General / Off-Topic Is man made climate change real or not? Prove your belief here.

[Darkfyre99]

One of the very fascinating things (for me, anyway) is this knee-jerk reaction of environmentalists - planing a lot of trees.

I guess it's not a common knowledge, but trees don't really help that much. They only contribute a relatively small amount to decreasing CO2.
Yes there are benefits to having trees in cities for example. They help with filtration and cooling down the air, but as far as climate change goes - they breathe in almost as much oxygen as they produce and although they build themselves out of CO2, it's laughably small amount compared to what we produce and it's a very inefficient way of storing it, anyway. We may as well start producing more plastics.

Trees don't CREATE oxygen. The amount of molecules we have at hand on this planet is relatively constant and oxygen circles between O2, CO2 and water (and other things of course). Planting a lot of trees doesn't change the balance of the states, it's only speeding up the circulation.

shruggs

Very true.

However, the alternatives to extracting CO2 from the atmosphere are worse, because they require energy operate, energy that would be much better used to replace fossil fuels outright, as opposed to offsetting their use. And they do have other beneficial effects, like helping reduce soil erosion, and are also aesthetically pleasing.

And of course, even a tiny contribution to the problem is better than doing nothing at all.

As token efforts go, planting a tree is a much better alternative than, say, buying bracelet made of plastic made from atmospheric-sourced CO2.

 

[Old Duck]

The answers to this dilemma have been around for decades: Nuclear Power.

As much as I look forward to flying in a nuclear powered jet and clearing the multiple feet of snow this winter with a nuclear powered snowblower, I just don't see this happening in time to make a difference

Also, what happens when my snowblower becomes a mini Chernobyl?

Here's the problem - batteries are still way behind in both the energy density and recharge capacity of gasoline, and batteries bring their own problems. Believe me, I use batteries where I can - my push mower and chain saw are battery powered, but neither compare to their gasoline alternatives, and these batteries are stupidly expensive for their 3-5 year life span.

 

[Chris Simon]

Very true.

However, the alternatives to extracting CO2 from the atmosphere are worse, because they require energy operate, energy that would be much better used to replace fossil fuels outright, as opposed to offsetting their use. And they do have other beneficial effects, like helping reduce soil erosion, and are also aesthetically pleasing.

And of course, even a tiny contribution to the problem is better than doing nothing at all.

As token efforts go, planting a tree is a much better alternative than, say, buying bracelet made of plastic made from atmospheric-sourced CO2.

Yes, energy cost and money cost are most definitely the most important factors in all of this. If somebody came up with an energy efficient and profitable way of getting rid of CO2 and other greenhouse gasses, you can bet corporations would be all over it.

 

[Darkfyre99]

If we really want to do something;

My own opinion on your list:

1. Stop using pesticides - Unless we're willing to reduce the human population by over 60%, this'll never happen. It might be possible to drastically reduce both pesticide, herbicide, and fertilizer use, but in order to do so, you'll have to drop the next thing off your list:
2. Stop using GMO - GMOs, used responsibly and in conjunction with sustainable farming methods, is pretty much our best bet of weaning ourselves off the practices I listed above without a lot of people dying in the process.
3. Clear up the oceans - no argument here
4. Reduce consumptions ( you don’t need a new phone every year) - again, no argument here.
5. Demand 3rd world countries get there current automobile pollution under control. Like make sure the trucks and cars, motorcycles actually use a exhaust filter. - It's far more likely that their own population will enact this change, than us making demands of them. It's a natural consequence of an increasing standard of living. More importantly, its much more likely to be sustainable. As the old saying goes, "Bully a man to do something, and he'll stop as soon as you leave. Persuade a man it's in his best interest to do something, and he'll keep doing it until someone persuades him otherwise.'
6. Stop deforestation, expand instead. - Agreed
7. Invest in infrastructure, the inner cities need much better transportation systems. Make it easy to recharge ecars. - While I'm a big fan of EVs, we don't have the quantity of rare-earth elements necessary to make this wide spread... at least not without self-driving cars. Self-driving cars will be a literal game changer. In the mean time, at least here in the United States, we don't really need better EV infrastructure. We need better public transportation period.
8. Remove all taxes on electrical driven vehicles. - IMO, private vehicle ownership is on its way out, and REE scarcity will never make EVs available for most people.
9. Ramp up research on batteries and storage of electricity. - IMO, we're better off focusing our research and development on nuclear power, both fission and fusion. REE scarcity will limit EV utility, and fusion in particular would allow for cheap production of hydrocarbons as a portable fuel source.
10. Promote zero energy domestic houses. - Agreed.

 

[Arry]

My own opinion on your list:

1. Stop using pesticides - Unless we're willing to reduce the human population by over 60%, this'll never happen. It might be possible to drastically reduce both pesticide, herbicide, and fertilizer use, but in order to do so, you'll have to drop the next thing off your list:
2. Stop using GMO - GMOs, used responsibly and in conjunction with sustainable farming methods, is pretty much our best bet of weaning ourselves off the practices I listed above without a lot of people dying in the process.
3. Clear up the oceans - no argument here
4. Reduce consumptions ( you don’t need a new phone every year) - again, no argument here.
5. Demand 3rd world countries get there current automobile pollution under control. Like make sure the trucks and cars, motorcycles actually use a exhaust filter. - It's far more likely that their own population will enact this change, than us making demands of them. It's a natural consequence of an increasing standard of living. More importantly, its much more likely to be sustainable. As the old saying goes, "Bully a man to do something, and he'll stop as soon as you leave. Persuade a man it's in his best interest to do something, and he'll keep doing it until someone persuades him otherwise.'
6. Stop deforestation, expand instead. - Agreed
7. Invest in infrastructure, the inner cities need much better transportation systems. Make it easy to recharge ecars. - While I'm a big fan of EVs, we don't have the quantity of rare-earth elements necessary to make this wide spread... at least not without self-driving cars. Self-driving cars will be a literal game changer. In the mean time, at least here in the United States, we don't really need better EV infrastructure. We need better public transportation period.
8. Remove all taxes on electrical driven vehicles. - IMO, private vehicle ownership is on its way out, and REE scarcity will never make EVs available for most people.
9. Ramp up research on batteries and storage of electricity. - IMO, we're better off focusing our research and development on nuclear power, both fission and fusion. REE scarcity will limit EV utility, and fusion in particular would allow for cheap production of hydrocarbons as a portable fuel source.
10. Promote zero energy domestic houses. - Agreed.

This is all very pretty. But. No one is going to 'fund', the poor to make theses changes.
I keep hearing that we should all buy electric cars. But what about those millions, of people, who will never be able to afford a new car, for the whole of their working lives?
Zero energy domestic homes. Again, who is going to fund the poor, to do this?
All the poor are going to get, is fined for non compliance, or taxed, for using the only things that they can afford, to heat their homes, or get to work.

 

[Chris Simon]

9. Ramp up research on batteries and storage of electricity. - IMO, we're better off focusing our research and development on nuclear power, both fission and fusion. REE scarcity will limit EV utility, and fusion in particular would allow for cheap production of hydrocarbons as a portable fuel source.

I'd just like to underline this particular point.
Batteries are nearing their max performance and unless we develop some completely different miraculous materials, their energy density will NEVER reach truly usable levels.
Hydrogen fuel cell + electric motor is the way forward for EVs, imho, not batteries. And for the general grid, yes nuclear power is by far the cleanest energy source we have and will have for a long time. Unfortunately I see a mad trend of closing the nuclear powerplants down in favour of coal. Unbelievable.
As for the fusion, well, that's science fiction for at least another 20-30 years.

 

[Darkfyre99]

As much as I look forward to flying in a nuclear powered jet and clearing the multiple feet of snow this winter with a nuclear powered snowblower, I just don't see this happening in time to make a difference

Also, what happens when my snowblower becomes a mini Chernobyl?

Here's the problem - batteries are still way behind in both the energy density and recharge capacity of gasoline, and batteries bring their own problems. Believe me, I use batteries where I can - my push mower and chain saw are battery powered, but neither compare to their gasoline alternatives, and these batteries are stupidly expensive for their 3-5 year life span.

From my point of view, CO2 emissions from vehicles, while significant, pale in comparison to those produced by homes, businesses, and industry. If the US would replace our coal and natural gas power plants with nuclear plants, we could reduce our CO2 emissions by half.

I think this would be a much more viable change than trying to replace our current petroleum vehicles with EVs, especially since I'm skeptical that there are sufficient rare-earth elements to replace every vehicle... not that I think this will be necessary in the mid-future, given self-driving cars potential to make private vehicle ownership a thing of the past. IMO a better strategy for batteries in transportation is improving fuel efficiency.

As a method of energy transportation, hydrocarbons will always have an advantage over batteries, and I see no reason to abandon their use. On the other hand, I do see plenty of reasons to replace our source of hydrocarbons, from extracting them from the ground, to producing them via other methods. While I'm not a fan of growing crops to use as biofuel, I do think there's no reason why waste-sourced biofuels, along with CO2 synthesis, couldn't eventually replace geo-hydrocarbons, once newer (and safer) versions fission power plants are able to take advantage of economies of scale.

And, of course, this assumes that fusion power remains the "energy of the future." While I'm cautiously optimistic, I'd rather build fission plants now, than wait for fusion to be economically viable.

 

[WeComeInPeace]

The answers to this dilemma have been around for decades: Nuclear Power. Of course, nuclear power has its own massive corpolitic political issues to implement, especially the safer and more efficient modern designs. The short-term solutions to our climate change problems aren't a scientific or engineering problem. It's a political problem, which is why scientists need to engage in the political process just as much as ordinary citizens do.

It seems that we agree on a lot of points

However, my primary "expertise" is sustainability and biophysics. I do not think that we have the resources, especially the energy, to get us out of the mess we're in. As you wrote, EVs are not a possibility if we want to replace diesel and gasoline in cars and trucks, simply because we don't have the lithium/cobalt it takes. I have only recently started looking at cobalt, but at least with lithium I'm certain the the current USGS estimates of the reserve are too low, and that even though the actual reserve might be 5-10 times larger than the estimate, it's still far from enough to store all the energy we will need to store without fossil fuels. We use 30% of the energy on food production and distribution, and we get 85% of the energy from fossil fuels.

Regarding nuclear energy I'm divided. I hate it, but it might be what we need temporarily to get on. We know that in the time we have had nuclear power plants, we've seen several core meltdowns, and we need to anticipate far more of those, if we switch to nuclear energy for a while. An accident like Chernobyl could potentially have left most of Eastern/Northern Europa uninhabitable. If we have had a hundred core meltdowns since the 2nd world war, we would have had quite a large area of the planet being useless, and we surely need more cropland already.

Finally, nuclear energy by fission is not sustainable. With the old reactor types, if we wanted to supply the planet with the current global energy "consumed", we would run out of uranium in a few decades. The newer reactor types help a lot with that problem, but we do not have a lot of experience with those, so basing our future on them might be risky.

The solution is extracting energy from the Sun, and using less resources including energy. It might also help somewhat to try and reduce population growth, but that idea is not controversial without a cause. Even if we banned having kids (a horrible thought) it would not be enough to reach the human carrying capacity of the planet before 2100 by naturally caused deaths.

 

[Arry]

It seems that we agree on a lot of points

However, my primary "expertise" is sustainability and biophysics. I do not think that we have the resources, especially the energy, to get us out of the mess we're in. As you wrote, EVs are not a possibility if we want to replace diesel and gasoline in cars and trucks, simply because we don't have the lithium/cobalt it takes. I have only recently started looking at cobalt, but at least with lithium I'm certain the the current USGS estimates of the reserve are too low, and that even though the actual reserve might be 5-10 times larger than the estimate, it's still far from enough to store all the energy we will need to store without fossil fuels. We use 30% of the energy on food production and distribution, and we get 85% of the energy from fossil fuels.

Regarding nuclear energy I'm divided. I hate it, but it might be what we need temporarily to get on. We know that in the time we have had nuclear power plants, we've seen several core meltdowns, and we need to anticipate far more of those, if we switch to nuclear energy for a while. An accident like Chernobyl could potentially have left most of Eastern/Northern Europa uninhabitable. If we have had a hundred core meltdowns since the 2nd world war, we would have had quite a large area of the planet being useless, and we surely need more cropland already.

Finally, nuclear energy by fission is not sustainable. With the old reactor types, if we wanted to supply the planet with the current global energy "consumed", we would run out of uranium in a few decades. The newer reactor types help a lot with that problem, but we do not have a lot of experience with those, so basing our future on them might be risky.

The solution is extracting energy from the Sun, and using less resources including energy. It might also help somewhat to try and reduce population growth, but that idea is not controversial without a cause. Even if we banned having kids (a horrible thought) it would not be enough to reach the human carrying capacity of the planet before 2100 by naturally caused deaths.

if and I fully understand the 'issues' with Nuclear power, if the issue is, a; the waste and b; potential accidents. Why not follow the Russian model? (no not the tech maybe) the latest ship nuclear power station option.

Think about it: Nuclear power plants are not new, on sea vessels. Most of the really big military vessels, are nuclear powered. Plus. Can be built, in one place and moved to where they are required. Moved later, if required else where. All of the waste, can be sailed to one place on the planet. Or maybe a few, places, due to national territories. The places, nuclear weapons, were tested and are already off limits.

Just a thought.

 

[Darkfyre99]

This is all very pretty. But. No one is going to 'fund', the poor to make theses changes.
I keep hearing that we should all buy electric cars. But what about those millions, of people, who will never be able to afford a new car, for the whole of their working lives?
Zero energy domestic homes. Again, who is going to fund the poor, to do this?
All the poor are going to get, is fined for non compliance, or taxed, for using the only things that they can afford, to heat their homes, or get to work.

That is the main problem.

But I don't think it's as hopeless as you're making it out to be.

No, the poor will never be able to afford EVs, IMO self-driving cars is an inevitability. Once you have that, there is most certainly going to be businesses opportunities that go along with that. Very likely, within ten years, it will be much cheaper for most people to use transportation services than it is to own a private vehicle, which spends 99% of its the time sitting idle. THAT is the future market of EVs.

As for reducing energy home consumption, again, that's something that I'm looking to businesses to do, because its simply good business. More and more apartment buildings and businesses are focusing on reducing waste heat and improving energy efficiency, and I'm seeing solar panels popping up on the roofs of apartments and businesses more often. And while energy companies are willing to take advantage of you installing solar on your own roofs, or to "rent" panels at solar farms, I think that as the economies of scale for solar improve, it'll reach a point where energy companies might be willing to pay you to install solar panels on your roof.

And this of course assumes that political pressure won't be able to move subsidies from fossil fuels to clean energy.

Energy efficiency is an investment, one that pays dividends in the future. Even if the poor never receive the help they need to do it on their own, sooner or later they'll reap the benefits as well. After all, a microwave that cost $2700 50 years ago (adjusted for inflation) can be bought for $40 today... and the $40 one will have more features, but won't last nearly as long.

 

[Chris Simon]

Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7W33HRc1A6c


I think I'll just leave this here.
(There are a couple of swearwords, btw. So hopefully it stays. For a little while. Like us. )

 

[Gun Star]

I believe in climate change, but not the extent that media likes people to believe. It is also part of the suns cycles.

I love how people use climate change as a scapegoat for their ignorance of a region's history. Example: It snowed in the Chicagoland area this Halloween. So many people that have lived in this area all their lives were crying its global warming. When in fact it has snowed 7 times here since 1873. The last being 2014 and 1994 before that. The coldest record is still in 1873 (31) and the warmest was 1950 (84)

 

[lysan]

Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7W33HRc1A6c


I think I'll just leave this here.
(There are a couple of swearwords, btw. So hopefully it stays. For a little while. Like us. )

RIP George I always liked his kind of humor.

 

[MaxG10]

George had his head screwed on and his heart in the right place.

 

[Chris Simon]

George had his head screwed on and his heart in the right place.

A fearless mind and an articulate mouth can be a terrifying weapon.

 

[Darkfyre99]

Regarding nuclear energy I'm divided. I hate it, but it might be what we need temporarily to get on. We know that in the time we have had nuclear power plants, we've seen several core meltdowns, and we need to anticipate far more of those, if we switch to nuclear energy for a while. An accident like Chernobyl could potentially have left most of Eastern/Northern Europa uninhabitable. If we have had a hundred core meltdowns since the 2nd world war, we would have had quite a large area of the planet being useless, and we surely need more cropland already.

According to the Union of Concerned Scientists, we've had seven serious accidents since WWII. Seven. Nuclear accidents are a lot like airline accidents: they they sound scary, they affect a lot of people, but the reason you hear about them is because they're so rare. More importantly, when you compare them with the alternatives, they're a lot safer.

Finally, nuclear energy by fission is not sustainable. With the old reactor types, if we wanted to supply the planet with the current global energy "consumed", we would run out of uranium in a few decades. The newer reactor types help a lot with that problem, but we do not have a lot of experience with those, so basing our future on them might be risky.

IMO, there are really only two sustainable power sources: fusion power ("the energy of the future"), and solar (which is basically fusion power once removed ) The problem is that going from old fashioned solar power (grow plants to power muscles, both human and animals) to do work) to modern solar power (semiconductors that convert sunlight into electricity that can be used to power machines) is impossible. There has to be intermediary steps in between.

One of those steps was fossil fuels. Another should've been nuclear power, but for some reason the public developed a fear of it, leaving us using fossil fuels far longer than we should've been, with predictable results.

 

[Han_Zen]

Hydroelectricity is the cleanest major energy source. It gives us about 17% of global electricity and counts for about 70% of the renewable electricity production.
There is probably potential for more HE plants. The main issue is that they often have great local impact, by flooding land.

There is potential for tidal plants as well. The tides in the English channel could probably cover most of Europe's power need. The technology for converting the potential in large masses of relatively slow moving water is unfortunately not top notch. I doubt that it's harder than creating an self sustaining fusion rector though.

 

[WeComeInPeace]

According to the Union of Concerned Scientists, we've had seven serious accidents since WWII. Seven. Nuclear accidents are a lot like airline accidents: they they sound scary, they affect a lot of people, but the reason you hear about them is because they're so rare. More importantly, when you compare them with the alternatives, they're a lot safer.

There has been two major incidents, Chernobyl and F-ukushima (damn profanity filter). At the latter three cores malted down, and that problem is far from solved. Three Mile Island could have gone much worse but it didn't, so four melted cores in ~50 years of commercial nuclear energy. Today that covers ~5% of the global energy. If it was to be 100% then we would need 20 times as many nuclear power plants as we have. That could, though the numbers are pretty poor for statistics, mean that we would see 20 times more accidents, or 4x20 accidents in 50 years, more than one Chernobyl per year.

Of course modern reactors are more safe than the one that blew up in Chernobyl, but both the major accidents were mostly because of human error and unforeseen problems. The reactors in F-ukushima were pretty high tech, but nobody had predicted the chance of a tsunami being big enough to secure the plant.

Furthermore, every time there is an accident, you need to send people in to clean it up. I personally believe that if we accept nuclear power, anyone who agrees should be willing to accept that job of cleaning up, even if it means certain death. That's not how it works though.

Given all that and some personal (lethal) experiences I've had with radiation, I hate it, but given the fact that the alternatives are even worse, I guess I have to find somewhere to dump my hate and get on with it. It's not that fossil energy is safe, and it kills more people even today than fission has ever done (including the bombs).

Fusion sounds much better, but it's still Sci-Fi and we're very much in a hurry, so we need energy now.

 

[Arry]

Hydroelectricity is the cleanest major energy source. It gives us about 17% of global electricity and counts for about 70% of the renewable electricity production.
There is probably potential for more HE plants. The main issue is that they often have great local impact, by flooding land.

There is potential for tidal plants as well. The tides in the English channel could probably cover most of Europe's power need. The technology for converting the potential in large masses of relatively slow moving water is unfortunately not top notch. I doubt that it's harder than creating an self sustaining fusion rector though.

Scotland, already knowns they can generate all of their power, from the sea. They already have some massive tidal generators in place. The main issue, slowing things down, is damage to marine life etc..

 

[Talarin]

Scotland, already knowns they can generate all of their power, from the sea. They already have some massive tidal generators in place. The main issue, slowing things down, is damage to marine life etc..

I'd dispute that's the main issue (although certainly a worthy factor to consider) - assuming you're referring to offshore wind generation.

While the total generation statistics (usually talked about in TwH in a certain calendar period) make pretty reading, the reality as things stand is somewhat different. If you do a production vs. demand analysis on an hour-by-hour basis over the last 24 months, you'll find that you need quite significant dispatchable capacity to cover the shortfalls in generation from renewable sources (and that's true across the UK, not just Scotland). In reality you should do that same analysis on a minute by minute basis at least.

So you then have a choice between having to have enough gas generation, diesel generation to cover the grid as a whole or no power in the shortfall periods. This is why renewables as they stand don't actually work.

However, this is only true until some sort of breakthrough in cheap energy storage happens. That's a proper game changer.