RE: [Vo]:How many volcanoes would it take...
I came across a study a few years ago that showed that the US presently has more forested land than it did in the year 1900. My personal observation verifies that. The fields around the house I grew up in, and the house I have live in now (33 yrs.) have all grown over with forest. Historical photos of the Berks county Pennsylvania area of 1900 vintage show surprising areas of cultivation that are now forest. Jeff -Original Message- From: Jed Rothwell [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Friday, April 25, 2008 1:23 PM To: vortex-L@eskimo.com Subject: Re: [Vo]:How many volcanoes would it take... thomas malloy wrote: Compared to the volcanoes, all 6,000,000,000 of us are the equivalent of a pimple on an elephant's rear end. That is incorrect, as shown by the stats Nick Palmer found. It is also obviously wrong because in North America, we burn roughly twice as much fossil fuel as all of the plants on the continent convert back into carbon and free oxygen. If volcanoes added far more CO2 to the mix then we do, than plants would have a negligible effect and the atmosphere and there would be practically no free oxygen. (By the way, decreasing levels of free oxygen have not been examined, and recent evidence shows this, too, is a threat.) This notion that people have an inherently smaller effect than natural phenomena is widespread, but it has no logical or factual basis. In North America we have stripped away most of the top soil, cut most of the trees down, destroyed the water table over large areas and paved over an area the size of Nebraska. It is inconceivable that such large scale terraforming would not have a major impact on the environment. At this rate we will destroy most of the continent in a few hundred years as effectively as people in ancient times destroyed Iraq (Mesopotamia). - Jed No virus found in this incoming message. Checked by AVG. Version: 7.5.524 / Virus Database: 269.23.5/1398 - Release Date: 4/25/2008 2:31 PM No virus found in this outgoing message. Checked by AVG. Version: 7.5.524 / Virus Database: 269.23.5/1398 - Release Date: 4/25/2008 2:31 PM
Re: [Vo]:How many volcanoes would it take...
Howdy Jeff, Same here in Texas. Before 1870 range prairie grass fires could sweep across whole counties that acted to prevent forests from gaining a foot hold. Interesting arguments for and against greenhouse effect. Al Gore and Rush Limburger cheese et al should both be proud of their ability to keep the CO2 gas balloon in the air for so long before it becomes obvious that a parallel exists.. similar to two divorce lawyers. There is money in keeping the bickering going. Meanwhile back at the ranch the whole place winds up broke and knee deep in cockle burrs and Bushes. At some point the problem becomes insoluable.. unless.. well.. err.. some kid playing with matches... Richard Jeff wrote, I came across a study a few years ago that showed that the US presently has more forested land than it did in the year 1900. My personal observation verifies that. The fields around the house I grew up in, and the house I have live in now (33 yrs.) have all grown over with forest. Historical photos of the Berks county Pennsylvania area of 1900 vintage show surprising areas of cultivation that are now forest.
Re: [Vo]:How many volcanoes would it take...
A lot of marginal farmland in the United States has been returned to forest land. It's the same throughout much of New England -- lots of woods, but it's all second growth because it all was farmland a century ago. It was terrible farmland, but in the absence of the Interstate system and cheap long distance transport, it was cheaper to grow the food locally than try to bring it in from elsewhere at great expense. I thought that was common knowledge. This is a strong argument against the Hundred Mile Diet but has nothing whatsoever to do with the supposed question of whether anthropogenic greenhouse gases are behind the now very well documented phenomenon of global warming. Note that, while the United States has regrown some forests, far more have been cut down, bulldozed, or burned elsewhere in the world. This has strong implic R C Macaulay wrote: Howdy Jeff, Same here in Texas. Before 1870 range prairie grass fires could sweep across whole counties that acted to prevent forests from gaining a foot hold. Interesting arguments for and against greenhouse effect. Al Gore and Rush Limburger cheese et al should both be proud of their ability to keep the CO2 gas balloon in the air for so long before it becomes obvious that a parallel exists.. similar to two divorce lawyers. There is money in keeping the bickering going. Meanwhile back at the ranch the whole place winds up broke and knee deep in cockle burrs and Bushes. At some point the problem becomes insoluable.. unless.. well.. err.. some kid playing with matches... Richard Jeff wrote, I came across a study a few years ago that showed that the US presently has more forested land than it did in the year 1900. My personal observation verifies that. The fields around the house I grew up in, and the house I have live in now (33 yrs.) have all grown over with forest. Historical photos of the Berks county Pennsylvania area of 1900 vintage show surprising areas of cultivation that are now forest.
[Vo]:How many volcanoes would it take...
Assuming we could magically, starting tomorrow, stop emitting all forms of CO2 as a result of our technology: How many active volcanoes would it take to produce an equivalent amount of CO2 that humanity currently produces and/or is indirectly responsible for producing, such as deforestation techniques through burning. I was wondering how prior active volcano counts lined up with previous epochs, along with the prevailing weather patterns and temperatures of that time. Regards Steven Vincent Johnson www.OrionWorks.com www.zazzle.com/orionworks
Re: [Vo]:How many volcanoes would it take...
I don't know how many volcanoes it would take but the global total CO2 emissions of active volcanoes is about 1/150th of what humans are doing. see this site http://gristmill.grist.org/story/2006/12/17/223957/72
Re: [Vo]:How many volcanoes would it take...
OrionWorks wrote: Assuming we could magically, starting tomorrow, stop emitting all forms of CO2 as a result of our technology: How many active volcanoes would it take to produce an equivalent amount of CO2 that humanity currently produces and/or is indirectly Compared to the volcanoes, all 6,000,000,000 of us are the equivalent of a pimple on an elephant's rear end. BTW, did you see the Newman video? Joseph intimated that his technology could have made a difference in, I assume, the Sun's behavior. which is over the top, even for a man who believes that he is Jesus. I viewed the video to the point where he had the two solar images. and it stopped. I think I'll try again. --- Get FREE High Speed Internet from USFamily.Net! -- http://www.usfamily.net/mkt-freepromo.html ---
Re: [Vo]:How many volcanoes would it take...
thomas malloy wrote: Compared to the volcanoes, all 6,000,000,000 of us are the equivalent of a pimple on an elephant's rear end. That is incorrect, as shown by the stats Nick Palmer found. It is also obviously wrong because in North America, we burn roughly twice as much fossil fuel as all of the plants on the continent convert back into carbon and free oxygen. If volcanoes added far more CO2 to the mix then we do, than plants would have a negligible effect and the atmosphere and there would be practically no free oxygen. (By the way, decreasing levels of free oxygen have not been examined, and recent evidence shows this, too, is a threat.) This notion that people have an inherently smaller effect than natural phenomena is widespread, but it has no logical or factual basis. In North America we have stripped away most of the top soil, cut most of the trees down, destroyed the water table over large areas and paved over an area the size of Nebraska. It is inconceivable that such large scale terraforming would not have a major impact on the environment. At this rate we will destroy most of the continent in a few hundred years as effectively as people in ancient times destroyed Iraq (Mesopotamia). - Jed
Re: [Vo]:How many volcanoes would it take...
Further to my previous comment - there seems to have been some black propaganda put about that the output of volcanoes dwarfs what humans produce - and we are invited by this fact to imagine that nature's effects are much larger than humans and therefore all the talk of manmade global warming must be politically inspired rubbish etc etc. The source of this big lie seems to be that when some volcanoes like Mount St Helens and particularly Mount Pinatubo (the largest recent eruption) erupt they put a huge amount of CO2 into the atmosphere. I was going to say ah, but they are only erupting for a relatively short time compared to when they are not - a week or so as opposed to many years - so their average output is much less than their peak output and I would have been prepared to believe that the largest volcano in recent times could have out CO2'd humans for a couple of weeks BUT... I don't know how reliable this quote is but Gerlach and others estimate that, in addition to the measured 17 Mt of SO2, the eruption of approximately 5 km3 of magma was accompanied by release of at least 491 to 921 Mt of H2O, 3 to 16 Mt of Cl, and 42 to 234 Mt of CO2. EIA Anthropogenic CO2 output = ~25,162 MTonnes/yr So even Mt Pinatubo only put between 1/107th to 1/600th of the CO2 out that humans did in that year. It does look as if the peak output during the climactic few hours of the final eruption did equal us for a few hours but there absolutely isn't any way volcanoes generally are of much significance at all compared to the mighty homo sapiens...
Re: [Vo]:How many volcanoes would it take...
OrionWorks wrote: Assuming we could magically, starting tomorrow, stop emitting all forms of CO2 as a result of our technology: How many active volcanoes would it take to produce an equivalent amount of CO2 that humanity currently produces ... thomas malloy wrote: Compared to the volcanoes, all 6,000,000,000 of us are the equivalent of a pimple on an elephant's rear end. Hi All, My impression, and I have no numbers to back it up, is that volcanoes are only important when a mega-volcano like Toba (70,000 ago) or Yellowstone (due any day now) blows. The major daily carbon release by the Earth is in the form of methane, an even more effective greenhouse gas than CO2. I don't have any numbers on this either -- maybe C. Warren Hunt estimated it someplace. Even methane release probably has wide swings because some of it may be trapped in water-ice, or is subject to periodic warming of the tundra. All this is beside the point, which is that we must stop using rock oil NOW -- JUST SAY NO TO PETROLEUM! This is a matter of the highest national security. It should be as socially unacceptable to use rock oil as it is to spit on the floor. Jack Smith
Re: [Vo]:How many volcanoes would it take...
In reply to Jed Rothwell's message of Fri, 25 Apr 2008 13:22:59 -0400: Hi, [snip] If volcanoes added far more CO2 to the mix then we do, than plants would have a negligible effect and the atmosphere and there would be practically no free oxygen. (By the way, decreasing levels of free oxygen have not been examined, and recent evidence shows this, too, is a threat.) [snip] At 400 quad / year energy use, and assuming that all the energy is derived from carbon combustion (e.g. anthracite), and further assuming that all the energy is used in the form of heat (or that electricity production from heat is 100% efficient), and that the biosphere wasn't recycling CO2 (IOW CO2 just accumulated) it would take 34000 years to use all the Oxygen in the atmosphere. Also consider that people live quite well at considerable elevations, where the Oxygen levels are considerably reduced. In short, I suspect we could go on like this for at least 1000 years, without even noticing any effect on our breathing from Oxygen depletion. In fact we are more likely to run out of fossil fuels before we run out of Oxygen to burn them. So, IMO Oxygen depletion is not a problem - certainly not on the scale of global warming. Regards, Robin van Spaandonk The shrub is a plant.
Re: [Vo]:How many volcanoes would it take...
Robin van Spaandonk wrote: (By the way, decreasing levels of free oxygen have not been examined, and recent evidence shows this, too, is a threat.) [snip] At 400 quad / year energy use, and assuming that all the energy is derived from carbon combustion (e.g. anthracite), and further assuming that all the energy is . . . Also consider that people live quite well at considerable elevations, where the Oxygen levels are considerably reduced. In short, I suspect we could go on like this for at least 1000 years, without even noticing any effect on our breathing from Oxygen depletion. My, my, aren't you anthro-centric! People are not the only species, and breathing is not the only form of respiration. Many other species, and many chemical process, including possibly atmospheric processes, are affected by the slight decrease in oxygen content. There are also problems such as the oxygen exchange with water, and fish, and so on. - Jed
Re: [Vo]:How many volcanoes would it take...
In reply to Jed Rothwell's message of Fri, 25 Apr 2008 18:19:31 -0400: Hi, [snip] Robin van Spaandonk wrote: (By the way, decreasing levels of free oxygen have not been examined, and recent evidence shows this, too, is a threat.) [snip] At 400 quad / year energy use, and assuming that all the energy is derived from carbon combustion (e.g. anthracite), and further assuming that all the energy is . . . Also consider that people live quite well at considerable elevations, where the Oxygen levels are considerably reduced. In short, I suspect we could go on like this for at least 1000 years, without even noticing any effect on our breathing from Oxygen depletion. My, my, aren't you anthro-centric! Whether or not we like to admit it, survival is what motivates us. Of course I'm anthropo-centric, I'm a human being. People are not the only species, and breathing is not the only form of respiration. Many other species, and many chemical process, including possibly atmospheric processes, are affected by the slight decrease in oxygen content. Name some. There are also problems such as the oxygen exchange with water, and fish, and so on. The fish are already dead. We have eaten them. (somewhat tongue in cheek). BTW global warming may be more important in this regard than actual Oxygen content in the air, since less Oxygen dissolves in warm water than in cold. Regards, Robin van Spaandonk The shrub is a plant.
