Moderated Global Warming Discussion

[quarky]

I just stopped in to check the state of the debate.
It's winter where I live, and pretty dang warm...which is sort of nice.
The bitching will re-commence in the spring and summer, regarding the weather.

As the resident peace-nik hippy at jref, I'd like to emphasize the contribution of the U.S. military efforts to the climate. Without adding any more charts and graphs to the equation, it's a lot.

Ignoring the morality of our pointless aggressions, and their failures, our military machine is obligated to use up its allotment of fuel, so that it can keep coming.

It's like Nascar, on steroids. Except, instead of just driving around in circles, with fans hoping to see horrific crashes, children are killed.

The anti-war movement has really crapped out in my country, and I can't imagine why.
Since Vietnam, our wars have only gotten more ridiculous and hopeless.
And they crank out a butt-load of CO2 into the atmosphere.

I hope I don't need to define "butt-load", in terms scientific.

Anyway, now more than ever, a rethink of aggressive hostilities is in order.
The economics of these pointless efforts, even though they do create wealth in a handful of deep pockets, are driving us down...on many levels.

so,

Make love?

 

[aleCcowaN]

As the resident peace-nik hippy at jref, I'd like to emphasize the contribution of the U.S. military efforts to the climate. Without adding any more charts and graphs to the equation, it's a lot.

On the contrary, I think that those 700,000 million dollars spent in "defence" by the US Federal Government would lead to much greater GHG emissions if spent in building roads, or in tax returns, or as general expenditure. Of course, if you spend it in health or in GHG emission reduction, the result would be great.

Peripheral war morass -the Usian style- is not much contaminating (remember: it was the others who burned the oil fields). And it also has indirect positive effects on AGW: it stops economic growth, it raises mortality rates and it lowers natality rates.

"Defense" is just a necessary national policy in the USA, what implies a great expenditure to keep the lead, a great expenditure which means development of protected edge technology, protected in a way that apparently hides it from both potential enemies and allies but more significantly protected in a way that keeps technological development away from international commercial competition. Of course, a expenditure of 13 figures in a decade needs now and then a practice ground, a playfield to release tensions and solve disputes -not with a foreign enemy- and a justification of its existence.

Imagine what would happen if the USA buys weaponry in a market of competition. The trade balance will be more off than it is already. Less "defence" expenditures would have a similar effect as the same resources would be spent in areas more open to international markets.

I suppose the new policy of "energy self-sufficiency" is the way that will allow indirectly both a reduction in "defence" and having a bit of control on US' trade balance.

 

[macdoc]

Reasonable, but without a carbon price it would also eliminate some renewable projects. There's also oil-fracking as well as gas, which may retard the transition to new transport models (more public transport, less travel generally through localisation and suchlike).

if the renewables cannot compete at this point I don't care....coal is the first target and as solar continues to drop it will have more impact.
Getting rid of all fossil fuel subsidies and closing old coal plants and banning new ones.
I'd take that as a first step.

 

[BenBurch]

if the renewables cannot compete at this point I don't care....coal is the first target and as solar continues to drop it will have more impact.
Getting rid of all fossil fuel subsidies and closing old coal plants and banning new ones.
I'd take that as a first step.

Yes, a gas conversion at least staunches the bleeding.

Solar does indeed look like the solution now that hopes for fusion have dimmed considerably.

Still, I would love to get a grant to build a prototype Thorium energy amplifier. I am quite certain this could be made to work.

 

[Blue Mountain]

Yes, a gas conversion at least staunches the bleeding.

Solar does indeed look like the solution now that hopes for fusion have dimmed considerably.

Still, I would love to get a grant to build a prototype Thorium energy amplifier. I am quite certain this could be made to work.

Norway is building a thorium reactor [smartplanet.com]

 

[macdoc]

India and China cannot really afford to stop building coal plants nor can we morally justify telling them to.
Both are pursuing nuclear and China leads in solar and soon will in wind but with their population and growth they also lead in emissions.... yet at least they have tighter emission controls on vehicles than North America.

China acknowledges the problem of AGW and particulate pollution - that's head start over a few dunderhead nations.

With solar falling so quickly a business case for private is hard to construct so it will fall back to a combination of end user and gov subsidizes plus I think some large scale gov backed arrays.

It's sort of like Gates satellites - took a couple of depreciation rounds to work. Third world will benefit hugely from solar as a combination of cell towers and solar eliminate the need for build out of power/communications grid as occurred elsewhere.

Industry will still need infrastructure but off grid will be more and more easily viable.
It is already,.
The entire Daintree area north of where I am in Cairns Australia is off grid and most likely will stay that way - yet we and our hosts ( there for a decade ) were comfortable and that was before it got cheap.

Aside from coal - vehicles are still a challenge and city sprawl. But getting rid of coal or a serious attempt to get a fuel cycle based on the C02 emissions from coal onsite is a worthy long shot to pursue.

That the US military is active in alternate fuels means big money for research. At least they take the threat seriously even if the dumb ass right wing in the US and Canada don't.

 

[CapelDodger]

if the renewables cannot compete at this point I don't care....coal is the first target and as solar continues to drop it will have more impact.
Getting rid of all fossil fuel subsidies and closing old coal plants and banning new ones.
I'd take that as a first step.

Fossil fuel subsidies are pretty immaterial, but obviously a nonsense in the developed world. They're more complicated in the developing world, which are pretty much stuck with the "modern" transport and power systems foreign donors were prepared to finance.

The way I see it, a few years more of old coal plants which are doomed anyway is less important than a few years extra start on the renewables arc. Subsidies there now would have a great impact over time.

From a PR perspective fossil-fuel subsidies are a great weakness, and the majors should be eager to surrender them. Whether they are is a different matter.

 

[CapelDodger]

As the resident peace-nik hippy at jref, I'd like to emphasize the contribution of the U.S. military efforts to the climate. Without adding any more charts and graphs to the equation, it's a lot.

It has to be said that the US military has provided the most rational response to AGW of any national institution.

The anti-war movement has really crapped out in my country, and I can't imagine why.
Since Vietnam, our wars have only gotten more ridiculous and hopeless.

After Vietnam the US had no wars until Saddam invaded Kuwait, and that was both seriously executed and successful. Afghanistan was overdue and successful, but not carried through. It was the Iraq diversion which sent everything astray.

And they crank out a butt-load of CO2 into the atmosphere.

And are trying to reduce that. They're all-too-aware of the cost of getting fuel to the front, but they also recognise that AGW is strategically destabilising and not in the national interest. That makes it a matter for government.

The US military is on the side of reason. There's some comfort to be taken in that.

 

[CapelDodger]

Norway is building a thorium reactor [smartplanet.com]

Afraid not, they "will start burning thorium fuel in a conventional test reactor", which does raise the question of what an unconventional test reactor is like.

The "four-year test at Norway’s government owned Halden reactor could help thorium inch closer to replacing uranium as a possible safer and more effective nuclear power source". Using a mix of thorium and plutonium, for safety's sake .

File it away with fusion.

 

[macdoc]

The CanDu reactors are fine with thorium and Canada just concluded a deal with India to supply Candu technology to their industry after a moratorium.
Small steps.
Ill founded nuclear fears and over the approval costs have prevented cookie cutter roll out of modern reactor tech which could have been.
At least China and India are moving forward and a few others.

 

[Acleron]

Mitsubishi Heavy in Jpapn has called for nuclear reactors to be restarted.

 

[aleCcowaN]

Certainly conservative LDP and their allies New Komeito have gained a two-thirds majority in the House of Representatives what allows them overcoming any negative vote from the House of Councillors.

 

[macdoc]

Some sanity and economic reality sinks in.

 

[Trakar]

A two-minute preview of next IPCC report

A good way to spend an hour: "AGU Presidential Forum - Ira Flatow, NPR Science"

My personal favorite lecture: "Tyndall Lecture: GC43I. Successful Predictions"
(one of only two man-crushes I'll openly admit! - great review of history of AGW early predictions and understandings by Tyndall and contemporaries. Again, about an hour, but good information.)

Greetings! I've got a couple of weeks to myself, and thought I'd check back in on everyone. Great conferences out of the AGU meeting this year. I apologize if these have already been brought up, I have only briefly skimmed the front page of the thread, I'll be catching up on a couple of threads over the next few days. Good to see everyone, happy holidays, I hope all are in good health.

T.S.

 

[quarky]

Geepers.

I'm used to being wrong, but I never would have guessed how wrong I was about the U.S. military machinery, and its contribution to global warming.

Now, I learn that it's the exemplary organization for groovy change.

Boy, do I have egg on my face.

 

[CapelDodger]

The CanDu reactors are fine with thorium and Canada just concluded a deal with India to supply Candu technology to their industry after a moratorium.
Small steps.
Ill founded nuclear fears and over the approval costs have prevented cookie cutter roll out of modern reactor tech which could have been.

The lack of uptake of this technology is a worldwide phaenomenon, so a cookie-cutter explanation hardly cuts it. The promise of thorium, like fusion, has been with us for decades and yet remains essentially as far off as ever.

So colour me unconvinced.

At least China and India are moving forward and a few others.

Free, for the most part, of political fears and approval costs, so China at least should be a perfect test-bed. If they don't take it up with any eagerness, when doing something about air-quality (which is to say, about coal) is a looming imperative, then it very likely has inherent problems.

 

[macdoc]

Did not mean on thorium - just nuclear power in general. Nice that Japan is restarting some nukes.
AFAIK there is a technical problem with thorium that makes is harder to control the power levels - can't recall where I read that.

••

Quarky - the US military is the largest single consumer of fossil fuels so it's mostly out of necessity rather than good will that there is research being done.
BUt the US military also recognizes climate change as a very serious strategic threat due to the potential disruptions in many spheres.

 

[CapelDodger]

Geepers.

I'm used to being wrong, but I never would have guessed how wrong I was about the U.S. military machinery, and its contribution to global warming.

Now, I learn that it's the exemplary organization for groovy change.

Boy, do I have egg on my face.

Any military machine is an ugly thing, existentially, but by it's mechanical amoral nature it is capable of pure reasoning. The great failings are usually in the people who can put the machine to use.

In the US the military as an institution still has high regard (historically high), so its a great comfort to know that it has not become politicised recently. It also means that getting seriously-uniformed faces on the TV, perhaps speaking to Congress, saying these things could have a great impact.

Whether anyone in Congress or the mainstream media have the stones to make that happen is a matter for speculation so far. We can write off the White House, because they've ducked behind Gun Control for the duration (day-to-day imperatives aside, which AGW notoriously never is). Or maybe not, I'm just another pundit on the internet .

 

[Corsair 115]

Or maybe not, I'm just another pundit on the internet .

Those are in short supply, are they not?

 

[CapelDodger]

Did not mean on thorium - just nuclear power in general.

OK, so still a good testbed for nuclear in general. It's deeply uncertain in the UK; the political will is there, but the will to trap that much capital isn't.

An advantage for windfams is that each windmill starts earning as it's built, and if a project isn't working out the plug can be pulled early on. The same is not true for nuclear.

Nice that Japan is restarting some nukes.

Nice that there's less geological stress in the region now than before, you know, those issues arose.

AFAIK there is a technical problem with thorium that makes is harder to control the power levels - can't recall where I read that.

To me it reeks of not being as tasty as it might look on the surface.

Of course some pundits would say that of nuclear in general, but that's not really what this thread's about .