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The concurrence of three climatic events

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161–170 of 408 posts

Re: The concurrence of three climatic events

#161
post #26

> The IPCC suggests that current sulfur aerosol levels are contributing in the neighborhood of 0.5° C to total global cooling, offsetting warming that would otherwise rapidly occur. > By cleaning up shipping fuels, massive regions of the world’s oceans that were protected from heating by shipping sulfate aerosols are now experiencing rapid warming. This includes the main shipping routes between Asia and the Western U…

Sulfur emissions also cause acid rain, so it's not as simple as "keep the emissions as is"

Re: The concurrence of three climatic events

#162
post #94
post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> But if every fraction of a degree matters, shouldn't we also be at least continuing if not scaling up these these albedo-increasing changes? Acid Rain is also a bad thing with bad consequences. While I'm not necessarily that opposed to cautious attempts at some geoengineering, I don't think "scale up the sulfate emissions" is a viable solution.

The argument the OP was really making was, could we at least not scale down sulfur emissions

I don't think it's that simple. Sulpher, causing acid rain, was a big deal and caused a lot of damage. Whole forrests died, public structures and art was damaged, etc... Also, sulpher contributes to ocean acidification.

The point is that the earth is a really complex systems, and it's not always clear what technical fixes to use, Let alone getting the political will to implement them.

Re: The concurrence of three climatic events

#163
post #26

> The IPCC suggests that current sulfur aerosol levels are contributing in the neighborhood of 0.5° C to total global cooling, offsetting warming that would otherwise rapidly occur. > By cleaning up shipping fuels, massive regions of the world’s oceans that were protected from heating by shipping sulfate aerosols are now experiencing rapid warming. This includes the main shipping routes between Asia and the Western U…

Also approximates the theme of Neal Stephenson’s most recent book of the same name, Termination Shock.

Re: The concurrence of three climatic events

#164
post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I completely agree with this sentiment. We should either remove the sulfur scrubbers from ships, start solar dimming around the poles, or both. It's an emergency and we're feeling the shocks right now. Another example, the war in Ukraine is accelerating the clean energy revolution in Europe, cutting down on air pollution. How's that going to help their drought? Will the EU act on national interests?

"Another example, the war in Ukraine is accelerating the clean energy revolution in Europe, cutting down on air pollution." Maybe in the long run it helps, but right now, not really: "European coal-fuelled power generation climbed last year as countries scrambled to replace Russian gas, but the increase was smaller than feared as renewable energy helped to plug the gap, ...Outright coal generation in the EU increased…

Also tanks get bad gas mileage.

But the Ukrainians seem to have a lot of fight in them, and we are willing and able to support them solo from the US. So, I suspect the fastest path, of the options that the EU can actually pick from, is: maximum support, get it over with.

Re: The concurrence of three climatic events

#165
> These next two years are a pre-amble to what it will mean for the world to pass the Paris 1.5°C barrier. The end of global industrial civilization is where we are headed right now, not at some future dystopian moment. I wish I had a hopeful word to end with. But I don’t.

This isn't going to age well.

Re: The concurrence of three climatic events

#167
post #12

I fear that this is the year "wet-bulb temperature" becomes a term regular households across the world become deeply familiar with. It may be as ubiquitous as the term "social distancing" became. I've always naively thought that climate disaster was still 10-20 years out, but it seems like it's going to begin in earnest now and instead be completely catastrophic after these next 10 years. What can I as an individual…

There's literally nothing a "bottom-up" approach will do to effectuate any serious change on the climate. The climate is a dynamic system, and "climate change" is a tautology. At which point, ever, is any "climate" in a static state? Never, because systems are dynamic, and it's chaotic. Now, if anyone (the State powers and corporate interests) actually WANT to "solve" this "problem," it's, uh, very very clear where t…

Double pendulums are a great example of complex, chaotic, and dynamic system. Given an initial state, I wouldn't be able to predict the outcome. However, I could easily go over and smash the toy and then have a pretty good prediction of the outcome state.

Anyone who is interested in having a deeper understanding of climate change I would recommend checking out IPCC AR6.

https://www.ipcc.ch/report/ar6/syr/downloads/report/IPCC_AR6...

Re: The concurrence of three climatic events

#168
This article and discussions here in the comments motivated me to send off 3 emails to relevant ministers of my provincial government.

When I had my first kid, the environment and what our Earth would look like when she was my age really got to me. I realized that small, individual actions aren't going to cut it (ex turning off a light). It's not to say I don't do those things, but I had to do more, things that may actually move the needle.

I pay for Bullfrog power to my house (https://bullfrogpower.com/) and I now email my local representatives to make sure they know their constituents care about this. What will you do today?

Re: The concurrence of three climatic events

#169
post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I completely agree with this sentiment. We should either remove the sulfur scrubbers from ships, start solar dimming around the poles, or both. It's an emergency and we're feeling the shocks right now. Another example, the war in Ukraine is accelerating the clean energy revolution in Europe, cutting down on air pollution. How's that going to help their drought? Will the EU act on national interests?

"Another example, the war in Ukraine is accelerating the clean energy revolution in Europe, cutting down on air pollution." Maybe in the long run it helps, but right now, not really: "European coal-fuelled power generation climbed last year as countries scrambled to replace Russian gas, but the increase was smaller than feared as renewable energy helped to plug the gap, ...Outright coal generation in the EU increased…

This is likely season/already out of date

https://cleantechnica.com/2023/06/11/crossover-solar-wind-po...

Re: The concurrence of three climatic events

#170
post #17
post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Perhaps. I never know what to believe. I've heard smart, knowledgeable people like Bill Gates state that he thinks we won't experience a scorched Earth ending, but that we will solve this crisis. I'd like to believe him, but then I see an article like this and I don't know who to believe, the graphs are pretty damning if only to say "that line is way above the other lines, and that is bad."

For what it’s worth, the average interpretation I’ve seen from climate scientists is: - No, we won’t hit scorched earth Venus-like runaway warming. - If we don’t reduce emissions drastically, greenhouse gas warming plus various feedbacks will cause extreme weather, render some parts of the world unlivable due to wet bulb temperature, and overwhelm unprepared infrastructure, costing huge amounts of money and creating…

> greenhouse gas warming plus various feedbacks will cause extreme weather, render some parts of the world unlivable due to wet bulb temperature, and overwhelm unprepared infrastructure, costing huge amounts of money and creating millions of migrants

This is what I've been trying to tell people for years. Climate change is everyone's concern, if only because entire nations becoming uninhabitable, wars over natural resources (not just oil - now we'll be seeing fighting over arable land and water sources), etc. will cause massive influxes of refugees. Even if many nations did not have a significant split in opinions on migrants, most are still ill-equipped to handle the many millions of climate refugees that will come.

Remember the Syrian migrant crisis? Where people were shouting about "the great replacement" (read: "white genocide") over people fleeing ISIS? That's going to seem like chump change compared to what's coming (and I'd bet good money that new extremist groups will start popping up as conditions deteriorate, governments collapse, etc. - a good chunk of the blame for climate change can be laid at the feet of developed nations, after all, so I would be shocked if no extremist groups decided to take matters into their own hands).

I could write at length about this, but I'll leave it at this: the US is not going to come out of this unscathed. Obviously, sea level rise will lead to coastal flooding, yada yada, but unless American agriculture is forced to be more conservative with its water usage, the aquifers we rely so desperately on for our farmlands will run dry due to over-pumping within this century (and with megadroughts getting worse, our aquifers are recharging far slower than before...this will only get worse as climate change worsens).

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