Alaska’s thawing soils are now pouring carbon dioxide into the air • Hacker News Board

Re: Alaska’s thawing soils are now pouring carbon dioxide into the air

#31

Post by lutorm » Wed, Aug 23, 2017, 7:56 PM UTC

taberiand wrote: post #3

I wouldn't be surprised if such feedback loops have been excluded from the models of climate change because they paint a picture so dire that no amount of mitigation (if there were any serious attempts at mitigation going on) could save our way of life. "Sooner and worse than expected" is a phrase I expect to hear with increasing frequency.

IIRC they were not included in the IPCC reports, but for a different reason: even though pretty much everyone agrees that they exist, they were too difficult to quantify.

Re: Alaska’s thawing soils are now pouring carbon dioxide into the air

#32

Post by Boothroid » Wed, Aug 23, 2017, 7:58 PM UTC

EGreg wrote: post #25

Can someone PLEASE tell me why there haven't been more efforts underway to have commnities around the world plant more trees and engage in planned reforestation? This is as close as you can get to a globally available mechanism for pulling carbon dioxide out of the air (and methane can burn leaving carbon dioxide). I mean this very seriously. Richard Branson is looking to fund ways to pull Carbon out if the atmospher…

Couldn't agree more. Here in the UK we have a lower percentage of forested land than many other European countries and I much prefer forest to the barren green fields which we have in many places. Sadly I think lots of my countrymen think of green fields being the default state of rural UK and don't realise it's the legacy of deforestation by stone age man.. I can only imagine what the UK must have been like prior to that. It must have been truly idyllic.

Re: Alaska’s thawing soils are now pouring carbon dioxide into the air

#33

Post by cmurf » Wed, Aug 23, 2017, 7:59 PM UTC

topspin wrote: post #20

cmurf wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is idiocy. You basically have to believe tens of thousands of scientist are liars to accept the first statement. Not merely they're mistaken, not merely they have imperfect data, but intentionally deceiving with malice. That's how many scientists and how much data there is contravening your first statement, not least of which is Exxon - that liberal bastion of environmental preservation.

"You basically have to believe tens of thousands of scientist are liars to accept the first statement" The first statement, that human industry is not "the main cause of co2 release," is undisputed fact. This is what the DOE says [1]: "Natural CO2 sources account for the majority of CO2 released into the atmosphere." and "Carbon dioxide comes from both natural and anthropogenic sources; natural sources are predominan…

That page says: Myth: Carbon dioxide comes only from anthropogenic sources, especially from the burning of fossil fuels.

Jesus is a myth. The above statement is not something any thinking person has ever considered. You'd have to be a moron to think CO2 only comes from human source. Of course CO2 predates mankind, as well as mandkind's activities. Positioning something that no one is claiming as if it's something someone is claiming and then knocking it down, is known as a strawman, it is not a myth. But this is what you'd expect from a DOE run by an oilman and climate change denier.

The concern is not the source or reason for historic CO2 levels, it's the source and reason for increases above historic CO2 levels.

Treating people as if they're too stupid to see through such transparent attempts at distraction should be a violation of the code of conduct, before name calling those who try to get away with shit like this.

Re: Alaska’s thawing soils are now pouring carbon dioxide into the air

#34

Post by danharaj » Wed, Aug 23, 2017, 8:03 PM UTC

EGreg wrote: post #25

Can someone PLEASE tell me why there haven't been more efforts underway to have commnities around the world plant more trees and engage in planned reforestation? This is as close as you can get to a globally available mechanism for pulling carbon dioxide out of the air (and methane can burn leaving carbon dioxide). I mean this very seriously. Richard Branson is looking to fund ways to pull Carbon out if the atmospher…

> Can someone PLEASE tell me why there haven't been more efforts underway to have commnities around the world plant more trees and engage in planned reforestation?

The prevailing political and economic system.

Re: Alaska’s thawing soils are now pouring carbon dioxide into the air

#35

Post by lutorm » Wed, Aug 23, 2017, 8:04 PM UTC

topspin wrote: post #20

cmurf wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is idiocy. You basically have to believe tens of thousands of scientist are liars to accept the first statement. Not merely they're mistaken, not merely they have imperfect data, but intentionally deceiving with malice. That's how many scientists and how much data there is contravening your first statement, not least of which is Exxon - that liberal bastion of environmental preservation.

"You basically have to believe tens of thousands of scientist are liars to accept the first statement" The first statement, that human industry is not "the main cause of co2 release," is undisputed fact. This is what the DOE says [1]: "Natural CO2 sources account for the majority of CO2 released into the atmosphere." and "Carbon dioxide comes from both natural and anthropogenic sources; natural sources are predominan…

Sure, if you don't include the word "net". Natural processes account for the majority of CO2 introduced into the atmosphere. They also account for the majority of the CO2 removed from the atmosphere, because there's an equilibrium flow.

The important part is that anthropogenic sources are a significant contribution to the net imbalance of those flows, because it's all in one direction.

It's like arguing that your spending, because is a small fraction of the amount of money you move between your checkings and savings accounts, won't make you run out of money...

Re: Alaska’s thawing soils are now pouring carbon dioxide into the air

#36

Post by knieveltech » Wed, Aug 23, 2017, 8:08 PM UTC

jerf wrote: post #24

taberiand wrote: post #3

I wouldn't be surprised if such feedback loops have been excluded from the models of climate change because they paint a picture so dire that no amount of mitigation (if there were any serious attempts at mitigation going on) could save our way of life. "Sooner and worse than expected" is a phrase I expect to hear with increasing frequency.

"I wouldn't be surprised if such feedback loops have been excluded from the models of climate change because they paint a picture so dire that no amount of mitigation (if there were any serious attempts at mitigation going on) could save our way of life." If such feedback loops could be that dire and unavoidable, then they would already have happened direly and unavoidably. It has been this warm before, in the not-th…

Evidence suggests they already have happened several times in earth's history. You might consider doing a little research into the relationship between climate shifts and mass extinction events.

Re: Alaska’s thawing soils are now pouring carbon dioxide into the air

#37

Post by koube » Wed, Aug 23, 2017, 8:08 PM UTC

EGreg wrote: post #25

Can someone PLEASE tell me why there haven't been more efforts underway to have commnities around the world plant more trees and engage in planned reforestation? This is as close as you can get to a globally available mechanism for pulling carbon dioxide out of the air (and methane can burn leaving carbon dioxide). I mean this very seriously. Richard Branson is looking to fund ways to pull Carbon out if the atmospher…

Trees are not a carbon processing factory, they are a carbon battery. If they die the carbon will be released again during decomposition. Once they are planted they must be maintained into perpetuity, unless they are planted where they will naturally survive. Maintaining these forests will probably involve energy usage that releases more carbon.

We need method of fixation that is both permanent and does not have the constraints that tree planting does.

Re: Alaska’s thawing soils are now pouring carbon dioxide into the air

#38

Post by nyolfen » Wed, Aug 23, 2017, 8:08 PM UTC

castis wrote: post #30

jerf wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Then trillions of dollars were extremely inefficiently allocated to the task of creating better worlds and a much better world could have been created with that money instead, costing lives in the process. Having noble goals doesn't immunize you from accounting.

And none of it means anything if we all die because the planet cant sustain us any longer.

quite a nice little set of rhetorical positions you've constructed for yourself

Re: Alaska’s thawing soils are now pouring carbon dioxide into the air

#39

Post by crush-n-spread » Wed, Aug 23, 2017, 8:10 PM UTC

The atmospheric carbon situation is not good, and we (as a species) need to come up with actionable geo-engineering solutions. Here is one.

Rainwater hits mountains and dissolves silicate minerals into cations that flow into rivers and then oceans. The oceans naturally uptake carbon from the atmosphere by reacting atmospheric carbon with cations in the water that come from those dissolved silicate minerals. This uptake de-acidifies the oceans and produces food for ocean life; for us to collect all the carbon produced in the USA last year, we would need to crush about 60km^3 of silicate rock (which is in abundance) and spread it along coastlines.

To successful sequester enough carbon to save the ecosystem, this might one of the best options we have. This paper [1] does a good job of explaining what I've touched on here.

[1]http://www.greensand.nl/content/user/1/files/rog20004.pdf

Re: Alaska’s thawing soils are now pouring carbon dioxide into the air

#40

Post by RcouF1uZ4gsC » Wed, Aug 23, 2017, 8:10 PM UTC

castis wrote: post #12

candiodari wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It was never true that human industry was the main cause of co2 release into the atmosphere. Which is one of the reasons to doubt that all those climate accords will have any influence on global warming at all. > "Sooner and worse than expected" is a phrase I expect to hear with increasing frequency. If you increase the input into self-reinforcing feedback loop that is exactly what you'd expect to happen. Not that at…

What if it's all a big hoax and we create a better world for nothing?

I have heard this line several times before, and it is the environmental equivalent of "What if there is no God, and we are being good to each other for nothing."

It completely ignores tradeoffs. General environmentalism has been very aggresively anti-nuclear. In a world of CO2 caused climate change, it has to rethink that opposition. Another example is with diesel engines. There is a tradeoff between NOX emmisions and efficiency (and thus CO2 emissions). What you decide the tradeoff to be, is influenced by how much you thing climate change is a problem.

Another example is endangered species. If we really are going to have catastrophic global warming, then maybe we don't try as aggressively to protect all species from habitat destruction say from building hydroelectric, wind, solar power plants in Africa.