A ‘vicious cycle’ of global warming.
By on Feb 22nd, 2007 at 9:50 am
A ‘vicious cycle’ of global warming.
“Nearly half of the carbon that exists on land is contained in the sweeping boreal forests, which gird the Earth in the northern reaches of Canada, Alaska, Scandinavia and Russia. Scientists now fear that the steady rise in the temperature of the atmosphere and the increasing human activity in those lands are releasing that carbon, a process that could trigger a vicious cycle of even more warming.”
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Can we try to communicate to nature to only destroy the homes of repugs? I think that’s our best chance at conserving the worth-saving portion of humanity..
February 22nd, 2007 at 9:56 amI am cutting down on my energy use. Are YOU?
February 22nd, 2007 at 9:58 amWe are down to being a one-car family!
February 22nd, 2007 at 10:02 amThis crap again.
February 22nd, 2007 at 10:02 amA simulation study of future defense “scenarios” commissioned for the US Air Force calls for:
“US aerospace forces to ‘own the weather’ by capitalizing on emerging technologies and focusing development of those technologies to war-fighting applications… From enhancing friendly operations or disrupting those of the enemy via small-scale tailoring of natural weather patterns to complete dominance of global communications and counterspace control, weather-modification offers the war fighter a wide-range of possible options to defeat or coerce an adversary… In the United States, weather-modification will likely become a part of national security policy with both domestic and international applications. Our government will pursue such a policy, depending on its interests, at various levels.(5)
Washington’s Weapons Have the Ability to Trigger Climate Change
February 22nd, 2007 at 10:07 amI have cut done on my energy use. At 82 I don’t do near what I use to do. Sure hope this helps.
February 22nd, 2007 at 10:08 amPatrick1 sez:
Reality does tend to intrude from time to time, doesn’t it?
February 22nd, 2007 at 10:08 amWe are down to being a one-car family!
Comment by Raven — February 22, 2007 @ 10:02 am
We have been a one car family for 4 years. All it takes is a little coordination.
February 22nd, 2007 at 10:09 amI am cutting down on my energy use. Are YOU?
Comment by George
Yes! I take the bus, and only drive once a week.
February 22nd, 2007 at 10:13 amWait a minute!!!!
It’s cold in Idaho this morning, I think global warming might be over.
It’s really cold….
/sarcasm
February 22nd, 2007 at 10:15 amDid you read the linked article, Patrick1?
February 22nd, 2007 at 10:17 am(Not bad, for oilmen to come up with a solution…..)
I drive a 1998 Ford Escort that is now 9 years old (I was a math minor – that was an easy calculation). Today the odometer reads 24,545 miles or 2,727 miles driven on average per year – or an average of 227 miles per month. Living in the Washington DC area its very easy to not drive with the public transportation system including the subway system. Living here and doing what I can to cut down on energy consumption of CO2 generation, it aggrevates the hell out of me to see how many people are on the streets with only one person in a car, and how many Repugnicans are out there driving their Humvees that probably get less than 10 miles per gallon. Yes, we can each do our individual part but until the masses get its act together, all of our individual parts wont counterbalance the destruction the majority continues to create.
February 22nd, 2007 at 10:20 amThat’s amazing, Mike…. at first I thought your decimal points were off!
February 22nd, 2007 at 10:38 amMy lifelong driving averages about 10,000 miles a year, I live in New Mexico, and it’s a long ways to anywhere….
My energy saving efforts focus on electrical self sufficiency at home, from solar, and collecting rain water and xeriscaping the yard. (all precipitation is collected and or channeled to vegetation)
Other than that, I walk and ride a bike around town.
I got in an argument with someone about the urgency of addressing global warming. His argument was that at the historical rate of warming, we still have plenty of time to deal with the issue. Try as I might, I couldn’t convey the essential non-linearity of the process. That release of boreal carbon, failure of polar ice sheets, and catastrophic storm events do not happen gradually. To wait for there occurence is to wait beyond the point of no return.
February 22nd, 2007 at 10:53 amGlobal Warming is a faux religion it has nothing do with science.
February 22nd, 2007 at 10:55 amTo wait for there occurence is to wait beyond the point of no return.
Comment by pluky
Besides is a stupidity to wait until you have the problem right in your nose. We have to do something now. It always amazes me the amount of energy that US citizens use. For example, in movies you see a person in his apartment or house and he has like 5 TVs. ¿What for? The use of water is beyond normal. 3 billion people in this world dont have access to clean water and we, middle class, are spending it in huge amounts when we wash our cars with hoses instead of using buckets. The average person uses 70 liters of water in the shower. We have to decrease this. We have to use public transportation as most as we can. We have to change incadescent bulbs for fluorescent bulbs. And we have to create a culture of saving resources. This is not a finite world, nor its resources.
February 22nd, 2007 at 11:06 amDope… this is a not an infinite world…
February 22nd, 2007 at 11:11 amThis fraud is trying to scare people into something socialism couldn’t achieve via the gun or ballot, the end of a free market economy that has brought about the greatest standard of living in human history.
February 22nd, 2007 at 11:13 amI am a wildlife biologist with a Federal agency in Washington DC. My first job out of graduate school was with the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources where my supervisor had a great analogy for people like Patrick1, #15 above. The analogy went like this.
Imagine you wake up with a toothache one day. You go to the dentist who tells you a root canal is needed. Because of the dentists training and experience you believe him and let him auger out your tooth.
Then imagine you wake up one day with a horrible pain in your right side. At the doctor’s office you’re told your appendix is about to burst and it needs to be removed now. Because of your doctor’s training and experience you let him/her sedate you and cut open your body to remove a faulty part.
However, my supervisor said, when it comes to issues of wildlife biology everyone from the local bank president to the high school janitor is an expert and we who are trained in the profession know nothing about the needs of wildlife or its habitat.
The same is true with the science of climate change/global warming. Uneducated loudmouths like Rush Limbaugh and Senator James Inhofe squawk the loudest and protest the most and nimrods like Patrick1 profess to know the truth, while scientists who devote their life and career to understanding the vagaries of climate, or passionate advocates like Al Gore, are dismissed as alarmists.
Maybe, just maybe, some morning when Patrick1 wakes up and sees the ocean creeping up his front steps he’ll wake up. By then it will probably be too late not only for Patrick1 (no big loss there) but more importantly for society.
February 22nd, 2007 at 11:21 amGlobal Warming is a faux religion it has nothing do with science.
Comment by Patrick1
Gotta link to back up that idiotic assertion? Any idea what science is, Patrick?
February 22nd, 2007 at 11:27 amScience is open to peer review the recent UN report for example was not.
February 22nd, 2007 at 11:28 am#19…Patrick1. Your ignorance is showing. The United Nations report was a PEER review of existing published data on climate change. Peer review involves experts looking at the data and analysis of others. Thats what the United Nations report did. Its the epitome of peer review.
http://www.ipcc.ch/about/about.htm
Did you go to college with Bush perhaps?
February 22nd, 2007 at 11:34 amGeez, Patrick1, are you prepping for St.Patricks week? Stupid git………..
February 22nd, 2007 at 11:35 amOn July 24, 1974 Time Magazine published an article entitled “Another Ice Age?” Here’s the first paragraph:
February 22nd, 2007 at 11:46 am“As they review the bizarre and unpredictable weather pattern of the past several years, a growing number of scientists are beginning to suspect that many seemingly contradictory meteorological fluctuations are actually part of a global climatic upheaval. However widely the weather varies from place to place and time to time, when meteorologists take an average of temperatures around the globe they find that the atmosphere has been growing gradually cooler for the past three decades. The trend shows no indication of reversing. Climatological Cassandras are becoming increasingly apprehensive, for the weather aberrations they are studying may be the harbinger of another ice age.”
If global warming was a crisis there would be screams for a crash program to replace our 600-or-so coal-fired plants with 200 CO2-free nuclear ones. Unlike windmills and electric cars (which actually would be mostly coal-powered since 52 percent of our electric power comes from coal), nuclear plants are proven and practical. Jane Fonda would be hitting the talk shows praising uranium. Jackson Browne and Bruce Springsteen would have Pro-Nuke concerts. Sure there are issues with nuclear power but can they compare with the end-of-life-as-we-know-it? No. So no concerts, no crisis. For what it’s worth, U.S. coal plants produce 10 percent of the world’s greenhouse gas and we already have 100 nuclear plants up and running.
If global warming was a crisis, we’d be getting cars off the street by encouraging telecommuting by doing things like exempting home offices from OSHA regulations and indemnifying corporations from home accidents. The lawyers would not object because they’d understand that it is better to lose out on a few paydays than see their children fighting mutant mosquitoes on the Pennsylvania seashore. Of course, they do object so there is no crisis.
If global warming was a crisis, we’d bend over backward to remove traffic bottlenecks. There would be small and symbolic acts like getting rid of toll roads and bridges and there would be massive emergency road programs in which affirmative action and Davis-Bacon wage requirements were waived to maximize resources.
Of course, not only are these things not being done but those who scream the loudest about our impending globally warmed doom would scream equally loud about trying to implement them.
So it is perfectly safe to say there is no crisis.
©CountyPressOnline.com 2007
February 22nd, 2007 at 11:51 amOn July 24, 1974 Time Magazine published an article entitled “Another Ice Age?….â€
Comment by Patrick1
Yeah? Well, one time a couple of dudes named A.M. Ghezelbash & R.B. Mann wrote a book called “Nutty Bubbles.”
February 22nd, 2007 at 11:52 amPatrick1,
I thought you were only ACTING stupid on Spongebob!
You’d have to have your head up your arse to believe that NOBODY is screaming about these things.
And you pulled a reference that makes strawman arguments which actually help PROVE global warming if you had any perception of irony and the common sense of an adult.
February 22nd, 2007 at 12:04 pmWhy are you quoting an article from 34 years ago, splatrick-one?
February 22nd, 2007 at 12:04 pmBecause it is as accurate as the Think thing that was posted at the beginning of this thread.
February 22nd, 2007 at 12:07 pmScience is open to peer review the recent UN report for example was not.
Comment by Patrick1 — February 22, 2007 @ 11:28 am
This comment exhibits breathtaking stupidity. The IPCC process constitutes the greatest peer review effort ever mounted in science. Hundreds of experts reviewed thousands of peer-reviewed papers to reach a consensus on the meaning of it all. Because of the large number of people involved, consensus could only be reached on the findings of greatest certainty. In that regard, this is a very conservative assessment of the situation, which could be far worse.
Give it up, Patrick. You are painting yourself into a teeny-weeny lonesome corner of fringe freaks.
February 22nd, 2007 at 12:08 pmI was talking with my very liberal friend over the weekend. This friend is extremely concerned about global warming, the environment, and all that noise. It’s a religion to him. Almost all he talks about. That and about how horrible Bush is. Like all good Democrats, he wakes up every morning hating President Bush more than the day before.
Anyways, I asked him about global warming and our energy use. He was saying that we have to conserve. It’s the most important thing. So I asked him if he was.
Well, he can’t. He has kids, so he and his wife can’t carpool. They each work different shifts at work so one can drop them off at school, and one can pick them up. I asked him why didn’t his kids take the school bus? He said that he was concerned about their safety, so that is why they drove their kids to school.
In addition, both kids have lots of life activities. So both he and his wife have to take seperate trips many evenings for soccer and volleyball practice, tae kwon doe lessons, basketball, etc. Something year around for the kids. Of course, they both drive SUVs. I asked him why? He said that smaller cars just aren’t roomy enough when you have kids and equipment in the car.
So I asked about alternative energy such as nuclear energy. He is opposed beyond all belief, and say “If people just conserve, we don’t need to do that.”
I guess he means “other people” have to conserve. Multiply him by 100 million, and now you know why conservation will at most only amount to a drop in the bucket as part of a solution to our energy needs. People won’t conserve in large enough numbers to make an impact.
February 22nd, 2007 at 12:10 pmPatrick, it’s easier just to agree with them. Furthermore, if we assume what the “climate cassandras” are saying as 100% accurate, then we need to stop burning fossil fuels.
The only way we can do that is to build hundreds of nuclear power plants to generate our electricity.
If the “climate cassandras” balk at that idea and start talking about biofuels and alternative energy, then we know they’re not really serious and they’re not educated on the subject matter. And we can move on.
February 22nd, 2007 at 12:13 pmSplatrick….You’re going to have to pull your mug up outa’ that pint and start looking around a bit more…. the world has evolved considerably since you took up self induced oblivion…..
February 22nd, 2007 at 12:13 pmPatrick, since to you the work of scientists constitutes a faux religion in which you refuse to believe, I suggest that you give up all the trappings of civilization that science has brought to you and revert to a stone age life. Otherwise, STFU before you make an even bigger fool of yourself.
And give it up on the global cooling thing. It was a flash in the pan idea that never gained much traction in the scientific community, so it died a quick death. In contrast, global warming theory as it now stands represents 20 years of research that has culminated in a broad and deep consensus among the entire scientific community.
February 22nd, 2007 at 12:17 pmThat is what keeps you alive, idiot.
February 22nd, 2007 at 12:20 pmPeople won’t conserve in large enough numbers to make an impact.
Comment by muckdog — February 22, 2007 @ 12:10 pm
I fear this is true, with the catastrophically bad leadership we have in this country. Make gas $5 a gallon and people will start conserving. Make them pay for the externalities associated with consuming fossil fuels and they will start conserving.
By the way, I am not unilaterally opposed to nuclear, but it is only a small piece of the puzzle. Nuclear plants take a long time to build at an enormous capital cost, and at an enormous energy cost because of the tremendous amount of concrete used. Furthermore, the known reserves of uranium would only last a few decades if we replace oil entirely with nuclear (see David Goodstein’s book “The End Of The Age Of Oil”).
February 22nd, 2007 at 12:22 pmScientists fear that human activity is increasing the carbon level in the atmosphere, which could cause a cycle of dangerously warmer weather. I believe that if every person were to cut down on their energy use by only 3% it could make a world of difference. If high school siblings were to take only one vehicle to school instead of them each taking one of their own, it would not only cut down on fuel use but carbon emissions also. I believe that global warming is an issue that we as Americans need to take seriously. I don’t think that we need to bring an abundance of technology and billions of dollars to this issue. In fact, I believe we could not only save the world by making a few simple daily changes, but save money. Fuel-efficient cars should be made cheaper, electric cars should be made more practical, and if the issue gets out of hand, hummers and other gas guzzling vehicles should stop being mass produced and less available. There should be more investments in solar powered items; i.e. homes, cars, lawn mowers…
February 22nd, 2007 at 12:36 pmIf we take too long to realize that there is an issue at hand, we will have a serious and potentially deadly problem in the future. It is not just changing energy usage person by person, but we need to change the way our culture thinks. We could do more telecommunicating and more in home jobs. There could be tighter restrictions on the emissions that being put out.
Furthermore, the known reserves of uranium would only last a few decades if we replace oil entirely with nuclear — VerbalKint
Then there is the question of what to do with the nuclear waste.
Oh, I forgot, we just use it on our ememies in Depleted Uranium shells, doh. How could I forget that!
February 22nd, 2007 at 12:46 pmSadly, I believe that the Corporate Militarists are more than willing to lose some coastal real estate once they have made their sale, and bought a new bunker on higher ground, and to hell with whoever can’t afford to leave.
February 22nd, 2007 at 12:48 pmExploitation of people and resources at the moment is their primary goal, with no regard for the future.
They are willing to turn the Mesopotamian oil fields into uninhabitable wastelands.
They are anxious for the arctic sea ice to melt, providing them with year rounding drilling and shipping of oil and mineral resources the receding permafrost and ice will expose.
I could go on, but I’m starting to bum myself out………
There are about 80 years worth of uranium left. In addition, we now know how to recycle the waste. 95% of the energy is still in the waste. France, Japan and others are now recycling the waste. So this will prolong the viability of nuclear power.
Nuclear would be a stop-gap for the next 50-80 years until technology advances to something else.
The waste isn’t that big of an issue because so little waste is generated compared to coal plants, for example.
In addition, we’re wasting our Natural Gas resources to generate electricity. If we replaced those with nuclear, we could use the Natural Gas for something else like fueling vehicles. Much cleaner than burning gasoline.
Nuclear is the “big” part of the solution for the next 50 years. That’s why China is building 40 plants over the next 15 years, and plans on 300 nuclear plants over the next 5 decades. That’s why France gets 85% of their energy from nuclear power. That’s why India, Japan, and Australia are building more nuclear plants.
But the US is full of nuclear hysterics and we’re stuck in the 70’s while these other countries move forwards. Shame on the US.
February 22nd, 2007 at 12:55 pmNo wonder Repugs are addicted to Global Warming if it has anything ‘vicious’ in it.
February 22nd, 2007 at 1:06 pmfrom #24
“On July 24, 1974 Time Magazine published an article entitled “Another Ice Age?†Here’s the first paragraph…”
I first remember hearing about global warming in 1988. People talked about it more and more, and today, 19 years later, people are still talking about it. Time magazine still talks about it.
Does anybody remember the last time he/she heard scientists talking about the new Ice Age? The fact that that story’s been pretty much dead for the last 30-ish years, compared to the consistent pronouncements on global warming, might suggest that some people are still taking this climate change thing seriously.
February 22nd, 2007 at 1:34 pm#24 – David Carlisle,
February 22nd, 2007 at 1:41 pmThe only term I’ve heard used is ‘nuclear winter’.
The waste isn’t that big of an issue because so little waste is generated compared to coal plants, for example.
Comment by muckdog — February 22, 2007 @ 12:55 pm
The sheer stupidity of this comparison is awesome, muckdog. No reckoning whatsoever for the relative lethality. Brilliant. Just f***ing brilliant.
February 22nd, 2007 at 1:47 pmThe sheer stupidity of this comparison is awesome, muckdog. No reckoning whatsoever for the relative lethality. — VerbalKint
All these pro-nuclear plant people never really address the waste issue. Nuclear waste continues to be radioactive for thousands of years. The land it is dumped in or on is lethal to all life for thousands of years.
February 22nd, 2007 at 1:58 pmThe land it is dumped in or on is lethal to all life for thousands of years.
Comment by Wayne
Walt, can you give us a hand here regarding nuclear waste disposal technologies? I havent had the opportunity to look deeper into the subject.
Wayne, I agree with you. Nuclear plants are expensive, imagine Haiti trying to build one of those. Nuclear wastes are confined under tons of concrete once the reactor has passed its lifetime. My concern is what about earthquakes, floods, etc. that can damage this protection shell between uranium and environment. There is no 100% waste disposal technology, yet, IMO. Besides, uranium is not a renewable source of energy. The only renewable source of energy is the sun.
February 22nd, 2007 at 2:21 pmThis “vicious cycle” of global warming is NOTHING compared to the RABID Segway(tm) which got its mechanical fangs imbued in CHIMPya and left him bruised and battered! Now why can’t the sun burn some MALIGNANT MELANOMAS into CHIMPya instead of the benign moles he recently was BLESSED with?
February 22nd, 2007 at 3:22 pmJuan C,
February 22nd, 2007 at 3:33 pmJuan C,
The French encapsulate their waste in glass where the waste is part of the structure. The last I had access to techniques used in the United States, we were using cooling pools sited at the reactor or concrete barrels which were stored willy-nilly on government bases. They have been trying to create a storage facility in Nebraska but have met local resistance. In addition, some states have written laws that forbid the transit if nuclear waste products through or over their territory. The Soviet Union kept its waste in above-ground dumps until one day in the mid-50s, a truck dropped one too many loads at a place in the Urals. The driver of that particular vehicle and the dump crew were not available for questioning.
Global Warming is a faux religion it has nothing do with science.
Comment by Patrick1
Your denial is a Fox religion that has nothing to do with science.
February 22nd, 2007 at 4:42 pmThis is probably very important, but, “half the carbon on the land” is a bit of a misleading statement … most of the carbon is not “on the land” … it’s a lot of carbon in these trees but it is not as much as this statement makes it sound. Also, this is NOT fossil carbon. The biggest problem is release of fossil carbon. Of course, carbon sinks matter (and trees are a carbon sink)…
Don’t get me wrong .. I am NOT a “global warming apologist” or whatever you call the yahoos who deny the importance of global warming. I’m just a lot less worried about this carbon source than about the industrial based sources. We don’t need to get thrown off the track of a better environment by blaming the trees again!
February 22nd, 2007 at 4:53 pmhttp://www.canada.com/nationalpost/story.html?id=22003a0d-37cc-4399-8bcc-39cd20bed2f6&k=0
February 22nd, 2007 at 5:19 pmGlobal Warming is a faux religion it has nothing do with science.
Comment by Patrick1
Your denial is a Fox religion that has nothing to do with science.
I can hear Faux News blaring in the background as he types.
February 22nd, 2007 at 9:00 pmW will combat global warming by turning up the AC. By the time Houston is under water, H W and Babs will both be dead. Crawford has at least 100 years to go prior to the flood. Cheney is a short-lifer as he is both bald and gray at 66 so what does he have to worry about? He should be worm fodder within two to four years.
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life cycle assessment
Well spoken. I have to research more on this as it is really vital info.
March 17th, 2008 at 1:12 pmauger
When the victim shut down the machine and exited from it, he stepped
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April 13th, 2008 at 10:27 am