Man Based Global Warming....

[TimBikes]

Originally Posted by Alric

The primary driver of global temperature is of course the sun. This is what drives the seasons. The point is whether CO2 can contribute to warming and that is clearly the case.

OK - so we agree. The sun is the primary driver. There are of course other important drivers, some quantified, some not.

CO2 is a bit player. If it weren't, you would see it overcome other climate drivers during periods such as 1940-1980. During that period CO2 increased dramatically, yet temperatures declined. Why? And why did temperatures increase from 1910 to 1940 despite negligible increases in CO2?

Q: Isn't it the case that during the entire span of nearly 110 years from 1900 to 2008, the only time temperatures rose in alignment with significant increases in CO2 was from roughly 1980 to the late 1990s?

A: Yes.

Q: How does a CO2 based climate model explain these discrepancies?

A: It does not.

[Alric]

It just doesn't work like that Tim. You can not pick a couple of points you like in a graph and argue that there is no link. It is a complex system. You have to look at a couple of millennia to be able to discern the clear trend.

A blip here and there is immaterial and expected.

CO2 is a bit player but it only takes a bit of change to drastically affect climate patterns and human civilization.

[darelldd]

Originally Posted by PriuStorm

Not to argue with you, darrell, but until either you or your wife are gone, the net result has been an increase in population.

No worries. I'm reasonably good at math as well. I'm pretty sure that I stated that our net reduction will happen only after we're gone??

Interestingly enough, my daughter is eight years old. Almost all of our food is grown within a 50 mile radius of our home - unlike 10 years ago. We all eat almost no red meat - unlike 10 years ago. Our houshold energy consumption is far less than it was 10 years ago. Our transportation energy consumption is far less than it was 10 years ago. We have smaller cars than we had 10 years ago. One of them is electric and gets its energy from the sun. The other is a Prius and is rarely driven. We do, however, have two more bicycles in the garage. Adding one more child to the mix is not always a horrible thing. Not when she admonishes ME for wasting resources! She just LOVES catching me. But I digress...

[JSH]

Originally Posted by darelldd

Interestingly enough, my daughter is eight years old. Almost all of our food is grown within a 50 mile radius of our home - unlike 10 years ago. We all eat almost no red meat - unlike 10 years ago. Our houshold energy consumption is far less than it was 10 years ago. Our transportation energy consumption is far less than it was 10 years ago. We have smaller cars than we had 10 years ago. One of them is electric and gets its energy from the sun. The other is a Prius and is rarely driven. We do, however, have two more bicycles in the garage. Adding one more child to the mix is not always a horrible thing. Not when she admonishes ME for wasting resources! She just LOVES catching me. But I digress...

Adding one more child isn't the end of the world. If you only have one child that will lead to a net reduction in population as the replacement rate is 2.1 children. However, it would have been better to adopt an existing child. There are more than 100,000 children in foster care in the US alone. The only type of child that is difficult to adopt in the US is a white infant.

You seem to have made quite a few very positive changes over the last 10 years. I envy your RAV4.

I've made similar changes. We purchased our current house due to close proximity to my wife's job and south orientation for solar gain. We have added insulation, sealed leaks, and added a programable thermostat. The thermostat is set at 65F in the winter, dropping to 60 at night, and 79F in the summer. We have the heat pump off for 6 months out of the year. Every light in our house is fluorescent though we don't use this as an excuse to leave them on. It is not unusual for our house to be lit by (2) 13 watt bulbs.

We buy our produce from the local farmer's market when it is open. We garden and are still using vegetables we grew the past summer. Red meat doesn't enter our house and we eat vegetarian 2-3 nights a week.

On the transportation front we traded our truck for the Jetta TDI wagon back in 2002 and added an used Prius in 2006. We now combine trips and walk to the local grocery store, restaurants, and gym.

On Policy Issues:

• I think that all power plants and factories in the US should be required to update to current pollution controls.
• The think super insulated homes with solar hot water heating should be set as the minimum in building codes.
• I applaud the current measures by CARB and the EPA to address particulate and NOx emission from diesel vehicles. I wish I could retrofit a DPF to my TDI but can't. I'm upset as the very slow pace that these pollution controls will be implemented in the heavy duty markets. There is no reason to implement these regulations over the next 20 years, 5 would be perfectly acceptable.
• I think that Obamas pledge to spend billions of dollars on highways and bridges is misguided. We should be spending those dollars on public transportation in cities and rail for city to city. There is not reason to spend billions rebuilding the past when we could be building the future.
• I don't think the new CAFE standards go far enough. We should expect more and focus on EV's not hybrids. The technology is available, we should implement it.
• To me the fact that we have 3% of the world's oil reserves and consume 25% of the world supply is reason enough to kick the habit. We should cut back on US pumping to save that oil for future use and feedstocks for products and chemicals.
• I support combining the CAFE regulations for cars and light trucks. If trucks are used as passenger cars they should meet the same requirements. If they are to be classified separately as commercial vehicles they should require a CDL to operate.
• I think we need a minimum price for gasoline and diesel. $4.00 per gallon is about right for now and we should increase the gasoline tax $0.10 per year.

These are but a few of my thoughts. It's funny, people that know me think I'm the environmental nutjob, but here I seem to be the voice of the status quo.


It is amazing the venom that comes out when you publicly say that you don't believe that man-made CO2 is the main driver for climate change. I believe that the climate is changing and that CO2 has an effect though it is no where near the main driver. I still believe that it is arrogant to claim that we know with almost certainty that CO2 released by man going to set off a chain reaction of climate change will destroy the world unless we change in 10 to 15 years. I'm not ready to make that leap based on computer models, 150 years incomplete data and 30 years of detailed data.

I've never said that we should do nothing or that we should stop researching. However, we should take action based on sound data. We have plenty of reasons to move forward based without the specter of climate change.

[TimBikes]

Originally Posted by Alric

It just doesn't work like that Tim. You can not pick a couple of points you like in a graph and argue that there is no link. It is a complex system. You have to look at a couple of millennia to be able to discern the clear trend.

And yet we hear from the global warming crowd that the 20th century experienced a 0.8 C temperature increase due to CO2? You can't have it both ways.

Regardless, if CO2 is indeed a significant climate driver, you would expect to see some indication in recent temperature trends. So could CO2 have contributed to the roughly 0.6 C temperature increase from 1980-1998? Certainly. But it appears that nature alone, without help from man, is capable of a similar 0.6 C temperature rise, as documented from 1910 - 1940 when CO2 levels were negligible.

I guess we will once again have to agree to disagree.

[FL_Prius_Driver]

Originally Posted by jhinton

It is amazing the venom that comes out when you publicly say that you don't believe that man-made CO2 is the main driver for climate change. I believe that the climate is changing and that CO2 has an effect though it is no where near the main driver. I still believe that it is arrogant to claim that we know with almost certainty that CO2 released by man going to set off a chain reaction of climate change will destroy the world unless we change in 10 to 15 years. I'm not ready to make that leap based on computer models, 150 years incomplete data and 30 years of detailed data.

I've never said that we should do nothing or that we should stop researching. However, we should take action based on sound data. We have plenty of reasons to move forward based without the specter of climate change.

Many of the responses you have been getting are because most here recognize you are very much a thinking poster. When you state something that does not mesh with your previous post "gesalt", it is quite attention getting and is worth figuring out why. To me, your last justification of arrogant is quite acceptable. The initial ones had quite a different "gesalt" to them, similar to some talk radio hosts.

I actually follow the global warming related science articles in Science and have been for some time. A very significant number of them have results that do not mesh with a dramatic AGW scenario. (Example, the permafrost in Canada is not melting as fast as some predictions.) On the other hand, a significant number changes underway that are worthy of understanding (Example, effects of CO2 driven pH changes on worldwide coral health). Good research can only be understood by examining the results with no bias and ensuring that a premature "belief" does not take root based on politics or political leanings....at either extreme. There is too little data to predict the end of natural climate age, but there are effects other than just climate at issue here.

Yet without waiting for a verdict on AGW, I still know the difference between right and wrong....and it seems that most everyone else does too.

[JSH]

Originally Posted by icarus

Get out of your NorthAmerican centric world view and go to China, go to India. See what is really happening. We have the benefit of 30 years of at least having SOME environmental regulations that at least allow people in LA or Chicago or Denver to breath much of the year, and yet there are still people who think that unleaded gas, catalytic converters, etc is just stupid.

When you accuse me of a North American centric world view it shows you know nothing about me. I have been out in the world. I'm 30 years old and have been to 16 countries in the last 5 years. From 2004 to 2007 I spent 2-3 months a year traveling internationally.

On my latest trip abroad my wife and I spent the first 2 weeks of October traveling through Slovenia, Bosnia, and Croatia. It is amazing and life changing to see the effects of war first hand even if that war was 10 years ago. It opens your eyes when you see skull and crossbone signs that signify that both sides of the road are still mined. It is sickening to see a Christian town completely rebuilt while the adjoining Muslim town is abandoned, destroyed, and still mined. It is even more sickening to see a monument to the citizens of that town that were massacred by their neighbors because they were muslim. I have been in the world, though I have a lot more to see and much more to learn.

As to pollution controls in developing countries. These have nothing to do with climate change and CO2. The effects of industrial pollution are well documented. I would love to see developing countries adapt western levels of pollution control. They could benefit from our mistakes instead of repeating them and learning through their own tragedy. However, as an American I can't force the Chinese government to adopt these standards. All I can do is try my best not to purchase goods made in their factories.

[icarus]

If , as reported, the Chinese are building one coal fired power plant per WEEK, and you don't think that has an effect on climate,,,,,

Icarus

[JSH]

Originally Posted by icarus

If , as reported, the Chinese are building one coal fired power plant per WEEK, and you don't think that has an effect on climate,,,,,

Icarus

I'm concerned about their conventional pollution controls; particulates, NOx, mercury, etc. Hopefully these are state of the art coal-fired plants with modern pollution controls. I'd also be concerned with what they are doing with the fly ash. The recent TVA spill in Tennessee shows how poorly the US deals with our waste.

I'd also prefer that the Chinese citizen cooked and heated their homes with energy from a coal-fired plant. Currently large segments of the population cook and heat on individual coal burning stoves.

I'm not one to tell developing countries that they aren't allowed western standards of living. Until we cut pack our consumption we have no business telling others what to do. Who is being "North American centric" now?

[icarus]

Originally Posted by jhinton

I'm concerned about their conventional pollution controls; particulates, NOx, mercury, etc. Hopefully these are state of the art coal-fired plants with modern pollution controls. I'd also be concerned with what they are doing with the fly ash. The recent TVA spill in Tennessee shows how poorly the US deals with our waste.

I'd also prefer that the Chinese citizen cooked and heated their homes with energy from a coal-fired plant. Currently large segments of the population cook and heat on individual coal burning stoves.

I'm not one to tell developing countries that they aren't allowed western standards of living. Until we cut pack our consumption we have no business telling others what to do. Who is being "North American centric" now?

I absolutely agree that we have no business telling other people what to do until we get our own house in order. Having said that I am surprised that you don't think that C02 emissions are a problem, as you seem to have a better grasp of the issues than most.

I have spent the bulk of my adult life preaching about the need to change our ways when it comes to consumption. We live pretty green, generate some our our power with solar PV, heat our water with solar etc. We consume very little, but I freely admit that I'm not perfect, but we do pretty well. The fact that here in N. America we consume far more than our share of the earth's resources is not only unsustainable, it is by it's nature, bad for the environment.

I agree with you , that it would be much better if the average Chinese could cook/heat etc from a clean(er) grid rather than individual stoves, but the real work needs to be for all of us to not only consume less, (especially in the west) but also focus like a laser on technologies that will produce energy and products in a sustainable way.

As you rightly imply, we have been living too high on the hog for too many decades. The world cannot sustain our level of consumption of both energy and material. I read a stat once that off all the things we buy in a calendar year, less than 1% is still in use 1 year later! How dumb is that,,, not to mention wasteful.

Icarus