Moderated Global Warming Discussion

[Trakar]

I never made that claim, try reading this again

The same people complaining about rising food prices and future shortages are the same ones insisting that it needs to be turned into fuel.

Is that a "yes-no" or a "no-yes"?

 

[Trakar]

Mostly that they don't exist. That's prohibitive.

So its not that such "isn't possible on a commercial scale," its that such systems have not yet become widely availble? You do realize that this is fundementally different than what you have claimed up until now,...don't you?

 

[CapelDodger]

China is a sad example; The "Great Leap Forward" was in the wrong direction. It should have been in a direction of sustainability that would have ensured China a future. Yet another way in which Mao was a lousy student of history; Had he comprehended Thomas Malthus, he would have seen this coming.

Veering way off-topic, but Marxism-Leninism specifically rejects Malthus, and Mao would have been well aware of this (he was quite a Marxist theologian). It accepts no limits to what is achievable by a society properly organised. Those few Marxists who still exist are firmly in the AGW denialist camp; for them it's an Imperialist plot to prevent Third World development, just as for Munchkin and Inhofe it's a communist internationalist plot to bring down the Free World.

Marxism and laissez-faire, free market absolutism were formed in the same period by people with a similar mindset. They build models of society completely sealed off from the physical environment.

But China not only entered the Coal age and the Oil age in record time, but they have succeeded in burning though a larger percentage of their fossil fuels in a shorter time than any of the Western industrial powers they wanted to emulate and exceed.

They got on the exponential curve late in the game, when the technology was available to do that.

Well, exceed they did. And if you want a prediction, I predict that China will crash hard in about a decade, and we may see the world's first nuclear civil war there.

Not a chance, but I'm not about to predict what will happen in China. It's far too cohesive to break up (unlike, for instance, Pakistan) but there may be an abrupt change of course. Or they'll be too involved in fire-fighting climate disruption to give much thought to the future (I suspect there'll be a lot of that generally).

 

[CapelDodger]

I think I see where you are becoming confused. I've rolled processing into transportation.

What you wrote was

The bulk of our emissions comes from driving around this massive country ...

and I expressed my doubt. How what you wrote "rolls processing into transportation" is not immediately obvious. I went with the most obvious interpretation.

I don't see how you separate them ...

You do so by referring to specific elements, such as "emissions from transport" or "emissions from farm equipment". "Driving around this massive country" means emissions from road transport.

... we're talking about all those machines that make these energy intensive industries possible.

I'm not. You claimed that most of Canada's emissions come from driving and I said I doubted it. Given the way you've responded, I'm now convinced of it. It was just something you plucked out of the air and are now regretting.

The mining and pulp and paper industries use more energy than the entire residential sector.

And nobody's in the slightest bit surprised, but what's your point?

 

[Trakar]

So are Canadians.

As soon as you come up with solar powered mining equipment I think we'll have it licked.

Much of the mining in Canada involves the use of the large dragline shovels, which are predominantly electircally powered, for nearly the last 100 years.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dragline_excavator

http://www.letourneautechnologies.com/mining/loaders_dozer.php
(these currently use diesel generators to power electric drive motors but no retrofitting to battery packs shouldn't be that complicated.)

In most cases we aren't talking about anything that is difficult or complicated, its just a matter of the mining and harvesting companies not having provided a market for such modified power equipment. It is actually a burgeoning trend in commercial construction, primarily due to the elimination of fumes and noise issues. I think we will see a lot of growth battery powered heavy equipment in the near future.

 

[Trakar]

...Or they'll be too involved in fire-fighting climate disruption to give much thought to the future (I suspect there'll be a lot of that generally).

And not limited China!

 

[macdoc]

Bulk of emissions from driving eh

just another bit of unsupported opinion that is WRONG by a huge factor.....

Figure 1: National sectoral greenhouse gas emissions from Canada’s 2008 Greenhouse Gas Inventory data

Figure 1 indicates that our largest source of emissions came from the energy sector. Electricity and heat generation, taken together, were our biggest contributor, followed by other stationary sources of energy-related emissions such as fossil fuel production and refining, manufacturing industries and commercial and institutional energy emissions. In the transportation sub-sector the three largest emission levels were from light-duty gasoline trucks, gasoline automobiles and heavy-duty diesel vehicles. The energy sector alone was responsible for 81% of emissions nationally.

fig 1
http://zizzoclimate.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/08/Fig1.jpg

If you expect to be taken seriously in a science forum the very least you could do is support your opinion with accurate facts instead of ill informed spew that is simply wrong.

http://zizzoclimate.com/2010/08/20/canadas-ghg-emissions-georgias-roundup/

 

[Furcifer]

And nobody's in the slightest bit surprised, but what's your point?

It's pretty obvious. These industries are energy intensive and there's no getting around it. You can't move forests closer to the city or melt ore at a lower temperature.

 

[Furcifer]

So its not that such "isn't possible on a commercial scale," its that such systems have not yet become widely availble? You do realize that this is fundementally different than what you have claimed up until now,...don't you?

You're not making sense. It isn't possible because they aren't widely available.

 

[Furcifer]

I'm not. You claimed that most of Canada's emissions come from driving and I said I doubted it. Given the way you've responded, I'm now convinced of it. It was just something you plucked out of the air and are now regretting.

No, it just depends on the graph and how it's broken down. There tends to be overlap. See this graph: CO2 emissions by sector 1999
Transportation 29% Electricity and Heat 23% Manufacturing and Construction 18%

If you look at this graph Combustion Sources 46.1% Transportation 26.7%

 

[Furcifer]

Bulk of emissions from driving eh

just another bit of unsupported opinion that is WRONG by a huge factor.....

fig 1
http://zizzoclimate.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/08/Fig1.jpg

If you expect to be taken seriously in a science forum the very least you could do is support your opinion with accurate facts instead of ill informed spew that is simply wrong.

http://zizzoclimate.com/2010/08/20/canadas-ghg-emissions-georgias-roundup/

You need to look at more than just a single source to get a complete picture. It helps you from making erroneous conclusions.

 

[Furcifer]

Much of the mining in Canada involves the use of the large dragline shovels, which are predominantly electircally powered, for nearly the last 100 years.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dragline_excavator

http://www.letourneautechnologies.com/mining/loaders_dozer.php
(these currently use diesel generators to power electric drive motors but no retrofitting to battery packs shouldn't be that complicated.)

In most cases we aren't talking about anything that is difficult or complicated, its just a matter of the mining and harvesting companies not having provided a market for such modified power equipment. It is actually a burgeoning trend in commercial construction, primarily due to the elimination of fumes and noise issues. I think we will see a lot of growth battery powered heavy equipment in the near future.

Some of the most common industrial equipment has been electric for years, the fork lift comes to mind. Despite the cost savings of using electric propane and diesel have continued to remain popular. It isn't a matter of cost, if the equipment can't perform the tasks required of it it's useless.
Lithium batteries have extremely high energy density. Unfortunately they're extremely volatile and extremely expensive. If their use in industrial applications is feasible they will most certainly be used, if not this isn't something you can force people to use because you fear the future.
While battery technology has improved their is limits to what it can and can't do. I'm afraid you're a little out of touch if you think people are just using petroleum products because they have some cavalier attitude towards carbon emissions.

 

[macdoc]

No, it just depends on the graph and how it's broken down. There tends to be overlap. See this graph: CO2 emissions by sector 1999

you mean like 12 year out of date stats that you chose to be purposefully misleading to try and prove an opinion that is not supportable.

The oil sands have grown hugely in those 12 years and even since the 2008 statistics. Seems hiding the reality is a fav trick of the denier crowd......right up to Harper...

Canada tries to hide Alberta tar sands carbon emissions

Greenhouse gas emissions from the tar sands are on the rise, but try finding that in Canada's official report to the UN



Emissions from tar sands mining, such as this pit in Alberta, were left out of Canada's carbon emissions reporting. Photograph: Jiri Rezac/eyevine

Barely a day goes by it seems when someone from Stephen Harper's government is not touting the benefits of the Alberta tar sands.
But when it came to counting up the carbon emissions produced by the tar sands - big and growing bigger - a strange amnesia seems to have taken hold.

The Canadian government admitted this week that it deliberately left out data indicating a 20% rise in emissions from the Alberta tar sands when it submitted its annual inventory to the United Nations.

The deliberate exclusion does not amount to an attempt to deceive the UN about Canada's total emissions. Emissions from the tar sands were incorporated in the overall tally in the report. But it does suggest that the government is anxious to obscure the source of its fastest-growing source of climate pollution: the Alberta tar sands.
Greenhouse gases from the tar sands grew by 21% in the last year reported, despite the economic receission. Even more troubling, the tar sands is becoming even more carbon intensive, with emissions per barrel of oil rising 14.5% in 2009.



And overall production is set to triple by 2020, according to some projections. So that's an increasingly significant share of Canada's greenhouse gas emissions - 6.5% now and rising.

more
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/blog/2011/jun/01/canada-tar-sands-carbon-emissions

 

[Trakar]

It's pretty obvious. These industries are energy intensive and there's no getting around it. You can't move forests closer to the city or melt ore at a lower temperature.

So it's not mining, now, it's the refining?

 

[Trakar]

You're not making sense. It isn't possible because they aren't widely available.

You're right, you'd think by now I would have learned that chasing constantly moving goalposts is irrational and nonsensical.

 

[Trakar]

Canada's GHG Emissions

http://www.conferenceboard.ca/hcp/details/environment/greenhouse-gas-emissions.aspx

Canada ranks second-to-last out of 17 countries for greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions per capita and earns a “D” grade.
Canada’s GHG emissions have increased by 32 per cent in 15 years.
The largest contributor to Canada’s GHG emissions is the energy sector, which includes combustion, transportation, and fugitive sources.
(...)
The energy sector was responsible for 82 per cent of Canada’s total GHG emissions in 2005. Emissions from this sector come from combustion sources (such as electricity and heat generation, and fossil fuel industries), transportation (such as road transportation), and fugitive sources (such as coal mining, and oil and natural gas). Energy combustion is the largest of these sources, contributing 46 per cent of Canada’s total GHG emissions in 2005...

IT is wiki, but...

"Climate change in Canada" - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Climate_change_in_Canada

...Canada is a large country with a low population density, so transportation – often in cold weather when fuel efficiency drops – is a big part of the economy. About 25 per cent of Canada's GHGs come from trucks, trains, airplanes and, especially, cars. Commerce, residential fuel consumption and industry (excluding oil and gas) account for 24 per cent of the total, but much of those emissions come from equipment (mining trucks, front-end loaders) that do not get recorded in the transportation ledger. Another 14 per cent come from non-energy sources. The rest come from the production and manufacture of energy and power...

25% - Transportation
24% - Commerce/residential fuel consumption/industry (excluding oil and gas) and heavy equipment emissions.
14% - non-energy sources
37% - production and manufacture of energy and power.

 

[Trakar]

...I'm afraid you're a little out of touch if you think people are just using petroleum products because they have some cavalier attitude towards carbon emissions.

Please cite and reference where I have stated, or clearly implied, that "cavalier attitudes towards carbon emissions," is involved, yet alone a primary problem, in increasing GHG emissions problems.

 

[Mikemcc]

You're not making sense. It isn't possible because they aren't widely available.

It made perfect sense. It's possible, just not widely deployed.

 

[Mikemcc]

It's pretty obvious. These industries are energy intensive and there's no getting around it. You can't move forests closer to the city or melt ore at a lower temperature.

But you can improve power generation and distribution; HVDC grid spines, more local generation using more diverse fuels (that can be locally sourced). You can improve efficiencies in many areas, especially by exchanging old fixed AC drives for variable speed drives to lower the load. In fact you will be more likely to get year-on-year improvements from this approach, rather than fanciful magic bio-engineering hopes.

 

[Trakar]

You need to look at more than just a single source to get a complete picture. It helps you from making erroneous conclusions.

That sounds like wise advice indeed! Which most people commenting here seem to follow rather rigorously. MacDoc in particular seems to be pretty good about providing multiple supports for statements and considerations shared, they may span several posts instead of being in one response, but I'm sure if there are ever any questions about MacDoc would be happy to expand and list additional supporting references, if you but asked.