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Author: FredM
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The Environment Con.

FredM

We are being fed a daily diet of pseudo-scientific garbage..

 

Lets take one of these.. Recycling.. I am surrounded by yoghurt pot collectors - these people collect waste plastic containers, wash them in hot water till you could use them in an operating theatre, and then proudly drive their cargo to a "recycling" centre - For Gods sake! Why "recycle" this rubbish - the energy (not to mention water) required to wash, transport, and recycle this CARBON BASED RUBBISH is absurdly counter-productive..

 

A recent article in New Scientist presented another "Planet saving" idea.. Plant fast growing trees - Young trees absorb large quantities of carbon - when the trees reach "adulthood" they become less efficient at carbon capture, so you chop these trees down, AND BURY THEM UNDERGROUND ! This way you end up keeping the carbon extracted by the trees, out of the atmosphere...

 

See where i'm going with this?  Couldn't we rather take the Garbage (which is mostly carbon) we spend tons of CO2 trying to 'recycle', and bury this instead? Don’t recycle paper - squash it, cover it in compressed yoghurt pots, and bury it deep underground.. Well - If we can think about burying forests, why not start with burying waste carbon which is all around us - rather than producing more CO2 in "recycling" it ? - We can move on to "farming" forests for carbon later..

 

And what about light bulbs - Are we REALLY going to make the kind of CO2 reductions being touted, by switching to these 'eco' bulbs? .. I doubt it!

The estimates for the savings must be close to double what using a few of ones neurons tells one.. The "wasted" energy from incandescent bulbs is manifest as heat - so, if one is in a hot room with air conditioning on, then yes - this is absolutely wasted energy producing CO2. However - If the room is cold and requires heating, this thermal energy is NOT being wasted at all ... So, if one puts this fact into the equation, probably 50% of the claimed "planet saving" effect of using these bulbs is bogus. This also does not take into account the higher carbon cost of producing these "long Life Eco (LOL)" bulbs. The REAL reason for the push to adopt fluorescent bulbs probably has more to do with the depleting stocks of Tungsten, and its increasing cost.

 

But all the above is almost irrelevant..

 

What is the real truth about climate change, and what we can realistically do to limit its effects?

 

The truth is awful, stark, almost too frightening to "look in the eye" -

 

We have already gone well past the "tipping" point - Even if we could stop all CO2 from human activities, greenhouse gasses will continue to increase - Why?  Because the level of these gasses in the atmosphere would not dissipate instantly (temperature would continue to rise for at least 10 years) - because this increase in temperature will cause more greenhouse gasses (particularly methane) to be released, therebye further increasing the temperature and concentration of greenhouse gasses - and this increase will dwarf all our present CO2 output within 10-20 years.. and there is no known "stop" mechanism we can rely on.

 

And nothing "passive" we can do will stop or seriously retard this process .. sure, we might buy a few extra years if we stopped all industry today, and we certainly should do all we can to avoid speeding the process up - BUT - The only REAL effect our "passive" action will have is to make us feel better about ourselves, and give us the delusion that we are doing something, and that there is hope for our children.

 

There is ONLY ONE HOPE -

 

We MUST engage globally in massive scientific and engineering action - It is only innovative radical Geo-Engineering which has ANY chance of giving today’s children a possibility of carrying human genes into the future earth.. Earth will continue (even if it looks more like Venus 100 years from now) but humanity will not, and life may not, unless we all really start using our highly evolved brains and start work NOW!

Anonymous
  • in reply to Former Member

    Hi Ray -

    I have just taken a copy of your posting just in case.. LOL!

     

    I agree with everything you say above.. particularly "I am afraid that until that global attitude changes no amount education about climate change or pollution is going to save us, we are aleady lost."

     

    In my view, the greatest hazard is the argument about who is 'to blame' - even if it is not "us" who are destroying "the world", and "man made CO2" is not the primary reason for climate change,( there have been many ELE's long before what evolved into man was more than a small insignificant mamal crawling in the undergrowth), the fact that the human race (and probably the majority of complex life) on this planet is at risk from the processes which are now well underway, should be the primary (only) issue.

     

    I suppose, in a way, this is an evolutionary test - In the past, when extinction level events occurred, the most complex life on earth was usually subject to the most catostrophic depletion in numbers - and many were forced to extinction.. Nature 'won' and wiped out life which had evolved over billions of years.. If this had not happened, the opertunity for the evolution which resulted in us would never have occurred.. If Dinosours had been technologically and socially  advanced enough they may have engineered their way out of extinction - but they were not..

     

    We have only been on earth for a 'blink'.. Have we evolved (intelectually / technically) enough to take on engineering challenge of reversing what is now a 'natural' progression for earth? .. And (probably far more doubtful) have we evolved socially / ethically enough that we can put aside our political / religeous / other differences, and work together to make earth habitable for future generations?

     

    I am doubtful.. As the ice melts, it seems that the thing which is of most interest to nations nearbye is their improved access to carbon reserves they have previously been unable to tap.. and their legal claims to these - These are the people who can see the speed of the meltdown most clearly - but they are not the ones asking about the longer term implications - they are being driven by short view greed.

     

    " we are aleady lost. " seems almost inescapable... Unless "global attitude changes" ..  How many of us need to change? If some groups or nations refuse change, can enough of "us" change to implement geo-engineering without "their" involvement?

     

    Lets imagine a scenario (fictitious) - Say America, (most of) Europe, Australia, Japan and some other nations were to realise the likelyhood of a ELE, and threw EVERYTHING into escaping human extinction, without regard for the loss of competitiveness and lower living standards which would result from taking on the worlds problem - And that Russia, China and some other nations refused to make any changes, but were happy to make money from engineering contracts thrown their way..

     

    *Please note - I am not suggesting that I think the above nations will align themselves in the above way - one could swap the 'do' and 'dont' nations in any way - it makes no difference to the fiction / hypothesis.

     

    I think the above fiction is probably the best we can hope for (I may be wrong).. This all reads like Sci-Fi  ... But, one way or another, I believe our future will be beyond anything Hollywood could dream up - It will be a disaster movie beyond comprehension - Or it could be a disaster movie with awesome 'redemption' in its finale.  If the latter, I will not see the finale - My grand children might, and my children might (hopefully) be players in that finale.

  • in reply to FredM

    Hi Fred, I've being staying quiet on this topic until the problem you mentioned was resolved...

     

    As I suggested to you earlier I see a problem with perception - there is a lot of pseudo-science and bad science bandied around particularly by politicians who don't understand it, or choose to misrepresent the findings to suit their own ends. I would ask you to consider when we last had a politician with any credible scientific background? I personally think that many folk regard them as self-serving and deceitful, and so distrust anything they say.


    So who do you believe?

     

    I can remember back in the 70's when there were several hard winters and the scare at the time was that the next Ice Age was about to decend upon us. Fuel prices were soaring and the lights were going out across the country. For many people the climate change issue is just another attempt at global paranoia by 'those in power' to keep the people subservient.

     

    Now, I'm not suggesting that I believe this to be true, but I *do* know people who hold this view, probably more than believe that man made CO2 is going to doom us all....

     

    So, how do we convince the sceptics that we are destroying our world? we need to somehow seperate the science from both the politics and the industrial money that both have vested interests in skewing the research, and still be able to make enough noise for the world to hear it - and back it up with real scientific evidence.

     

    I think the point I'm trying to get at is that when the world believes enough to pull together, the problem can be solved quickly - not through recycling etc, but by massive shifts to clean power and Geo-engineering. At least in the short term I can see no alternative to Nuclear fission until we can find a better alternative. We must look to remove all CO2 generation from power generation and surface transportation. maybe we can then buy enough time to address more of the issues.

    To illustrate my point, compare and contrast the bank bonuses and the NASA funding. We as a society are prepared to hand out some $20Bn (from 1 company alone) to already rich bankers who have wrecked the lives of so many in the last 2 years, and yet our best hope for long term survival as a species (that of off world space travel) hangs in the balance again for want of some $3Bn.

     

    I am afraid that until that global attitude changes no amount education about climate change or pollution is going to save us, we are aleady lost.

     

    Ray

  • in reply to FredM

    Due to a bug or an error on my part, I accidentally edited and deleted a comment placed here - Really sorry about that!

     

    Following comments / discussion related to the above problem, which is now being resolved.. I have therefore deleted these postings to allow this thread to get back to topic.

     

    Any comments added here WILL NOT be edited by me, and I am really sorry I made this mistake with a past comment, and wish it was impossible for a blog owner to edit comments.

  • in reply to awinning

    Hi Alistair,

    I agree with "surely being as efficient as possible could buy us the time while we investigate this action?" - This is the position I took a few years ago..  I then took on a contract to evaluate the (99.999% bogus) claims from "free energy" "researchers" - this led me to look at the physics and chemistry of climate change - a long separate story - but I got a "behind the public face" view of what is really going on, and the real, 'unsanitised' data being processed..

     

    I have been "green aware" all my teen - adult life, and 'hung out' with greens, done the protest bit etc.. I understand where these people come from, and what they feel - I have also been involved in engineering, particularly electronics and biophysical chemistry, for many years - And I understand the issues that scientists face with regard to presenting unpalatable data to their peers / public / government.

     

    The greens who know the truth do not want to talk about it - They fear the kind of posting I have made, believing that people will give up, and that the result will be an increase in wasteful practices.. They also know that, when people hear things that they cannot accept (regardless of the truth in what they hear) they often reject everything about the idea.

     

    Greens have many noble ideas which I subscribe to - Biodiversity, holistic environments etc .. They want a "nice" earth - they want organic farming - they don’t want "ugly" wind farms.... They (the majority) do not understand (or do not want to understand) that it is TOO LATE to achieve their ideals - So they carry on washing their yoghurt pots and ignoring the oncoming ELE.

     

    The Scientists who know (and they do know - there is no clear moment when we passed "the point of no return" - but it was many years ago) have similar reasons to the greens for not telling the whole truth.. They would not be believed (regardless of what evidence they present) - And also, in science, absolutes are never declared - they cannot (if they are really scientists) say "We know with certainty that greenhouse gasses being released into the atmosphere will increase over the next 20 years, to a level which exceeds total greenhouse gas being released into the atmosphere at present, regardless of what actions we take" - but talk to some right in the centre of the data, and they will tell you (off the record) that 20 years is extremely optimistic.

     

    As the problem gets worse, the difficulty in applying any practical measures will increase -

    So yes, we must do everything we can to extend the time available to us.

     

    The fact that we have passed "The tipping point" does NOT mean there is "nothing we can do" - but it should direct us to focus on what we CAN do.. We are possibly technologically advanced enough to engineer a solution - But, unless we use this remaining time to engineer our way out of this mess, humanity is doomed.. And unless there is some truly astounding "simple" innovation which enables us to remove huge (astronomical) quantities of greenhouse gasses from the atmosphere (and somehow 'sink' this), it will take massive engineering effort to turn things around. As one SF writer said: "I cannot see the future - there’s a mountain of corpses blocking the view".

     

    Yes - it is always possible that something will change what looks like a an inevitable conclusion.. Earths weather is probably the most complex system we have ever tried to model - We could get an Ice Age..

     

    But - imagine (this is entirely hypothetical - and the "science" is bad - pure fiction) that a large asteroid was seen on collision course with earth – impact due (say) 50 years from now, and that some tiny particles of this asteroid were already impacting causing 'minor' problems , and larger, more catastrophic debris was predicted to impact earth 20 years from now –  full extinction level impact was 95% probable .. What would we be doing about it?

     

    I hope we would be moving every scientific and engineering resource NOW in an attempt to escape oblivion.. And I believe our present situation is no less serious.

     

    I wish I was wrong, I wish I was talking utter nonsense - And anyone who can show me anything indicating that I was in error on this matter would have my deepest gratitude - I dont want to believe any of the things I have posted here - I have 3 young children.

  • That's a fairly sobering post. There is a positive feedback aspect of global warming which we can't control, but surely being as efficient as possible could buy us the time while we investigate this action? The more companies that take action and responsibility, the more time we buy ourselves to find a solution. As an aside, the company I work for signed the UN Global Compact today.

     

    I also don't think according to most scientists I've read that the tipping point where there is nothing we can do to slow down the proces has not been reached yet, although it is not too far into the future.