What Do We Think About Climate Change

ancient kayaker, it is not just one part of the equation that the zero growth fanatics are distorting. They didn't misinterpret CO2, they deliberately lied. Remember the hole in the ozone? OOPSIE, wrong again! Antartica, melting, darn, must have read that ground penetrating radar wrong, the ice is getting thicker. Greenland glaciers disappearing, there was aerable land there 700 years ago, remember? No one is disputing that the climate is changing, of course it is. That is called clyclical climatic change, normal and has been going on since you were a toddler and well before. The mini ice age was one of the causes of unrest that brought on the French Revolution because the French did not adapt their agriculture like much of the rest of Europe and when the wheat crop failed again and again there was famine, soooo, off with their heads. In area after area the radical left of the environmental movement have simply made stuff up, distorted scientific data, exploited a brainless media and Hollywood Glitteratti, threatened opponents in the scientific community, and published reports and studies which stretch the truth so far they must have taken lessons from Goebbels. Finally they reflect the arrogance and elitism that presumes so great an importance on themselves that they truly believe the human race is so omnipotent that they can change the earth. We are just the latest of a species the creator put here. There will be others after we are gone, whether it be by disease or the stupidity of those who insist on running other peoples lives.

 

There's NO EVIDENCE that ANY of these dire consequences you allude to will happen; NONE; ZERO; NADA

It was several degrees warmer than now only a few thousand years ago (less than 10 thousand) and everything was fine. The atmosphere was fine, it obviously supported human life, the polar bears are still here.

This is what the warmers do: they wave around these scary 'what if' scenarios but fail to tell you they have no evidence that this has ever happened or ever will. it's just their pet theory. We've had atmospheric CO2 levels this high before (even as recently as 150 years ago; go back and look at the old posts!). We've had temperatures HIGHER than the IPCC predicts for the next century 'if we do nothing' and all was well.

The 'con' crowd jeers at the sheer lack of scientific honesty on the warmer side; they claim they have what they in fact DO NOT have; evidence that something, ANYTHING 'unusual' is happening AT ALL.

Jimbo

 

I think it’s great that my post got some responses, it’s good to know that some people are interested enough to follow this discussion of environmental change and take the time to respond, no matter what their viewpoint. Right. That’s enough of the nice stuff!

Mas: how’s the boat coming along? It’s a bit early to ask, I know.

About your proposed experiment, well, science is all about testing theories, right? The only way I could see implementing it would be to have all the rain forests and oil wells fired and all the emission controls removed from all vehicles and industrial plants for a year or two so we can see what happens. Personally, I would not recommend adding a few dozen nuke events to that but, - hey - if we want to do it properly ... Yet, if we were to do that, everybody would still disagree on the significance of the results - just read the 2 posts following your’s. “It’s all lies” and “there’s no evidence”.

Lovely though that outlook seems, I still prefer working towards clean air, sustainable production and freedom from dependence on oil. I gues I don't know when I'm well off.


We are conducting just such an experiment right now. Ever wonder how it will turn out?

There’s been at least one recent large-scale experiment - the oil fires in Kuwait, part of the scorched earth policy of Iraqi forces leaving Kuwait in 1991. That impacted local health and weather patterns for about a year and continues to impact local vegetation to this day. It will likely have long-term consequences on ground water as the balance of the guck slowly sinks through the soil. But it was too short to show anything, and just a gnat’s bite compared with non-stop world-wide polluting.

You are entirely right on all the other counts. We are having an effect, we must have an effect, and we don’t know enough. We should ask the questions, should we not?

The first question is, how big an effect?
The second question is, how long until we know the answer to the first question?
The third and really scary question is, will we get and accept the answer in time to put in the fix if needed?

It just occured to me that, since this is a somewhat serious matter perhaps we should err on the side of caution and take action, until we all know and agree that we need not have worried.

I don’t know the answers, and none of you do either. I do know that denial will serve no purpose, it’s just a guess that all will turn out fine. Who knows, you may get lucky. How many of you run your lives like that? Few of you, I suspect. If that kind of “wisdom” is insufficient for your personal life, why is it sufficient for the entire planet?

It is the record of ice cores and tree rings, magnetic reversal in rocks and other scientific discoveries that reveal to us the changes of the past. There have been a lot of climatic changes. With each major changes thousands of species disappeared and new ones took their place. Earth is going through a bit of a cool prolonged spell at present, for a couple of hundred thousand years or so. Our species evolved in that cool spell, it seems to suit us. If the planet warms up as it was in the past, we may be one the things to disappear this time.

Well, if it happens, being human, we will undoubtedly do the right thing. Here’s the scenario: weather warms, sea level rises, coastal plains become inundated, a very large percentage of the world’s human population lives or depends on the coastal plains but luckily they see it coming and all agree not to have any kids for 50 years so when the floods come the few million left are easily air-lifted out and welcomed elsewhere with open arms even in already heavily-populated countries that are already starving because of crop failures due to shifts in the weather patterns, and all is well.

Gosh, and to think I envisaged millions of desperate people taking to the boats, hand-to-hand fighting on the beaches between citizens defending their land from illegal immigrants with no place to go, suicide bombers outside the offices of oil and other international companies, massive wars world-wide over diminishing resources, insane religious cults battling with nihilistic groups, etc. No, I really should have more faith in human nature. I have to admit though, that I find a certain attraction in the ideas of clean air and water, sustainable production and freedom from dependence from oil-porduced energy that seems to do little more than give rise to and fund international terrorism.

 

Hi Mas,

I've got a poor cat that insists on being in my lap when I'm at the computer . . . he hates it when I do that. Gives me looks of pure disgust!

I think he's worried about climate change.

BillyDoc

 

The impact we have has been measured, and the fraction of a percentage that human generated green house gases that are released are insignificant. Do the math, humans account for 3% of CO2, a gas that only makes up 2.5-3.5% of the atmosphere. A bad forest fire season in the west will account for more than that. I'm not gonna give up my boat, take public transportation, live 6 to a room, give up meat, and all the other nonsense the zero growth fanatics want us to embrace over a fart in a hurricaine.

 

The idea that tiny changes to such a small and frankly arbitrary constituent gas could somehow change the temperature of the whole planet is silly on its face, but since many are considering it in all seriousness, it's worth a look at the details of the scenario that warmers are postulating.

Basically they are saying that our climate is dominated by positive (strongly positive, no less) feedbacks between CO2 concentration and water vapor concentration, as water vapor is the only greenhouse gas of real importance. Repaeting once again:

THERE CAN BE NO SCARY GREENHOUSE WARMING WITHOUT A POSITIVE FEEDBACK BETWEEN CO2 AND WATER VAPOR.

But, as Billydoc pointed out many pages ago, it's not just a positive feedback between CO2 and water vapor, but more precisely a feedback between the extra heat retained by CO2, or whatever else and water vapor. This means that any change in the atmosphere's heat budget will be amplified by this feedback if it exists.

This again makes for a hypothesis that is eminently testable. Are small temperature changes in our atmosphere amplified (positive feedback) or mitigated (negative feedback)? What do we observe?


Correction:

CO2 accounts for .025-.035% of the atmosphere, NOT 2.5-3.5%.

Jimbo

 

Do the math...

Ok, lemmeseee....

Assume that CO2 stick around in average for 20 years ( Ok; some say 5 years some other say 75 years, there are disagreements going on there, but when I fart, my personal feeling is that it sometimes hangs around too long... I use that as an argument to say with some certainity that outlet gases stick around for some time...).

Now assume that we have 0,02 CO2 in the atmosphere, No human influence. Assume a balance in release, input/ output.


Now, add the human factor for CO2 gases:
0,02 x 1,03 x 1,03 x 1,03 x 1,03 x 1,03 (ok lets do that 20 times..) = 0,0361

Oh.... Try find a bank that are willing to give you that intrest rate now...

In a 20 year period of time; some increase, close to a double from the starting point.

Ok, the CO2 has not increased with that speed; The sea will act as a buffer, plants too, probably... But there MAY be a point along that "CO2 increase line" where there's some sort of tipping point. Often, in nature there are some stabilizing factors, that tend to kick in. But right now, we know the distance we have travelled, we know THAT road. We do not know for certain that the rest of the journey will be smooth and safe.

And yeah, the CO2 level have been higher than this, same has the temperature.. I wasn't around, maybe I wouldn't like it like it were then, but i kinda like this

CO2 is a mouse's fart in the galaxy, 0,02 to 0,03 % will add some insulation effect to the atmosphere, but let's take a closer look at that mouse's fart:

Go to http://www.engineeringtoolbox.com/carbon-dioxide-d_1000.html

Now, I suggest that you do the math, I believe i've done that earlier... here...(can look that one up). It kick better in if you yourself struggle out the numbers.

Then, take the difference in CO2, spread it evenly around the globe some 12600 or 12700 km in diameter, calculate the thickness of that extra layer of CO2. You can use the formulas found here: http://www.engineeringtoolbox.com/conductive-heat-transfer-d_428.html

I assure you, you'll get some impressive numbers.


Now there's more to heat transfer than just these formulas, inside the gas mixture itself, there's mechanical transfer of the temperature, there's radiation, direct contact.

But it's a sure bet that if we add a gass with more insulation capasities to a gas with some prpperties, the result will normally be a gas mixture with an increased insulation capasity.

Oh, by the way; You'll find me in the "better safe than sorry camp"....

 

Be cool, then.....

Cheers.

 

This is actually settled science; CO2 IS NOT a long-lasting gas in the atmosphere. There is NO study ANYWHERE that shows CO2 lasts anywhere near 75 years or 200 years; such data simply does not exist. 35 peer-reviewed studies have been done on this and the average life is 5.6 years.

The ONLY reason you hear about longer half-life numbers for CO2 is that these are the numbers that it takes to get GCM's to produce scary global warming scenarios.

I know some of you are going to take issue with the above statement, and for good reason. After all, how could anyone use such circular logic, such as to assume that observed warming is caused by CO2, then massage the GCM's parameters (like CO2 dwell time) until the models produce the 'expected' warming, then assume that the parameters must then be reality, when WE ALREADY KNOW the reality of CO2 dwell time; IT'S ~5.6 YEARS!!


Yet this is EXACTLY what the AGW alarm camp has done. Knut , if you can't see the error in this, then I don't think there's much that could ever persuade you. And if nothing could ever persuade you, then you believe as a matter of faith, NOT due to the strength of scientific argument. It's just that you (and most other warmers) use 'science-ish' words to help your reconcile your new religion with you need for logic and reason.

But the two DO NOT reconcile, as I and Guillermo have pointed out to you numerous times.

All hail the new religion

Jimbo

 

Don't know where you get your numbers Jimbo. My source is Wikipedia. The whole subject is hedged around by phrases like "thought to be", "not fully understood", "too complex", "high error probability" etc. However it seems reasonable to use the upper and lower bounds for CO2 residence time which are, according to my REVEALED source:

Time to reabsorb into carbon cycle 60-200 years.
Time to absorb geologically 500-8,000 years.

The time to absorb into the carbon cycle, including solution in oceans and absorption by plants, seems a valid time to use for CO2 released from the carbon cycle, such as burning forests. The time to absorb geologically by the formation of carbon-bearing rocks would be appropriate for CO2 released from other sources such as volcanoes and oil.

Perhaps an analogy would help you understand my point of view. Let's go back a few decades; I'm sitting in the doctor's office and he wants to give my kid an injection. I ask about side effects and he uses phrases like "thought to be", "not fully understood", "too complex", "high error probability" etc. So should I shrug my shoulders and say, sure go ahead or say that the kid's OK and let's leave him that way?

Back to the future folks: it's the planet we're discussing and it's likely to be the only place where my great-grandchildren can live.

To dismiss our valid and reasonably expressed concerns as a "new religion" based on numbers that you do not substantiate is hardly likely to persuade anyone, is it? Since all are agreed there is reasonable doubt about the reliability of everyone's predictions I am proposing that a cautious and conservative approach to the management of the planet's resources and environment is the sensible path to take for the immediate future, until the situation is better understood.

Exactly what do YOU proposing we do? I can see 3 alternatives:

1) Nothing
2) A little of something or other
3) Blast ahead like we have been doing for the last few hundreds of years with exponential growth on the faith-based assumption that the planet is too big to destroy

So Jimbo, and the other nay-sayers in this thread, let us all hear what actions you propose.

 

I'm not even going to address your other points as the very first bit about CO2 dwell time is so completely erroneous that once fully rebutted, the answers to your other questions become moot points.

So you went to the illustrious Wikipedia to find out about AGW, did you? Where do you think the average amateur encyclopedist is going to get his data? Probably (likely) from the last IPCC report, a report that uses the exact circular logic I delineated above. In that report it is asserted that CO2 must last 60-200 years, since that dwell time will cause the models (GCM's) to 'reproduce' the present climate given the other assumptions, such as that CO2 interacts in a strong positive feedback with water vapor. No empirical evidence WHATSOEVER is presented in that report to bolster this claim of long-lived CO2. Not even one single scientific paper. And why is that?

BECAUSE NONE EXISTS!!

The thing is, the dwell time of atmospheric CO2 was already established science many years before the whole AGW hysteria came about. There have been a total of 35 scientific studies done over a period of about 50 years by different scientists in different countries and they all came to basically the same conclusion: CO2 has a dwell time of about 5-6 years.

Google Tom Segalstad and watch his PPT presentation

You need to learn to recognize when YOU ARE BEING HOSED!


Jimbo

 

4) Prepare for the Cold Ages....

Cheers.

 

I did. Got as far as him telling me about an experiment with a candle floating on water under a glass. The candle burns, producing CO2 which quickly dissolves in water so the water level in the glass rises.

I stopped at that point. Any junior high school student will tell you that a burning candle also produces H2O, yes, water vapor, which instantly condenses, and THAT is the reason why the water level in the glass rises so quickly. If CO2 dissolved as readily as this guy claims, why is soda lime used to absorb CO2 in many applications such as submarines, diving, anesthesiology etc?

What a pointless experiment! Of course CO2 dissolves in water; we call it soda water! There's a big difference between that and clearing CO2 from the atmosphere.

I guess we have one vote for option 3).

 

There's no difference at all. The oceans dissolve the CO2 exactly like soda water. You comment about soda lime is the very same one I would put to you. After all, what do you think sea water has in it? Did you not notice the chemical makeup of the water in the little experiment? It was not pure water you know. Or did you fail to notice that little detail?

Jimbo

 

Relevant stuff:

http://www.ngu.no/sciencepub/eng/pages/Whatsup_20_10_08.html

Jimbo