1. Heat pipes and natural system are not equal (See above).
2. Unintended consequences. We are pretty sure of the consequences of BAU and natural heat movement of heat to the deep is the only demonstrated way atmospheric warming has been reduced.
3. Unsustainable. As long as the sun shines and the seasons produce freezing and melting of polar waters you can produce energy from ocean thermal energy conversion.
4. Uses up non-renewable resources. The oceans contain vast quantities of dissolved resources which OTEC makes accessible. Potable water is another potential derivative.
5. Heat will come back out of the oceans. OTEC is first the conversion of heat to work in accordance with the second law of thermodynamics. No other energy source actually reduces the amount of heat stored in the ocean.
6. CO2 reduction is a permanent solution, heat pipes are a band-aid, so why bother? Electrolysis of sea water is Carbon Sequestering Energy Production. If you think humans are going to passively sit by and see their ranks decimated as much as 85% or their standard of living depleted by energy deprivation without a fight, I respectfully submit you are deluded. I will take the late Richard Smalley up on hisTerawatt Challenge any day of the week. Heat pipes are the only way to Global Energy Prosperity. OTEC is the only base load renewable and also the only one with sufficient capacity to make a difference.
First we construct a network from four major climate indices. The network approach to complex systems is a rapidly developing methodology, which has proven to be useful in analyzing such systems’ behavior [Albert and Barabasi, 2002; Strogatz, 2001]. In this approach, a complex system is presented as a set of connected nodes. The collective behavior of all the nodes and links (the topology of the network) describes the dynamics of the system and offers new ways to investigate its properties. The indices represent the Pacific Decadal Oscillation (PDO), the North Atlantic Oscillation (NAO), the El Niño/Southern Oscillation (ENSO), and the North Pacific Oscillation (NPO) [Barnston and Livezey, 1987; Hurrell, 1995; Mantua et al., 1997; Trenberth and Hurrell, 1994]. These indices represent regional but dominant modes of climate variability, with time scales ranging from months to decades. NAO and NPO are the leading modes of surface pressure variability in northern Atlantic and Pacific Oceans, respectively, the PDO is the leading mode of SST variability in the northern Pacific and ENSO is a major signal in the tropics. Together these four modes capture the essence of climate variability in the northern hemisphere. Each of these modes involves different mechanisms over different geographical regions. Thus, we treat them as nonlinear sub-systems of the grand climate system exhibiting complex dynamics.
Perhaps just one more – although this was discussed in a missing comment. I had a look at the Azimuth site – and the latest emphasis is – and has been for some time – on network math to capture dynamical complexity. This is an example of a worthwhile mathematical and physical approach to analyse complex systems. The entire system is resonant. This determines the approaches that are realistic – and not just blogospheric blather.
I quoted Marcia Wyatt – but cant remember whether this survived.
Climate is ultimately complex. Complexity begs for reductionism. With reductionism, a puzzle is studied by way of its pieces. While this approach illuminates the climate system’s components, climate’s full picture remains elusive. Understanding the pieces does not ensure understanding the collection of pieces. This conundrum motivates our study.
“OTEC is the only base load renewable and also the only one with sufficient capacity to make a difference.”
OK, you’ll have to explain that one. Geothermal is generally considered to be baseload, and theoretically at least, it could have sufficient capacity to power our civilization by itself–never mind the contributions from the present commercial renewables, solar and wind, both of which trivially have “sufficient capacity to make a difference” since their deployment is already visibly restraining emissions.
You may object that such a magnitude of geothermal is mostly theoretical. I’d retort that it’s at least quite a bit further down the developmental pipeline than OTEC–the first commercial geothermal plant came online in 1911, according to that same article.
Greg Simpsonsays
It wasn’t really by Anthony Watts, he just published it on his site. It was written by Jan Kjetil Andersen. It is one of the better articles I’ve seen there.
@ Jim Baird — 23 Apr 2015 @ 12:15 PM – CO2 could be used between -2.5C and -35C or ~500 to 140 psi. The Siemens 250MW sst-900 series steam turbine will work at input pressures of 165 bar and outlet pressures of 16 bar, so off the shelf tech could be used for a proof of concept. the increased thermodynamic efficiency from the larger delta T would offset the winter only duty cycle.
dangling a heat exchanger on the end of a 0.5-1km pipe loop, and running liquid CO2 to the bottom by gravity, boiling it to vapor that returns to the surface “under its own steam” so to speak, saves having to pump sea water or thermal liquids.
Increased THC would permit larger tropical extraction without upsetting the oceans thermal structure – “This order-of-
magnitude analysis indicates that about 3X10^9 kW (3 TW) may be available, at most. This value is much smaller than estimates
currently suggested in the technical literature. It reflects the scale of the perturbation caused by massive OTEC seawater flow rates on the thermal structure of the ocean. Not surprisingly, maximum OTEC power nearly corresponds to deep cold seawater flow rates of the order of the average abyssal upwelling representative of the global thermohaline circulation.” An Order-of-Magnitude Estimate of Ocean Thermal Energy Conversion Resources, Gérard C. Nihous, Journal of Energy Resources Technology, DECEMBER 2005, Vol. 127 / 329 [DOI: 10.1115/1.1949624]
Two terawatts won’t make much of dint and geothermal does nothing to convert the heat accumulating in the ocean, which is what climate change is about.
Steve Fishsays
Re- Comment by Jim Baird — 25 Apr 2015 @ 1:27 PM, ~#251
Two problems- Your #1 regarding untended consequences is actually the problem that the solution could be worse than BAU. What guarantees are there? Problem two is that this whole scheme may not be economically feasible. To solve these two problems to my, and I suspect most people’s satisfaction, would require a working plant producing 200 to 500 MW for a period long enough to make an evaluation of the concept. I am very doubtful that the cost to produce a reliable generator in the severe ocean environment would be practical. Start looking for venture capital.
Steve
Killiansays
#251 Jim Baird said, “I maybe a denier.”
I say, watts up with your head? Going to continue anyway, though any validation of wattsupwithstupidity pretty much signals you as a non-serious person. You’ve set a high hurdle for yourself to overcome.
1. Heat pipes and natural system are not equal (See above).
Cannot be, are not, the same. Period. If you do not understand that, you’ve got issues. Global systems of currents and winds, etc., vs. man-made pipes? Are serious? Watts up with your thinking?
2. Unintended consequences. We are pretty sure of the consequences of BAU and natural heat movement of heat to the deep is the only demonstrated way atmospheric warming has been reduced.
Not with heat pipes. Also, flatly incorrect. Every little bit of soil-sequestered carbon, every food forest planted, every ounce of bio-char has its effect. If you’re going to baldly misrepresent facts, watts up with that?
3. Unsustainable. As long as the sun shines and the seasons produce freezing and melting of polar waters you can produce energy from ocean thermal energy conversion.
Seriously? You don’t understand the difference between source and production? Why are you even posting if your understanding is that limited?
4. Uses up non-renewable resources. The oceans contain vast quantities of dissolved resources which OTEC makes accessible. Potable water is another potential derivative.
You really do not understand sustainable. I mean, not even a little. Not only does that point only *potentially* expand the potential resource, it does not make them recoverable, nor does it change the characteristic of being limited. If you understand exponents, you should know better than to try that argument.
5. Heat will come back out of the oceans. OTEC is first the conversion of heat to work in accordance with the second law of thermodynamics. No other energy source actually reduces the amount of heat stored in the ocean.
You are proposing ADDING heat to the oceans by speeding up total storage in the deep oceans, but it doesn’t add heat to the oceans? You’re nuts. Worse, changing it to mechanical doesn’t change anything. It all ends up or is compensated by construction, mining, heat transfer from the mechanical work, etc. The energy doesn’t disappear, and the amount converted to mechanical would be tiny as a fraction of the heat balance.
OTEC is NOT an energy source.
Heat is not the issue. Heat balance is. Once it’s held by the system, it’s here. The ONLY way to change that is reduce the imbalance and flip it, which heat pipes would have ZERO effect on. It’s a non-solution.
6. CO2 reduction is a permanent solution, heat pipes are a band-aid, so why bother? Electrolysis of sea water is Carbon Sequestering Energy Production.
Prove it.
If you think humans are going to passively sit by and see their ranks decimated as much as 85%
Watt the heck are you ranting about? Straw man much?
or their standard of living depleted
See above.
by energy deprivation
See above.
without a fight, I respectfully submit you are deluded.
The delusion is yours. You are suggesting something that will change absolutely nothing wrt cliamte, has potentially huge unintended consequences, and wastes resources to achieve nothing.
When you need sustainability, merely shrugging off that your suggestion solves nothing, that there is no choice BUT sustainability, what have you said? Nothing. It doesn’t matter what people want. If the planet cannot support it, pretending you can magically make that not true by waving a hand in the air saying people just won’t do that, you’re nuts. You are saying people will choose extinction. Maybe so. Pretending you are offering anything other than extinction with this nonsense is what is delusional.
I will take the late Richard Smalley up on hisTerawatt Challenge any day of the week. Heat pipes are the only way to Global Energy Prosperity.
Energy prosperity? LOL… You’d do well to learn something about resources. FWIW, the best way to get energy secure it to need less than we produce, not to pretend unsustainable energy *production* is a solution.
Done with this. You obviously lack the knowledge to engage usefully.
Killiansays
#254 Rob Ellison said, First we construct a network from four major climate indices. The network approach to complex systems is a rapidly developing methodology, which has proven to be useful in analyzing such systems’ behavior
Permaculture principles:
* The output from every element must support at least two other elements.
* The input for every element must be supported by at least two other elements.
* Zero waste. (Closed loops.)
This is exactly the same kind of thinking and analysis. This is why I can analyze as well, if not better than, any scientist or other layperson.
Like our OTEC-blinded poster, if you don’t *start* with systems thinking, you are very unlikely to to figure out the solutions… let alone the system.
Chuck Hughessays
PURE GOLD!!! This is what we’ve been needing… President Obama summons his “Anger Translator” to deal with Climate Change Deniers. Break out the popcorn!
“While this approach illuminates the climate system’s components, climate’s full picture remains illusive.”
Indeed, since “climate’s full picture” is hidden under a Scotsman’s kilt.
1) We can always define a system that we can’t solve.
2) We can always define a system that we can solve.
(2) is how science and engineering have progressed since long before we called it science and engineering. (1) is how you find yourself curled up in a cave praying to the gods for mercy.
Zebra,
Indeed. Ellison writes narratives based on the ideas of scientists such as Tsonis, who want to create some sort of system that is great for mathematicians but may have no applicability to predicting El Ninos. You can dig yourself a deep hole by creating a mathematics that is not solvable, yet forever analyzable in the abstract.
Further, Ellison misrepresents what we are currently working on at the Azimuth site. He asserts that ” I had a look at the Azimuth site – and the latest emphasis is – and has been for some time – on network math to capture dynamical complexity.” That turned in to a dead-end IMO, ala above, and the only path that has remained is analyzing the dipole that is part of ENSO. Like zebra said, this is a model that features math that we can solve.
What really depresses me about the OTEC conversation is that I recall the same kinds of conversation from the 1970s, including a time when they were already building 10-MWe-scale demo plants. In 40+ years we’ve made no progress at all, simply because fossil fuels got cheap for a while and we let it all go. Humanity is not going to survive, and the main reason for that is, for all our vaunted intelligence, we have the attention span of a rhesus monkey.
The Gentlemen Who Prefer Fantasy (GWPF), an organisation that gets tax relief from the British Government because somehow it has managed to remain registered as an educational charity, is presumably expending some of that money investigating the global instrument temperature record.
GWPF have engaged a panel to examine HADcrut, GISS, NCDC & BEST and address the following really really really necessary questions:-
Are there aspects of surface temperature measurement procedures that potentially impair data quality or introduce bias and need to be critically re-examined?
How widespread is the practice of adjusting original temperature records? What fraction of modern temperature data, as presented by HadCRUT/GISS/NOAA/BEST, are actual original measurements, and what fraction are subject to adjustments?
Are warming and cooling adjustments equally prevalent?
Are there any regions of the world where modifications appear to account for most or all of the apparent warming of recent decades?
Are the adjustment procedures clearly documented, objective, reproducible and scientifically defensible? How much statistical uncertainty is introduced with each step in homogeneity adjustments and smoothing?
The panel comprises Terence Kealey (chairman), Petr Chylek, Richard McNider, Roman Mureika & Roger A Pielke Sr who are inviting submission of evidence on any matters related to the inquiry with a closing date of 30/6/2015.
And this is all because, according to the GWPF “Questions have been raised about the reliability of the surface temperature data and the extent to which apparent warming trends may be artefacts of adjustments made after the data are collected.” The GWPF don’t make clear who has been raising these questions.
zebrasays
#265 Webhubtelescope,
Just to remind you of the point of my original comment. It’s about both the measurement and the math. And the public perception of what you are doing.
Tell me, in my hypothetical world where I provide scientific funding, this: If I can get you more detailed measurements of the Pacific, in real time and increased coverage, how would it make a difference to your analysis?
If you can’t tell me that, I would be as skeptical about your math as I am about Ellison’s more grandiose project.
Pete Dunkelbergsays
BPL: “What really depresses me about the OTEC conversation is that I recall the same kinds of conversation from the 1970s,….”
Indeed
“OTEC theory was first developed in the 1880s and the first bench size demonstration model was constructed in 1926. Currently the world’s only operating OTEC plant is in Japan, overseen by Saga University.”
– http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ocean_thermal_energy_conversion
#268, Edward–I’m pretty sure that isn’t going to happen. In 15 years, there’s a decent chance I’ll still be alive if not. Would you care to wager, say, a dinner–provided of course that you can come up with a means by which I could pay up if I lose?
I suppose that one could argue that the unlikelihood of me providing dinner to you amid the ruins of our civilization would be offset by the very high potential value it would offer you if that long shot did come to pass.
Why do I feel that we won’t see a collapse that soon? Because I take the best available information–AR 5–quite seriously. There is at present little indication that we’ll be ‘droughted out’ over that timescale, and we sure won’t be ‘warmed out’. I do think that we are going to see continuation and indeed acceleration of some of the current observable trends (Arctic sea ice loss, extreme weather, warming, for leading examples)–and I think it’ll be such that denialism will be very considerably reduced by then.
It’s unfortunately also possible, and at all not (I fear) unlikely, that we’ll be firmly committed to exceeding 2 C by then.
1. So we are in agreement that geothermal is indeed baseload. Good.
2. Your dismissal of the potential of geothermal was extremely hasty. Had you read through to the end of the paragraph the initial sentence of which you quoted, you would have seen this:
“…over 200 zettajoules (ZJ) would be extractable, with the potential to increase this to over 2,000 ZJ with technology improvements – sufficient to provide all the world’s present energy needs for several millennia.” The basis for that is not clear to me, unfortunately; the report is firmly focused on the US, and I don’t see those exact figures. (Maybe the Wiki author extrapolated from the US case to the global case?)
But the MIT report’s figure 1.7 does give *US* resources (with a conservative 2% recovery factor–midrange is 20%!) as exceeding total *world* energy usage by a factor of about 500 (if I haven’t dropped a decimal somewhere.)
3. I’m not saying that geothermal is a ‘silver bullet.’ Actually, I don’t believe there is one–not nuclear, not the ‘new conventional renewables’ of wind and solar, not OTEC, not regenerative ag, not demand management and energy efficiency. I like all of the above, though not equally, but most can’t scale fast enough, as far as I can tell, to avoid 2 C warming (and the remainder, so far, aren’t.) Nonetheless, I think that civilization remains savable, and that all of the above will play some role in doing so.
I think that many of us like to propose silver bullets because they are comforting in the face of looming planetary disaster. But as advocates, silver bulletry is a flawed strategy because, as we all know but only selectively remember, “extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence.” Thus, the more we reify our preferred solution, the higher the burden of proof we impose upon ourselves. (And, quite often, the more we damage our own credibility as advocates.)
Better, IMO, to stay a little more down-to-earth and concrete with our advocacy.
#260–OK, this is why I’ve pretty much given up on Killian’s comments. I pasted #260 into Word and separated out what I saw, as tabulated below, then used the word count tool to quantify the categories.
a) Complete post: 689 words
b) Quoted from original: 223 words
c) Essentially denigratory or vituperative: 133 words
d) Substantive: 296 words
For my taste, the c/d ratio is way too high (and the tone way too nasty.) Also, too many of the ‘substantive’ words were really rhetorical. Coherence is an issue, too. This sentence is the worst example:
“When you need sustainability, merely shrugging off that your suggestion solves nothing, that there is no choice BUT sustainability, what have you said?”
What have you said, indeed?
{Methodological appendix}
Here’s what I classed “vituperative”:
I say, watts up with your head? …though any validation of wattsupwithstupidity pretty much signals you as a non-serious person…
If you do not understand that, you’ve got issues… Are serious? Watts up with your thinking?
…If you’re going to baldly misrepresent facts, watts up with that?
Seriously? …Why are you even posting if your understanding is that limited?
…I mean, not even a little. …If you understand exponents, you should know better than to try that argument.
…You’re nuts.
…Watt the heck are you ranting about? Straw man much?
…The delusion is yours.
…you’re nuts. …Pretending you are offering anything other than extinction with this nonsense is what is delusional.
…Energy prosperity? LOL… You’d do well to learn something about resources. …Done with this. You obviously lack the knowledge to engage usefully.
zebrasays
#269 MARodger,
Not to worry; NOAA is on it:
“The vision of the USCRN program is to maintain a sustainable high-quality climate observation network that 50 years from now can with the highest degree of confidence answer the question: How has the climate of the Nation changed over the past 50 years?”
Good to know the science will be settled without my grant funding, so I guess I can keep my lottery money when I win. Invest it in coal stocks, maybe.
That’s an amazing list of goals to accomplish by 2030, just after civilization collapses due to GW.
Comment by Edward Greisch — 27 Apr 2015
So Edward, I really, really want to know something here… Your last comment…. is that your true take on the situation? Civilization collapse somewhere ~ 2030? I’ve heard more dire and less dire predictions than that but I think Guy McPherson may be a little extreme but when you look at it in the aggregate, I just don’t see any good news out there. When I’ve asked this question in the past people tend to shut up. What are the experts out there giving as an estimate of our “sell by” date generally? I know the world isn’t going to end on Tuesday but… Can you point me to come credible sources on this?
Thanks
Steve Fishsays
Re- Comment by Kevin McKinney — 27 Apr 2015 @ 12:19 PM, ~#275
Kevin, I agree. It is actually kind of thrilling to see such a perfect amalgam of exaggerated self reference and the Kruger and Dunning (1999) hypothesis.
Edward Greischsays
278 Chuck Hughes: Our very own Barton Paul Levenson, whose comment on the subject is in this unforced variations. BPL has the best estimate I know of.
Edward Greischsays
274 Kevin McKinney & 278 Chuck Hughes: No wager. Correction: Last month:
278 Chuck Hughes said, “That’s an amazing list of goals to accomplish by 2030, just after civilization collapses due to GW.”
The world produces many times more food (Food being stuff we grow for EITHER humans or cows) than could possibly be consumed by a billion people. The internet and other computers ensure that our knowledge can’t be lost. Even if we slaughter or starve 6 billion people, civilization can’t collapse because we are on the cusp of automating everything from farming to lawyering.
So shout about people dying if you want, but to state that the impossible is inevitable, well, tis foolish. The science is clear. We can lower the temperature of the planet at will with sulphur. That ten or even millions of people will die as a result is pretty immaterial when we have 7-9 billion people to start with. (if civilization collapse is the issue you’re concerned about.)
The whole global geothermal flux is about 44 TW. It’s hard to see how we could extract more than that.
Chuck-san,
My own estimate is that civilization collapses c. 2028, with error bars of perhaps six years. I base this on a feedback between warming and drought. I’ve written a paper on this but can’t get it published.
#283–Barton, correct. But I don’t think that is what is being claimed, particularly in the MIT report. Unfortunately, it’s rather densely written and you really have to dig in to fully grasp the priors applying to any given sentence. I hadn’t the time to do that, hence my comment that much remained unclear to me.
(There was a fuller earlier comment I had tried to post, which went into more of the detail that I did sift, but it got lost to a ‘try later’ error message. Had quite a few of those lately, which makes me wonder if RC is being subject to DOS attacks? If so, we must not be quite so ‘irrelevant’ as some denialist commentators have claimed!)
Bottom line, the Wiki figures in zettajoules must not be annual, but cumulative.
Be all that as it may, let me address your point. The EIA gives 2012 total primary energy consumption as 13,371 Million Tons of Oil Equivalent (MTOE, in the jargon), which is 155,504,730 gigaWatt hours. Backing out the hours in a year, you get 17,752 GW, or ~18 TW. That seems to be the basis for the figure given in this Wiki article, which says:
In 2012, [total worldwide energy consumption] was 567 exajoules (158,000 TWh), equivalent to an average power use of 18.0 terawatts (2.41×1010 hp).
Estimated potentials for various forms of renewable energy are just given below in the same article:
geothermal energy 5,000 EJ (1,400,000 TWh)
solar energy 1,575 EJ (438,000 TWh)
wind power 640 EJ (180,000 TWh)
biomass 276 EJ (77,000 TWh)
hydropower 50 EJ (14,000 TWh)
ocean energy 1 EJ (280 TWh).
I’ve reordered them in descending order of potential; as you’ll note, geothermal is at the top of the list. (I think that ‘ocean energy’ doesn’t include OTEC, which is why it’s at the bottom. ) So, if for some silly reason we wanted to power absolutely everything from just one type of renewable energy, geothermal would be far from the worst one to choose on the basis of potential output.
#281–Ed, discussed previously. While there’s no way to absolutely exclude ‘black swan’ events as Jim Larsen tries to do at #282, the drought data we have as of now just don’t support your statement. (I know, Dai had argued otherwise a couple of years back, but that claim has been vigorously attacked, and with what appears as of AR5 to be scientific success. As of now, the field appears to be trying to agree what drought metrics are appropriate for what purposes, and the observations allow only low confidence that there are any trends at all. IOW, we can’t even claim to have detected much of a signal, yet.)
And we aren’t going to run out of resources in 15 years, either. Water is going to be increasingly a problem, I think, in places like the US southwest, and in probably northern China, but places like that haven’t even started to get serious about managing the resource really rationally. They will, as the need becomes more and more immediate. (Northern China is probably ahead in this regard, but then the crunch has been longer, and more drastic.)
Biologicals are going to be more of a problem than chemicals; there are getting to be an awful lot of alternatives in the latter, and some of the high demand ones are awfully common–silicon, for instance.
I guess we’ll just have to disagree on this.
Chuck Hughessays
My own estimate is that civilization collapses c. 2028, with error bars of perhaps six years. I base this on a feedback between warming and drought. I’ve written a paper on this but can’t get it published.
Comment by Barton Paul Levenson — 28 Apr 2015
BPL, I checked out your website and noticed your Christian roots so I have to inquire if your predictions have anything to do with the reading of the Bible or are they strictly scientifically based assessments and calculations? I assume you’re quite able to separate your beliefs from the science so that may sound like an unfair question.
I would think that there is some way to calculate the wide variety of known forcings, feedbacks and known-unknowns and approximate time scales involved to make some sort of predictions about when things might accelerate to the point of being beyond human control. I also know that human activity cannot continue like it has been doing without some outside force stopping it. I think we all know that.
Is there a scientific consensus on this that you know of or any other reliable assessments you can direct me to? I know about James Lovelock, Frank Fenner, Peter Ward, Stephen Hawking and have either read or listened to their assessments of the Climate situation. I have no reason to doubt them. Of course they’re not going to single out a specific year or decade but tend to speak in more general terms but every one has indicated this century as being very critical for the continuation of human civilization beyond 2100.
Thanks
Chuck Hughessays
The science is clear. We can lower the temperature of the planet at will with sulphur. That ten or even millions of people will die as a result is pretty immaterial when we have 7-9 billion people to start with. (if civilization collapse is the issue you’re concerned about.)
Comment by Jim Larsen — 28 Apr 20
I think lowering the temperature with sulfur is “geo engineering” isn’t it? I was thinking that most in the scientific community consider any sort of geo engineering to be futile or a temporary fix. Also, if we could lower the temperature “at will” why aren’t we doing it? Are we gonna wait until all the ice melts before we try that?
Thomassays
BPL @283.
He can extract (much) more than the 44TW, because he isn’t proposing a steady state geothermal system, but to mine the heat stored in the upper few kilometers of the crust. The heatflux hardly figures into the picture -except as far as it determined the initial temperature of the rock in question.
wilisays
And what are we to make of this:
“More Fatal Earthquakes to Come, Warn Climate Change Scientists”
[Response: That some commentators are irresponsible and stupid.–eric]
Chuck Hughessays
My own estimate is that civilization collapses c. 2028, with error bars of perhaps six years. I base this on a feedback between warming and drought. I’ve written a paper on this but can’t get it published.
Comment by Barton Paul Levenson — 28 Apr 2015
Do you have a link to your paper?
Thanks
Jim Larsensays
283 BPL said, “My own estimate is that civilization collapses c. 2028, with error bars of perhaps six years”
How will civilization collapse, given that we can and will probably have to use geoengineering to stop global warming in its tracks? Do you have ANY information that supports what seems to be your claim, that we’ll just let ourselves boil like the proverbial frog in a pot of water? Or, if not, that geoengineering will cause the collapse of civilization? Bad things will happen. There is no positive when it comes to increasing CO2. But, the level of maximum harm given mankind’s ability to react to threats simply doesn’t come remotely close to an existential threat.
Jim Larsensays
287 Chuck H said, “I think lowering the temperature with sulfur is “geo engineering” isn’t it? I was thinking that most in the scientific community consider any sort of geo engineering to be futile or a temporary fix. Also, if we could lower the temperature “at will” why aren’t we doing it? Are we gonna wait until all the ice melts before we try that?”
You are correct. It’s geoengineering and it is a “banned” topic similar to eugenics. That will change as things get worse, millions die, and our other options disappear. Perhaps we’ll get lucky and evade the worst, but I’m rather pessimistic. That pessimism doesn’t lead to fatalism. We’re 7-9 billion strong and our science and technology are ramping up at ever greater rates. We could lose 6 billion innocent souls and our civilization won’t be in the slightest danger of collapse. Geoengineering is a temporary fix, but that’s all we need, given that the final solution only needs to support a few hundred million or a billion people to be successful – assuming that survival of the species and civilization are your primary concerns.
[Response: Geoengineering is not a “banned” topic. It is talked about all the time — too much in my view. We’ve written extensively about this, e.g. https://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2009/10/why-levitt-and-dubner-like-geo-engineering-and-why-they-are-wrong/. To quote Gavin, “Geo-engineering is neither cheap, nor a fix, and the reasons why it is very likely to be a bad idea are ethical and legal, much more than its still-uncertain scientific merits.” As for eugenics, you can talk about it all you want (but I hope you read up on history while you are at it). But please don’t waste our time with that here. –eric]
Thomas O'Reillysays
289 Rob Ellison – are you seriously concerned and dismayed at the lack of energy access and the extent of poverty in the world?
Or are you only really concerned about all the poor science and poor policy in the world regarding the “faux issues” of AGW/CC in your opinion?
CH 286: I checked out your website and noticed your Christian roots so I have to inquire if your predictions have anything to do with the reading of the Bible or are they strictly scientifically based assessments and calculations?
BPL: Stupid question. I wouldn’t have submitted a paper to peer-reviewed science journals if I’d based it on the Revelation of Saint John.
JL 293: the level of maximum harm given mankind’s ability to react to threats simply doesn’t come remotely close to an existential threat.
BPL: The key word there is “react.” Humans don’t prevent crises; we wait until the crisis hits and then respond to it. That’s why we didn’t stop Hitler in 1934, 1936, or 1938. If you’re depending on humans to be rational, please explain why we now have climate science deniers heading every congressional science committee, or why 40% of Americans think the world is only 6,000 years old, or why Shi’ites and Sunnis are bombing each others’ mosques over the question of who was the proper successor to Ali in the early 700s.
HadCRUT4 for March has been posted, being the 7th hottest anomaly on record.The showing of recent months is less impressive than for GISS or NCDC. Of the last 12 months of HadCRUT4, two are in the top ten (4 for NCDC, 5 for GISS) and eight in the top 20, nine in the top 30 (NCDC & GISS both 9 in the top 24).
Color me cynical, but that would be a much more compelling point, were it not that political advantage, ideological correctness, administrative convenience, and corporate profit are increased on the backs of the world’s poorest people every minute. It rather reminds me of those who only worry about bird kill when it comes via wind turbine.
But perhaps I’m being unfair to the Breakthrough Institute–however infelicitous the framing in the quote *and* in their very name appears to me to be. Certainly it’s important to deploy aid money cost-effectively, especially in the context of energy policy and emissions mitigation…
wilisays
Thanks for your reply to my query about CC possible effects on seismic activity, Eric. But could you point me to some source that shows how these effects are not likely so I can share them with people elsewhere who may be lead astray?
SecularAnimistsays
I’d just like to note that in comment #277, Chris Dudley linked to a New York Times article about an important new study on attribution of extreme weather events to global warming.
That’s a very important issue, I think, since extreme weather phenomena including heat waves and intense precipitation events are, in a sense, the “face” of global warming for many people, and increases in the frequency and severity of such events seem to be increasing public awareness and concern about the problem of climate change. And a great deal of denialist propaganda has accordingly been focused on denying that there is any connection between global warming and extreme weather events.
And it is a climate science issue, of exactly the sort that this site is an ideal forum for discussing.
But in the 20 or so comments posted since then, not one commenter has even acknowledged it. Instead, just the usual back and forth about when the world will end.
The original Nature Climate Science is online here:
Just to remind you of the point of my original comment. It’s about both the measurement and the math. And the public perception of what you are doing.
Tell me, in my hypothetical world where I provide scientific funding, this: If I can get you more detailed measurements of the Pacific, in real time and increased coverage, how would it make a difference to your analysis?
If you can’t tell me that, I would be as skeptical about your math as I am about Ellison’s more grandiose project.
”
The important data is not current but is contained historical records such as in coral proxy data. If I said that I could take a model of ENSO for the last 150 years and use that to show good correlation with coral proxy records from 1650 to 1800, would that make a difference? I will place the latest results on the Azimuth Forum later today.
Substantiation of models does not occur overnight and due to our inability to do controlled experiments, we gain credibility through accumulation of evidence.
#244 Killian, heat pipes.
“Natural convection etc. Both move energy as heat, but very, very differently.”
See Climate as a heat engine by Anthony Watts
Learning:
1. Heat pipes and natural system are not equal (See above).
2. Unintended consequences. We are pretty sure of the consequences of BAU and natural heat movement of heat to the deep is the only demonstrated way atmospheric warming has been reduced.
3. Unsustainable. As long as the sun shines and the seasons produce freezing and melting of polar waters you can produce energy from ocean thermal energy conversion.
4. Uses up non-renewable resources. The oceans contain vast quantities of dissolved resources which OTEC makes accessible. Potable water is another potential derivative.
5. Heat will come back out of the oceans. OTEC is first the conversion of heat to work in accordance with the second law of thermodynamics. No other energy source actually reduces the amount of heat stored in the ocean.
6. CO2 reduction is a permanent solution, heat pipes are a band-aid, so why bother? Electrolysis of sea water is Carbon Sequestering Energy Production. If you think humans are going to passively sit by and see their ranks decimated as much as 85% or their standard of living depleted by energy deprivation without a fight, I respectfully submit you are deluded. I will take the late Richard Smalley up on hisTerawatt Challenge any day of the week. Heat pipes are the only way to Global Energy Prosperity. OTEC is the only base load renewable and also the only one with sufficient capacity to make a difference.
Just one point. The 26 degree north array monitors AMOC.
https://watertechbyrie.files.wordpress.com/2014/06/26-degree-n-array.png
It is providing some intriguing data. As in the study I linked to.
https://watertechbyrie.files.wordpress.com/2014/06/smeed-fig-71.png
But I have lost too many civil and science rich comments here to continue to waste my time.
Frankly – the quality of responses such as at 246 and 248 suggests – encouraging noise without any substance – suggests a realbias.
JB 251,
Anthony Watts? Really???
Perhaps just one more – although this was discussed in a missing comment. I had a look at the Azimuth site – and the latest emphasis is – and has been for some time – on network math to capture dynamical complexity. This is an example of a worthwhile mathematical and physical approach to analyse complex systems. The entire system is resonant. This determines the approaches that are realistic – and not just blogospheric blather.
I quoted Marcia Wyatt – but cant remember whether this survived.
“OTEC is the only base load renewable and also the only one with sufficient capacity to make a difference.”
OK, you’ll have to explain that one. Geothermal is generally considered to be baseload, and theoretically at least, it could have sufficient capacity to power our civilization by itself–never mind the contributions from the present commercial renewables, solar and wind, both of which trivially have “sufficient capacity to make a difference” since their deployment is already visibly restraining emissions.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geothermal_electricity#Resources
You may object that such a magnitude of geothermal is mostly theoretical. I’d retort that it’s at least quite a bit further down the developmental pipeline than OTEC–the first commercial geothermal plant came online in 1911, according to that same article.
It wasn’t really by Anthony Watts, he just published it on his site. It was written by Jan Kjetil Andersen. It is one of the better articles I’ve seen there.
@ Jim Baird — 23 Apr 2015 @ 12:15 PM – CO2 could be used between -2.5C and -35C or ~500 to 140 psi. The Siemens 250MW sst-900 series steam turbine will work at input pressures of 165 bar and outlet pressures of 16 bar, so off the shelf tech could be used for a proof of concept. the increased thermodynamic efficiency from the larger delta T would offset the winter only duty cycle.
dangling a heat exchanger on the end of a 0.5-1km pipe loop, and running liquid CO2 to the bottom by gravity, boiling it to vapor that returns to the surface “under its own steam” so to speak, saves having to pump sea water or thermal liquids.
Increased THC would permit larger tropical extraction without upsetting the oceans thermal structure – “This order-of-
magnitude analysis indicates that about 3X10^9 kW (3 TW) may be available, at most. This value is much smaller than estimates
currently suggested in the technical literature. It reflects the scale of the perturbation caused by massive OTEC seawater flow rates on the thermal structure of the ocean. Not surprisingly, maximum OTEC power nearly corresponds to deep cold seawater flow rates of the order of the average abyssal upwelling representative of the global thermohaline circulation.” An Order-of-Magnitude Estimate of Ocean Thermal Energy Conversion Resources, Gérard C. Nihous, Journal of Energy Resources Technology, DECEMBER 2005, Vol. 127 / 329 [DOI: 10.1115/1.1949624]
Kevin McKinney 255
According to your reference “Estimates of the electricity generating potential of geothermal energy vary from 35 to 2,000 GW.”
The estimated maximum steady-state OTEC electrical potential is about 14 TW. http://hinmrec.hnei.hawaii.edu/ongoing-projects/otec-thermal-resource/
Two terawatts won’t make much of dint and geothermal does nothing to convert the heat accumulating in the ocean, which is what climate change is about.
Re- Comment by Jim Baird — 25 Apr 2015 @ 1:27 PM, ~#251
Two problems- Your #1 regarding untended consequences is actually the problem that the solution could be worse than BAU. What guarantees are there? Problem two is that this whole scheme may not be economically feasible. To solve these two problems to my, and I suspect most people’s satisfaction, would require a working plant producing 200 to 500 MW for a period long enough to make an evaluation of the concept. I am very doubtful that the cost to produce a reliable generator in the severe ocean environment would be practical. Start looking for venture capital.
Steve
#251 Jim Baird said, “I maybe a denier.”
I say, watts up with your head? Going to continue anyway, though any validation of wattsupwithstupidity pretty much signals you as a non-serious person. You’ve set a high hurdle for yourself to overcome.
1. Heat pipes and natural system are not equal (See above).
Cannot be, are not, the same. Period. If you do not understand that, you’ve got issues. Global systems of currents and winds, etc., vs. man-made pipes? Are serious? Watts up with your thinking?
2. Unintended consequences. We are pretty sure of the consequences of BAU and natural heat movement of heat to the deep is the only demonstrated way atmospheric warming has been reduced.
Not with heat pipes. Also, flatly incorrect. Every little bit of soil-sequestered carbon, every food forest planted, every ounce of bio-char has its effect. If you’re going to baldly misrepresent facts, watts up with that?
3. Unsustainable. As long as the sun shines and the seasons produce freezing and melting of polar waters you can produce energy from ocean thermal energy conversion.
Seriously? You don’t understand the difference between source and production? Why are you even posting if your understanding is that limited?
4. Uses up non-renewable resources. The oceans contain vast quantities of dissolved resources which OTEC makes accessible. Potable water is another potential derivative.
You really do not understand sustainable. I mean, not even a little. Not only does that point only *potentially* expand the potential resource, it does not make them recoverable, nor does it change the characteristic of being limited. If you understand exponents, you should know better than to try that argument.
5. Heat will come back out of the oceans. OTEC is first the conversion of heat to work in accordance with the second law of thermodynamics. No other energy source actually reduces the amount of heat stored in the ocean.
You are proposing ADDING heat to the oceans by speeding up total storage in the deep oceans, but it doesn’t add heat to the oceans? You’re nuts. Worse, changing it to mechanical doesn’t change anything. It all ends up or is compensated by construction, mining, heat transfer from the mechanical work, etc. The energy doesn’t disappear, and the amount converted to mechanical would be tiny as a fraction of the heat balance.
OTEC is NOT an energy source.
Heat is not the issue. Heat balance is. Once it’s held by the system, it’s here. The ONLY way to change that is reduce the imbalance and flip it, which heat pipes would have ZERO effect on. It’s a non-solution.
6. CO2 reduction is a permanent solution, heat pipes are a band-aid, so why bother? Electrolysis of sea water is Carbon Sequestering Energy Production.
Prove it.
If you think humans are going to passively sit by and see their ranks decimated as much as 85%
Watt the heck are you ranting about? Straw man much?
or their standard of living depleted
See above.
by energy deprivation
See above.
without a fight, I respectfully submit you are deluded.
The delusion is yours. You are suggesting something that will change absolutely nothing wrt cliamte, has potentially huge unintended consequences, and wastes resources to achieve nothing.
When you need sustainability, merely shrugging off that your suggestion solves nothing, that there is no choice BUT sustainability, what have you said? Nothing. It doesn’t matter what people want. If the planet cannot support it, pretending you can magically make that not true by waving a hand in the air saying people just won’t do that, you’re nuts. You are saying people will choose extinction. Maybe so. Pretending you are offering anything other than extinction with this nonsense is what is delusional.
I will take the late Richard Smalley up on hisTerawatt Challenge any day of the week. Heat pipes are the only way to Global Energy Prosperity.
Energy prosperity? LOL… You’d do well to learn something about resources. FWIW, the best way to get energy secure it to need less than we produce, not to pretend unsustainable energy *production* is a solution.
Done with this. You obviously lack the knowledge to engage usefully.
#254 Rob Ellison said, First we construct a network from four major climate indices. The network approach to complex systems is a rapidly developing methodology, which has proven to be useful in analyzing such systems’ behavior
Permaculture principles:
* The output from every element must support at least two other elements.
* The input for every element must be supported by at least two other elements.
* Zero waste. (Closed loops.)
This is exactly the same kind of thinking and analysis. This is why I can analyze as well, if not better than, any scientist or other layperson.
Like our OTEC-blinded poster, if you don’t *start* with systems thinking, you are very unlikely to to figure out the solutions… let alone the system.
PURE GOLD!!! This is what we’ve been needing… President Obama summons his “Anger Translator” to deal with Climate Change Deniers. Break out the popcorn!
http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2015/04/obama-just-skewered-republican-climate-deniers-epic-anger-translator-rant
#254 Ellison
“While this approach illuminates the climate system’s components, climate’s full picture remains illusive.”
Indeed, since “climate’s full picture” is hidden under a Scotsman’s kilt.
1) We can always define a system that we can’t solve.
2) We can always define a system that we can solve.
(2) is how science and engineering have progressed since long before we called it science and engineering. (1) is how you find yourself curled up in a cave praying to the gods for mercy.
Brian Dodge 257
In 2013 Nihous and Rajagopalan acknowledged that the 2005 paper was wrong because it was based on a one dimensional model. In a 3D model the output would be about ten times that predicted in the earlier one dimensional study. – http://hinmrec.hnei.hawaii.edu/wp-content/uploads/2010/01/Global-OTEC-Resources_2013.pdf
Subsequently Nihous cut that back by about a half to 14TW – http://hinmrec.hnei.hawaii.edu/ongoing-projects/otec-thermal-resource/ .
Steve Fish 259
This piece – http://theenergycollective.com/jim-baird/2186591/lowest-cost-renewable-energy-comes-2000-percent-environmental-payback – citing an MIT masters thesis by Shylesh Muralidharan http://dspace.mit.edu/bitstream/handle/1721.1/76927/824363276.pdf?…1 suggests OTEC at the 500 to 1000 MW scale can be the cheapest renewable. Before getting to that point however the unintended consequence could start to be sorted out at lab scale with two tanks representing the ocean’s hot and cold reservoirs servicing a system of about 1500 watts. If that works a 10 or so MW ocean going plant should be tried before fully scaling up.
Zebra,
Indeed. Ellison writes narratives based on the ideas of scientists such as Tsonis, who want to create some sort of system that is great for mathematicians but may have no applicability to predicting El Ninos. You can dig yourself a deep hole by creating a mathematics that is not solvable, yet forever analyzable in the abstract.
Further, Ellison misrepresents what we are currently working on at the Azimuth site. He asserts that ” I had a look at the Azimuth site – and the latest emphasis is – and has been for some time – on network math to capture dynamical complexity.” That turned in to a dead-end IMO, ala above, and the only path that has remained is analyzing the dipole that is part of ENSO. Like zebra said, this is a model that features math that we can solve.
Paul Pukite (#WHUT)
What really depresses me about the OTEC conversation is that I recall the same kinds of conversation from the 1970s, including a time when they were already building 10-MWe-scale demo plants. In 40+ years we’ve made no progress at all, simply because fossil fuels got cheap for a while and we let it all go. Humanity is not going to survive, and the main reason for that is, for all our vaunted intelligence, we have the attention span of a rhesus monkey.
http://www.nature.com/ngeo/journal/vaop/ncurrent/full/ngeo2413.html
“Future productivity and carbon storage limited by terrestrial nutrient availability”
William R. Wieder, Cory C. Cleveland, W. Kolby Smith & Katherine Todd-Brown
Nature Geoscience (2015) doi:10.1038/ngeo2413
Received 23 July 2014 Accepted 12 March 2015 Published online 20 April 2015
Basically, it seems to claim that terrestrial plant turn from a C sink to a net C source by the end of the century. How much of a ‘game changer’ is this? More discussion at CarbonBrief: http://www.carbonbrief.org/blog/2015/04/worlds-plants-and-soils-to-switch-from-carbon-sink-to-source-by-2100-study-shows/
and briefly by Andy Skuce at SkS: https://www.skepticalscience.com/Schuur2015.html#commenthead (comment #21)
Rob Ellison 252: http://watertechbyrie.com
“……8. By 2030 ensure increased access to sustainable modern energy services.
9. By 2030 phase out fossil fuel subsidies that encourage wasteful consumption
10. Build resilience and adaptive capacity to climate induced hazards in all vulnerable countries. ……..”
That’s an amazing list of goals to accomplish by 2030, just after civilization collapses due to GW.
The Gentlemen Who Prefer Fantasy (GWPF), an organisation that gets tax relief from the British Government because somehow it has managed to remain registered as an educational charity, is presumably expending some of that money investigating the global instrument temperature record.
GWPF have engaged a panel to examine HADcrut, GISS, NCDC & BEST and address the following really really really necessary questions:-
The panel comprises Terence Kealey (chairman), Petr Chylek, Richard McNider, Roman Mureika & Roger A Pielke Sr who are inviting submission of evidence on any matters related to the inquiry with a closing date of 30/6/2015.
And this is all because, according to the GWPF “Questions have been raised about the reliability of the surface temperature data and the extent to which apparent warming trends may be artefacts of adjustments made after the data are collected.” The GWPF don’t make clear who has been raising these questions.
#265 Webhubtelescope,
Just to remind you of the point of my original comment. It’s about both the measurement and the math. And the public perception of what you are doing.
Tell me, in my hypothetical world where I provide scientific funding, this: If I can get you more detailed measurements of the Pacific, in real time and increased coverage, how would it make a difference to your analysis?
If you can’t tell me that, I would be as skeptical about your math as I am about Ellison’s more grandiose project.
BPL: “What really depresses me about the OTEC conversation is that I recall the same kinds of conversation from the 1970s,….”
Indeed
“OTEC theory was first developed in the 1880s and the first bench size demonstration model was constructed in 1926. Currently the world’s only operating OTEC plant is in Japan, overseen by Saga University.”
– http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ocean_thermal_energy_conversion
#268, Edward–I’m pretty sure that isn’t going to happen. In 15 years, there’s a decent chance I’ll still be alive if not. Would you care to wager, say, a dinner–provided of course that you can come up with a means by which I could pay up if I lose?
I suppose that one could argue that the unlikelihood of me providing dinner to you amid the ruins of our civilization would be offset by the very high potential value it would offer you if that long shot did come to pass.
Why do I feel that we won’t see a collapse that soon? Because I take the best available information–AR 5–quite seriously. There is at present little indication that we’ll be ‘droughted out’ over that timescale, and we sure won’t be ‘warmed out’. I do think that we are going to see continuation and indeed acceleration of some of the current observable trends (Arctic sea ice loss, extreme weather, warming, for leading examples)–and I think it’ll be such that denialism will be very considerably reduced by then.
It’s unfortunately also possible, and at all not (I fear) unlikely, that we’ll be firmly committed to exceeding 2 C by then.
“at all not” = “not at all”
Sorry…
Jim, #258–
1. So we are in agreement that geothermal is indeed baseload. Good.
2. Your dismissal of the potential of geothermal was extremely hasty. Had you read through to the end of the paragraph the initial sentence of which you quoted, you would have seen this:
“…over 200 zettajoules (ZJ) would be extractable, with the potential to increase this to over 2,000 ZJ with technology improvements – sufficient to provide all the world’s present energy needs for several millennia.” The basis for that is not clear to me, unfortunately; the report is firmly focused on the US, and I don’t see those exact figures. (Maybe the Wiki author extrapolated from the US case to the global case?)
But the MIT report’s figure 1.7 does give *US* resources (with a conservative 2% recovery factor–midrange is 20%!) as exceeding total *world* energy usage by a factor of about 500 (if I haven’t dropped a decimal somewhere.)
http://geothermal.inel.gov/publications/future_of_geothermal_energy.pdf
3. I’m not saying that geothermal is a ‘silver bullet.’ Actually, I don’t believe there is one–not nuclear, not the ‘new conventional renewables’ of wind and solar, not OTEC, not regenerative ag, not demand management and energy efficiency. I like all of the above, though not equally, but most can’t scale fast enough, as far as I can tell, to avoid 2 C warming (and the remainder, so far, aren’t.) Nonetheless, I think that civilization remains savable, and that all of the above will play some role in doing so.
I think that many of us like to propose silver bullets because they are comforting in the face of looming planetary disaster. But as advocates, silver bulletry is a flawed strategy because, as we all know but only selectively remember, “extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence.” Thus, the more we reify our preferred solution, the higher the burden of proof we impose upon ourselves. (And, quite often, the more we damage our own credibility as advocates.)
Better, IMO, to stay a little more down-to-earth and concrete with our advocacy.
#260–OK, this is why I’ve pretty much given up on Killian’s comments. I pasted #260 into Word and separated out what I saw, as tabulated below, then used the word count tool to quantify the categories.
a) Complete post: 689 words
b) Quoted from original: 223 words
c) Essentially denigratory or vituperative: 133 words
d) Substantive: 296 words
For my taste, the c/d ratio is way too high (and the tone way too nasty.) Also, too many of the ‘substantive’ words were really rhetorical. Coherence is an issue, too. This sentence is the worst example:
“When you need sustainability, merely shrugging off that your suggestion solves nothing, that there is no choice BUT sustainability, what have you said?”
What have you said, indeed?
{Methodological appendix}
Here’s what I classed “vituperative”:
I say, watts up with your head? …though any validation of wattsupwithstupidity pretty much signals you as a non-serious person…
If you do not understand that, you’ve got issues… Are serious? Watts up with your thinking?
…If you’re going to baldly misrepresent facts, watts up with that?
Seriously? …Why are you even posting if your understanding is that limited?
…I mean, not even a little. …If you understand exponents, you should know better than to try that argument.
…You’re nuts.
…Watt the heck are you ranting about? Straw man much?
…The delusion is yours.
…you’re nuts. …Pretending you are offering anything other than extinction with this nonsense is what is delusional.
…Energy prosperity? LOL… You’d do well to learn something about resources. …Done with this. You obviously lack the knowledge to engage usefully.
#269 MARodger,
Not to worry; NOAA is on it:
“The vision of the USCRN program is to maintain a sustainable high-quality climate observation network that 50 years from now can with the highest degree of confidence answer the question: How has the climate of the Nation changed over the past 50 years?”
Good to know the science will be settled without my grant funding, so I guess I can keep my lottery money when I win. Invest it in coal stocks, maybe.
more attribution: http://www.nytimes.com/2015/04/28/science/new-study-links-weather-extremes-to-global-warming.html
That’s an amazing list of goals to accomplish by 2030, just after civilization collapses due to GW.
Comment by Edward Greisch — 27 Apr 2015
So Edward, I really, really want to know something here… Your last comment…. is that your true take on the situation? Civilization collapse somewhere ~ 2030? I’ve heard more dire and less dire predictions than that but I think Guy McPherson may be a little extreme but when you look at it in the aggregate, I just don’t see any good news out there. When I’ve asked this question in the past people tend to shut up. What are the experts out there giving as an estimate of our “sell by” date generally? I know the world isn’t going to end on Tuesday but… Can you point me to come credible sources on this?
Thanks
Re- Comment by Kevin McKinney — 27 Apr 2015 @ 12:19 PM, ~#275
Kevin, I agree. It is actually kind of thrilling to see such a perfect amalgam of exaggerated self reference and the Kruger and Dunning (1999) hypothesis.
278 Chuck Hughes: Our very own Barton Paul Levenson, whose comment on the subject is in this unforced variations. BPL has the best estimate I know of.
274 Kevin McKinney & 278 Chuck Hughes: No wager. Correction: Last month:
https://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2015/03/unforced-variations-march-2015/comment-page-5/#comment-627687
233 Barton Paul Levenson says:
278 Chuck Hughes said, “That’s an amazing list of goals to accomplish by 2030, just after civilization collapses due to GW.”
The world produces many times more food (Food being stuff we grow for EITHER humans or cows) than could possibly be consumed by a billion people. The internet and other computers ensure that our knowledge can’t be lost. Even if we slaughter or starve 6 billion people, civilization can’t collapse because we are on the cusp of automating everything from farming to lawyering.
So shout about people dying if you want, but to state that the impossible is inevitable, well, tis foolish. The science is clear. We can lower the temperature of the planet at will with sulphur. That ten or even millions of people will die as a result is pretty immaterial when we have 7-9 billion people to start with. (if civilization collapse is the issue you’re concerned about.)
Kevin-san,
The whole global geothermal flux is about 44 TW. It’s hard to see how we could extract more than that.
Chuck-san,
My own estimate is that civilization collapses c. 2028, with error bars of perhaps six years. I base this on a feedback between warming and drought. I’ve written a paper on this but can’t get it published.
#283–Barton, correct. But I don’t think that is what is being claimed, particularly in the MIT report. Unfortunately, it’s rather densely written and you really have to dig in to fully grasp the priors applying to any given sentence. I hadn’t the time to do that, hence my comment that much remained unclear to me.
(There was a fuller earlier comment I had tried to post, which went into more of the detail that I did sift, but it got lost to a ‘try later’ error message. Had quite a few of those lately, which makes me wonder if RC is being subject to DOS attacks? If so, we must not be quite so ‘irrelevant’ as some denialist commentators have claimed!)
Bottom line, the Wiki figures in zettajoules must not be annual, but cumulative.
Be all that as it may, let me address your point. The EIA gives 2012 total primary energy consumption as 13,371 Million Tons of Oil Equivalent (MTOE, in the jargon), which is 155,504,730 gigaWatt hours. Backing out the hours in a year, you get 17,752 GW, or ~18 TW. That seems to be the basis for the figure given in this Wiki article, which says:
Estimated potentials for various forms of renewable energy are just given below in the same article:
geothermal energy 5,000 EJ (1,400,000 TWh)
solar energy 1,575 EJ (438,000 TWh)
wind power 640 EJ (180,000 TWh)
biomass 276 EJ (77,000 TWh)
hydropower 50 EJ (14,000 TWh)
ocean energy 1 EJ (280 TWh).
I’ve reordered them in descending order of potential; as you’ll note, geothermal is at the top of the list. (I think that ‘ocean energy’ doesn’t include OTEC, which is why it’s at the bottom. ) So, if for some silly reason we wanted to power absolutely everything from just one type of renewable energy, geothermal would be far from the worst one to choose on the basis of potential output.
#281–Ed, discussed previously. While there’s no way to absolutely exclude ‘black swan’ events as Jim Larsen tries to do at #282, the drought data we have as of now just don’t support your statement. (I know, Dai had argued otherwise a couple of years back, but that claim has been vigorously attacked, and with what appears as of AR5 to be scientific success. As of now, the field appears to be trying to agree what drought metrics are appropriate for what purposes, and the observations allow only low confidence that there are any trends at all. IOW, we can’t even claim to have detected much of a signal, yet.)
And we aren’t going to run out of resources in 15 years, either. Water is going to be increasingly a problem, I think, in places like the US southwest, and in probably northern China, but places like that haven’t even started to get serious about managing the resource really rationally. They will, as the need becomes more and more immediate. (Northern China is probably ahead in this regard, but then the crunch has been longer, and more drastic.)
Biologicals are going to be more of a problem than chemicals; there are getting to be an awful lot of alternatives in the latter, and some of the high demand ones are awfully common–silicon, for instance.
I guess we’ll just have to disagree on this.
My own estimate is that civilization collapses c. 2028, with error bars of perhaps six years. I base this on a feedback between warming and drought. I’ve written a paper on this but can’t get it published.
Comment by Barton Paul Levenson — 28 Apr 2015
BPL, I checked out your website and noticed your Christian roots so I have to inquire if your predictions have anything to do with the reading of the Bible or are they strictly scientifically based assessments and calculations? I assume you’re quite able to separate your beliefs from the science so that may sound like an unfair question.
I would think that there is some way to calculate the wide variety of known forcings, feedbacks and known-unknowns and approximate time scales involved to make some sort of predictions about when things might accelerate to the point of being beyond human control. I also know that human activity cannot continue like it has been doing without some outside force stopping it. I think we all know that.
Is there a scientific consensus on this that you know of or any other reliable assessments you can direct me to? I know about James Lovelock, Frank Fenner, Peter Ward, Stephen Hawking and have either read or listened to their assessments of the Climate situation. I have no reason to doubt them. Of course they’re not going to single out a specific year or decade but tend to speak in more general terms but every one has indicated this century as being very critical for the continuation of human civilization beyond 2100.
Thanks
The science is clear. We can lower the temperature of the planet at will with sulphur. That ten or even millions of people will die as a result is pretty immaterial when we have 7-9 billion people to start with. (if civilization collapse is the issue you’re concerned about.)
Comment by Jim Larsen — 28 Apr 20
I think lowering the temperature with sulfur is “geo engineering” isn’t it? I was thinking that most in the scientific community consider any sort of geo engineering to be futile or a temporary fix. Also, if we could lower the temperature “at will” why aren’t we doing it? Are we gonna wait until all the ice melts before we try that?
BPL @283.
He can extract (much) more than the 44TW, because he isn’t proposing a steady state geothermal system, but to mine the heat stored in the upper few kilometers of the crust. The heatflux hardly figures into the picture -except as far as it determined the initial temperature of the rock in question.
And what are we to make of this:
“More Fatal Earthquakes to Come, Warn Climate Change Scientists”
http://www.newsweek.com/nepal-earthquake-could-have-been-manmade-disaster-climate-change-brings-326017.html
[Response: That some commentators are irresponsible and stupid.–eric]
My own estimate is that civilization collapses c. 2028, with error bars of perhaps six years. I base this on a feedback between warming and drought. I’ve written a paper on this but can’t get it published.
Comment by Barton Paul Levenson — 28 Apr 2015
Do you have a link to your paper?
Thanks
283 BPL said, “My own estimate is that civilization collapses c. 2028, with error bars of perhaps six years”
How will civilization collapse, given that we can and will probably have to use geoengineering to stop global warming in its tracks? Do you have ANY information that supports what seems to be your claim, that we’ll just let ourselves boil like the proverbial frog in a pot of water? Or, if not, that geoengineering will cause the collapse of civilization? Bad things will happen. There is no positive when it comes to increasing CO2. But, the level of maximum harm given mankind’s ability to react to threats simply doesn’t come remotely close to an existential threat.
287 Chuck H said, “I think lowering the temperature with sulfur is “geo engineering” isn’t it? I was thinking that most in the scientific community consider any sort of geo engineering to be futile or a temporary fix. Also, if we could lower the temperature “at will” why aren’t we doing it? Are we gonna wait until all the ice melts before we try that?”
You are correct. It’s geoengineering and it is a “banned” topic similar to eugenics. That will change as things get worse, millions die, and our other options disappear. Perhaps we’ll get lucky and evade the worst, but I’m rather pessimistic. That pessimism doesn’t lead to fatalism. We’re 7-9 billion strong and our science and technology are ramping up at ever greater rates. We could lose 6 billion innocent souls and our civilization won’t be in the slightest danger of collapse. Geoengineering is a temporary fix, but that’s all we need, given that the final solution only needs to support a few hundred million or a billion people to be successful – assuming that survival of the species and civilization are your primary concerns.
[Response: Geoengineering is not a “banned” topic. It is talked about all the time — too much in my view. We’ve written extensively about this, e.g. https://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2009/10/why-levitt-and-dubner-like-geo-engineering-and-why-they-are-wrong/. To quote Gavin, “Geo-engineering is neither cheap, nor a fix, and the reasons why it is very likely to be a bad idea are ethical and legal, much more than its still-uncertain scientific merits.” As for eugenics, you can talk about it all you want (but I hope you read up on history while you are at it). But please don’t waste our time with that here. –eric]
289 Rob Ellison – are you seriously concerned and dismayed at the lack of energy access and the extent of poverty in the world?
Or are you only really concerned about all the poor science and poor policy in the world regarding the “faux issues” of AGW/CC in your opinion?
CH 286: I checked out your website and noticed your Christian roots so I have to inquire if your predictions have anything to do with the reading of the Bible or are they strictly scientifically based assessments and calculations?
BPL: Stupid question. I wouldn’t have submitted a paper to peer-reviewed science journals if I’d based it on the Revelation of Saint John.
JL 293: the level of maximum harm given mankind’s ability to react to threats simply doesn’t come remotely close to an existential threat.
BPL: The key word there is “react.” Humans don’t prevent crises; we wait until the crisis hits and then respond to it. That’s why we didn’t stop Hitler in 1934, 1936, or 1938. If you’re depending on humans to be rational, please explain why we now have climate science deniers heading every congressional science committee, or why 40% of Americans think the world is only 6,000 years old, or why Shi’ites and Sunnis are bombing each others’ mosques over the question of who was the proper successor to Ali in the early 700s.
HadCRUT4 for March has been posted, being the 7th hottest anomaly on record.The showing of recent months is less impressive than for GISS or NCDC. Of the last 12 months of HadCRUT4, two are in the top ten (4 for NCDC, 5 for GISS) and eight in the top 20, nine in the top 30 (NCDC & GISS both 9 in the top 24).
.1 2007/01 – +0.835°C
.2 1998/02 – +0.762°C
=3 2002/02 – +0.701°C
=3 2006/12 – +0.701°C
.5 2002/03 – +0.697°C
.6 2015/01 – +0.69°C
.7 2015/03 – +0.683°C
=8 2010/03 – +0.677°C
=8 2010/04 – +0.677°C
10 1998/07 – +0.672°C
#289–“Climate change can’t be solved on the backs of the world’s poorest people…”
– See more at: https://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2015/04/unforced-variations-april-2015/comment-page-6/#comment-629175
Color me cynical, but that would be a much more compelling point, were it not that political advantage, ideological correctness, administrative convenience, and corporate profit are increased on the backs of the world’s poorest people every minute. It rather reminds me of those who only worry about bird kill when it comes via wind turbine.
But perhaps I’m being unfair to the Breakthrough Institute–however infelicitous the framing in the quote *and* in their very name appears to me to be. Certainly it’s important to deploy aid money cost-effectively, especially in the context of energy policy and emissions mitigation…
Thanks for your reply to my query about CC possible effects on seismic activity, Eric. But could you point me to some source that shows how these effects are not likely so I can share them with people elsewhere who may be lead astray?
I’d just like to note that in comment #277, Chris Dudley linked to a New York Times article about an important new study on attribution of extreme weather events to global warming.
That’s a very important issue, I think, since extreme weather phenomena including heat waves and intense precipitation events are, in a sense, the “face” of global warming for many people, and increases in the frequency and severity of such events seem to be increasing public awareness and concern about the problem of climate change. And a great deal of denialist propaganda has accordingly been focused on denying that there is any connection between global warming and extreme weather events.
And it is a climate science issue, of exactly the sort that this site is an ideal forum for discussing.
But in the 20 or so comments posted since then, not one commenter has even acknowledged it. Instead, just the usual back and forth about when the world will end.
The original Nature Climate Science is online here:
http://www.nature.com/nclimate/journal/vaop/ncurrent/full/nclimate2617.html
The important data is not current but is contained historical records such as in coral proxy data. If I said that I could take a model of ENSO for the last 150 years and use that to show good correlation with coral proxy records from 1650 to 1800, would that make a difference? I will place the latest results on the Azimuth Forum later today.
Substantiation of models does not occur overnight and due to our inability to do controlled experiments, we gain credibility through accumulation of evidence.
Yet, certain aspects of climate science are perhaps simpler than one may think:
http://contextearth.com/2015/04/28/climate-science-is-just-not-that-hard/