Skepticism about Climate Change

[Alan Klein]

The point I was making is that the wealth and prosperity of people in general depends on the availability and cost of resources, particularly energy supplies, and the uses to which we put those resources..

Spending, say, 50 million dollars on a magnificent mansion on a large-acreage property with a private golf course, just so one can occasionally spend a few days there each year, or invite a few friends to play golf now and again, does provide a certain amount of work to build the place and maintain the garden and house, but not nearly as much work and/or as much benefit to the community as a farm or factory or mine on the same amount of property.

The same applies to the poor man who spends $600 on an iPhone. He'd be better off if he were to spend just $200 on a less sophisticated  phone and the other $400 on building  garden beds, buying some horse manure, and growing his own fruit and vegetables, assuming he has a garden of course.

It's not quite true that it's none of our business what others do with their money. It's illegal to literally burn it, for example. It's also illegal to exchange it for prohibited goods.

Ray, I think you should stick to CO2.  You know more about that then economics and human psychology. 

[Alan Klein]

By whom?

AI, robots, extraterrestrials, or...other humans, pure and clean of any bad behavior, liberated from greed and having no self-interest? Organized into communist cells and led by a central committee and a dear leader?

+1

It makes one think of all the well meaning leaders who wanted to purify their people like Mao, Pol Pot, Stalin, Castro, etc.

[Alan Klein]

How does solar and wind compete cost wise with fossil fuel use when you have expansion of oil production like this?

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-05-03/oil-resumes-decline-as-u-s-crude-production-expands-11th-week

[Ray]

Ray, I think you should stick to CO2.  You know more about that then economics and human psychology.

So says the person who comes from a country which has a total national debt of nearly 20 trillion dollars. 

As of March 1, 2017, the official debt of the United States government is $19.9 trillion ($19,920,418,771,289). This amounts to:

(1) $61,365 for every person living in the U.S.

(2) $158,326 for every household in the U.S.

(3) 106% of the U.S. gross domestic product.

(4) 560% of annual federal revenues.

Jesus!!

[LesPalenik]

In a new BBC documentary called "Stephen Hawking: Expedition New Earth" set to air later this year, the professor will "present his predictions that the human race only has 100 years before we need to colonize another planet," a press release from earlier this week said.

"With climate change, overdue asteroid strikes, epidemics and population growth, our own planet is increasingly precarious."

Previously, Hawking theorized that humanity probably has around 1,000 years left before it becomes extinct. His timeline appears now to have shortened. The famous physicist has issued a number of warnings about the future over the past few years.

[Otto Phocus]

I hope he is right.  The sooner our failed species can become extinct, the sooner the earth can start the long process of repairing itself.

Until humans can learn to integrate responsibility with the ecosystem of our own planet, we have no place traveling to another planet and trashing that one.
Since I have low expectations that we could ever do that, perhaps it is best that we stay on this planet and reap what we sow.

[kers]

So says the person who comes from a country which has a total national debt of nearly 20 trillion dollars.  ...

and it will increase a lot due to lower tax, higher military spending, building infrastructure, building fences, reform of the public health system that just have changed ...
Another trumpromise lost.

coming back on topic; If the US will not change its focus from oil/coal to renewable energy its technology will be behind in a few years and needs to import it- just what Trump does not want to do.

[Ray]

coming back on topic; If the US will not change its focus from oil/coal to renewable energy its technology will be behind in a few years and needs to import it- just what Trump does not want to do.

Not necessarily. Electricity from coal and gas is stable and available 24 hours a day. One reason electric cars have not developed as fast as they should have, is because they would increase demand on coal generated power which still releases CO2, even though the real pollutants which affect human health have been virtually eliminated with the latest technology.

If one is travelling a long distance in an electric vehicle, and one needs to recharge the battery along the way, the normal petrol stations could provide recharging facilities, but they would need a stable and cheap supply of electricity which solar and wind power cannot provide.

Batteries have been developed which can be recharged, at least partially, in a very short time if sufficient power is available. Perhaps no longer than it takes to have a snack and a cup of coffee.

"A very powerful terminal can charge an electrical battery to 80% in a half hour.
This time could be further reduced in the coming years: the manufacturer Tesla is currently developing an electrical terminal capable of fully charging a battery in a matter of minutes. The electrical power needed is enormous: 600 kilowatts, equivalent to the connecting power of 70 houses!"

[Alan Klein]

So says the person who comes from a country which has a total national debt of nearly 20 trillion dollars. 

As of March 1, 2017, the official debt of the United States government is $19.9 trillion ($19,920,418,771,289). This amounts to:

(1) $61,365 for every person living in the U.S.

(2) $158,326 for every household in the U.S.

(3) 106% of the U.S. gross domestic product.

(4) 560% of annual federal revenues.

Jesus!!

Ray, you don't have to convince me America spends too much.  I've been telling my wife she better start saving so she will be able to pay back all that money she owes. 

[Alan Goldhammer]

I've been telling my wife she better start saving so she will be able to pay back all that money she owes. 

We have always had separate checking and credit card accounts.  It give each of us a piece of mind!!!!

Alan

[Alan Klein]

We have always had separate checking and credit card accounts.  It give each of us a piece of mind!!!!

Alan

So do we.  But my wife is always telling me to charge it on mine!

[Farmer]

Other than when travelling for emergency use (in case of loss of the primary) we don't use credit cards but rather only debit cards linked to accounts that we determine the balance of.  It's OK if you pay off a credit card fully each month, but it's a far better idea to ensure you have the cash already before spending it than waiting (as many - maybe even most? - people do) for the next pay to come in to cover what was spent the previous month.

Debt for large capital expenditure (buying property, for example, or a motor vehicle for business use where you get tax rebates and the like) makes sense or for other one-off large costs that you determine are necessary.  Similarly for governments, debt is fine to get infrastructure and the like in place, but as for people it would be far better if governments did not rely on debt for the general cost of normal operations because there's limited (if any) return on such things.

Of course, debt is just too easy to get, particularly for governments, and people demand they spend on things and so they do, at a much inflated cost in the end because of borrowing.  It's the same mentality the demands that capital markets provide ever increasing rates of return and become a play ground for short term speculation instead of long term capital funding with reasonable long term returns.  Almost no one takes the longer view, making them blind to the true cost because they simply expect someone else to have to pay it back.

[Ray]

Of course, the problem is that Economics is a soft science as is Climatology; therefore predictions are often not sound and reliable. The complexities are too great for certainty.

This is my main objection to the AGW mantra. On one side, one could argue that the benefits of the resulting development of alternative and clean sources of renewable energy must be of everlasting benefit to mankind, considering the fact that fossil fuel resources will eventually become scarce and very expensive, and considering the fact that many countries will try to save money by using cheap and obsolete fossil-fuel-power stations which cause health problems due to emissions of noxious gases (of which CO2 is not one).

On the other side, we have the very reasonable argument that real pollution is the problem, whether plastic bags in the oceans, toxic chemicals in the rivers, or noxious chemicals in the atmosphere, such as particulate carbon, SO2, CO, various nitrogen oxides and traces of heavy metals.

If we tackle the real pollution through advanced emission controls, and this turns out to be more expensive than replacing energy sources with renewables such as solar and wind, then of course I would be in complete support of the renewables.

I'm all in favour of research into clean renewables, but such research should be supported by clean fossil fuel sources. They should be used in tandem.
Describing CO2 as a pollutant similar to strychnine, has a very negative effect on our economic progress, because it might exclude the use of reliable, relatively clean, and cheap sources of energy which are needed in the process of a transition to renewables, and are needed to reduce poverty in the world and build infrastructure to protect ourselves from natural extreme weather events.

Also, because of the uncertainties of the soft science of climatology, we don't know whether or not increased CO2 levels could protect us from a future cooling effect, within the next hundred years or so, assuming it is true that elevated levels of CO2 have a warming effect, which I don't seriously doubt. What I doubt is the degree of the warming effect, which cannot be precisely determined because of the soft nature of the science.

[Bart_van_der_Wolf]

Of course, the problem is that Economics is a soft science as is Climatology; therefore predictions are often not sound and reliable. The complexities are too great for certainty.

Ray, you can repeat that utter nonsense, but it remains nonsense. Instead, predictions are reliable (if you care to understand them), because it's basic physics, and of course, nothing is 100% certain, duh.

Describing CO2 as a pollutant similar to strychnine, ...

Warning, it was you who suggested that the low concentration of CO2 in our atmosphere made it a negligible factor. Let me remind you that without that small concentration of CO2 (in combination with water-vapor and Methane), our Earth temperature would be more like our moon's. When sunlight hits the moon's surface, the temperature can reach 253 degrees F (123 C). The "dark side of the moon" can have temperatures dipping to minus 243 F (minus 153 C).

A lot of the confusion comes from the lack of understanding of the positive feedback aspect of CO2, and the continuing man-made addition of more CO2 to the natural cyclic, thus disrupting the balance that eventually would occur.

Also, because of the uncertainties of the soft science of climatology, we don't know whether or not increased CO2 levels could protect us from a future cooling effect, within the next hundred years or so, assuming it is true that elevated levels of CO2 have a warming effect, which I don't seriously doubt. What I doubt is the degree of the warming effect, which cannot be precisely determined because of the soft nature of the science.

So you're saying, that because we cannot predict temperature rise to within a tenth of a degree Celsius with a 100% confidence level it becomes unactionable?

That's not 'doubt', that's bordering on denial. And you try to sugarcoat that by saying that Climatology is a 'soft' science and cannot be predicted accurately enough to draw conclusions. Well, surprise, it isn't 'soft', and it does allow to draw conclusions within reasonable confidence levels. Climatology is a study of climate, and it involves multiple exact sciences to understand the complex balance between the driving physical/chemical mechanisms.

Human activity can change the temperature predictions by changing our emissions. And by not acting now, we will need more drastic/costly corrections as time slips through our hands.

Cheers,
Bart

[Alan Goldhammer]

Other than when travelling for emergency use (in case of loss of the primary) we don't use credit cards but rather only debit cards linked to accounts that we determine the balance of.  It's OK if you pay off a credit card fully each month, but it's a far better idea to ensure you have the cash already before spending it than waiting (as many - maybe even most? - people do) for the next pay to come in to cover what was spent the previous month.

For most on line payments, I use PayPal as much as possible as it's more secure than using a credit card.  When I cannot use that, I have a dedicated credit card for on line use.  The reason for this is simple.  I've had 3-4 instances of credit card number theft over the past several years and it's an inconvenience to wait for the new card to arrive, particularly if travel is scheduled.  I don't know how much credit card scamming goes on in Australia but it's pretty rampant here in the US.  You never know when someone has hacked a gas station pump or free standing ATM.  I'm also pretty compulsive about expenditures and everything is recorded in Excel so that I have a full cash flow analysis of where money goes (increasingly to Amazon these days ).

[Ray]

Let me remind you that without that small concentration of CO2 (in combination with water-vapor and Methane), our Earth temperature would be more like our moon's. When sunlight hits the moon's surface, the temperature can reach 253 degrees F (123 C). The "dark side of the moon" can have temperatures dipping to minus 243 F (minus 153 C).

Let me remind you, Bart, that water vapour alone represents about 80-85% of the greenhouse effect which prevents our planet becoming like the moon.

Here is what the IPCC say about the effects of water vapour.

"Modelling the vertical structure of water vapour is subject to greater uncertainty since the humidity profile is governed by a variety of processes. The CMIP3 models exhibited a significant dry bias of up to 25% in the boundary layer and a significant moist bias in the free troposphere of up to 100% (John and Soden, 2007).

Upper tropospheric water vapour varied by a factor of three across the multi-model ensemble (Su et al., 2006). Many models have large biases in lower stratospheric water vapour (Gettelman et al., 2010), which could have implications for surface temperature change (Solomon et al., 2010).

Most climate model simulations show a larger warming in the tropical troposphere than is found in observational data sets (e.g., McKitrick et al., 2010; Santer et al., 2013).

Because of large variability and relatively short data records, confidence in stratospheric H2O vapour trends is low."

A lot of the confusion comes from the lack of understanding of the positive feedback aspect of CO2, and the continuing man-made addition of more CO2 to the natural cyclic, thus disrupting the balance that eventually would occur.

No more confusion than comes from the lack of understanding of the negative feedback aspect of CO2. For example, if CO2 increases cause some degree of warming, more evapouration of water takes place. This has an initial cooling effect at the surface as the evapouration takes place, then an additional warming effect due to the increased concentration of water vapour higher in the atmosphere, then an additional cooling effect as clouds form which reflect the direct radiation from the sun (known as the albedo effect), then the release of heat as the water vapour condenses into rain, then the transfer of such heat through convection into the upper atmosphere where it can escape from the earth's surface.

I'm very surprised that you don't seem to understand the distinction between 'hard' science and 'soft' science, Bart.

An example of 'hard' science is the analysis of camera performance in terms of dynamic range and SNR, by DXOMark, They can test as many cameras of the same model as they want, note the slight variation in performance according to the quality control of the camera manufacturing process, and provide very accurate results within a specified margin of error.

Such results can be confirmed, in terms of comparisons of different models, by any competent photographer. That's 'hard' science, which is easy. 'Soft' science by comparison, is ridiculously hard, and results are continually proved to be wrong or at best inaccurate.

[Alan Klein]

For most on line payments, I use PayPal as much as possible as it's more secure than using a credit card.  When I cannot use that, I have a dedicated credit card for on line use.  The reason for this is simple.  I've had 3-4 instances of credit card number theft over the past several years and it's an inconvenience to wait for the new card to arrive, particularly if travel is scheduled.  I don't know how much credit card scamming goes on in Australia but it's pretty rampant here in the US.  You never know when someone has hacked a gas station pump or free standing ATM.  I'm also pretty compulsive about expenditures and everything is recorded in Excel so that I have a full cash flow analysis of where money goes (increasingly to Amazon these days ).

I have alerts set on my checking and charge cards so I get immediate text notifications when withdrawals or charges or deposits are made.

PayPal seems like an added step since exposure using a credit card is limited to $50.  Also, my credit cards add another one year to typical one year warranties for cameras,  electronic equipment,  etc. That's worth a lot as its like free extended warranties.

[Bart_van_der_Wolf]

Let me remind you, Bart, that water vapour alone represents about 80-85% of the greenhouse effect which prevents our planet becoming like the moon.

You still do not (want to) understand it, do you?

Water vapor absorbs different wavelengths than Carbon Dioxide, as was already explained in this video. Adding CO2 will increase the absorption of surface reflected heat in addition to what water-vapor already does. Additionally, more CO2 in the atmosphere causes yet more water vapor in the atmosphere. If the net effect (reflecting incoming solar radiation but also trapping heat emission) of cloud albedo was causing cooling, we wouldn't see rising global temperatures, would we?

Your cherry picking from reports about water vapor only demonstrates the lack of understanding of the combination, at best (it could also be the result of deliberately misleading argumentation, AKA trolling).

You have demonstrated time and again only wanting to see one effect of a CO2 aspect at a time when that suits your agenda. That's why I've occasionally had to show the more complete picture, and the balance of the complete picture is not a pretty picture.

As for hard facts (little science required, just instrumentation):
http://forum.luminous-landscape.com/index.php?topic=117058.msg972584

Cheers,
Bart

[Alan Klein]

If all the Paris accords were implemented:
1. When would we see an effect on the climate?
2.  When would it stop warming?  How many degrees?
3. How much would the world have to pay per year to complete the Paris accords?
4. Would the sea level stop rising?  When?

Please, no links.  No one wants to read through long reports.  Just provide the answers simply. 

[Bart_van_der_Wolf]

If all the Paris accords were implemented:
1. When would we see an effect on the climate?
2.  When would it stop warming?  How many degrees?
3. How much would the world have to pay per year to complete the Paris accords?
4. Would the sea level stop rising?  When?

Please, no links.  No one wants to read through long reports.  Just provide the answers simply.

The simple answer (to the meaning of life, the universe, and everything) is: 42.




The more elaborate short answer, simple enough for even folks like Trump to understand (I hope, although there's a difference between understanding and acting in accordance with that 'knowledge'):
1. The moment we change, the effect will change. It may take a while to be measurable because these are slowdowns in an acceleration at first, and it depends on how much of a change is introduced into the system and how fast.

2. It will reduce warming immediately, hopefully to a level that Mother Earth can find somewhat of an equilibrium again. Even with the Paris agreements, the warming will not stop, but the aim is:
"Holding the increase in the global average temperature to well below 2 °C above pre-industrial levels and to pursue efforts to limit the temperature increase to 1.5 °C above pre-industrial levels, recognizing that this would significantly reduce the risks and impacts of climate change"
Skeptics (realists?) say that that goal is optimistic, and will not be reached by the current actions taken (2.5-3 °C may be more likely).

Without action, it will keep accelerating for quite a while.

3. The pledges and other associated costs are specified in the agreement to which you do not want a link.
However, make no mistake that not acting will cost more. And it will be harder and more costly when action is postponed.

4. When the temperature drops (not slows down increasing, but going down), the expansion of the water mass is reduced and thus the water volume is also reduced. It may take a while (50-100 years for the climate to reach a new equilibrium) for the atmospheric climate effects on water level to lead to a reduction.

Just to give you an idea of cost due to only waterlevel rise (we're not even calculating the much higher cost of droughts, food shortages, mass migration, war, etc.):
http://floods.wri.org/#/country/240/United%20States

And again, the longer we wait, the higher the cost.

Cheers,
Bart