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27th May 2010, 06:48 AM | #1 | ||
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Global Warming Discussion
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27th May 2010, 07:01 AM | #2 |
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I don't know if you guys have followed potholer54's channel on youtube, but his series of delightfully devastating and withering videos on climate science and creationism are something to behold. The latest in the series looks at the "scientists" that represent the denialist side in the climate "debate"
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qZzwRwFDXw0 |
27th May 2010, 09:38 AM | #3 |
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I'm aware of realclimate.org, have read a few articles and what not over the last few months.
The response was of course tongue and cheek, a commentary on the nonsense that you can't have a meaningful discussion without hot links. Hoepfully this new thread will promote just such discussions. I don't see how, short of turning to nuclear entirely, how we can reduce CO2 levels without sequestering and GE. Not only that, but if you believe the current models to be accurate, we need to reduce the effects of CO2 now. |
27th May 2010, 10:40 AM | #4 |
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27th May 2010, 07:11 PM | #5 |
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A point-by-point evisceration of the quite-insane "Lord" Monkton by Professor John Abraham, Engineering, St. Thomas University, St. Paul, Minnesota;
http://www.stthomas.edu/engineering/jpabraham/ |
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29th May 2010, 02:53 AM | #6 |
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Has anyone looked into using rock such as peridotite to absorb CO2?
Sorry I can't post links but the article was at Miller-Mccune " A rock that helps out in a hard place" The Earth's mantle is made of ultramafic rock and it protrudes through the crust in a few areas. I often wonder if it could be cost effectively pulverized with a powerful explosive and exposed to the atmosphere, captured CO2, or dumped in the ocean to absorb CO2? It is amazing that rock that absorbs CO2 is so abundant but we can't yet use it to help us. Another article mentioned pumping it into deep formations but I wondered if the surface to the rock would convert some CO2 and then an equilibrium would be reached stopping further absorption. There were many other suggestions like fracturing the formations which I didn't think seemed economically viable. As there are likely problems with altering huge surface areas where local populations may be affected I wonder if there are any areas where peridotite might be easily accessible on some underwater slopes where it could be blasted and pulverized underwater to absorb the CO2? There would be no need to move the rock and the cost would be the drilling of the hole for the explosives and the explosives themselves. This would seem to need to happen in the upper levels of the ocean that have absorbed the CO2. There may be some simple reason this wouldn't work that I am unaware of but IMHO the more ideas we look at hopefully the sooner we may find a solution or combination of solutions. ? |
29th May 2010, 03:49 AM | #7 |
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CO2 solutions
AARGGHH It now occurs to me that huge blasts underwater would kill a lot of marine life and likely damage their senses for many miles.
Now I'm thinking of blasting in underground cavities in the peridotite and circulating the CO2 depleted water back into the ocean. This whimsical idea might work by using directional drilling to drill two holes into a large cavity in a formation in peridotite. One hole would be for seawater to be pumped into the cavity, and the other hole would be an outlet hole back into the shallow ocean. The inlet hole would be deep enough to be in stable water but as shallow as possible for relatively easy access for a pump, or pipe, or whatever is needed to move seawater into the hole.. The outlet hole would need to be drilled in the upper part of the formation and on downslope where it enters the cavity in order to avoid the hole becoming plugged by blasted rock. A third hole would be drilled straight down from above to allow directional drilling of smaller holes for placing the explosives at the top of the cavity. Pumping water through the formation would not need a lot of energy as the water is not being lifted. Rather than trying to fracture the formation using pressure injected from a rig on the surface instead just blast the rock with explosives and let it fall to the bottom of the cavity. The top drill pipe would have to be out of the hole during blasting and a lot of seawater would gush upward but the drilling gear up top could be moved away from the hole. The pump moving the water through the formation would have to be moved out of harms way as well. So blast and shatter a lot of peridotite in the formation and let the rock settle. Use the pump to circulate seawater through the formation and back into the ocean now CO2 depleted. During the periods that the rock is absorbing the CO2 from the seawater and being pumped use directional drilling from above to make the holes for the next round of explosives. Liquid CO2 could also be pumped into the cavity for a certain amount of dwell time for absorption and then pushed out by seawater. I hope these random ideas stimulate some better thoughts on the potential possibilities. It's about cost effectively getting the peridotite and CO2 together. All the best! |
29th May 2010, 08:31 AM | #8 |
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May 29th. It's snowing today. I'm in the northern hemisphere, just north of the 49th parallel.
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29th May 2010, 11:59 AM | #9 |
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http://www.ecoseed.org/en/general-gr...can-absorb-co2
Limestone circulation would also help de-acidify the ocean - that has been touted as a potential in Australia |
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29th May 2010, 01:08 PM | #10 |
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Here's the link to the peridotite infomation
http://www.miller-mccune.com/science...d-place-10909/ "The problem Krevor and other researchers must surmount is that ultramafic rock sequesters CO2 very slowly — over tens of thousands of years. “This process is important on geological time scales in buffering the CO2 concentration of the atmosphere, but on a year-to-year time scale it doesn’t keep up,” he said. “So the question is: Is there a way to speed the process up so that it’s fast enough to counteract the emissions from industrial processes?” In 2003, a group of researchers at the Albany Research Center, a laboratory in Oregon funded by the Department of Energy, attempted to answer that question. They focused on two traditional methods of accelerating chemical reactions in minerals — pulverizing them into tiny particles, and heating them to extreme temperatures. Both methods worked, but there was a problem: They required so much energy to enact that they produced more CO2 than they sequestered." Again the ideas is rather than mining and moving all the rock, pulverize it underground using explosives and circulate seawater through it. A simple schematic is here http://picasaweb.google.com/wave77xx...72366239020194 ? |
29th May 2010, 02:21 PM | #11 |
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The article rather glosses over the fact that to make this rock into an effective CO2 absorber, it needs to be processed. This means we are talking about mining and pulverizing (and possibly chemically treating) an entire mountain range worth of rock. Furthermore, we would then have to store the carbonated minerals somewhere where they would not exposed to even the mild acids prevalent throughout our environment (rain, groundwater, soils, etc.,.) as this triggers the release of the the CO2 from these minerals. So now we are not only talking about mining, processing, exposing, transporting and disposing of a monumental mass of material with no innate or profittable return on invested labor. Its not that such is impossible, merely that it is an expensive and difficult task with little individual benefit to motivate its accomplishment. If you can find a way to make a profit off of the process it might be a more viable option, as it stands, however, and lacking alturistic world governance, it would seem beyond the scope of any single national government, corporation or group movement.
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29th May 2010, 05:47 PM | #12 |
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University of Virginia petition courts to squash Cuccinelli's anti-science witch hunt. Read the full text:
Quote:
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30th May 2010, 08:43 AM | #13 |
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a better approach methinks
This looks very interesting as an approach to sequester carbon at source....
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http://www.sciencedaily.com/images/2...1020-large.jpg
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31st May 2010, 08:35 PM | #14 |
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From my local area.
Late spring runoff could wash out Tahoe rafting revenues By Jason Shueh and Kyle Magin Union News Service and The Union Staff Writer As wet storms continue to buffet the Sierra this week — including snow in the high country — some local water sports companies are salivating. Others, based at higher elevations, are concerned runoff from a heavy snowpack could wash out revenues this year. “This is an extremely late runoff right now, and it looks like this may be latest water runoff peak in 40 years,” said Chad Planchard, chief deputy water master for the Truckee River Operating Agreement organization in Reno. Snowpack levels across the Sierra are at their highest levels in more than five years. <snip> Because of the unseasonably cold temperatures and high snowfall totals, the water flow from the Truckee into Reno hasn't fallen below 500 cubic feet per second, the minimum water level operators require to open reservoirs like Tahoe to flow into the Truckee River, Planchard said. |
31st May 2010, 11:59 PM | #15 |
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I was recently in contact with Eugenia Kalnay, one of the scientists misrepresented on Poptech's (you all remember him, right) list of papers that he claims support "skepticism" of anthropogenic global warming. She was naturally outraged to find her work misrepresented like that, and even more so when she took my advice and googled "700 Peer-Reviewed Papers Supporting Skepticism of "Man-Made" Global Warming Alarm" which is the title of the list. She asked me if I had any suggestions on what to do about this sort of thing. Naturally, I couldn't say, as I just didn't know, but I told her that my personal belief is that the IPCC and climate scientists in general are going to have to become increasingly aware that their work is being misrepresented by "skeptics", and that internet blogs are a major source of public understanding of science.
I'd like to ask people here for suggestions on what climate scientists can do to make sure their message reaches the public so that policy decisions are made on good science and not tarnished by denialist misrepresentation thereof. |
1st June 2010, 06:36 AM | #16 |
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Winnipeg is at 780 feet above sea level. Calgary is 3430 feet above sea level. Yet when I drive from Winnipeg to Calgary, every once in a while I actually drive down a hill!
DSo and brantc, how on Earth can this happen? How is it possible for me to drive down a hill even once when Calgary is 2,650 higher in altitude than Winnipeg? Shouldn't I be driving uphill all the way? |
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1st June 2010, 07:54 AM | #17 |
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That's the perennial question, isn't it? Joe Romm has a post over at CP on this very subject regarding a Newsweek piece. I certainly don't have an answer, except to say that we should stop beating around the bush and fight fire with fire, we need to stop using such measured and calculated language that befits a scientist and start seizing the issue by the throat. I know that scientists risk their scientific reputations by abusing the facts to create an on-point message, but really we need to adopt the same tactics used by the deniers if we're to have a hope of winning the PR war. We understand science better than they do, but they understand PR better than we do. We need to get ruthless imo.
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1st June 2010, 08:39 AM | #18 |
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1st June 2010, 09:53 AM | #19 |
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The only consistent advice I have offered is for these researchers to devote a few hours a week toward exploring and commenting on the science blogs. This doesn't have to be a point-by-point debate battle on the political and psuedoscience blogs, it can just be a few posts discussing and clarifying past and current work, and even just general understandings of the science from their particular field of expertise on a couple of the relevent mainstream science blogs. Good information can be as viral as bad information, there is just a lot more bad information being kicked out there. Starting out at places like RealClimate, SkepticalScience, etc., building up a collection of 3-4 main participatory sites and then participating on them with at least a few posts/responses every week.
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4th June 2010, 09:46 PM | #20 | |||
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Abraham eviscerates Monckton
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5th June 2010, 04:17 PM | #21 |
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Lomborg the liar.
http://scienceblogs.com/deltoid/2010..._deception.php
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This is a special method by Lomborg of telling lies. Give your book all the appearance of being a scholarly tract, with copious foot notes as evidence. However, when you check the footnotes, they often say nothing about what he is using them for, say the opposite of what he is claiming, are just worthless as sources of evidence, or are just poor analysis. This is the same MO from "The Skeptical Environmentalist". It works for him, he is known around the world, respected and influential. It is, however, just a house of cards. |
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5th June 2010, 08:20 PM | #22 |
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6th June 2010, 03:39 AM | #23 |
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The lies work unfortunately. Take Lord Monkton as another glaring example of this same type of slime. I had a person at work tell me the other day that the Academies of Science were controlled by the Democratic party. He must watch Fox News.
And here are the results http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases...0127095932.htm ScienceDaily (Jan. 27, 2010) — Public concern about global warming has dropped sharply since the fall of 2008, according to the results of a national survey released January 27 by researchers at Yale and George Mason universities. Only 50 percent of Americans now say they are "somewhat" or "very worried" about global warming. When I look at the global temperature graph it seems to me that even though 2010 is the hottest year on record we are still at the bottom of the next big leg up in global temperatures. I can't see how shallow coral reefs will survive the next increase in temperature and I believe we may see the Great Barrier Reef succumb to the heat, and there are some places in Hawaii that will definitely die off. Sea surface satellite readings will indicate when this is happening as the 1998 event was well recorded and the heat will likely often surpass the 1998 record in the Pacific. Perhaps we should start recording the people on Fox News etc. and keep them on permanent record for future generations to watch. Perhaps the idea that the younger generation may hold them accountable in the future might sway them enough to start telling the truth. It's amazing to show people the consensus on AGW by all the world's leading Academies of Science and then to hear them dispute the scientists based on what they have heard on Fox News etc., as in the post above. The next leg up in temperature over the next four to five years does not look good and I hope the liars will finally be muzzled. People are so easily manipulated in so many ways. Love the JREF! |
6th June 2010, 02:08 PM | #24 |
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7th June 2010, 12:43 AM | #25 |
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He's referring to the fact that the spring runoff the local weather report he quotes is talking about is the latest for 40 years. This single datum point clearly proves that the world hasn't warmed at all in the last 40 years, in the same way that a single observation of a single wave on a single beach can prove that the tide isn't going out, and that the simple physics which predicts tides based on the position of the moon and sun is completely wrong.
In other news I know a smoker who doesn't have cancer, which disproves the link between smoking and cancer. Also it's colder today than it was two weeks ago, therefore the physics which says that the Northern Hemisphere warms between January and July is also wrong. |
7th June 2010, 09:30 AM | #26 |
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7th June 2010, 07:26 PM | #27 |
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8th June 2010, 10:07 AM | #28 |
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Thank-you, it's a java script issue, try:
http://discover.itsc.uah.edu/amsutemps/ you then need to set the parameters to display a graph of the datasets you are interested in. make sure that you check the current year and near surface data, and then you may select any other years from 1998 through the present for comparison. The point being that his year is on track to be the warmest on record so far, regardless of any temporary regional or area fluctuation. Apologies for the link issue. |
8th June 2010, 08:38 PM | #29 |
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8th June 2010, 09:51 PM | #30 |
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Poisoning the well is not a seemly tactic for a discussion like this, is it?
Where the data comes from is a NASA project, AMSU, where this guy did a lot of the design work. It has nothing to do with his lack of understanding of biology or natural history. The project was extensively reviewed before launch and the data is vetted. And this is not an interpretation of data, but a presentation, so it is doubly disingenuous to impugn bias on the basis of his religious beliefs. One of the most famous neo-Darwinists of our age, the late Stephan Jay Gould, maintained his religious beliefs and asserted that science and religion had no overlap at all. Obviously a crock, but it does not call into question his work in evolutionary biology. |
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8th June 2010, 10:03 PM | #31 |
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10th June 2010, 05:48 PM | #32 |
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Probably not truly relevant to this discussion.
It serves more as a comparison and contrast between the acceptance of Dr. Spencer here, compared to his treatement in this thread. |
10th June 2010, 08:19 PM | #33 |
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10th June 2010, 08:21 PM | #34 |
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10th June 2010, 08:26 PM | #35 |
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It does, but in a very predictable way. The sun is coolest at sunspot minimum, and hottest at sunspot maximum. You can see this in the temperature record. However, this minimum does not seem to be reflected there.
Back to news. If you want to discuss this, the AGW thread is a good place. |
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11th June 2010, 12:24 AM | #36 |
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Wangler, that is because though his data is sound, his interpretation is bollocks.
Very different things. Getting technical details correct is one thing, and he does that here and in a way that couldn't be more peer reviewed. |
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11th June 2010, 05:56 AM | #37 |
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Thanks for the response, Ben. You have maintained this opinion throughout, as far as I can tell, and your opinion makes sense, and is reasonable. There were others who, disturbingly, wouldn't give a haiku written by Spencer a second look, just because he was a professed ID'er. I just don't understand that. |
11th June 2010, 05:58 AM | #38 |
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11th June 2010, 09:16 AM | #39 | |||
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It does... Or at least it did, the very clear correlation between solar variability and temperature diverges in the mid-1970's with solar activity falling while temperatures rise rapidly as CO2 takes over as the dominant forcing.
David Attenborough explains:
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11th June 2010, 10:09 AM | #40 |
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This has nothing to do with an "acceptance of Dr Spencer." This is about a an official university/government data website on which Dr. Spencer is acknowledged as an established figure. If you can demonstrate how his influence has somehow distorted the data or analyses represented on the site due to Dr. Spencer's contributions, please present your evidence.
This isn't a political witch hunt mud-fest where anything and everything associated with someone who holds some different perspectives become fair game in discrediting and dismissing the entirety of their life's work, this is science. Verifiably good data and compellingly supported analysis stand on their own merits regardless of whose names are attached or depicted in association with the presentation of data and analyses. |
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