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Comments 3501 to 3550:
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MA Rodger at 16:41 PM on 28 August 2022Is Nuclear Energy the Answer?
John ONeill @292,
Really?
Maybe I've missed something but it is quite easy to demonstrate that nuclear is not delivering.
It is not a particularly clever analysis by this economist Edgardo Sepulvda. Cutting the world into tiny bits such that a small country with a nuclear power plant or two will suddenly have a big chunk of low carbon electricity capacity arriving in short order. Isn't that inevitable?
Imagine. Shoe-horn a nuclear reactor into Luxembourg, press the on button and bingo - we have a winner!!
A cleverer approach would surely be to take the global view of this. AGW is after all a global problem requiring a global fix.
OurWorldInData shows the meatiest increase in nuclear generation occurred back in 1984 & 1985 when generation jumped by 221TWh/y & 234TWh/y respectively. This compares with the almost exponential rise in wind generation which jumped 265TWh/y in 2021. Or if longer periods are compared, both nuclear and wind increased massively from under 100TWh/y, wind achieving 1,860TWh in the last 17 years, and nuclear 1,730TWh/y over a similar 17 year period. So the numbers are not dissimilar but the nuclear stuff was back over thirty years ago.
Of course, we don't know for certain how tomorrow will shape out but the near-exponential growth in wind generation will presumably continue in coming years, so presumably easily exceeding a linear increase which would be 265TWh/y. Meanwhile for nuclear we know there is 0.058TW of new build expected to switch on in the next six years which. if it arrives on time to give say 90% load factor and none of the existing capacity shuts down, that would result in 76TWh/y increase in low carbon generation, a level well below 30% of the wind delivery.And that is why I say that, in comparison with wind, a sensible analysis shows nuclear not delivering. But then, have I missed something?
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One Planet Only Forever at 09:44 AM on 28 August 2022Cranky Uncle: a game building resilience against climate misinformation
JasonChen,
Perhaps a clarification of the issue being discussed would help. Discourse is only possible when there is a common understanding of what is being discussed.
The issue is the need to help people be less tempted to believe misunderstandings regarding climate science.
There is undeniably a problem of successful efforts to selectively/misleadingly tempt people to want a product or service that they do not 'need'. There is even the hope that people will be so powerfully tempted that they will consider an 'unnecessary want' to be an 'essential need' which will keep them from investigating or recognising harm done. Those marketing efforts include deliberately failing to investigate and inform about, or misinforming about, harmful risks or results of the 'hoped to be popularly needed' product or service.
'Does it work' is therefore regarding how effective the 'game' is at helping a person be less likely to be misled into misunderstanding climate science matters. The objective is to reduce the popular support for unnecessarily harmful human activity.
So it is possible that your perception of the issue is 'a good distance', remote, from the common sense of what the issue is. The popularity of the 'game' is not the issue. Neither is the possibility that someone who is fond of misunderstanding climate science matters would feel 'manipulated' by the game.
If you believe there is a better tool to help limit the popularity of harmful misunderstanding offer it up. It could be helpful beyond the challenge of the popularity of harmful misunderstandings regarding climate science. But it is common sense that it would be wise to use any such 'better' tool in addition to, not instead of, other helpful tools.
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Doug Bostrom at 06:40 AM on 28 August 2022Is Nuclear Energy the Answer?
As (mostly) a bystander to discussions of this kind, I keep thinking that I'm hearing something along the lines of "are winter tires the solution to driving with good traction?" Emphasis on "the."
There's no "the," it seems, if one looks at reality as it unfolds on a daily basis: USEIA Electric Power Monthly with Data for June 2022.
We want simple, "the," but that's very unlikely, is contradicted by plain evidence and facts on the ground. What we actully get is "it depends."
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John ONeill at 23:43 PM on 27 August 2022Is Nuclear Energy the Answer?
Economist Edgardo Sepulvda has analysed the electricity generation profiles, and the concomitant emissions reductions, for thirty OECD countries. 'Over the last 50 years, countries that adopted nuclear power consistently reduced emissions intensity, by more than three times as much as those that went without nuclear.'
He proposes that the faster nuclear builds in the 70s and early 80s occurred when electricity demand was growing faster than GDP, whereas demand more recently in the richer countries has been flat, so long-term investment was discouraged. To have any hope of reducing the impact of climate change, we'll have to increase non-fossil power generation by about 3x at least. Nuclear generation has been static, but that's hardly surprising when some of the governments of many countries with high nuclear percentages - Germany, Japan, South Korea, France, Belgium, Sweden, Switzerland, Taiwan - have been actively trying to reduce or eliminate the industry. So have regional governments - Governor Brown in California, and Governors Mario and Andrew Cuomo, in New York, spent forty years trying to sabotage their respective States' largest low-carbon generators.
Of the twenty fastest deployments of electricity generation per capita, measured by increase in MWh produced per person during deployment, eight were from hydro and nine from nuclear - only three involved wind power.
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/FWpposPaIAIqYC6?format=png&name=900x900
The Olkiluoto reactor in Finland has been a byword for how slow reactor projects can be to come to completion - it has in fact taken seventeen years, just being brought up to full operation now. ( Chinese, Japanese, South Korean, and formerly French reactors have been built and powered up in about four years.) Yet this troubled plant will produce more power than all the wind turbines built in Denmark over the same period. Denmark and Finland have similar populations, though the Danish economy is larger. Denmark is famous for having the world's highest proportion of power from wind, but the electricity emissions of Finland, which has five nuclear reactors, are almost always lower.
Moderator Response:[BL] Links activated.
The web software here does not automatically create links. You can do this when posting a comment by selecting the "insert" tab, selecting the text you want to use for the link, and clicking on the icon that looks like a chain link. Add the URL in the dialog box.You have been advised about this before. Please make the effort to make it easier for readers to follow your links.
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Eclectic at 13:59 PM on 27 August 2022How not to solve the climate change problem
Scvblwxq1 , now you are talking sense, I reckon.
Your tropical deforestation 20% component is rather too high for a long-term nett figure . . . but 25% would be nearer the mark by the time you add in production of cement and steel.
Deforestation is obviously self-limiting . . . as we approach zero natural forest remaining. And even half of that Climate Change legislation's USD369 billion (over 10 years, I gather) would not go far against the underlying causes (Third world poverty and entrenched corruption etc). In perspective: USD369 billion is about 5% of US military expenses over 10 years.
# More effective and logical, imo, would be to aim more at reducing the other roughly 75% of the CO2 problem that comes from fossil fuel usage ~ that is a formidable problem, yet not as intractable as the example you have chosen.
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scvblwxq1 at 09:09 AM on 27 August 2022How not to solve the climate change problem
Getting rid of tropical deforestation would drop greenhouse gas emissions(probably mainly CO2) by 20% would drop the CO2 ppm value from about 420 ppm to about 336 ppm, about the 1980 value.
The US Climate Change bill was $369 billion. The US and the other countries should consider spending most of that money buying up the forests they are burning and making arrangements to take care of displaced people.
Moderator Response:[BL] If you wish to discuss deforestation, there are better places than this thread.
https://skepticalscience.com/trillion-trees.htm
https://skepticalscience.com/REDD_and_climate.html
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scvblwxq1 at 08:35 AM on 27 August 2022How not to solve the climate change problem
The article doesn't mention 3 major sources of CO2 that have been producing more CO2 in modern times.
Forests and grasslands are being converted to farmlands worldwide. Both forest and grasslands take up CO2 constantly compared to cropland that only takes up large quantities of CO2 when the plants get larger and shortly after that they are harvested and no CO2 is taken up by that land until more crops are planted.
Tropical deforestation contributes about 20% of annual global greenhouse gas emission alone. 'Measuring Carbon Emissions from Tropical Deforestation: An Overview' Environmental Defense Fund
The other major source of CO2 that has changed is insects. Insects comprise more than 50% of all animals by weight and are major CO2 producers. The population of the birds that control the insects has dropped by 30% in the United States in the last 50 years and the decline in bird populations is worldwide. Fewer birds means there are more insects eating the plants that have taken up CO2 and releasing it when they exhale.
Moderator Response:[BL] Then maybe it is off-topic? You've been warned. Pay attention to those warnings.
...and reposting comments that have had things moderated out is a rapid path to having comments deleted completely.
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BudRoberts at 07:33 AM on 27 August 2022CO2 lags temperature
The other thing apparent from that graph is that temperature climb rate early in the post-glacial period seriously flattens at the peak. That seems to imply a variation in sensitivity that is not mentioned in the Shakun paper. If that were not the case, the temperature would continue to climb at the faster rate.
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BudRoberts at 06:58 AM on 27 August 2022CO2 lags temperature
Figure 2a in the Shakun paper seems to confirm that the very minor warming due to higher CO2 after the peak temperature is reached following deglaciation is substantially smaller than the effects of the Milankovitch cycles, which clearly dominate earth's climate. Is that not apparent from the graph?
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MA Rodger at 04:48 AM on 27 August 2022Is Nuclear Energy the Answer?
John ONeill @289/290,
You can blame all them cooling problems on the fishes if you like and point to wondrous solutions, but the access to cooling water from rivers for existing nuclear reactors is a problem. Yet in the grand scheme of things, the various problems nuclear would have to address are all-of-them fixable with enough time and effort, even the uranium fuel constraint. And surely even the constraint which Abbott (2012) describes as the "harder one, ... An increased demand for rare metals" is not beyond the wit of man.
But time is a ticking and time-&-tide waits for no man, while there are also limited resources available to address AGW with the competing available technologies.
The challenge set by the OP above is for "nuclear proponents" to provide a demonstration of approaches for fixing all these problems, and fixing them all in a useful and timely manner such that nuclear can then play a significant part of the non-carbon-emitting power required by humanity (which Abbott 2011 totals as 15TW), this within the next couple of decades and without costing an arm and a leg.
Now that is quite a daunting challenge, but perhaps that is the measure of what is needed to set out a case for nuclear.So as 2050 draws ever closer, while discussion of the different approaches to cooling nuclear reactors may be an interesting one, where would demonstrating cooling problems as being fixable (or not) get us?
Perhaps the question should be "How is the ramping-up of global nuclear capacity going?" (Note this is my 'Pudding Test' from up-thread.)
We do have a start-point in today's 0.39TW global nuclear capacity and as of today, the output of that nuclear capacity has been flat-lining for the last two decades.
So not an encouraging start. But maybe there is a new dawn for the technology.The WNA list 53 reactors under construction completing 2022-28 (totalling 0.058TW and comprising 0.019TW, 0.008TW, 0.005TW & 0.009TW in successive years, so no sign of any accelerating in the building although an increase on the 0.004TW/yr average new capacity 2000-16 graphed in this CarbonBrief piece from 2016), this WNA listing seemingly smack up-to-date and pointing to a 0.01TW/yr of new capacity.
The WNA also talk of 0.09TW "on order or planned and over 300 more [that's 300 reactors = 3TW pro rata] are proposed."
Strangely, the WNA also quote numbers from the IEA for 2050 nuclear capacity variously as 0.525TW amd 0.669TW, neither of which seem to match the level of planned/proposed new nuclear described by WNA on the same webpage, a mismatch which goes without comment. But that is the nature of the WNA commentary.
I note they have a page in which it addresses the question "In practice, is a rapid expansion of nuclear power capacity possible?" and they argue in reply that the 1980s saw a large increase in nuclear capacity with a new reactor starting up "an average of one every 17 days. .... So it is not hard to imagine a similar number being commissioned in a decade after about 2015." The actual increase in nuclear generation seen 1980-90 was 0.14TW which would pro rata add 0.39TW 2022-50, less closures of 0.15TW, yielding simplistically a 66% increase to 0.65TW by 2050.
Perhaps it should be a more thoughtful analysis presented in the WNA's Harmony Programme which talks of a 0.033TW build rate 2025-50 and 1.25TW capacity by 2050, although if it is a more thoughtful analysis, that thought is not evident.So "a nuclear realist" as described by Abbott (2011) who "would only suggest that we need about 1 TW of nuclear power as part of our world energy mix" has less daunting challenge, although Abbot (2011) does conclude that "one only has to divide the results, in this paper, by fifteen to see that 1 TW still stretches resources and risks considerably." And the rate of build is yet still deep in the inadequate zone.
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JasonChen at 21:45 PM on 26 August 2022Cranky Uncle: a game building resilience against climate misinformation
That's a good distance from what I said, so I don't have an answer for you.
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John ONeill at 17:33 PM on 26 August 2022Is Nuclear Energy the Answer?
Article on adaptation of French nuclear to climate change.
https://bonpote.com/en/will-nuclear-power-plants-withstand-climate-change-1-2/
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Doug Bostrom at 17:08 PM on 26 August 2022Cranky Uncle: a game building resilience against climate misinformation
Whoa there, Jason. We're still stuck at your first question. You've started a discussion— don't scurry away now.
You asked "does it work?" You were shown where that question is answered. You say you've read those cites, and to have found your question unaddressed.
So in a nutshell, you're saying that Cook is making unsupported claims.
Specifically, how are Cook's assertions "Inoculation has been found to be effective in neutralizing misinformation casting doubt on the scientific consensus on human-caused global warming [2, 6]. Inoculation messages are also long lasting [8]" unfounded?
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JasonChen at 14:18 PM on 26 August 2022Cranky Uncle: a game building resilience against climate misinformation
If you don't want to discuss the article, Doug, obviously there's no obligation to. I followed the first two citations you recommended, found they didn't address any of the interesting questions, and one has limited time for data mining expeditions. I also tried out the app.
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Doug Bostrom at 12:27 PM on 26 August 2022Cranky Uncle: a game building resilience against climate misinformation
We can lead you to water, Jason, but we can't force you to drink.
Sincerely: do youself a favor by finding the answers yourself. You'll find most (if not all) of your questions addressed in the list of citations. Whatever your attitude, belief or intentions, you'll be the better for investing some effort.
Many of the citations above will show up with a link to given article in our glossary/cite system if you hover your cursor over titles. What I personally can do to help is to render the entire citation list into a set of clickable links. Would you like that?
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JasonChen at 04:56 AM on 26 August 2022Cranky Uncle: a game building resilience against climate misinformation
My questions remain, Doug. The in-vitro studies based on recruited panels are one thing, a game app is another. Can it gain any traction with people who aren't being obliged to use it? Is it supposed to? To what extent does it convert versus filter for the already converted? Does it sharpen critical thinking skills generally or on the contrary build commitment to a particular point of view regardless of subsequent input? Which is the goal? How often does it backfire, triggering people's sense they're being manipulated, preached at, or talked down to?
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Doug Bostrom at 02:56 AM on 26 August 2022Skeptical Science New Research for Week #33 2022
Accustomed as we are to using the same tool for providing nearly all of our energy requirements, perhaps part of the challenge here is the mental shift of needing context-dependent replacements.
If one likes "simple," perhaps it's unappealing to need a relative plethora of capture and storage tech where previously everything was centered on combustion and turbines.
We're nonetheless left with the plain fact that our days of "simple" are fleeting, not a permanent feature.
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Doug Bostrom at 02:50 AM on 26 August 2022Halfway point in this year's run of Denial101x - 6 more months to go!
Wol, we could start with legislation demanding that all online comment systems include the option for bullet points. :-)
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Doug Bostrom at 02:48 AM on 26 August 2022Cranky Uncle: a game building resilience against climate misinformation
"...no benefits."
I suppose you're thinking of tangible, material personal benefits that sit in a driveway or a bank account, Jason.
There are other benefits we can seek, such as not embarassing ourselves by being gullible chumps, soft putty in the hands of demagogues etc.
Does it work? That begs another question: did you read the article?
Inoculation has been found to be effective in neutralizing misinformation casting doubt on the scientific consensus on human-caused global warming [2, 6]. Inoculation messages are also long lasting [8]
Those numbers are called "citations," and they lead to "references," foundational support for claims of which we may not be familiar. Here the complete list of references accompanies the article directly inline.
As you become more familiar with scientific literature, you'll understand the value of citations and references. Here you can practice by actually reading Cook's article. When you run into something not plainly obvious to a reader versed in a paper's topic discipline (for the rest of us such as "the sun rises in the east") there'll generally be a supporting citation.
If you see a claim made that is controversial or in doubt and is not supported or that a citation is misapplied, that's when things become potentially interesting, assuming you can articulate the problem.
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John ONeill at 19:30 PM on 25 August 2022Is Nuclear Energy the Answer?
'We currently see in Europe that during heat waves and/or drought that many reactors on rivers have to be shut down due to lack of cooling water.'
The reactors have not been shut down ( or run below full power) because they can't be cooled - the problem is that the rivers downstream of the power plants are already much warmer than normal, so a couple of degrees further from the reactor could push the river beyond limits that have been set to protect fish life. Due to the severe power shortage, some plants have been allowed to exceed these limits. This applies only to at most five of the fourteen inland power stations. The others are equipped with the iconic hyperboloid cooling towers, which reduce run-through water temperatures from a few degrees C hotter, to a few tenths of a degree. In theory, the remaining plants could be retrofitted with cooling towers, but that's unlikely. More than 60% of France's nuclear capacity is currently offline. This follows a decade of the industry being deliberately downgraded by renewables zealots, with the stated goal of reducing nuclear from 75% to 50% of the grid. Hopefully, the country will revert to having an 'energy minister', instead of an ex-Green Party 'minister of the ecological transition'. Changing the system of 'l'ARENH' -'Acces Regule a l'Electricite Nucleaire Historique' - which forces Areva to sell a quarter of it's output at below cost to its competitors, fossil and renewable - would give the industry a healthy capital boost to maintain its systems. Reactors in the USA run at capacity factors over 90%, and time their maintenance for either spring or fall, when power demand is lowest. Most of them have also had their capacity boosted by up to 25%, as increased knowledge of the reactors' behaviour allowed them to be run at higher power levels. France has traditionally aimed for highest availability in winter, when electrical heating placed most demand on the grid. Rising temperatures, and increased use of air conditioning, will force a change to a schedule more like the US. New accident-tolerant fuels, combined with higher enrichment, will allow reactors to run for two years straight, instead of eighteen months, further reducing downtime.
One retrofit that could be cheaply applied is a recently developed system to harvest water from the cooling tower plume, further cutting water use by about a third. A wire grid can be installed at the top end of the tower, to collect water droplets, but most of them just go round the wires. By beaming ions at the water vapour column, the droplets pick up a charge, and are instead attracted to the grid. There is no loss of efficiency, and not much installation needed. The harvested water is extremely pure, and could be used for domestic supply in a pinch.
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Eclectic at 16:25 PM on 25 August 2022How not to solve the climate change problem
Scvblwxq1 @10 and prior :
Your arguments seem to be rapidly moving their goalposts, or (perhaps) are turning into a drip-feed sort of Gish Gallop.
The points you try to make have all been addressed many times before (over decades!) . . . and it is high time you educated yourself about them (if that was indeed your intention?). Please read through the "Climate Myths" and other information available at SkepticalScience etcetera.
The regurgitation of inaccurate & debunked Myths does become more boring than entertaining, in the eyes of readers here.
That said, it was rather entertaining that you implied all the climate scientists are wrong because more New Yorkers are moving to the warmer climate of Florida (than vice versa). ;-)
Still, if you do actually have valid argument to support your claim of gross scientific error . . . then now would be a good time to make it.
(Heh ... still chuckling about them thar rich elderly Northeners. )
Moderator Response:[BL] If scvblwxq1 wishes to continue to participate here, scvblwxq1 needs to do two things:
- Find an appropriate thread, using the search function or the list of Most Common Climate Myths. Both of these are available in the upper left of every page.
- Read the posts that point out why these are myths.
- Actually make a coherent argument in support of the statements that he is making.
Three things! Three things that scvblwxq1 needs to do if he wishes to continue posting here!
As eclectic says, seeing these simple, wrong, often-repeated claims gets boring.
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JasonChen at 15:46 PM on 25 August 2022Cranky Uncle: a game building resilience against climate misinformation
Procter and Gamble and other large companies who want to persuade people to their point of view spend billions on ads to make the brand name familiar, build good associations with it, and convey the benefits you might get from buying it.
This is a very different approach. No brand name, no positive associations, no benefits. Find people with low critical thinking skills, give them a game designed to perhaps improve their skills, perhaps innoculate them against specific skeptic arguments.
Does it work, for whatever definition of work it aims at?
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scvblwxq1 at 13:57 PM on 25 August 2022How not to solve the climate change problem
The IPCC says that CO2 only stays in the atmosphere for 4 years average before it is converted to sugar by plants or dissolves in the ocean. That means the CO2 from fossil fuels have allowed more plants to grow and that means more animals eating them and exhaling CO2.
Moderator Response:[BL] This one is interesting (almost). You are clearly confused about what the the IPCC says about CO2 and what it means. Numbers in the 4-5 year time span indicate the residence time of a single molecule - how long one molecule will remain in the atmosphere before it is removed into some other carbon storage.
But the residence time has very little to do with how long it will take for the natural systems to compensate for the atmospheric addition of CO2 by burning fossil fuels. CO2 levels will remain high for centuries.
And guess what? This has already been addressed here at Skeptical Science.
Allowing plants to grow? Also address here, in the "CO2 is plant food" topic.
And most of your repetition of common myths is off-topic for this thread. You need to read the Comments Policy. For your convenience, I will provide the first four items in the policy - all of which you are violating.
- All comments must be on topic. Comments are on topic if they draw attention to possible errors of fact or interpretation in the main article, of if they discuss the immediate implications of the facts discussed in the main article. However, general discussions of Global Warming not explicitly related to the details of the main article are always off topic. Moderation complaints are always off topic and will be deleted
- Make comments in the most appropriate thread. Some comments, while strictly on topic, may relate to issues discussed in more detail in some other thread. Extended discussion of those points should be carried out in the more appropriate thread, with link backs to reference the discussion as needed. Moderator's directions to move discussion to a more appropriate thread should always be followed.
- Comments should avoid excessive repetition. Discussions which circle back on themselves and involve endless repetition of points already discussed do not help clarify relevant points. They are merely tiresome to participants and a barrier to readers. If moderators believe you are being excessively repetitive, they will advise you as such, and any further repetition will be treated as being off topic.
- No sloganeering. Comments consisting of simple assertion of a myth already debunked by one of the main articles, and which contain no relevant counter argument or evidence from the peer reviewed literature constitutes trolling rather than genuine discussion. As such they will be deleted. If you think our debunking of one of those myths is in error, you are welcome to discuss that on the relevant thread, provided you give substantial reasons for believing the debunking is in error. It is asked that you do not clutter up threads by responding to comments that consist just of slogans.
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scvblwxq1 at 13:41 PM on 25 August 2022How not to solve the climate change problem
I remember the Global Gooling movement that ended in the 60's and the Global Warming movement that started in the 70's and ended around 2000. Now it is Climate Change which really means Global Warming. It's 50 years of global warming movements that just haven't shown that enough warming is going to happen anytime soon enough to stop people from moving to warmer cllimates. Many more people are moving to warmer climates than are moving to colder climates every year.
Moderator Response:[BL] It is beginning to look like you are reading through the Most Common Climate Myths page, and picking items that you want to post -one-liners about.
The "Global Cooling movement" was never a movement, and the myth is about the 1970s, not the 1960s, so your memory is faulty. You can read about why it is a myth on this page.
You can also read about the myth that "they changed the name from global warming to climate change" on this page.
There is no such thing as "the global warming movement". If you are trying to argue that climate scientists are in it for the money, you should read this post.
If you are trying to claim that warming isn't happening as fast as predicted, you need to read this post.
Congratulations. One paragraph, and at least four previously-debunked myths!
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nigelj at 07:18 AM on 25 August 2022Skeptical Science New Research for Week #33 2022
David acct @9. You keep highlighting periods of several days where weather has not much wind thus reducing output of wind farms. Where I live gas peaker plants make up for this deficit, if required, and this seems common practice in the world. Do you not realise it works that way? Eventually in NZ gas peaker plants will be replaced by storage.
The government is considering pumped hydro storage at Lake Onslow (you can google this if you are interested). It comes down to the costs and practicalities of storage as previously stated. However pumped hydro is proven practical technology and is used in places like Australia. I also endorse what MS is saying.
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michael sweet at 06:58 AM on 25 August 2022Skeptical Science New Research for Week #33 2022
David-acct:
The authors name is "Clack", my spell checker changes it to " Clark". I note that there was controversy because some people listed as authors did no work on the paper. We will leave that aside.
I don't think you understand scientific argument the same as I do. In 2015 Jacobson et al published what they thought was right. They had data for the USA and found renewables were as reliable as fossil fuels and only a little more expensive. Clack et al published what they thought Jacobson said that was wrong. The primary issue was the use of hydro power. Jacobson replied.
Back in 2017 there was a question of who was correct. I thought Jacobson was correct but I think you would have agreed with Clack.
Science advances by people obtaining more data and making better arguments. In 2018 Jacobson published a new paper where he showed 100% renewable energy in 139 countries was as reliable as fossil fuels and cost about the same as fossil fuels. He treated hydro power as Clack had suggested and adjusted his model to correct the other issues Clack had raised. Clack did not raise any issues with this new paper which indicates that he felt his issues were addressed properly.
In 2022 Jacobson has a new paper (linked above) about 145 countries. Now renewable energy is much cheaper than fossil fuels and more reliable. Jacobson uses primarily batteries to store electricity instead of more exotic storage way back in 2015. His model uses a much better weather model testing every 30seconds where he tested every 5 minutes in 2015. He has adjusted his argument to include changes, like the immense decrease in cost of batteries, solar and wind, that have occurred since 2015. No one has challenged his 2022 paper.
You are wasting our time arguing about Jacobson 2015. It has been superseded three times. Even if Clack had been correct way back in 2015, Jacobson has answered all the issues Clack raised in his subsequent papers. You need to address Jacobson 2022 if you have any questions. New data has shown that Clack was wrong and Jacobson was right.
Breyer et al 2022, previously linked above, has over 460 references. Virtually all of them show that 100% renewable energy is cost effective and as reliable as fossil fuels.
If you want to argue that renewables are limited, you need to address current thinking and not try to argue that people in the distant past were incorrect. Your claim that Jacobson did not address periods of low wind or solar is simply wrong. Read Jacobson 2022 and Breyer 2022.
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Bob Loblaw at 04:50 AM on 25 August 2022How not to solve the climate change problem
scvblwxq1:
Yes we know that solar output has been decreasing. But this purported "cooling" just isn't happening, Things are warming up, instead. Maybe there is some other factor involved?
If you think we're heading towards another glacial period (within the current ice age), you're worrying about something that would not happen until the distant future.
If you think that warming is going to be good for us, you need to think again.
Please take discussions of these arguments to the appropriate thread, as indicated by the links I have provided.
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scvblwxq1 at 02:56 AM on 25 August 2022How not to solve the climate change problem
The Earth is in a grand solar minimum and the total solar irradiance(the energy Earth receives from the sun) has been dropping, the recent high value was about in 2002. There was an increase in 2015 but is was below 2002. The Earth won't warm while it is receiving less energy. The total solar irradiance during the recent solar minimum period measured by SOHO/VIRGO.
We are still in the 2.588 million year ice age called the Quaternary Glaciation. That isn't going to change until all the permanent ice on Earth melts and 11% of the planet is permafrost. We already have to live in heated house and travel in heated vehicles. The average temperature of the US is 52 degrees which is colder that the 60 degrees people can stand for a long period.
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Bob Loblaw at 02:45 AM on 25 August 2022How not to solve the climate change problem
For what it is worth, RealClimate also has an older post (March 2020) on bad papers in the "Climate change is caused by solar radiation" subject area. Triggered by the retracted Zharkova paper, but a broader discussion.
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MA Rodger at 23:03 PM on 24 August 2022Remote sensing helps in monitoring arctic vegetation for climate clues
David-acct @3,
So you are actually saying that tree-line records assist in providing "a better proxy for temp," not that they are better relative to "proxies such as tree-rings," although you still suggest tree-line data would "most likely" have precedence over tree-ring data when the two datasets show differing results, but I'm not sure why that would be.
As for that 'Yamal controversy', I don't think there was anything that would have abated that particular denyospheric storm because the last thing the perpetrators were seeking was "reconciliation."
The subject review of tree-lines of Harsch et al (2009) 'Are treelines advancing? A global meta-analysis of treeline response to climate warming' is still a good start to understand the value of tree-line records as temperature proxies, to which we can now also add Hannson et al (2021) 'A review of modern treeline migration, the factors controlling it and the implications for carbon storage'
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Bob Loblaw at 22:23 PM on 24 August 2022Remote sensing helps in monitoring arctic vegetation for climate clues
Any vegetation-based measure of "climate" needs to address three factors:
- What is it about vegetation that you are measuring? The remote sensing disucssion in the post will be looking at changes in radiation that are linked to changes in physical characteristics of some sort. Ground-truthing can assess physical characterisitcs directly.
- How does that physical characteristic change with respect to weather or climate? What other factors affect that physical characteristic?
- How long does it take for that physical characteristic to respond?
In the case of tree rings vs. treeline, the response time is very different. Rings show annual effects, while tree line takes decades or longer to change. That means that tree line has a built-in "climate" averaging - less affected by extremes in a single year, or other short-term factors such as insect outbreaks. It will not respond quickly to rapid shifts in climate, though.
Tree rings can be measured as changes in width, or density, or other structural characteristics of the wood. Both temperature and moisture will have an effect, as will insect or disease outbreaks. Rate of growth also changes as a tree ages, so this is factored into the analysis. And data will be collected from trees of varying ages, to look for consistency.
In addition to tree line, things like pollen analysis in local sediments can tell about species abundance and changes over time.
And as David-acct says, reconcilliation across multiple sources of analysis is important. That's why reconstructions of past climates from proxy data bring together large numbers of proxies of different types - to search for common signals.
An old post here at SkS talks about some of this:
https://skepticalscience.com/new-remperature-reconstruction-vindicates.html
It is also worth noting that the common Koppen Climate Classification system - where we get terms such as "continental", "maritme", "temperate" etc. that are part of the common language of climate - was originally developed to explain vegetation patterns. The links between climate and vegetation are strong.
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David-acct at 20:40 PM on 24 August 2022Remote sensing helps in monitoring arctic vegetation for climate clues
MA Rodger - you raise a good point on why the tree line records can be better proxies for temps than tree rings.
The primary reason is that the tree line is a good cross check against the tree ring proxies. The location of the tree line in the past is a strong indicator of warmer or lower temps. So if the tree ring proxies show colder temps (or comparable temps) with present day, but the tree line is farther north (or higher), then most likely, the calibration of the tree rings is off.
If nothing else, the tree line serves as a basis for reconciliation. partly noted in the yamal controversy
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MA Rodger at 19:59 PM on 24 August 2022Remote sensing helps in monitoring arctic vegetation for climate clues
David-acct @1,
The subject is evidently not that interesting as the lead author has not continued the work, at least not in the last decade. (The paper dates to 2007). As for tree-line records being "a better proxy for temp than proxies such as tree rings," in what way is that?
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David-acct at 11:36 AM on 24 August 2022Remote sensing helps in monitoring arctic vegetation for climate clues
www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2606780/
interesting study on the tree lines in russian artic region during the holecene period.
this should provide some context and comparison with the common era past with respect to the current warming
The is some indication that the tree line is a better proxy for temp than proxies such as tree rings.
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David-acct at 11:19 AM on 24 August 2022Skeptical Science New Research for Week #33 2022
Michael - Can you point to studies where the Clark critique has been discredited by any experts with real world experience. The only rebuttal I located was from Jacobson which was quite superficial. The critiques of Jacobson are based partly on the unrealistic assumptions for future storage capacity along with the failure to properly address the frequent drop in electric generation from renewables due to the variations of weather..
Again in my world, due diligence is imperative. In my world , we dont rely on what someone claims in a study just because they said it was true. We test against other known data. I provided the EIA website link which allows you review actual electric generation by source on a real time basis. I previously mentioned the Feb 2021 drought of wind and solar production which affected most of the north american continent for 7-9 days.
The EIA website for just the 8 months of 2022 shows drops in wind and solar generation in the USA
Feb 23 - march 3, 9 days average drop of electric generation from renewables approx 60-70%
May 3-7 4 days 50% -60% drop
June 1 - June 12 10-12 days, average drop of electric generation from renewables approx 60-70%
July 4th through August 22, approx 50 days where electric generation dropped by 2/3 with the exception of 8 days where the electric generation only dropped by 1/3.
Additionally, there were numerous other days that had significant drops in generation from wind and solar.
I saw nothing in Jacobson's analysis that addresses those frequent periods of 3-4 days or the 40-50 days drop in electric generation from wind/renewables in a realistic fashion.
comparing and contrasting the quality of the competing analysis, and comparing real time data (due diligence ), the clark et al critique has the better analysis of the feasibility.
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Eclectic at 10:31 AM on 24 August 2022How not to solve the climate change problem
Typo correction from @4 :
(last paragraph)
... a GSM typically will produce a global cooling of 0.5 degrees or less ...
!!!
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Eclectic at 10:20 AM on 24 August 2022How not to solve the climate change problem
Scvblwxq1 , may I offer a couple of points to save you time (and you may wish to check them against the record of published scientific papers & expert views).
A / The length of interglacials varies considerably. You are correct in saying that an interglacial length does average somewhere around 10,000 years. Yet the present Milankovitch cycle has an unusually low level of ellipticity ~ which likely results in a long interglacial . . . thought to extend for 20-30,000 years (as best as can be judged from prior effects of the Milankovitch cycles during the past million years). In other words, the deep glaciation will next occur in something around 15,000 years from now.
So there is no need to hurry to warm our planet. And it has been estimated that the current (420ppm) level of atmospheric CO2 has already exceeded the level required to make a major postponement in the next glaciation that you were worried about. A postponement of some tens of thousands of years. And so the present-day concern is the adverse effects of the current rapid global warming.
B / Will the proposed Grand Solar Minimum have a (beneficial) cooling effect on planetary temperatures? Evidently not ~ for a GSM typically will produce a global warming of 0.5 degrees or less : and that effect will be insufficient to counter our ongoing AGW of approx 0.18 degrees per decade. Sorry, but there is more warming ahead (even if Prof. Zharkova's very uncertain predictions of GSM turn out to be mostly correct).
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Bob Loblaw at 04:58 AM on 24 August 2022CO2 is coming from the ocean
Likeitwarm:
Glad to hear that you find the resource useful. Just remember: on the upper left of every page (just below the masthead banner) there is a search box and links to the most common climate myths. Always at your fingertips (or whatever you click your mouse or trackball with). Make it your friend.
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Bob Loblaw at 04:42 AM on 24 August 2022How not to solve the climate change problem
scvblwxq1:
That particular paper by Zharkova was previously mentioned in the weekly Skeptical Science New Research post back when it appeared in 2020. Quoting from that post:
The Taylor and Francis journal Temperature has squeezed in a paper by Valentina Zharkova claiming (yet again) upcoming global cooling, as an "editorial." Zharkova's work is a redo of a previous publication that was retracted due to a basic misunderstanding on the behavior of the barycenter of the solar system.
You can read about the previous paper in this thread at PubPeer:
https://pubpeer.com/publications/3418816F1BA55AFB7A2E6A44847C24#
and the retraction was noted at Retraction Watch. The blogger And Then There's Physics was involved in noting some of the many issues with the earlier paper, and wrote several blog posts on the subject:
https://andthentheresphysics.wordpress.com/2019/07/07/nature-scientific-reports/
https://andthentheresphysics.wordpress.com/2019/07/25/retract/
https://andthentheresphysics.wordpress.com/2020/01/13/zharkova-et-al-an-update/
https://andthentheresphysics.wordpress.com/2020/03/04/zharkova-et-al-retracted/
Zharkova makes a habit of beating this drum, and the results are rarely worth reading. To coin a phrase, this is nothing new under the sun.
Moderator Response:[BL] Corrected third link to And Then There's Physics.
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scvblwxq1 at 04:13 AM on 24 August 2022How not to solve the climate change problem
I forgot to include the link to an article explaining the calculations and forecast.
'Modern Grand Solar Minimum will lead to terrestrial cooling
Valentina Zharkova'https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/23328940.2020.1796243
Moderator Response:[BL] Link activated.
The web software here does not automatically create links. You can do this when posting a comment by selecting the "insert" tab, selecting the text you want to use for the link, and clicking on the icon that looks like a chain link. Add the URL in the dialog box. -
scvblwxq1 at 04:02 AM on 24 August 2022How not to solve the climate change problem
The Sun has entered a Grand Solar Minimun that will last from 2020 to 2053 and will cool the Earth. Solar irradiance has already started declining. The worst will be from 2028 to 2032 when crop failurs due to cold wet weather are widespread. The cold will cause the oceans to absorb CO2 and it will get colder. We are still in the 2.588 million-year ice age called the Quaternary Glaciation. The interglacial period is usually aboout 10,000 years. It has been 11,700 since the last glacial period which suggests that with the cold another 90,000 year glacial period might be starting.
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Likeitwarm at 03:58 AM on 24 August 2022CO2 is coming from the ocean
@Bob Loblaw
I agree. I should have searched your site more thoroughly before making that post. Just trying to figure out who to believe. SKS seems to have a lot of supporting science.
On the topic, I see adding more CO2 to the atmosphere would also increase it in the ocean by whatever the ratio is.
Thanks for the education.
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Eclectic at 22:27 PM on 23 August 2022There's no tropospheric hot spot
MA Rodger @35 , many thanks for your self-sacrifice in undertaking a summarization of the Piers Corbyn effusions at that Reading Uni. site.
Hardened as I am by years of scanning through the denialist blogsite WUWT , nevertheless Corbyn gave me a leaden feeling after even a few paragraphs of his stuff. Further skimming did not give indications of any likely intellectual benefit ~ unlike with WUWT , where sometimes a spoonful of wheat can be found amongst the chaff.
Another denialist blogsite, Dr Judith Curry's ClimateEtc , can be crossed off the list of interesting denialist websites. It had always been a more genteel version of WUWT , in lacking WUWT's vitriol ~ but in recent months it has developed a dreariness, owing to the gradual disappearance of that small band of sane commenters who are capable of lifting the average. A month or so ago, there were a few comments by "Dikran Marsupial" (a worthy scientific commenter at SkS in earlier years) . . . but that has been the only point of light in the recent darkness.
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MA Rodger at 19:23 PM on 23 August 2022There's no tropospheric hot spot
Cedders @33,
And having had a read of that PDF...
Cedders @33,
Having examined the PDF (16 pages not 24), it is quite evident that it is a pile of utter nonsense, a "welcome to the lunatic asylum" message and not anything in any way scientifically-based.The author is Piers Corbyn, a well-kown denialist and an elder brother of Jeremy Corbyn (a long-serving left-wing Labour MP who bizarrely gained the heady position of Leader of the Labour Party for 4½ years).
Piers Corbyn is described in Wikithing as "an English weather forecaster, businessman, anti-vaxxer and conspiracy theorist" and does feature here at SkS being (1) Cited within a spot of denialism of 2015 in the Daily Express tabloid/comic, (2) The main source of a pile of climate nonsense of 2013 from the then Mayor of London Alexander Boris von Pfiffle Johnson, a man now renowned throughout the known world for not being particularly truthful, (3) Listed here at SkS as a denialsit with zero peer-reviewed writings.
The 16 page thesis linked up-thread @33 is a 2019 thesis presented to the Reading University Debating Journal and sitting at the top of a list of 24 such theses posted 2018-19, top of the list because it is the most recent (the journal lasted less than a year), a list which addresses such important topics as 'Why Self-Service Checkouts are the Invention of the Devil' and 'The Great University of Reading Catering Con: Man Shall Not Live off Sandwiches Alone' and an anonymous piece 'Why I Support the Conservatives: The Most Successful Party in British History'.
The Piers Corbyn thesis begins by citing David Legates' dismissal of the 97% AGW consensus before dismissing that because "it is about facts; and no Global-Warming Inquisition is going to prevent me exposing their nonsensical theories."
Corbyn then kicks off by asserting anthropogenic CO2 comprises 4% of atmospheric CO2 (thus confusing FF carbon with naturally-cycled carbon) and that CO2 is not the main controller of global temperature (here presenting a graphic which confuses the US temperature with global temperature - shown below in this comment).
A further assertion is then presented, that CO2 is the result of warming oceans with six references/notes provided in support which seem to all point back to crazy denialist Murry Salby.
So, a la Salby, the present rise in CO2 is claimed to result from the good old Medieval Warm Period. A graphic is presented comparing a denialist 1,000y temperature record (based on the schematic FAR Fig 7c) with the much-confirmed scientifically-based Hockey Stick graph.
This brings us to the halfway page of Corbyn's denialist rant.The thesis continues with pageful of misunderstanding of how the GH-effect works, ending with accusations that this misunderstood 'theory' breaks the 2nd Law of Thermodynamics (or it does if you misinterpret the 2nd Law of Thermodynamics).
Happily, this misunderstanding is considered to be not supported by "better scientists" who consider the lapse rate. And this indeed is a 'better' consideration. But here Corbyn perhaps confuses the tropical 'hot spot' (which is caused by increased tropical rainfall transporting more latent up into the troposphere) with some CO2 effect. (The 'hot spot' results from a warmer tropics and not per se any enhanced GH-effect.) And he fails to address the reasons why there is difficulty detecting this tropical 'hot spot'. Indeed he brands it as a 'coldspot' that he seems to say is caused by "more CO2 & other GHGs" which cause a diurnal fluctuation in the IR "heat-exit height" to become greater and, due to the 4th-power in the SB equation, this causes cooling. Whether such a phenomenon extends beyond the tropics (thus globally more-than negating the 'hot spot') is not properly explained but, due to the lapse rate this phenomenon can apparently also negate "the original expected surface warming."A first graphic box is presented with three unsubstantiated bullet points explaining "Why CO2 theory does not work" alongside two similar "apart from"s.
A second graphic box also titled "Why CO2 theory does not work" states:-In the real atmosphere there are day/night temperature fluctuations (eg in upper atmosphere). They are larger with more CO₂ because CO₂ (infra red absorber / emitter) gains & loses heat easier than N₂ & O₂ and so enables all the air to adjust quicker.
This is a fundamentally different explanation from the previous fluctuation in IR "heat-exit height" explanation described earlier, and it is still wrong.
(A packet of air with X concentrations of CO2 will both emit and absorb an IR photons of quantity P. With absorb=emit, it is thus in equilibrium. Add CO2 so the concentration is doubled to 2X, and the emitting photons will double to 2P and the absorbed photons will also double to 2P so absorb=emit and the same equilibrium is maintained. The main result is that twice the level if IR emission has half the pathlength before absorption so at any point the IR flux remains unchanged. And CO2 does not "gain & lose heat easier than N₂ & O₂" when it remains thermally coupled to the N₂ & O₂. )
The remainder of this second graphic box on PDF page 9 is a little too confused to rebut with any confidence. A diurnal range of "about 5 or 6 deg" is given which is apparently a temperature range yet whatever “deg” means (presumably Kelvin), the bulk of the troposphere has a far smaller diurnal range than even 5ºF. The mechanism for the enhanced cooling from the "heat-exit height" is presented as due to a fluctuating temperature losing more heat (by radiating IR) than a constant temperature (which is true). A rather dodgy-looking equation is followed by the note "Detail subject under research" but no reference is given and three-years-on there is no sign of such "research."
And a third graphic box is shown on the next page also titled "Why CO2 theory does not work," this third such graphic mainly presenting a pair of images from Australian denialist David M. W. Evans who has his own SkS page of climate misinformation.
The thesis then turns to the proposition that it is not CO2 but solar forces that "rules climate temperature" with the dotted line on the graphic below described as such a ruling influence. It apparently shows how the "9.3yr lunar-nodal crossing & the full 22yr solar magnetic cycle" allegedly shift the jet stream and "many circulation patterns." The graphic's 60-yr periodicity is less than convincing,being fitted to US rather than global temperature which, when extended beyond the 1895-2008 period shows itself to be simple curve-fitting (eg the Berkeley Earth US temperature record 1820-2020 does not show it, even to a blind man). The graphic was presented by Corbyn at the Heartland Institute's 2009 conflab in NY in which Corbyn [audio] insists other findings demonstrate “something is going on” but why it is this graphic being reused in this 2019 thesis is not clear – perhaps the forecast of world temperature dropping to 1970s levels by 2030 is too evident on other slides he used in that Heartland presentation.
To support his thesis Corbyn mentions an alleged cover-up by the likes of the BBC in reporting only global warming when the 'true' data shows cooling, the reported support for all this Piers Corbyn craziness from oil companies who shy away only because they want to use AGW to "make higher profits" and how these AGW-inspired mitigation agendas are already directly responsible for needlessly killing "millions" annually.
The thesis ends with a challenge:-It is for this reason that I, Piers Corbyn, challenge whoever is willing in Reading University or other appropriate institutions to a debate on the failed Global warming scam vs evidence-based science.
So I interpret the thesis as a "welcome to the lunatic asylum" message from Piers Corbyn.
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nigelj at 10:43 AM on 23 August 2022Skeptical Science New Research for Week #33 2022
I believe renewables can work. Break the issue down to the absolute basics. Renewables are intermittent sources of energy but this can be solved by storage and / or overbuild. There can be no real debate about this because its basic engineering and physics. Therefore its all about practicality and costs (and practicality comes down to costs anyway). I'm ignoring smart grids for the sake of simplicity.
Studies I've seen suggest renewables can easily be cost effective at 80% grid penetration, and should be cost effective at 100% grid penetration. Either option is great for the climate although 100% penetration is obviously best.
I don't have time to search out links analysing costs. I just wanted to make the point that 1) to understand the issue and have the correct starting point for discussion, first break the issue down to something that can't be realistically disputed or reduced further. Although the denialists will try I suppose and 2) we don't have to have a 100% penetration of renewables to make a difference although 100% penetration is desirable. There are many storage options including battery farms, pumped hydro, electrofuels, etc, etc.
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Bob Loblaw at 10:19 AM on 23 August 2022CO2 is coming from the ocean
The link to the OA not OK part 9 that OPOF mentions is this:
https://skepticalscience.com/Mackie_OA_not_OK_post_9.html
You can find links to each part of the entire series on that page, and you can also download a booklet containing the entire story.
https://skepticalscience.com/Mackie_OA_not_OK_part_21.html
LIkeitwarm: You seriously need to stop believing some of the claptrap you are reading. Posting these one-liners is just running through the list of Most Common Climate Myths. Please try to come up with something that has not been debunked many times over.
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One Planet Only Forever at 10:04 AM on 23 August 2022CO2 is coming from the ocean
Likeitwarm @15,
Maybe the SkS post "OA not OK Part 9: Henry the 8th I was (*)" would help unpuzzle you.
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One Planet Only Forever at 09:54 AM on 23 August 2022CO2 is coming from the ocean
Likeitwarm @15,
"Who ever he was/is" also applies to the question of the merit of 'climate science' comments made by a blogger named Bud Bromley who has a strange range of blog topics.
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Likeitwarm at 09:24 AM on 23 August 2022CO2 is coming from the ocean
According to Bud Bromley, Henry's Law (who ever he was) governs how much CO2 is in the oceans and atmosphere and nothing humans do will change that. Explains in his blog post. So, I'm puzzled, now.
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michael sweet at 08:42 AM on 23 August 2022Skeptical Science New Research for Week #33 2022
David-acct:
It is discouraging when someone says "I completely agree with you that everyone should read the literature to become fully informed" and then cites an old, discredited paper like Clack et al 2017 (typo in citation in post 6 above). Clack's primary complaint was how hydropower was handled. Jacobson 2017 shows that issue does not affect the result. All Clacks' 2017 issues have been solved.
Since 2015 Jacobson has updated his work about every two years. Renewable energy has gone down in price much more than expected so now renewable energy not only can deliver all energy, it is much, much cheaper than fossil fuels. Jacobson et al 2022 is state of the art. A lot has changed since 2015. Try to stay current. As I mentioned above, Jacobson now uses batteries as a major energy storage system.
Breyer et al 2022 reviews the history and current status of scientific thought on All Energy Renewable Energy Systems. There are multiple solutions to the issue of intermittent wind. Jacobson does not use any combustion, he believes the pollution from burning is not worth it. Other solutions are cheaper. Even with no combustion, renewable energy is much cheaper and more dependable than fossil fuels. (Think low gas supplies currently in Europe and recently in Texas).
Scientists have shown that large renewable grids are much cheaper than small grids like EPCOT. I do not care if wind was low in a small area like ERCOT. I note that consumers in Texas have been charged several billion dollars extra in the last decade because the grid in Texas is set up to fleece consumers.
Jacobson models the entire world in 30 second intervals using 3 years of weather data. He counts the entire contenental USA as one grid. Renewables provide all energy more reliably than the current grid. Texas will have to upgrade to be with the rest of the USA. If the wind in Texas in Feb 2021 was an issue Clack would have published on it by now. The fact that he hasn't tells me it is not an issue.
