I don’t know what to think about Global Warming, and it’s driving me rather bonkers. Having lived through a time when we were threatened with an Imminent Ice Age, having had people try to frighten me about Our Fatally Diminished Ozone Layer – whatever happened to that, by the way? – and now seeing the same groups of people agitating for Less Debate and More Instant Action on Global Warming I have inherited the right to skepticism, I believe.
And yet, if the alarmists are right – not just niche scientists fanning the flames of ecological hysteria in search of government grants to support their continued employment research, not just anti-globalization nihilists, not just reflexively anti-American or anti-industry anarchists, not just political partisans who cynically manipulate the emotions of wolly-headed Gaians and other people who “just want to do some good” – if none of those things are true individually or in combination, then we ought to have an frank and open discussion about what impact humanity is actually having on the environment, what the the potential cost of that impact might be and whether or not it’s technologically, economically and morally feasible to do something about it.
Which is increasingly difficult to do because the alarmist set – which quite certainly counts as members in their ranks the kinds of people enumerated above, along with good people trying to do the right thing, of course – have begged the question, declared the debate to be over and insisted that everyone else kindly shut the hell up. But even though a lot of these people have been horribly wrong about pretty much everything, they might be right in this case, even given their antecedents.
And it’s not as if we can simply make up our own minds on this: If there is unseasonably warm winter weather, the Global Warmers say, “Aha! It’s been proven!” while if the weather is unseasonably cold, or there are more hurricanes than usual, or less hurricanes, we are told that “extremes are predicted by the model.” Which, is wonderful, if true, because we now have a unified field theory that can explain everything: Warm weather and cold, calm winds and violent.
Of course, a theory that can placidly claim to explain extreme weather and mild doesn’t really explain anything at all, or at least, it doesn’t explain anything in a very useful way. The passion of environmental activists on this subject is something very closely akin to religion. In fact, for some enviro-activists Global Warming appears to fill the hole – a need to feel virtuous about oneself, even while defining the sins of others – that a sense of the sacred fills in people of faith. Non-believers in mankind’s contribution to climate change are actually labeled as “heretics,” rather than openly debated.
Pardon me, but I’ve only got room for one religion in my life and the spot is pretty much filled, while science? It doesn’t work that way.
And into the breach of my continued uncertainty, the UK’s Channel 4 has leapt with this video- “The Great Global Warming Swindle”:
The video runs a bit more than an hour and appears to substantially demolish a great deal of what is the accepted Global Warming narrative. A good outline of the program’s thesis is laid out here, in a blog whose point of view is probably very far from my own in significant ways, yet whose owner shares my concern that spending a great deal of money unwisely might be the worst possible thing we can do. To excerpt:
1. Our climate is always changing. The current change is not out of the ordinary if one considers the Little Ice Age of C16-C18th, or the Medieval Warm Period.
2. Man produces only a small amount of carbon dioxide compared with natural causes.
3. Changes in carbon dioxide do not precede global warming. They follow global warming.
4. If the theory of climate change science is correct, temperatures should be rising more rapidly in the troposphere. This is not the case.
5. Global temperatures are dependent on cloud formation, which in turn are seeded by sub-atomic particles from the sun. In periods of high solar activity, such as now, fewer particles reach the earth leading to fewer clouds and therefore more warming.
6. Support for global warming science began in the 1980s with an unholy alliance of anti-capitalists and anti-coal Thatcherites; after the death of communism, environmentalism became a useful rack on which to hang otherwise-discredited socialist beliefs.
7. Promoting climate change was a great way for climate scientists to leverage money for their research. It has since become a way for any researcher to attract cash. It has spawned a massive industry that is now devoted to protecting its
I was open to being persuaded that humans were causing global warming until I read that other planets are warming also. That’s significant. I’m now unwilling to support economic damage for the purpose of reducing CO2.
Lex;
Global cooling, ozone layer, global warming: Ever hear of Chicken Little?
Go read “The Art of Contrary Thinking” by Humphrey B. Neill. First printing in 1954, but the 1960 edition is better. It’s about Wall Street and the Stock Market, but like most good, clear thinking, what he says can apply to other fields.
Also, go find “Voice of The People: Readings in Public Opinion and Propaganda”. The 1962 edition is the best as it has Plato’s “Allegory of the Cave” which still blows my socks off when I re-read it.
We are living in the age of propagnaga, (the art of manipulation through the judicious use of Bulls**t).
Lex,
I found this interview pretty informative…
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/warming/debate/singer.html
Yes, pixelkiller, Chicken Little is a good way to look at this sometimes; “the sky is falling, the sky is falling, the sky is falling.”
One may wish to assume the same take as the farmer on all of this: “Oh, sh*t, a talking chicken!”
Lex,
Saw this vid last eve over at LGF. Was wunnerin if I should chose the same topic and same vid to post on the Fightdeck. Global Warming certainly is a religious and political topic, but since you brought it to light at this blog, I’ll have at it.
After y’all watch this vid, there’s even more evidence being ignored by the environmental cultnuts:
***********
More severe storms and climate change are being seen — on Jupiter.
The “Great Red Spot” has developed a palor for the past few annos.
A new “Little Red Spot” has formed in the same hemishpere, and the two storms may merge together to make the perfect Jovian storm. No comments from El FatAl.
***********
Polar ice caps are disappearing at an alarming rate — on Mars.
Blame the two SUVs up there.
No comments from El FatAl.
**************
We have just endured an incredible “solar maximum”. Just a few years ago I was atop a local peak observing deep space objects. That evening had an incredible display of Northern Lights that was visible to Sandy Eggo.
Satelllites are being zapped at an alarming rate from particle bombardment.
SUV emissions do not not induce these phenomenae: solar coronal mass ejections do.
All this coincides during a period when we are a few degrees warmer.
No comment from El FatAl.
**************
A friend who is a former NASA planetary climatologist just barfs at all this bad science.
**************
Before you buy-in, look to see who plans on making all the money. One of the big money makers is already El FatAl, and that is his very incovenient truth.
With respect,
-SJBill
Shipmates,
If you want to read a REAL incoveniant truth, one that AlGore doesn’t want folks to know about, then read this article:
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1794309/posts
Gore set up his LLC to make money off of pollution credits before he made his movie. His movie is nothjing but an infomercial for his scheme, but the real tragedy is that he’s using the average Joe as suckers. His Corporation is for the major financial players, the average worker can’t afford to buy in.
This is nothing but a merging of PT Barnum and Tammany Hall, albeit on an international scale.
AlGore is a parasite.
Respects,
I know what you mean Lex…..I tend to run hot and cold on the whole issue too. Looks to me kind of like…….who doesn’t have a hidden agenda?
I forgot sumptin: this ball has been kicked around for a while:
Nothervid link: http://www.glumbert.com/media/globalwarming1958
Wayyyy back in ‘58 Richard Carlson (of “I Lead Three Lives”) and Dr. Frank Baxter (Bell Labs “science” vids fame) were crying their Chicken Little hearts out about Global Warming. Only prob: it got real cold in the 70s, and as y’all know, the tune swung to Global Cooling back then.
So these guys are keeping little kids awake at night scared more than we were back in the Duck and Cover days, and they are making money.
Our star is a variable, not as variable as most, but variable to within a few percent. Let’s all hope she doesn’t really start having spasm, or we are likely to have another ice age.
Me, I wanna grow mangoes in my back yard and now I can’t. And my neighbor’s banana trees froze this past winter. Pity.
-SJBill
Captain Lex,
I’d venture that, like you, I am willing to be convinced, yet skeptical of the motives of some of those doing the convincing. P.J. O’Rourke once quoted the alarmist Stephen Schneider as saying something very close to the following: “We [scientists] have to offer up scary scenarios…decide for ourselves on the proper balance between being truthful and being effective.”
Having said that, I can’t resist making the following points. I am not a climate scientist, and claim no expertise at all in this discussion.
We were well on track to destroying the ozone layer. I am generally no fan of politicized environmentalism, but without the kind of strict controls that were into place on ozone-destroying chemicals, you wouldn’t have to ask, “whatever happened to that, by the way?”
There’s some chicken-and-egg on that. Gases are less soluble in liquids as they warm up. When the earth gets warmer now and then, which of course it will do in cycles without our help, then CO2 will bubble out of the oceans; bubbles trapped in ice will be released, and good proxy records reaching back into the past will no doubt show that when the temperature rises, there’s more CO2 in the atmosphere.
There has been, however, this remarkably steady rise in atmospheric CO2 concentration from about 280 ppm in the late 1800s, to 380 now. It was 360 at the point in the ’90s when people started worrying loudly about it.
There is a lot of argument on how much of this can be attributed to natural outgassing. But (here’s where I get the alarmists mad) the oceans haven’t actually warmed up that much. The difference in CO2 solubility between then and now is too slight to explain much of that increase. Attributing most of the rise to the Industrial Revolution isn’t just lazy post hoc reasoning.
Which brings me to:
Let’s leave that aside for now. GDP correlates pretty well with carbon emissions. Not coincidence; both getting rich and living comfortably involve using lots of energy, and right now most of it comes from fossil fuels. If China and India come up to our standard of living, absent a revolution in energy generation, just man-made CO2 emissions should bring the total level past 800 ppm by the end of the century. (That’s assuming no change in natural causes, which could add to it or subtract from it.)
In terms of gross quantities of CO2, yes: Our emissions are small compared to those from natural sources. Ours, however, are the ones not in equilibrium with some corresponding consumption process. Last I checked, we (the world; I’m not a blame-America guy) are putting out 26 billion tons of CO2 a year. That’s over 3,000 cubic miles.
If you’ll forgive the metaphor, sir, point #2 is a bit like arguing that that little horizontal stabilizer can’t possibly rotate the whole aircraft off the runway.
None of this is meant to argue for either (a) trying to get the Third World to stay impoverished, or (b) crippling our economy while Third World economies continue to fire up largely on coal. But with all due respect to the Law of Unintended Consequences, I’d just about support something like a Manhattan Project for non-fossil-fuel-based energies, both for environmental and (long-term) national security reasons.
JPS,
Funny you should mention the Manhattan Project.
I have been writing my Congress-Critters for 2 decades now to urge them to covert from fossil duel to nuclear for the majority of energy needs in this country.
My solution is simple, really. Place the United States Navy in charge of national nuclear production. Build cookie-cutter plants, of a similar design and size to that we use on our submarines. Put them in every county, and make all of the employees Active Duty Navy Personel.
Think about it. Every nuke plant in this nation is unique. No two are designed or built alike. As a result, it’s difficult for employees to transfer from one power company to another. these plants are also huge, monolithic beasts.
By using a standard design, for limited area production, we could supply nearly all the electric energy we would need, and be able to use personell from one plant at another as needs arose. Parts would be interchangeable, so costs would go down. It’s a win-win system.
Heck, if the whole system was well thought out, you could even have stations every few miles where electric vehicles could plug in to recharge, or perhaps work on a transfer system whereby the energy could be sent to the roads and picked up by the car during transit, thus relegating battery power to emergency needs.
Yeah, pipe dream perhaps, but if it was a military project, it might well get off the ground fast, and using current Navy powerplants, could be in use in a surprisingly short amount of time.
But what do I know…..
Respects,
AW1 Tim:
Interesting. I’ve wondered about that myself, from time to time, though not quite from the perspective you’ve detailed. Given the Navy’s vast wealth of nuclear engineering experience, and its track record on safety, I think there’s a real case to be made for it.
There remains of course the political question of what to do with the compact but very nasty mess that nuclear power makes. As if leaving it in temporary storage, above ground, is so much safer. I keep wondering where France, which doesn’t have our deserts, puts theirs.
Carbon dioxide readily dissolves in water. Just leave any container of boiled H2O out in the open for a while and it eats up the CO2 in the room. It forms carbonic acid and in bays or open oceans (especially in the polar regions), it does, it feeds organisms by the cubic mile. These organisms become reefs and ocean bottom ooze, again, by the cubic mile.
Ever heard of limestone? We live on it in much of the terrestrial environment. That’s how much CO2 used to be floating around and has been captured by critters that like the stuff. So if’n all the CO2 that has been converted to limestone and dolomote should be fizzed away, I still wouldn’t be worried by CO2. It’s been up there before and is certain to return via the CO2 cycle (that used to be taught in schools before the schools and the media fell into lockstep.)
The Earth has been warmer than it is now for most of its life. We are just exiting an ice age just 10,000 years ago, and we’re getting back to “normal”.
Read any good oceanography, stratigraphy or oceanography text from 25 years ago before everybody got caught up in this bogus hysteria.
The gummint sponsored schools are not producing scientists. They are producing cookie cutter activists that I can’t get next to.
Do you really think that any of the physicists of today’s generation could/would conceive of an atomic bomb? No way. Most have become way too PC, which is why I have stopped subscribing to the journals of my discipline.
JPS,
Thought about that fuel storage problem as well…. Why store it here? Why not boost it off planet and send it into, say, the sun? We could have a valid use for all those left-over ICBM boosters. Put the used fuel into ablative cannisters for protection in case of accident, and boost them into the sun.
Alternately, boost them into one of the three lagrangean point (L1; L2, or L3) and when we have a large volume, boost them all at once into a decaying solar orbit. Heck, send them to Venus or Mercury. There’s nothing there that anyone will be trying to mine or explore in person since the environment there is so hostile.
Thing is, folks keep looking about on Earth for solutions, when we have a number of valid off-planet ones. There could be a great deal of money made by commercial space ventures who could develop an off-Earth disposal system.
We can do it if we want to. The key is convincing our “green” friends that nuclear power isn’t the boogie man they envisage. Yes, it requires respect, but the answer of more and better burnable fuels isn’t going to get the job done. Corn prices, due to the stupid idea of ethanol, have risen dramatically, and in Mexico are threatening the food supply, since farmers are selling their crops to ethanol producers instead of to food producers to make tortillas and other grain foods.
Oil is still plentiful and relatively cheap, but the refining capacity is running full tilt and we need to build more infrastrecture there to increase production until we can get the Nukes online.
Yet you would think that a clean-burning nuclear fuel would be more attractive than caol and oil, but our Enviro-Freinds keep pushing it.
Solar power is neat, but it’s too inefficient and too costly to answer for anyone but the truly rich. Yeah, I could convert my house to a pure solar enviroment, but the cost would be near 100K dollars. Up front.
So, nuclear it is. We just need to have the will to do it, and the national program to get it off the ground, so to speak…
respects,
Tim, I not only thought those things I devoted a considerable amount of time and treasure to them back in 1985, when I declared my college major to be Nuclear Engineering, emphasis on power production. I’d lived through the Arab Oil Embargo, the gas prices of the mid-80’s, it was time to go nuclear and I was going to get in on that elevator and ride it to the top.
Three years later I changed majors because, well, we couldn’t get policy passed without some bearded bed-wetting vegetarian bicyclist who bothers whales on weekends filing a lawsuit and it became obvious the whole debate wasn’t about power in electrical form, it was about power in political form.
Regarding your two points, look up the Westinghouse and Toshiba 4S sodium-cooled designs. They’re basically a nuclear battery, self-moderating, heck they could replace diesel in trains if you wanted them to. Also, for removal of waste, it’s only treaties that keep us from reprocessing, and I note the French seem to have no problem with reprocessing for others, so waste could be much reduced by simply re-negotiating treaties designed for a Cold War era. After that, ever notice the solar system is sort of a plane? If you launch something towards the sun you’ve a chance it might miss and intercept your orbit again, but launch it outside of that plane and it won’t be seen for eons. And gee, a Saturn V fueled with liquid hydrogen and liquid oxygen produces only water as a waste product. I think I see a potential waste disposal solution here.
Now just try to get that allowed by a Congress fed by donations and as technical as a brick. It’s 2007, and we still don’t have a nuclear power industry, and we never will until the costs of annoying one group is less expensive than annoying the populace.
– Max
Max,
Everything you said.
I’ve been beating my head against that same stone wall for so many years I have a permanent headache.
What slays me most is that it is all so doable. We CAN do it, if we’d just slap down the damned politics and go for the solution.
Respects,
Tim,
The notion of dumping the radiowaste into the Sun pops up over and over.
But if you look at the deltaV (total acceleration) required, it’s a *lot* easier to send it out of the solar system; to hit the Sun, you need to dump much of the earth’s orbital speed.
It turns out that we don’t have any launchers that can do that currently. Proposals for a Sun-grazing probe generally require a slingshot trajectory around Jupiter to get enough change in velocity to get near the Sun.
It would be easier/cheaper to send the package to hit the moon. It’s nearby (comparatively), we know we can hit it, and if it turns out that the stuff is useful for something later, we can go and pick it up, too, rather than wasting it all.
Shipmates,
And MaxDamage brought up another point. If a Saturn V can achieve orbit with a mix of Hydrogen and Oxygen, why can’t we simpk,y create some massive electrical plants on eacxh coast that uses the same technology that our submarines use to create O2 from salt water? We use electrolysis to take in sea water and convert it into oxygen and hydrogen, dumping the Hydrogen back into the water.
Why not pump in sea water, seperate the O2 from the Hydrogen, and then use the two as fuel to make heat to create steam to drive electric generators. Am I missing something here?
Respects,
SJBill:
I’ve heard of limestone. And I know that boiled water dissolves CO2. In the long run, we can turn all flammable carbon into CO2 and eventually the world will reach equilibrium again. Your points are well taken. It’s in the short and medium term that I happen to think the uncontrolled release of CO2 could prove disagreeable. I’m no activist, and my own science is far enough removed from this that I’ve got no axe to grind.
AW1 Tim:
SJBill:
I’ve heard of limestone. And I know that boiled water dissolves CO2. In the long run, we can turn all flammable carbon into CO2 and eventually the world will reach equilibrium again. Your points are well taken. It’s in the short and medium term that I happen to think the uncontrolled release of CO2 could prove disagreeable. I’m no activist, and my own science is far enough removed from this that I’ve got no axe to grind.
AW1 Tim:
I agree–for now. But I’d venture that advances in inorganic and solid-state chemistry may yet change this equation. The business of converting light to stored chemical energy, in artificial systems, is in its infancy, and it’s starting to get a lot of attention.
I’d be very surprised if photovoltaics remain as impractical in 20-30 years as they are now. I tend to think that nuclear power is the way we’ll buy ourselves time until we learn to use light better.
‘Fact, the only reason I wouldn’t argue that we should spend the energy from those naval reactors you envision to turn silica to high-grade silicon, thereby nationalizing the prohibitive sunk cost of solar, is that it would mire us in the current horse-and-buggy era of photovoltaics.
I think you’re talking about generating hydrogen on each coast, using these massive reactor complexes and seawater, then shipping the hydrogen around the country as conventional generator fuel? Interesting–the inland generators would be in essence running off the coastal reactors. If I understand you correctly–not sure I do–you’re not missing anything but I think the logistics of shipping all that hydrogen around might be prohibitive. Hydrogen storage is a really big research effort right now, because if we’re serious about using it as a fuel, we’ve got to find better ways to handle it.
AW1, I’m no expert, but I think that the amount of energy to do what you suggest with the sea water would be too great. I operate a Steam Methane Reformer that makes hydrogen for a refinery, and the Btu’s we pump in to reform methane and steam to H2’s is tremendous. Like I said, I’m no expert, but, I do make ~35mmscfd of the little buggers (hydrogen molecules, that is) everyday I go to work, and if there were an easier and cheaper way to do it, believe me, we’d be doin’ it. Just a thought…
But I do love the whole USN Operated Munincipal-Nuke plant idea… wonder if they’d take back an old Senior Chief to help keep things tidy?
SJBill- we seem to denerate it and store it and ship it and pipe it and bottle it just fine… we supply NASA with all their H2’s… I don’t think that is really an issue…
SJBill- we seem to generate it and store it and ship it and pipe it and bottle it just fine… we supply NASA with all their H2’s… I don’t think that is really an issue… more of a political issue imho.
Lee:
Thanks for that, but the objection was mine, not SJBill’s. We certainly do have the technology to generate, store, ship, pipe, and fuel rockets with liquid hydrogen. I was referring to the economics of scale, of trying to use hydrogen as the energy currency for 300 million people. I’d venture that we need some pretty big improvements in hydrogen storage technology before this becomes anything like cost-effective.
I am basing this objection solely on the knowledge that DOE has a pretty major funding initiative in this area. Not saying they alwways spend their money wisely, but they don’t tend to fund research into solved problems.
Follow the Money Trail !
JPS, sorry… not only am I dyslexic, I’m fat fingered too! As far as using hydrogen for an energy source, you really wouldn’t need to store it per say. Just the methane, which we already have a means to do. A SMR (Steam Methane Reformer) can be scaled to the requirement, i.e.- it can be small, in your garage say to conduct local refueling, or made larger to refuel at a gas station sized facility. Storing it as a liquid is really not that much more of a ’step’ in the process, we do it now at facilities here on the left coast for H2 powered vehicals. The reality of the hydrogen myth is that the only real benefit is in emmisions from the cars themselves (much lower than carbon fueled cars, water mostly I think). The rub is in making the hydrogen for fuel, it requires tremendous amounts of energy, and that energy usually creates vast tons of CO2, and then we’re right back where we started… oh the inconvenient spoof of it all!
[...] Neptunus Lex says the global warming talk leaves him cold. [...]
Two weeks ago I read the following line,..”Proof of man’s total arrogance is to believe he caused global warming and… that he can reverse it”
I recycle plastics, newspapers & cardboard. I carpool to work, I keep my household thermostat set very low even in a chilly New England winter, I use cloth napkins and cloth kitchen towels (hey I gotta do laundry anyway, and they don’t take up that much space in a load). I do my part in small ways.
But do I think I caused global warming? I’d have to believe in it first, wouldn’t I…and I don’t.
Should I sell my small waterfront house and run to Montana? I would if’n I could you know!
I live on the water and have been overflown by 4-5 hurricanes. Water comes up- water goes down. If it goes up 40′- I’m paddling.
You know, even though we have all this technology and global information with internet and celluar, life today is getting to be like the Dark Ages- rumours, pestilence, zealotry, dire predictions and area ZPG, in particular. Hell. The Europeans are just going back to their Tree Worshipping pagan beliefs pre Christianity….!
Except now it is just a hype-Dark Ages (created by GW Bush in the last 7 years!). We’ve got technical imbeciles (journalists & Gore like critters) explaining acientific things and scientists who want their names in the papers. Dangerous mix for true science.
Yep Dark Ages. Add the Islamo-facists to da mix and one can agree we’re riding a planet-ship o’fools! Ah humanity.
b2
Ooops- got off on that Dark Ages ages tangent!
“Nine FACTS About Climate Change“:
Web Reconnaissance for 03/12/2007…
A short recon of what?ǂ
Web Reconnaissance for 03/12/2007…
A short recon of whats out there that might draw your attention….
Some light reading on the topic if anyone is interested:
Senator James Inhofe (R-Okla.)
Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works
September 25, 2006
Hot & Cold Media Spin: A Challenge To Journalists Who Cover Global Warming
DECEMBER 08, 2006
SENATOR INHOFE ANNOUNCES PUBLIC RELEASE OF “SKEPTIC”S GUIDE TO DEBUNKING GLOBAL WARMING”
Bill C:
Bill C:
Two years ago I heard a colleague say: “For those of you who don’t believe CO2 has anything to do with global warming? Don’t worry…we’re doing the experiment.”
(I hate to give this exasperating friend any credit, but I thought this was pretty good.)
We are on track to tripling atmospheric CO2 concentrations relative to 1880. Now, unless you believe that that can’t possibly matter, then it really isn’t arrogance to believe that we mere humans are capable of creating quite a problem.
I’m not convinced of the link, myself. There are other factors in play here. I know Mars is getting warmer too. I’m sure as hell not sold on most of the solutions I’m hearing from the enviros. But if they’re right (and you have no idea what satisfaction I would take in seeing Al Gore and a lot of other smug, self-righteous bullies eat crow on this), it’s going to be a hell of a problem, and it’ll be a lot harder to ameliorate than it would have been to avoid.
I believe in preemption, in other words. Someone over at Protein Wisdom made the analogy.
I’ve been reading that it’s now our meat-based diet, rather than our SUV’s, that are the culprit. Why, if we only adopt a vegan diet this pesky Global Warming problem is solved! Apparently the authors of this study conveniently forgot about the 70 million Bison that used to belch and thunder methane across the plains of yore.
Before we start thinking of solar power in any great quantity, remember that the Earth is solar powered already. Every square foot of sunlight devoted to electricity or boiling water is energy that’s not going into photosysthesis or heating the soil or oceans, so as it scales solar provides its own unwanted side effects.
Longtime lurker, infrequent poster here. Ladies and Gentlemen, I must commend you on an excellent post and discussion. A civil conversation on a very controversial suject without name calling, cussing and other, generally distastful, comments. There is still hope for mankind! BZ
I’m an Electrical Engineer. Back in the eighties we were installing digital microwave links in Europe to support our troops stationed there. We experienced significant outage time on one long link in particular. A number of climate scientists were consulted and wrote learned essays on atmospheric Inversion layers and suggested we fund all sorts of long-range studies to discover methods of mitigating the problem. I noted that these scientists had never visited the sites in question, and that similarly configured links were not experiencing the similar outages. A quick visit to the site soon revealed the problem to be an antenna flange separation. Repair of this purely mechanical problem eliminated our outages completely. Undaunted, our climatologists claimed that Inversion layers were still a major problem which could recur at any time, and even suggested that our fix might have actually been due to a particular type of Inversion that created an atmospheric duct! I guess you can’t blame them for trying.
JPS’s experiment quote is exactly right. We are essentially pumping vast quantities of Carbon directly out of the earth and into the atmosphere. It won’t destroy the world, but a lot of evidence says that it will make it a more unpleasant place to live.
Ah well, I’m going to go outside and enjoy this 75 degree, early March day. Meanwhile, maybe you’ll find this interesting: http://www.norvig.com/oreskes.html (Peter Norvig is a very well respected computer scientist).
Google vid moved: now at http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-4520665474899458831
CO2 into air makes fizzwater. Worry about the sun, Eric, honestly. It changes. Really.
Respects-
-SJBill
Saw your Blog bookmarked on Reddit.I love your site and marketing strategy.