Global warming - technical solutions

[theimmortal1]

Well, we can gather up all the water on earth and throw it on the sun, and hope to God that actually makes a dent on the heat of the sun.

Lefties, you need to get used to the fact that global warming is not man-made. At least not on any significant level.

 

[History_Buff]

Well, we can gather up all the water on earth and throw it on the sun, and hope to God that actually makes a dent on the heat of the sun.

Lefties, you need to get used to the fact that global warming is not man-made. At least not on any significant level.

Righties, you need to get used to the fact that is very likely man made, and that the market has failed you once again, because there is no mechanism to account for externalities.

 

[Fugitive Sisyphus]

I just want to say that this is the only usefull global warming thread.

 

[Napoliean]

Global Warming is a myth. The CO2 humans create is in single digits. Animals create more Methane and CO 2 then all humans put together. Its a big fat lie!

 

[StarWorms]

Global Warming is a myth. The CO2 humans create is in single digits. Animals create more Methane and CO 2 then all humans put together. Its a big fat lie!

24,126,416,000 Tonnes/yr is a single digit?

 

[theimmortal1]

How has the market failed? Because you think the earth is warming due to human productivity? Or is it cooling? Have you made up your mind yet?

 

[emzie]

Well, we can gather up all the water on earth and throw it on the sun, and hope to God that actually makes a dent on the heat of the sun.

Lefties, you need to get used to the fact that global warming is not man-made. At least not on any significant level.

Maybe, maybe not. Many floods are not caused by human activity, atleast not significantly or directly. Should we not build dikes?

 

[theimmortal1]

We shouldn't overreact to every single thing.

 

[emzie]

We shouldn't overreact to every single thing.

How do you know when something is or is not an overreaction before the event (mild or catistrophic) is upon you?

 

[theimmortal1]

That is a disorder called obsessive compulsive.


If the earth is going to warm 20 degrees and that is going to wipe our mankind, then yeah we should do something about it. Whether or not man caused it, would be irrelevant.

But a little warming, and a few floods are actually good. Warm weather is good. Sure its not going to be perfect for everyone. But so what? It would be best long term. Just like some floods make for better farmland.

But many scientists basically are coming to the same conclusions. FIrstly that global warming is mostly not man-made. It is cyclical. We can do very little about it. And that we will be cooling soon enough to get the lefties all worried about that.

 

[Adebisi]

No, it won't. Bio-diesel and Ethanol will in fact increase CO2 output, because it requires so much energy to refine them. The only advantage they have is that it's a domestic source.

If it would require more energy to refine it than it contains, it cant be used as a fuel at all. If a process yields a net gain of energy it lowers CO2 emissions. The biodiesel in itself does not generate any new CO2, so the only emissions come from refining. A net gain of energy is of course a prerequisite, and such processes do exist, even though the technology is still new.

The net gain in an ethanol economy is very small though, which is why I believe biodiesel from for example rapeseed is better.

 

[El_Machinae]

No, it won't. Bio-diesel and Ethanol will in fact increase CO2 output, because it requires so much energy to refine them. The only advantage they have is that it's a domestic source.

Well, the biofuels have a net zero emission for themselves, and so all we'd need to measure is the fossil fuels required to generate the biofuels. As long as the amount of fossil fuels required to generate biofuels is less than the energy available from the biofuels, it's a net win.

As well, once we get the combines running on biofuels, then it seems to me that we'll move more and more to zero sum carbon emissions in that field.

How has the market failed? Because you think the earth is warming due to human productivity? Or is it cooling? Have you made up your mind yet?

The market has failed due to failing to capture the externalities of CO2 production. The free market is a powerful and awesome force, which will continue to lead to our compounding prosperity for a long time to come. However, it loses efficiency if certain things are not maintained. One of the things required to maintain the free market is that the people who cause a problem have to be the ones to pay to fix the problem. If not, the free market hiccups.

With regards to your cooling comment: the 'global cooling' was a couple scientific papers years ago, that were then discredited rather quickly by the same scientific procedure. Such a discrediting event has not happened with regards to CO2-caused climate change. In fact, the evidence has been compounding. And instead of making comparisons to the 'cooling scare', why not mockingly compare the GW problem to the 'ozone scare' or the 'acid rain scare'?

 

[CIVPhilzilla]

It's actually pretty easy to solve global warming. Just repeal the 1970 Clean Air Act, and presto no more global warming. Once this act was passed and our atmosphere lost our Sulfur emissions, the dreaded global cooling scientists were all worried about changed into global warming.

 

[Murky]

It's actually pretty easy to solve global warming. Just repeal the 1970 Clean Air Act, and presto no more global warming. Once this act was passed and our atmosphere lost our Sulfur emissions, the dreaded global cooling scientists were all worried about changed into global warming.

So you would rather have acid rain than solve global warming in a more practical way?

The only reasonable way is to drastically reduce greenhouse gas emissions and increase the number of trees that clean can the air naturally. The Bush administration has already weakened or repealed too many environmental protections as it is.