Earth Hour: Turn Off the Lights!

[Tonington]

Uhmm....OK, educate me. When power consumption drops, say 10%, for just an hour do they shut off 10% of coal fired generators? How do you turn off a very large, hot coal fire? And do they turn it on again the instant consumption surges back of to previous levels? How do you do that with a coal generator?

I'm all ears.

The answer lies in the difference between baseload capacity and load fluctuations. Most generators aren't run at either 100% or 0% capacity...

Don't be ridiculous.

 

[Extrafire]

A one or two degree rise in the mean global temperature would have catastrophic consequences.

No it won't. Science tells us that the earth has been much warmer that that in the past.

Global warming is a self feeding thing. When the ice melts and exposes bare ground, that ground will absorb more heat which will lead to more melting and so on. One look at the changes that have taken place in Canada's Arctic should convince anyone.

One look at the science and geological history should inform anyone that it didn't happen before when it was much warmer so it shouldn't happen now.

The worst thing is that we don't know if it can be stopped.

Yes we do. It stopped last time, why not this time when it's not nearly as warm?

 

[Extrafire]

But as said earlier, this is about awareness. No one will ever switch anything off without switching mindset. How can you develop a long term sustainable reduction when people get disjointed by something like this? It reminds me off everyone who argued they could drink and drive no problem..possibly drive better drunk. It took years to change thinking before it got people off the roads. This too will take years but you have to start somewhere.

So,,,,since you apparently have the "correct mindset" why haven't you disconnected from the grid permanently? Why did you switch your lights back on?

 

[Extrafire]

Science is utterly unconcerned about consensus. That's the purview of politics. Science is concerned with evidence and reproducible results.

That is how consensus is formed, Extrafire. Scientists perform experiments, publish their results. Other scientists examine the results critically, try to reproduce them. The results then support one theory or another and a consensus is formed.

Thus at one time there were two competing theories of Cosmology, Big Bang theory and Steady State theory. Over decades, experiments performed gave results that could be explained by one and not by the other (the red shift, background radiation etc.). So consensus formed around the Big bang theory.

Evidence and scientific consensus is usually the same thing. It is very rare indeed, that evidence points to one theory, but scientific consensus supports another theory, just doesn’t happen.

He was opposed by every scientist in the world. It wasn't until 1950, 20 years after his death that the theory was confirmed.

Sure, that is because evidence was not available. Until the evidence becomes available, consensus is not going to change. Thus at one time consensus was that earth was flat, or that sun goes around the earth.

So consensus can be sometimes wrong. However, consensus is usually based upon the best available evidence. Even if consensus is wrong, it is based upon the best possible evidence available. That is the scientific method. So I will go with consensus, even if at a later date consensus may be proved wrong.

You are very confused about the definition of the word evidence and how science works.

It's like beating my head against a wall trying to penetrate that fog of yours...

 

[lone wolf]

I understand you don’t give a damn as to how people in the third world live, that is your right. But then don’t challenge my contention that your house at 850 sq. ft. will be considered palatial by third world standards.

The whole argument started because you claimed that your house is not a palatial house. To which I replied that by third world standards, it is a palatial house.

That was our point of contention. Where did the point as to whether you give a damn or not come in? Give a damn or not as you will, but I stand by my contention that any house in North America will be considered palatial by third world standards (including your house).

Excuse me? At the risk of becoming one of your poodles (or is it the poodle-keeper, following you around to clean up your messes) Get off your high horse. This is NOT the third world so those alien standards are NOT applicable. If you are going to quote me, kindly do it verbatum. Give your overstuffed head a shake will you?

 

[Extrafire]

Maybe Joseph Farah got the idea from me Or maybe the bloggers had also come up with the idea on their own,

Extrafire, sez you. Maybe he got the idea from you, I don’t know. But I do know that Farah is a leader of far right, you belong to far right. Farah told his followers to turn on all of their lights; you turned on all of your lights.

From this I draw the only reasonable conclusion, that you probably were following the dictates of Farah. I don’t know if you got the idea before he did, may be so. But it is reasonable to draw the conclusion that I did.

And if you are a follower of Farah, that really tells me all about you that I need to know. His extreme right wing policies, his claim that Obama is a Muslim terrorist, illegal alien and should be imprisoned by the Supreme Court (or at least thrown out of the country, deported) and so on. Chances are his followers agree with him on most of the policies.

Oh puleeze, knock it off. Far right, me?:lol: I guess I'll have to look the guy up to see just how bad you're trying to smear me, but you should give it up. That this is the best you can do to support your cause is very revealing.

 

[Extrafire]

The answer lies in the difference between baseload capacity and load fluctuations. Most generators aren't run at either 100% or 0% capacity...

Don't be ridiculous.

Uhmmmm.....yeah, that's pretty much what I said...

 

[Tonington]

Uhmmmm.....yeah, that's pretty much what I said...

Is it? You seemed to have a problem understanding that. Can you explain why a power generator would continue to generate based on a higher demand when the load on the lines doesn't require that? Why would they burn up those joules, when they aren't receiving any payoff for those extra watts?

I don't think you do understand. Just another thing to add to the lengthy list.

 

[Francis2004]

But as said earlier, this is about awareness. No one will ever switch anything off without switching mindset. How can you develop a long term sustainable reduction when people get disjointed by something like this? It reminds me off everyone who argued they could drink and drive no problem..possibly drive better drunk. It took years to change thinking before it got people off the roads. This too will take years but you have to start somewhere.

Kreskin, that reminds me of the argument that if everyone was driving drunk no one would hit ( drive into ) each other. What absurd thinking those people had..

 

[captain morgan]

Like I said, Look at the Canadian Arctic.

Mere mankind has the power to extinguish all life on this planet in several different ways. I get a kick out of those who think we can do anything to our planet and get away with it. Pretty stupid don't you think?

What about the Canadian Arctic? Do you believe that the environment in the Arctic is/has remained static since the Earth was formed?

Are you of the opinion that the Earth has a thermostat in place wherein the temperature is set and there is never any fluctuation?

Please answer me this... What is a reasonable explanation for the multiple ice ages that have advanced and receded over the millenia? Obviously the ice age is the significant global temp drop and the receding is the warming. Certainly these can't be blamed on humanity as we weren't around, nor can be chalk them all up to extraordinary events like meteor hits that turn-on or turn-off the system.

So, excepting the possibility that the events are the result of the Earth's systems, how did they occur?

 

[Tonington]

So, excepting the possibility that the events are the result of the Earth's systems, how did they occur?

Go to Wikipedia and look up Milankovitch cycles.

 

[captain morgan]

This is a ridiculous argument.

One single copy of the Ebola virus can lead to death, even though it is but a single part out of trillions in your body.

The magnitude of response in dynamic systems is not primarily dependent on the %volume it occupies, but the innate characteristics of the source of perturbation.

There are many examples in this world where small amounts lead to significant results.

I am a little confused relative to the contention that is pretty much agreed upon by all parties that the majority cause of global warming is due to water vapour. Water vapour has/is considered the most impacting single element in the system.

I can appreciate the comment relative to the examples of small volume of input having disproportionately high impacts, however, if this is the case with the global climatic system, we should have seen dramatic impacts during the Industrial Revolution or Atomic bomb testing. That representation is not evident.

 

[captain morgan]

Go to Wikipedia and look up Milankovitch cycles.

Fair enough. However, this is input that is extraneous to input via humanity.

 

[SirJosephPorter]

Excuse me? At the risk of becoming one of your poodles (or is it the poodle-keeper, following you around to clean up your messes) Get off your high horse. This is NOT the third world so those alien standards are NOT applicable. If you are going to quote me, kindly do it verbatum. Give your overstuffed head a shake will you?

I don’t know what brought this on, Lone Wolf. But I stand by my contention, that any home a person owns in North America will be considered palatial in the third world. You really haven’t said anything to contradict that (which really is our argument, if you remember).

 

[SirJosephPorter]

Kreskin, that reminds me of the argument that if everyone was driving drunk no one would hit ( drive into ) each other. What absurd thinking those people had..

Sir Francis, that will lead to what the Physical Chemists call Brownian Motion. It is random motion of gas molecules.

So a group of drunk drivers (assuming they are totally drunk) would collide with each other in a random way. The mathematics of the Brownian motion can be worked out beautifully.

In fact, I remember from my college days, we used Drunkard’s Walk in analyzing random motion.

 

[SirJosephPorter]

Oh puleeze, knock it off. Far right, me?:lol: I guess I'll have to look the guy up to see just how bad you're trying to smear me, but you should give it up. That this is the best you can do to support your cause is very revealing.

Look him up here:

WorldNetDaily

i think there will be perfect fit between you and him.

 

[lone wolf]

I don’t know what brought this on, Lone Wolf. But I stand by my contention, that any home a person owns in North America will be considered palatial in the third world. You really haven’t said anything to contradict that (which really is our argument, if you remember).

Yes dear.... Of course you are correct. Happy now?

What brought it on is your continual need to be appear as brilliant - no matter what. Let us just agree to disagree on this. Now, go away. You bore me.

 

[SirJosephPorter]

You are very confused about the definition of the word evidence and how science works.

It's like beating my head against a wall trying to penetrate that fog of yours...

Let us just agree to disagree on this.

 

[Tonington]

I am a little confused relative to the contention that is pretty much agreed upon by all parties that the majority cause of global warming is due to water vapour. Water vapour has/is considered the most impacting single element in the system.

No, it is pretty much agreed by most parties that the majority of the cause of global warming is human emissions of greenhouse gases. Being the largest component of the natural greenhouse effect, by number of molecules (water vapour), is not the same thing at all.

I can appreciate the comment relative to the examples of small volume of input having disproportionately high impacts, however, if this is the case with the global climatic system, we should have seen dramatic impacts during the Industrial Revolution or Atomic bomb testing. That representation is not evident.

I didn't say anything about disproportionately high. I said significant. Small amounts can lead to significant changes.

If you want further info on attribution of this global warmign phenomenon, investigate the trend in the stratospheric temperature. It has been cooling for years, while the troposphere warmed.

This is exactly what to expect from greenhouse induced warming. If the warming came from the sun, the incoming solar radiation would heat all layers of the atmosphere, from the topmost to the bottom most as the radiation passes through. But, that isn't happening. The stratosphere is cooling at about 0.5°C per decade, while the troposphere warms at about 0.16°C per decade. That's because the accumulating greenhouse gases heat the lower atmosphere, and as more greenhouse gases accumulate, less infrared radiation escapes to space (global warming), and that means less outgoing radiation to heat the stratosphere.

Somewhat related to this is the loss of ozone, which cools the lower stratosphere, for different reasons.

 

[captain morgan]

No, it is pretty much agreed by most parties that the majority of the cause of global warming is human emissions of greenhouse gases. Being the largest component of the natural greenhouse effect, by number of molecules (water vapour), is not the same thing at all.



I didn't say anything about disproportionately high. I said significant. Small amounts can lead to significant changes.

If you want further info on attribution of this global warmign phenomenon, investigate the trend in the stratospheric temperature. It has been cooling for years, while the troposphere warmed.

This is exactly what to expect from greenhouse induced warming. If the warming came from the sun, the incoming solar radiation would heat all layers of the atmosphere, from the topmost to the bottom most as the radiation passes through. But, that isn't happening. The stratosphere is cooling at about 0.5°C per decade, while the troposphere warms at about 0.16°C per decade. That's because the accumulating greenhouse gases heat the lower atmosphere, and as more greenhouse gases accumulate, less infrared radiation escapes to space (global warming), and that means less outgoing radiation to heat the stratosphere.

Somewhat related to this is the loss of ozone, which cools the lower stratosphere, for different reasons.

You are welcome to believe whatever you wish. I suggest that you go directly to the IPCC document (I believe to be high skewed and therefore the supporters will not rebut the source), but in that doc, you'll find conclusive statements that water vapour is by far and away, the largest contributor to this hysteria.

Anthropomorphic sources represent single digit causes.