the arctic basin each year. Warming got severe enough to break up the plug" Non-geologists don't seem to realize that ice events are discontinuous. Ice dams form and hold ice or water back until a semi-catastrophic break occurs. The regime after that break may be totally different from what it was beforehand. Yet another reason why a single 'trend' isn't just misleading, its incorrect. -
Berényi Péter at 22:26 PM on 13 July 2010Hotties vs Frosties?
#137 KR at 15:27 PM on 13 July, 2010 There's a row of 1.4 MW windmills just outside my home town. No noise issue, and even in the US snow belt (several 1 meter snowfalls per year over the last couple years) they don't ice up and throw chunks. And if I'm not on a ladder sticking my head in the blades, the speed of the blade tips is completely irrelevant OK, let's go for a reality check. Wind Turbine noise at 1600 feet Wind Turbine Ice Throw Wind Turbine Shadow Flicker and Noise, Byron Wisconsin Windmill/turbine going wild and finally break Wind turbines and health problems Wind Turbine Shadow Flicker Impact Lawsuit over wind turbine noise Does an industrial scale wind turbine sound like a refrigerator to you? Wind Turbine Fire Danish wind turbine explosion slowed down Voices of Vinalhaven Part 1: wind turbine noise Voices of Vinalhaven Part 2: wind turbine noise I understand you would not like your property value to go down. In case you live more than 2 km away from the windfarm, you may be safe. But that's what I am talking about. This thing overconsumes valuable land area. -
muoncounter at 22:23 PM on 13 July 2010What's in a trend?
#1: "a big physical shift occurred in Arctic Ocean sea ice right at that time (1989), with a large "flush" of old thick ice" Exactly the type of thing I was looking for! Thanks. #2, #3: I don't like removing months here and there. Rather, the ninos/ninas appear as short term events, which (IMO) need to get filtered out to see long term behavior. One thing I did, but did not include here, is a graph of the global data with the straight line trend subtracted out. There is a very distinctive sawtooth pattern with a 4-6 year period and that annoying spike in '98. But these are removed by the curve fit, which is not unlike a moving average. #4: See the last graph. Tweaked or not, UAH and GISS show the same overall pattern for the last 30 years. Or is that what you mean by 'tweaked'? #5: I looked at UAH's South polar record; it's basically flat (with even a slight downward look). Nowhere else but in the Arctic does one see such numbers as the Official Trend (0.47) or the Alarming Trend (0.9). HR, the Antarctic down/Arctic up is highly asymmetric. Must be more to it than a 180 phase shift. Are you suggesting some sort of heat flow from south pole to north pole, which seems anti-thermodynamic? As for <CYNICISM></CYNICISM> (why isn't that an HTML tag?), sure. It seems to be a human tendency to see lines in everything, even when they may or not be there. I once had to explain to an oil company executive why straight lines on a map were not really straight over long distances because, err, the earth isn't flat. Have you ever shown anyone a 'right triangle' on a globe, consisting of 2 longitudes and a latitude? Easy picture to draw, but what about those 2 90 degree angles? But the UAH data are posted by a science group at a university; why can't they assume their audience is college educated and can handle the mathematical equivalent of 'big words'? By providing a single 'trend', are they not creating a false impression? Especially among the "Details? We don't need any stinking details!" crowd. -
CBDunkerson at 21:57 PM on 13 July 2010What's in a trend?
In reference to Andy Revkin's point about ice export circa 1990... in short, a 'tipping point' was passed. The large block of decades old ice along the northern edge of the Canadian archipelago and Greenland broke up and started to drift out of the arctic. Prior to that this had been a massive block which endured year after year and served as a 'plug' forcing most of the younger / thinner ice to remain in the arctic basin each year. Warming got severe enough to break up the plug and now we're seeing accelerated ice loss. Even without further warming we'd see the arctic continue to decline because that solid plug is gone and won't come back until temperatures drop below where they were circa 1990 and stay there. -
Ned at 21:56 PM on 13 July 2010Hotties vs Frosties?
Zeph writes: However, with these posts (109 & 118) you [BP] strayed into territory where I have more knowledge, and your lack of objectivity becomes glaringly apparent to me. This causes me to give less weight to your pronoucements where you (appear to believe you) have more expertise than I have, like OHC. For what it's worth, BP's comments in this thread about the GHCN surface station data and the surface temperature record were similarly wrongheaded. -
Ned at 21:48 PM on 13 July 2010Hotties vs Frosties?
CBDunkerson's point here is a really good one. I don't know how things work elsewhere, but in the US Upper Midwest wind turbines generally are built on private farmland, with the power company "renting" the space for the turbine's footprint. It's a good deal for everybody -- almost all the land is still farmed; the payments from the power company provide an additional source of income; and (IMHO) the turbines themselves add some interest to what's otherwise a fairly ... dull ... landscape. If BP's figure of 2.9 W/m2 is for all the land area within the vicinity of the wind farm, then yes, that's extremely misleading, since other economic activities continue within that same area. -
Ned at 21:42 PM on 13 July 2010Hotties vs Frosties?
I see lots of people in this thread arguing for wind, solar, nuclear, or whatever. Not many people arguing in favor of coal, at least. Could I make a modest suggestion? We don't actually need to decide a priori that the electrical grid of 2050 will be powered by x% wind, y% solar, z% hydro, nuclear, geothermal, tidal power, biomass, etc. That's really not an efficient way to proceed. If we implemented a substantial (and increasing) price for fossil carbon-based energy -- a carbon tax, cap-and-trade, whatever -- the market will then decide what mix of power sources is most cost effective in a given region. Such a pricing system can be made revenue-neutral (e.g., refunding all proceeds from a carbon tax on a per-capita basis -- in which case the average cost of energy usage doesn't change, but there's an incentive to move from fossil-fuel-based to non-fossil energy sources). It's pretty easy to imagine that in 2050 we might have a lot more solar in the US southwest and Australia, wind in northern Europe and the US/Canadian Great Plains, tidal power in Maine and the Maritimes, etc., with nuclear and (limited) fossil fuels filling in the gaps. By 2100 there are lots of different possible scenarios ranging from space-based solar to nuclear fusion to ... something else. But the point is that we don't have to have the answers worked out in 2010. Of course, there are also issues of path dependence and inertia. Actions we take today will influence the future mix of energy sources, transportation methods, etc. While a pricing penalty for carbon-based energy will benefit all the non-carbon alternatives, it's probably worth continuing to invest substantially more in research on all the major alternatives, so the market can have better information in advance on their likely future costs and capacities. -
CBDunkerson at 21:31 PM on 13 July 2010Hotties vs Frosties?
BP #118 & #132, I'm sorry but the 2.9 w/m^2 figure you are quoting for wind power generation is just STUNNINGLY incorrect. You presumably READ the report you are pulling it from and thus know that they differentiate between the total land area a wind farm is spread over and the total land area actually USED by the wind farm and thus unavailable for other purposes (most of which turns out to be access roads). The figures cited in the report conclusion are; 34 +/- 22 hectares per megawatt land SPREAD OVER 1 +/- 0.7 hectares per megawatt land USED Converting the average values there to the units you cited (which appear nowhere in the report) yields; 340000 m^2 per 1,000,000 w = 2.9 w/m^2 based on land SPREAD OVER 10000 m^2 per 1,000,000 w = 100 w/m^2 based on land USED This is presumably how you got the 2.9 w/m^2 figure... based on the area a wind farm is spread over rather than the area it actually USES. That's just totally unreasonable since every US wind farm I've ever seen is also used for crops and/or livestock. Indeed, many of the access roads built for wind farms later turn in to regular transportation routes... decreasing their REAL 'footprint' to just the area taken up by the base of each turbine. Then of course you are also completely ignoring offshore wind... which uses up no 'land' at all. Resorting to the citation of blatantly false/misleading statistics does not help your case. Rather it shows that you are pursuing a belief which can only be sustained via dishonesty. -
chris at 21:11 PM on 13 July 2010Watts Up With That concludes Greenland is not melting without looking at any actual ice mass data
The problems that efforts to deny real world observation lead to is shown by the relationships between polar and mountain glacier land ice melt and sea level rise. Despite a short period (2006-2008ish) when sea level rise slowed down a bit probably due to a la Nina event, the rate of increase has "recovered" and the current sea level is pretty much smack on its long term trend rising by somewhere upwards of 3 mm.yr-1. That sea level rise must have come from somewhere. Elsewhere on these boards strenuous efforts are being made to insinuate that the thermosteric (water volume expansion due to enhanced heat absorption) contribution to sea level rise is negligible since 2003. If there is no Greenland contribution to sea level rise and no thermosteric contribution then what is causing the sea levels to rise!? Are we therefore getting 3 mm.yr-1 from mountain glaciers and Antarctic melt? The evidence simply doesn't support such a conclusion. More likely the sea level rise is a combination of Greenland and Antarctic melt contributions, mountain glacier melt contributions and thermosteric (enhanced ocean heat absorption) much as the science indicates. The real world does make sense and our interpretations should reflect that! -
mspelto at 20:34 PM on 13 July 2010Watts Up With That concludes Greenland is not melting without looking at any actual ice mass data
It is particularly good timing, with the Jakobshavn Glacier losing a a substantial chunk in a major calving event July 6-7. This is also a summer where the melt season has gotten off to a fast start on the ice sheet. -
pikaia at 20:31 PM on 13 July 2010Watts Up With That concludes Greenland is not melting without looking at any actual ice mass data
It would be helpful to know what the TOTAL mass of the Greenland ice sheet is, to put it into perspective.Response: This is examined in why Greenland's ice loss matters. -
HumanityRules at 20:15 PM on 13 July 2010What's in a trend?
Petr Chylek recently published on the seesaw effect on the poles temp caused by the AMO. He detrends the arctic and antarctic temp records and shows these are in an anti-phase. He then compares these detrend temp records with the AMO index and shows arctic detrended temp is correlated with the AMO (antarctic anti-correlated). In it he suggests that two thirds of the recent arctic warming is due to this shift in the climate patterns of the earth. Maybe one third GHG. Specific to your 3 questions 1) 1970-1980 represent the point when the AMO index was at it's lowest and just beginning to rise. 2) 1990 is the point at which the detrend arctic and antarctic temp records cross which suggests a point when the extra warming from shift in climate regimes rather than increases in GHG really kicked in. Post 1990 warming is the sum of GHG and AMO effects. 3) [cynicism on] straight lines allow for simple singular explanations for trends. Complicated trends demand complicated explanations [cynicism off] -
Berényi Péter at 20:05 PM on 13 July 2010Hotties vs Frosties?
#136 scaddenp at 14:25 PM on 13 July, 2010 MacKay's estimate was for 125kWh/p/d. Beats me how US manages to use 250kWh/p/d - we use 91 No. In 2004 US primary energy comsumption (achievement at primary energy carriers stressed on the average) was 10,460 Watts/head. If you do the math that comes out as 251.04 kWh/p/d. In Europe it was 105.768 kWh/p/d (Hungary 82.3 kWh/p/d), China 24.84 kWh/p/d and 16.248 kWh/p/d in India. World average was 52.8 kWh/p/d. Think globally, act locally. -
Esop at 18:53 PM on 13 July 2010What's in a trend?
Don't forget that the UAH dataset has been tweaked multiple times over the past months, in addition to other changes specifically for the channel 5 data. This brought the anomalies down. This was done right at the time that new records were set, probably a coincidence. -
Peter Hogarth at 18:12 PM on 13 July 2010IPCC were wrong about Amazon rainforests
Zeph at 15:57 PM on 13 July, 2010 Thank you for this viewpoint. It is welcome and I think from wide experience it also more broadly reflects the viewpoint of many scientists who normally stay clear of proactive public debate. -
Bern at 17:41 PM on 13 July 2010What's in a trend?
That's an interesting idea, jyyh. I wonder what a chart of temperature anomalies would look like with all El Nino / La Nina periods removed? (apart from somewhat incomplete!) Other than that, this is an interesting post, muoncounter - thanks, it provides another perspective on trends. -
JMurphy at 17:31 PM on 13 July 2010IPCC were wrong about Amazon rainforests
Zeph, well written and well put. I think I agree with you 100%. Well, except for the probable deletion part... Hope to see more from you in future. -
Zeph at 15:57 PM on 13 July 2010IPCC were wrong about Amazon rainforests
When things get this polarized, it appears to an outsider like me that almost everybody is busy trying to be "right", as in win points. I can certainly understand that, being human myself. Willis appears to need to hear confirmation that there was no peer reviewed publication to be cited for the 40% quote - acknowledgment of a mistake in citation even if it doesn't affect the actual facts or outcome. That's his strong point. He would appear to not care much whether the science was correct or not, just whether a mistake was made and he can force his opponents to admit that. JMurphy seems to want to focus instead on whether the science was probably correct, which is his strong point. He doesn't care as much whether a mistake was made in the published event - admitting a mistake might be embarassing or give ammunition to the critics, and the actual truth is more important than the citation formality anyway (this is what I'm reading into it). For some of us, the real point is more about whether the IPCC's case was very strong, rather than whether it was flawless. So maybe this was another error, and maybe there's too much "circling the wagons" defensiveness - if so, that's regretable, but still a sideshow to the main issues. I see no evidence that the IPCC's conclusions are overall in question because the chairman spoke too enthusiastically to the press. For those of us concerned about balancing the planet and the economy, trying to make this or that person right or wrong in what they said when is not very interesting. Trying to discredit the report based on what the chairman said to the press about only peer reviewed science is not terribly relevant - it's more about scoring points than arriving at the truth. Hey, maybe he spoke too incautiously to the press and deserves a bad PR report card or something - that's still a side show, not a challenge to the science. Many people on both sides think this is a critical make or break decision for mankind - fearing potentially enormous environmental or economic consequences from a wrong decision. In that circumstance, I'd like to see our first priority being to find the most fundamental truths, not win contests. I picture us on an old sailing ship with most of the ship's carpenters saying there is some dry rot that could cause big problems - other folks say there's no big problem and we don't need to beach the ship to fix it at great financial cost. That's an important question in which all of us have a great deal invested. One of the carpenters says this was the best built ship in the navy - and some people want to attack or support him in this assertion. If the perfection of that carpenter's personal judgment was all we had to go on, that would be relevant, but there are measurements and soundings being taken. So the report itself acknowledges & justifies using "grey literature", and even some critics think that's reasonable. But the chairman has told the press it's all peer reviewed and it isn't. If your job is to do his annual review, then this is relevant - maybe his PR skills are not up to par - he exaggerated or appeared to. But if you want to know what's happening, this really isn't the main question to focus on. I want to know whether the IPCC is basically sound or not, not whether anybody ever got defensive or made relatively minor errors. Again, as an outsider, there seems to be a huge bias being asserted by the critics - the IPCC and its supporters must prove their case to an extremely high standard and even a few errors out of 3000 pages are a big deal. The critics are not held to the same standards. This seems to presuppose that "the course we are on" needs no justification, only course changes do, and no course change can be made while there is some dissent. Imagine if the shoe was on the other foot, and there was need of a comprehensive and bullet-proof EIR before more gigatons of carbon were emitted. Imagine if it took a more solid scientific consensus than we have today, but in in the other direction, before continuing to emit CO2 was allowed. Imagine if the EIR supporting "no AGW to worry about" could be discredited on even a fraction of a percent of errors which didn't affect the conclusions, or a small number of dissenting scientists? That would not be reasonable either. For deciding what's probably happening and making adjustments, we need a more balanced standard of proof. Reading blogs on both sides has convinced me that the preponderance of the evidence supports AGW and that it's only by creating highly assymetric burdens of proof that any policy debate continues. That doesn't mean I think AGW is proven, only that if both sides are evaluated on an even footing, the critics are trying to poke some holes in a remarkable intellectual edifice (albeit one with some holes) while unable to build anything even remotely as impressive themselves. They have no alternative which they can agree upon, which would "prove" that there's no problem. That is, I don't see critics creating and supporting against criticism any GCMs which fit the data better without CO2 or with a low sensitivity. I don't see anything similar in scope and accuracy to the IPCC positing a coherent alternative around which to build a scientific consensus (I see lots of incompatible anti-AGW threads: solar, GCR, it ain't happening, etc). And a lot of sniping. Which doesn't seem to bring out the best in AGW supporters, who do seem to get defensive and sometime change the subject when a critic gets the upper hand on an argument. I can see evidence of that - but WHO CARES? So they are human and can be baited until they react defensively. THAT'S NOT THE SCIENCE and AGW doesn't rest on the unbaitability of its proponents. Sigh. This will probably be deleted, it's not really about the science of course, but about how it gets discussed. A bunch of frustration after many hours reading "both sides" just came out. If a person or two reads it before it gets deleted, thanks for listening. -
shawnhet at 15:39 PM on 13 July 2010Hotties vs Frosties?
Frankly, it seems like the whole wind power issue is a side show. IMO, by the time we could build a working wind-based electrical system, it would already be obsolete. Solar, however, is a *much* better bet. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Space-based_solar_power Cheers, :) -
KR at 15:27 PM on 13 July 2010Hotties vs Frosties?
Berényi - But would you tolerate huge windmills in your neighborhood? Already have them. There's a row of 1.4 MW windmills just outside my home town. No noise issue, and even in the US snow belt (several 1 meter snowfalls per year over the last couple years) they don't ice up and throw chunks. And if I'm not on a ladder sticking my head in the blades, the speed of the blade tips is completely irrelevant. Your prejudices are showing. I much prefer the windmills to a coal fired power plant (most likely in my region), or even a natural gas power plant. As to my previous post, the 734 GW figure was for average continuous power, which includes varying wind conditions. If the spread of wind power sites exceeds a local low/high pressure zone, you will ALWAYS have wind on some portion of the grid. That makes interconnections/power sharing important, but those issues are easy to deal with. -
jyyh at 15:04 PM on 13 July 2010What's in a trend?
heh, i might practise some intellectual dishonesty in my next (hobbyist) analysis and discount 1998, for it was clearly some 1/50 event considering El Nino. What it did show was that anomalous El Ninos may be stronger than anomalous La Ninas, the strongest of which should be also discounted from it ;-). One might get a clearer picture of the trend this way, analysing only ENSO neutral months. I've no doubt this has already been done but never published, as true scientists like to check their findings in more than one way. -
Andy Revkin at 14:33 PM on 13 July 2010What's in a trend?
One thing to note about that ice transition you stress in 1990 is that a big physical shift occurred in Arctic Ocean sea ice right at that time (1989), with a large "flush" of old thick ice, as explained in some detail here: http://dotearth.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/03/22/new-light-shed-on-north-pole-ice-trends/ As was the case in 2007, ice up there can change as much through motion as melting, Arctic scientists tell me. -
scaddenp at 14:25 PM on 13 July 2010Hotties vs Frosties?
MacKay's estimate was for 125kWh/p/d. Beats me how US manages to use 250kWh/p/d - we use 91. Not enough petroleum for citizens of China to reach that level of consumption with fossil fuel anyway. Suggests there is a fair bit of scope for conservation in US. Anyway, whatever happens with climate, the world will have to figure this out somehow, someday, because fossil fuel doesnt last forever. -
BaerbelW at 14:17 PM on 13 July 2010Czech translation of Scientific Guide to the 'Skeptics Handbook'
With more and more downloadable content on Skeptical Science, could a "Download Page" make sense where all the files could be collected? We now for example have the Handbook (orginal and three languages and formats) and the Flyer (original and one language) and there might be others already existing or coming soon....Response: I was thinking of doing a "Software" page, with links to the iPhone app, the Android app (now finished, probably out later this week) and the other secret little goodie I'm just itching to get out there (last I heard it was a few weeks away but they also said that a few months ago).
Then I'd do a "Media" page with the Guide, the Flyer, the powerpoint of the UQ talk, the PDF notes of the UQ talk plus a powerpoint that we played at the Perth climate change forum outlining the empirical evidence that humans are causing climate change.
It all requires I reprogram the navigation links at the top to have dropdowns which I've been putting off for years now but is sorely needed. I won't be able to avoid it for much longer. Thanks for the suggestion. -
Berényi Péter at 13:56 PM on 13 July 2010Hotties vs Frosties?
#130 Tom Dayton at 12:53 PM on 13 July, 2010 How about "a solar array to generate the entire world’s present electricity consumption"? That was done at RealClimate quite a while ago. The question is not about the entire world’s present electricity consumption, but all the energy consumed by the global economy. In that case MacKay's 2 million km2 is a bit more realistic than raypierre's 53,333 km2. If you want to decarbonize, do it properly. It is also fit to allow for some increase in consumption for economies like China or India. If you let everyone have the same energy quota as the US have got today and consider some inevitable increase of world population, it comes close to ten million square kilometers. That still does not sound too much (less than 4 W/m2 on average over the globe), but you want to concentrate it to several desert areas. That would have a considerable impact on global circulation patterns. -
Albatross at 13:50 PM on 13 July 2010Hotties vs Frosties?
Chris @107, Thanks for your feedback. I really do need to write more clearly. When I said "Or are they referring only to the contribution from thermal expansion?, the "they" I was referring to was Ken Lambert. -
ProfMandia at 13:49 PM on 13 July 2010Must-read article on ocean impacts by ocean scientists
BTW, you may freely download the Science article by the authors here: http://web.me.com/ventana121/BrunoLab/Publications.html I agree with John, the catastrophe is right around the corner. I am working on my Impacts page and just finished Ecosystems of Oceans and Shallow Seas to be published online later. Very disturbing what we are causing now and likely into the future. For example, Silverman et al. (2009) suggest that by the time atmospheric CO2 concentrations reach 560 ppm all coral reefs will cease to grow and will start to dissolve. This cannot be taken lightly. Scott A. Mandia, Professor of Physical Sciences Selden, NY Global Warming: Man or Myth? My Global Warming Blog Twitter: AGW_Prof "Global Warming Fact of the Day" Facebook Group -
scaddenp at 13:05 PM on 13 July 2010Hotties vs Frosties?
"But most of the thingies needed for a hitech environment are pretty permanent." But if you are talking about nanotech to provide energy, then you have to release that carbon to get energy. 1st law must apply. "Burning all the unoxidized carbon compounds in the crust may not be enough to supply the carbon needed for an advanced economy." The "advanced economy" needs to cut cloak to cloth. If you want carbon for purposes other than oxidizing it, then let me point you to some coal seams. Sounds like you have much better use for it than our current schemes. As to albedo change... well we are assuming the 0.5% of the globe changes from say perfect reflector to perfect absorber. Surface albedo reflects 21W/m2 at moment, so I'd say the increased warming effect would be way less that the 3.7Wm2 from GHG. -
Berényi Péter at 13:03 PM on 13 July 2010Hotties vs Frosties?
#122 Zeph at 10:43 AM on 13 July, 2010 However, with these posts (109 & 118) you strayed into territory where I have more knowledge That's fine. You could supply a more reasonable estimate of windpower efficiency than the 2.9 W/m2 value of the technical report I have found. National Renewable Energy Laboratory of the U.S. Department of Energy Technical Report (NREL/TP-6A2-45834) August 2009 Land-Use Requirements of Modern Wind Power Plants in the United States Paul Denholm, Maureen Hand, Maddalena Jackson, and Sean Ong -
Sean A at 13:02 PM on 13 July 2010Must-read article on ocean impacts by ocean scientists
"Which catastrophe? I don't see any catastrophe." -- Famous last words. -
kdkd at 12:56 PM on 13 July 2010Hotties vs Frosties?
BP #129 Personally I find the aesthetics of wind farms quite pleasing. You are showing your subjective biases again. BP #119 The most obvious objection to your approach is that you will not deal with the interdependency problem in any way other than one which is guaranteed to result in scientific impasse. This provides you with an illusion of validity but also allows you not to address your substantial and blinding preconceptions in any meaningful way. -
Tom Dayton at 12:53 PM on 13 July 2010Hotties vs Frosties?
BP asked "Would you please calculate the effect on global climate of covering two million square kilometers of the most sunny places on Earth with a low albedo material?" How about "a solar array to generate the entire world’s present electricity consumption"? That was done at RealClimate quite a while ago. -
Berényi Péter at 12:40 PM on 13 July 2010Hotties vs Frosties?
#127 KR at 12:17 PM on 13 July, 2010 AMERICAN WIND ENERGY ASSOCIATION - Estimated 20% of US electrical needs, including environmental and land use exclusions Of course they could supply that much (provided you also have the backup capacity in case of lulls). The US is still an empty country, land is cheap. But would you tolerate huge windmills in your neighborhood, blade tips speeding at several hundred km/h, throwing pounds of ice in winter to hundreds of meters and generating omnipresent low frequency noise? BTW, US population may exceed one billion by the end of century, pushing property prices up in the sky. -
Berényi Péter at 12:23 PM on 13 July 2010Hotties vs Frosties?
#120 scaddenp at 10:30 AM on 13 July, 2010 "To supply every person in the world with an average European’s power consumption (125 kWh/d), the area required would be two 1000 km by 1000 km squares in the desert." Would you please calculate the effect on global climate of covering two million square kilometers of the most sunny places on Earth with a low albedo material? And the cost and environmental impact of creating huge temporary energy storage capacities close to points of consumption. Then come environmentalists to accuse you for killing all those desert snakes and scorpions. -
HumanityRules at 12:21 PM on 13 July 2010Must-read article on ocean impacts by ocean scientists
This article just highlights the fact that scientists are not always the objective beings they should be. They like the rest of us have the right to make whatever comment they wish but this article has nothing to do with science or them being scientists. Just on one line in the article. "We all call this man-made catastrophe "global warming" or "climate change" Which catastrophe? I don't see any catastrophe. There may be some future imagined catastrophe but there certainly isn't anything of the such at the moment. It's the fact that such casual alarmism is allowed to pass unnoticed that really worries me.Response: "Which catastrophe? I don't see any catastrophe."
When I first met with John and Ove earlier this year, they showed me some of the peer-reviewed research into global warming impacts on ocean ecosystems and the ripple effect that is affecting humanity. Some of it was their own research. I hadn't even heard of some of the impacts they were researching and it was sobering stuff. I would suggest reading into their research and the impacts of global warming on the ocean before pronouncing their comments as "casual alarmism". My first post on the subject was Ocean Acidification: global warming's evil twin followed by Earth's five mass extinction events. Unfortunately these only scratch the surface - I would like to go deeper into the peer-reviewed literature but finding the time is tough. -
KR at 12:17 PM on 13 July 2010Hotties vs Frosties?
Here's a more conservative approach: AMERICAN WIND ENERGY ASSOCIATION - Estimated 20% of US electrical needs, including environmental and land use exclusions. North Dakota alone could (theoretically) supply >25% of US electrical needs, this takes into account a lot of land use restrictions. -
KR at 12:09 PM on 13 July 2010Hotties vs Frosties?
Berényi - even at low W/m^2 total land usage there are lots of places to put windmills. This link, which includes references to the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (and which also has great maps for PV and CPV power availability) indicates that the USA has sufficient land with 300-2000W/m^2 wind energies (wind incident on the windmill), within 10km of current power lines, to generate an average continuous 734 GW. The USA used 474 GW of electric power in 2007. Throw in some PV or concentrated PV energy, at up to 9 kWh/m^2/day, and a few new power lines - there is no physical issue preventing generating sufficient power. -
Berényi Péter at 12:07 PM on 13 July 2010Hotties vs Frosties?
#121 scaddenp at 10:42 AM on 13 July, 2010 when you burn the sugar to get energy, then surely you release CO2 back? This appears to me to be just high-tech carbon neutral biofuel, powered by the sun as well. Yes and no. If you had molecular nanotech, you could manufacture just about anything using carbon and little else. Sugar (or whatever) is just a temporary carbon storage. But most of the thingies needed for a hitech environment are pretty permanent. Including molecular machinery to convert light, water and carbon dioxide into oxygen and sugar (L-glucose may be favored, it's not consumed by bacteria), then oxygen and sugar into water, carbon dioxide and electricity. Burning all the unoxidized carbon compounds in the crust may not be enough to supply the carbon needed for an advanced economy. Then some limestone should be exploited, creating a serious ocean basification problem by releasing untold amounts of lime milk into the environment. But these are problems for the day after tomorrow. -
snapple at 11:54 AM on 13 July 2010Czech translation of Scientific Guide to the 'Skeptics Handbook'
I wish someone would translate the book into Russian. They just had an article in Russia called "Pseudoscientific Genius." The article discusses how gullible Russians are about scientific charlatans. During Climategate, Pravda was quoting Fox News. The article stated: "Rasputin-style infiltration into the upper echelons of power remains a problem even in post-Soviet Russia. 'In the Kremlin there were whole groups of—I’m scared of calling them charlatans—but mystics, astrologists. These were prominent people—generals. The 1990s were an analogue of Rasputin’s time,' said [Eduard Kruglyakov, the head of the Pseudoscience Commission at the Russian Academy of Sciences]. Several appointments made by Boris Yeltsin suggested that he sought advice from odd sources. For instance, Yeltsin made General Georgi Rogozin, an ex-KGB officer and star-gazer, the deputy head of his Presidential Security Service. Rogozin led a team of 12 astrologers who would draw on their expertise to counsel the president."---RIA Novosti (7-8-10) http://legendofpineridge.blogspot.com/2010/07/ria-novosti-criticizes-russias.htmlResponse: Noone has contacted me about doing a Russian translation yet but a past Skeptical Science blog post has been translated into Russian. I'll contact the translator of that blog post, ask if he's available to translate the handbook. -
Riduna at 11:52 AM on 13 July 2010Must-read article on ocean impacts by ocean scientists
Surprised the article does not mention the effects of increased absorption of CO2 creating carbonic acid, particularly in cooler seawater. These cause depletion of aragonite and other material on which calcifying marine life depends for production of protective shells. This is known to threaten a major marine food source, Pteropods (Thecosomata). Such a wide variety of fish depend on them as their main source of nourishment and consume them in such vast numbers that they have been appropriately described by Dr. Hoffmann (University of California) as ‘chips of the sea’. Extinction of Pteropods is likely with increased absorption of CO2 and their loss may well threaten marine life which depend on them and, ultimately, humans who depend on marine life as a major source of protein. While the presence of CO2 does stimulate seagrass growth, providing an enhanced nursery for some marine life, its ability to form carbonic acid poses a threat to corals which provide such an important environment for a wide variety of marine life. The loss of coral reefs endangers marine life on which humans depend. -
scaddenp at 11:18 AM on 13 July 2010Hotties vs Frosties?
Just a further note on CSP. According this report 25% efficiency commercial CSP is available and close to 50% efficiency is expected in future. This should yield CSP with 40W/m2 or better instead of the 15W/m2 that MacKay based his calculation on. -
Philippe Chantreau at 10:55 AM on 13 July 2010Hotties vs Frosties?
BP @ 99:http://www.skepticalscience.com/news.php?p=2&t=122&&n=266#18218 It's not the error that is a shame, it's the baseless accusations. The researchers of the papers you accused to be frauds are people, honorable people. They must be considered as such until proof of the contrary. You launched the accusations but dispensed from the proof. -
Zeph at 10:43 AM on 13 July 2010Hotties vs Frosties?
BP: "Therefore decarbonization is nothing else but the end of the world as we know it. It's as simple as that." BP, as a new reader of this blog, I was weighing your critiques for objectivity and merit. I am not really qualified to fully scientifically judge OHC or acidification; at best I might form semi-informed opinions. For a non-specialist it can be hard to really judge the science of a particular niche accurately in the "spare time" available. A key aspect is that it's often easy to follow a given thread of argument, but without deeper domain knowledge it's harder to weigh the balances and to be sure when all relevant factors have been accounted for. This is not specific to climate science - it could have to do with setting tuna harvest quotas in the south pacific - one side can show you the facts and analysis they want you to see, then the other can, and it takes a lot of time to objectively sort out the conflicting claims. So sometimes I look for who seems to have the most rational analysis with the least unconscious baggage; it's a matter of judging credibility rather than going into each discipline's science in sufficient detail to create publishable papers. However, with these posts (109 & 118) you strayed into territory where I have more knowledge, and your lack of objectivity becomes glaringly apparent to me. This causes me to give less weight to your pronoucements where you (appear to believe you) have more expertise than I have, like OHC. Just by the way, given that a substantial number of decarbonization advocates are supporting varying degrees of increase in reliance on nuclear energy (conventional or some form of breeder, particularly thorium), for either a transition period or for the long term, your black and white declaration in this area as quoted above is blatently inaccurate and far from objective. Likewise, you appear to be selective lowballing in your analysis of renewables + conservation (to be fair, many advocates of renewables tend to highball their estimates of what's possible - see below for why). However, the quote above does potentially explain the sense of a seething undercurrent of urgency mixed with despair which I sense behind your ostensibly rational presentations. I actually find that helpful - and familiar, as your sense of "impending doom" and the vital necessity of changing course before it's too late is remarkably similar to climate change alarmists. (By which I do NOT mean all hotties. I'm using the term selectively in regard to the urgency-to-avoid-the-end-of-the-world-as-we-know-it aspect, justified or not - not as a broad brush or put-down). For those with viewpoints similar to yours, "decarbonization" would mean the end of the world as we know it; for the hotties with a similar psychological urgency, c02 driven global climate change would mean about the same - in both cases that urgency sometimes fuels some hyperbole and lack of respect for opponents. Understanding that urgency, I can cut both ends of the spectrum a certain degree of slack. But I'm more interested in the middle, and in the audience John Brooks is seeking to reach. De-escalating the names whenever is a step in that direction. I doubt that "hotties" vs "notties" will catch on, tho I applaud the effort. While it's hard for bloggers who type a lot and prefer quick terms and acronyms for efficient communication among the in-group, often when writing for others it's useful to just avoid the shorthand and expand the text. So for example, one could talk about "those who disbelieve in human caused climate change" or "those who believe that humans are changing the climate". Yes, those are not fully accurate (eg: "via CO2 or other means?") but they can be understood without demeaning or overly stereotyping. -
scaddenp at 10:42 AM on 13 July 2010Hotties vs Frosties?
"However, as the main raw material for such tiny engines is CO2 in air, it's time to start worrying about irresponsible depletion of this resource up to a degree that plants would suffer" Umm, when you burn the sugar to get energy, then surely you release CO2 back? This appears to me to be just high-tech carbon neutral biofuel, powered by the sun as well. -
scaddenp at 10:30 AM on 13 July 2010Hotties vs Frosties?
BP. depends on what you use solar for. Solar hot water, more like 40W/m2 but then that is not the major use of energy. SCP is more like 15Wm2 and to quote from MacKay, "To supply every person in the world with an average European’s power consumption (125 kWh/d), the area required would be two 1000 km by 1000 km squares in the desert." Of course that solve problem of available desert (especially for europeans), nor of storage. Nuclear would probably be better. Nonetheless, this is a problem we have to solve sooner or later as oil demand outstrips supply. -
Berényi Péter at 10:09 AM on 13 July 2010Hotties vs Frosties?
#118 kdkd at 07:52 AM on 13 July, 2010 obscures the poor quality reasoning enough to give a veneer of respectability That's vague. Which specific step you've found objectionable? Why? -
Berényi Péter at 09:30 AM on 13 July 2010Hotties vs Frosties?
#111 KR at 03:26 AM on 13 July, 2010 there was a very interesting article in the Nov. 2009 issue of Scientific American detailing how wind, solar, and wave energy could supply 100% of energy requirements in the next 20-40 years Come on. According to this study nominal land use efficiency of modern wind power plants in the United States is 2.9 W/m2. Taking into account the intermittent nature of winds, the actual average power output is only a fraction of this figure. That's more than ridiculous. Wind power should be banned ASAP. Land use efficiency of solar power is not much better than that (at most 10 W/m2 in mid-latitudes, including losses related to storage). The only reasonable place for solar panels is on rooftops, but first the energy storage problem should be resolved (because the sun fails to shine at night and in the winter when most of the energy is used up). Even then this area is far too small to provide for a reasonable fraction of consumption. Costs should also be decreased by an order of magnitude to make this solution competitive with no subsidies on taxpayer's money. If roads would be paved with solar panels as well, captured energy stored locally in some non-toxic, not flammable but energy-rich chemical (like sugar) and microscopic fuel cells would produce electricity on demand, that could come close to a permanent solution. However, some R+D is still needed to make micron sized self replicating and self cleaning solar powered sugar factories and sugar powered fuel cells in quantity, durable enough to be used as pavement at a reasonable cost. I wouldn't bet on their large scale availability in the next few decades. That would require full scale molecular nanotechnology. However, as the main raw material for such tiny engines is CO2 in air, it's time to start worrying about irresponsible depletion of this resource up to a degree that plants would suffer. Also, MNT has its onw perils. Nuclear breeder reactor technology has the irrefutable advantage of existence. In fact it was available even thirty years ago. And its land use efficiency is simply beyond imagination. -
apeescape at 09:11 AM on 13 July 2010Must-read article on ocean impacts by ocean scientists
oops, John B, you're right. Somehow I read that wrong, and I'm obviously not an expert. BTW, if you search for the titles of the papers, there should be links to the pdf. -
KR at 08:52 AM on 13 July 2010Must-read article on ocean impacts by ocean scientists
andthorne - that's a fascinating analysis. Sadly, I haven't seen any evidence for large scale increasing formaldehyde levels or sub-sea seismic activity - do you have any evidence for your hypothesis of deep sea methane hydrate explosions??? That's one of the more entertaining alternative theories I've heard so far... and I agree with John B that it's baloney.
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