Perpetual Innovation

Category: global warming

  • Our planet is at a point of crisis – Leonard Pitts – Newsday

    Our planet is at a point of crisis – Leonard Pitts – Newsday:

    Leonard Pitts is going to get some hate mail out of this article. But, sadly, its all true.

    The only are that could be clarified a bit is the 97% of scientist agree. I think the agreement is that there is global warming, it drops way off to 80% or so of those scientists who believe that humans are primarily the cause.

    The controversy is well discussed in Wikipedia’s Global Warming Controversy.

    The idea that taking action now is not even thinkable because it would destroy the economy, jobs, etc., etc., is not a sound one. That was the argument against doing anything related to auto emissions and mileage standards.

    Fortunately coal is a good place for government intervention. The costs of coal in health and safety are massively higher than the $.04 per KWH from the past. Although we do a better job of cleaning coal, that doesn’t help if we ship it all off to China and India where they burn it without the same scrubbers that we use. Also, there’s the dirty little secret of coal: coal ash!. See our discussion here on: Pain in the ash!

    As well, coal produces huge amounts of CO2 emissions: twice the pollution and emission of oil or nat gas.

    Hey, here’s an idea. We are flaring about 50% of the nat gas produced in the USA, why not pipe it to power plants and use the fuel for “free”. Or, why not build small power plants near the frank wells and run the power lines to the grid… and have power for “free”.

    We, at SBP, like projects that save emissions and save money and save the environment. Things like Energy Efficiency (EE) and telecommuting… Projects that will save trillions of dollars every 3 years, en perpetuity. Projects that are — I hate to say it — “no brainer” decisions. Projects that require no government “help”.

    Sadly, these projects are hard areas to gain traction.
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  • Invest Yourself – Roaches, Never Just One

    Free Investment Newsletter | Invest Yourself:

    I really like what they (Robert B. Rinear) say on the currency. That all seems very very
    true.  The currencies in the world are
    all crap. The best may be Japan and they can’t keep the Yen low enough to be a     competitive exporter so it is wreaking havoc on their economy…
    The Yankee Dollar is a piece of crap. But we are less crappy then the
    Yuan or the Euro.  We are the best house
    in a slum-blighted neighborhood. 
    You can only have all the currencies in the world artificially low for
    so long. Especially if all the effects are compounding, year over year. I
    really do think that real assets, like land and gold, will slingshot into the
    stratosphere sometime rather soon, say 1 to 3 years.
    But the same thing that they complain about, the talking heads at CNN,
    they did themselves. Go look at any of the databases, since recorded history,
    on any of the measures you chose, and you will see that the global warming is
    very real, and accelerating. It also     coincides well with populations explosion and industrialization.  And it is a compounding effect. Panicking certainly doesn’t make
    sense, but ignoring facts and data supporting global warming means the “hoax”
    is on you.
    Give a look at: https://www.skepticalscience.com/
    (Real science and no crap, discussing the real facts and actual data about
    Climate Change & Global Warming. It is very real by every measure that is
    measurable.)
    Want to know about Sustainability, look at my book (www.TinyURL.com/SustainYBook/) created
    from live Wikipedia links on Sustainability. The Intro is by Elmer Hall and created the
    dynamic links to carefully selected Wikipedia articles (pages). The pages in
    this book represent the best, most current and most accurate single source of
    information related to sustainability and climate change in the world.

    Sustainability. The world currencies are not!… 
    Ever growing greenhouse gas emissions,  sustainable we are not.

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  • Scientists Warn of Rising Oceans From Polar Melt – NYTimes.com: … Implications

    Scientists Warn of Rising Oceans From Polar Melt – NYTimes.com:

    Or: http://nyti.ms/1sEIHC3 

    Studies published in the journals Science (here) and Geophysical Research Letters  (here) magazine find that the antarctic is melting, probably at a very very fast pace. The terms “beyond the point of no return” and “unstoppable” are used to describe the collapse of this glacial area in Antarctica. How long it will take is harder to predict.

    This really scares the bejeebers  out of everyone. Let me summarize a few reasons why this is bothersome:
    * It seems that arctic (north) should be shrinking a little and the antarctic (south) should be expanding if there were no human factors influencing such. So the shrinking/melt-off in the south would/should have to overcome this tilting effect of the earth, and then some. (This “effect” is something for people far smarter than I to explain.)
    * The north pole is now becoming more navigable, longer in the summer as the ice sheets melt off. China, for example is planning to navigate through a north passage for 3 months a year and avoid bringing oil from Russia through the Suez Canal, essentially cutting the trip in half (and maybe making twice 6-months worth of oil runs.
    * The melt off in the north pole is not as worrisome in terms of direct ocean level rise because much of the ice is over water, so the conversion from ice in the north pole to water is not a big deal related to ocean rise (although the resulting warming of the oceans from more heat absorption and less glacial reflection definitely is).
    * The antarctic is mostly over land. The melting of the Antarctic glaciers results directly into a rise in the sea levels.
    * Combine that with apparent acceleration effect, as the glaciers melt, they move faster and faster, accelerating the depletion process.
    * Thermal expansion. As ocean and land become exposed by the melting ice sheets, the ocean, land and air all become warmer. In the case of the oceans, water expands. If the average dept of the oceans are 2 miles, the oceans levels should rise at about 2 feet for every increase in (water) temperature of 1 degree Centigrade.

    At this rate, the best case by the IPCC of 2 degrees C increase in global warming has got to be very unlikely. The worst case scenarios of business as usual (BAU) of 3 to 4 degrees or more seem to be the most likely… The 4 degree increase would result in about 9 feet (or 3 yards) increase in sea levels.

    That means that by the end of the century, water-front cities will have new waterfront. Venus and New York will be new shapes and sizes. The Florida Keys will be less than half their current size.

    Some of us would argue that Business as Usual is not working so well, especially if you care much about your grand kids and great grand kids.

    Keywords: Antarctica, Arctic, business as usual, glaciers, Global Warming, IPCC, North Pole, sea levels, thermal expansion,

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  • 13 of 14 warmest years on record occurred in 21st century – UN | Environment

    13 of 14 warmest years on record occurred in 21st century – UN | Environment | theguardian.com:

    Ouch. As you look at the clock, you will see that we are only 14 years into the 21st Century. Yet we have 13 of the hottest 14 years in recorded history.

    You do have to take the whole of the earth into account, obviously, not just the USA, where we were ?fortunate? enough to have a exceptionally cold and blizzardy Winter. (Polar Vortex is now in our daily vernacular.)

    If you are interested in the science go here to look at the 11 or 12 major indicators (based on several data sources each) that would indicate global warming. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Instrumental_temperature_record

    If you want a composite graphic that shows the robustness of the evidence, go here. There are several data sources overlaid in each graphic. Note that the stratosphere is decreasing (cooler), that is consistent with a depletion of the ozone layer.

    The recent UN report talks about the trends in costs associated with climate effects, like typhoons. A draft report talks about $1.45T costs associated with climate change over the next decade. (See here http://www.livescience.com/43891-global-warming-economic-damage.html.)

    The costs are expected to reach $70 to $100B per year for adaptation by 2050. (See here: http://www.usnews.com/opinion/articles/2014/03/31/will-the-uns-new-report-shift-the-global-warming-debate)

    NASA has lots of interesting graphics, including time-series that will show the world temperature changes over the last couple hundred years. (Or just recently if you want since 1970).(The science visualization study at NASA is awesome, no mater what your interests: http://svs.gsfc.nasa.gov/Gallery/index.html or if you want to draw your own graphs based on the underlying data, go here: https://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/cag/time-series/global/globe/land_ocean/3/2/1880-2014).

    As we come up on Earth Day (EarthDay.org or EarthDay in Wikipedia) the impacts of business as usual (BAS) really revolves around whether you think something should be done to be much more sustainable NOW!, in decades or in centuries to come.

    The degree of urgency really depends on how much you believe in global warming, and how fast you think that warming may take place.

    Look at the graphs and make your own call on this.

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  • Skeptical Science on a Skeptical Scientist: Patrick Moore on climate change

    Is there really a debate as to whether humans are contributing to Global Warming?

    This will take you some time, so if you are looking for a couple quick sound-bites, skip this entire post, and absolutely, skip the videos.

    Dr. Patrick Moore was recently pointed out to me as a qualified scientist and a active skeptic of Global Warming. Read about Moore on Wikipedia. He was an active founder of Greenpeace, but left the greenie organization when they become too radical. He thinks that Greenpeace has moved toward more social and anti-capitalistic agendas, not so much the protection of the environment that Greenpeace was founded on.

    Now he is very skeptical of many things, especially the man-made contribution to global warming.

    Moore has become a PR guy for some of the most criticized companies and industries by environmental groups. Working, and consulting for ‘the enemy’ is not at all a bad thing. Being in the economic engine side of energy production, metals, etc., can give people detailed insight into complete solutions to major issues. But this does not seem to be how Moore functions; his interviews and books seem to actually be an extension of his job as a PR guy. See the criticism at the end of his Wikipedia page.

    (Wiki note: The Wikipedia entry seem mature, with about 700 edits, 21 over the last 30 days and the most recent edit today. No editorial complaints. Note that there are no articles outside links to this page, so Moore does not seem to be the indisputable expert he might lead us to believe.)

    There are many interviews of Moore that seem rational and reasonable enough on the surface: Hannity Feb 2014, and Fox Business Network with Stuart Varney pushing his book, Confessions of a Greenpeace Dropout. But, don’t watch these videos unless you are willing to go look that the scientific breakdown of what Moore has to say. Point by point, issue by issue.

    This is a blog by John Mason (2012, Aug 25).
    Unpicking a Gish-Gallop: former Greenpeace figure Patrick Moore on climate change:

    Mason takes on the details of an interview in which Moore lavishes on facts, figures, assumptions and conclusions. And Mason breaks it down point-by-point with the best facts that exist today. Mason gives some of the best, and most factual, address of the issues associated with “Global Warming” and those who would say their “ain’t no such thing”. And he did it all without “sensationalist scare tactics”.

    When you are done, ask yourself: Who was the most shrill and panic? Who presented the facts with the most facts? Who’s probabilities are most probable, give the facts?

    This SustainZine blog does not devote much time to the debate over “Global Warming”. Life’s too short. There is global warming. Moore and Mason agree on this. Humans contribute to global warming. Moore says only a little; Mason (and the IPCC scientists) say humans contribute a lot to global warming. One of the last skeptical climate scientist Richard Muller, said that there was global warming and that humans are a major cause. Blogs here. Muller’s research was funded by the Koch brothers.

    This blog, however, focuses on Sustainability. Sustainability is good. Activities and business models that are non-sustainable are broken models. (Hah, you thought I was going to say “Bad”.). A steady move toward 100% sustainability is not only a good plan, it is a sane plan. (Hah, you thought I was going to use the words “insane not to do so…”.)

    So let’s get past this foolish debate and have real people and real companies start making real progress toward sustainability. If businesses and communities and individuals take long enough to get started on serious efforts to become sustainable, then governments will (start to) take charge.

    What probably scares people more than Global Warming itself, actually, is that Governments far and wide will jump into the mix to “fix” things.

    We especially like efforts that will save money, save time, save resources and reduce our impact on the environment. Usually, we “don’t need no government” for that. (Actually that, not entirely true, but subject of another story.)

    Responsible vs. Irresponsible.
    You choose?

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