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Comments 2901 to 2950:
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stranger1548 at 10:05 AM on 29 January 2023The connection between Hurricane Sandy and global warming
Sorry, this is the only reference I could find to hurricanes. My question is that it seems I've for read for years that there is no scientific consensus on increasing numbers of hurricanes but that there is consensus on growing intensity. Exchanging posts with a skeptic I failed to back the statement on hurricane intensity. The studies I've looked use modeling the future but as we know the word modeling only receives derision from climate skeptics. I couldn't find any actual proof that hurricanes have intensified. I couldn’t find any climate signals that support the premise.
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Charlie_Brown at 06:29 AM on 28 January 2023It's Urban Heat Island effect
HamletsGhost @69
You say “The Greenhouse Gas model does not account for any heat transfer arising from rain-cooled macadam.” By greenhouse gas model, perhaps you are referring to the models for radiant energy transfer in the atmosphere. MODTRAN In Infrared Light in the Atmosphere is one such model available to everyone and can be used to clearly demonstrate the powerful effect of greenhouse gases. Urban heat island effects, including changes to albedo, evaporation, transpiration, precipitation, and energy production, are negligible compared to radiant energy loss to space. Actually, while the changes in these effects are tiny, the hydrologic cycle, convection, and conduction in the troposphere are built into the atmospheric temperature profile (lapse rate) upon which radiant energy transfer models are based. All that you have described are ways that energy moves around within a small portion of the troposphere and they do not have any significant effect on the global average temperature profile of the atmosphere. You jump to an incorrect conclusion that “In omitting the fact of transfer, the Greenhouse Gas model must be inaccurate.” Then to say that “Within a model that takes into account UHI-created weather patterns and rain-cooled macadam, atmospheric increase in carbon dioxide is less as the cause of global warming than an index of burning” is simply not true.
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One Planet Only Forever at 05:53 AM on 28 January 2023Checklist: How to take advantage of brand-new clean energy tax credits
peppers,
The latest data on US electricity generation appears to be on the following EIA Frequently Asked Questions response "What is U.S. electricity generation by energy source?"
That indicates fossil fuels are 61% of the generation mix in 2021. But that is declining. The 2022 percentage will be lower.
And the decline may be rapid. When was the "Over 80%" you referred to? In the recent past? Or are you recalling data from further in the past. The more recent the "over 80%" data point is the more rapid the decline of fossil fuel generation has been.
Anther important point is the fatal flaw of the developed socioeconomic-political systems that 'focus on the positives of lower cost' and 'dismiss or excuse any consideration of harm done'. More harmful is cheaper in most situations.
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Bob Loblaw at 02:57 AM on 28 January 2023It's Urban Heat Island effect
The biggest failing in Hamlet'sGhost's comment #69 is his use of the phrase 'Greenhouse Gas model". There is no such model - what we do use in climatology is models of things like radiation transfer, energy conservation, fluid motion, conduction, the hydrological cycle, cloud formation and precipitation, etc., all built together into broad-scope "climate models". Greenhouse gas effects are the result of the well-understood radiation tranfser part of that - as they play out across all the combined physics.
There is also no such thing as an "Urban Heat Island model" - unless it's a creation of HamletsGhost's imagination. The urban heat island effect is a combination of energy balances, surface properties, changes in evaporation due to availability of water (see "hydrological cycle"), etc. All those physical properties and processes are part of "climate models" HamletsGhost's idea that UHI is something excluded from our climate models is bizarre.
In short, HamletsGhost has no idea what he is talking about.
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michael sweet at 13:58 PM on 27 January 2023Checklist: How to take advantage of brand-new clean energy tax credits
Peppers,
Five of the ten tips do not involve electricity. What is your beef?
In any case, in order to control Global Warming we need to switch all energy use to electricity. The heat pumps described in two tips are much more efficient than fossil heaters. More efficient appliances save money even if electricity is expensive.
Similarly, electric vehicles are cheaper to own than ICE cars because they are much more fuel efficient and they require much less maintenance.
The remainng tips suggst that you plan ahead so that you can take advantage of as many rebates as possible. What is wrong with that?
Please pay more attention to the articles you comment on.
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One Planet Only Forever at 13:53 PM on 27 January 2023Checklist: How to take advantage of brand-new clean energy tax credits
peppers,
My first observation is that you may have cherry-picked a location and a month as the basis for the claim you try to make.
My quick internet search for the broader matter of "california electricity prices" identified the following NYTs article "Why Are Energy Prices So High? Some Experts Blame Deregulation." that seems to provide an excellent explanation.
It appears that all of the states that 'deregulated' their electricity systems have seen their rates increased relative to the regulated states. And the higher costs are not due to the way the electricity is generated. They are due to the way that the deregulated system operates.
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One Planet Only Forever at 09:17 AM on 27 January 20232023 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #2
Evan,
I appreciate the value of the Keeling Curve as evidence that the required change of direction of over-developed harmful human ways of living is occurring. And, of course, my concern is all harms, not just climate change harm. But the generalized point can be made by focusing on climate change.
Developed popular and profitable climate change harm, the powerful resistance to ending the harm, and the even stronger resistance to repairing the harm done, is a clear example of many other harmful impacts developed by misleading marketplace over-development of human ways of living. And a very harmfully misleading aspect is a focus on the positives. That focus on the positives delays and resists learning about the negatives. It also excuses the negatives ‘because of the perceived positives’. An example of climate change impact reduction misleading marketing is the Alberta production of oil sands for export being claimed to be working towards being net-zero by 2050. That sounds good until you realize that there will be other harms produced by the activity in Alberta, potentially even new harms as a result of ‘focusing on the positives’ of the actions that ‘get to net-zero carbon impact of the part of the fossil fuel system happening in Alberta’. And the real eye-popping negative is that actions ‘outside of Alberta’ related to those ‘net-zero Alberta exports’ are not going to be close to net-zero. The total global impacts needs to be ‘net-zero’, not just parts of it. However, the impacts of people already living better than basic decent lives need to lead the transition to ‘total global net-zero’. So Alberta oil sands production becoming net-zero by 2035 would be genuinely helpful, with the understanding that before 2060 there would be no export market for what Alberta wants to benefit from exporting export.
Back to the Keeling Curve. In spite of the value of the Keeling Curve the more important measure of the required transition to limit harm done is the amount of global average surface temperature increase above pre-industrial levels. The uncertainty of the relationship between CO2 levels and resulting average temperature makes the temperature a more relevant measure. The science strives to narrow the range of CO2 levels to be targeted. But the understanding that 1.0 C is where we should be striving to eventually get back to in order to limit future harmful consequences is clear. And the CO2 levels for 1.0 C warming are now well known (proven due to the lack of corrections of development direction to limit harm done to 1.0 C). And the CO2 levels for 1.5 C warming will also almost certainly become known in the near future. Hopefully the CO2 levels for 2.0 C warming will never be proven by the lack of correction of human development. That is the ‘BIG IF’. The science is clear that ‘when’ the upper limit on global harm is reached the the higher the magnitude of that peak the more harm is done to the future. And the harm done includes the extra unprofitable effort required to bring the level of harm back down below 1.5 C. And the sooner it is brought back down the better. The science also indicates the disastrous consequences ‘If’ the correction does not happen, or happens too slowly (and the correction has been happening too slowly because of the incorrect economic ideology that requires ‘perpetually more, never less, especially never less for people with higher status and more power’).
Important points are:- ‘When’ is the appropriate term for the science of climate change impacts.
- ‘If’ is the term for socioeconomic-political results.
So my current understanding is that ‘when’, scientifically, total global human activity transforms to the point of no longer causing accumulating global warming impacts, and continues to transform to reducing CO2 levels at an increasing rate, there may even be a delay of response in the Keeling Curve.
The annual rate of human impacts is the important item to track. And the Keeling Curve is one of many measures for tracking harmful human impacts. Global fossil fuel use is another way to track things. The current situation is ‘human activity impacts cause significant annual increase of CO2 levels’. The curve of human impacts on CO2 levels needs to be brought down to ‘Zero’ and continue to be brought below zero, removing CO2, to limit and repair the harm done by human impacts. Admittedly some of the harm done will not be able to be repaired. And some of the repairs, like reversing glacier retreat (regrowing glaciers), may take a long time. So limiting the magnitude of harm done needs to be the ‘governing objective’ rather than compromising that objective by attempting to protect developed status quo perceptions.
That leads to understanding that continuing to ‘grow global economic perceptions based on the developed ideology that promotes the positives and tries really hard to ignore or dismiss the negatives’ makes the future required corrections more dramatic. And, pushed too far, the result will be socioeconomic-political collapse that ‘catches a lot of people by surprise’.
Optimism for the future of humanity does require the ‘ending of harm done’ to be ‘when not if’. There is no improving future for humanity ‘if harmful ways of living are not ended’. Developing harmless replacements for developed harmful ways of living can help. But some 'developed popular and profitable activities' likely need to be 'restricted to only help the poorest live better'. And the amount of harm done to the future continues to increase until the harmful activity is ended. And improving the future requires efforts to repair the harm already done. And all of that is contrary to developed popular socioeconomic-political ideology.
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peppers at 21:05 PM on 26 January 2023Checklist: How to take advantage of brand-new clean energy tax credits
Electricity is a delivery method, not a power source. My fear is getting trapped in the higher cost. You can make electricity from natural gas for instance, but not the reverse, and over 80% of electricity is still made from coal, gas, etc. Here is a blurb about electricity costs ( in Ca. ): Bureau of Labor Statistics, Geographic Information, Western
News Release, 1/18/23: The 26.0 cents per kWh Los Angeles households paid for electricity in December 2022 was 57.6 percent more than the nationwide average of 16.5 cents per kWh. Last December, electricity costs were 69.0 percent higher in Los Angeles compared to the nation. An intregal part of this article is that electricity is a better costing alternative. It actually appears as a trap. -
MA Rodger at 18:03 PM on 26 January 2023Climate change: Water vapor makes for a wet argument
pewtergod @145,
It is actualy untrue to say H2O & CH4 absorb at the same frequency but such argument becomes a little technical so the exact wording of the claim is required to properly rebut what is being argued.
The graphic below is much-used (although not a good explanation of the power of CO2 as a GHG) and show the frequencies absorbed by different atmospheric gases. The Earth only emits at frequencies longer than 5 microns so it is only the right-hand portion of the graph which is of interest.
And even if H2O did absorb/emit at the same frequencies as CO2 it would be a flawed argument from the denialists as CO2 is present up to 50 km (way above the bulk of the H2O), and it is the height of emissions into space that determines the GHG effect.
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pewtergod at 06:56 AM on 26 January 2023Climate change: Water vapor makes for a wet argument
Why can't I find anything about methane and water vapor?
Climate denialists keep saying they absorb the same frequency, and I can't find a rebuttal.
Moderator Response:[PS] Just enter "Water vapour" or "methane" in the search box on top left. You will find plenty like "Water vapour is the most powerful GHG" myth. (spoiler: water vapour is a powerful GHG but its concentration is temperature dependent so it is a feedback not a forcing). You find detail on relative importance of gases here.
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Evan at 22:53 PM on 25 January 20232023 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #2
OPOF, thank you for your comments. We missed you in this conversation. :-)
"My current understanding is that when the Keeling Curve levels off, when human activity is no longer causing CO2 levels to increase, there should not be a significant further increase of the global average surface temperature."
According to the best climate science, IF, not when, the Keeling Curve levels off, we will still have "warming in the pipeline". To have no significant further increase of global average temperature the Keeling Curve must decrease, as would happen for a time if we were to reach net-zero emissions. This is what I address in my recent paper Climate Confusion.
I wrote that paper because there is confusion about the implications of different emissions pathways. Many are thinking that recent scientific research shows that we can limit the warming to no more than we've already caused, but as Hausfather notes, this science dates back to 2008 and is not a new result.
"The best available evidence shows that, on the contrary, warming is likely to more or less stop once carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions reach zero, meaning humans have the power to choose their climate future.
When scientists have pointed this out recently, it has been reported as a new scientific finding. However, the scientific community has recognised that zero CO2 emissions likely implied flat future temperatures since at least 2008. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) 2018 special report on 1.5C also included a specific focus on zero-emissions scenarios with similar findings"
But it's rise to prominence now is causing confusion between what happens if the Keeling Curve levels off and what happens if we reach net-zero emissions. These are two different scenarios, but the science behind each has been known for a long time and is not a new result.
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One Planet Only Forever at 15:35 PM on 25 January 20232023 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #2
I have been an interested follower of this discussion. I am optimistic about humanity in the long term, but pessimistic about the short term.
My current understanding is that when the Keeling Curve levels off, when human activity is no longer causing CO2 levels to increase, there should not be a significant further increase of the global average surface temperature.
However, I also understand that increasing temperatures will activate feedback mechanisms that will increase CO2 levels. Therefore, before the Keeling Curve is levelled off, any activated feedback mechanisms will require more reduction of human impacts than would have been required before the feedbacks were triggered. In other words, more warming makes it harder for humans to reduce human impacts enough to ‘level-off the Keeling Curve’ (get to net-zero).
Also, the science (from decades ago) indicates that warming above 1.0 C risks significant harm (now proven). And warming beyond 2.0 C is considered to be very risky (hopefully never proven). That understanding is the basis for the 1.5 C objective that is paired with the need to limit the peak impact level to less than 2.0 C. (Refer to the Story of the Week “1.5 and 2°C: A Journey Through the Temperature Target That Haunts the World” in the “2022 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #50”)
Developed governing economic ideology is justifiably questioned. The short term competitive pursuit of status interests over-powering the reduction of harm is detrimental to the global future of humanity. Also, the perceived need for constant growth of activity that is perceived to be profitable develops harmful results.
The removal of excess CO2, levels above 1.5 C impacts, is now almost certain to be required. CO2 impacts exceeding 1.5 C are ‘in the pipeline’ because it will take time to correct the current harmfully over-developed activity that is the result of a lack of actions to limit impacts through the past 30 years. And the marketplace will not naturally develop CO2 removal to bring peak human impacts back down to 1.5 C levels because that will never be a profitable activity. External governing will be required to make it happen.
External governing of economic activity will also be required to limit the amount that impacts exceed 1.5 C before they are drawn back down. A key understanding is that the area under the global average temperature curve needs to be minimized to limit the future challenges. The more that 1.5 C level of impacts is exceeded the more harm is done. The longer the 1.5 C level is exceeded the more harm is done. But the required changes of the developed governing socioeconomic-political systems are contrary to ‘popular developed socioeconomic ideology and the developed status-quo’.
So, in my comment @2 I expressed optimism about the long term future of humanity. However, I am also pessimistic about how harmful the impacts of the ‘over-developed harmful marketplace system fuelled by marketing that is focused on promoting positive impressions’ will be before that system is corrected (I made a similar point in my comment @4 on the SkS item “Can induction stoves convince home cooks to give up gas?”). That pessimism will be reduced when a significant amount of ‘unprofitable’ CO2 removal facilities are operating. The sooner those ‘correction of harm done’ facilities are operating the sooner there is justification for optimism that there will be a sustained improving future for humanity.
Many of the supposedly highest status people today are obliged to pay for carbon removal facilities to be built and operated in the current day. That activity cannot ethically be pushed off to be a ‘future, development that will continue to face reluctance to be implemented because it is not profitable’. And it is important for those ‘unpopular and unprofitable’ facilities to be almost certain to be harmless. Less expensive and ‘more harmful in other ways’ ways of appearing to reduce the harm of CO2 need to be understood to be unacceptable. It is important to see evidence of leadership pursuing the limiting of harm done, not claiming to be reducing harm done by actions that are harmful in other ways. All harmful impacts need to be limited to sustainable Planetary Boundary levels of impact, not just CO2.
Therefore, I am hopeful and optimistic about the long term future of humanity. But I am skeptical/pessimistic regarding how soon there will be evidence to support that optimism. I am justifiably concerned about how much harm will be done that future generations have to overcome in order to develop sustainable improvements. Sustainable improvements can be achieved almost Forever within the Boundaries of this One Amazing Planet if that is a governing objective, which it really should be.
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Evan at 12:50 PM on 25 January 20232023 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #2
Rob, rather than a long rebuttal, I refer you to a paper I published recently on this very subject titled "Climate Confusion." In it I deal with the very subject we're discussing, and reference the Hausfather paper.
There are only very special conditions where we don't have warming in the pipeline: all of humanity come together to do the right thing and nature plays nice. I will continue to point people to the Keeling Curve as the best assessment of how we're doing and what to expect. In the meantime, Hausfather's paper presents a result of a scientific modeling study, and is not an assessment of the likely trajectory of the Keeling Curve.
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Philippe Chantreau at 12:11 PM on 25 January 2023It's Urban Heat Island effect
A quick addition for the sake of clarity:
HamletsGhost mentions land breezes. A land breeze is kind of the opposite phenomenon of a sea breeze. In land breeze conditions, the land surface cools down and reaches a lower temperature than the adjacent sea surface. They are usually stongest in the morning, when the temperature gradient is the largest. As a result, air flows from the land toward the sea, where air rises by convection. Although some sea breezes are known to reach far over land (it's relative, the farthest reaches identified are about 200 miles in tropical regions), land breezes are usually weaker and seldom reach beyond the 30 miles range off the coast.
In any case, it is worth emphasizing that a land breeze brings cooler air from the land over the sea surface. A sea breeze occurs during the day, when the land surface heats up quicker than the water and reaches a higher temperature. Air then rises over land and cooler air comes from the sea. These local patterns have been studied.
There is research suggesting that increased urbanization plays a role in decreasing trends in sea and land breezes, although no clear trend appears to be identifiable on a larger, global scale.
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scaddenp at 11:25 AM on 25 January 2023It's Urban Heat Island effect
I am also mystified by the energy budget here. Radiation absorbed by low albedo areas, tend to radiate that back in infrared which is absolutely part of the models. Conductive transfer to rainwater is negible by comparison. Take a small amount of conductive heat transfer from a very small part of the area of the world going into a very large body of water and I would challenge you to measure the effect. I suspect it would hard to measure the effect on even the rivers flowing through a city let alone the ocean but happy to contradicted by data
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Eclectic at 09:13 AM on 25 January 2023It's Urban Heat Island effect
HamletsGhost @69 :
You propose interesting methods of heat transfer from cities to rural & marine regions (such as Siberia and the Arctic sea).
However, to be worth consideration of this matter, it would be necessary for you to give at least a rough approximation of the actual quantification of this proposed effect. Size matters.
In post #60 above, MA Rodger notes the world's urban area is about 0.12% of global area. How will that percentage (adjusted by its albedo difference from rural) alter the Greenhouse Gas related calculations of global warming? My off-the-cuff guesstimate is that the overall alteration would be a poofteenth* .
[ *poofteenth is a mathematical term recently adopted by analysts assessing various magnitudes of contribution from heating/cooling factors driving Earth's surface temperature ]
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Rob Honeycutt at 05:29 AM on 25 January 20232023 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #2
Evan... The paper I'm referring to is the same Hausfather paper. In the link we've both cited the lede to the article seems pretty clear.
Media reports frequently claim that the world is facing “committed warming” in the future as a result of past emissions, meaning higher temperatures are “locked in”, “in the pipeline” or “inevitable”, regardless of the choices society takes today.
The best available evidence shows that, on the contrary, warming is likely to more or less stop once carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions reach zero, meaning humans have the power to choose their climate future. [emphasis added]
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Evan at 04:54 AM on 25 January 20232023 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #2
Rob,
"Based on more recent research it's far from certain and may not be correct at all."
Can you provide a reference to recent research that is downplaying the effect of feedbacks?
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Evan at 04:38 AM on 25 January 20232023 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #2
Rob,
"Those are infinitely better challenges for humanity to face over a civilization ending 4°C+ planet."
Obviously I agree with this statement. But for the large voting population that still thinks climate scientists are being alarmists and feel that we can easily adapt, they will be more concerned about the supposed negative economic impact of taking action than they will be about the impact of a "small" amount of warming. I get this specific feedback from a lot of people whose opinions I respect.
I will change my view of the future when the upward acceleration of the Keeling Curve begins to slow. Not before.
Rob, you are making business analogies and projections which I respect, but businesses are usually selling things that people want. Getting to net zero requires an awful lot of negative emissions technologies that are effectively a tax, things that are likely to be strongly opposed.
My point is this. The more we sell to the not-very-well-informed people the idea that the future lies in our hands (i.e., future warming depends on future emissions and not past emissions), and the more we sell the idea that there is a renewable energy and EV revolution that will drastically cut our emissions, the more likely they will believe that all is well and no need to worry. We are effectively removing their impetus for revolutionary change and accepting evolutionary change as sufficient.
The Hausfather paper indicates that an immediate 70% reduction in emissions would get us to stabilizing atmopheric CO2 emissions, which effectively leaves warming in the pipeline (read here). That's 70% of emissions across the entire world and across every sector, including agriculture and deforestation. And that massive effort still leaves warming in the pipeline. Then year on year that 70% reduction has to grow to keep theatmospheric CO2 concentration from increasing.
Therefore, (repeating myself here) I continue to advise people to expect that the current atmospheric CO2 levels correspond to committed warming. If and when the upward accelerationg of the Keeling Curve begins to slow, I will modify that advice. Until then, I think it prudent advice.
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Rob Honeycutt at 02:07 AM on 25 January 20232023 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #2
Evan... I was being sarcastic by inferring a complete collapse of modern civilization would also bring us to net zero.
This is the element of your statements that I'm challenging here: "...even if we reduce our emissions that feedbacks in the system may continue to drive the Keeling Curve upwards..."
Two years ago I would have agreed. Based on more recent research it's far from certain and may not be correct at all.
I think one other thing history teaches us is that early research is slow, difficult and costly (and that's where we've been). But once we get to a cost effective point markets can scale very quickly (and that's where we're headed). This very moment in history we are probaly at the inflection point between those two.
Renewable energy markets have been ploughing through R/D, getting through the expensive Valley of Death, and are now emerging with highly profitable businesses. I think the challenges in the coming 30 years are going to be more related to resource availability over carbon emissions. Those are infinitely better challenges for humanity to face over a civilization ending 4°C+ planet.
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HamletsGhost at 00:51 AM on 25 January 2023It's Urban Heat Island effect
In my view, the most important — and understudied — effect of UHI as it relates to global warming is the fact that large expanses of macadam act as heat sinks. This resuts in the phenomenon where by cities create their own weather: on the coast, UHI-expanses like that of Houston increase the effect of the landbreeze; stack moisture in clouds at a higher rate, and, eventually, drop more water onto the heat sinks. The rain cools these heat sinks off and, in the process, transfers warmer water into aquifers that feed the Gulf Stream.
Our senses, higher summer temperature readings at airports, and the chart above showing no significant difference over time between the temperature increase in rural and urban areas tells us this heat transfer is significant.
The UHI heat-transfer model explains both the effect on the polar ice cap and the warming of tropical waters. The Gulf Stream, now warmer than otherwise, leads up to the arctic polar ice cap and melts it. In the summer months, the Gulf Stream slows its transfer of warmer water into cooler water so that warmer water remains in Caribbean to develop into storm.
The Greenhouse Gas model does not account for any heat transfer arising from rain-cooled macadam. In omitting the fact of transfer, the Greenhouse Gas model must be inaccurate.
Within a model that takes into account UHI-created weather patterns and rain-cooled macadam, atmospheric increase in carbon dioxide is less as the cause of global warming than an index of burning.
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slumgullionridge at 20:47 PM on 24 January 2023Input to USDA about how to allocate IRA climate-smart agriculture funds
Placing these IRA funds in the hands of the USDA is, again, an unuseful vehicle for the objectives advanced by the legislation. CCL either ignores the ample peer-reviewed science challenging the very existence of industrial animal agriculture, or are simply unaware of its presence in the literature. The work of Christine Jones, PhD, the Australian soil scientist, shows the adverse effects of livestock on the planet, she being only one of the scientists suggesting the elimination of livestock farming as a significant partial solution to the climate problem.
Moreover, CCL is either unaware or unconvinced that the heavy losses of phytoplankton render reforestation a futile remedy to the planet's growing oxygen production deficit.
The "livestock will save us" mantra of the Allen Savory school continues to dominate public policy, apparently because global animal agriculture employs over two billion humans, thus disabling the general public's acceptance of the scientific evidence showing otherwise.
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Evan at 12:43 PM on 24 January 20232023 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #2
I'm not sure on what basis you say that we will get to net zero emissions. Yes, airplanes eventually run out of gas and crash. If that's what you're referring to, then it is a moot point. When we talk about getting to net zero emissions I am framing it in the context of doing so while simultaneously preserving something that resembles our current civilization. That represents a planned landing, not a crash.
The problem with talking about net zero emissions is that this is only one component of what drives the Keeling Curve. I originally responded in this thread to the issue of whether there is effectively warming in the pipeline. That is governed by the behavior of the Keeling Curve. Even if we get our emissions to 0, we may have already triggered feedbacks that cause atmospheric CO2 to continue to rise. That is, the longer we delay, the less we are able to affect the behavior of the Keeling Curve.
Long story short, given the difficulty of reducing our emissions, and given that even if we reduce our emissions that feedbacks in the system may continue to drive the Keeling Curve upwards, I think it a far safer bet to assume that there is warming in the pipeline equivalent to the current atmospheric CO2 concentrations. It's been 35 years since the IPCC was established, and if history has taught us anything, it takes far longer than people project to bring about the kind of change needed to reach net zero emissions.
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Bob Loblaw at 11:29 AM on 24 January 20232015 SkS News Bulletin #2: Willie Soon & The Fossil Fuel Industry
Long:
Although this is an old thread, comments never close here at SkS - for just the reason that someone may want to discuss them again in the distant future.
Institutions will differ; countries wll differ. Funding can be quite complex.
My own experience in universities is within Canada, and from roughly 30 years ago. Times have changed. Academic positions will have rules that affect what sort of outside contracts a professor may hold - but expectations may differ even between departments in the same university.
Where I was (Geography), outside contracts and external activities that took away from your research time were not looked upon all that favourably, but my understanding was that within some other departments - e.g. Engineering - that outside consulting work was essential to advance your career. If you weren't getting outside contracts for "real engineering" work, what good were you? At least in our academic environment your entire salary was typically covered by the university for the entire calendar year.
My understanding was that many U.S. universities only paid a professor's salary during the school term, and you had to get outside funding that included salary dollars for yourself during the summer (non-teaching) periods. That could come from grants, etc.
In Canada, major academic granting agencies would not allow grant money to go to the principal investigator's salary - but it could go to grad students or post-docs. In the U.S., grant money for your own salary was more or less expected. Institution claw-backs for "administrative overhead" could also vary, depending on the institution, the type of funding, etc.
In the example above (comment #3), clearly part of the contract was going to Soon as salary - but there is no indication whether this is to cover his regular salary, or is an extra "perk". Either way, though, Soon benefited personally, directly from that contract.
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Long Knoll at 11:04 AM on 24 January 20232015 SkS News Bulletin #2: Willie Soon & The Fossil Fuel Industry
Thanks for this information Bob Loblaw. I realise its a very old thread but I wasn't sure how else to have a chance of finding an answer; I couldn't find another relevant thread and I'd read a lot of articles on the subject to no avail, probably because I don't have a great grasp of how these institutions work. I was asking due to a debate I was having with a climate skeptic. Again, I appreciate your time.
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Rob Honeycutt at 07:14 AM on 24 January 20232023 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #2
Evan... Oh, we absolutely will get to net zero carbon emissions. There's no doubt about that. It's a little like flying an airplane. You're eventually going to land, it's just a matter of how you land.
My personal optimism comes from the fact that energy technologies are coming forth in rapid succession. Years back I remember wondering why so much money was being poured into off-shore wind when the cost was >$300/MW. Then, I watched turbines escalate in size and fall in cost and I went, "Ohhh..." Same is happening with grid storage now. There are certainly going to be physical constraints to each solution that comes to market, but fortunately lots of solutions are coming to market.
All (or nearly all) energy generation plants are going to be replaced over the coming 30+ years. It already makes little sense to invest in new FF plants. There are aspects of decarbonization that are going to be more tenatious problems to solve, but I know smart people are eager to work on those problem. My larger 30,000 ft level view concern is the general notion out there that nothing is being done, and it's just plain wrong. People have been working on this for decades and those efforts are clearly bearing fruit.
Regarding the Keeling Curve, I believe it's going to be a lagging indicator of what's happening, and figures related to the growth of renewables (which have been tragically underestimated) is more of a leading indicator.
The biggest wild card, in my mind, is human behavior. We're sure to see some pretty serious socio-political upheaval over the coming 30 years. My biggest concern is whether such disruptions will further delay progress right as we need to further accelerate progress.
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Evan at 03:28 AM on 24 January 20232023 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #2
Thanks Rob for your comments.
I agree with most of your points, but differ in messaging. Climate scientists, and even yourself, use the phrase "Once we get carbon emissions down to net zero," as though it is a foregone conclusion that we will. For the not-so-well-informed, watching from a distance layperson, one could get the feeling that we've found a way out of our mess, that we're well on our way, and that the current rollout of renewable energy and EVs will solve the problem. Yes, there are promising technologies, but rolling them out across the globe and replacing, not supplementing the fossil-fuel industry, is quite another matter. This all assumes, of course, the renewable energy is replacing fossil-fuel energy. Or is renewable energy merely allowing cheap expansion of more generating capacity? Rapid growth of renewable energy does not mean we are reducing emissions.
And as you well know, energy consumption is just one part of the problem.
I am not trying to spread pessimism. I am trying to help people prepare for a likely future. It is far more likely that we will have warming in the pipeline for decades to come, than not. It is far more likely that our current CO2 concentrations represent committed warming than not. The fact that the future theoretically lies in our hands and depends on what we do, cannot be construed to give us a likely future where we get to net zero emissions by 2050.
Take a look at the following graph, where I've taken the 1970-2005 upward accelerating trend line and projected it forward. The 2010, 2015, and 2020 data all lie about this upward accelerating trend line! I don't see any indication of an inflection point. What I do see is a hint, not proof, but a hint that the trend line is more than accelerating upwards.
For all of our sakes Rob I hope you're right and that I'm wrong. But the Keeling Curve only tells me one message. Time to prepare for a very tough future. We're in the middle of building a house now, and we're putting a lot of money into building it strong, into a ground-source heat pump, and into an expensive roof that can withstand high winds and hail. In short, the Keeling Curve is suggesting that we must build far beyond current building codes to keep up with the changing climate.
I am serious, though, when I say that I hope you're right and I'm wrong. I don't want to be a pessimist. But I do want to help people prepare for the likely future.
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Rob Honeycutt at 02:24 AM on 24 January 20232023 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #2
Evan @13... I don't think "scientists" make such a mistake, nor do they make specific assertions about whether we will or won't get to net zero.
Climate research offer up a very wide range of potential outcomes, since obviously no one can predict future events. All researchers are doing is saying "if" we get to net zero (and there certainly is a chance we can achieve this in the next 30 years) then warming should stop as we reach that level.
You say, "But so far, nothing we have done has slowed the upward acceleration of the Keeling Curve." I think the challenge there is, when you're at the inflection point it's very hard to determine where the trend is going to go by eyeballing charts.
I remain positive on this topic because I do see things are happening. Every day when I read the news I see new technologies and new strategies aimed at elimination of greenhouse gases. I know that renewable energy is now the cheapest energy available and is continuing to fall in cost, and it's now scaling exponentially.
I also find pessimism to be a mindset that robs people of motivation to achieve new things. By framing the issue as "we're screwed" tends to act as a self fulfilling prophecy.
I am realistic in that I know for certain things are going to get worse. The tasks ahead are gargantuan. The impacts are going to affect different people to different degrees. But there are levels of how bad this gets. As Dr. Stephen Schneider said, "'End of the world' and 'good for us' are the two lowest probability outcomes."
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Evan at 22:01 PM on 23 January 20232023 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #2
Take a look at the following curve that I published in Addressing the Climate Crisis: Evolution or Revolution. It suggests a very strong connection between population and the accumulation rate of CO2 in the atmosphere, spanning many different levels of technology and governance. It also illustrates our path to net zero emissions, even though this graph only shows our path to stabilizing CO2, and not to net zero emissions. My point in bringing this up is that we must not speak confidently of reaching net zero emissions as though it will happen. If all we did was to follow the path to net zero accumulation, that would still leave "warming in the pipeline".
I also offer thoughts on this issue in a separate post, Climate Confusion, where I address this issue of prematurely concluding that there is no longer warming in the pipeline. Some people are becoming confused by the scientific messaging, thinking that warming in the pipeline represents old science. The only way we avoid warming in the pipeline is by going beyond atmospheric CO2 stabilization and getting it to drop. Here is a graph of what the warming would look like if we stabilized CO2 immediately, and reached net zero emissions by 2100.
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EddieEvans at 19:50 PM on 23 January 20232023 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #2
"But so far, nothing we have done has slowed the upward acceleration of the Keeling Curve."
I cannot ignore the past, and there's more than enough evidence to show the role of government and fossil fuel's role in the Keeling Curve's relentless climb. James Speth, "They Knew" and Juliana vs The United States ), and the Climate Files scream at us to stop burning fossil fuels.
We have no real cause to doubt the inexorable climb of the Keeling Curve and our reliance on passing the buck to the next generation, as they will do to the next generation.
I have a sense of the frustration Galileo must have felt.
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One Planet Only Forever at 04:39 AM on 23 January 2023Can induction stoves convince home cooks to give up gas?
The following NPR article, “Gas stoves became part of the culture war in less than a week. Here's why”, shows that the people who want to benefit from prolonged, or increased, gas burning jumped on, and dumped on, the report of the study about the harms of cooking with gas.
Marketing promoting the ‘positives’ of anything is actually a serious problem. And consumerism fuelled societies are full of it. Exclusively selling positive impressions, including selling how a product or service will alleviate unjustified fears like the health and cosmetic industry does, builds popular support and profitability. And that popularity and profitability can cause people to resist learning about harmful aspects of what they have been enticed to develop a liking for. People can be harmfully tempted to like leadership that makes-up things to be feared and claims to fight against the created, but unjustified, fears and anxiety. And a nasty twist of that understanding is the ways that misleading marketing can get people to believe that climate change impacts are a ‘made-up fear’.
Most of the societies in human history that are perceived to be more advanced and superior, aspired to by others, can be understood to have been governed by misleading marketing and a related resistance to learning to be less harmful and more helpful to others.
Human history is also full of evidence that a portion of the harmfully governed dominant populations have tried to promote learning about the harmful realities of the supposedly advanced and believed to be superior societies and cultures.
The challenge continues to be breaking that cycle to get an increasing amount of human activity governed and limited by the pursuit of learning about what is harmful. That requires leadership actions that understandably reduce real harm done, repair harm done, and help people who genuinely need assistance to live a basic decent life. All human activity being governed that way would develop amazing sustainable improvements.
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Evan at 01:46 AM on 23 January 20232023 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #2
Honeycutt@4
"Once we get carbon emissions down to "net zero""
The mistake scientists are making is assuming so strongly that we will get to net-zero emissions, that they are already saying there is no warming in the pipeline because we will get to net-zero emissions. There is no evidence to suggest that we will reach net-zero emissions, but there is ample evidence to suggest that we will continue with emissions sufficiently high to effectively guarantee warming in the pipeline.
It is merely a theoretical conclusion that there need not be warming in the pipeline, but this is a theoretical conclusion that currently appears to be completely disconnected from our actions. I am planning my life and recommending that others plan as though there is warming in the pipeline. If, not when, we get emissions under control, we will be that much better off. But so far, nothing we have done has slowed the upward acceleration of the Keeling Curve. There is lots of talk and plans, but it is relatively easy to get a small sector of the world to agree on what we need to do. It is an entirely different matter to get the rest of the world to follow suit.
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EddieEvans at 18:30 PM on 22 January 20232023 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #2
Thanks for helping me out with the Hausfather paper. It took a couple of readings but is worth the time. It clarifies the "mixing of two different concepts: a world where CO2 levels in the atmosphere remain at current levels; and a world where emissions reach net zero and concentrations begin to fall." I believe that I was at the latter, "a world where emissions reach net zero and concentrations begin to fall." That was some years ago, and it seemed intuitive. Somewhere I became interested in the former and forgot the latter. I remind myself of today's biggest climate literacy problem, how many voters mix weather and climate. (My in-laws) I will summarize the article and make a robotic read video for Youtube.
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John Mason at 01:46 AM on 21 January 2023Can induction stoves convince home cooks to give up gas?
I've been using a single portable induction-hob and it's amazing the diversity of dishes that it can churn out. Got a single ring camping gas stove too, of a similar size, that I used for much of last year. I've kept that in case of power-outages, but am very impressed with the hob.
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Cajetan at 14:08 PM on 20 January 2023Mt. Kilimanjaro's ice loss is due to land use
It is evidently a global warming issue. Since Kilimanjaro is located along the equator it makes matters even worse. Climbing Kilimanjaro during the wet season you might not notice but during the dry and warm season, you can obviously notice how dry the peak can be. is it that glaciers have a lifespan or global warming is the primary cause? Most glaciers and icefields have receded. Some of the famous glaciers on the Mountain e.g, Arrow Glacier, and others have disappeared completely.
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scaddenp at 11:07 AM on 18 January 2023Can induction stoves convince home cooks to give up gas?
i have used a few induction tops which convinced me that good controls are necessary to convince someone used to using gas. On 250V supply, it heats much faster than gas. However, first one I used had digital controls which were fussy to use and effectively "quantized" control to 10 levels. Compared to fine level of control on gas, this was awful. Also, the control system had slow feedback so on low settings the heat oscillated around the control point - ie your simmer was constantly going off and on. These put me off till a friend (very keen cook) showed me his which had none of those problems. If you are switching from gas, then pay the money for decent controls.
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Miriam O'Brien (Sou) at 10:32 AM on 18 January 2023Can induction stoves convince home cooks to give up gas?
My induction stove top is 20 years old this year. It works as well as it ever did. It was installed beside a gas cooktop because at the time we were getting a lot of brownouts.
It's years since we've used the gas. The induction stove is much, much better to cook with. The temperature control is terrific plus it's so clean.
Is it the low 110V domestic power supply in the US that is the drawback to takeup there? It seems strange. I've always thought Americans were early adopters of technology.
(I'm planning to sell the gas stove together with the gas heater that also hasn't been used in years.)
Moderator Response:[PS] Edited more or less as requested
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sailingfree at 08:30 AM on 18 January 2023Scafetta's Widget Problems
MA Roger @69,
Thanks for clarification of the data. And thank you moderator [PS] for fixing the mess I made with the URL.
Moderator Response:[PS] You are welcome. Thanks for your work
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Bob Loblaw at 04:08 AM on 18 January 20232023 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #2
Eddie: Rob linked to the Hausfather paper at the end of paragraph 2 in comment #4. The text only displays "Hausfather", but the lin is there if you click on it.
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EddieEvans at 02:24 AM on 18 January 20232023 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #2
I'm not sure where to find you link; I must have missed it.
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Rob Honeycutt at 02:05 AM on 18 January 20232023 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #2
Eddie... Regarding the Hansen paper, note it's not a peer reviewed paper, yet. It's going to go through revisions prior to being published. Take this pre-review version with an appropriate quantity of salt (even from Hansen).
@5... No, I'm not ignoring ocean heat. What I stated is, once we stabilize CO2 concentrations warming will stop. Please read the Hausfather explainer I linked to.
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BaerbelW at 01:58 AM on 18 January 2023New paper: Assessing ExxonMobil’s global warming projections
Thanks, Joel! But credit has to go to Geoffrey Supran for laying things out clearly in his Twitter thread! I didn't do much more than a "copy & paste job" with just a few tweaks here and there.
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Joel_Huberman at 00:50 AM on 18 January 2023New paper: Assessing ExxonMobil’s global warming projections
Thank you, Baerbel, for this clear, informative summary.
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EddieEvans at 00:37 AM on 18 January 20232023 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #2
Here's a recent pipeline article by James Hansen. It took some searching.
"6.14 Recently, the first author (JEH) of our present paper published a
qualitative description of the decade-long investigation that led to the conclusion that most climate models are unrealistically insensitive to freshwater injected by melting ice and also that ice sheet models are unrealistically lethargic in the face of rapid, large climate change.15"Not to be obnoxious, but I did want to refer to James Hansen. Also, if you believe that a warming ocean is a "blessing" to humanity, you might want to take that up with residents in Maimi, Maryland, Vietnam (Mekong Delta, a rice bowl to millions), China, and an assortment of Pacific islanders. Then there's the plankton surviving in a warming ocean, never before tested in human history. Biodiversity in the Global Ocean will become stressed beyond the bounds of natural selection and loss of habitat for unknown numbers of ocean ecosystems.
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EddieEvans at 23:30 PM on 17 January 20232023 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #2
If you are following US politics, you may believe that descent is underway. It would not matter in any case. I refer to history, especially after US President Johnson pointed to the issue in 1965, over half a century ago. I also refer to Jame's Speth "They Knew: The US Federal Government’s Fifty-Year Role in Causing the Climate Crisis," and Juliana vs The United States Government. James Hansen recently co-authored a paper on CO2 in the pipeline, and it was not encouraging. Then there's global dimming and the rest, not to mention Arctic Sea ice melt, which no one has found a way to rectify. I could go on and on. I have not seen research on cooling the global ocean in any short-term scenario. What I'm reading says "hundreds of years," at least. If you have more comforting information, I would enjoy seeing it. We have no idea what we are handing to the next generation. "Nature is very complex to think about, and probably more complex than we can think."
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MA Rodger at 19:25 PM on 17 January 20232023 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #2
EddieEvans @1,3&5,
The threat to humanity is not the extinction of our species. The threat is the collapse of the world economy and a descent into a future where the sovereign state system is replaced by an anarchy. The further we push the climate and thus also the natural world, the more likely that threat will become a reality.
The idea of there being "plenty of CO2 in the pipeline" is worth a few words. The IPCC has for some time set out the science which links the rise in global temperature we face with the accumulative CO2 emissions reached at the point of 'net zero', as per AR5 Fig SPM.10 below. As we know the CO2 emissions so far, that sets a budget of CO2 for any measure of temperature rise. And it appears humanity is struggling to stay within a budget commenserate with a +1.5ºC rise, indeed struggling to admit there is any such budget.
But do note that to curtail the temperature rise for a CO2 budget, the 'net zero' event is now followed by decades of 'net negative' when CO2 is drawn down more quickly than nature would manage alone (amounts depending on the scenario) with (for the SSP1-1.9 projections) all our emissions ~2007-to-'net zero' extracted as 'negative' emissions.
And the "warming oceans" you mention are actually a bit of a blessing. Once the energy balance out into space is restored, the "warming oceans" will maintain a cooling of surface temperatures. But of course we do need to get the energy balance up above zeroed.
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EddieEvans at 17:29 PM on 17 January 20232023 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #2
At the risk of being dogmatic, your assessment seems to miss the warming ocean, which cannot be cooled in any foreseeable future. Nuclear weapons, population pressures, plague, and overall loss of sustainable habitat tell me we'll live up to our history, we'll kick the can down the road, and pass the buck to the next generation until there is no next generation. I'm pointing to what I'm reading, seeing, and hearing, and my personal experience. The question is not if, but when. Science cannot answer this question because it's a bit metaphysical. We have no crystal ball, only our history on thi planet.
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Rob Honeycutt at 03:02 AM on 17 January 20232023 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #2
Eddie... @1: Human extinction is highly unlikely in any scenario. Extinctions (plural) of a broad range of wild species is ongoing and likely to worsen. Those extinctions have impacts on humanity. High emissions scenarios could produce a collapse of modern society as we know it. That would entail a great deal of human suffering. But actual human extinction isn't likely.
@3: The recent research on "warming in the pipeline" is suggesting this is incorrect. Once we get carbon emissions down to "net zero" (to the point where atmospheric concentrations stabilize) warming is expected to stop. Currently, with renewables scaling exponentially, we could get to net zero by mid-century. (Haufather)
Climate related impacts are certainly going to keep getting worse until we can get our emissions stabilized. Bringing them back down to, say 350ppm, isn't in the cards any time in the foreseeable future. Thus, I think the climate we have for quite a while is the one where we stabilize emissions. That's a very different world than the one most of us were born into.
...but, again, human extinction? No.
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EddieEvans at 02:25 AM on 17 January 20232023 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #2
I'm basing my comment on what I'm reading and seeing on the Internet and in books. Global ocean warming cannot be stopped or turned around any time soon, and there's plenty of CO2 in the pipeline even if, and when humanity gets it right.
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One Planet Only Forever at 12:54 PM on 16 January 20232023 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #2
EddieEvans,
I am optimistic about the future of humanity. Human history appears to have a long-term trend towards individual activity being governed by ‘the pursuit of increased awareness and improved understanding of what is harmful’. There appears to be more thoughtful leadership limiting the harm done, encouraging people to be more accepting of harmless differences, and encouraging people to be more helpful to Others.
I am encouraged by the development of important global understandings like the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the Sustainable Development Goals, and even the ‘inadequate so far’ global agreements to limit the harm done by climate change impacts.
Some powerful groups try to fight against helpful harm reducing learning. But it is unlikely that their attempts to stifle learning will succeed in the long-term. Unfortunately, as the climate change challenge proves, a lot of harm can be done while they fight their losing battle against improving the future for humanity.
However, I understand that the long-term winners may be the disastrous cases in the past where ‘interests contrary to learning to be less harmful’ become permanently powerful by resisting learning to develop sustainable improvements.
It is tragic when undeserving winners of power and perceptions of superiority relative to others can over-power learning to be less harmful. It is discouraging to see supposedly more advanced people fail to effectively govern and limit harm done. They set very bad examples that others can be tempted to aspire down to (a potentially tragic downward spiral).
Hopefully more people are learning to be less harmful fast enough to govern and limit the harm done by the pursuits of 'more perceptions of superiority' by people who resist learning to be less harmful.
