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HighClassSwankyTime posted:
Ok, I think we need to reiterate for posterity that not everything is some kind of super relative 'both parties are guilty' type equivalency fallacy. Scientists don't go to work monitoring chemical compositions of peat bogs and sit in Antarctic monitoring stations for months at a time because they just want to get 'gravy train' (that's the term you used, right?) handouts from the government. There is no equivalency between the aims of business trying to deep six science using creative measures that play on the general populace's ignorance of the scientific method and what these researchers do. I think we've had a pretty decent conversation about this subject so far, lets not muddy it with poo poo arguments like the above.
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Dec 15, 2011 20:07
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I also feel like the disturbing results that studies are coming up with have gone way past the point they would be at if all of these groups were looking to make money with sensationalism. I mean, what they're saying is already bad enough that most people can't accept it as a real risk just because of how scary it is. If anything, I would expect exaggerations and misinformation applied to short-term risks that are more easily accepted by normal people, as an effort to provoke action that would slow down the more serious long-term risks.
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Dec 15, 2011 20:42
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Deleuzionist posted:It's actually a good question: what is the viability of planting a trillion trees? Did Dyson do anything but calculate the amount of trees needed to reduce carbon in the atmosphere? Does he have any idea where they should be put, with what resources, what they should use for nourishment, and what other impacts on the environment would they have? Probably not. I'm not sure about a trillion, but as far as I know reforestation is literally the only practical way to sequester carbon today. Unfortunately forests are being destroyed faster than they are being replaced, and the necessities of agriculture make completely replacing everything we're losing pretty much impossible. It's often overlooked that deforestation is the second leading source of human carbon emissions after fossil fuels. There's actually so much carbon sequestered in the Amazon that if too much of it gets bulldozed it'll set off one more of those nasty feedback loops similar to release of the methane clathrates.
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Dec 15, 2011 21:34
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TyroneGoldstein posted:Ok, I think we need to reiterate for posterity that not everything is some kind of super relative 'both parties are guilty' type equivalency fallacy. The argument is poo poo because it comes from a vested interest in the first place. It's a false equivalency to try and play up the "balanced debate" to journalists who'll then muddy the waters on your behalf. Governments usually have a buck each way, it's nothing like the kind of R&D spending that's actually needed to open new markets up. Industry would just prefer there to be no dissenting voices.
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Dec 16, 2011 02:30
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So, since this topic has already slid into the inevitable "But Space!!" discussion, I need to say something: Any technology that could be used to sustainably support human life in space could be used to sustainably support human life on Earth much, much easier. As in profitably so. There's no point to escaping to space to survive It's an escapist discussion that ignores the far more depressing and important work at hand: fixing our home before 80% of our species dies of starvation and thirst. *sorry.
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Dec 16, 2011 03:24
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I don't really think those are mutually exclusive endeavors. In any case an active space industry would be a massive boon to keeping Earth stable and raising the standards of living for pretty much everyone.
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Dec 16, 2011 03:30
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Agreed, they are not mutually exclusive at all. The problem is people in climate change threads seem to inevitably say "Earth is doomed, let's hit the road", instead of "Hey, here's a great opportunity to not only help ourselves, further our technology, and save Earth, but also to lay the foundation for space habitation." Saving Earth should come first. If the means to saving ourselves can save Earth, but we chose to focus only on saving ourselves, then how can we believe we are worth saving. getting a bit heavy handed on my part, but you see my point. Besides, if we're so irrational we can create sustainable space habitation but not bother to save Earth, we won't survive space habitation anyways because we'll be too irrational to not murder each other over minor political differences. It really goes back to fixing ourselves. And also the atmosphere and ocean. Basically all three of those things could do with a tune up.
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Dec 16, 2011 04:21
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Cinnamon Bastard posted:Besides, if we're so irrational we can create sustainable space habitation but not bother to save Earth, we won't survive space habitation anyways because we'll be too irrational to not murder each other over minor political differences. It really goes back to fixing ourselves. And also the atmosphere and ocean. Basically all three of those things could do with a tune up. *Tries to fix a malfunctioning jet engine in midflight*   "Past Tense" - Star Trek Deep Space 9 (Season 3, Episode 11) It's on netflix and you know the internet 
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Dec 16, 2011 04:37
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Fatkraken posted:I would say very low. There are only less than half a trillion trees in the world right now, which cover about 1/3 of the land surface. Essentially we would have to cover nearly 100% of the land with trees, including the land which is currently not suited to tree growth like deserts and Antarctica. You could probably get this down quite a bit by going for super dense plantings, plantations tend to have a lot more trees per hectare than natural forests, but even so it's a lot of land for trees and not much left for food.
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Dec 16, 2011 08:38
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Mr Chips posted:Logistical issues aside, trees in drought/heat stress can become net carbon emitters - this has already been observed in forested areas of mountain ranges on the eastern seaboard of Australia.
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Dec 16, 2011 08:45
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Trees need the same fresh water we want to drink, and the world ain't getting more flush with water without salt in it. In catchment areas, there's a balance between density of forest and net water into the catchment, I believe. That is to say, a trillion trees to stop carbon buildup in the atmosphere would be great, but then we might be even more short of water on land than we are now.
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Dec 16, 2011 12:14
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Narxysus posted:Trees need the same fresh water we want to drink, and the world ain't getting more flush with water without salt in it. In catchment areas, there's a balance between density of forest and net water into the catchment, I believe. Evapotranspiration returns water to the atmosphere in pretty short order, trees don't suck up and permenantly sequester water, they return it to the air where it can fall again as rain. The biggest river in the world has as it's catchment the biggest tropical forest in the world. Trees also play vital roles in stabilizing soils. REMOVING trees causes desertification and water shortages far more effectively than planting them. Reforestation is in fact one of the main ways of rehabilitating degraded land in arid regions.
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Dec 16, 2011 12:28
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Strudel Man posted:Surely that's only in the sense of emitting previously-absorbed carbon, though? Considered over the lifetime of the plant, a tree grown from seed can only be a net carbon sink, unless I've gotten some of the chemistry here badly wrong. Fatkraken posted:Evapotranspiration returns water to the atmosphere in pretty short order, trees don't suck up and permenantly sequester water, they return it to the air where it can fall again as rain. Mr Chips fucked around with this message at 13:40 on Dec 16, 2011 |
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Dec 16, 2011 13:35
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Fatkraken posted:Evapotranspiration returns water to the atmosphere in pretty short order, trees don't suck up and permenantly sequester water, they return it to the air where it can fall again as rain. The biggest river in the world has as it's catchment the biggest tropical forest in the world. Trees also play vital roles in stabilizing soils. You are right, but in the process of evapotranspiring, they hold water for a time. A trillion trees worth of water becomes locked up in the trees, even if you call it a flow. They are vital for the creation of rain, but they lock up some of the stock of fresh water. I guess I'm saying they're lifeforms, we'd have to share.
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Dec 16, 2011 14:26
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Narxysus posted:You are right, but in the process of evapotranspiring, they hold water for a time. A trillion trees worth of water becomes locked up in the trees, even if you call it a flow. They are vital for the creation of rain, but they lock up some of the stock of fresh water. I guess I'm saying they're lifeforms, we'd have to share. Would that affect the freshwater flux though? I don't know enough about the quantitative water cycle, but water is constantly moving from the sea to the land (via evaporation and precipitation) and back to the sea (via surface runoff and percolation) with a certain amount being locked up as groundwater, in ice and in organisms. If you fill up all the aquifers (ie, there is more fresh water in storage) once they're full it doesn't mean the amount available for use is smaller. During the filling up phase yeah there will be a bit less runoff, but once they are saturated the total amount of freshwater in the world is greater. There isn't a set tonnage of fresh water that can possibly exist in the world where if you lock up portions of that tonnage there is less available for use for all time, because freshwater is constantly being "generated" from seawater. It's the balance between evaporation, precipitation, sequestration and runoff that's important EDIT: to cut through all that crap, the important question is this: do trees substantially reduce usable surface runoff/percolation and aquifer regeneration? When talking about water for human use, that is what matters, all the fresh water we use comes from groundwater or rivers. In addition to this, remember that some forms of surface runoff are harmful contributing to soil erosion or flooding after storm events, do trees mitigate these harms? http://www.fao.org/news/story/en/item/53391/icode/ says yes, trees are a net boon to watersheds, most watersheds providing high quality water for drinking, agriculture and industry are forested. In general forests are agreed to be GOOD for water supplies Fatkraken fucked around with this message at 14:43 on Dec 16, 2011 |
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Dec 16, 2011 14:33
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I cede the point, I suppose in my mind I was primarily thinking about dams and their surrounds. For another topic - what we can do personally, I'm making a point to start on my own personal adaptation strategy by growing food. Extreme weather aside, I'd imagine that in the coming years there's going to be a lot of flux in the normal seasonal weather. For example, in Perth we're experiencing the wettest December in a long while. I am planning to plant in anticipation of abnormal weather later that might lend itself to a late crop. It's going to be important to be able to recognise new weather patterns and grow food accordingly. Injoduprelo fucked around with this message at 14:58 on Dec 16, 2011 |
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Dec 16, 2011 14:50
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I think it's a good idea to always work with a knowledgeable organization when attempting reforestation. You're not going to plant a trillion trees all at once. Sometimes the trees are grown to restore degraded land and replenish soils with nutrients, to be used in sustainable timber lands, to provide additional food by growing healthily maintained fruit trees, and to provide nitrogen-fixing trees. There are also ways to grow certain trees within rows of crops to promote better water-retention or irrigation. Personally I think Eco-Libris and Rainforest Alliance may be the best orgs to support.
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Dec 16, 2011 19:00
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Kilted Canuck posted:The problem is, as Dyer has mentioned, it is likely that it will be a last ditch effort of the first victims of major climatic shifts. It only takes some relatively basic technology to put particles high enough in the atmosphere to affect a 1-2 degree cooling. That's the problem: it is actually so easy to do that the decision to do it won't be after global discussions, it will be as a knee-jerk reaction to immediate crisis. I agree completely. That's why I mentioned some sort of geo-engineering accord and the need to do it soon while we still have relative global goodwill. It seems impossible now since we can't even get an emissions agreement either, but something has to be worked out otherwise some country will use some form of geo-engineering to lower the temperature and it probably will cause a war. As Dyer argues, geo-engineering isn't a permanent solution, it's just something to let us cheat since we will not get our emissions down before we go above 2 degrees average global temperature. Even if we cut our emissions right down this very instant there's no telling how much current C02 emissions will affect the climate in 20 years.
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Dec 16, 2011 19:03
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What are some things we can start doing right now to prevent the situation from getting any worse? Are we already sitting on a ticking time bomb that will end our existence a few decades from now regardless of what we do? How do we save the environment while maintaining technological civilization?
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Dec 17, 2011 01:15
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DerDestroyer posted:What are some things we can start doing right now to prevent the situation from getting any worse? Are we already sitting on a ticking time bomb that will end our existence a few decades from now regardless of what we do? Generally with things that start with the word "crash" and end with either "program" or "and burn". Lots of Gen IV nuclear power plants (probably in a "commission a nuke, decommission a coal plant" kind of game"), solar panels everywhere practical, electrification of transport, reforstation programs, building regulations (everything from insulation requirements to painting the roofs white) and a long hard look at agricultural practices. Hell, I'd also do a huge ramp up of our foreign aid budget that would consist solely of green electric and thermal power generation projects. Hell, if I could have a magic wand, I'd have started that 30 years ago, so we'd have some hard data on how much intermittent power generation (wind and solar) can be safely integrated into an electric grid. Also, free condoms for everyone. As an individual... you can not have children. Maybe adopt if you want to be a father/mother.
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Dec 17, 2011 04:14
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So in some bizarre political alignment, the Republicans might have just killed the Keystone Pipeline http://news.firedoglake.com/2011/12/16/republicans-demand-to-kill-the-keystone-xl-pipeline/ quote:The provision would force the Administration to decide on a permit for the pipeline within 60 days, and that the permit would automatically be granted otherwise. The President could decide that the pipeline production “would not serve the national interest,” and deny the permit. Politico goes on to claim that this decision would be “fraught with political risks in the thick of an election year.”
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Dec 17, 2011 04:25
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Claverjoe posted:Generally with things that start with the word "crash" and end with either "program" or "and burn". If we stopped all emissions tomorrow it may actually make things worse. We need someway to get the carbon out of the atmosphere that is already in there, in conjunction with moving to non-fossil fuels. Sorting out the ocean at the same time would help as well. Also bribe/pay/buy whoever you need to to stop deforestation in the amazon. I'm gonna go play 'Fate of the World' again now
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Dec 17, 2011 05:15
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theblackw0lf posted:So in some bizarre political alignment, the Republicans might have just killed the Keystone Pipeline
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Dec 17, 2011 05:24
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Pretty sure this wasn't posted. George stated it pretty well. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eScDfYzMEEw
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Dec 17, 2011 06:46
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DerDestroyer posted:What are some things we can start doing right now to prevent the situation from getting any worse? Are we already sitting on a ticking time bomb that will end our existence a few decades from now regardless of what we do? Hoping for some well-timed volcanic activity in the next couple decades couldn't hurt...
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Dec 17, 2011 08:59
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Honestly I think its time we admit that nothing will be done to stop climate change, and we need to start learning how to deal with it. We need to armor our crops against extremes of weather and temperature, armor our coasts against hurricanes, and armor our society against the coming period of increased scarcity. Also we need to face the facts that cutting the amount of sunlight reaching the earth by even 1 or 2 percent would do immense damage to crops and biospheres in marginal areas that depend on getting as much light as possible. Enveloping our planet in mirrors and aerosols is the dumbest loving thing we could do.
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Dec 17, 2011 12:26
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thesurlyspringKAA posted:We need to armor our crops against extremes of weather and temperature, quote:armor our coasts against hurricanes, This will not get done because while there is money in it for those who do it, those who would be paying will not have the means at the time it can no longer be ignored. quote:and armor our society against the coming period of increased scarcity. If humanity in general and the US in particular were capable of doing this, we would not be in this mess. quote:Also we need to face the facts that cutting the amount of sunlight reaching the earth by even 1 or 2 percent would do immense damage to crops and biospheres in marginal areas that depend on getting as much light as possible. Enveloping our planet in mirrors and aerosols is the dumbest loving thing we could do. Once we've killed all the phytoplankton, there'll be plenty of areas you can get away with shading.
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Dec 17, 2011 12:58
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So is Jared Diamond right?
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Dec 17, 2011 14:55
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eh4 posted:So is Jared Diamond right? The future is unwritten! But if we're not careful, quite possibly.
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Dec 17, 2011 15:01
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Alctel posted:If we stopped all emissions tomorrow it may actually make things worse. We need someway to get the carbon out of the atmosphere that is already in there, in conjunction with moving to non-fossil fuels. Sorting out the ocean at the same time would help as well. Yeah, I'm going to have to ask for something to help back up the bolded part. I'm a bit skeptical and more than a little curious as to why that is the case.
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Dec 17, 2011 17:08
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eh4 posted:So is Jared Diamond right? Does this mean we westerners are not as smart as we thought we were?
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Dec 17, 2011 18:02
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Claverjoe posted:Yeah, I'm going to have to ask for something to help back up the bolded part. I'm a bit skeptical and more than a little curious as to why that is the case. It's not set in stone (which is why I said 'may') but there is a fair bit of evidence that a fortunate side effect of pumping a lot of pollutants into the atmosphere is that it causes a lot more clouds to form, reflecting a lot of sunlight back up. If we suddenly stopped all emissions, all the carbon that was previously released is still going to be floating around in the atmosphere trapping the gas, but there will be less cloud cover to reflect sunlight, thereby heating up the earth quicker. So even though we need to reduce emissions heavily, we also need to figure out a way to get rid of a bunch of the stuff that's already up there as well. In theory anyway.
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Dec 17, 2011 19:15
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Are you talking about particulate matter or is their some other pollutant reducing warming?
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Dec 18, 2011 01:24
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eh4 posted:So is Jared Diamond right? I think it's fair to say that his view of the world is more accurate than most. Is he "right"? About what?
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Dec 18, 2011 01:32
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MickeyFinn posted:Does this mean we westerners are not as smart as we thought we were? That's the premise of Guns Germs and Steel IIRC, that people in successful western countries were the beneficiaries of a number of geographical and historical coincidences and strokes of good luck.
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Dec 18, 2011 01:38
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I often find a certain strain of thought in these Dnd climate threads, a strange and misanthropic conception of mankind. Its purveys look at the social worker, the psychologist, and the politician, and with an air of total exasperation ask "Do you seriously believe you can change him? How have you not realized yet that man is dead and frozen forever as he is now, as cold and enduring as the rocks beneath your feet? That perhaps he is even less animate than those rocks, as they at least have the hope of one day being inhabited by the spirit of science, or engineering, or art. These spirits lend a warm vitality to those rocks, a glimmer of geodesy, soaring architecture, and awe inspiring art. Oh you wretched fools! You waste your time on the dead, there is time only for those rocks that live! Where does this idea come from? How does one become so cynical that it looks easier to fight the sea than to change our behavior? Have they never seen an example of a society that changed?
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Dec 18, 2011 02:21
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ALSO I can only communicate in questions, apparently. Im just really frustrated when people say oh you want to change people well sorry that's impossible let's just drat the entire coast against a rising sea it's really the most practical solution you see!
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Dec 18, 2011 02:30
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Squalid posted:Im just really frustrated when people say oh you want to change people well sorry that's impossible let's just drat the entire coast against a rising sea it's really the most practical solution you see! Who exactly is saying this?
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Dec 18, 2011 02:42
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Change is impossible barring a total reevaluation of the way world society prioritises. How likely is world revolution looking to you these days? We're hosed. We can try to stave off the inevitable, but we're pretty much hosed. Not as hosed as the Bangladeshis, of course, or the millions of millions of people who're going to die or be displaced as a result of this bullshit, but we're still hosed. The especially twisted part is that we're all going to have blood on our hands afterwards - we're all directly contributing to the problem by our absurd overconsumption, and so we're all guilty by the logic of western liberal democracy. I seriously hope I'm wrong, but there you have it. Let's fight, but let's not delude ourselves into hope.
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Dec 18, 2011 02:55
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Change is inevitable, not impossible. The reason people are pessimistic about that change is because the data is quite bleak.quote:Where does this idea come from? How does one become so cynical that it looks easier to fight the sea than to change our behavior? Have they never seen an example of a society that changed? Can I ask you what changes you think we should make in our behaviors to fix the current situation we're in? a lovely poster fucked around with this message at 03:09 on Dec 18, 2011 |
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Dec 18, 2011 03:06
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