a 1°C increase in the earth's temperature increases the energy radiated away by about 1.5%. Using your 6000:1 figure for current human energy releases we could increase our energy consumption by about 100 times (ie 1/60th of suns input energy) and only increase the Earths temperature by 1°C on average, and at that sort of energy consumption we could all live permanently in aircraft flying around the world.
1°C isn't very significant next to the 3°C temperature variation we have had during the current interglacial (the Holocene over the last 10000 years, most of which was hotter than today). Or next to the 8-10°C variation we get between the normal ice-age state and the brief interglacials that we have had over the last few million years. Solar variation appears to be relatively minor, perhaps about 0.1% in terms of total incident energy (though we don't have good information before the satellite era - the sun could be long-term variable and we wouldn't know), but is perhaps much more significant in terms of how the spectrum of that energy is distributed, with possibly small variations in higher frequencies, solar magnetic field and charged particles producing large effects via subtle changes in atmospheric chemistry and cloud nucleation. So there are obviously natural effects that massively overwhelm our present ability to affect the earth's temperature, even if doubling CO2 does ultimately increase temperature by 1-2°C Luckily there are relatively subtle ways where we can input a small amounts of energy and produce bigger effects on the earth's temperature. In particular using distributed water turbines or erecting barriers in the ocean to modify oceanic circulation and heat transport between poles and equator (can magnify the effect of your input energy by 1000's of times). Or melting icecaps, or growing them by pumping water onto them. Hopefully we will be able to use such tricks to prevent the oncoming iceage that is otherwise due to start sometime in the next 2000 years. On 5 August 2012 20:14, David L Babcock <[email protected]> wrote: > On 8/5/2012 11:21 AM, David Roberson wrote: > It seems apparent that the final global consideration is that extra heat > is released into the atmosphere, land, and water of the earth as a result > of us burning fossil fuels. > > In other terms, one kilogram of coal results in the net earth heating of > X times the initial heat outlay. > > I found part of the picture in Wikipedia: The ratio of all the energy > incident from the Sun, to all the energy mankind used globally (in 2009?) > was roughly 6,000 to 1. (I assume this was only the energy that involved > payment, ie, almost all fossil sourced energy). > > Unknown to me is the added heat energy from "new" CO2 and methane. If our > present rate of warming is caused by (*really *wild guess) 1% more > retention of solar energy than "before", then that 1% is 60 times more than > our total energy consumption, for x = 60. If you diddle in the all the > renewable and nuclear parts it won't be much different. > > Hey, a wild guess is better than none. > > So if, if, if, all co2 sources get replaced by LENR, no problem. But > bloody unlikely. Also, there WILL BE a huge increase in total energy > usage, exponential, year after year after year. Might take us all of 200 > years to get back in trouble. > > Ol' Bab. > > > > I would greatly appreciate it if some of our esteemed members join into > this discussion. Do you consider my thought experiment completely off > base or is there a way to get a handle upon the true X factor I am > suggesting? > > Dave > > >
