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Indonesia's palm oil fires emitted more greenhouse gases in a day than the U.S.

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Re: Indonesia's palm oil fires emitted more greenhouse gases in a day than the U.S.

#51

Post by mikeash »

karl_gluck wrote: post #30
Afforess wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, it would be terrible if we did all that work to improve the atmosphere for nothing. http://i.imgur.com/kUCPeBo.jpg

Come on, that's incredibly disingenuous. Of course it's not terrible to improve the atmosphere. But you're making it sound like all methods are equivalent; when there are limited resources to address the problem, they need to be allocated accordingly. It's a similar situation to water in California -- yes, everyone should cut down on consumption. But the single-family mega-mansions using as much as 90 normal residenc…

How is it 200x more effective to reduce the emissions of Indonesia and Malaysia by 5%? These fires exceeded the emissions of the US for 26 days and otherwise the US far outweighs these countries when it comes to emissions. If the choice is 5% of ours or 5% of theirs, surely 5% of ours produces a far greater effect.

Re: Indonesia's palm oil fires emitted more greenhouse gases in a day than the U.S.

#52

Post by sliverstorm »

thrownaway2424 wrote: post #22
dymk wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sort of. It would be nice if we could sequester the carbon already in the air in trees. The benefit is two fold: More trees, and removal of carbon that is already in the air from burning fossil fuels.

You cannot just infinitely accumulate trees. In a steady state, forests neither sequester nor release carbon.

No, but you can still increase the amount of sequestered carbon by expanding forestland, as forest is a carbon sink. We can control atmospheric carbon by reducing emissions, but we can also control it by sequestering more carbon, which more forestland can help do.

Re: Indonesia's palm oil fires emitted more greenhouse gases in a day than the U.S.

#53

Post by nathangrant »

siilats wrote: post #14

The article title is misleading though. It was for 1 day that they emitted more. So overall about 1% of us emissions if you average for the year or 100 times less.

"On 26 days from the period of Sept. 1 to Oct. 14, their daily emissions surpassed those of the entire US"

It seems they claim 26 days not 1, but you are correct the initial assumption readers will come to is that every day they exceed US emissions.

Re: Indonesia's palm oil fires emitted more greenhouse gases in a day than the U.S.

#54

Post by mikeash »

planfaster wrote: post #38
Afforess wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, it would be terrible if we did all that work to improve the atmosphere for nothing. http://i.imgur.com/kUCPeBo.jpg

Cartoons use a myriad of figures of speech in order to build a setup-punchline structure that is actually funny. One of the tricks of the trade is to use logical fallacies, as they are mechanisms for hiding premises or faulty logic, which is ideal to build assumptions in the viewer's mind that are then shattered by the punchline. The figure of speech employed here is a fallacy called Begging the Question. When the ch…

We already saw what happens when the government doesn't take control and lets industry do what they will. The result is massive pollution, widespread health problems, and global climate change.

And in fact we already saw what happens when government does take control. The result is vastly improved pollution, and without wrecking the economy.

Re: Indonesia's palm oil fires emitted more greenhouse gases in a day than the U.S.

#56

Post by planfaster »

Avalaxy wrote: post #9
gsibble wrote: post #2

This is why I don't buy into cap and trade and other expensive systems for the US to reduce its emissions. Compared to emerging economies, our emissions are already dramatically lower. It's the 2nd and 3rd world that needs to get in line (China most of all).

The fact that other people are messing up doesn't mean that you should as well. Everyone should take responsibility for their own actions.

The Tragedy of the Commons illustrates precisely the opposite: that if other people are messing up a common good (the world, or the atmosphere, in this case), that means you should mess up as well, or you lose (in every sense: productivity, sustainability, etc).

Re: Indonesia's palm oil fires emitted more greenhouse gases in a day than the U.S.

#57

Post by mcherm »

mikeash wrote: post #37
siilats wrote: post #14

The article title is misleading though. It was for 1 day that they emitted more. So overall about 1% of us emissions if you average for the year or 100 times less.

How is it misleading? The title seems to be saying exactly that. Or was it edited?

Original Article Title: Indonesia’s palm oil fires are emitting more greenhouse gases every day than the entire US

More Accurate Title: Indonesia’s palm oil fires are emitting more greenhouse gases on some days than the entire US

Re: Indonesia's palm oil fires emitted more greenhouse gases in a day than the U.S.

#58

Post by swagswag »

noobermin wrote: post #3

My SO is in Singapore, and she complains almost everyday about the smog. While we in the US and other 1st worlders could do much to stem our pollution especially given our ability, the fight against climate change has to be a global fight, and not just the acts of a few willing nations.

trudat brotha

Re: Indonesia's palm oil fires emitted more greenhouse gases in a day than the U.S.

#59

Post by masklinn »

krisroadruck wrote: post #12

Burning trees doesn't actually change the atmospheric balance at all. Every tree releases its carbon, either by being burned or when it dies by rotting. It's effectively a non-trapped part of the atmospheres circulatory system. Remember trees breath the stuff in and eventually they exhale. The problems only crop up when you extract trapped hydrocarbons from underground and burn those. Oil and Coal bad, Tree's not so…

> Burning trees doesn't actually change the atmospheric balance at all. Every tree releases its carbon, either by being burned or when it dies by rotting.

In the normal lifecycle of a forest, there is a continuous low-level carbon release from trees rotting (or small fires) which is cycled back in the forest by new trees growing up in their placed. A mature forest is a carbon store, if the forest is stable it takes in as much carbon as it produces out.

You burn the forest, all the locked carbon gets released in the atmosphere with no recapture.

And that's not even considering that indonesian forests sit on peat, which are non-cycling long-term carbon stores.

> The problems only crop up when you extract trapped hydrocarbons from underground and burn those. Oil and Coal bad, Tree's not so much.

All that oil and coal originally came from the environment, it's the exact same result.

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