Good thing we're shutting down nuclear reactors and spinning up coal plants.
Sea Change – The Pacific's Perilous Turn
11–20 of 179 posts
Re: Sea Change – The Pacific's Perilous Turn
#12Is the problem that we're simply creating more CO2 than can be manufactured back into O2 by plants? Would the practicality of a "CO2 vent to space" work? We vent the excess but obviously not everything considering we wouldn't want to destroy all plant life on earth (and subsequently our own in the process). The one major downside is if this wasn't tightly controlled and a "leak" happened we could foster the end of life on the planet. It looks like ocean acidification would do that already so if it'd be the lesser of two evils I'd go for the one we could control.
The more obvious choice is to reduce our dependency on fossil fuels. How's that really been going all this time? Yeah that's what I thought. Rock? Meet Hard Place.
Re: Sea Change – The Pacific's Perilous Turn
#13Like many who visit HN, I am an atheist. I am coming to believe, however, that the production of CO2 is the greatest sin, in the religious sense, that exists today. It dwarfs all other problems -- Syria, terrorism, the NSA, class and economic disparity, all of them. Being technologists we tend to assume (hope?) that some solution will present itself before it is too late. I am growing increasingly pessimistic that su…
"It dwarfs all other problems -- Syria, terrorism, the NSA, class and economic disparity, all of them."
I don't know enough about climate science to be fully informed about impact, but this I know... A true carbon tax would be of such enormous magnitude, that it would compare with issues like class disparity. * If the pessimists are true, the deaths involved from climate change will draw Syria plus 9/11 plus many other wars.
* - On a side note, if done on a revenue neutral basis, it could be used to lower taxes for everyone, and provide relief for people who live a lower-carbon lifestyle.
Re: Sea Change – The Pacific's Perilous Turn
#14Is the problem that we're simply creating more CO2 than can be manufactured back into O2 by plants? Would the practicality of a "CO2 vent to space" work? We vent the excess but obviously not everything considering we wouldn't want to destroy all plant life on earth (and subsequently our own in the process). The one major downside is if this wasn't tightly controlled and a "leak" happened we could foster the end of li…
> Would the practicality of a "CO2 vent to space" work?
Not really. First you need to capture the CO2, then you need to send it to space. Considering the scales involved we're unable to do either.
Re: Sea Change – The Pacific's Perilous Turn
#15Like many who visit HN, I am an atheist. I am coming to believe, however, that the production of CO2 is the greatest sin, in the religious sense, that exists today. It dwarfs all other problems -- Syria, terrorism, the NSA, class and economic disparity, all of them. Being technologists we tend to assume (hope?) that some solution will present itself before it is too late. I am growing increasingly pessimistic that su…
"It dwarfs all other problems -- Syria, terrorism, the NSA, class and economic disparity, all of them." I don't know enough about climate science to be fully informed about impact, but this I know... A true carbon tax would be of such enormous magnitude, that it would compare with issues like class disparity. * If the pessimists are true, the deaths involved from climate change will draw Syria plus 9/11 plus many oth…
If the pessimists are correct, death due to climate changes will be on the scale of world wars.
Re: Sea Change – The Pacific's Perilous Turn
#16What can I, as an individual with no money nor power, do to help stop this?
I can reduce my energy use as far as possible. Apart from the online stuff I'm pretty low CO2. I can reduce, reuse, and recycle. (I need to get better at that.)
But what else can I do?
Re: Sea Change – The Pacific's Perilous Turn
#17Like many who visit HN, I am an atheist. I am coming to believe, however, that the production of CO2 is the greatest sin, in the religious sense, that exists today. It dwarfs all other problems -- Syria, terrorism, the NSA, class and economic disparity, all of them. Being technologists we tend to assume (hope?) that some solution will present itself before it is too late. I am growing increasingly pessimistic that su…
Here's a way to sequester CO2 in soil, reverse desertification, and make more delicious steak, all at the same time: http://www.savoryinstitute.com/
No, we must throw off the shekels of our oppressors, then we can talk about practical solutions.
Re: Sea Change – The Pacific's Perilous Turn
#18So, how do we build solar faster? The energy is there, there is ~89 petawatts of incoming solar hitting the ground and we apparently use ~18 terawatts and it looks technically achievable using current technology, so the main restriction would seem to be production capacity and capital costs.
We'd have to cover too much land with solar panels. What we need are more nuclear power plants, but no one will build them anymore.
There's a lot of land not being used. And of course we can (and should) do both at the same time, and windfarms as well.
Re: Sea Change – The Pacific's Perilous Turn
#19Like many who visit HN, I am an atheist. I am coming to believe, however, that the production of CO2 is the greatest sin, in the religious sense, that exists today. It dwarfs all other problems -- Syria, terrorism, the NSA, class and economic disparity, all of them. Being technologists we tend to assume (hope?) that some solution will present itself before it is too late. I am growing increasingly pessimistic that su…
Fukushima possibly contaminating the entire Pacific, making any seafood from there not able to be eaten, is not as bad as a little more CO2?
By the way, not 1 word in the article, filled with all sorts of scary quotes, about diatoms and their role in CO2 sequestration.
Re: Sea Change – The Pacific's Perilous Turn
#20So, how do we build solar faster? The energy is there, there is ~89 petawatts of incoming solar hitting the ground and we apparently use ~18 terawatts and it looks technically achievable using current technology, so the main restriction would seem to be production capacity and capital costs.
We'd have to cover too much land with solar panels. What we need are more nuclear power plants, but no one will build them anymore.
There are a ton of roadblocks to nuclear power, unfortunately. Although I agree with you that, done right, nuclear is the way to go, it's a tough road to get to.
Perhaps biggest, at least in the USA, there is the "Not in my backyard" syndrome. We all want clean energy, but we don't want the chance of a meltdown happening near us / our kids / our workplace.
Then there are the coal workers--there are a LOT of jobs tied up here, and it would be political suicide to tell a huge chunk of Southeast America that their job is going away.
Then there's the question of other countries. We can make all the changes we want here in the USA, but what do we do about China, Brazil, etc? Any developing country is going to want to trade emissions for growth. China's been doing it for decades and is just now starting to wonder if maybe they should clean up the air. We still breathe that same air, how do we get them not to foul it up? Do we encourage them to build nuclear reactors? Do we have to inspect them to make sure they're safe? Maybe they don't care if a meltdown happens every 5 years, but again, that fouls up our air/waters as well.