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Chiloe
Trad climber
Lee, NH
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Dec 10, 2009 - 11:30am PT
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I say the albedo change is overwhelming and reject the proposed linkage to the rise in CO2 for the accelerated snow pack melting.
You got new data and calculations to show why you're certain it's all due to black carbon, with no contribution from other shifts in temperature, winds, precipitation or seasonality? Good for you if you do, write that up, send it off to a journal, find out what the folks who know most about snow and carbon think of your evidence.
Black carbon certainly is a hot research topic these days; I haven't seen anyone disagree that it contributes substantially to observed snow and ice melting in some places, including the Arctic. At the Arctic Observing Network meetings last week, it came up often in discussions and proposals. A lot of the focus has been trying to quantify the relative contributions of carbon and albedo changes, compared with other forcings. Some of that Arctic Ocean ice is melting top-down, where carbon can clearly play a role. Some of the melt occurs bottom-up, however, due to warmer waters, which have other drivers. Also, some of the ice attrition reflects air pressure changes creating winds that bring in warmer air and water, and also push ice around -- even out through Fram Strait.
Then there's the Greenland ice sheet, which experiences some top-down melting related to black carbon, but also some from other forces including winds transporting heat from the no longer ice-covered seas to the north. I was sitting next to a guy recently back from the field, taking measurements near the Jakobshavn outlet. What's that like? It sounds awesome, watching a gigaton of ice pushed into the sea every week or so. Recent articles (regarding Greenland and West Antarctica) have looked particularly at the role of outlet conditions as a control on the rate of flow upstream.
But Antarctica is a whole 'nother story. Anyway, lots of people are looking and thinking hard about black carbon these days, along with the many other things that are changing. I don't think you'll find any scientists (unlike bloggers) claiming this huge suite of changes reflects just one process.
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Roger Breedlove
climber
Cleveland Heights, Ohio
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Dec 10, 2009 - 11:48am PT
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So are you saying that if we could cause black carbon to mutant through some process to albino carbon, the world would be saved? Would that have to be spontaneous, ala Dan Brown, or do we have enough time for a Dawinian process?
Maybe I missed something.
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dirtbag
climber
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Dec 10, 2009 - 12:07pm PT
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Some thoughts for my skeptical friends by Thomas Friedman. It's not really an argument about science.
When I see a problem that has even a 1 percent probability of occurring and is “irreversible” and potentially “catastrophic,” I buy insurance. That is what taking climate change seriously is all about.
and
If we prepare for climate change by building a clean-power economy, but climate change turns out to be a hoax, what would be the result? Well, during a transition period, we would have higher energy prices. But gradually we would be driving battery-powered electric cars and powering more and more of our homes and factories with wind, solar, nuclear and second-generation biofuels. We would be much less dependent on oil dictators who have drawn a bull’s-eye on our backs; our trade deficit would improve; the dollar would strengthen; and the air we breathe would be cleaner. In short, as a country, we would be stronger, more innovative and more energy independent.
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/12/09/opinion/09friedman.html?_r=1&adxnnl=1&adxnnlx=1260464414-kC/ToUV3uX1elcTsi09Cmw
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Mason
Trad climber
Yay Area
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Dec 10, 2009 - 12:09pm PT
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Ed - can you post a direct link, I'm not spotting this post of Roger's.
I do have to say that even if I read this post, which I will, I'm not here to argue a case.
Debating with you guys about this stuff, while it might be fun and opinions might sway one way or another, is not really going to make a difference.
The governments of the world are going to do what they want to do.
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Roger Breedlove
climber
Cleveland Heights, Ohio
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Dec 10, 2009 - 01:04pm PT
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Mason, this is what I posted upthread:
Thanks Ed, for the links. I have downloaded and copied a few hundred pages of reports, which I will read. I think that everyone who has posted or read along should read the summary report for the IPCC fourth report (2007) and the The Copenhagen Analysis just published to update the science since the IPCC report. In this debate, I don’t think anyone should have an opinion one way or the other unless they are willing to put in that effort.
These two reports cover the establishment science. It is all in pretty much layman terms. If you hear skeptics raise issues, many of which are valid, they have to be evaluated in light of all the underlying work that has been going on and reported since 1993 (formation of the IPCC).
I don't agree with your assessment that understanding the arguments about global warming doesn't matter. This is not an academic debate nor is it religious. It is not like evolution where we as individuals the only vote we get is how our children turn out or religion where we can have private views and let the world go to hell, or bolting on rappel on the South Face of Half Dome. Climate change is all for one and one for all. The timeline for global climate change is out 90 years for the current debate. You will probably live that long. More importantly, our Senators will have to ratify any agreement that is reached with the rest of the world--The Copenhagen meetings are going on right now. I seriously doubt that either party has a real handle on how to balance the costs and benefits of doing our part in the world—we are one of the highest emitters of CO2 on both a relative scale and in absolute terms, but no politician can stay in office by urging any voter to support any sensible plans to reduce C02.
There are a large proportion of Americans (and politicians) who are confusing the uncertainty of the science--the range of estimated outcomes--with fraud and conspiracy. Most don’t have access to trusted folks like Ed and others on ST to dig up reasonable stuff. That said, since it is all for one and one for all, everyone is obligated to sort it out. Just as you should exercise your right to vote to support our right to have a say, you should be able to sort out the drift of argument and counterargument in the climate change debate.
Here are the basics: the science has overwhelmingly reached the conclusion that C02 and its equivalents from human sources is causing an increase in global warming. The estimates for the temperature rise by 2100 is 1.1 to 6.4 degrees C. There are fringe elements that don’t believe the science, but the real issue is that the range is uncertain. There is a general view that anything less than 2 degrees is livable and anything above is increasingly risky, but it is hard to pin down the risk. The idea posted above about buying insurance sums up the issue in not having to face the prospect of 2+ degree warming. There is a real debate about how much to pay for the insurance versus living with the consequences--the same issue you face when buy any sort of insurance. The reason it is so real is that while the economics and the rates of change and effects of warming are sliding around, there are likely tipping points beyond which efforts to make corrections are not possible. The fact that it sounds like fear mongering doesn't make it any less probably (or improbable).
So I would say that whether or not you take the time to understand the issues, the range of uncertainty, and the potential solutions, you will vote both for politicians with particular points of view and in the way you live your life; it is just a matter doing so based on an informed judgment.
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Roger Breedlove
climber
Cleveland Heights, Ohio
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Dec 10, 2009 - 01:09pm PT
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Egads! My jokes have to be explained by Ed?
Did you guys see Steven Chu's statement that painting roofs white and using concete colored road surfaces would be the equivalent of removing all cars from the enviroment for 11 years? Time to invest in TiO2 feed stocks.
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corniss chopper
Mountain climber
san jose, ca
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Dec 10, 2009 - 01:27pm PT
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Careful what you wish for because you could get it
Mountain communities in the Sierra's likely target for this ban.
EPA to regulate CO2: Wood burning in home fireplaces may be banned!
A Fireplace Ban Realistic? - Associated Content .
Non-gas fireplaces banned in new homes - Care2 News Network
Wood-burning Fireplaces May Be Banned in California - by James M .
Ban on Wood Burning Fireplaces? (Colebrook, Washington: for sale...
Fireplaces Ban in California Bay Area - Smog Fighters Target Air ...
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Roger Breedlove
climber
Cleveland Heights, Ohio
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Dec 10, 2009 - 02:02pm PT
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dc, at lunch today, I was reading a summary (The Economist 5 Dec 09) of the economics of mitigating climate change--very interesting issues about calculating the trade off of current costs versus the very long term future benefits--and realized that the analogy of insurance is somewhat misleading. Insurance transfers the risk of a particular bad event from one person or small group to many: if on average one in 1100 houses catches fire per day, I am willing to pay to insure against the damage of mine catching fire. Global warming is different since it will affect all of us, maybe not equally, but all of us.
CC, I think it is a mistake for the EPA to be writing regulations to reduce GHGs. From an economic view the best estimate is to tax carbon at $40 per ton. Our politicians and the voters like regulations such as the EPA will institute or cap and trade schemes that can be gamed by business and politicians. A straight tax is much more efficient. In Europe, there are no fuel consumptions regulations, just high fuel taxes for cars. Their cars get fuel consumptions rates that are significantly better than we can ever hope to achieve.
In the US, we have been given the world's fist place prize for "the most counterproductive 'green' policy" with low carbon taxes, corn-based ethanol subsidies, and tariffs on cheaper, greener imports. (I would wager that most of ST campers who believe themselves to be 'green' would object to paying more in fuel taxes and repeal of ethanol subsidies.)
If burning wood had a tax with a relative value to NG, oil or electricity, then everyone could make sensible decisions. I can count on one hand the number of people I know personally who would agree with this approach.
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JEleazarian
Trad climber
Fresno CA
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Dec 10, 2009 - 02:38pm PT
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Excellent posts, as usual, Roger. I've spent parts of the last couple of years trying to estimate marginal costs and benefits of carbon reduction. This is an exceedingly difficult problem. A State of California report about a year ago summed it up by saying, in essence, we know next to nothing about these costs.
That shouldn't surprise us, for the very reasons you state. The obvious externalities with climate change, and the seemingly long-term nature of the problem preclude the normal ways of measuring cost, supply or demand functions.
I think there's also one other problem, however, that produces skeptics in this area. There is a certain segment of the intellectual community that purports to be progressive, but is in fact economically reactionary. In particular, they've never come to grips with the industrial revolution, the inherent production efficiencies of large private organizations, or the concept that specialization is productive.
When a perceptably large number of such people latched on to anthropogenic climate change, the theory seemed a little too politically convenient. If they could quickly dismantle an economy by banning energy derived from carbon combustion, perhaps they could re-shape it more to their liking. Not surprisingly, they've campaigned to make it so. That campaigning gives the impression that this is not a dispassionate inquiry, but more in the nature of a tobacco company's study minimizing the dangers of smoking.
For this reason, I think the campaiging plays into the hands of the skeptics. The polemics contained in the purloined emails from CRU, and the attempt to make consensus sound like unanimity don't help, and aren't needed. Consensus doesn't require unanimity. I would say there's a consensus that quantum mechanics is our best description of certain physical phenomena, but Einstein never really accepted it.
Sorry for the ramble, but the obvious insults, distortions and condescension by some who want immediate economic changes do no good. I'm just grateful that we have Ed, Chiloe, you and others who respond with data, references, logic and facts. Thanks to all three of you.
John
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Roger Breedlove
climber
Cleveland Heights, Ohio
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Dec 10, 2009 - 04:03pm PT
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Well hurry up Ed.
John and I are ready to run the economic models (clear, unequivocal, precise, repeatable, transparent, fast, uncontroversial--as you can imagine) as soon as you give us the answer.
One of the economic debates is the discount rate to use for long term investments. Lord Stern, author of the Stern report on climate change economics, used a very low discount rate when other economists think that a shorter term market rate should be used. These positions have also been summed up as moral issues: we are obligated to fund the protection of the climate for future generations (low rate) versus the the people in the future will be richer than we are and can figure it out (high rate)--or more colloquially, should peasants in the 18 century have eaten less gruel so we are able to buy more computers.
Someone pointed out that a one cent investment in Caesar’s time compounding at 2% would be worth $1.5 quadrillion today (30 times the value of entire world economy.) That calculation probably would have taken a few months in Caesar’s time (1.02 raised to the 2000th power) and there would have been a lot of debate about the purpose, method, accuracy, range of uncertainty, work of the devil, etc. It takes only a few seconds today.
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cleo
Social climber
Berkeley, CA
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Dec 10, 2009 - 05:18pm PT
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^^^ and THAT is what is flawed about many aspects of economics!
not to get off on a tangent
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JEleazarian
Trad climber
Fresno CA
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Dec 10, 2009 - 05:51pm PT
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Ed, the Malthusian answer to your question is an uncontroversial "no, we cannot so maintain that growth." No one seriously questions that resources (now inlcuding, many of us believe, climate) limit growth. The tough question is whether they regulate growth. We all know that at some population level, we'd all barely subsist. The tougher question is always whether we've reached the point where the population is increasing faster than its access to resources.
The pro-population growth folks think we haven't because, historically, peoples' access to resources has increased faster than the population, so people seem to be better off materially now, with our higher populations, than they were before. My personal view is to the contrary, viz. that our present population, and likely growth in population, is straining our resources to the point that is making people materially worse off. We already see it in housing prices and, I believe, we'll see it in commodity prices generally, and in a sort of locust-like destruction of our own habitat if we continue at this pace. That, however, is just my personal opinion. I have never tried to study this rigorously, although I've been nibbling around the edges with my marginal cost and benefit studies.
John
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WBraun
climber
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Dec 10, 2009 - 07:43pm PT
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The planet can handle 3 times more than there are now.
With proper management.
The modern man does not know the art of proper management.
It was lost ....
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Roger Breedlove
climber
Cleveland Heights, Ohio
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Dec 11, 2009 - 12:23pm PT
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Ed, I think that the evidence is that the Plant can sustain many more people as economies grow. During the food shortages in the last few years, the issue was not the lack of the ability to grow food but the lack of economic incentives to grow food cheaply and the lack of income to pay higher prices. So on this basis, increasing the world's GDP more or less keeps the equation in balance. This has been going on for at least the 200 years since Malthus published his theory that population would increases would outstrip food increases.
There is another element in the equation that bears mentioning: birth rates go down with increasing wealth.. This seems to largely be a result of developing societies being able to increase wealth without having more field hands and also better medical care which allows more babies to grow up.
All that said, the issue with regard to CO2 emissions is that developing counties use much higher rates of CO2 to fuel their wealth than developed countries do, even inefficient ones such as the US. China and the US have about the same number of tons of CO2 emissions in total but China has a population that is four times larger than ours. If it continues to grow its economy, it will likely increase its CO2 emissions to four times its current level. India has steadfastly refused to promise to reduce its CO2 emissions in total except to say that it will never exceed the rate of GHG emissions per person as the US--clever diplomacy since no US negotiator can deliver on a promise of the US reducing its CO2 emissions. I have friends who are convinced that energy intensity is constant with regard to GDP—lower CO2 levels can only be achieved by lower levels of national income. My counter to that, since most of them drive expensive gas guzzlers, is to ask if their personal productivity would be reduced if they drove a Prius to work. (I am losing friends fast!)
The trick with controlling CO2 emissions is to find a way that developing countries can cost effectively increase their wealth at much lower CO2 intensity levels. China build a very state of the art power plant with relatively low levels of CO2, but its power costs are double the cost of the old coal plants.
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Chiloe
Trad climber
Lee, NH
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Dec 11, 2009 - 12:44pm PT
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There is another element in the equation that bears mentioning: birth rates go down with increasing wealth.. This seems to largely be a result of developing societies being able to increase wealth without having more field hands and also better medical care which allows more babies to grow up.
Roger raises a topic that is interesting and complicated in its own right, the subject of much discussion and research. The "demographic transition" from rough population stability within high-birth-rate/high-death-rate societies in the bad old days, to rough stability in low-birth-rate/low-death-rate societies of the new age, can be understood as a description of what happened historically in Japan and some parts of Europe. The transition is more controversial as a general proposition about what is happening or will happen elsewhere; developing countries aren't necessarily following the same pattern, or if they are it is at much higher absolute levels of population and under more time pressure, which makes everything harder.
So, while birth rates do tend to fall where infant mortality declines *and* women's economic opportunities expand, it matters a lot just how far and how fast they fall -- often, not enough to stabilize large and rapidly growing populations.
Anyway, interesting topic, but I don't mean to hijack this thread.
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cleo
Social climber
Berkeley, CA
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Dec 11, 2009 - 01:49pm PT
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The birth rate question is interesting, however, it raises some concerns
1 - first world low-birth-rate countries (like US) emit a magnitude or two more carbon (and other nasties) than developing countries. So even if birth rate falls to zero, if they all become like us, we're in trouble.
Hence, we need to look in the mirror and fix ourselves first.
2 - World fertility rate has dropped at an unprecedented rate, we don't really know why, and NOT just in first world countries. At least, according to a recent Economist article:
http://www.economist.com/displaystory.cfm?story_id=14743589
"SOMETIME in the next few years (if it hasn’t happened already) the world will reach a milestone: half of humanity will be having only enough children to replace itself. That is, the fertility rate of half the world will be 2.1 or below. This is the “replacement level of fertility”, the magic number that causes a country’s population to slow down and eventually to stabilise.....The move to replacement-level fertility is one of the most dramatic social changes in history.
....
The fall (in fertility rates) in developing countries now is closer to what happened in Europe during 19th- and early 20th-century industrialisation. But what took place in Britain over 130 years (1800-1930) took place in South Korea over just 20 (1965-85).
Things are moving even faster today. Fertility has dropped further in every South-East Asian country (except the Philippines) than it did in Japan. The rate in Bangladesh fell by half from six to three in only 20 years (1980 to 2000). The same decline took place in Mauritius in just ten (1963-73). Most sensational of all is the story from Iran."
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cleo
Social climber
Berkeley, CA
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Dec 11, 2009 - 02:39pm PT
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^^ Ha! maybe it was one of those wormhole-cosmic string things connecting our brains. Or God.
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corniss chopper
Mountain climber
san jose, ca
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Dec 11, 2009 - 03:01pm PT
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For a moment imagine the horrible scene of a forced abortion, while from the gallery, the President and his Science Czar look on smilingly.
President Obama's "science czar," John Holdren, once floated the idea of forced abortions, "compulsory sterilization," and the creation of a
"Planetary Regime" that would oversee human population levels and control all natural resources as a means of protecting the planet -- controversial
ideas his critics say should have been brought up in his Senate confirmation hearings.
John Holdren, who has degrees from MIT and Stanford and headed a science policy program at Harvard's Kennedy School of Government for the past 13 years, won
the unanimous approval of the Senate as the president's chief science advisor.
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=9766870
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