A new open thread for climate solutions in the new year (and the soon-to-be new US administration actions). As for the climate science open threads, please try to renew your commitment to constructive dialog that prioritises light over heat (like LED bulbs for instance!). Thanks!
Re: KIA (443)
Not this discussion, Genius. This “ 10% of GDP” – is mainly from oil EXPORTED. So no need to wax on as if you were the Friendly Oildrop in the 1950s B&W 16-mm movie: “1001 of marvelous uses of oil, for grades 1-4”. The discussion is whether Canada’s economy will collapse without the oil exports or not.
“ Starting to get the picture now?“
David B. Benson (448): “ Given that the wind turbines exist and are required to be used, what’s to power the grid when the wind doesn’t blow?”
– That’s a … different argument than the one you posted originally and I have challenged. So let’s finish the previous play, before we move the goalposts, shall we?
DBB(448) “[I] recommend stopping the flogging of dead horses”
-C’mon, David, you are not quite dead yet, still kicking!
DBB(448) “Doesn’t assist your reputation”
So, unable to acknowledge that you were wrong, you changed the subject, and this “Doesn’t assist … my reputation“?
=====================
– DBB: ” Wind power, when available, is less expensive than the backup.”
– Piotr: “but it makes sense ONLY if you can switch off the backup, when there is wind.”
– DBB: “ Pressurized light water reactors can be controlled from 20% to maximum and reverse, sufficiently quickly to track wind power variation….”
– Piotr: “MOST of GHGs and costs from the lifetime of your nukes will be realized WHETHER you run it at 100% electricity generation or at 20%.”
– DBB: [changes the subject and warns me that asking about his previous arguments, I risk my reputation … ;-)]
=====================
Re 444 mike:
For example, soil losses:
https://www.producer.com/news/survey-reveals-amazing-soil-loss-in-great-plains-region/
——
blockquoteThese results show the very important role of soil for long-term sequestration of C as it may related to its exchange with atmospheric CO2. Grassland sites were sampled by horizon to a depth of about 2 m. Nearly one-half of the total weight of SOC is in the top 20 cm and up to one-third can be in the top 10 cm of the soil. The remaining one-half is located from 20 to 200 cm below the surface. The mass of SOC was between 85-150 t ha-1 in the top 2 m of soil. These data show the importance of protecting near-surface soil and its associated SOC from loss. 14C dating of soil C indicates that the one-half of the SOC that is sequestered below 20 cm has mean residence times (MRT) that are greater than 1000 to 2000 years. Soil C at depths of about 2 m has MRT of 9000 to 13000 years, but accounts for only about five percent of the total. Thus, once sequestered, immense amounts of SOC have remained in soil profiles for a very long time.blockquote
One of the things we do in Permaculture Design Science (regenerative ag) is preferentially use plants to achieve aims good for the system, thus good for us. One of those is co-planting. An important issue in co-planting is root depth. Using complementary root depths aids growth for all plants in the system. I.e., planting three plants together with the same root depths vs three plants with the same functions but different root depths so they don’t compete with one another. The latter is preferable, obviously.
Of course, local conditions matter and that includes indigenous vs. non-indigenous, meeting needs, etc., but one way we can massively ramp up sequestration is via exploiting those root depths.
And, as you can see, Kevin, residence times can be massively long, particularly when you consider you don’t sequester once, but it is ongoing, so the amount of carbon should be constantly increasing to whatever theoretical limits one wishes. (Again, terra preta is at least 13%. Do that globally, we’d have to start emitting more C just to stay warm!)
444:
From published peer reviewed research below based on independent field trials, soils can be made to sequester up to an additional 1.85 gigatonnes carbon per year assuming the proper forms of farming are used (no tilling, mulching, crop rotation, biochar.) and scaled up globally to include all or most croplands
None of that research is on regenerative farms. I don’t mean pseudo-regenerative, I mean a fully functioning system. I have made this point over and over. Stop responding with this tripe until you are willing and able to be fair and equitable. I repeat: The PUBLISHED crap is not doing experiments on fully regenerative systems.
Just as more than ten years I ago said 1M SLR was the minimum we should expect, the science now agrees. I tell you now, the science is getting this wrong because they have no idea how to test it, and that is partly because they simply do not believe in it. Say “permaculture” to the vast majority of scientists and they will laugh in your face.
Further to nigel at 441 (incorrectly labeled 444 above):
You said “thousands of years” then contradict yourself with a claim of @200 years.
Next time, avoid the nonsense in the first place, and, don’t double down with additional nonsense by repeating the same sad mantra of sources that are *not* reflective of regenerative systems.
A 7-year study saw an increase of: On average, SOC stocks were 1.73 kg m−2 (17.3 t ha−1) higher than those in the reference pasture plot.
https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fenvs.2018.00116/full
17.3 / 7 yrs = 2.47 tons/yr/hectare = 205,010,000 tons/year if on all arable land. Again, we are talking upper bounds to frame possibilites.
From “science.”
And, again, these are basic systems not systems integrating all the functions we can stack. While this study looked at “permaculture” systems, they did not include bio-char, humanure, vermiculture, hugelkulture, and so much more. A farm/community employing all there is to employ could sequester vast amounts of carbon – well beyond anything in the literature. And all this without any discussion of simplification.
Don’t tell me what we can’t do. It’s cowardly. It’s fearmongering. It’s fear of change. It’s outdated ideologies. It’s “faith” in tech and science that is doesn’t exist yet and may never.
It’s time to stop making excuses.
it’s beyond time to talk about how to get this done.
Sorry, “A Question of Power” is by Robert Bryce.
Piotr @452 — False! UAMPS has wind farms but as yet no nuclear power plants.
Please do read the Real Climate Comment policy, given just above the area for writing comments. You repeatedly violate.
KIA 449: No comments about how PVs will produce electricity when it’s cloudy please – for all practical purposes they do not.
BPL: KIA apparently never heard of diffuse light. Yes, KIA, solar panels actually do work when it’s cloudy. Not as well, but they do produce power. “Cloudy” is not the same thing as “night.”
KIA, #443–
Well, we’re all careless with language sometimes–certainly, I’ve been known to be at times. However, that bit just quoted is a real ‘poster child’ for poorly formulated thought misleading the formulator.
No, those things are NOT “possible because of oil” merely because at some point in their respective production processes oil was used.
How do I justify such an outrageous statement? With the simple observation that “jobs” existed, “dollars” existed, many of the same “products” existed, and even more certainly than any of those, “food” existed, long before the fossil fuel era came around. Of course, fossil fuel has been a remarkably convenient tool in economic development; there’s no denying that.
But its time has been relatively brief on the stage of history. With intelligence and wisdom, that time will soon be drawing to a close. The intrinsic value of petroleum products for lubrication and chemical feedstocks is really too high to be burning oil just to generate energy, anyhow. But the historically short-term (ie., century-plus) glut fooled us–along with our own collective ignorance.
Ignorance does that.
Killian, multiple posts–
Which is ~0.2 billion tons(?)/yr, as against ~35 billion tonnes of CO2 emitted annually in recent years, equating to ~9.55 tonnes of carbon. Yes, I understand that you have presented some reason to think that the 0.2 billion is not the upper bound:
However, I can’t help but notice that the “1.85 gigatonnes carbon per year” requoted from nigel @ #454 is ~9x the figure you cited @ #456. And nigel’s number is still less than 20% of current annual emissions.
I’m not trying to argue with you here, but quantifying the extent of the mitigation we could achieve via soil sequestration is certainly an important question. And I’m not getting a very clear answer at this point.
DBB, #458–
I haven’t been following this discussion in detail, but color me puzzled: repeated readings of #452 fail to disclose a single word about UAMPS. Piotr’s comments seem to be relevant to nuclear plants in general and in principle, not about specific instances.
Mr. KIA: “No comments about how PVs will produce electricity when it’s cloudy please – for all practical purposes they do not. To size a system based on current best-technology cloudy-day-output would cost more money than will ever exist on earth in all of history.”
Sorry, Moron, wrong again! If you can fricking read, your solar arrays are producing energy. Really, dude, don’t you get tired of being so wrong all the fricking time? I mean, I get tired of you being wrong. Dude, maybe pull your head out of the capacious anus that is the rightwing blogosphere.
#449, KIA–
Yes–west of the mountains. The interior, though, not so much. As previously discussed on these very threads, there is excellent solar potential in eastern Oregon and Washington.
https://www.nrel.gov/gis/assets/images/solar-annual-dni-2018-01.jpg
In fact, solar DNSI is better in south-central to southeastern Oregon than nearly anywhere east of the Mississippi.*
And projects are now being developed at a rapid rate. This fact doesn’t address the eventual possible proportion to which they may contribute to the energy mix, but it certainly does demonstrate that KIA is wrong about the putative lack of resource.
https://www.spglobal.com/marketintelligence/en/news-insights/latest-news-headlines/kicking-coal-oregon-emerges-as-a-solar-and-energy-storage-development-hub-57104313
Additionally, wind has a lot of potential, not only in the interior, but notably offshore:
Oregon windspeed map (onshore):
https://windexchange.energy.gov/maps-data/104
Washington windspeed map (onshore):
https://windexchange.energy.gov/maps-data/133
Offshore:
https://www.pnnl.gov/news-media/wind-power-oregon-coast-could-provide-more-electricity
Note the discussion of the complementarity of the offshore resource.
Finally, the PNW is not an energy island; energy is already traded with California and the plains. Enhanced regional energy cooperation could be a big help in decarbonization.
*Yes, the solar maps from NREL account for cloudiness: “PSM uses cloud properties from the satellite retrievals and then uses those properties to calculate surface radiation.”
https://nsrdb.nrel.gov/about/u-s-data.html#psm
And interestingly, the relative variation proposed by KIA is completely wrong, per the monthly versions of those same maps: winter DNSI, surprisingly, is relatively uniform across the entire country (presumably because the variation is dominated by seasonality of light hours, not cloudiness.) So are summer variations! The biggest regional differentials are during the equinoctial months of March and September.
Kevin McKinney @462 — The issue is a misreading of
https://bravenewclimate.proboards.com/thread/405/smr-small-modular-reactors?page=6
Ray Ladbury @463 — Generators, including solar, produce power, not energy.
David B. Benson (458) above the above:
Piotr @452 — False! UAMPS has wind farms but as yet no nuclear power plants.
Eeerr.., which of my arguments you have just “False!”-fied? To make it easier, I’m reposting them at the bottom of this post. So, David, is it No.2 or No.4? And HOW exactly have you managed proved them “False!“?
DBB(458) Please do read the Real Climate Comment policy, given just above the area for writing comments. You repeatedly violate.
And which policy would it be:
Commandment XI: “You shall never ask David B. Benson to justify his earlier claims”
Commandment XII: “You shall never question David B. Benson’s right to change the subject after getting himself into a corner with his earlier claims” ?
================== and here the exchange in question =============
Piotr (452):
[1.] DBB: ” Wind power, when available, is less expensive than the backup.”
[2.] Piotr: “but it makes sense ONLY if you can switch off the backup, when there is wind.”
[3.] DBB: “ Pressurized light water reactors can be controlled from 20% to maximum and reverse, sufficiently quickly to track wind power variation….”
[4.] Piotr: “MOST of GHGs and costs from the lifetime of your nukes will be realized WHETHER you run it at 100% electricity generation or at 20%.”
[5.] DBB: changes the subject from his claims 1&3 to: “Given that the wind turbines exist and are required to be used, what’s to power the grid when the wind doesn’t blow?” and warns me that asking about his previous arguments “ Doesn’t assist your reputation”
=====================
on soil and permaculture as a response to our CO2 problem: I am not convinced that permaculture can be as effective at resolving our CO2 buildup as Robyn Francis suggests it might be, but I am pretty sure that it can be more effective than Nigel suggested.
I think that soil permaculture approaches to CO2 sequestration are interesting and worth a try. The permaculture approach would also simultaneously produce food and might also help with water issues in regions where drought and hunger are issues that should cause us concern.
Similarly, I think it makes sense to encourage the improvement of African energy infrastructure by encouraging the floating solar model that I posted about earlier. This project does not mean that we might not also be supportive of a grassroots, roof top distributed energy system.
I think our solution to the CO2 problem, if it exists, is going to include a diversity or tactics and approaches that will vary from time to time and place to place.
Cheers
Mike
448 – David Benson
“I question whether you actually understand how electrical power grids actually function. Try reading
https://bravenewclimate.proboards.com/thread/714/pjm-style-electricity-markets”
Thanks for that link. On that blog page is a link to a course on electricity markets. Seems to be pretty good so far:
https://www.e-education.psu.edu/ebf483/node/508
451 – Piotr
“This “ 10% of GDP” – is mainly from oil EXPORTED.”
10% may be the part of GDP from production/sales of oil. If you think you can shut off the oil and have 90% of the economy still running you are mistaken. ALL GDP in Canada and the world is dependent on the use of oil. Every product produced, bought, sold, eaten, etc is made possible by energy from oil. Can it be replaced? Maybe, we are going to try to replace it, but as I tried to convey previously if you turn off the spigot too quickly, it will be TILT! GAME OVER! ALL economic activity will cease, except for survival of the fittest. ;)
459 – BPL
” Yes, KIA, solar panels actually do work when it’s cloudy. Not as well, but they do produce power.”
You are correct. They DO put out an insignificant amount of power and no, you cannot size a system on their cloudy day output. It’s cost prohibitive. I guess the government might try it if they think they have infinite dollars. They don’t.
For those interested in facts of PV Power instead of wishful thinking, PV Panels are CLAIMED to put out 10-25% of rated power on cloudy days:
https://us.sunpower.com/blog/2019/05/09/how-solar-panels-work-cloudy-days
Don’t believe it? Take it up with Sunpower. :)
David Benson, if they are producing power over a given time, they are producing energy as well. Isn’t dimensional analysis fun!
DBB 466: Generators, including solar, produce power, not energy.
BPL: Power is energy per unit time.
#468, mike–
Yes, I agree with you that we will need more than one ‘bullet,’ regardless of the substance of which the ‘bullets’ are metaphorically composed. I’d like to see more done with regenerative practice such as Killian advocates alongside the sort of ‘decarbonization via substitution’ which I’ve been advocating. The mitigation problem is complex, to say the least, so recalibration as we go will be a necessity. (“Even the wise cannot see all ends.”) Should the results of regenerative ag/simplification be as stellar as Killian anticipates, it won’t go unnoticed.
468 mike:
6 Feb 2021 at 6:30 PM
on soil and permaculture as a response to our CO2 problem: I am not convinced that permaculture can be as effective at resolving our CO2 buildup as Robyn Francis suggests it might be, but I am pretty sure that it can be more effective than Nigel suggested.
I think that soil permaculture approaches to CO2 sequestration are interesting and worth a try.
I want to clarify something: Permaculture does not = regenerative ag. However, if you apply permaculture design you will end up with a regenerative system if you fully develop it. And, regenerative ag is a blanket term for a lot of different techniques. Permaculture is a design process with a set of design principles that shape the decisions you make. However, things like silvopasture are not “permaculture techniques,” but are techniques you will often find utilized in a permaculture design.
We really should rename it ecological engineering.
As for the C? I think it is clearly demonstrated that we can easily remove C from the atmosphere and oceans with regenerative planning, and that’s where we can say via permaculture. Communities and landscapes designed via permaculture will be inherently regenerative and carbon sequestering when fully realized. But the focus on soil in this discussion appears to be misunderstood. I thought I had clearly made the point my OP was a thought experiment merely seeking to finally make the case clear to people reading this forum how simple and possible rapid drawdown of C is. However, I would be rather stupid to only use farming to do this. There are many ways to sequester C and we should be doing all of them.
As you said, mike, and as I have said for a decade here, sustainability is ultimately local which means solutions are ultimately local. (This is also why we should not be building out massive grids, but should be building out microgrids… as I wrote and argued all the way back in 2008.
The permaculture approach would also simultaneously produce food and might also help with water issues in regions where drought and hunger are issues that should cause us concern.
Yes. And not might, would definitely help with water cycles. Water management is a base consideration in permaculture design: Start with water, sun, wind, and the land. Design from patterns to details.
Similarly, I think it makes sense to encourage the improvement of African energy infrastructure by encouraging the floating solar model that I posted about earlier.
I don’t really care how Africans solve their energy needs because it is up to them. I cannot tell you if *any* floating solar is a valid choice without being there and going through the design process. Imposed solutions are not a good idea, and this is why cookie-cutter solutions are not a good idea. It may well be floating panels make sense in some places, but that is solely for them to determine.
This project does not mean that we might not also be supportive of a grassroots, roof top distributed energy system.
“Supportive of” is something we should all stop talking about. Do the design. Choose what fits in your location. There is no right or wrong, per se. One can easily imagine small-scale nuclear being useful on, say, the moon – but I don’t want *any* nuclear on Earth. E.g.
I think our solution to the CO2 problem, if it exists, is going to include a diversity or tactics and approaches that will vary from time to time and place to place.
Yes. We design in place and to place to meet needs.
David B. Benson (465) Kevin McKinney @462 — The issue is a misreading of
https://bravenewclimate.proboards.com/thread/405/smr-small-modular-reactors?page=6
There is no misreading – nobody is discussing your writings on some other forum -the discussion is about your claims HERE, on RC, and in THIS thread, I quote:
[1.] DBB: ” Wind power, when available, is less expensive than the backup.”
[2.] Piotr: “but it makes sense ONLY if you can switch off the backup, when there is wind.”
[3.] DBB: “ Pressurized light water reactors can be controlled from 20% to maximum and reverse, sufficiently quickly to track wind power variation….”
[4.] Piotr: “MOST of GHGs and costs from the lifetime of your nukes will be realized WHETHER you run it at 100% electricity generation or at 20%.”
[5.] DBB: changes the subject from his claims 1&3 to: “Given that the wind turbines exist and are required to be used, what’s to power the grid when the wind doesn’t blow?” and warns me that asking about his previous arguments “ Doesn’t assist your reputation”
In what logical system does your “False! UAMPS has wind farms but as yet no nuclear power plants.” falsify my points 2 or 4 ?
461 Kevin McKinney says:
6 Feb 2021 at 9:05 AM
17.3 / 7 yrs = 2.47 tons/yr/hectare = 205,010,000 tons/year if on all arable land.
Which is ~0.2 billion tons(?)/yr, as against ~35 billion tonnes of CO2 emitted annually
I don’t know why people keep repeating this. It’s the excess that matters, not the total. If atmospheric CO2 is rising at around 2.6ppm/yr, then we need a reduction yearly equal to that to be neutral for the atmosphere. No?
1ppm CO2 = 2.13 gt > 7.82 gt CO2
2.13 x 2.6 = 5.538 gt C, not 35 gt.
Now, I guess we need to account for the ocean, or 90% of the C. But if I multiply 5.538 x 10 it’s significantly more than what is emitted, so the numbers are off somewhere.
Regardless, if 5.538 gt increases global CO2 ppm by 2.6, then wouldn’t drawing down, say, 10 gt decrease atmospheric C? Or, in the beginning, at least decrease oceanic C as outgassing occurred as oceans and air balanced?
I need to better understand the numbers before we get into the weeds as it were. The discussion on this site always gets the cart before the horse. Let’s deal with the horse first: How do we do proper math on emissions and drawdown? If the above is correct, we REALLY need to stop talking about total emissions and start talking about where the net-zero level is so we can understand what we need to do to get to -2 ~ -5 ppm/year.
Then we can better determine the mix of methods and techniques that give us the “least change for maximum effect” (permaculture principle).
In hopes that the merits of discussing both the Carbon Recovery & Planetary Albedo Restoration modes of Climate Engineering are no longer dismissed here on RC., I’d link to the Guardian Report of the spat on the latest SCoPEx research. “Balloon test flight plan under fire over solar geoengineering fears” – https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2021/feb/08/solar-geoengineering-test-flight-plan-under-fire-over-environmental-concerns-aoe
In opposing the research for its overall aim of advancing the possibility of Stratospheric Aerosol Injection [SAI]eventually being deployed, Prof Pierrehumbert reportedly “called for the establishment of an international body to govern geoengineering experiments. Pierrehumbert said widespread adoption of the technology would be a “Damocles sword” over humanity.
“If we don’t actually reduce our CO2 emissions to nearly zero, because of the multimillennial lifetime of CO2 in the atmosphere, each year that goes on, you’ll have more CO2, which gives you more of a warming force which has to be counteracted by an even larger amount of geoengineering.
“You go into this death spiral, where you try to keep the Earth habitable in the face of ever-increasing CO2 and set ourselves up for a bigger and bigger risk of catastrophe.”
This critique of SAI is plainly incomplete in that certain demerits are not described. However, it warrants consideration for its reliance on particular malign circumstances for SAI to pose a threat: namely the member nations of UNFCCC having failed to reduce our net CO2e emissions to the Near Zero goal to which they are comitted; and their failure to deploy the simpler mode of Climate Engineering, namely Carbon Recovery, as the means to prevent any further increase of atmospheric CO2. Only with both those failures, and with both being acknowledged by the UNFCCC as irredemable, would the subsequent deployment of SAI entail a steady intensification of the aerosols’ injection.
Given the obvious and unmendable demerits of SAI – including the unavoidably global reach of its interference in the hydrocycle, and the aerosols’ residence period of up to two years meaning that even catastrophic unintended consequences may not be controllable for that long – it is hard to see why the professor rests his critique on such far fetched malign circumstances.
As Prof Piers Forster pointed out in an article for the “Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists,” any technology proposed for “Planetary Albedo Restoration” [PAR] (aka SRM) is going to require a decade of stringent scientific trials before its reliably benign effectiveness could be accredited for official consideration (presumably by the UN members). A point he perhaps felt did not need to be made but which seems apposite is that such trials would have to be of one PAR technology at a time to ensure a clear testing environment.
In this light I’d suggest that the requisite scientific discussion is about identifying a list of criteria by which PAR options may be ranked for their probability of passing 10 years of stringent testing satisfactorily with minimal incidental threat, so that a front runner can be selected for official consideration of the launch of a research program. For a whole string of demerits, SAI seems highly unlikely to be selected as the leading option.
An aspect normally missed from discussion of Climate Engineering is that there is no guarantee of the UNFCCC achieving its goal and if it failed to avoid catastrophic impacts – say serial global crop failures with mega-famine and geo-political destabilization – then the successors to Edward Teller in the USA would be greatly empowered in deploying his preference of a cheap, dirty and effective SAI program.
The key question is: who would then be in a position to stop them if there were no reliably benign and effective option ready to hand ?
From this perspective I’d fully support the proposal of a UN mandated global scientific council for the governance of climate engineering research. Without it we are, potentially, drifting towards catastrophe.
Regards,
Lewis
A portfolio of fifty ‘2% solutions’ will be required to address human contributions to climate change. A trillion trees and changes to agriculture, decarbonizing cement, electric vehicles and solar panels, even rinsing your laundry with cold instead of hot water.
But many these are already taking fledgling steps or more. We should encourage and celebrate their emergence. Some of them will be close to token steps, but we should salute them as hopefully changing the political environment, if not the climate.
Robert Hargraves on Electrifying Our World:
http://box5924.temp.domains/~lectrjc4/
I’ve only actually read this page:
http://box5924.temp.domains/~lectrjc4/?page_id=1418
but I’m sure the rest is as good.
Moderators, do we have to put up with Piotr, the latest @474, repeatedly violating the comments policy by stating the same thing over and over and over?
Crank for the crank shaft?
Ray Ladbury @470 & Barton Paul Levenson @471 — Generators are rated by maximum power.
Piotr(451): “Not this discussion, Genius. This “ 10% of GDP” – is mainly from oil EXPORTED. So no need to wax on as if you were the Friendly Oildrop in the 1950s B&W 16-mm movie: “1001 of marvelous uses of oil, for grades 1-4”
KIA: 10% may be the part of GDP from production/sales of oil.
Piotr: Irrelevant to my (451) which was about infantile love letter to the crude oil:
KIA(443): “ Every job, every dollar made, every product produced, every bite of food eaten, every transaction of any kind is possible because of oil.”
not only is ridiculous in its hyperbolic overreach (people were able to have food BEFORE oil, there were “jobs”, “dollars”, “products” and “transactions” long before oil), but also NOT LIMITED to countries exporting oil. Hence my: “Not this discussion, Genius.”
As for Canada – spare my your crocodile tears – I don’t think giving up on a branch of industry produced only 6.3 % of GDP in 2019 (i.e. BEFORE the collapse in prices of oil) when SPREAD OVER SEVERAL DECADES – would be THE END of the Canadian economy as the paid propagandists for oil/ Russia/ Saudi Arabia portray.
“ Starting to get the picture now?“ ;-)
Kevin McKinney (461): “Which is ~0.2 billion tons(?)/yr, as against ~35 billion tonnes of CO2 emitted annually”
Killian (475) “I don’t know why people keep repeating this. It’s the excess that matters, not the total.”
You should give a stern talking to this Killian (302) guy:
– Piotr(246): “To stabilize CO2 we need reduction of emissions by 70-80%, more if we want to reduce CO2”
– Killian (302): You’re chasing your tail. You said 70-80, I have long said 80-90. You’re barking pedantic words into the wind.
So let’s see: 100%= 35 Gt CO2= 9.55 Gt C; 80-90% of that is: 7.6-8.6 Gt C/yr.
Kevin’s: “~0.2 billion tons(?)/yr” is 2.3-2.6% of emissions that have to be sequestered each year. Based on that, I’d say that Kevins’s point – that 0.2 GtC/yr IS MUCH TOO SMALL to achieve the necessary CO2 stabilization and reductions
– is still valid.
Or to put it differently: with numbers like 2.3% or 2.6% – I don’t think it is the denominator that is your problem…
K(475):”I need to better understand the numbers before we get into the weeds as it were”
Huh? So when two weeks ago you lectured me that we need 80-90% reduction of emissions instead of my “70-80% or more” – you were …”deep in the weeds” about the very numbers you were lecturing me about???
===
– Piotr(246): “To stabilize CO2 we need reduction of emissions by 70-80%, more if we want to reduce CO2”
– Killian (302): You’re chasing your tail. You said 70-80, I have long said 80-90. You’re barking pedantic words into the wind.
– Killian (475):”I need to better understand the [reduction] numbers before we get into the weeds as it were”
====
;-)
Lewis Cleverdon @476, I had this nightmare vision a few years back of desperate tropical countries forming a consortium to try an even more desperate mass solar geoengineering operation, and to hell with the global risks and what the rest of the world want’s. This is what could happen if we dont mitigate the climate problem.
This is an excellent critique of a poor essay on hunter-gatherer cultures. If you understand how to analyze this excellent critique, you will see within it the possibility of the success of the model I created ten years ago: Regenerative Governance.
https://www.facebook.com/helgav1/posts/10158629816915549
476 – Lewis
How do they get the aerosols into the atmosphere, and how much CO2 does it take to accomplish that, if any?
Mr. KIA@469, Is part of the reason for your utter ignorance a reading problem? Because your characterization of Sunpower’s blurb on cloudy-day solar bears no resemblance to what they said.
Or has a steady diet of lies from Faux News and other rightwing nutjob sites left you incapable of parsing simple English sentences?
Thomas Fuller:
I agree, now that I know you support carbon fee and dividend with border adjustment tariff 8^)!
Folks, Tom’s not really an AGW-denier, not even a lukewarmer, in spite of his claims to own the word. YMMV, but when he’s not trying to pick a fight, IMHO he often makes sense.
Killian, #475–
Seems like a good idea to me. Some searching came up with this:
https://essd.copernicus.org/articles/11/1783/2019/#&gid=1&pid=1
Summarizing their Figure 2 (Gigatonnes/yr):
Relating this back to gigatonnes of CO2, which was the terminology used upthread, that’s:
So the thought experiment would essentially be to address the ‘excess’–the atmospheric increase–by enhancing the land sink using regenerative ag. That’s 18 GtCO2, of course.
We were discussing 0.2 GtCO2 (#456), and you (#454) also cited a figure of 1.85 GtC/yr, or 6.8 GtCO2. (I think that was originally nigel’s number, @#444, but whatever.) Those amounts come to ~11.1% and ~37.8% of the target amount, respectively. By comparison, a 2001 article I saw during my search estimated that enhanced land sinks could account for 23% of the necessary emissions abatement, which seems like pretty good agreement in context.
It’s probably worth noting that this is a big change:
More than doubling the current terrestrial sink is a pretty ‘heroic’ result. It’s also roughly 3x the magnitude of the land-use change emissions we’re creating now. So I’m thinking that while this may be possible, “easy” is not really warranted as a description!
But there’s also another way to look at this. If you consider the sequestration as effectively reducing total emissions, and assume that the marine and terrestrial sinks operate on that amount proportionately to the present, you get this result:
If this framing is right, we’d end up by not eliminating the increase–we’d merely cut it from 4.9 GtC to 2.96 GtC. So that’s where considering total emissions, not net increase, could be relevant. The sequestration we’d need in this case would actually be the total emissions.
How responsive are the marine and terrestrial sinks to dCO2, and on what timescale? It seems to me that answering that compound question should also answer which of the two models I just put forward better represents the physical reality. Gavin–or anybody hep to the state of play in carbon cycle modeling–what do we know about that?*
But either way, it’s clearly indicated that soil sequestration can make a worthwhile contribution–unsurprising, since all four of us have agreed on that much from the get-go. The unanswered question is, how big is what bizspeak apparently terms ‘the upside?’
*It would seem to me that sinks ought to respond not to the change in emissions directly (‘dCO2em’), but to the change in atmospheric concentration (‘dCO2at’), since that’s what is actually ‘seen’ at particular locations. If so, the first scenario would be a good approximation initially, but as CO2 began to fall, the annual ‘sunk amounts’ would shrink each year and you’d see a decelerating trend toward (eventual) equilibrium. There has *got* to be some literature on this!
Another article about UAMPS and NuScale:
https://www.ksl.com/article/46715753/utah-based-uamps-pioneers-next-generation-nuclear-technology
DBB @479, some advice for your good self. If you want to get Piotr, the human pitbull terrier to let go of your leg, stop defending the indefensible!
Killian @473:
I’m going to ask you an honest question, Killian. Do you seriously think that the current population of Terra can be supported with “regenerative agriculture” methods? Or do they require a major dieoff… or killoff?
The Georgia Guidestones prove that at least one group’s goal is a world population of around 700 million, requiring at least a 90% dieoff of the current world population. Is THAT what you want?
What world population do you project, and how do you expect it to be supported? Note that industrial farming can support far more people than pre-industrial agriculture, which can support far more than hunting and gathering. So, what is it… and how do you expect your culture to support “regenerative agriculture” rather than what feeds the most mouths? WHO do you expect to make the sacrifices?
Who do you expect to die? Volunteers, or victims? Expecially while popular demand is for increased per-capita energy consumption, everywhere?
The ONLY way to do that is with radically reduced CO2/MWh, both electric and thermal.
@483:
You and me both, Nigel. You and me both.
On our current trajectory, our alternatives are geoengineering or frying the planet. I’d dearly love to change that trajectory, and a Manhattan Project-scale effort could probably do it, but I don’t see the political will. The USA needs a wartime footing and a leader and ruling party willing to bend to reality, and we have NONE of those things.
Kevin McKinney @488 yes I’ve read much the same thing that enhanced natural land sinks can potentially abate about 20% of our yearly CO2 emissions. And I think its a useful number. Please also read my comment @441.
NigelJ at 483 – No consortium required I’m afraid. The official US “Bipartisan Policy Committee” which is adamant that Climate Engineering has no role as an alternative to global Emissions Control, is on record as describing the cost of the SAI form of Planetary Albedo Restoration [PAR] as being “easily funded from the petty cash of any middle rank economy.”
As the Paris Agreement commits us to the use at scale of the Carbon Recovery mode of Climate Engineering, identifying and researching the best candidate technology for the PAR mode would provide insurance against the risks:-
– of the failure by Paris signatories to achieve the agreed Net-Zero emissions goal and avoid catastrophic Climate Destabilization,
– and of the Paris signatories’ successful efforts being offset by burgeoning Major Interactive Feedbacks’ outputs of GHGs and direct global heating.
Please note: arguments that taking out insurance may somehow make people less careful in efforts to avoid fires, crashes and other catastrophes – are patently speculative and not backed by real world evidence.
Mr Know it all – 485 – When Edward Teller proposed SAI to Cheney in 1995 (while the latter was chair of Halliburton & senior in the Global Climate Coalition) as the ‘exit strategy’ for a covert US policy of letting AGW rip – with a view to China’s eventual containment by exploiting its inherent major weakness in food security – the intended delivery system was normal large freight aircraft fitted with spray nozzles to release their cargo at high altitude. Current proponents of SAI are likely talking of biofuels for such aircraft.
Regards,
Lewis
Killian 475: Now, I guess we need to account for the ocean, or 90% of the C. But if I multiply 5.538 x 10 it’s significantly more than what is emitted, so the numbers are off somewhere.
It’s in the “ we need to account for the ocean, or 90% of the C“. Ocean is NOT taking 10 x more than atmosphere (“5.538 Gt/yr”), more like half of the atm. take.
KIA, #469–
25% is not insignificant. Hell, even 10% is not insignificant.
And as for ‘turning the oil spigot off too quickly,’ well, maybe you could let us know just where it’s located. Seems like that could be important knowledge. I mean, what if somebody turned it off suddenly and nobody knew where to go to open it up again?
Kevin(488): Sources: Total: 11.0 Sinks: Total: 5.7 – Terrestrial: 3.2 – Marine: 2.5 Net result: Atmospheric increase: 4.9 Unaccounted: 0.4–which I am going to resolutely ignore henceforward.
If you take Killian’s 5.538 Gt C instead of 4.9 – it gets closer: 0.2Gt/yr surplus – my guess the terrestrial uptake should be 3.0 instead of 3.2. The 5.53Gt of excess C would raise the bar though for the sequestration (require to take up 5.54 instead of 4.9 Gt).
Kevin (488) We were discussing 0.2 GtCO2 (#456), and you (#454) also cited a figure of 1.85 GtC/yr, or 6.8 GtCO2. Those amounts come to ~11.1% and ~37.8% of the target amount
Assuming that you meant 0.2GtC not 0.2GtCO2 (which would be even less) your first number is 4% not 11%.
Kevin (488) “ But there’s also another way to look at this. If you consider the sequestration as effectively reducing total emissions, and assume that the marine and terrestrial sinks operate on that amount proportionately to the present” “If this framing is right, we’d end up by not eliminating the increase–we’d merely cut it from 4.9 GtC to 2.96 GtC ”
I don’t think most sinks scale up proportionally with atm. CO2 concentration, MUCH LESS in proportion to the …. relative decrease of the total emissions [0.55 =(11 GtC–4.9 GtC)/(11 Gt)]
And I am also not sure why? I thought we were discussing ways to achieve stabilization of CO2(= no accumulation), or, as Killian repeatedly argued before, significant reduction in atm conc. of CO2 (i.e. accumulation <0 Gt/yr).
David B. Benson (479) “Moderators, do we have to put up with […] repeatedly violating the comments policy by stating the same thing over and over and over?
Hmm…
David B. Benson (27): “Moderators — do we have to put up with Piotr?”
David B. Benson (458): “[Piotr] you repeatedly violate [the RC Comment policy].
David B. Benson (479): “Moderators, do we have to put up with Piotr, repeatedly violating
Lewis Cleverdon (494) Please note: arguments that taking out insurance may somehow make people less careful in efforts to avoid fires, crashes and other catastrophes – are patently speculative and not backed by real world evidence.
The onus of proof is on the proponent. And on the less-probable proposition. Yours. Which requires:
– to believe that without the global warming gun to their heads, the politicians will freely embark on very costly and politically unpopular fundamental changes in the way the societies work to reduce CO2 emissions,
– to ignore the obstructionists who have been for years asking why are we fighting Co2 when at a fraction of the cost (” petty cash of any middle rank economy”) we take care of the problem and have our previous lifestyle too
– to believe that after reducing the temperature with a technological silver bullet – the fossil-fuel industrial complex will forego TRILLIONS of $ in profits relying on dumping CO2 for free into the atmosphere
– to believe that after getting the temperature “under control”, Russia and Saudi Arabia will gladly give up their oil and gas exports, without which their economy, social order and their geopolitical importance – collapse
All that is well BEYOND “speculative” and well into “unbelievable“. As in “I can’t believe he just said _that_ with a straight face”.
In addition to all the UNPREDICTABLE effects of a global-scale experiment, we may well:
– predict that acidification of the ocean will accelerate, because we will likely increase our emissions since we no longer have to worry about effects of CO2 on temperature
– consider what happens if there are regional negative impacts – say a change in monsoons damages crops in China, Indonesia, India or Pakistan – do you really think they will be standing idly by, letting their people die of hunger for the greater benefit of the humanity?
– and if we STOP, for whatever reason, all the pent-up warming from the accumulated CO2 – starts heating up the Earth immediately. And this makes a CRITICAL difference to the species and communities ability to adapt: most can adapt ONLY if the changes are not too fast (evolution and migration take time). So by keeping the temperature artificially stable for a time, and then creating sudden temperature jump, we rob them of even a chance to adapt.
So forgive me if I don’t share your Panglossian optimism.
nigelj @490 — Only Piotr claims that I “defend the indefensible”.
See my latest link to an article about UAMPS.