From: everything-list@googlegroups.com
[mailto:everything-list@googlegroups.com] On Behalf Of meekerdb
Sent: Wednesday, November 13, 2013 2:18 PM
To: everything-list@googlegroups.com
Subject: Re: Global warming silliness
On 11/13/2013 10:49 AM, LizR wrote:
Obviously there is more CO2 in the air than there has been for a very long
time, and obviously the climate has changed somewhat in the last couple of
decades (warmest on record, again and again). It's hard to prove the
connection, of course, but the circumstantial evidence is overwhelming. Of
13,950 peer-reviewed climate articles published between 1991 and 2012, 24
rejected global warming. It's a little thing we've come up with to try and
understand the world. We call it "science".
I'd say it's a lot better than circumstantial. Direct measurements over the
last century have shown global warming. Direct measurement over the same
time period have shown increase in CO2. Industrial statistics show that more
than enough fossil fuel has been burned to account for the increased CO2.
The physics of CO2 in warming the earth has been understood for 150yrs.
Obviously fossil fuel will run out anyway, so even without climate change
we'd have to do something. I think nuclear is a good short term solution,
for sure. Especially subcritical reactors.
But as Telmo points out we can't just wait till fossil fuel runs out and
then switch. It takes energy to build nuclear power plants and solar panels
and wind tubines. In principle they could bootstrap themselves, but not on
the time scale we need to transition.
The only buildable bridge from our current global situation into a
sustainable future must begin, before anything, most critically ramp up the
efficiency with which we do things and maintain our built environments. We
need to retrofit the built structures currently here that we live in, work
in. It is not a glamorous or cutting edge activity so it holds little charm
on the cocktail circuit, but doing this globally (or especially in a large
pivotal economy such as the US) is very arguably the lowest hanging fruit -
the cheapest, easiest, quickest, intervention and change we can make and one
that if applied across a majority of the built structures would have the
biggest immediate impact on the energy future situation than anything else
we can do.
Large scale energy systems require decades of time to go from early planning
to full scale deployed & operating systems. Energy retrofits are low tech
labor intensive small operator - your average Joe contractor - dirty jobs,
such as adding insulation, caulking leaks and so forth. When retrofitting a
building it pays to also retrofit it for other building systems, such as
putting in grey water plumbing - skyscrapers that flush their toilets with
re-cycled/filtered grey water for example.
The world and especially places like the US need to look first at the demand
side of the equation. This does not necessarily mean collapsing the standard
of living - as will most assuredly happen when we soon run straight over the
fossil energy availability cliff (denial of the global production plateaus
for oil for example does not make the reality of our supply situation
vanish). Investing now - while we still have surplus fossil energy to burn -
in improving the insulation, lighting etc. of our buildings and homes will
have long term payback in terms of becoming leaner.
If any of the teabaggers on here think this is all hippy dippy sh-t, the
biggest most successful and most profitable global corporations around are
all actively looking at their own supply chains, production systems, and
built assets finding ways to eliminate and reuse waste, to become leaner
more resource efficient organizations in every dimension of their presence
and operation.
It is pointless to talk about new forms of supply - though of course this is
a most important subject - without first ramping up a sustained
multi-decadal global effort to become far more efficient in how we use
fossil and other non-replenishable resources. It is - as farmers used to say
putting the cart before the horse.
Chris
Brent
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