Scientists link harsh winter to dramatic decline in Arctic Sea Ice

[EagleSmack]

An ad hoc implementation isn't going to work, there needs to be a comprehensive plan, and that includes the phaseout of fossil fuels...which brings in a political element that makes it very hard to do anything.

Phase out fossil fuels? lmao.

True story... I helped design a living complex that was all green. Oh people were soooo excited! They were so hip and uppity about it.

Then came the day they turned on the taps and a moderate trickle flowed. From the sinks to the shower...

"What the F*** is this? What's with the water pressure? No matter how much I turn the nozzle only a little comes out!"

Well... that is what going green is! You can turn them all day... you will only get what you are given. No more blasting hot shower. You will get wet, you will be able to wash up... but that is it.

Then the hall lights and room lights... dull and dreary... not much light at all..

"What the F*** is this! I can barely see! The place is hardly lit!"

Well that is going green too! The bulbs will be changed by management when needed.

LMAO

They thought going green was going to be easy!

I loved it!

 

[taxslave]

You make it sound like this is a controlled process, it isn't.

Canada has everything to lose, just as does the rest of the world.

Changing climatic and temperature zones means that the habitat that most species have evolved to live in are moving rapidly polewards, in many cases faster than the biotas(all the life that lives there) can follow. As the process progresses more and more species will be lost as they no longer have the factors necessary for life.

A melting Arctic also means warming a region with massive amounts of methane in frozen deposits, methane is a greenhouse gas many times more powerful than CO2, we could see massive pulses of it released in the coming decades.

A warming Canada also means melting glaciers which many of us depend on for water in the summer months, there is already a serious decline in glaciers in the west.

A warming Arctic could also change the basic chemistry of the region meaning much higher levels of tropospheric ozone, which is a harmful pollutant at that level.

Across the west there has been a drying trend that is expected to worsen over the coming decades and could eventually result in a desert stretching from Mexico into the Canadian Prairies.

The oceans are already seeing a increase in average level and there is significant mass loss from the polar ice sheets as measured by satellite. Go ahead and tell all the people living on Canada's extensive coast line that their valuable property is doomed in the mid to long term.

We're already seeing extreme storm and weather activity that has resulted in huge costs, there are also significant costs associated with the spread of pests like pine beetles that are no longer controlled by cold winters. The range for disease vectors like mosquitoes carrying things like malaria, dengue fever and West Nile will also increase, a much warmer Canada can also mean a more dangerous one.

If you're suicidal or completely moronic then I guess you could find something to celebrate in all this.

I see you been sucked in hook, line. and sinker.

 

[EagleSmack]

Sorry, my mind doesn't work like that.

.

And of course... of course your mind doesn't work like that. You've been brainwashed.

Across the west there has been a drying trend that is expected to worsen over the coming decades and could eventually result in a desert stretching from Mexico into the Canadian Prairies.

Oh man... I can't believe I missed this! Are you serious!?

A desert from Mexico to Canada in decades?

The oceans are already seeing a increase in average level and there is significant mass loss from the polar ice sheets as measured by satellite. Go ahead and tell all the people living on Canada's extensive coast line that their valuable property is doomed in the mid to long term.
.

Dude I live by the ocean... it is the same as it ever was. I walk the same beaches... the same dunes... the same sea walls now as I did when I was a kid. The ocean is as it always has been. No rising no falling. When I am old and gray many years from now, I will walk the same beaches, the same dunes, along the same sea wall. I will not be chased inland by the sea.

They got you bad dude.

 

[taxslave]

Would that desert be to replace the existing one? We have has a real desert in BC for thousands of years. Funny how the global warming folks have never heard of it.

 

[EagleSmack]

Would that desert be to replace the existing one? We have has a real desert in BC for thousands of years. Funny how the global warming folks have never heard of it.

Denier! Tin Hat! Remove Yourself from the planet! Hit me with a fly swatter!

 

[Tonington]

Blah blah blah.
Unicorns, moonbeams and foil hats.

Canada is slightly larger than the USA geographically.
Canada has a population of around 35 million the US of A has a population of around 320 million.
The reason?
The much warmer weather in the States.
It's more liveable there.

Yet Russia with more comparable seasonal weather to Canada has a population of what, about 145 million? Is Russia special in that people didn't have warmer countries to choose to live in? I think not. What about Australia? Pretty warm, but they have a lower population than we do. The reason? There's not one, there are many. Choosing weather alone to explain something complex like population is foolish.

Equally foolish is trying to say with such certainty what the future will hold. A good start on what could be expected is found here:
http://www.nrcan.gc.ca/earth-sciences/climate-change/community-adaptation/assessments/487

 

[Zipperfish]

It's the graph the deniers hate.

 

[DaSleeper]

You Might Be A Progressive Ideologue If - YouTube

 

[EagleSmack]

It's the graph the deniers hate.

Why do we hate it? I think it is awesome!

How many bank transfers and grants will it take again?

 

[Mowich]

Nor can it BE controlled.

I might add ..........nor should anyone or group try to do so, Eagle. You don't mess with Mother Nature without consequences. Some of the schemes that I have read about to try and alter the climate are truly scary - salting the atmosphere with sulfuric acid?

 

[petros]

I might add ..........nor should anyone or group try to do so, Eagle. You don't mess with Mother Nature without consequences. Some of the schemes that I have read about to try and alter the climate are truly scary - salting the atmosphere with sulfuric acid?

[/FONT][/FONT]

Acid is nothing, it's aluminum, barium, cadmium, lithium, zinc etc that work the best for weather altering.

 

[Tonington]

Acid is something...aerosols of sulfuric acid are potent reflectors of sunlight. Major volcanoes can cover the globe with these aerosols and can reduce the amount of sunlight reaching the surface for years. Mount Pinatubo reduced the insolation at Earth's surface by roughly 10%. That caused the Northern Hemisphere surface temperature to drop by about 0.5°C, while increasing the temperature of the stratosphere. The effect lasted for three years. That hardly counts as nothing.

 

[taxslave]

It's the graph the deniers hate.

To believe this graph you would also have to believe that in 1880 scientists had the same quality of test equipment that we have today. Also that they had the same dedication to proving the earth is warming.

 

[petros]

Nothing in comparison to ....... Pinatubo didn't do that without all the other aerosols. Pinatubo isn't humans with a purpose.

 

[Tonington]

Nothing in comparison to ....... Pinatubo didn't do that without all the other aerosols. Pinatubo isn't humans with a purpose.

Not all aerosols persist for three years or more. Suffice it to say, acid does not qualify as nothing when it comes to points such as geoengineering like Mowich mentioned. Whether the aerosols come from man or a geologic process, the effect of like for like is the same.

 

[Cobalt_Kid]

Phase out fossil fuels? lmao.

True story... I helped design a living complex that was all green. Oh people were soooo excited! They were so hip and uppity about it.

Then came the day they turned on the taps and a moderate trickle flowed. From the sinks to the shower...

"What the F*** is this? What's with the water pressure? No matter how much I turn the nozzle only a little comes out!"

Well... that is what going green is! You can turn them all day... you will only get what you are given. No more blasting hot shower. You will get wet, you will be able to wash up... but that is it.

Then the hall lights and room lights... dull and dreary... not much light at all..

"What the F*** is this! I can barely see! The place is hardly lit!"

Well that is going green too! The bulbs will be changed by management when needed.

LMAO

They thought going green was going to be easy!

I loved it!

You've got a very limited view of alternative sources of energy to replace fossil fuels.

There are a number of different nuclear technologies that offer many advantages over current Pressurized Water Reactors and few of the drawbacks.

Liquid fluoride thorium reactor - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The Nuclear Green Revolution: More on the Denatured Molten Salt Reactor from David LeBlanc

http://info.ornl.gov/sites/publications/files/Pub29596.pdf

Pebble bed reactor - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Liquid metal cooled reactor - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

There are also synthetic fuels that offer a carbon neutral or even carbon negative footprint.

Introduction to NH3 Fuel | NH3 Fuel Association

We can produce light crude through catalytic processes that would allow the production of carbon negative products...you'd loss some over time to geological sequestration(they'd get buried).

Thermal depolymerization - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Wind power is going airborne into regions of the atmosphere where the winds are much more constant and energetic.

Google Acquires Unique Airborne Wind Turbine Technology > ENGINEERING.com

Tidal power is taking off.

List of tidal power stations - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

It goes on and on, instead of relying on fossil fuels creating a positive future we're getting the opposite, political instability from being involved in places like the Middle East and environmental and social degradation on some epic scales.

Deepwater Horizon oil spill - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The cleanup of the Gulf Coast disaster has also been devastating.

"Very, Very Sick Population" Due to BP Oil and Dispersants, say Medical Experts, Scientists | Bridge The Gulf Project

Kindra says, “This is not something that we’re used to here. Our kids are bayou kids. They’re tough.” But she says the change in children’s health has been the most striking: “We have kids down here that are now over 80% bald because their hair has fallen out. Their noses are bleeding… I’ve watched these kids go from healthy, thriving children to a shell of themselves.” Her 11-year-old daughter has been ill for several years now, “She suffers from headaches, nausea, upper respiratory issues, heart palpitations, chest pains, fatigue.”

Dr. Michael Robichaux, a physician in Raceland, Louisiana, began to see many patients with similar symptoms and then discovered that, “People from Florida, Alabama, Mississippi and Louisiana were all experiencing almost identical problems.” Robichaux sought out help, and was able to fund a detox clinic to treat chemical illnesses. The treatment improved the health of many patients, but the funds ran out. A former state senator, Robichaux is extremely frustrated with the BP settlement process related to public health impacts:

There could be hundreds of thousands of Americans who've been made sick by the dispersants BP poured into the Gulf of Mexico off of Florida, Alabama, Louisiana and Mississippi.

You've got mountaintop removal coal mining in the US east coast, massive mines in the west and over a billion tons of coal from the country being burned or sold each year adding an immense amount of pollution to the planet.

We can keep doing what we're doing and make a few people rich from the sale of fossil fuels while they destroy the social and ecological base that make up our world or we can invest in modern technology and build societies and economies that would make what we have now look primitive.

 

[Ron in Regina]

You've got a very limited view of alternative sources of energy to replace fossil fuels.

There are a number of different nuclear technologies that offer many advantages over current Pressurized Water Reactors and few of the drawbacks.

Liquid fluoride thorium reactor - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The Nuclear Green Revolution: More on the Denatured Molten Salt Reactor from David LeBlanc

http://info.ornl.gov/sites/publications/files/Pub29596.pdf

Pebble bed reactor - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Liquid metal cooled reactor - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

There are also synthetic fuels that offer a carbon neutral or even carbon negative footprint.

Introduction to NH3 Fuel | NH3 Fuel Association

We can produce light crude through catalytic processes that would allow the production of carbon negative products...you'd loss some over time to geological sequestration(they'd get buried).

Thermal depolymerization - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Wind power is going airborne into regions of the atmosphere where the winds are much more constant and energetic.

Google Acquires Unique Airborne Wind Turbine Technology > ENGINEERING.com

Tidal power is taking off.

List of tidal power stations - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

It goes on and on, instead of relying on fossil fuels creating a positive future we're getting the opposite, political instability from being involved in places like the Middle East and environmental and social degradation on some epic scales......

I wonder how many of the green alternatives above are manufactured or shipped
without the use of fossil fuels? Just wondering about the irony in the debate, is all.

 

[Cobalt_Kid]

I wonder how many of the green alternatives above are manufactured or shipped
without the use of fossil fuels? Just wondering about the irony in the debate, is all.

Not many, because we're currently reliant on fossil fuels for most of transportation and construction needs then it follows that they will be required to build new energy production facilities and infrastructure.

As the new technologies come online we can begin to start to phase out fossil fuels, probably starting with the most polluting like coal. Carbon taxes could be used to pay for a lot of the capital costs, and there is nothing to prevent companies that are currently in the fossil fuel sector from moving into the new sector. Southern Company which has significant coal interests in the US also runs nuclear generation stations.

Overview | About Us | Southern Company

It would probably take about $5 billion US and about ten years to bring a thorium based two fluid Molten salt Reactor to prototype status, at which point the US and Canada could build large numbers of the much more efficient and practical reactors with a fuel source that will last thousands of years at current demands.

There's enough thorium stockpiled in Nevada to meet all the US energy demands for several years. Thorium is usually found with rare earths which are mined for high tech products like yttrium in headphones.

Rare Earth Elements Explained

The thorium mined as a byproduct has to be treated as hazardous waste even though it is only very weakly radioactive, it has a half life about the current age of the universe, 14 billion years. It's also as plentiful as lead and four times more plentiful than uranium, and we're throwing the stuff away.

It's an energy source over a million times more dense than coal.

 

[Tonington]

I wonder how many of the green alternatives above are manufactured or shipped
without the use of fossil fuels? Just wondering about the irony in the debate, is all.

It's ironic? The debate from the risk side is that we need technologies to reduce our output of greenhouse gases. Inventors need to work with what we have don't they? I don't think that makes it ironic. I don't think anyone has ever said that there would be one silver bullet- a technology to replace all others. I could be wrong, but I think if anyone has ever said that they are either supremely ignorant, or not being intellectually honest. That's not realistic. Whatever happens, it's clear that change will occur incrementally. Betting on one disruptive technology is a very long shot indeed.

 

[Cobalt_Kid]

It's ironic? The debate from the risk side is that we need technologies to reduce our output of greenhouse gases. Inventors need to work with what we have don't they? I don't think that makes it ironic. I don't think anyone has ever said that there would be one silver bullet- a technology to replace all others. I could be wrong, but I think if anyone has ever said that they are either supremely ignorant, or not being intellectually honest. That's not realistic. Whatever happens, it's clear that change will occur incrementally. Betting on one disruptive technology is a very long shot indeed.

I agree, if there are delays in one area then resources can be transferred to others.

It also makes sense to create an energy market that has some competition built into it.