'Educated' opinions on climate change 41

[csd72]

As engineers we are educated in physics and chemistry and should have a reasonable idea on what really effects the energy consumption that causes climate change. I am looking for peoples opinions on what suggestions have been good ideas to reduce your individual impact. Alternatively what suggestions have you heard that are utter nonsense.

It would be good to hear comments from engineers on this matter.

 

[PBroad]

The planet is enjoying more mild and balmy temperatures, and the ice caps around the south pole had been diminishing for three summers in a row. So says Habibullo Abdussamatov, head of space research at St. Petersburg's Pulkovo Astronomical Observatory in Russia.

However, he is not talking about planet Earth, but rather about Mars.(this info has been in the public domain for more than a year)

If anyone believes that this has a human cause would they like to explain it to me in words that I can understand.

If two neighboring planets are both getting warmer isn't it logical that there is a common cause? Obviously those who believe in the religion that human influence on our environment is more important than the hand of God, think that man can do anything.

 

[KENAT]

It's Mars rovers fault. Weeling around for longer than planned they've affected Mars climate.

KENAT, probably the least qualified checker you'll ever meet...

 

[josephv]

'A rise in wind-swept dust on Mars is causing more heat from sunlight to be absorbed by the planet's surface, leading to rising temperatures, according to a study published in the British journal Nature... On Mars, one of the key factors in planetary warming is the change caused by the darkening of its surface, according to the team led by NASA planetary scientist Lori Fenton.'

http://www.cbc.ca/technology/story/2007/04/04/science-mars-warming.html

 

[KENAT]

Yeah but what's kicking up the dust, it's them mars rovers shooting across the planet at crazy speeds, I'm telling you.

Bet Al would agree with me;-).

KENAT, probably the least qualified checker you'll ever meet...

 

[521AB]

Unfortunately (or fortunately) i don't think we, humans, are so powerful to change the climate on the our planet.
We don't even know how many animals are leaving on this planet, and don't even know what we have 10 km under our feet..

 

[Unotec]

Other idea: Stop drinking milk. One of the biggest deforestation activities are grasslands for milking cows. Oh, and apparently, milk is not that good for children either. Ask yourself, would you drink dog milk? Why cow then? Both are allien to us.

<<A good friend will bail you out of jail, but a true friend
will be sitting beside you saying ” Damn that was fun!” - Unknown>>

 

[moltenmetal]

521AB: we're powerful enough to double the concentration of one of the normal constituents of our atmosphere.

We were also powerful enough to de-forest vast tracts of land on just about every continent for the purposes of agriculture, fuel and other wood uses. We've made innumerable other changes to the ecosystems on the planet that you can see from space, much less in your own backyard.

Why then would you consider us incapable of affecting the climate, for good or bad?

I'll concede that the climate is sufficiently complex that we cannot know anything about it with analytical certainty. But the fact that the vast majority of those who actually STUDY the climate for a living are of the opinion that we are PROBABLY affecting the climate in an essentially irreversible way, is evidence enough for me that action to mitigate this risk is necessary. This whole issue is about risk mitigation- no different than any other situation where we engineers have to deal with uncertainty. The option of just carrying on with the status quo and seeing what happens wouldn't be considered adequately protective in anything else we engineers do: so why should we take this approach with the earth's climate?

 

[vc66]

I love the words "vast majority"...

Tell me, how many people actually study climate for a living? I'll give you a star if you have the answer ± 100.

V

 

[moltenmetal]

vc66 I have no more idea how many climate scientists there are and don't really care. Should I? Are you claiming that there are only five of them and they're all in cahoots or something?

"the vast majority of those who study the climate for a living" doesn't satisfy you? OK, how about "the vast majority of climate scientists who report their results in peer-reviewed journals". Does that satisfy you?

 

[jmw]

Interesting discussion on the radio the other day about "conservation".
There was much debate about what it is we are trying to conserve, forests being one of the topics and the country in question being the UK. Oh dear, it depends on which time you want to take as your datum. From the last Ice age we have been through tundra, birch pine and oak. We've been forested and then not forested.
The most recent time we as people made the most difference to forestation was during the Napoleonic wars when oak was felled for ships.

Most of the UK woodland is cultivated.
By the way, don't expect trees in all the forests because forest was originally a term for a hunting preserve (of the king). Much is and was moorland.
Pretty much every aspect of the UK's countryside has been managed in some way or other for some time and well before the modern industrial era.

At one time, during the Roman occupation, the climate favoured cultivation of vines for wine. There appears to be a resurgence at the moment but the weather may count against it again as we have had the coldest spell for 44 years.

To oppose or question the claims for Anthropogenic Global Warming does not mean we live in denial. It means that what is proposed to combat AGW is a huge undertaking and that we really need to get it right. But irreversible? not a term I'd apply to the climate, changeable, yes. Can we ever revert to some other time? I doubt it. Do we risk irreversible damage to society and the economy? yes. We get it wrong and we may not be able to recover.

Should we suspect the AGW claims? on the basis of the data, absolutely. It grows ever more suspect day by day.



JMW

http://www.ViscoAnalyser.com

 

[vc66]

moltenmetal- I'm not saying there are only 5... I'm saying that there are just as many scientists opposing AGW as are supporting it. I'm not saying it's not possible. I'm saying it's suspect.

And until I get indisputable scientific evidence supporting it, I don't buy it.

V

 

[rtmote]

No one has mentioned the predicted pole shift change (2012) hich will render mute 'global warming' and reinforce 'climate change' label; this shift will really screw up the weather predictions. Wasn't this the source of the last ice age, turning the safari Siberia to Tundra wasteland?


Robert Mote

http://www.motagg.com

 

[ivymike]

But irreversible? not a term I'd apply to the climate, changeable, yes. Can we ever revert to some other time? I doubt it. Do we risk irreversible damage to society and the economy? yes. We get it wrong and we may not be able to recover.

Oh come off it... any argument you use to justify calling the environment changeable but not damageable applies just as well to the economy. You can't damage it, you can only change it so that in the future it is in a state you find less favorable than today's. It's not damaged, just different. It's already different than it used to be, so what's a little more change?

 

[zdas04]

Comparing the climate to the economy is much like comparing the ocean to a toilet bowl. That dog ain't going to hunt.

David

 

[moltenmetal]

I disagree with the notion that taking action on greenhouse gas emissions will automatically destroy our economies. It will merely tie the consumer to costs we currently ALL bear collectively whether we consume these products in large or small measure. I argue that we as engineers are particularly well placed to benefit from a world where energy can no longer be squandered wantonly. There might actually be a PAYBACK for the engineering necessary to do things in a better, more efficient way.

Both adaptation to climate change itself and greenhouse gas mitigation measures represent risks to our standard of living if not our economies. The difference is that we collectively will bear ANY cost that is necessary to adapt to the effects of climate change because we have no choice in the matter.

Until we all bear the full costs of our fossil fuels consumption by putting a cost on dumping stuff into the atmosphere, we WILL continue to squander this finite resource. The market can't control our excesses at present because it receives no signal tying the consumption to the costs of the consequences: it's the classic economic "problem of the commons".

The risk of climate change is only one of a great number of good reasons we should try to kick our fossil energy addiction- even if it costs us dearly. Don't kid yourself: the status quo is costing us dearly too.

 

[MRWilliams]

Whether or not we are causing climate change is purely academic in my opinion, we should be reserving resources and reducing pollution regardless of climate change.

Unless you plan to eat or burn (for a useful purpose) what you plant in your garden I'm afraid your not doing anything to reduce your carbon footprint, and even then your only saving in the transport your good would alternatively require. Where do you think all the carbon your plants are taking in goes when they die? The life cycle of a plant is carbon neutral, not carbon negative.

Until they are improved, hybrid cars are largely a waste of time, the resources to make them outweigh the (limited) benefits of using them. Extra weight/resources/chemicals.

Catolytic converters on cars only work once the engine is hot enough, most car journeys don't achieve this temperature and the extra weight just increases emmisions.

 

[csd72]

MRWilliams,

Plants do act as a carbon sink, the more plants you have the more carbon can be stored in them at any given time.

This is why deforestation has achieved so much attention from the climate scientists. There are also studies in the US on how much carbon can be absorbed in a given area. Listen to the podcast in my link above - one of the last ones covers this.

 

[jmw]

http://www.blackle.com/about/

I think that says it all.....

JMW

http://www.ViscoAnalyser.com

 

[zdas04]

Whether a particular individual or corporate entity can/will/should spend capital (thereby consuming resources) to conserve resources is an economic decision that must be fit into the framework available assets and obligations. In general, if something must be acquired, then it often makes sense to acquire it in a way that reduces the amount of resources consumed--that is sound engineering.

Today's hysteria over the possibility of anthropogenic global warming is driving people toward decisions that are far from conservative. If a machine has a remaining life of 30 years, but the latest technology is 0.5% more fuel efficient, then it is probably irresponsible to pay the resources required to fabricate and transport the new machine simply for the marginal fuel savings--but those sorts of decisions are being made every day to capture carbon credits, meet Kyoto obligations, or some other shell game.

In fact, when you factor in all the costs of acquiring and transporting raw materials, turning them into products suitable for device fabrication, transporting the bulk materials to the factory, converting them to finished products, and transporting those to the final consumer it is often the case that the savings will never pay back the energy used to create the new gee gaw.

I've never said that conservation is bad, it is not bad. I've never said that fuel efficiency is bad, it is not bad. I'm saying that spending resources to reduce our "carbon footprint" will not have a positive impact on global climate change and when you factor out the emotion it could very well have a negative impact on some aspect of the planet.

David

 

[ivymike]

There are apparently lots of dogs that don't hunt, and people who love them anyway.

As long as yall can make your new gee gaw without playing the rules of the carbon tax game, yall probably can game the system...

I wonder whether your well-phrased opinions on climate change will be proven wrong in your lifetime?