Here’s an open thread for various climate science related discussions, to prevent more off-topic clutter everywhere else. We have some good posts coming up, but if you want to discuss something you read in the media, saw in a press release or just wanted to ask about, this is the time.
Some interesting things we’ve seen recently include discussions on the epistimology of climate modelling, Andy Dessler’s adventures in debate land and his new paper on water vapour trends, and a review of trends in the Columbia glacier. Have at it.
Addendum: Kevin McKinney has beaten us to the mention of this, but another recent article of importance is a thorough review of the state of knowledge of drought, past and future, by Dai. The article is open access here.
It seems like the Canadians are demonstrating how government and corporations can work in the common interest. the common interest? economics
This all leads to the need to keep a massive forest project in the public domain, literally, such that it serves the common good. see lead pic of clip 2, good example of public forest in BC, definitely no morality involved, corporate or regulatory.
445 Hank Roberts,
I have been trying to steer clear of the horrors of deforestation all over the world, and instead, simply construct a completely new system. This does not mean that there is not a lot to learn from those working to avoid deforestation.
I guess it can be said that the tree project I bring up could be measured against the need to balance deforestation, but that is a battle I can not win. Thus, I leave it to others, and simply relate to ‘carbon’ capture being planned by the EPA. Maybe someone can think bigger than me on this, but for now, it seems a big enough big-think for me.
And let me repeat, this is only a matter of me bringing up some old stuff and relating it to a different problem, in a slightly different way. And I see no way to make any money on it.
432, JiminMpls: The rest of the world must take action: Place a 100% tarrif on all US goods and services until the USA reduces carbon emissions top 20% of 1990 levels.
Do you think that the WTO would really do this? Most members, including the EU states, are not really much better than the US; not to mention the BRIC countries.
451 flxible
Thanks for that link. Canadian corporations and USA corporations seem equally adept at misusing resources.
I think the mistake is in believing anything said by a corporation. Anywhere, of any kind, always.
And still we need this form of business entity.
Government has a job and the only way it will do it is if people really understand what is going on and demand that governments step up to their job. If that does not happen, capitalism will certainly fail.
I try to operate on the assumption that some sanity will prevail. So far, there is not a lot to support this. I have long believed that the reason capitalism has looked so good is that there have been vast resources to plunder.
But let’s get back to constructive thinking.
I have long believed that the reason capitalism has looked so good is that there have been vast resources to plunder.
And you think the way to “fix” this is to further plunder ever diminishing resources in order to maintain that capitalist economy for an increasingly unsustainable population in the face of the diaster it has wrought? Incomprehensible.
455 flxible
Huh?
Who said anything about plunder?
Well, I guess you see using water otherwise draining into the ocean as plunder. Or is it plunder to plant trees on land that otherwise is not doing much? These uses of resources do not seem like plundering to me.
I argue for controlling corporate actions in a way that keeps their actions within limits such that they serve the common purpose of us all. But I do put our common purpose in context of our present developed world standard of living. Of course, we could give up on that, but I would not want to try to sell 18th century lifestyles.
I see plundering as the waste that comes about from our system of central power plants, where much more energy in heat is wasted than is converted to electricity. I look to fixing that over time, but do not see that it can be done except on a gradual, long term plan.
“the United States will do absolutely nothing to curb greenhouse gas emissions.”
Obama’s EPA is shutting down Mountaintop Removal coal mining for “environmental” reasons [water pollution].
Obama’s Department of Labor is shutting down an underground mine because of safety violations and deaths of miners.
Nothing was done for the previous 30 or more years on either of these situations.
Obama’s EPA is considering changing the rules so that coal ash will be treated as hazardous waste. It is more correct to say that coal ash is low level radioactive waste, but it must happen one step at a time. Disruptions must be limited to a manageable level. Treating coal ash as hazardous waste puts coal ash within the jurisdiction of the EPA without having to change any laws.
The engine making the CO2 can be shut off either at the input end or at the exhaust end. Coal ash is the exhaust end. If coal ash cannot be disposed of cheaply or at a profit, burning coal becomes impossible. Electric utilities will be liable for cleaning up the hazardous coal ash that they have already created. WHEN coal ash is admitted to be radioactive waste, burning coal will be impossible and a great controversy will ensue.
http://www.ornl.gov/ORNLReview/rev26-34/text/coalmain.html
Conclusion: The Obama Administration is taking action at the maximum bureaucratic speed to curb CO2 emissions in the absence of congressional action.
All 3 of the above actions raise the cost of coal. These 3 actions are the “stealth” strategy for limiting CO2 emissions. They make the alternatives more attractive. Coal is the source of energy that makes the most CO2. In all 3 cases, old laws are enforced for the first time. New laws are not required. All that is required is a president who is determined to do something about CO2.
We could even say that the Cap & Trade bill was the camouflage or sacrificial distraction or feint attack.
Obama is very cleverly doing quite a bit to curb greenhouse gas emissions. WHEN coal ash is admitted to be radioactive waste, our CO2 emissions will drop 40%. There will be a great emotional reaction nationwide and worldwide. Coal will become “radioactive” in the emotional sense. This will be a psychological change equal to the change caused by 9/11.
Never again say “the United States will do absolutely nothing to curb greenhouse gas emissions.”
Jim Bullis @456:
Jim Bullis @454:
what makes you the judge of whether any given “vast resource” is being/has been “plundered” or should be “used” for your geoengineering schemes to “serve the common purpose”? How you define plunder obviously doesn’t include any understanding of reality.
RealClimate readers may (or may not) find this recent report interesting :
http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v468/n7320/full/nature09508.html
Jim Bullis,
Why don’t you determine for yourself how much carbon your super-forest would have to fix to offset emissions from coal plants? You could assume that I mean C when I write C but it only takes a couple of minutes to run the numbers for yourself thanks to the web. Maybe you’ll catch a mistake I made. Then take a look at the material Hank referenced to see if it would be realistic to expect your super-forest to achieve that goal. There’s no need to estimate how forests work by the way of trucks!
If you’re not aiming at offseting 100% of emissions from coal plants then what percentage are you talking about? You claimed this was an alternative to raising the price of electricity, remember? The main point of raising the price of electricity is not to finance CCS but to move away as quickly as practical from the wasteful use of coal for baseload electricity generation.
I talked about the potential of biomass burial/sinking and of biomass/biogas CCS to reduce the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere elsewhere on RC. But their potential is limited. I am certainly not suggesting one could offset the current level of emission that way. Emissions would have to be reduced by at least 80% from current levels to begin with (ideally they would be reduced to a much smaller fraction of course). This would of necessity involve raising the relative price of electricity in many US regions (as well as in some other countries).
Could you disclose your numbers for “national land holdings vastly exceed available lake storage capacity” by the way? I’m not sure what you mean but the numbers should make it clear.
Humans are interfering with nature’s way of keeping forests healthy – forest fires. They kill off far more beetles and diseased trees than healthy trees.
457, Edward Greisch,
That’s a good post.
Thomas Lee Elifritz @459 — I found it interesting. Thanks.
Plunder? I regard our mindless squandering – by burning! – our descendants heritage of geologic carbon resources to be plunder.
Oil at least is a much, much more valuable resource for carbon based technologies – burning it instead of carefully preserving as much as possible is unbelievably foolish.
David B. Benson,
I just noticed your comment elsewhere (Joe Romm site),
#25. David B. Benson says:
April 26, 2009 at 5:25 pm
Jim Bullis — Use 100,000 km^2 = 100,000,000 ha to grow Miscanthus at 12 t C/ha/yr. Biochar will be about 40% yield (pyrolysis oil about the same), that’s 480,000,000 t biochar, enough for almost half of US coal consumption. Could (if there were water) do this close to here and then UP & BNSF would be happy to move the stuff to the power plants.
I am sure you must be pleased to have contributed to the present effort to establish a Water and Trees Project.
I would use forest scrap for the biochar though.
It has to be processed at power plants?
464 Adelady,
Re your: Oil at least is a much, much more valuable resource for carbon based technologies – burning it instead of carefully preserving as much as possible is unbelievably foolish.
I say: Yes, and natural gas is even more valuable. Burning it in central power plants where twice to three times the energy is burned as the energy that comes out in the form of electricity.
As we plant forests to control CO2, we should be sipping natural gas in cogeneration systems to generate electricity. That will be a meaningful way to keep the forest size from growing indefinitely.
1 km2 is 100 ha, not 1000 ha. Being an order of magnitude off will ruin the best plan. The US coal consumption figure is off in the other direction, but not by nearly as much so it doesn’t offset the conversion error.
Amazon is tidal river (5m)
once were huge tidal rivers on northwest Australia.
BETTER CLIMATE more energy, food, land and water.
Use mighty power of nature. In the northwestern Australia, we have huge tides,
huge evaporation and huge dry rivers and lakes.
Tides are up to 12m. Evaporation is up to 4m per year and can be increased.
Huge 12m tidal erosion can revive old dry paleo dormant once mighty rivers, creeks and lakes,
desalinate the country and change deserts to rain forests to provide more rain across Australia.
World population is growing rapidly and we need more energy, food, land and water.
see: Mitic CLIMATE ENGINEERING
http://www.climatechange.gov.au/en/submissions/cprs-green-paper/~/media/submissions/greenpaper/0929-mitic.ashx
this will change deserts and whole continent for better climate
environment, provide hydro energy, permanently.
Jim Bullis, on miscanthus — I recommend this overview:
http://littlebloginthebigwoods.blogspot.com/2007/10/fuelish-fantasies.html
Key fact you probably already know, assuming you did some reading on this, but if not, consider what a difference this makes in your idea:
“… hundreds of thousands of contiguous acres–of DRY grass. 8 feet tall.
[Switchgrass] has to be big, mature, and dry …. if you cut it when it’s green, you seriously weaken the roots–no crop next year. And if you cut it when it’s green–you’ll either have to use it right now, or spend energy drying it, so it won’t rot….”
469 Hank Roberts,
Thanks, I will get to it.
Off the top of my head, the process of harvesting that you describe loses the advantage of storing Carbon compounds that standing tree mass provides. Unless, there is significance to the root mass which survives.
Still, the fuel, generated to replace other fuels, that could be worth it. It could be particularly worth while as the trees first start growing.
If we get water to land that is not already good cropland, this is a winner in any case. I still vote for big trees but this all needs to be carefully studied.
465 Anon anon
I have been saying 3000 miles x 20 miles so my number is 60,000 sq miles which is about 200,000 sq. km. = 20 million ha.
True, I pasted Benson’s info from Joe Romm’s site from 18 months ago without noticing a slip of decimal point.
Benson also might have been thinking of expanded use of coal in the future.
In any case, switch grass is not my favorite, but biochar is a way not to waste forest mass. That is the real point.
Also, I was trying to get Benson to say a bit about the biochar process.
A question. Why do sea level rise predictions stop at around 2100?
[Response: Simple — 2100 is the number most of the work has been focussed on, I suppose with the idea that it doesn’t sound ‘too far off’. Of course, we’ve written about this, and how it leads to a sense of complacency, since sea level just gets higher the longer you look forward.–eric]
I hope the scientists don’t let the denialists claim the religious “high ground.” I always ask Cuccinelli’s deputy W. Russell if the Holy Father is a greedy liar, but he doesn’t answer that question, either. Many Christians don’t realize that the leaders of their churches do accept the science of global warming and believe it is a social justice issue.
“The scientific evidence for global warming and for humanity’s role in the increase of greenhouse gasses becomes ever more unimpeachable, as the IPCC findings are going to suggest; and such activity has a profound relevance, not just for the environment, but in ethical, economic, social and political terms as well. The consequences of climate change are being felt not only in the environment, but in the entire socio-economic system and, as seen in the findings of numerous reports already available, they will impact first and foremost the poorest and weakest who, even if they are among the least responsible for global warming, are the most vulnerable because they have limited resources or live in areas at greater risk…Many of the most vulnerable societies, already facing energy problems, rely upon agriculture, the very sector most likely to suffer from climatic shifts.”—Permanent Observer of the Holy See to the United Nations, H.E. MSGR. Celestino Migliore (5-10-07)
http://www.holyseemission.org/migliore.html
[moved]
Jim, one more time then I’ll give up.
If you would
— listen to yourself first
— type your assumptions into a search box
— adjust what you believe based on what you find
— cite your sources when you decide, after thinking about that, to post
Then you would not post your ideas and have other people telling you they have already been thought through by others. If you show you’ve studied the area yourself, people will pay more attention.
This led me to post this suggestion again, one last time. You wrote:
> If we get water to land that is not already good
> cropland, this is a winner in any case.
Check that assumption. You’ll find, for example:
http://www.fws.gov/mountain-prairie/contaminants/contaminants4.html
http://wwwrcamnl.wr.usgs.gov/Selenium/irrigation.htm
http://www.usbr.gov/niwqp/datasynthesis/_pdf/circ1180.pdf
Sorry–I accidentally posted this on the wrong place. This is in relation to the story about the Climate Scientists getting organized into a “Rapid Response” team.
I’ve looked through several papers, and I can’t find this. What is the predicted range for the annual rate of sea level rise in 2100, when sea level is expected to have risen 75 cm to 190 cm?
It has to be a whole bunch more than 3.2 mm per year.
Under BAU, assuming the rate stays in its normal relationship with temperature increase, will the rate of change in the annual rate be about the same in the 22nd century as it is predicted to be in the 21st. If not, why?
for JCH:
http://www.google.com/search?q=site%3Aipcc.ch+predicted+range+for+the+annual+rate+of+sea+level+rise+in+2100
Also for JCH, as of the Fourth IPCC report sea level change was recognized as not dealt with well; the upcoming Fifth report will have much more info:
https://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2007/03/the-ipcc-sea-level-numbers/
http://www.nature.com/climate/2010/1004/full/climate.2010.29.html
and here’s the picture:
http://www.nature.com/climate/2010/1004/fig_tab/climate.2010.29_F1.html
Hank – I’ve already read those. If what I am asking about is in them, I’m too dense to see it. Rahmstorf 2009 finds scenario B1 is 81 cm to 131 cm above 1990 sea level by 2100. A1F1 is 113 cm to 179 cm. The the other scenarios lie between them.
What I’m trying find is the predicted range for the annual rate of sea level rise in 2100. Right now the annual rate is 3.2 mm. In 90 years, that’s not 81cm to 179 cm of sea level rise. I can guess, but I don’t think the public, which is me, should have to guess.
To be honest, when lay people read “linear”, and they see the historic rate, they tend to extend that historic rate 100 years out and shrug their shoulders in “hey, no big deal.” Saying total sea level rise over 1990 is likely going to be 1.14 meters in 2100 gives them little sense of how rapidly it’s happening in 2100, and no clue where it will be in 2101; hence, a lot of silly talk about building simple seawall solutions, etc. The Netherlands did not subdue an ocean that was rising by more than one meter a century. Nobody has ever done that.
The 22nd Century is essentially top secret as far as lay people are concerned.
#477–Seems to add up; the rate for A1F1 is 9.7 mm/yr. Call it 10 for simplicity (surely allowable given the error bars), and 90 years x 10 mm = .9 meters. That is the highest estimate, but of course is not really the upper bound due to excluded ice dynamics effects such as Hank links to in #478, and uncertainties in the estimates themselves.
Although it’s an illuminating reference in many ways, though it doesn’t really address the question JCH had about changes in SLR over time.
The 1.9 m rise was from work subsequent to AR4–the “Copenhagen Diagnosis” report, IIRC, which did consider the effects of ice dynamics.
“The 1.9 m rise was from work subsequent to AR4–the “Copenhagen Diagnosis” report, IIRC, which did consider the effects of ice dynamics. …”
I had not read that one, Kevin, so thank you for that tip as it clears up much of my muddle. It shows an upper bound (German Advisory Council on Global Change, WBGU, 2006) of 5 meters (3.1 meters most likely?) by 2300, so now the 22nd Century exists with respect to SLR.
Does Vemeer-Rahmstorf 2009, 75 cm to 179 cm by 2100, include ice dynamics in a complete sense, or is there still something being left out because of uncertainty?
JCH,
My take on the whole (very complex) matter is that rate of SLR will likely be constantly accelerating (with some pauses, possibly as long as a few decaded) for more than a hundred years.
There’s no secret (that I know of). If you want a figure, no one is able to make a halfway reliable prediction unfortunately. Depending on how sure you want your bet to be, you might have to plan for a very large range of SLR by whatever 22nd century date you’re concerned about.
You ask about Vermeer & Rahmstorf, 2009. They are straightforward: “highly nonlinear responses of ice flow may become increasingly important during the 21st century. These are likely to make our linear approach an underestimate.”
They also state “To limit global sea-level rise to a maximum of 1 m in the long run (i.e., beyond 2100), as proposed recently as a policy goal, deep emissions reductions will be required. Likely they would have to be deeper than those needed to limit global warming to 2 °C, the policy goal now supported by many countries. Our analysis further suggests that emissions reductions need to come early in this century to be effective.”
This ties in to carbon sequestration through biomass actually. Check the old thread if you’re curious.
Be careful with alarmist arguments based on “no one has ever done that”. Before the Dutch achived what they did, no one else had!
Building a simple seawall for a 1-2m/century SLR isn’t much of a problem, assuming current infrastructure and resources. There are some largish anti-flooding works being built at great expense right now. The problem is that simple seawalls keep water inside the wall from flowing out. And more complex schemes can only deal with so much SLR without creating huge flooding risks.
AC – yes, but is V-R-09 still an exclusively linear approach? It sounds like it is.
If so, Kevin said they used dynamic changes for the Copenhagen Diagnosis. The Copenhagen Diagnosis appears to use V-R-09 through 2100, then cites two other research sources for 22nd century prediction that apparently include dynamic changes in land-based ice. Does that sound right or wrong? Linear to 2100, both linear and nonlinear to 2300?
For a long time I followed SLR each week, but the news pace was so slow I quit. Now I’m like 59 cm underwater.
On seawalls, what you are saying is interesting. Galveston just flooded -Ike. Had the inhabitants stayed in place, the loss of life may have been pretty high by modern standards, but nothing like 1900. I’ve read varying reports, but it sounds like most of the water entered from the unprotected backside, and now they want to seawall that. Few Texans believe in climate change, so, unless the Texas State Climatologist intervenes (and good luck to him on that), there is no reason why a new seawall in Texas has to be much taller than the post-1900 seawall. Our seawall for the Wall Street of the South is going to a lot cheaper than the AGW-based seawall they’re planning for Wall Street.
When it comes to a scale similar to US shorelines, we can’t, fortunately, even build a border fence, and the illegal aliens are not getting 10 to 50 mm taller each year. But I agree with your point. Thanks.
474 Hank Roberts
You seem to not read what you advise me to read. The general subject you focus on seems to be the problem of irrigation of shallow root crops in areas where evaporation is ‘2.5 times’ that of downward drainage. Or perhaps I am not adequately describing the big picture.
This and similar problems is not a new subject to me; I was familiar many years ago with tools to ‘break up hardpan’ to avoid trapping water at the surface. I do not mean to suggest that I am up to date on this.
Trees however, should have a very different situation. Here, the assumption is deep root systems where arrangement for that drainage would be part of the ground preparation for planting.
Generally speaking, there are many problems that I do not think necessary to examine deeply, when it is apparent from on-going agricultural success that these problems are not insurmountable. At this stage of the discussion I depend on existing ‘best practices’ in agriculture that are demonstrated to be successful. Does that mean that there are no problems? Of course not.
Perhaps I have not been clear about the order of things that I am suggesting, meaning that standing forests are first order, shallow root crops would be secondary as a way of paying for the tree investment, and biochar would be a third order mop-up activity to minimize waste.
Yes, the comment box with strung out information is not the best format for writing, but it seems to be good for getting reactions.
478 -483 McKinney, JCH, anon–
Compare the engineering projects of building sea walls and building standing forests.
Sea walls will cost a lot of money and never show a return. Standing forests will cost a lot of money but will eventually be a valuable source of products.
Either will cause disruption of the natural scheme of things to some degree.
A couple of miscellaneous items; I was wondering if there are venues or publications where scientists who’ve, in the past, predicted problems and tried to get them dealt with — successfully or not — have discussed the experience.
Fisheries comes to mind
http://climateprogress.org/2010/05/10/ocean-ecosystems-in-the-age-of-cassandra/
So does much done in public health.
These got me started reading; they point to more in several directions.
http://meetings.abanet.org/webupload/commupload/IC810000/otherlinks_files/RECENT_DEVELOPMENTS_IN_OCEAN_LAW_AND_POLICY.ppt
http://www.springerlink.com/content/c06v020741675375/
Perspective
Revisiting the Cassandra syndrome; the changing climate of coral reef research
and http://www.energybulletin.net/node/15535
Public health and the precautionary principle: the case of peak oil
Ohio State University School of Public Health April 28, 2006
“…. Judith Kurland has pointed out that in the health and environment arenas, the PP is better received and more consistently implemented in Europe, where it was formalized into environmental policy in the 1970s, than it is in the U.S. In our country the manufacturers of tobacco, lead paint, petroleum, pha r maceuticals, asbestos, among others, have at times sought to withhold, stall, or doctor vital epidemiological and biostatistical information while simultaneously arguing that “all the data are not in” (Kurland, 2002: 499).
“Kurland rightly contends that action in the face of “informed” uncertainty is the cornerstone of the PP – and I add of good-faith –(as opposed to faith-based) public health. We are touching upon the fault line of a narrow versus a broad conception of the public health mission – just think of our current debate in this country about climate change, also known as global warming. Is it a public health issue? ….”
Jim Bullis, Miastrada Co. @465 — Anonymous Coward later points out my conversion error; need 10 times as much land. Around here all forestry wastes are fully utilized for electric power production.
But all such plans are rended rathr futile if
http://climateprogress.org/2010/10/20/ncar-daidrought-under-global-warming-a-review/
should come to pass.
487 David B. Benson,
So why would you pronounce it futile to do things that would avoid the catastrophe your reference predicts if we do not do those very things?
I would agree that much of the popular stuff like windmills and solar panels are probably trivial measures.
I suggest govt. encourage conversion from electric appliances to natural gas, which would actually matter quite a lot, but that gets nary a nod. Our PG&E (Northern CA electric utility) would rather bamboozle around with smart meters and rate fixing tricks. SDGE (Southern CA) has been requesting a program where people sign up to not use air conditioning 14 days a year, those being the days they really need them.
By the way, something is really wrong here, where PG&E workers were “stuck in traffic’ for 90 minutes while people were dying and a whole neighborhood was burning because nobody was around to shut off the natural gas pipeline. Was there a ripple of criticism? Only from me it seems, and that is not much of a ripple.
JCH,
It’s more complicated than a linear/nonlinear dichotomy. Long term SLR will likely be dominated by a relatively small amount of fairly unique (due to geographic differences) processes no one understands well enough to predict (given a temperature scenario) with any confidence.
What is to be done then? To the extent that quantitative methods are used to come up with figures, they are usually extrapolations from the SL record or simply assumptions which do not capture the nonlinear properties of the systems involved as opposed to modelling based on physics.
The Dutch paper you’re talking about tries to guesstimate figures for some plausible dynamic changes in the 20th century and justifies that by presenting them as low-probability/high-impact scenarios but they end up with a figure lower than V&R which doesn’t include low-probability events. This goes to show how much we are in the dark.
Then the Dutch paper largely extrapolates the 22nd century from the 2100 SLR rate. Whether this really captures the low-probability risks is left as an excercise for the reader. I think the evidence presented in the paper could justify less conservative figures but the take home point is really that they don’t think many key processes are understood well enough to be quantified.
I have no idea what the German paper is about but that figure for 2300 must be about their assumptions than anything else.
Jim Bullis,
You keep presenting grandiose plans based on unproven methods which are already an order of magnitude off or more on paper as alternatives or solutions. Nothing we can do with biomass is an alternative to seawalls. And nothing we do with biomass could prevent potential climate catastrophes such as NCAR’s global drought without deep emissions cuts. If you think I’m wrong, show your numbers!
What appliances do you want to convert to natgas? AAnd in California of all places? Come on… Have you looked at costs and efficencies? Then compare the potential savings to the electricity wasted by the commercial sector in California (especially at peak load)…
JB 488: I would agree that much of the popular stuff like windmills and solar panels are probably trivial measures.
BPL: Of course you would. You want people to use fossil fuels with the cogen equipment you sell. Same motivation as Exxon-Mobil, really.
“there is no reason why a new seawall in Texas has to be much taller than the post-1900 seawall.”
No “scare-quotes” for “no reason?”
Anyway, the same “thought-process” was apparently in place for the construction of the replacement levees in New Orleans. I guess the facts that multiple billions of dollars were being invested, and that failure of the previous system killed a couple of thousand people, weren’t enough to induce designers to look at the big picture.
AFAIK, anyway.
I’m starting to warm up to idea that “insulating blanket” is a poor analogy for the general thermal effect of our atmosphere. What do you guys think of “integrating blanket” or “homogenizing blanket” instead?
Can you think of an even better analogy?
#485–Sorry, Jim, you’ve still not presented anything (unless I missed something, which is always possible, of course) to convince me that you’re appreciating the challenges of your scheme to even the correct order of magnitude. No offense intended, but that’s where I’m at.
Jump in Energy Demand Seen by 2035
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/11/10/business/global/10oil.html?_r=1&hp
So what’s wrong with “insulating blanket”? It keeps your body heat close to your body and stops your toes getting cold.
Of course it’s not perfect, it’s only a crude image of a complicated reality. But it’s simple and not nuanced, and easily grasped.
I still say grow trees where trees like to grow. There, scale is less of a problem: akin to the difficulties encountered when raising lots of weeds or varmints, which even I can do. Why sign up to paddle a hardwood forest upriver for a 1000 years?
Jim Bullis wrote: “I would agree that much of the popular stuff like windmills and solar panels are probably trivial measures.”
I would agree that windmills are a somewhat trivial measure, since the CO2 emissions from grinding grain are a relatively minor part of the problem.
Wind turbines are another story.
Concentrating solar thermal power plants on only five percent of the USA’s desert lands could generate more electricity than the entire country uses — and with integrated thermal storage can provide 24×7 baseload generation.
The commercially exploitable on-shore wind energy resources of only four midwestern states could likewise generate more electricity than the entire country uses.
Then there is the huge potential for distributed PV. Then there is the vast offshore wind energy resource.
Wind and solar are not “trivial”. They can easily provide far more energy than we currently use, in perpetuity.
Re SecularAnimist I would agree that windmills are a somewhat trivial measure, since the CO2 emissions from grinding grain are a relatively minor part of the problem. – Nice! :)
496 Secular Animist,
“Easily” becomes a bit harder if real costs are involved. Maybe, these will come down a lot, and then we can talk some more.
In the meantime take a drive over the Altamont pass in Northern CA and Tehatchapee pass in Southern CA and explain these bogosities that were put in place 30 years ago, mostly as a mining project, mining that is, of public money.
Then lay out the details of any of the larger projects. Pickens figured out it was no go. There is a project in Oregon where the developer said he never would have done it without a large subsidy that was foisted on the public, and they were just last year realizing they had been had. Sorry, no detailed references, but the Portland newspaper carried the expose on the Oregon trickery around Halloween last year.
These exercises should tell us that such enterprises will not scale up to non-trivial size.
> encourage conversion from electric appliances to natural gas
That’s done now in N. Ca., because using electricity to heat household water — counting transmission losses — is less efficient and produces more CO2.
Ask your local building permit office for details. We found out when our old hot water heater started leaking and we checked options to replace it.