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Global warming has accelerated significantly

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Re: Global warming has accelerated significantly

#291
post #176
post #147

Nothing will change until developed rich countries are starting to hurt. And I don't think it's going to hurt enough in 10 or 20 years. The pain will come slowly, people won't see it. It's like going back to the middle age so slowly, that the population don't realize or feel it. And honestly, wars and trump are making climate concerns so difficult to think about.

Developed rich countries are hurting. See the wildfires across North America, massive amounts of flooding across Europe, etc. Nothing will change until many of the global electorate stop burying their heads in the sand. These people don't change their minds until things affect them specifically. Then they change their mind, and all their former fellows tell them they're brainwashed. This doesn't change until nearly e…

Aren’t all these developed countries voluntarily self-depopulating by way of having birth rates below replacement? Seems like the problem will sort itself out if we can resist the urge to invite the entire third world to come in and instantly raise their carbon footprint to first world levels.

Re: Global warming has accelerated significantly

#292

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The majority of pollution is caused by 3rd world/ eastern countries. Do you want to go to war with China to enforce an environmentalist agenda?

China produces a lot less carbon per capita than we do

And they make most of the stuff we buy, including the climate emissions involved in making them.

Re: Global warming has accelerated significantly

#293
post #147

Nothing will change until developed rich countries are starting to hurt. And I don't think it's going to hurt enough in 10 or 20 years. The pain will come slowly, people won't see it. It's like going back to the middle age so slowly, that the population don't realize or feel it. And honestly, wars and trump are making climate concerns so difficult to think about.

China creates about 30–35% of global emissions. India about 8% but it is climbing fast.

What rich countries do is they just export their factories to other countries and say: look we do not pollute.

Re: Global warming has accelerated significantly

#294

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The majority of pollution is caused by 3rd world/ eastern countries. Do you want to go to war with China to enforce an environmentalist agenda?

Over the past century, the US has produced more cumulative carbon emissions than any other country, and it's not even close. China is in the middle of a massive expansion in wind, solar, and electric vehicles. The US is burning even more coal to support AI, and has gutted much of its federal emission reduction efforts.

This changed on the last decade or so. It's close now.

Of course, China has 5 times more people than the US, so they get a little bit of leeway. But they are close, and their emissions are growing.

That said, yes, they are investing more than anybody else. And they are improving the technology we need more than anybody else. People talking about military intervention are full of shit, but we could use some diplomatic collaboration.

Re: Global warming has accelerated significantly

#295
FWIW my personal assessment is that this acceleration is both real and largely out of our control. Models in the past did not attempt to account for non-anthropogenic carbon emissions, but as we experience further warming, most especially in the Arctic, feedback loops and tipping points mean that this (carbon emissions caused by “natural” processes) are becoming more evident. This is especially sensitive because a large proportion of such emissions are methane, which is a much more powerful greenhouse gas vs CO2, albeit with a much shorter expected effect time once airborne (~12 years). Consider also that warming is not uniform and the polar regions are warming significantly faster (3x) than lower latitudes, making permafrost melting a very significant climate tipping point. The last point I’ll mention is not about non-anthropogenic emissions but rather absorption. The world’s oceans have been a significant absorber of CO2 however that process is sensitive to temperature and is less effective as the planet warms, not to mention acidic ocean waters prevent shell formation, which is a minor but meaningful carbon sink all by itself.

I’m of the opinion that direct air capture is the primary escape hatch we have for not hitting 3 or even 4C warming in the next 100-200 years, which mean major dieoffs in warm latitudes, even for humans, due to exceeding wet bulb limits. Oh and roughly 65M of sea level rise as the planet shifts to a snow/ice-free mode.

Re: Global warming has accelerated significantly

#296
post #172
post #147

Nothing will change until developed rich countries are starting to hurt. And I don't think it's going to hurt enough in 10 or 20 years. The pain will come slowly, people won't see it. It's like going back to the middle age so slowly, that the population don't realize or feel it. And honestly, wars and trump are making climate concerns so difficult to think about.

I've been mentally tabulating a list of reasons rich (and/or older) people should care about climate change, even if you're only looking out for your own interests: - Your children and younger family members will have to deal with this - Climate change is causing increasingly worse turbulence for airplanes - It will disproportionately affect your favorite vacation spots - Probably something about stock markets and pe…

Wildfires have to be a big one as well, the time range and geographic range is growing on a seemingly yearly basis.

Related, home insurance cost increases (and, in places, unavailability) from wildfires & worsening storms hits the pocketbook directly.

Re: Global warming has accelerated significantly

#297

This ship has sailed, warming is irreversible. Developing nations mainly in Asia (China, India etc) are, well, developing and burn like there is no tomorrow. But they are not to blame. It is their turn to live nicely, like the US and Europe did for decades. Nobody can remove this right from them.

Ideally us rich countries would help pay for overhauling of infrastructure in developing nations since each $ goes way further to reduce emissions there compared to at home.

Re: Global warming has accelerated significantly

#298

This ship has sailed, warming is irreversible. Developing nations mainly in Asia (China, India etc) are, well, developing and burn like there is no tomorrow. But they are not to blame. It is their turn to live nicely, like the US and Europe did for decades. Nobody can remove this right from them.

> This ship has sailed, warming is irreversible.

Nobody who understands the subject claims that it is reversible on a human life scale. In the realistic best cases, it’d stabilise in a couple of decades and slowly decrease from there.

The real question is not whether it is reversible, but how high it will go and how we are going to deal with it.

Re: Global warming has accelerated significantly

#300
post #162
post #3

For those (like me) who don't know the authors, apparently they are well-published authors in the field of climate science whose work is very highly cited: https://scholar.google.com/scholar?hl=en&as_sdt=0%2C39&q=gra... Not a perfect measure of whether this is a reputable article but at least readers should know this isn't from some randos in a basement somewhere.

It says this in bold red at the top - "This is a preprint; it has not been peer reviewed by a journal." I am not a climate scientist - how should I think about this statement? Normally I am looking for some statement that shows a document has been vetted.

It is already published at Geophysical Research Letters, a highly (if not the most) reputable source in the area. But that journal is behind a paywall: https://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1029/202...
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