West Antarctic Ice Sheet Is Doomed

[One Brow]

Question for the dal/one brow side of the debate.

What steps would you recomend to decrease the CO2 output of the US?

No hidden agenda Brow, just curious.

The only way to reduce overall CO2 emissions is to reduce fossil fuel consumption (oil, coal, natural gas). If we stop taking it out of the ground, we will stop adding to the levels in the air. We have a large and diverse geography in this country, and I'm sure different alternative sources can work in different areas (hydro power near the rivers/mountains, wind on the plains, solar in the desert,etc.). Of course, each of these methods have drawbacks, as well.

We can also do more work on the power consumption side. Right now in many areas, developers ignore previously developed, currently abandoned locations for new development in favor of expanding outward (urban sprawl). The greatly increases the energy required by the development both during construction and afterwards by the populace. Encouraging gentrification of inner cities in the Midwest/West/South would r4educe energy consumption.

 

[Deleted member 848]

Getting so worked up over it that you turn a few specious comments into a full-blown argument almost entirely on your own is certainly symptomatic of being dogmatic.

if you say so

Well now you're just being silly, especially with that last comment. You are saying that in the face of a TRUE SPECIES-DESTROYING EVENT, the culture of individuals should be considered equal with the SURVIVAL OF THE ENTIRE SPECIES AS A WHOLE? So we let our species go entirely EXTINCT if we cannot save it while guaranteeing that every single culture will also survive entirely intact? Ridiculous.

What is ridiculous, is your notion of a single "species-destroying event". First of all, I have no idea wtf you're talking about when you mention that. There are species being 'destroyed' by climate change at this given moment, and there has been for decades. Ever heard of the Global Amphibian Decline??

Secondly, your naiveté of the issue is in full-display, in your conception of the human 'species' begin destroyed in a single event. It doesn't work like that. It's gradual.


First the oceans will rise-- then the oxygen levels in the water will deplete. Then the atmosphere will warm. As you can imagine, the Earth is vast, the habitat of its citizens are vast, and different people will be affected to different extents as the climate of the planet changes.


Anyways, let me get back to your point:

Well now you're just being silly, especially with that last comment. You are saying that in the face of a TRUE SPECIES-DESTROYING EVENT, the culture of individuals should be considered equal with the SURVIVAL OF THE ENTIRE SPECIES AS A WHOLE?

Lol, again, not what I said at all. That is what, three straw men in a single thread?

Rather, I just pointed out your tunnel-vision in appropriating the culture of an east-Asian with "grandma's food, and historical monuments". I specified the importance of conserving culture-- I did not say that this goal reigns supreme, and superior (or even equal to) that of human survival. Quit being so melodramatic. Also, as I mentioned earlier, this is not going to happen all in one event, like The Day After Tomorrow or something. Get this idea out of your head. Obviously you in Nevada, with your AC, and little dependence on seafood will be fine. Can we say the same for 1 billion people who rely on aquaculture, or the 634 million people who are currently at risk from rising sea levels, despite contributing relatively nothing on their carbon footprints relative to North Americans?

 

[Deleted member 848]

Ever read some of the economic analysis should the US have ratified the Kyoto protocol? Give it a google sometime.

Your fellow German brethren seem to really be suffering economically from embracing environmental adjustments to climate change.

 

[One Brow]

What I mean is we should not base policy that will affect billions on "mights". If we do not know exactly what effect curbing our CO2 emissions will have, and whether or not it is actually a problem that climate change may be happening in the first place, and be able to accurately predict the outcomes of any changes we may make, or not making any changes for that matter, then making sweeping changes that could lead to widespread famine and other socio-economic issues is more than unwise. I am against panic-mongering, on the whole.

This is special pleading. If you use that line of thinking in other human endeavors, it is very obviously foolish. Vaccinating your children against measles is not a guarantee they will not get measles, it just greatly increases the probability of their being immune. Turning on your car's ignition is not a guarantee you will arrive at your location, it just greatly increases the probability of your arrival. No one ever knows exactly what will be the outcome of any given decision, we just look at probabilities, risks, and benefits, and then make a decision based on them. Why should we do this differently for global warming?

The question is whether we are more likely to face global famine in an environment where climate change has altered the weather patterns over the entire planet drastically, or in an environment where we have made a decision to rely on fewer fossil fuels. I don't see how you can calculate that global famine is less likely in the former case; that way lies madness.

 

[Stoked]

The only way to reduce overall CO2 emissions is to reduce fossil fuel consumption (oil, coal, natural gas). If we stop taking it out of the ground, we will stop adding to the levels in the air. We have a large and diverse geography in this country, and I'm sure different alternative sources can work in different areas (hydro power near the rivers/mountains, wind on the plains, solar in the desert,etc.). Of course, each of these methods have drawbacks, as well.

We can also do more work on the power consumption side. Right now in many areas, developers ignore previously developed, currently abandoned locations for new development in favor of expanding outward (urban sprawl). The greatly increases the energy required by the development both during construction and afterwards by the populace. Encouraging gentrification of inner cities in the Midwest/West/South would r4educe energy consumption.

How do you feel about nuclear energy? Also do you consider hydrogen fuel cells a viable option for cars?

 

[One Brow]

What is the exact mechanism of extinction? Does it apply directly in every single case? Can it be proven objectively that this rise in CO2 will absolutely results in an extinction event for mankind?

Humans are evolutionary generalists, we have a better survival chance than, say, chimpanzees, because we can thrive in a more diverse array of environments. On the other hand, we are fairly large mammals; in the last two major extinctions, I don't think any land animal populations of our size survived.

Different mechanisms have arisen in different extinction events.

 

[Deleted member 848]

Question for the dal/one brow side of the debate.

What steps would you recomend to decrease the CO2 output of the US?

No hidden agenda Brow, just curious.

The first step I would take, is to eliminate this idea of "we will never be independent of fossil fuels". It's flawed, inaccurate, and 'panic-mongering', as LogGrad likes to say.

Secondly, I would want to change the notion that we need to change everyone's attitude before we can change their behaviour. It doesn't work like that. We need to convince our government to try and change the behaviour of the entire nation, and slowly the change of attitudes will follow. Did everyone agree with banning slavery before it was prohibited? Nope.


Thirdly, we need to understand that there is no silver bullet to solving the energy crisis. There are many forms of alternative energy generation, and several of them can be used in conjunction with one another to summate, and be a viable replacement to fossil fuels. I am a strong believer in wind-power, and I find that it has loads of potential. Geothermal, tidal, solar-- nuclear I'm less fond of, but I mean put a gun to my head, and I'd rather choose nuclear than fossil fuels. Still, I find that a movie like Pandora's Box (which says that it's either nuclear or bust) is inaccurate, as wind, solar, and geothermal have loads of potential.



If anyone is in the mood for a good, balanced read, I would recommend checking this book out:

https://www.amazon.com/Society-Environment-Pragmatic-Solutions-Ecological/dp/0813345944

Carolan is a professor from Colorado State, and he offers a really darn good, solution-oriented look at society and the environment.

I could go more in depth if you'd like, but I'll just speak in general terms for the time being.

 

[Deleted member 848]

How do you feel about nuclear energy? Also do you consider hydrogen fuel cells a viable option for cars?

I don't find nuclear energy as necessary for severing our ties with fossil fuels.

Hydrogen fuel cells are only viable if we are not using fossil fuels to assemble them.

 

[One Brow]

How do you feel about nuclear energy? Also do you consider hydrogen fuel cells a viable option for cars?

Nuclear energy has its own drawbacks, but increasing CO2 emissions is not among them. I am ambivalent there.

It depends on the source for the hydrogen. If you are using seawater and a renewable power source to divide it into oxygen and hydrogen, then it certainly does not contribute to CO2 emissions.

 

[Deleted member 848]

The only way to reduce overall CO2 emissions is to reduce fossil fuel consumption (oil, coal, natural gas). If we stop taking it out of the ground, we will stop adding to the levels in the air. We have a large and diverse geography in this country, and I'm sure different alternative sources can work in different areas (hydro power near the rivers/mountains, wind on the plains, solar in the desert,etc.). Of course, each of these methods have drawbacks, as well.

We can also do more work on the power consumption side. Right now in many areas, developers ignore previously developed, currently abandoned locations for new development in favor of expanding outward (urban sprawl). The greatly increases the energy required by the development both during construction and afterwards by the populace. Encouraging gentrification of inner cities in the Midwest/West/South would r4educe energy consumption.

Going off of this, I would also shoulder more responsibility on industry, corporations, and manufacturers for the entire life cycle of their products, and for controlling their energy expenditures.

The German government does foster this producer-responsibility with their "Der Grüne Punkt" program. Taken from their website: "the German Packaging Ordinance is based on the German Act for Promoting Closed Substance Cycle Waste Management and Ensuring Environmentally Compatible Waste Disposal and implements the European guidelines on the return and waste management of packaging. The goal of the ordinance is to avoid or reduce packaging waste and the protection of natural resources." (https://www.gruener-punkt.de/en/customer/infocenter/questions-and-answers.html)


As far as incentivizing energy-consumption, that is a little more tricky. Many strategies have been devised (such as the oh-so-socialistic carbon tax), but nothing has really gained traction.

 

[Stoked]

I don't find nuclear energy as necessary for severing our ties with fossil fuels.

Hydrogen fuel cells are only viable if we are not using fossil fuels to assemble them.

Nuclear energy has its own drawbacks, but increasing CO2 emissions is not among them. I am ambivalent there.

It depends on the source for the hydrogen. If you are using seawater and a renewable power source to divide it into oxygen and hydrogen, then it certainly does not contribute to CO2 emissions.

Seeing as how we are currently a fossil fuel nation, despite attempts at diverging our energy source, there has to be some trade off does there not?

More than likely fossil fuel burning tech would be used to start up and build the infrastructure and tech. Then it could be switched ovcer to renewable sources.

How long would be an acceptable trade off? 5 years? 10? These kind of changes will not happen over night. You will gradually see the rise in energy from these sources and you can phase out the use of fossil fuels accordingly.

 

[Deleted member 848]

Seeing as how we are currently a fossil fuel nation, despite attempts at diverging our energy source, there has to be some trade off does there not?

More than likely fossil fuel burning tech would be used to start up and build the infrastructure and tech. Then it could be switched ovcer to renewable sources.

How long would be an acceptable trade off? 5 years? 10? These kind of changes will not happen over night. You will gradually see the rise in energy from these sources and you can phase out the use of fossil fuels accordingly.

It's a good question, and those are good points. Sentiments like these are pragmatic, and I have no problems with them. It only irks me when people either call climate-change panic-mongering, or they exclaim that fossil fuels are irreplaceable.


It's funny, because despite all of what has been said, we still haven't even gone into the detrimental human health consequences of things like fracking (which USA heavily endorses, due to the US being the Saudi Arabia of methane), or the health consequences of the Indigenous Aboriginals of Northern Alberta (in Canada) who are suffering from extremely elevated cancer rates from the oil sand projects.

 

[Stoked]

It's a good question, and those are good points. Sentiments like these are pragmatic, and I have no problems with them. It only irks me when people either call climate-change panic-mongering, or they exclaim that fossil fuels are irreplaceable.


It's funny, because despite all of what has been said, we still haven't even gone into the detrimental human health consequences of things like fracking (which USA heavily endorses, due to the US being the Saudi Arabia of methane), or the health consequences of the Indigenous Aboriginals of Northern Alberta (in Canada) who are suffering from extremely elevated cancer rates from the oil sand projects.

To be fair there is a good deal of fear mongering that has jumped on that wagon. But they are not mutually inclusive.

They way I look at it is simple, shocking I know. If we can make something cleaner and more enviromentally friendly than why not? Short of destroying the businesses why not? Start building everything new in alternative forms of energy and the CO2 foot print will decrease. Also it has the added goal of updating vital parts of our aging infrastructure and creating jobs (construction, engineers, sceintists...)

Obviously that is simpler said than done but I do not believe it is outside our ability to do so.

 

[franklin]

What about locations in the 3rd world? Are you as an American prepared to take in the 100 million Environmental refugees from Bangladesh once their country gets flooded? If you say no, then what will you tell these 'not-smart' people to do, o smart one?



Ironically, the influx of environmental refugees has way more economically crippling potential than staving off the consumption of fossil fuels

The changes aren't scheduled quickly enough to make this flood of migration a remote concern. I think your response on the last page where you discuss changing our collective thinking and goals over time will solve your own worries here.

 

[franklin]

Because of recent SC decisions on freedom of speech, it's darn near impossible to stop the bribery of big industry.

I think the only way we change is if things become so sucky that the costs finally begin to weigh down on the economy. If places like the San Jacquin valley are left desolate. If places like LA, Phx, NO, Miami, and NY must be abandoned. Then finally we will listen.

I always get a kick out of repubs who deny that humans can have any influence on the climate. Apparently they never studied the Dust Bowl of the 1930s. Of maybe that was another EPA conspiracy, right? Since the EPA was around back then....

If your hysteria does anything good it's providing a platform for others to put down the nonsense put up by populist political hacks.

Despite this talking point, WE ARE doing something about the environmental issues of our time. In fact, if anything, the lobbyists for business are the ones leading the charge. Do you really think CAFE standards aren't raised at the request of Detroit? Do you really believe the democratic party doesn't ask the auto industry what standards can be met before tightening the legal code? Does anyone believe that party would be willing to do anything with even a remote possibility of not helping the auto unions? NO! Increasing CAFE standards raises the prices of automobiles and creates more assembly line jobs.

Same goes for electricity generation. It is in a utility's best interest to shake hands with government and force a higher rate (read revenue growth) onto the consumers. Utilities are, in general, guaranteed a certain rate of return. Nothing too low or too high. The more capital they can borrow at 2% and receive a stable 8% in return the better off their shareholders are (often times pension funds whose managers love the stable, predictable, recession proof ROI). It's also in many ways cheaper to invest in subsidizing household energy savings than it is to build a brand new power plant that is subject to the newest and most stringent environmental standards. Haven't you ever stopped to wonder why consumer credits for attic insulation, solar panels, etc. have been made available and are promoted by the power and gas companies? It's because The Thriller's big, bad lobbyists are making money off of them. And I could write several more pages saying "ditto" about wind, solar, geothermal, Elon Musk, etc. etc. It is lobbyists who are cleaning up our environment and profiting from it.

 

[One Brow]

Seeing as how we are currently a fossil fuel nation, despite attempts at diverging our energy source, there has to be some trade off does there not?

Social progress is always accompanied by trade-offs. There were trade-offs in the liberation of slaves and in the Industrial Revolution. Further back , there were trade-offs is the development of aqueducts or the creation of cities. Are there specific trade-offs that worry you here?

How long would be an acceptable trade off? 5 years? 10? These kind of changes will not happen over night. You will gradually see the rise in energy from these sources and you can phase out the use of fossil fuels accordingly.

I don't have a specific timeline in mind.

 

[Stoked]

Social progress is always accompanied by trade-offs. There were trade-offs in the liberation of slaves and in the Industrial Revolution. Further back , there were trade-offs is the development of aqueducts or the creation of cities. Are there specific trade-offs that worry you here?



I don't have a specific timeline in mind.

Trade off was a reference to a time frame. You and Dala indicated oyu would be more open to supporting those other techs (hydrogen fuel cells) if they were not made with fossil fuels. Well more than likely they will be. To start with anyways.

So worry me? No. Unrealistic timelines? Of course, it'll take some time to make that change. But we need to start somewhere.

 

[franklin]

The first step I would take, is to eliminate this idea of "we will never be independent of fossil fuels". It's flawed, inaccurate, and 'panic-mongering', as LogGrad likes to say.

It's populist opinion, what can we do?

Technology is already taking care of the problem for us. The gas guzzling USofA peaked consumption in 2005 and will likely never reach those levels again in spite of adding millions more vehicles to our roads every year.

The way our Clean Air Act works is it requires the EPA to revisit standards every 7 years or so and tighten them up where necessary. It's like a torque wrench ratcheting down a nut on a bolt ever & ever tighter. (This has a huge flaw, of course, as in many ways it tends to unnecessarily burdens small-to-medium sized businesses with overly cumbersome regulations that no one in their right mind would expect a small business owner to ever be aware of these new regulations that are both onerous and often carry such a low impact on the environment that they're outright laughable...). Anyway, the EPA revisits both standards on business/consumption and also on overall air pollution levels, then revises and tightens them both down as scientific evidence [of health concerns] and technological advances permit. Here in Utah, we are in the middle of creating a new State Implementation Plan which has the purpose of meeting these new, tighter air quality standards. We've already met the old, tighter standards EPA set back in 1994 IIRC. They tightened a couple pollutant levels up significantly, & we are no longer in compliance.

Back to the first paragraph -- Utah's newest proposals have vehicle pollution as 50% of our air quality (geographic) problem. We have proposed to EPA using Federal Tier 3 standards, which require cutting our current statewide fleet pollution levels in half. In essence, we are leaning on technological advancements to cut out 25% of our wintertime inversion pollution (50% of 50%). Thanks Detroit Lobbyists, you big bad evil Ronald Reagan devil worshipping ********.

 

[LogGrad98]

Your fellow German brethren seem to really be suffering economically from embracing environmental adjustments to climate change.

In other words you cannot be bothered to let facts disrupt your singular view of the world. Whatever works for you I guess.

As far as straw men go, you are the one that keeps shifting the focus when you hear things you cannot refute. You specifically talk about if the western world (me specifically) would accept the refugees from those countries displaced by floods. I say yes, which is not what you wanted to hear so you shift the topic to the culture. You are the one who brought about the fact that these people would be outright wiped out by our "western arrogance" or whatever ******** you are spinning it into, and I argue that if that were the case, if we were truly facing an event so horrendous (as you framed it) that it might mean the end of the species then how important would culture be then.

Look, I understand you have a hard time following along, so I am going to let you go ahead and re-read everything now while I talk to the grownups.

 

[LogGrad98]

Humans are evolutionary generalists, we have a better survival chance than, say, chimpanzees, because we can thrive in a more diverse array of environments. On the other hand, we are fairly large mammals; in the last two major extinctions, I don't think any land animal populations of our size survived.

Different mechanisms have arisen in different extinction events.

In other words, there is no way to say if it will or if it won't. Again, that is an example of the reasons I am against making broad sweeping changes on such tight timelines with known deleterious effects because we are afraid of a shadow of an idea. We absolutely must make progress in replacing fossil fuels. Hell, given enough time we won't have an option when we just can't get the fossil fuels anymore. Necessity is the mother of invention they say, but we better be well ahead of this curve when it starts to really drop off. It is a balancing act to be sure.