I agree Adam. I’m currently doing some synthesis on aspects of the potential implications of disruptive / exponential technologies (e.g. in relation to ecosystems and clean energy) and while some topics (e.g. electric cars, Blockchain) are now media-visible, others are not.
I think that a key problem is lack of requisite collective endeavour by scientists, technologists, assorted others. Where are the attempts at holistic overviews, syntheses, analyses? We have done this in the past. For example, the 1955 Wenner-Gren symposium that produced Man’s Role in Changing the Face of the Earth, and the 1987 follow-up, The Earth as Transformed by Human Action. It may be the case that we assume there is no longer a need for such collaborations, now that we have IPCC. But this is wrong: IPCC has a quite different remit – it is essentially a reporting mechanism. For the topics covered in this thread, the need is as much for argument, debate, and the advancement (and debunking) of hypotheses. To pick two examples from the thread: Greg argued that ‘Isn't biology naturally designed to recycle rather than store most C and nutrients such that there has to be intervention to increase the photosynthesis/respiration ratio to make bio CDR area and energy efficient (e.g.,biochar, CROPS, BECCS, etc)? For these reasons isn't this why abiotic rather than bio processes dominate natural CO2 management on big time and space scales, and therefore shouldn't enhancing these proven, global scale processes take a rather large seat at the CDR table?’ There are some huge assumptions in here: do abiotic rather than bio processes really dominate natural CO2 management? Where in the world of publications is the marshalling of evidence to support this? As an aside, I think it ignores the fact that biotic CDR does demonstrably provide a form of permanence over millennia, e.g. in standing forests that renew themselves, slowly increasing aggregate carbon storage in the process. The implication is that we need to finesse definitions of ‘recycling’ and ‘cycling’, and grapple properly with interpretations of ‘transience’ in ways that are meaningful in the now. Measures to regenerate degraded forests, if continued, will in principle be able to ensure carbon storage over several upcoming centuries, a big slab of time in the context of the current CDR imperative. Ray noted that ‘Whatever you put into the atmosphere by deforestation can (in principle) be taken back on a century time scale by reforestation, if there is political will to do so. Beyond that, it is extremely dicey to rely on an equilibrium forest to be a carbon sink. There is very little soil carbon that is truly recalcitrant, and most studies of average age of soil carbon show rather little that is much older than a century. This is a rather unsettled area of the carbon cycle, though.’ Similar points to Greg; but what caught my eye is the statement that this area of the carbon cycle is ‘rather unsettled’. Why? And where is the report that provides the best possible analysis of the challenges in ways that neither dumb-down nor lock up knowledge in technical garb such that policymakers can make no sense of it? It seems to me that we have a wealth of knowledge that should help us make the right calls on which abiotic and biotic interventions should be prioritised - when, and where, and how (and I can see, and I am sure that many others can too, that we need both). But if this is grappled with in a somewhat ideological and individualistic manner (each advocate only promoting their favoured solution) then it will not be surprising if policymakers turn away, throw up their hands, and ignore. Why should they listen if what they hear is cacophony, not choir? Best, Bernard From: adamd...@gmail.com [mailto:adamd...@gmail.com] On Behalf Of Adam Dorr Sent: 06 September 2016 00:57 To: Greg Rau <gh...@sbcglobal.net> Cc: R. T. Pierrehumbert <phys1...@nexus.ox.ac.uk>; Bernard Mercer <bmer...@mercerenvironment.net>; andrew.lock...@gmail.com; geoengineering <geoengineering@googlegroups.com>; Andrew Revkin <rev...@gmail.com>; cla...@onid.orst.edu; Oliver Morton <olivermor...@economist.com>; Oliver Morton <omeconom...@gmail.com> Subject: Re: [geo] Scientists Focused on Geoengineering Challenge the Inevitability of Multi-Millennial Global Warming Very interesting discussion all around! But I would add that I have my usual concerns about the way in which folks are thinking about future technologies. With few exceptions, the contributes to the discussions commit one or more of the general errors in reasoning about the future that I've analyzed in depth in my recent paper (attached). I touched on this very briefly in my response to Clarke et al. (2016) that Nature Climate Change published which called out their unspoken assumptions about future technological progress and the need to think seriously about it today, but given the space constraints I was unable to go into detail. But the details matter very much! To take just one prominent example, I think that too few folks are giving serious consideration to the explosion in CDR feasibility (and other ecological restoration capacities) that is likely to follow the arrival of widespread narrowly intelligent machine labor (i.e. the AI of the sort that can drive a car, not the general sort that is self-aware and wants to take over the world). Dismissing this as science fiction might have been reasonable 20 years ago. But today, with cars that can drive themselves right over the horizon, I feel very strongly that it is intellectually lazy and socially irresponsible to continue doing so. Other imminent technological changes will also have a profound impact on the feasibility of various CDR approaches. It would be helpful if all who are actively engaged in this arena could take care to avoid some of the more common general errors in reasoning about the future, so that they may think more clearly about the policy, planning, and other implications of technological change. Best, Adam -- Adam Dorr University of California Los Angeles School of Public Affairs Urban Planning PhD Candidate adamd...@ucla.edu<mailto:adamd...@ucla.edu> adamd...@gmail.com<mailto:adamd...@gmail.com> On Mon, Sep 5, 2016 at 1:42 PM, Greg Rau <gh...@sbcglobal.net<mailto:gh...@sbcglobal.net>> wrote: Certainly adding CO2 to the ocean has been throughly discussed, but curiously not the safer, more secure and I think cheaper ways of first converting the CO2 to other stable forms like bicarbonates, carbonates, and recalcitrant organics prior to ocean storage. No need to expensively make and riskily store concentrated CO2, as in (BE)CCS. As one example: biomass or f fuels ----> energy + CO2 ---> CO2 + H2O + CaCO3 ----> Ca2+ + 2HCO3- ----> large, secure ocean C storage + ocean acidity mitigation. Use marine biomass and you eliminate land, water and nutrient use issues. So rather than circling the wagons around (BE)CCS and in the interest of maximizing our chances of success, how about an open and objective solicitation of ideas, policy prescriptions, and R&D investment that goes beyond land biomass +/- making concentrated CO2, storing it underground and hoping it: stays there, isn't too expensive, doesn't cause too many seismic events or contaminates too much ground water. Certainly any form of CO2 management will have negatives, so let's find out which forms offer the best benefit/risk and capacity before crowning winners or losers. Regards, Greg ________________________________ From: R. T. Pierrehumbert <phys1...@nexus.ox.ac.uk<mailto:phys1...@nexus.ox.ac.uk>> To: Greg Rau <gh...@sbcglobal.net<mailto:gh...@sbcglobal.net>> Cc: "bmer...@mercerenvironment.net<mailto:bmer...@mercerenvironment.net>" <bmer...@mercerenvironment.net<mailto:bmer...@mercerenvironment.net>>; "andrew.lock...@gmail.com<mailto:andrew.lock...@gmail.com>" <andrew.lock...@gmail.com<mailto:andrew.lock...@gmail.com>>; geoengineering <geoengineering@googlegroups.com<mailto:geoengineering@googlegroups.com>>; Andrew Revkin <rev...@gmail.com<mailto:rev...@gmail.com>>; "cla...@onid.orst.edu<mailto:cla...@onid.orst.edu>" <cla...@onid.orst.edu<mailto:cla...@onid.orst.edu>>; Oliver Morton <olivermor...@economist.com<mailto:olivermor...@economist.com>>; Oliver Morton <omeconom...@gmail.com<mailto:omeconom...@gmail.com>> Sent: Monday, September 5, 2016 4:57 AM Subject: Re: [geo] Scientists Focused on Geoengineering Challenge the Inevitability of Multi-Millennial Global Warming Actually, there has been plenty of discussion of using oceans as a place to sequester CO2. However, injecting liquid CO2 into the deep ocean does bad things to bottom ecosystems. One of the more interesting proposals is to inject the CO2 in pore space in marine sediments. The hold-up there seems to be lack of knowledge of the amount of pores space available, but I think the idea is still live. Note that simply injecting CO2 into the deep ocean (as opposed to sequestering it in sediments) only accelerates the equilibration of the ocean with the atmosphere. Once you go beyond the equilibrium point, the ocean will start outgassing CO2 back into the atmosphere, though with a time lag of several centuries to a millennium. As for why BECCS gets most of the attention, it’s because it’s the one technology that has fairly predictable scaling, though even there there’s the question of how well you can capture the CO2 from the combustion in practice, which is subject to a lot of the same engineering problems as for coal. They are solvable problems though, involving engineering of processes that are basically pretty well understood. The big question about BECCS is how much biomass you can really spare for BECCS while still feeding everybody (though if everybody becomes vegetarian that’s less of an issue). BECCS is just a way to capture CO2 from the air. It does not require that you store the CO2 on land — you can inject it into the deep ocean or ocean sediments. The way I look at reforestation is that it gives you a way to “take back” the part of the carbon budget in the atmosphere/ocean that was due to deforestation; that’s why, when I think about carbon budgets in the long term, I usually focus on just the fossil fuel component. Whatever you put into the atmosphere by deforestation can (in principle) be taken back on a century time scale by reforestation, if there is political will to do so. Beyond that, it is extremely dicey to rely on an equilibrium forest to be a carbon sink. There is very little soil carbon that is truly recalcitrant, and most studies of average age of soil carbon show rather little that is much older than a century. This is a rather unsettled area of the carbon cycle, though. —Ray On Sep 4, 2016, at 6:18 PM, Greg Rau <gh...@sbcglobal.net<mailto:gh...@sbcglobal.net>> wrote: Relatedly, how and why did afforestation and BECCS come to dominate the discussion, and why has 70% of the Earth surface, half of the C cycle and the vast majority of C storage potential (the ocean) so far been largely ignored in designing interventions? -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "geoengineering" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to geoengineering+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com<mailto:geoengineering+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com>. To post to this group, send email to geoengineering@googlegroups.com<mailto:geoengineering@googlegroups.com>. 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