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Scientists caught off-guard by record temperatures linked to climate change

reuters.com

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Re: Scientists caught off-guard by record temperatures linked to climate change

#121

Post by yourapostasy »

jsingleton wrote: post #88
cconcepts wrote: post #9

I have no doubt that climate change is a problem. I have kids, I dont want to give them a hospital pass. I've tried to stop living such a carbon dependant lifestyle but I look outside and my efforts feel futile. How do I REALLY do something about this other than a few pretentious yet barely discomforting lifestyle changes and the odd empassioned few sentences at dinner parties? Start pushing for a carbon tax? Start a…

You can do a lot in your own life that will also save you money. I won't go into too much detail because, as you note, this has a small effect unless lots of people do it. But some simple ideas that are cheap and boring. - Eat less meat or cut it out fully (or at least not every day) - Fly less and use long distance trains where you can - Insulate your property to reduce energy use - Ride a bicycle and take public tr…

> - Insulate your property to reduce energy use

I'm evaluating how to improve this small, isolated facet. Foamed glass blocks and sheets are really great insulation, but are currently prohibitively expensive for working and middle class to acquire in massive quantities (sufficient to reach and even exceed PassivHaus standards). However, if one is willing to accept lower efficiency end-product (made up for with thicker walls), extremely long, labor-intensive manufacturing times, and gradually add to insulation over years, it looks like it is feasible to build a backyard concentrated solar power kiln (only about 1,300 degrees C required, so not too many heliostats) and make one's own foamed glass insulation.

A minor benefit is the process requires a small amount of carbon, so while coal dust is usually specified, it might be possible to turn this process into a very minor carbon sink using other sources of solar-thermal-powered manufactured carbon.

You also need a machine that crushes glass into chunks, and can also crush into a powdery form called cullet. Make those solar electric-powered, and you have a process that can easily last a generation or two, making highly useful insulation the entire time there is plentiful sunshine out of your neighborhood's glass waste stream.

Aesthetically though, this kind of insulating is a difficult sell to mainstream developed world sensibilities: you need 2-3 feet thick walls and ceilings filled with this insulation, and about 10 feet in the sub-slab or pier foundation, to reach the American equivalent of R-90 all-around, for example. PassivHaus requires a lot less, but they are evaluating on net economic benefit across 30 years max while I don't mind a multi-generation payback if the result is an energy footprint that is in the single digit percentages of even "green" houses today.

Re: Scientists caught off-guard by record temperatures linked to climate change

#123

Post by hiou »

Declanomous wrote: post #101
jsingleton wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can do a lot in your own life that will also save you money. I won't go into too much detail because, as you note, this has a small effect unless lots of people do it. But some simple ideas that are cheap and boring. - Eat less meat or cut it out fully (or at least not every day) - Fly less and use long distance trains where you can - Insulate your property to reduce energy use - Ride a bicycle and take public tr…

As far as I'm aware flying generates fewer greenhouse gas emissions than any either trains, cars or buses over long distances. (At least in the US, where our rail infrastructure is freight-centric and diesel powered.) The argument against flying is that the greenhouse gas emissions end up high up, which could contribute to the greenhouse gas effect. However, long distance passenger trains in the US reduce the freight…

A solo ride in a car could be worse than a full plane on a cross country trip. But a train or bus is typically(there may be some edge cases) going to be much better than an airplane.

Also, long distance passenger trains absolutely do not reduce freight transport. They lease the the use of the tracks which provides additional income to the freight carriers and the freight carriers have right of way at all times on the tracks. On top of that the Northeast Coast(Washington, DC and north) lines in the US are electric.

Did you just randomly make this stuff up? It is completely false information.

Re: Scientists caught off-guard by record temperatures linked to climate change

#124

Post by Brakenshire »

Retric wrote: post #115
gst wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

IMO the problem is that most sides in the discussion don't propose any viable solutions: On one side there are the climate change deniers (and the people who don't care about it). They are fine to continue business as usual. On the other side there are the people who are concerned about climate change. But instead of agreeing to effective solutions (compromises) that allow us to somewhat mitigate global warming (such…

Nuclear costs more than wind without subsidies making it a non starter. We are still wasting a lot of money on nuclear R&D in the misplaced hope of changing this, but the underlying economics are still terrible. In terms of change, we have dramatically cut back on CO2 production vs. predictions from even 10 years ago. So we are making progress.

It is cheaper than wind plus storage. Wind plus storage might even be impossible to meet baseload requirements with current technology. Even if battery costs fall by 80%, they wouldn't feasibly be able to store grid-scale electricity for weeks.

But admittedly the situation may change within the lifetime of a new nuclear station, or even in the 20 years before it's actually built.

Re: Scientists caught off-guard by record temperatures linked to climate change

#125

Post by RodericDay »

pif wrote: post #62
mikekchar wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Actually, I can. Or perhaps not with no apples. But, I certainly use less apples... er energy... than I used to. By a lot, and I'm much happier. Warning, past this point you may think I'm a lunatic. I really am trying to see what works and what doesn't work. I've been really surprised at how much stuff I really don't want once I've gotten rid of it. I don't have a car. I hang my clothes on a line (I even went a year…

> I really am happier as a result of what I'm doing. I'm sincerely glad for you, but how much of your current happiness comes from the challenge that you posed yourself and you won? In other terms, how much effort are you putting every day in your (fully respectable) cause? > Can everybody be as happy as me with as little as me? I'm not sure. Me neither. It looks to me as you chose to be happier via ecology. Most peo…

> Most people have already chosen how they wish to be happier, and giving up cheap energy is just a huge roadblock for them.

this sounds like total resignation. how about challenging those people on their choices?

Re: Scientists caught off-guard by record temperatures linked to climate change

#126

Post by vkou »

CWuestefeld wrote: post #95
Brakenshire wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think the two sides you describe are correct, at least globally. In the UK, 70-80% of people agree that anthropogenic climate change is happening, and the Green party (who have the kind of position you're describing) only get 5% of the vote. You're presenting everyone who thinks that action needs to be taken as part of a much smaller, unrepresentative group. Also, I agree that flat blocking of nuclear is unre…

flat blocking of nuclear is unreasonable. But in my opinion disagreement on the issue is a relatively marginal issue in the general sweep of tackling climate change. The new DNC platform coming out of the convention this week doesn't seem to agree with you. It focuses solely on renewable sources, sweeping nuclear under the carpet. 70-80% of people agree that anthropogenic climate change is happening I don't understan…

But does the new DNC platform call for a large carbon tax? Does it price energy-intensive economic activity appropriately? Subsidies for alternatives don't do that.

Mainstream political thought in the US has largely self-sorted into two categories of politicians - ones that don't believe that climate change is happening, and won't do anything about it, and ones that do believe that it is happening, and won't do anything about it. Neither is of any use to us.

Re: Scientists caught off-guard by record temperatures linked to climate change

#127

Post by merpnderp »

Chathamization wrote: post #68
gst wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

IMO the problem is that most sides in the discussion don't propose any viable solutions: On one side there are the climate change deniers (and the people who don't care about it). They are fine to continue business as usual. On the other side there are the people who are concerned about climate change. But instead of agreeing to effective solutions (compromises) that allow us to somewhat mitigate global warming (such…

Part of the problem is that there's a certain group of people who are more interested in pushing their pet solutions than they are in pushing effective solutions. Most of the analyses I've read say that stuff like nuclear and geothermal aren't going to be major components of the fight against climate change. For nuclear specifically, a mass roll out of nuclear plants is simply too difficult - cost, production bottlen…

"For nuclear specifically, a mass roll out of nuclear plants is simply too difficult - cost, production bottlenecks, public opposition, production time and delays, etc."

And yet many Asian countries are doing just this.

Re: Scientists caught off-guard by record temperatures linked to climate change

#128

Post by merpnderp »

Cybiote wrote: post #90
the_gastropod wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's a third that I'm familiar with, and find compelling: construction. Building a new nuclear power plant costs tens of billions of dollars (usually requiring government funding) and ~10 years from start to finish. The efficiency of wind and solar power is increasing rapidly, and in 10 years will likely be a better investment than a nuclear plant.

"The world construction rate peaked at 30 GW of nuclear power per year in 1984" ... "The rate of new build was biggest in 1984, and had a value of (drum-roll please...) about 30 GW per year – about 30 1-GW reactors." https://www.withouthotair.com/c24/page_171.shtml

And the world doesn't even have to reach France's historic rate. Just getting anywhere close to it, and filling the gaps with wind, solar, and natgas, would be a overwhelming win for stopping CO2 production (and providing cheap and plentiful energy).

Re: Scientists caught off-guard by record temperatures linked to climate change

#129

Post by merpnderp »

omginternets wrote: post #61
scarmig wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm all for nuclear. Among people who want to mitigate climate change, there's no more dislike of nuclear than among public at large (which is to say, too much, but not an exceptional amount). The biggest issue with nuclear is that it, by itself, is entirely insufficient to deal with the problem. And the best policy solutions to climate change--namely, a refundable carbon tax--would themselves encourage the prolifera…

I'm all for nuclear in the short-term, but in the long-term it's just substituting one problem for another. I don't see how we can possibly break out of this cycle without revisiting the notion of an infinite-growth economy. Until we curb human population and energy consumption, we'll continue sprinting from dead-end to dead-end.

Human population is already leveling off. The richer a people become, the lower their reproduction rate. The lack of population growth has already become a major economic issue in many parts of the world.

And we have, for all current intents and purposes, an infinite supply of nuclear, solar, and wind energy.

Re: Scientists caught off-guard by record temperatures linked to climate change

#130

Post by merpnderp »

corecoder wrote: post #42
mikekchar wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If I said that apples were the cause of global warming and that to avoid catastrophe you had to avoid eating apples it wouldn't worry you nearly as much, would it? I mean apples are delicious, but they aren't worth the misery that extreme weather will inflict on us. There are also a lot of people who depend on apple production to make a living. We would have to find some way for them to transition to something else f…

The problem is that most of your neighbours and friends would see you as the hippy idealist guy who gave up apples in vain, because while you don't use apples anymore, airplanes full of apples keep flying, apples factories and farms keep producing and consuming apples, and apples provider ads keep showing how cheap apples are. There's a sense of helplessness (learned helplessness, some would say), due to the percepti…

Or we would see climate change leaders of the world driving armadas of vehicles, flying legions of people to their conferences, living in mansions, using the carbon footprint of a medium sized city, all while preaching we, the little people, need to put on a sweater in the winter and sweat more in the summer.
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