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Dr. X
Big Wall climber
X- Town
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Apr 12, 2016 - 11:32am PT
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John has the right of it....Al Gore and Bernard Sanders aren't afraid that their houses will go underwater with see level rises.......They are concerned for the "poor folk" that will be displaced.
And they use fear mongering to further their agenda.
Global Warming doesn't hurt the planet. It's been way, way hotter in the past. What it does hurt, is society.......
Pollution is bad for the biosphere we live in.
Habitat conversion leaves no room for the animals we share the planet with (except those like rats, squirrels, possums and trash pandas, who are more than happy riding our suburban coattails...).
And these things are caused simply by.....wait for it.......too many people.
If the sea rose 100 feet....would it bad a bad thing?
Only if your house, your building, your business were below 100'AMSL today.....It would ne a great thing for the ocean, and many thousands of square miles would be newly formed shallow seas (and if you know your marine biology, you would know that shallow seas are the big producers of life in the oceans).
And if every glacier were gone? They're pretty......They help modulate the climate....but they don't support much life.
The planet will survive fine....just people may not.
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monolith
climber
state of being
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Apr 12, 2016 - 12:34pm PT
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To think human's CAUSE climate change, is pretty egotistical.
Yea, how can humans possibly have an impact on climate? Ridiculously egotistical bullsh#t to drive Bernie and Al's agenda and line the pockets of scientists.
Also, Al Gore is fat and the climate is always changing.
Oops, well maybe there is something to this global warming stuff.
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SC seagoat
Trad climber
Santa Cruz, Moab, A sailboat, or some time zone
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Apr 12, 2016 - 12:51pm PT
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Ingi, can't wait to see you and Rudi in a couple days! We'll change some climate!
Susan
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mountain girl
Trad climber
Berkeley, CA
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Topic Author's Reply - Apr 12, 2016 - 01:15pm PT
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Cannot wait to be in the desert seeing you and Mike!
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Ed Hartouni
Trad climber
Livermore, CA
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Apr 13, 2016 - 09:06am PT
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two comments from this thread were in the back of my mind when reading three articles in the NYTimes this morning...
If we stopped using fossil fuel for energy right now, we would consign at least some of the world's poorest and most vulnerable people to starvation.
Eat now or suffer a little (for the rest of our lives) to (possibly) help those living 100 years from now. Hmm?
These comments seem to put the effects of climate change into the distant future... though three articles all have to do with what is happening now,
Climate Change Hits Hard in Zambia, an African Success Story
by NORIMITSU ONISHI describes the situation where persistent draught has conspired to deny Zambia of its hydropower, and the subsequent decline of its economy.
Wildfires, Once Confined to a Season, Burn Earlier and Longer
by MATT RICHTEL and FERNANDA SANTOS seem to confirm the earlier analysis that western wild fires are more extensive, and more frequent (this was actually a debate on the other thread).
and finally
In Wyoming, Hard Times Return as Energy Prices Slump
By JACK HEALY which describes the problems of Wyoming as the economy's energy sector reorganizes, apparently with no planning forthcoming from the USG. As coal starts to look like a longterm loser investment in coal mining operations fails, as the OPEC countries pump more and more oil, the commodity price falls. With the very low prices of these carbon fuels, now would be a very good time to impose a carbon tax. A carbon tax designed to be revenue neutral would be a huge benefit for those very people who will be hit the hardest with the energy sector restructuring.
The effect of climate change is not 100 years in the future, it is happening right now. What will happen then will be much worse if we don't curb the atmospheric carbon emissions.
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donini
Trad climber
Ouray, Colorado
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Apr 13, 2016 - 10:07am PT
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It's hard for to beieve this subject is still being actively discussed on 4/13/16 on a forum with, for the most part, well informed people.
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JEleazarian
Trad climber
Fresno CA
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Apr 13, 2016 - 10:39am PT
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The effect of climate change is not 100 years in the future, it is happening right now. What will happen then will be much worse if we don't curb the atmospheric carbon emissions.
The first quote, mine, has no underlying belief that effects are only happening in the future. It specifically referred to ending all fossil fuel combustion now. With that undertanding, I don't think we disagree.
John
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Laine
Trad climber
Reno, NV
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Apr 13, 2016 - 10:45am PT
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The climate has always been changing and will continue to do so regardless of human activity. Just enjoy life and do what you can to enrich your life and others around you.
And don't worry so much...
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EdwardT
Trad climber
Retired
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Apr 13, 2016 - 11:11am PT
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It's hard for to beieve this subject is still being actively discussed on 4/13/16 on a forum with, for the most part, well informed people.
It's about validation.
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BASE104
Social climber
An Oil Field
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Apr 13, 2016 - 11:16am PT
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Ed,
With the crash in prices, oil and gas drilling has almost halted. Most drilling is taking place at a loss, simply to hold leases. On most leases, you have 3-5 years to drill on the lease. If you don't, the lease expires and you lose zillions of dollars of bonus money.
You also lose control of a vast resource. In some gas plays, there is 90 billion cubic feet of recoverable gas from one square mile. It takes 7 to 8 wells, parallel with each other, to drain the whole section, and each well costs millions to drill. At today's prices, you will not come close to recovering your drilling costs. So nobody is drilling for gas right now. They are still trying to control the reserves in the ground, though, for that day when prices come back.
One thing that we can do right now is switch to methane as a transportation fuel. We already use it to generate electricity and provide heat. It is by far the cleanest fossil fuel, both in emissions and CO2 per ton used.
Look at Iran. Iran sits on several of the largest gas fields on the planet. They are totally stranded, with no market. Since they make most of their money from oil exports, Iran has led the world in converting their vehicle fleet to methane. They use the nigh free methane and save the oil for sales.
GE recently invented a modular natural gas filling station. You just truck it to the gas station and install it. Of course you need to be connected to a natural gas line, but in many areas where gas is used domestically for heating or power generation, the infrastructure exists. We call them "LNG stations in a box." They are very new. A year old or so.
Gas is selling for 1.80 per thousand cubic feet. This is incredibly low. Far lower, in a relative sense, than oil is. From fracking operations, they have found so much gas that it crashed the market.
Methane is of course a potent greenhouse gas, so methane emissions should be kept to a minimum. Currently, companies try to test new wells down the sales line instead of venting or flaring. Fugitive methane emission control is just a simple, and cheap, engineering problem. Until recently, nobody really worried about methane, but that has changed. It is far more potent of a greenhouse gas than CO2. Fortunately it does break down in the atmosphere naturally. You just have to stop the emissions. It is easy to flare.
I've been on a lot of well completions, and if you are venting very much gas, you must flare it or risk an explosion. Flaring is easy. You run a flow line to a flare stack and burn it. This produces CO2, but prevents methane emissions.
Also, methane in the atmosphere is unstable. It breaks down in sunlight and is gone in a decade or so, but if you keep venting, the levels will remain high. We are now seeing a shift, where production companies limit methane emissions, for PR reasons more than anything. Most oil execs don't buy global warming, but they do listen to stockholders.
It is different in the geoscience divisions. Even in oil and gas companies, most geoscientists that I've met agree with the science of climate change. Scientists are less swayed by politics and economics. However, it costs very little to control fugitive methane, and we are going to see it fall.
That doesn't stop methane emissions from melting permafrost, where methane hydrates are common. This is unrelated to oil and gas activities. It is a different problem. One caused by the warming itself.
Anyway, we should switch to natural gas as a bridge fuel until alternatives are ready, which they are not. You may drive an electric car, but when you charge it, chances are that the electricity is coming from a coal fired power plant. Power companies just love coal. Oil and gas folks hate it.
Anyway, we've discovered trillions of cubic feet of natural gas, and the prices are where it was in the 80's. It is super cheap.
If you can tell me of a cleaner way to change our vehicle fleet, I'm all ears. Here are the sources of methane. Anthropogenic methane is only a part of it, and cow farts actually are a big deal. Ruminants emit more methane than the oil and gas industry:
Mass (Tg/a)
Type (%/a)
Total (%/a)
Natural Emissions
Wetlands (incl. Rice agriculture) 225 83 37
Termites 20 7 3
Ocean 15 6 3
Hydrates 10 4 2
Natural Total 270 100 45
Anthropogenic Emissions
Energy 110 33 18
Landfills 40 12 7
Ruminants (Livestock) 115 35 19
Waste treatment 25 8 4
Biomass burning 40 12 7
Anthropogenic Total 330 100 55
Sinks
Soils -30 -5 -5
Tropospheric OH -510 -88 -85
Stratospheric loss -40 -7 -7
Sink Total -580 -100 -97
Emissions + Sinks
Imbalance (trend) +20 ~2.78 Tg/(nmol/mol) +7.19 (nmol/mol)/a
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BASE104
Social climber
An Oil Field
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Apr 13, 2016 - 11:24am PT
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It's hard for to beieve this subject is still being actively discussed on 4/13/16 on a forum with, for the most part, well informed people.
You are wrong, Jim, to a great degree. Conservatives almost all discount the science. It falls down political lines.
While the science is very consistent, human response is not. We even talk a big talk about climate change, but we do nothing about it.
The tea party types make me ill. They are just like a cult.
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Splater
climber
Grey Matter
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Apr 13, 2016 - 11:25am PT
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There is ZERO chance of ending all use of fossil fuel in the short term so that point is a strawman.
Improvements to national and global energy policy are fitful. Reductions in GHGs will be gradual.
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Craig Fry
Trad climber
So Cal.
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Apr 13, 2016 - 11:33am PT
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Senate Dems Blame Koch Brothers For Killing Clean Energy Tax Credits
Legislators say Koch-affiliated groups pressured Republicans on the issue.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/koch-brothers-clean-energy_us_570d6755e4b03d8b7b9eabc1?utm_hp_ref=politics
04/12/2016
WASHINGTON — Tax credits for clean energy sources won’t hitch a ride on legislation reauthorizing the Federal Aviation Administration in the Senate, and Democrats say conservative mega-donors Charles and David Koch are to blame.
Legislators agreed to an extension of tax credits for geothermal, small wind, fuel cells, and combined heat and power in the large omnibus spending deal passed last year, but the provisions were left out due to a “drafting error.” The understanding between both parties was that the credits would need to be included in another must-pass bill in the new year. The aviation bill provided an opening to settle the score, but on Tuesday, party leaders said negotiations to include the tax credits crumbled.
Yes
it is a cult
a cult of denial in facts that the moneyed interests want these people deny, they are dupes to their cult leaders
vvvvv
Not the art of the possible, we all know it's possible but won't get done, like so many other political issues
the art of denial
the art of keeping the big money happy
the art of obstruction to do the simplest things about the problem
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JEleazarian
Trad climber
Fresno CA
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Apr 13, 2016 - 11:34am PT
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^^^^^^^^
I agree that the point is a strawman, Splater. I made the statement (as part of a larger post) to show why no one goes there. My larger point was that the problem has a time dimension both for cost and benefit. I see an awful lot about what we need to do, but too little discussion about what we should do when, who is affected by actions and inactions, and what we should now to ameliorate those effects.
BASE104, I don't think "conservatives are anti science" describes the real issue with conservatives. A few may deny the science, but all see the economics. The left has too many that deny the economics. We need both disciplines, together with political science, to determine the best course of action: science to tell us the terms of trade (i.e. what actions lead to what results), economics to tell us the marginal cost and benefits, and political science to tell us what can actually happen.
Despite the use of "politican" as a pejorative in some (i.e. Trumpian) circles, politics remains the art of the possible. A solution that people will not implement is, by definition, no solution.
John
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BASE104
Social climber
An Oil Field
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Apr 13, 2016 - 11:52am PT
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Here is how methane breaks down in the atmosphere. It only has a life of about a decade. So why is it going up? I listed the sources above.
Oil and gas activities contribute to less than 5% of all methane emissions:
From wiki
Reaction with the hydroxyl radical- The major removal mechanism of methane from the atmosphere involves radical chemistry; it reacts with the hydroxyl radical (·OH) in the troposphere or stratosphere to create the CH·3 radical and water vapor. In addition to being the largest known sink for atmospheric methane, this reaction is one of the most important sources of water vapor in the upper atmosphere.
CH
4 + ·OH → ·CH
3 + H
2O
This reaction in the troposphere gives a methane lifetime of 9.6 years. Two more minor sinks are soil sinks (160 year lifetime) and stratospheric loss by reaction with ·OH, ·Cl and ·O1D in the stratosphere (120 year lifetime), giving a net lifetime of 8.4 years.[9] Oxidation of methane is the main source of water vapor in the upper stratosphere (beginning at pressure levels around 10 kPa).
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eeyonkee
Trad climber
Golden, CO
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Apr 13, 2016 - 11:55am PT
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I gotta say, I agree with Dr. X on maybe 90% of his statements. I've thought this for a long time - Earth abides. Climate change is not going to hurt the planet. The planet is pretty much beyond being hurt by the likes of us. It is going to GREATLY disrupt civilization, however.
I'm not quite sure what he is getting at with his politics. "Fear-mongering" is not what I would say politicians on the left are doing. The science is clear, we ARE accelerating the flux of greenhouse gases into the atmosphere, which is accelerating planetary warming. The planet is warming at a rate, for sure, over and above what it would be before the Industrial Revolution. Sure, it would be warming anyway because we are coming out of an ice age. So what? The short-term threat to civilization IS the issue and rate of change matters a lot.
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BASE104
Social climber
An Oil Field
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Apr 13, 2016 - 12:00pm PT
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The Koch brothers are truly evil people.
They don't drill for oil and gas. They purchase oil from wells and then refine it and make all sorts of products.
Their politics goes back to their daddy. They have a twisted version of libertarianism. I'm a libertarian, and from the way they control things, as well as outright theft by their company, I have zero respect for them. This attitude is common around here. They aren't liked, even by those who agree with their politics.
They have a bad rep in the oil business, and that takes something. They are dirty businessmen, who will rob you a nickle at a time.
You should hear what they did to the Osage nation wells. They were caught stealing a few barrels per load when they went out to a well and bought the crude from the tank battery. There was a secret investigation, and they got caught. The only reason they got caught is because the Osage control all of their minerals to this day. They are quite sophisticated.
No telling how often they were doing this to smaller companies.
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tuolumne_tradster
Trad climber
Leading Edge of North American Plate
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Apr 13, 2016 - 10:15pm PT
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Center for International Environmental Law's website has posted a series of documents dating back to the mid-1940s ...about how the world’s most powerful industry used science, communications, and consumer psychology to shape the public debate over climate change. And it begins earlier—decades earlier—than anyone suspected.
Explore our documents and discover what they knew, when they knew it, and how they collaborated to confuse the public, promote scientific theories that contradicted their own best information, and block action on the most important challenge of our time.
Smoke And Fumes: An Introduction to the Deep History of Oil and Climate Change
https://www.smokeandfumes.org/#/
https://vimeo.com/162411486
Here's a summary of a 1968 SRI report warning about the risks of CO2 accumulation in the atmosphere from fossil fuel burning that would lead to increasing global temperatures, including a prediction that the CO2 levels could reach 400 ppm by the year 2000.
Sources, abundance, and fate of atmospheric pollutants.
1968 E. Robinson, & R.C. Robbins
In 1968, Stanford Research Institute (SRI) scientists Elmer Robinson and R.C. Robbins produced a Final Report to the American Petroleum Institute (API) on SRI’s research in the sources, abundance, and fate of gaseous pollutants in the atmosphere. They reserved their starkest warnings to industry leaders for carbon dioxide. Robinson observed that, among the pollutants reviewed, carbon dioxide “is the only air pollutant which has been proven to be global importance to man's environment on the basis of a long period of scientific investigation." Summarizing the findings of the President’s Science Advisory Council, Robinson noted that CO2 emissions from fossil fuels were outstripping the natural CO2 removal processes that keep the atmosphere in equilibrium. He noted that the speed of CO2 accumulation would depend on fossil fuel consumption and projected that, on then-present trends, atmospheric CO2 could reach 400ppm by 2000, and that exploiting all then-recoverable fossil fuel would lead to concentrations of 830ppm. The report warned that rising CO2 would result in increases in temperature at the earth's surface, and that significant temperature increase could lead to melting ice caps, rising seas, and potentially serious environmental damage worldwide. It noted that, even if Antarctic ice caps took 1000 years to melt, this would mean sea level rises of four feet per ten years—"100 times greater than observed changes." Importantly, SRI acknowledged that of the various sources proposed for rising atmospheric CO2, "none seems to fit the presently observed situation as well as the fossil fuel emanation theory." Noting uncertainties about whether particulate pollution would offset some of this warming, SRI warned "…there seems to be no doubt that the potential damage to our environment could be severe…” The industry's own consulting scientists then confirmed that the most urgent research need was into technologies that could bring CO2 emissions under control.
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pud
climber
Sportbikeville & Yucca brevifolia
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Apr 14, 2016 - 07:08am PT
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All the quasi-scientists here with their cut and paste acumen are less than convincing in their efforts.
The climate change paranoia is just that.
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Spider Savage
Mountain climber
The shaggy fringe of Los Angeles
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Apr 14, 2016 - 07:25am PT
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So you better start swimming or sink like a stone.
Too late now baby.
Humans need to get humble and get real on waste management and waste production.
In the grand scheme of things Earth could fart and humanity would be gone. Nothing left but a thin black line in the sediments.
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