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stevestory at 05:56 AM on 27 February 20192019 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming Digest #8
I read the nearly 200 myths first to see if the subject was addressed, but I didn't see it. On several discussion boards I've seen people, usually conservatives, respond to global warming with nuclear power nuclear power nuclear power. I have a physics background, so I was able to spend 30 minutes putting together a quick explanation of why nuclear power is not a solution to global warming, because of the lead time for building new plants, the number of new plants that would be needed, the problems with waste, the expense of decommissioning, etc etc. But I was wondering if anybody knew of a comprehensive explanation that addresses all the considerations about why nuclear power is an inadequate response to global warming, so I could just link to that instead of having to reargue it each time.
Steve
Moderator Response:[PS] Some nuclear power proponents coming here have been asked to write up an article (which would need to be reviewed) putting the case, and backed by peer-reviewed literature. So far havent had any takers. Abbot 2011 does not seem to have an adequate reply from the nuclear industry but maybe there is one now. Does it fit your requirements? The main problem nuclear power has is convincing investors that it is a good deal.
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JWRebel at 05:14 AM on 27 February 2019Prices are not Enough
I don't disagree with your conclusion, but the politics and optics are important. A carbon tax with and accompanying per capita carbon dividend which leverages "market forces" is a lot easier to sell and actually get done. By taxing embedded carbon in imports, you can get around one of the major objections (international competitiveness).
Of course we also need to encourage research (we do that with public means already for many things), and redirecting direct fossil fuel subsidies provides hundreds of billions of runway for strategic public programs.
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Nick Palmer at 04:14 AM on 27 February 2019Fighting Climate Change: Structural vs individual action
I have to say I think certainot @3 raises a good point. Is it just me or do others also think that the first amendment to the US constitution - the 'free speech one' - which I trust was originally brought in to allow honesty and truth and genuine information to be spread and not crushed by darker forces - is increasingly being abused to spread deceit, delusion and disinformation - in short, bad actor propaganda?
I'm old enough to remember those times when people fought, and occasionally died, for the right to 'speak truth to power' without being stamped upon. I venture that literally none of those heroes went out to fight their good fight with the aim of bolstering indiviuals and organisations who lie and deceive and mislead and generally muddy the waters in the public arena -
AEBanner at 01:13 AM on 27 February 2019Global Surface Temperature: Going Down the Up Escalator, Part 1
Thank you again, MA Roger and Eclectic, for your help. Very interesting.
eddieb
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MA Rodger at 19:37 PM on 26 February 2019Global Surface Temperature: Going Down the Up Escalator, Part 1
eddieb @138,
To address your puzzlement directly, the Stefan-Boltzmann equation with albedo to reduce insolation accounted for - this does produce the 255K a global temperature. By adding the emissivity term at the value you use, the result is 288K, the average temperature of the global surface, rather than the effective temperature of the atmosphere at the altitude which emits energy to space. I think you will find that the value for emissivity you use, 0.612, is derived and used as an expression of the 33K GHG effect and is not a measured value.
The use of the emissivity term in Stefan-Boltzmann for use in a climate model is fraught will difficulty. The added complexity is not worth the effort, not least because emissivity considerations will be heavily wavelength-dependent and absorbivity (involving reflectivity/transperancy) also enters the mix. I would be happy to explain these difficulties further, but it is a dead-end in global climate modeling without entering the very-complex.
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BaerbelW at 15:16 PM on 26 February 2019Fighting Climate Change: Structural vs individual action
certainot @3
Have you tried contacting groups which regularly dig into stuff like this? I'm thinking for example of Desmog and/or Inside Climate News. They might be interested in checking this out if you dropped them a note.
You could try via their contact-forms:
https://www.desmogblog.com/contact_us -
Eclectic at 10:21 AM on 26 February 2019Global Surface Temperature: Going Down the Up Escalator, Part 1
Eddieb @138 ,
I'm not sure how your earlier comments came through to this thread, but things may as well stay here (unless the moderators wish to move it to Myth #65 or elsewhere). The listing of Climate Myths, on top left corner of every page, is numerical (for convenience of reference by readers) . . . but once you click on a Myth, and arrive at the thread, there's unfortunately no Number readily visible, to confirm that you have arrived at the correct destination.
Eddieb, it sounds like you would be aiming to get into the ground floor of self-education about "greenhouse" & related physics. It is not an intuitively obvious effect, and you need to learn and carefully think your way through the physical mechanisms involved (which concern the radiative physics of the "radiatively active gasses" ~ which is not at all like in a garden greenhouse, where the warming effect comes primarily from reduction of convective heat loss).
The Earth gains heat from solar radiation (of course!) and loses almost-precisely the same heat flux outwards into space, in the form of infra-red radiation (from the radiatively active gasses H2O, CO2, CH4, NO2, O3, etcetera). As very rough figures to remember, the outwards IR heat loss is : 60% from H2O; 30% from CO2, and 10% from the minor gasses.
I gather you are already somewhat aware of these actions, and the SB radiative formula. I am not clear where your uncertainty lies. Perhaps you are not separating the IR radiation from the Earth's surface . . . from the IR radiation from the upper atmosphere where the heat flux actually leaves the planet. Please excuse my usage of words like flux and heat and radiation and energy ~ in common parlance these are jumbled together and used rather unrigorously : but the underlying meanings are obvious enough when you think about the context.
Chase up the widely-known energy flux cartoon by Trenberth et al. It shows the influxes, outfluxes, reflectances, convections, H2O-phase-changes, back-radiations etc.
Commonly, scientists talk about the planetary heat loss as occurring at Top Of Atmosphere [ TOA ] but the TOA outwards flux is not happening at a narrow precise altitude (e.g. 6023 meters or whatever). It is happening at a band of altitude, varying with latitude and season etc., and is happening at a different band for H2O, a different band for CO2, a different band for CH4, and so on.
Between the solid surface and the TOA, is where the "greenhouse" effect occurs. I could give you a neat analogy with football players doing running exercises . . . but my post here is already rather too long.
Have a look at some of the eye-catching Climate Myths, which are great for doing some piece-meal self-education on climate science.
If you wish to "relax" while gaining info, then I recommend the Youtube videos by Potholer54. There are a couple of dozen or so of them [and a separate series debunking Anti-Evolution]. Potholer54 is a science journalist, who presents his info as based not on opinion by Talking Heads & Propagandists , but based on the actual science demonstrated in peer-reviewed papers from reputable science journals. His videos (usually about 10 minutes long) educate you somewhat indirectly, by meticulously debunking all the nonsenses coming from "the usual suspects" such as Moncton, Ball, Youtuber pundits, and even Al Gore too. Debunking, with listed references so you can check yourself on what he himself has said ~ and check on the misinformation / propaganda / downright deliberate porkies spouted by the anti-AGW brigade.
I recommend Potholer54, because I believe it is likely you will find his videos informative and vastly amusing in their humorous style. Entertainment +++
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RedBaron at 06:52 AM on 26 February 2019Fighting Climate Change: Structural vs individual action
I like the way they distinguish between individual change and systemic change in this video. However, the dietary advice given in this video is counter productive... really for the reasons given in the video itself actually.
In reality it is the production methods used for all our foods that make them either carbon sources or sinks and to what degree. So in this case Miriam is correct. It is a structural problem that the individual consumer's choices have very little effect improving.
Except that's not all there is to it. A person who doesn't eat meat can't use their power of consumer choice to change the way meat is raised. You are no longer a customer, and the meat industry no longer cares what your preferences would be. You don't eat meat, so therefor your opinion on how that food is raised no longer matters. It's a pity, but it is a fact of life.
But someone who boycotts meat raised in a way that is a carbon source and instead eats only meat produced in a way that makes it a carbon sink, when multiplied many times over, will ultimately cause a one business model to be more successful than the other. The same goes for local organic fruit and vegetable foods too. As one business model becomes more popular and profitable, the producers will change their production models to fill this consumer demand. Again, it is consumer demand they will ultimately meet. If you are no longer a consumer of their product, there is no consumer demand to meet.
This is how individual action repeated enough times can force systemic changes.
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certainot at 06:01 AM on 26 February 2019Fighting Climate Change: Structural vs individual action
Here is a suggestion for EASY structural change in the US - the 88 major universities listed at republiconradio.org help Republicans deny, spread misinformation, and obstruct action on global warming on the local and national level by broadcasting sports on 260 Rush Limbaugh talk radio stations. Those stations intimidate Republican politicians and scientists in media who would suggest global warming is real. They also help elect deniers.
One major reason the US is so far behind is Republican talk radio. There are several hundred talk show hosts on 1200 to 1500 talk radio stations who would likely lose their jobs if they didn't deny global warming or at the very least attack green energy initiatives in their own communities by lying about job loss, etc. They reach 50 mil a week as a well-protected 20-1 monopoly.
600 of those stations, including some of the loudest AM stations in the country, are headlined by the loudest and most powerful voice in Republican politics the last 30 years, Rush Limbaugh. All Republican talkers have to follow his lead. When the East Anglia emails were hacked by the Russians and taken out of context he spent a week 3 hrs/day calling them proof that climate change was a hoax. That ensured that no Republican and even some conservative Democrats could support Obama at Copenhagen a week later. He was calling the scientists 'traitors' and some got death threats. He and Trump still cite the East Anglia emails as 'hoax' proof. Some have suggested he has unknowingly been used by Putin on this and other issues.
By broadcasting sports on those 260 stations, 88 universities (at least) help the stations attract advertisers and community credibility.
Very few environmentalists, students, faculty at those 88 universities and in those communities listen to Republican talk radio. Most unaware of the associations or the significance and the part their universities are playing in supporting denial and undermining their activism and concern.
All those universities are appropriate places to complain/protest until they begin looking for non-denying apolitical alternatives to broadcast sports on.
When one university does the right thing others will follow.
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nigelj at 05:33 AM on 26 February 20192019 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming Digest #8
I read an article called regenerative agriculture on wikipedia last year. Quite an eye opener. One system, many benefits.
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nigelj at 05:27 AM on 26 February 2019Fighting Climate Change: Structural vs individual action
Obviously we need both individual action, systemic change and government action. But lets look at it more specifically. Individuals can reduce meat consumption, and there are many reasons to do this. Governments cannot do much about this issue, other than education perhaps.
Most individuals might be reluctant to buy electric cars and solar panels etc until they are affordable and perhaps subsidised by government, or alternatively they are impelled to make changes by a carbon fee and dividend. People are locked into an economic system of debt and credit cards where they live almost week to week so finding extra money is not easy. Savings are zilch. We want people to have noble environmental values that take precedence but realism is also needed.
Bottom line: make some changes in your personal lives, even easy ones like reducing meat consumption and buying smaller cars, and lobby politicians hard on the climate issue. If enough people do this they will be forced to take notice.
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nigelj at 05:12 AM on 26 February 2019Fighting Climate Change: Structural vs individual action
Thought provoking related article : Mitigating Climate Disaster Will Require Both Systemic and Lifestyle Changes.
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william5331 at 03:59 AM on 26 February 20192019 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming Digest #8
Organic farming, if only practiced to satisfy the 'letter of the law' is not the answer. Read Growing a Revolution by Montgomery and/or The Third Plate by Barber for a better way, which is actually what we would all think of when we hear the term Organic Farming.
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AEBanner at 01:33 AM on 26 February 2019Global Surface Temperature: Going Down the Up Escalator, Part 1
As suggested, I am transferring comments from New Research to Climate Myth #65
Thank you MA Rodger and Eclectic for your help, but I am puzzled how the GHG effect for increasing Earth's surface temperature by 33 deg C ties in with Stefan-Boltzmann simple radiation calculations.
If we take the measured values of 0.297 and 0.612 for the Earth's albedo and emissivity respectively, and 342 Watts per square metre incoming energy from the sun, then we find energy balance at 288.5 K. Very good. This without mention of GHG effect. So I'm puzzled.
Moderator Response:[PS] You are missing quite a few important details - starting with albedo.
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RedBaron at 01:19 AM on 26 February 2019New research, February 4-10, 2019
@8 MA Rodger
Here is evidence from the past of this ecosystem function:
Cenozoic Expansion of Grasslands and Climatic Cooling
Gregory J. Retallack DOI: 10.1086/320791
And here is a review of how we can apply the paleo record of this ecosystem function to modern times and near future AGW mitigation.
Global Cooling by Grassland Soils of the Geological Past and Near Future
Gregory J. Retallack doi:10.1146/annurev-earth-050212-124001
And here is empirical evidence of carbon sequestration rates in the field under various agricultural techniques and systems. A careful examination of the evidence with an understanding of how the LCP functions makes it very clear which systems use the LCP and why the difference in rates seen. It also confirms that the average sequestration rate of ~5-20 tonnes CO2e/ha/yr holds true in environments tested around the world.
Conservation practices to mitigate and adapt to climate change
Jorge A. Delgado, Peter M. Groffman, Mark A. Nearing, Tom Goddard, Don Reicosky, Rattan Lal, Newell R. Kitchen, Charles W. Rice, Dan Towery, and Paul Salon doi:10.2489/jswc.66.4.118A
Managing soil carbon for climate change mitigation and adaptation in Mediterranean cropping systems: A meta-analysis
Eduardo Aguilera, Luis Lassaletta, Andreas Gattinger, Benjamín S.Gimeno
doi.org/10.1016/j.agee.2013.02.003Enhanced top soil carbon stocks under organic farming
Andreas Gattinger, Adrian Muller, Matthias Haeni, Colin Skinner, Andreas Fliessbach, Nina Buchmann, Paul Mäder, Matthias Stolze, Pete Smith, Nadia El-Hage Scialabba, and Urs Niggli doi/10.1073/pnas.1209429109
Managing Soils and Ecosystems for Mitigating Anthropogenic Carbon Emissions and Advancing Global Food Security
Rattan Lal doi.org/10.1525/bio.2010.60.9.8
The role of ruminants in reducing agriculture’s carbon footprint in North America
W.R. Teague, S. Apfelbaum, R. Lal, U.P. Kreuter, J. Rowntree, C.A. Davies, R. Conser, M. Rasmussen, J. Hatfield, T. Wang, F. Wang, and P. Byc doi:10.2489/jswc.71.2.156
Grazing management impacts on vegetation, soil biota and soil chemical, physical and hydrological properties in tall grass prairie
W.R.Teague, S.L.Dowhower, S.A.Baker, N.Haile, P.B.DeLaune, D.M.Conover doi.org/10.1016/j.agee.2011.03.009
Some of these have paywalls, so if you have difficulty getting past them, message me for a private copy for personal use only.
@9 Philippe Chantreau The best I have for Dr Christine Jones is a short CV I posted here a while back: Christine Jones - short CV
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AEBanner at 00:56 AM on 26 February 2019New research, December 10-16, 2018
Thank you MA Rodger and Eclectic for your help.
As suggested, I am transferring to Climate Myth #65
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MA Rodger at 23:11 PM on 25 February 2019New research, December 10-16, 2018
eddieb @1,
There is a paper that models what would happen if all the long-lived GHGs were suddenly taken from the atmosphere - Lacis et al (2010) shows the surface temperature dropping fron +14ºC to -21ºC in 50 years. It hadn't stopped reacting by that time so the eventual temperature would be lower still.
While this is no more than facinating stuff and the eventual global temperature would rely not on GHGs but on things like how shiny the frozen oceans turn out to be (although through the eons the water would probably be transported poleward so 'frozen oceans' would be a poor description), it does demonstrate that the current GHG effect is +33ºC or there abouts.
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Eclectic at 22:53 PM on 25 February 2019New research, December 10-16, 2018
Eddieb @1 ,
the so-called Greenhouse Effect (for all relevant gasses, including H2O) ties in with the 33 degrees . . . and, well, with everything really. It is all one.
It might be helpful, if you could explain in more detail how you see any difficulties / differences.
But best to pursue your discussion on one of the appropriate threads for such a topic. Such as on Climate Myth number #65 or maybe #36.
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AEBanner at 21:59 PM on 25 February 2019New research, December 10-16, 2018
I think I understand the Greenhouse Gas theory explanation for anthropogenic global warming, but does this theory apply also to the Earth's surface temperature being raised by 33 degrees?
eddieb
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nigelj at 08:54 AM on 25 February 20192019 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #8
Alonerock, oops sorry I got the names confused. I hope I have at least helped with one point.
Nobody is going to have the time to go through every ridiculous statement by Moore, so have a look at the myths in the left hand of this page, because its mostly all there. Mostly, because restoring land after mining is not really a climate issue, but I suspect a google search would quickly establish if mines fulfill their obligations to restore the land.
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alonerock at 08:21 AM on 25 February 20192019 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #8
this was not my text, It was Moore's and I was simply asking people to comment on his errors, of which there are many. Possibly too lengthy to correct. I was simply hoping for help that would save me some time, and I will aslo do my own research to refute his opinions.
Moderator Response:[PS] Fair enough, I admit I jumped to conclusions. You will find the search function very useful for locating the science to refute that myth collection.
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nigelj at 05:14 AM on 25 February 20192019 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #8
"CO2 lags temperature by an average of 800 years during the most recent 400,000-year period, indicating that temperature is the cause, as the cause never comes after the effect."
Well this is of course wrong. It's well known that while changes in the planets orbit caused the initial warming, CO2 caused most of the warming as a feedback mechanism here.
However its wrong in other respects as well. I read this article on some research that the 800 year lag is only a couple of hundred years, and it has some interesting explanations on how the feedback mechanism worked in the antarctic region here.
The point being that this is one example of many where alonewrock is not only deluded, but is so out of touch with more recent research and data.
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Philippe Chantreau at 04:10 AM on 25 February 2019New research, February 4-10, 2019
RedBaron, I looked for LCP and Christine Jones. I found a lot of talks, her book, multiple sites dedicated to new agricultural methods but no peer-reviewed publications. Can you point us in the right direction?
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Philippe Chantreau at 03:48 AM on 25 February 20192019 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #8
This could be the mother of all Gish gallops. If you want anyone to give some attention to such a huge pile of nonsense, you should break it up in smaller fragments and take them to the appropriate thread. No references are provided and some parts of the gallop will show up obivously as the gross lies they are with only a few minutes of scrutiny. Other parts are more sophisticated and relfect craftmanship in misrepresentation. Some are accurate and of course out of context or used outside of their significance. It is obvious he is advocating for his industry. If you want to argue, perhaps you should do your own work. There is plenty on this site, and Google scholar is your friend.
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MA Rodger at 03:41 AM on 25 February 20192019 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #8
alonerock @3,
These are the words of a deluded climate change denier from an address he made 3-years-ago to a room of other climatechange deniers (in total 6,300 words). The extract you present is still rather long (2,300 words). Is there a particular part of it that needs rebunking? (A quick scan down to where he starts off about tar sands shows it is all pretty-much waffly nonsense, so it is all up for the treatment.)
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alonerock at 01:21 AM on 25 February 20192019 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #8
Hi All-
Please comment on Moore's text below so that I can refute his opinions with facts in an argument I am having with a friend about its content:
Patrick Moore Comments to refute/clarify:
CO2 lags temperature by an average of 800 years during the most recent 400,000-year period, indicating that temperature is the cause, as the cause never comes after the effect.
Looking at the past 50,000 years of temperature and CO2 we can see that changes in CO2 follow changes in temperature. This is as one could expect, as the Milankovitch cycles are far more likely to cause a change in temperature than a change in CO2. And a change in the temperature is far more likely to cause a change in CO2 due to outgassing of CO2 from the oceans during warmer times and an ingassing (absorption) of CO2 during colder periods. Yet climate alarmists persist in insisting that CO2 is causing the change in temperature, despite the illogical nature of that assertion.
. Will our CO2 emissions stave off another glaciation as James Lovelock has suggested? There doesn’t seem to be much hope of that so far, as despite 1/3 of all our CO2 emissions being released during the past 18 years the UK Met Office contends there has been no statistically significant warming during this century.
By 7,000 years ago all the low-altitude, mid-latitude glaciers had melted. There is no consensus about the variation in sea level since then although many scientists have concluded that the sea level was higher than today during the Holocene Thermal optimum from 9,000 to 5,000 years ago when the Sahara was green. The sea level may also have been higher than today during the Medieval Warm Period.
Coming back to the relationship between temperature and CO2 in the modern era we can see that temperature has risen at a steady slow rate in Central England since 1700 while human CO2 emissions were not relevant until 1850 and then began an exponential rise after 1950. This is not indicative of a direct causal relationship between the two. After freezing over regularly during the Little Ice Age the River Thames froze for the last time in 1814, as the Earth moved into what might be called the Modern Warm Period.
The IPCC states it is “extremely likely” that human emissions have been the dominant cause of global warming “since the mid-20th century”, that is since 1950. They claim that “extremely” means 95% certain, even though the number 95 was simply plucked from the air like an act of magic. And “likely” is not a scientific word but rather indicative of a judgment, another word for an opinion.
There was a 30-year period of warming from 1910-1940, then a cooling from 1940 to 1970, just as CO2 emissions began to rise exponentially, and then a 30-year warming from 1970-2000 that was very similar in duration and temperature rise to the rise from 1910-1940. One may then ask “what caused the increase in temperature from 1910-1940 if it was not human emissions? And if it was natural factors how do we know that the same natural factors were not responsible for the rise between 1970-2000.” You don’t need to go back millions of years to find the logical fallacy in the IPCC’s certainty that we are the villains in the piece.
Water is by far the most important greenhouse gas, and is the only molecule that is present in the atmosphere in all three states, gas, liquid, and solid. As a gas, water vapour is a greenhouse gas, but as a liquid and solid it is not. As a liquid water forms clouds, which send solar radiation back into space during the day and hold heat in at night. There is no possibility that computer models can predict the net effect of atmospheric water in a higher CO2 atmosphere. Yet warmists postulate that higher CO2 will result in positive feedback from water, thus magnifying the effect of CO2 alone by 2-3 times. Other scientists believe that water may have a neutral or negative feedback on CO2. The observational evidence from the early years of this century tends to reinforce the latter hypothesis.
Even at the today’s concentration of 400 ppm plants are relatively starved for nutrition. The optimum level of CO2 for plant growth is about 5 times higher, 2000 ppm, yet the alarmists warn it is already too high.
All the CO2 in the atmosphere has been created by outgassing from the Earth’s core during massive volcanic eruptions. This was much more prevalent in the early history of the Earth when the core was hotter than it is today. During the past 150 million years there has not been enough addition of CO2 to the atmosphere to offset the gradual losses due to burial in sediments.
Today, at just over 400 ppm, there are 850 billion tons of carbon as CO2 in the atmosphere. By comparison, when modern life-forms evolved over 500 million years ago there was nearly 15,000 billion tons of carbon in the atmosphere, 17 times today’s level. Plants and soils combined contain more than 2,000 billion tons of carbon, more that twice as much as the entire global atmosphere. The oceans contain 38,000 billion tons of carbon, as dissolved CO2, 45 times as much as in the atmosphere. Fossil fuels, which are made from plants that pulled CO2 from the atmosphere account for 5,000 – 10,000 billion tons of carbon, 6 – 12 times as much carbon as is in the atmosphere.
But the truly stunning number is the amount of carbon that has been sequestered from the atmosphere and turned into carbonaceous rocks. 100,000,000 billion tons, that’s one quadrillion tons of carbon, have been turned into stone by marine species that learned to make armour-plating for themselves by combining calcium and carbon into calcium carbonate. Limestone, chalk, and marble are all of life origin and amount to 99.9% of all the carbon ever present in the global atmosphere. The white cliffs of Dover are made of the calcium carbonate skeletons of coccolithophores, tiny marine phytoplankton.
The vast majority of the carbon dioxide that originated in the atmosphere has been sequestered and stored quite permanently in carbonaceous rocks where it cannot be used as food by plants.
Beginning 540 million years ago at the beginning of the Cambrian Period many marine species of invertebrates evolved the ability to control calcification and to build armour plating to protect their soft bodies. Shellfish such as clams and snails, corals, coccolithofores (phytoplankton) and foraminifera (zooplankton) began to combine carbon dioxide with calcium and thus to remove carbon from the life cycle as the shells sank into sediments; 100,000,000 billion tons of carbonaceous sediment. It is ironic that life itself, by devising a protective suit of armour, determined its own eventual demise by continuously removing CO2 from the atmosphere. This is carbon sequestration and storage writ large. These are the carbonaceous sediments that form the shale deposits from which we are fracking gas and oil today. And I add my support to those who say, “OK UK, get fracking”.
The past 150 million years has seen a steady drawing down of CO2 from the atmosphere. There are many components to this but what matters is the net effect, a removal on average of 37,000 tons of carbon from the atmosphere every year for 150 million years. The amount of CO2 in the atmosphere was reduced by about 90% during this period. This means that volcanic emissions of CO2 have been outweighed by the loss of carbon to calcium carbonate sediments on a multi-million year basis.
If this trend continues CO2 will inevitably fall to levels that threaten the survival of plants, which require a minimum of 150 ppm to survive. If plants die all the animals, insects, and other invertebrates that depend on plants for their survival will also die.
How long will it be at the present level of CO2 depletion until most or all of life on Earth is threatened with extinction by lack of CO2 in the atmosphere?
During this Pleistocene Ice Age, CO2 tends to reach a minimum level when the successive glaciations reach their peak. During the last glaciation, which peaked 18,000 years ago, CO2 bottomed out at 180 ppm, extremely likely the lowest level CO2 has been in the history of the Earth. This is only 30 ppm above the level that plants begin to die. Paleontological research has demonstrated that even at 180 ppm there was a severe restriction of growth as plants began to starve. With the onset of the warmer interglacial period CO2 rebounded to 280 ppm. But even today, with human emissions causing CO2 to reach 400 ppm plants are still restricted in their growth rate, which would be much higher if CO2 were at 1000-2000 ppm.
Here is the shocking news. If humans had not begun to unlock some of the carbon stored as fossil fuels, all of which had been in the atmosphere as CO2 before sequestration by plants and animals, life on Earth would have soon been starved of this essential nutrient and would begin to die. Given the present trends of glaciations and interglacial periods this would likely have occurred less than 2 million years from today, a blink in nature’s eye, 0.05% of the 3.5 billion-year history of life.
No other species could have accomplished the task of putting some of the carbon back into the atmosphere that was taken out and locked in the Earth’s crust by plants and animals over the millennia.
It does boggle the mind in the face of our knowledge that the level of CO2 has
been steadily falling that human CO2 emissions are not universally acclaimed as a miracle of salvation. From direct observation we already know that the extreme predictions of CO2’s impact on global temperature are highly unlikely given that about one-third of all our CO2 emissions have been discharged during the past 18 years and there has been no statistically significant warming. And even if there were some additional warming that would surely be preferable to the
analysis of the historical record and the prediction of CO2 starvation based on the 150 million year trend. Ad hominem arguments about “deniers” need not apply. I submit that much of society has been collectively misled into believing that global CO2 and temperature are too high when the opposite is true for both. Does anyone deny that below 150 ppm CO2 that plants will die? Does anyone deny that the Earth has been in a 50 million-year cooling period and that this Pleistocene Ice Age is one of the coldest periods in the history of the planet?
If we assume human emissions have to date added some 200 billion tons of CO2 to the atmosphere, even if we ceased using fossil fuels today we have already bought another 5 million years for life on earth. But we will not stop using fossil fuels to power our civilization so it is likely that we can forestall plant starvation for lack of CO2 by at least 65 million years. Even when the fossil fuels have become scarce we have the quadrillion tons of carbon in carbonaceous rocks, which we can transform into lime and CO2 for the manufacture of cement. And we already know how to do that with solar energy or nuclear energy. This alone, regardless of fossil fuel consumption, will more than offset the loss of CO2 due to calcium carbonate burial in marine sediments. Without a doubt the human species has made it possible to prolong the survival of life on Earth for more than 100 million years. We are not the enemy of nature but its salvation.Some of the world’s oil comes from my native country in the Canadian oil sands of northern Alberta. I had never worked with fossil fuel interests until I became incensed with the lies being spread about my country’s oil production in the capitals of our allies around the world. I visited the oil sands operations to find out for myself what was happening there.
It is true it’s not a pretty sight when the land is stripped bare to get at the sand so the oil can be removed from it. Canada is actually cleaning up the biggest natural oil spill in history, and making a profit from it. The oil was brought to the surface when the Rocky Mountains were thrust up by the colliding Pacific Plate. When the sand is returned back to the land 99% of the so-called “toxic oil” has been removed from it.
Anti-oil activists say the oil-sands operations are destroying the boreal forest of Canada. Canada’s boreal forest accounts for 10% of all the world’s forests and the oil-sands area is like a pimple on an elephant by comparison. By law, every square inch of land disturbed by oil-sands extraction must be returned to native boreal forest. When will cities like London, Brussels, and New York that have laid waste to the natural environment be returned to their native ecosystems?
The art and science of ecological restoration, or reclamation as it is called in the mining industry, is a well-established practice. The land is re-contoured, the original soil is put back, and native species of plants and trees are established. It is possible, by creating depressions where the land was flat, to increase biodiversity by making ponds and lakes where wetland plants, insects, and waterfowl can become established in the reclaimed landscape.
The tailings ponds where the cleaned sand is returned look ugly for a few years but are eventually reclaimed into grasslands. The Fort McKay First Nation is under contract to manage a herd of bison on a reclaimed tailings pond. Every tailings pond will be reclaimed in a similar manner when operations have been completed.Moderator Response:[PS] Welcome to Skeptical Science. Your comment reads as gish-gallop of debunked myths and violates comments policy. Please use the Search function or the "Arguments" menu item to find appropriate topics and put your comments there. Questions are welcome but please note that conformance with the comments policy is not optional.
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Postkey at 20:13 PM on 24 February 20192019 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #8
"The year is 2100." Is it?
10 September 2018
Secretary-General's remarks on Climate Change“If we do not change course by 2020, we risk missing the point where we can avoid runaway climate change, with disastrous consequences for people and all the natural systems that sustain us.”
https://www.un.org/sg/en/content/sg/statement/2018-09-10/secretary-generals-remarks-climate-change-delivered -
MA Rodger at 18:44 PM on 24 February 2019New research, February 4-10, 2019
RedBaron @7,
Your contention @5 is "We have degraded the environmental systems that would normally pull excess CO2 out of the atmosphere." Yet, as I pointed out @6, the references you cited do not support the contention that we have trashed a CO2 sequestration mechanism.
Now you say "It's been measured." Has it? You give no numbers for this lost CO2 sequestration. I would not be surprised if there were CO2 sequestration mechanisms that have been trashed by humanity but to suggest their loss is significant in the short term. Such lost CO2 sequestration may become significant over centuries. But decades?
If this issue is your raison d'être for rubbing shoulders in the climatological web-discourse, I would suggest you talk the right language. How much CO2 per hectare per year would be sequestrated by restoring these lost CO2 sinks?
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RedBaron at 16:14 PM on 24 February 2019New research, February 4-10, 2019
@6 MA Rodger,
It's been measured. I have been trying to push the point again and again because precisely this is what is being missed.
In soil science we knew for over 100 years there was this mysterious rapid accumulation of stable carbon, in large amounts, over long periods of time, deep in certain soils under certain conditions. But besides that it was associated with grasslands, no one knew precisely what was going on. It was counter-intuitive.
Dr Sarah Wright, a soil scientist for the USDA discovered the missing link in 1996, Glomalin. It is such a fundamental breakthrough, literally there has been no Nobel Prize winner in Chemistry that has ever made a more important discovery, in my opinion. But because this is a rather obscure field that very few understand, she isn't recognized as much for it as she should be.
Glomalin is the missing link, but the whole chain is what matters. It has been called the liquid carbon pathway and it is a completely natural carbon pump into the soil and is a primary forcing along with Milankovitch cycles explaining rapid decreases in excess CO2 between each and every glaciation period since this ecosystem function became mature.
Remember, this is a self regulating complex system. The biosphere is a major, if not the major, feedback in that system.
More CO2 means more LCP which sequesters deep in the soil profile. Thus the CO2 spikes are evened out quickly by this feedback.
Mankind has not created this feedback, we simply unknowingly destroyed it with our plows and pesticides mostly and somewhat also the mass extirpation of the megafauna. It does not need man's assistance except in restoring a healthy soil food web and the rest is done naturally.
We never knew about this biological function because it was largely destroyed before we even started looking! However, we do know about it now. We know what it is, how it works, and most importantly, how to mimick this natural biome function with agriculture.
When we use biomimicry to design an agricultural system to mimic the function of the grasslands biomes, including their many biodiverse species and even large grazers as the primarary ecosystem engineers, vast tonnes of soil carbon builds up deep in the A and B soil horizons.
Until 1996, it was thought the primary source of A and B horizon carbon was degrading organic matter in the O-horizon. And sure enough, in forests this is true. But in Grasslands the primary source for A and B horizon carbon is the LCP by at least 2 orders of magnitude or more. It is that big a deal. I can't emphasize this enough. It is and will continue to be a huge impact on agriculture for many years to come, even if climate scientists never catch up to the soil science.
Remember, my main purpose for taking climate science course was to communicate this knowledge to climate scientists who might have a different silo of knowledge. Please don't be fooled by the same merchants of doubt that are plagueing the energy side of climate science. We have our fully funded merchants of doubt too.
Now here is some info as to why many times you may see a study that even today misses the LCP. See we use chemical fertilizers to supply NPK. Unknowingly this bypasses the function of the soil food web in general and glomalin producing AMF in particular.
and
but more importantly, when we fertilize the soil with large quantities of NPK fertilizers, it shuts down this function.
Phosphorus and Nitrogen Regulate Arbuscular Mycorrhizal Symbiosis in Petunia hybrida
Something else too. Unlike saprophytic fungi which cause decay of organic matter in the O horizon releasing CO2 back into the atmosphere, AMF need a living root at all times to survive. So not only does using NPK fertilizers shut down the LCP, so does herbicides and plowing and even some fungicides.
In fact pretty much everything industrialized ag does now as common GAP unknowingly shuts down the LCP. It's no wonder it took so long to discover. Any time you see a study making claims of the potential rate of soil carbon sequestration, you need to look deeper and see if either standard green revolution methods are being used, or improved no till green revolution methods defined by the USDA as GAP (Good Agricultural Practises)
Turns out GAP was defined PRIOR to the discovery of glomalin and the LCP. So right now all those are being reviewed as we speak by the USDA-NRCS and the USDA-SARE. But already they are beginning to teach it to farmers voluntarily. Seminar on it in two days here in OKC. Was one last year too.
But it is a hugely political issue too with equally big players who are interfering with the denialism side of mitigation potential. All I ask is learn how to spot these so called "reviews" and see for yourself if the methods studied shut down the LCP or not. If they shut down the LCP, then the optimum sequestration rate is much lower and well modeled by the Roth C model.
However, the Roth C model is useless at modeling the LCP.
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nigelj at 05:38 AM on 24 February 20192019 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #8
David Wallace-Wells certainly resonates on the issues for me, except that novels on climate change sound like they would feed into the denialist campaign of making fun of the issue. Also novel writers and hollywood making money on such a serious issue is sickening, and will just confuse the science.
Regarding his comments on carbon footprints and political action, I would add solar panels for home use and electric cars are still expensive, so its hard to see the average person buying these. Politicians have to subsidise these sorts of things or have carbon fee and dividend programmes etc. But governments seem scared of having robust policies, possibly in case they upset some lobby group or campaign funder, or have to cut costs in some other area of government action and upset the public.It's going to take very brave politicians, and such animals are rare.
I'm getting despondent about whether the climate issue will be fixed. But something has to happen, because a world up around 3-8 degrees will almost certainly be the disaster scenario Wells talks about. Not wishing to downplay 2 degrees which will be quite serious enough.
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MA Rodger at 19:46 PM on 23 February 2019New research, February 4-10, 2019
RedBaron @5,
Where you say "You need to go back to basics and rethink what causes Anthropogenic Global Warming (AGW) to begin with," I find your second point is highly controversial and not supported by the three references you present.
Eswaran et al (2001) talks of soil degradation and makes not mention of lost carbon sequestration. Retallack (2013) talks of carbon uptake over millions of years and this as a potential mechanism for carbon sequestration. Bockheim (2014)[Abstract] appears to discuss only this millions-of-years carbon sink and its degradation.
Nowhere is there any suport for your assertion that there exists "environmental systems that would normally pull excess CO2 out of the atmosphere," at least no such mechanism existing that ever did so at a rate significant for AGW or could do so without the hand of man assisting it.
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MA Rodger at 19:25 PM on 23 February 2019Ivar Giaever - Nobel Winning Physicist and Climate Pseudoscientist
Ereman @116,
So we all have to sit on our hands for 50 years because you are incapable of seeing that you can "you can't predict with any certainty 50 yrs out."
Hang on a bit, we only have to wait 20 years coz here's one somebody did earlier.
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MA Rodger at 19:22 PM on 23 February 2019Ivar Giaever - Nobel Winning Physicist and Climate Pseudoscientist
Ereman @115,
The hurricane strikes on the good old USA may or may not be rising in number or intensity. That may or may not be because of the variability in such a small sub-set of tropical cyclones. But the North Atlantic basin is experiencing a greater number of hurricanes of greater intensity. See the graphic here (usually two clicks to 'download your attchment')
So your "If so when?" question should perhaps be not When? but Where?
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Riduna at 10:17 AM on 23 February 2019Global coal use may have peaked in 2014, says latest IEA World Energy Outlook
The Word Energy Outlook seems less speculative when it comes to technology advances, particularly those leading to improved electricity storage and increased photovoltaic efficiency. As argued in a recent essay, both are likely to have a profound effect on the speed with which uptake of EV’s occur and ability to store renewable energy more cheaply and access/use it more widely.
Nor should the importance of AI to reducing oil consumption be overlooked. It is possible that within a decade self-driving vehicles will provide a cheap, efficient alternative to private vehicle ownership. The result: more efficient use of roads and fewer vehicles on them, further contributing to a speedier reduction in the use of oil and resulting air pollution.
The 2018 EV Report by Bloomberg is well worth a read.
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sebi at 07:21 AM on 23 February 2019Extreme weather isn't caused by global warming
Weather extremes are often not a direct thermodynamically-driven consequence of increasing temperatures and humidity, but often indirectly driven by global warming via associated changes in the dynamics of weather systems. A prominent example is the projected poleward shift of the storm tracks under global warming scenarios (Ref. 1). The storm tracks are the accumulated footprint of the pathways of numerous extratropical cyclones, which then can cause, among others, extreme precipitation events. If the storm tracks shift poleward, storm frequencies change from one location to another. Storm intensities must be treated distinct from storm frequencies and their clustering.
One related example are weather fronts, along which most precipitation in an extratropical cyclone is formed. Forecasters may use slightly different definitions of what exactly a weather front is, but it is clear that extreme precipitation events (or hail) are often triggered ahead of cold fronts, due to the related forced vertical motion, for example during a hot summer day with high convective potential. It is known that the intensity of weather fronts scales with the precipitation during the following hours.
Consequently, changes in extreme events are often linked to changes in weather systems and related changes in their local frequencies and their intensities. This acts as an additional dynamical driver of changes in extreme weather, in tandem with the more direct thermodynamic change, i.e., the increase in the atmosphere's water holding capacity, due to global warming. Trends in the frequency of weather fronts and their intensity changes are presented for example in Ref. 2.
Selected references:
(1) Chang, E. K. M., Y. Guo, and X. Xia (2012), CMIP5 multimodel ensemble projection of storm track change under global warming, J. Geophys. Res., 117, D23118, doi:10.1029/2012JD018578.
(2) Schemm, S., M. Sprenger, O. Martius, H. Wernli, and M. Zimmer (2017), Increase in the number of extremely strong fronts over Europe? A study based on ERA‐Interim reanalysis (1979–2014), Geophys. Res. Lett., 44, 553–561, doi:10.1002/2016GL071451.
[Nature Climate Change, V7, page 96 (2017): https://doi.org/10.1038/nclimate3218]
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william5331 at 06:38 AM on 23 February 2019Global coal use may have peaked in 2014, says latest IEA World Energy Outlook
Peak Coal is not like Peak Oil. At least until the Americans went all out on fracking, oil was peaking because scarcity made it more expensive. It was a quasi natural economic phenomenon. Coal is not like that. There are enormous, easily accessed reserves of coal which can be easily and cheaply brought back into production. The only reason coal has peaked is that renewables have come down so much in price. What is needed to put the final nail in the coffin of coal is to make it illegal for them to finance politicians. That would really have an effect.
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Ereman at 05:04 AM on 23 February 2019Ivar Giaever - Nobel Winning Physicist and Climate Pseudoscientist
It is impossible to predict a "theory" about the effects of people on climate >=50 years out. The variables are too high to make any concrete corolation. If you can't predict with any certainty 50 yrs out, how then can you ask the right question. In other words if it is impossible to predict with ANY certainty, about something as volitile as weather, how can you figure out the answer; how do we stop it? How do we change an outcome when we really don't know the cause, of that outcome (50 years from now). Especially when Gores predictions almost 15 years ago, have not come close to being true. No change in weather intensity, no underwater cities. Hell, even New Orleans (below sea level) is completely intact.
If we can't even predict 10 - 20 years out, (Gore failed miserably), how does anyone hold stock in a guaranteed prediction 50 years out?
For the moderator. In my opinion you can not separate politics and global warming, the green new deal (political) they exist for each other. The green deal , i think, came first. It is not realistic to think the two are not inextricably linked.
I digress, will not mix the two here.
Moderator Response:[DB] Please note that posting comments here at SkS is a privilege, not a right. This privilege can and will be rescinded if the posting individual continues to treat adherence to the Comments Policy as optional, rather than the mandatory condition of participating in this online forum.
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Moderation complaints and off-topic snipped.
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RedBaron at 02:33 AM on 23 February 2019New research, February 4-10, 2019
@1 nowhearthis,
Very little in science is absolute. However, yes indeed there are solutions, but to understand this you must go back to basics.
This problem is not only about emissions. This is a carbon cycle. Trying to fix this by eliminating carbon emissions is tackling the problem with one hand tied behind our backs. It won't work, and several researchers have made the claim we already passed the point where that alone it actually can’t work.[1] There are two sides to this and BOTH must be improved, less emissions and more sequestration.
You need to go back to basics and rethink what causes Anthropogenic Global Warming (AGW) to begin with.
- We are burning fossil fuels and emitting massive amounts of carbon in the atmosphere as CO2 mostly but also some CH4 and a few other greenhouse gasses.[2]
- We have degraded the environmental systems that would normally pull excess CO2 out of the atmosphere.[3][4] (mostly grasslands[5])
- By putting more in the atmosphere and removing less, there is no other place for the excess to go but the oceans. They are acidifying due to absorbing just part of the excess.[6] (roughly 1/2)
- That still leaves roughly 1/2 of emissions that are building up in the atmosphere and creating an increased greenhouse effect.[7] (from ~280 ppm to 412+ppm CO2)
So this leads directly to the way we must reverse AGW:
- Reduce fossil fuel use by replacing energy needs with as many economically viable renewables as current technology allows. Please note that most current forms of ethanol gas additive are not beneficial because they further degrade the sequestration side of the carbon cycle and take more fossil fuels to produce than they offset.[8]
- Change agricultural methods to high yield regenerative models of production made possible by recent biological & agricultural science advancements.[9][10]
- Implement large scale ecosystem recovery projects similar to the Loess Plateau project, National Parks like Yellowstone etc. where appropriate and applicable.[11][12][13]
- In short we need to reduce carbon in and increase carbon out of the atmosphere to restore balance to the carbon cycle.
Currently at our technology and manufacturing capacity today, we have several technologies that can reduce fossil fuel use. Solar, Wind, Hydroelectric, Geothermal, Nuclear, and even Natural gas as a replacement for coal all helps reduce CO2. It would squash economies to 100% absolutely eliminate all fossil fuels and cement emissions, but we can right now, at a profit, with current manufacturing capacity and technology, dramatically reduce fossil fuel emissions of CO2 and CH4.
So this alone is not enough though. reducing fossil fuel emissions is not a panacea.
However, there is only one thing we humans do at scale large enough to geoengineer the other side of the carbon cycle, and that is agriculture. We have been doing that poorly for ~5-10 thousand years, but we know how to fix that side of the carbon cycle too. And sure enough, if we first reduce fossil fuel emissions, then change agriculture to these more modern science based organic methods, the two combined is more than enough to yield a net negative carbon footprint at an actual profit. No net cost at all actually.
Here is the outline of how we can balance the carbon cycle with the new scientific developments in regenerative organic agriculture.
Can we reverse global warming?
There is a hold up though. In the energy sector there is a huge misdirection and obfuscation campaign paid for by the fossil fuel companies. A book was written about this called "The merchants of Doubt".
What is less known is that a similar campaign exists in agriculture to protect the massive agribiz conglomerates dependant on fossil fuel based haber process nitrogen fertilizers made from natural gas, cheap oil to run tractors and fuel grain dryers, centralized refrigerated storage, and thousands of miles long distribution and shipping logistics networks. The whole "Green Revolution" system is massively energy inefficient, as it was designed long ago when fossil fuels were cheap and abundant.[14]
So the solution is easy actually, although so far no countries politicians have had the balls to tackle this full Monte except the Aussies.[15] No absolutes are needed, just everyone chipping in the best they can bring to the table. And unfortunately, as soon as the Aussies did, the next election cycle the Merchants of Doubt won and it was canceled.
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Postkey at 00:28 AM on 23 February 2019New research, February 4-10, 2019
No 'solutions'?
“ The level of fossil fuel consumption globally is now roughly five times higher than in the 1950s, and one-and-half times higher than in the 1980s, when the science of global warming was confirmed and governments accepted the need to act on it. This is a central feature of the “great acceleration” of human impacts on the natural world. . . .
CO2 emissions are 55% higher today than in 1990. Despite 20 international conferences on fossil fuel use reduction and an international treaty that entered into force in 1994, man made greenhouse gases have risen inexorably.”
https://piraniarchive.files.wordpress.com/2018/08/pirani-helsinki-wern2018-paper.pdf -
sebi at 20:46 PM on 22 February 2019Antarctica is gaining ice
The influence of near-surface winds, in particular steered by extratropical cyclones or anti-cyclones, has recently received renewed attension. As much of the sea-ice is guided by near-surface winds, anomalously strong offshore winds can act to reduce the seasonal retreat of sea ice (it can also act the other way round). This influence of the wind as a mechanical driver of changes in sea-ice extend is comparable to the associated thermodynamic influence via warm and cold-air advection onshore/offshore Antarctica (1).
Regional changes in the frequencies and intensities of different weather types, weather patterns, the associated storm tracks and related phenomena, like weather fronts, to a global-scale warming is highly complex and display no homogeneous increase. The local anomalies of the sea-ice extend during the melt season is even coupled to anomalous winds during the previous sea-ice growth season, which affects the sea-ice growth rate and acts as initial condition for the anomalies seen in sea-ice extend during the next season. The sea-ice extend anomalies are not directly/instantaneously connected in space and time to wind anomalies (2,3,4).
Nonetheless, studies have found trends in number of extratropical cyclones and anticyclones that agree with those seen in Antarctica sea-ice extend, across space and time and not suprisingly, the changes in the frequency of weather systems and related wind exhibit high spatial variability (4).
Assuming a homogenous decrease of sea ice in response to global warming is a clear over simplification as the intermediate scale, the weather scale, and its response to a hemispheric-wide mean warming trends is highly non-linear in space and time. There is clear tendency by critics to discount/ignore the influence of the wind as a mechanical driver underlying the observed sea-ice trends and focus purely on a simplified thermodynamic local response.
Literature:
(1) Holland, P. R., & Kwok, R. (2012). Wind-driven trends in Antarctic sea ice drift. Nature Geoscience, 5, 872–875. https://doi.org/10.1038/ngeo1627
(2) Holland, M. M., Landrum, L., Raphael, M., & Stammerjohn, S. (2017). Springtime winds drive Ross sea ice variability and change in the following autumn. Nature Communications, 8, 731. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-017-00820-0
(3) Holland, P. R. (2014). The seasonality of Antarctic sea ice trends. Geophysical Research Letters, 41, 4230–4237. https://doi.org/10.1002/2014GL060172
(4) Schemm, S. (2018). Regional trends in weather systems help explain Antarctic sea ice trends. Geophysical Research Letters, 45. https://doi.org/10.1029/2018GL079109
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Eclectic at 19:01 PM on 22 February 2019New research, February 4-10, 2019
@1
"absolute and confirmed" is possible only in retrospect.
A realist avoids the trap of impossible expectations.
Simply aim to do your best.
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MA Rodger at 18:56 PM on 22 February 2019New research, February 4-10, 2019
nowhearthis @1,
Could you describe what you mean by "solutions"? There may be "a lot of talk" on the subject but they are not using the word "solutions" on this page.
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nowhearthis at 17:22 PM on 22 February 2019New research, February 4-10, 2019
There's a lot of talk about "solutions". Is there any PROVEN solutions? Can anyone point me to the validation? I don't count 'appears-could-can-seems-may-projected-opinion-etc." as validation. I'm looking for something that is absolute and confirmed.
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Mal Adapted at 05:38 AM on 22 February 2019A Swedish Teenager's Compelling Plea on Climate
My thanks to all participants in this interesting and admirably rational discussion.
My understanding of the limits to economic growth, as well my moral discomfort with the myriad injustices arising from economic liberalism and the illiberal concentration of capital it enables, places me in sympathy with the radicals represented by jef and OPOF. Clearly, climate change due to anthropogenic global warming shares economic and political causes with other forms of pollution, loss of biodiversity and all other social costs externalized by the 'free' market for goods and services (free, that is, of collective intervention to internalize those costs in private transactions: we all recognize concentrated capital's power to distort markets to its further advantage).
Yet I reluctantly agree with scaddenp's #34:
OPOF - my issue is that what you want seems to involve somehow changing people. I do not see a feasible path to implementation...I predict there will be no progress in US unless Dems are also prepared to stop gaming for their tribal values.
Any solution the US Congress enacts will be with the consent of the governed: to suppose otherwise is to deny your fellow citizens agency. Accordingly, only broad-based public support can overcome the determined opposition of the wealthy elite. As much as I'd like to see guaranteed jobs and high-quality health care for all Americans, I don't want passage of a US national Carbon Fee and Dividend with Border Adjustment Tariff to be tied to the rest of the Green New Deal, and would negotiate away the GND's other goals for an effective decarbonization measure.
IMO, AGW is the most urgent problem the world faces, and it can be effectively addressed in advance of broader economic and political changes. A short-term (decades) solution won't require drastic redesign of global society, and will buy us time. As a consequence of free-market capitalism, AGW can be abated by targeted collective intervention in energy markets. If a meaningful fraction of the marginal climate-change cost of fossil fuels is collected from producers, they will adjust their profit margins as they see fit or exit the market. Either way, fuel prices will rise, causing consumer demand to shift toward carbon-neutral energy. Capital investment should then shift to its production, storage and distribution, bringing fossil carbon emissions to zero rapidly and at the lowest net cost. Yes, global liquidation of natural capital will continue meanwhile, but at least it will be in a stable climate!
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Ereman at 02:04 AM on 22 February 2019Ivar Giaever - Nobel Winning Physicist and Climate Pseudoscientist
One of the end games of climate change is crazy increased severe weather. Has anyone looked at hurricane history in U.S.?
https://www.nhc.noaa.gov/pastdec.shtml
The numbers don't support the assertion. Just as many back to 1851 -some decades there are more hurricanes before 1950. Definitely no increase in intensity or number recently, since 1950. Look at the numbers.
So will climate change produce more disasterous weather? If so when?
Beware, this climate change religion, strangley coincides w the inception of the "Green New Deal". I suspect the GND came first. They need climate change to scare people towards the green deal, that simple.
It is a huge planet (we really can't comprehend). Some cyles could be thousands or tens of thousands of years. We would be remiss to assume humans have that much power over this gigantic planet.
NOTHING significant has changed, since Gores doom and gloom ~13 years ago.
Come on folks, irrefutable, undeniable, incontrovertable (used to be the bible), now it is the religion of global warming.
Moderator Response:[DB] This is a science and evidence-based venue. Please check your political ideologies at the door. If you are unable to do that, then other venues exist for you.
The remainder of your comment is off-topic on this post. Any responses of continuations to this line of discussion should be done on this thread.
Ideological rantings snipped.
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scaddenp at 13:55 PM on 21 February 2019A Swedish Teenager's Compelling Plea on Climate
Changing core values is something I wouldnt bother to attempt. As far as I can see from literature you need either life-event that shocks worldview or tools rather associated with "brain-washing". Converting tribal GOP to Dem or Nat to Labour in our case isnt going to happen.
I dont think effective climate action needs to change core values. Market-based solutions are quite acceptable to right. The problem at moment, is any mention of climate action is immediately associated with people who cry "its the end of capitalism" etc. Again, the key is center. Formulate policy you can sell to the center with a charismatic salesperson and dont bother trying to convince the extremes. Generally parties dont need to worry that centrist policies offend their wings - they will grumble but vote for you anyway because that is what they do.
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nigelj at 13:18 PM on 21 February 2019A Swedish Teenager's Compelling Plea on Climate
Scaddenp @ OPOF.
It's a simple fact that conservatives have been taken over by extremists in some countries such as the USA and Britain And the Labour Party has also been taken over by an extremist leader in J Corbyn (although he means well). The following article attests to the conservative issue, and discusses three Tory MPs talking about leaving the party as a result of the extremism.
www.theguardian.com/politics/2019/feb/20/tory-mps-defect-independent-group-soubry-allen-wollaston
The system does seem to self correct like this eventually, and I would say we can encourage it, but it obviously has to be encouraged in factual ways that do not demonise conservatives too much. Simply stating the fact that their party has been taken over by extremists is a start!
This issue is also about changing peoples values systems and political ideologies. It's obviously hard, but I do think its possible to do this.
One example is many of us think racism / xenophobia is wrong and immigration has value , and we have to state "racism is wrong!" Its hard persuading people if we dont identify the problem. You have to identify problems clearly. But I suggest one should not "dwell" on that problem and demonise people for their beliefs. The emphasis has to be on the advantages of multiculturalism, socially and economically, so promote it in a positive way. And even progressives should also accept unreservedly that immigration has to have some basic controls on it : so here is an example of identifying with sensible conservative concerns!
I think this approach to racism has worked in New Zealand because conservatives have gradually become much more accepting of immigration and multi culturalism, and gay rights, although with the exception of one of the minor parties and their followers. Even if they have deeper misgivings, there is at least a level of acceptance!
But I fully admit changing peoples core values is hard work. For example I do not take kindly to bible bashers. But it's not impossible to change peoples deeper beliefs. I recall reading some science that we are born either liberal or conservative, but it doesn't appear to be rigidly fixed. I think this was in New Scientist.
Having said that it still makes total sense to also try to find common ground with other political groups and try and see things from their perspectives and not be too excessively preachy.
Regarding the GND. My preference is for carbon tax and dividend, but that has not gained traction, despite the fact it has been designed to satisfy conservative concerns!
The GND may be controversial but it could turn into a circuit breaker of some kind. While it is loaded up with social provisions that do not seem directly relevant, it has one distinct selling point, it is an actual "plan" and not some nerdy sounding single policy idea like a carbon fee or cap and trade. A lot of this issue is about perceptions.
Time will tell I guess.
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scaddenp at 11:39 AM on 21 February 2019A Swedish Teenager's Compelling Plea on Climate
" I want to correct any developed harmful unhelpful attitudes and minimize the future development of such attitudes."
And your path to that? I doubt you can do it. "I have not yet found a way to break them out of their incorrect developed beliefs" - that doesnt surprize me at all.
GND - well I didnt think Trump was electable so I maybe I will be wrong again. My money is on it going nowhere politically without a massive change. And if some miracle happens and it passes, then money is firmly on it not being achievable. Time will tell who is right.
I still think you are demonising the right. What I hear is people scared of the rapid change, seeing themselves, friends and/or neighbours redundant, towns in decay and no apparent interest from the government. Blaming immigrants/Chinese etc is humanly easier than blaming changing technology. Distant disasters and future change are far less compelling than what is in front of there eyes. Not to mention Trump seeming the lesser of two evils. Trump went for that sentiment and GND is clearly trying to pitch there as well.
However, I dont think center will buy GND and doubt enough of the disaffected will buy it to make up for that loss. Too many extremely obvious defects will be pointed out.
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Johnb at 10:59 AM on 21 February 2019Studies shed new light on Antarctica’s future contribution to sea level rise
The answer is in the MICI illustration. In the real world you have a number of random tipping points for when a particular ice flow/glacier retreats beyond its grounding line. Once that has happened the whole dynamics of melt and retreat change exponentially. As an aside in my humble opinion any modelling based on the Paris Accords, in particular the lower band is purely wishful thinking, the lower band was a political decision not a scientific one.
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One Planet Only Forever at 10:29 AM on 21 February 2019A Swedish Teenager's Compelling Plea on Climate
sacddenp,
I indeed want to change attitudes. I want to correct any developed harmful unhelpful attitudes and minimize the future development of such attitudes.
I have a relative who is a devout GOP supporter. When I challenge them to be helpful rather than harmful they shut down rather than improving their understanding, especially when I point out the factually incorrect things they have been tempted to believe. If I do not challenge them on that essential objective to be helpful and attempt to correct their understanding the conversations are pointless, purely 'getting along'.
I understand that chosing not to 'get along' can be hard. As an Engineer it was my responsibility to 'not get along with people who wanted to benefit from being harmful and to not get along with people who did not want to improve their understanding of a matter that mattered'. So my ability to accept that some people are not worth getting along with is potentially rather unique. But I still strive to help others improve their awareness and understanding and become more helpful to the development of sustainable improvements for the furture of humanity, even if it means not getting along with a relative (I still try to help them, but I have not yet found a way to break them out of their incorrect developed beliefs).
As for Other values. I only respect values that are governed by the pursuit of improved awareness and understanding and helping to develop sustainable improvemenst for humanity and correct harmful developments. Any 'values' that are not governed that way are immoral/unethical/harmful. The perfect examples are party loyalty and respect for hierarchy in the GOP that has supported/excused ridiculous members who have repeatedly spouted nonsense regarding climate science. Where are the Conservatives who will publicly ridicule those among them who deserve to be ridiculed (few and far between because of that tribal trait that is stronger in the Right Wing that resists correction than in the Left Wing that pushes for changes)?
The bottom line on the GND is that the vast majority of the younger population support it. The older generation resists it (including some, but not all, of the older Democrats in the USA). And that is consistent with Greta's perfectly pointed point.
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