tree huggers

[midwestcoast]

But the real point is that there is very little, if any science that supports the idea that carbon causes global warming. If you're not certain about what I'm saying, read up on the scientific method first. Science shows that water vapor traps a ton of heat. If you took all the water vapor out of the air we'd all freeze to death, no matter how much co2 we put up there. Methane traps heat much better than co2, and it's much easier to reduce too.

Let me guess... Do you get your "science" from oil industry shills like junkscience.com?

No. I read the reports from the climate "science" advocates and I look at the sources of the data. I compare their reconstructions with the science of other disciplines, like paleontology and archeology. Their story isn't consistent with the evidence.

Look at the weather station for LAX today and compare it to how it would have been sited in 1950. Yeah, it's warmer. Duh.

But don't take my word for it. Check your own weather station records.

Yeah, don't listen to thousands of independant climate "Scientists" & pay no mind to the scientific concensus that has solidly supported AGW for a decade now, just look at the data from a couple weather stations & base your beliefs on that.
BTW one big problem with water vapor as a greenhouse gas is that it causes a positive feedback loop that amplifies any warming from increased CO ². Higher global temps mean more water vapor in the atmosphere which causes further warming.
As for methane? More bad news there as there are massive reserves of methane essentially sequestered in deep polar sea-water and permafrost. Warming (which is most dramatic at the poles) can/will/already is starting to release these reserves by melting the permafrost and warming & mixing the water. If that happens on a large scale it'll cause massive positive feedback & lead to runaway greenhouse warming that would be catastophic for humanity.
Reading about the scientific method doesn't make anyone a scientist.

 

[onion]

But the real point is that there is very little, if any science that supports the idea that carbon causes global warming. If you're not certain about what I'm saying, read up on the scientific method first. Science shows that water vapor traps a ton of heat. If you took all the water vapor out of the air we'd all freeze to death, no matter how much co2 we put up there. Methane traps heat much better than co2, and it's much easier to reduce too.

Let me guess... Do you get your "science" from oil industry shills like junkscience.com?

No. I read the reports from the climate "science" advocates and I look at the sources of the data. I compare their reconstructions with the science of other disciplines, like paleontology and archeology. Their story isn't consistent with the evidence.

Look at the weather station for LAX today and compare it to how it would have been sited in 1950. Yeah, it's warmer. Duh.

But don't take my word for it. Check your own weather station records.

Yeah, don't listen to thousands of independant climate "Scientists" & pay no mind to the scientific concensus that has solidly supported AGW for a decade now, just look at the data from a couple weather stations & base your beliefs on that.
BTW one big problem with water vapor as a greenhouse gas is that it causes a positive feedback loop that amplifies any warming from increased CO ². Higher global temps mean more water vapor in the atmosphere which causes further warming.
As for methane? More bad news there as there are massive reserves of methane essentially sequestered in deep polar sea-water and permafrost. Warming (which is most dramatic at the poles) can/will/already is starting to release these reserves by melting the permafrost and warming & mixing the water. If that happens on a large scale it'll cause massive positive feedback & lead to runaway greenhouse warming that would be catastophic for humanity.
Reading about the scientific method doesn't make anyone a scientist.

Wait a second. I read a blog and took chemistry 101 in college. I also hate Al Gore, therefore AGW is a money making scheme. I'm sure that thousands of climate scientists are perfectly willing to throw their career away faking data to make money for Al Gore. Finally, Al Gore has made a lot of money, therefore AGW is fake.

See? Logic. Duh.

 

[renewablejohn]

How can NG make more sense when the UK has already run out of its own North Sea gas and now relies on Russia and Norway to supply our needs. I get annoyed when these sort of reports are issued which do not take into account over 14 million tonnes of waste timber which ends up in landfill every year. Or that the national forest area is increasing not decreasing and still large areas of woodland need to be brought back into commercial production. Fortunately stoves are selling like hot cakes as people worry about fuel independence and the threat of Russia turning off the gas tap. Unfortunately a lot of new power stations have been built to use NG so the threat of power cuts is increasing with the rise in foreign imports of NG.

Fortunately we use wood for both heating and cooking because the nearest gas point is 20 miles away.

While I'm hardly an expert in British energy use, the real issue seems to be that the UK energy production has largely peaked and will almost certainly have to rely on energy imports for the foreseeable future. For the sake of argument, lets assume that the 14 million tons of waste timber you refer to are very dense hardwoods and have an energy equivalent of 17 million BTUs per ton. This means that approximately 238 trillion BTUS are being discarded every year. In 2009, the UK consumed approximately 3.1 Trillion Cubic Feet of natural gas. One CF of NG is 1034 BTUs. This means that UK used just over 3300 trillion BTUs of NG in 2009. Assuming that all the waste wood in the UK could be converted with 100% efficiency to NG or its equivalent, your talking about just over 7% of demand, hardly enough to end NG imports.

I'm not saying that using biomass to supplement energy use is a bad idea or would not help reduce demand for Russian NG, but clearly, relying on wood to provide a substantial portion of energy is not feasible. Again, I believe wood consumption, particularly of what would otherwise be "waste" wood, will always occupy an important niche. However, when you take a hard look at the numbers, a large scale, societal shift to biomass energy is all but impossible.

The problem we have in the UK is that we use 80% more gas then we should both for domestic heating and power generation both of which are very inefficient. We have a housing stock of badly insulated homes which if they had been built to scandinavian standards would only require 5% of the heating requirement of a typical UK home. With power generation the dash for gas has resulted in power stations being built without district heating schemes so their energy efficiencies are only 40% when they should be over 80% and because the power grid is not decentralised we have high grid transmission losses. If steps were taken to improve the housing stock to minimum scandinavian standards heated by district heating schemes and decentralised CHP plants then we would be in a position to get rid of NG supplies bearing in mind the other renewable shift of using wind farms solar and hydro.

 

[renewablejohn]

We have strict controls on recycling waste timber which means it cannot be used for compost a

Why the controls?

The controls are for waste timber which has been treated with wood preservatives (nasty chemicals which have included arsenic in the past) to get into the food supply chain by composting. There is also a problem with burning this material in domestic stoves as it produces a large amount of dioxins which at the moment Europe is 50% higher then the recommended health level.

http://ec.europa.eu/environment/dioxin/pdf/brochure09.pdf

 

[pyper]

Yeah, don't listen to thousands of independant climate "Scientists" & pay no mind to the scientific concensus that has solidly supported AGW for a decade now, just look at the data from a couple weather stations & base your beliefs on that.
BTW one big problem with water vapor as a greenhouse gas is that it causes a positive feedback loop that amplifies any warming from increased CO ². Higher global temps mean more water vapor in the atmosphere which causes further warming.
As for methane? More bad news there as there are massive reserves of methane essentially sequestered in deep polar sea-water and permafrost. Warming (which is most dramatic at the poles) can/will/already is starting to release these reserves by melting the permafrost and warming & mixing the water. If that happens on a large scale it'll cause massive positive feedback & lead to runaway greenhouse warming that would be catastophic for humanity.
Reading about the scientific method doesn't make anyone a scientist.

Garbage in = garbage out. When you take a weather station that's been sited on grass for 120 years and move it to tarmac are you really surprised that it measures warmer temperatures? From a realistic standpoint, if it's getting colder where I live, and it's getting colder where you live, and it's getting colder everywhere that everyone else lives, then does it really matter that some collection of thermometers that are not randomly placed was getting warmer?

There's only a "consensus" if you ignore the growing body of dissent. I notice a shift in terminology, by the way. The "scientists" used to be calling it global warming, and now they're calling it climate change. Having seen the start of the next cooling phase they've changed their nomenclature to get ahead of the curve.

I agree that reading about the scientific method does not make a person a scientist, but how does one purport to be a scientist if one does not use the scientific method? There used to be a lot of scientists who believed in phrenology and eugenics too. When it comes to scientific theory, being popular isn't always the same thing as being correct.

If increasing concentrations of CO2 inexorably make the world warmer, then why was it cooling from the 40's to the 70's? If there aren't other factors involved, then why was it so much warmer in Roman times? And in the medieval period? (Things easily established by archeology) Why is there a total disconnect between CO2 and temperature over the last 600 million years?

Finally, all this supposed science is primarily based on a single variable -- temperature. Without taking humidity into account you really don't know anything.

 

[zknowlto]

How can NG make more sense when the UK has already run out of its own North Sea gas and now relies on Russia and Norway to supply our needs. I get annoyed when these sort of reports are issued which do not take into account over 14 million tonnes of waste timber which ends up in landfill every year. Or that the national forest area is increasing not decreasing and still large areas of woodland need to be brought back into commercial production. Fortunately stoves are selling like hot cakes as people worry about fuel independence and the threat of Russia turning off the gas tap. Unfortunately a lot of new power stations have been built to use NG so the threat of power cuts is increasing with the rise in foreign imports of NG.

Fortunately we use wood for both heating and cooking because the nearest gas point is 20 miles away.

While I'm hardly an expert in British energy use, the real issue seems to be that the UK energy production has largely peaked and will almost certainly have to rely on energy imports for the foreseeable future. For the sake of argument, lets assume that the 14 million tons of waste timber you refer to are very dense hardwoods and have an energy equivalent of 17 million BTUs per ton. This means that approximately 238 trillion BTUS are being discarded every year. In 2009, the UK consumed approximately 3.1 Trillion Cubic Feet of natural gas. One CF of NG is 1034 BTUs. This means that UK used just over 3300 trillion BTUs of NG in 2009. Assuming that all the waste wood in the UK could be converted with 100% efficiency to NG or its equivalent, your talking about just over 7% of demand, hardly enough to end NG imports.

I'm not saying that using biomass to supplement energy use is a bad idea or would not help reduce demand for Russian NG, but clearly, relying on wood to provide a substantial portion of energy is not feasible. Again, I believe wood consumption, particularly of what would otherwise be "waste" wood, will always occupy an important niche. However, when you take a hard look at the numbers, a large scale, societal shift to biomass energy is all but impossible.

The problem we have in the UK is that we use 80% more gas then we should both for domestic heating and power generation both of which are very inefficient. We have a housing stock of badly insulated homes which if they had been built to scandinavian standards would only require 5% of the heating requirement of a typical UK home. With power generation the dash for gas has resulted in power stations being built without district heating schemes so their energy efficiencies are only 40% when they should be over 80% and because the power grid is not decentralised we have high grid transmission losses. If steps were taken to improve the housing stock to minimum scandinavian standards heated by district heating schemes and decentralised CHP plants then we would be in a position to get rid of NG supplies bearing in mind the other renewable shift of using wind farms solar and hydro.

Well, I'm really outside of my expertise when it comes to building standards, but if a Norwegian house really only requires 5% of the heating energy a UK house does, and a significant amount of housing stock can be converted to this level of efficiency, then there is definitely the opportunity for wood to occupy a greater share of the overall energy portfolio. Unfortunately, these conditions don't exist now and, in my mind, aren't likely to exist for decades. Given this, and going back to the thrust of the original article, I don't think it's unreasonable to assume that a large number of UK citizens switching from NG to biomass heat, in the absence of other changes, will lead to increased carbon footprint over what exists now.

 

[renewablejohn]

Go Blue

The position in the UK is finally changing with the government supporting funding to better insulate the existing housing stock and higher insulation requirements within the building regulations for new build housing. If the price of NG keeps going up and the renewable heat incentive comes in for thermal solar panels I could see a dramatic reduction in the usage of NG for domestic heating within the next 10 years.

 

[midwestcoast]

Garbage in = garbage out. When you take a weather station that's been sited on grass for 120 years and move it to tarmac are you really surprised that it measures warmer temperatures? From a realistic standpoint, if it's getting colder where I live, and it's getting colder where you live, and it's getting colder everywhere that everyone else lives, then does it really matter that some collection of thermometers that are not randomly placed was getting warmer?

There's only a "consensus" if you ignore the growing body of dissent. I notice a shift in terminology, by the way. The "scientists" used to be calling it global warming, and now they're calling it climate change. Having seen the start of the next cooling phase they've changed their nomenclature to get ahead of the curve.

I agree that reading about the scientific method does not make a person a scientist, but how does one purport to be a scientist if one does not use the scientific method? There used to be a lot of scientists who believed in phrenology and eugenics too. When it comes to scientific theory, being popular isn't always the same thing as being correct.

If increasing concentrations of CO2 inexorably make the world warmer, then why was it cooling from the 40's to the 70's? If there aren't other factors involved, then why was it so much warmer in Roman times? And in the medieval period? (Things easily established by archeology) Why is there a total disconnect between CO2 and temperature over the last 600 million years?

Finally, all this supposed science is primarily based on a single variable -- temperature. Without taking humidity into account you really don't know anything.

Well, in for a dime, in for a dollar as they say so here goes.
The Urban Heat Island effect is well know by climate scientists and is accounted and corrected for in the climate models. Furthermore the greatest warming observed so far has been near the poles where there hasn't been asphalt laid.
Getting colder where everyone lives? Not according to NOAA who already predict 2010 to be the warmest year on record for the planet.
Increasing volume & Fox News coverage does not equal a growing body of dissent.
Scientists have been using the term Climate Change for decades & still use it. It is a better term really since the greatest effects are predicted to be severe storms, droughts, sea-level rises... more variable weather in general, not just a hotter summer in wherever one happens to be. Global Warming has always been a term used more by the media, perhaps that's changing. I haven't seen any evidence of cooling other than those ocean surface satelight readings from a couple years back that later turned out to show warming after-all.
The scientific method is a great way to teach science as a concept to 5'th graders, it kinda falls short when studying the entire planet. Look, I know anyone can fund quasi-science to prove whatever they want to prove, that's why I put more stock it a report from NOAA or the IPCC than one from an oil industry-funded 'Think Tank'.
Yes science has been used to try to justify some messed-up things; so has religion, politics, economics, social science.... Just 'cause eugenics happened is no strike against climate science.
The pause in warming (not actual cooling) from 40's-70's has been attributed to increased sulphates, volcanic aerosols, reduced solar activity, US vs UK ship record keeping differences, but in essence it's a short pause in the larger warming trend.
Global mean temp was most likely slightly (fracton of a degree) cooler in the medieval warm period, than it was by the late 20'th century, although it seems to have been warmer in the north Atlantic & north Europe/Asia. It was more of a regional event. So yes, grapes in Greenland & all that, but not a warmer globe than today.
I don't see the disconnect btwn CO2 & temperature at all.
The Global Climate Models are the most powerful and comprehensive tools we have to help us understand climate and no, they are not based on just one variable, they are based on collections of literally everything we know about the earth-climate system and all it's sub-systems. They, of course, project continued and accelerated warming. Maybe you need to start studying global moistening to find the missing key that will tell us there's no prob & just keep burning fossil fuels as fast as possible?

 

[jharkin]

I don't care about NASA weather stations vs my local weather station.

One, or even a few, hot or cold years in any given location prove nothing.

What I DO care about are the satellite photos that show the iceberg the size of new york city that broke off Greenland. And the record showing the size of the ice caps shrinking year after year. And the 1950 vs today photos of the Himalayan glaciers that show clearly how far they have shrunk.


To think that we can take a mass of carbon that took all the plantlife on the planet millions and millions of years to sequester underground, then dump it all back into the atmosphere in <100 years and expect that NOT to mess up the balance of nature is pure hubris.

 

[jharkin]

Lets take these one at a time.

From a realistic standpoint, if it's getting colder where I live, and it's getting colder where you live, and it's getting colder everywhere that everyone else lives, then does it really matter that some collection of thermometers that are not randomly placed was getting warmer?

Is not getting colder where I live. We just had the hottest summer in a decade and I can clearly recall longer colder winters as recently as the 80s. But in any case its one one or two or a handful of locations that matter - its the overall world average.

There's only a "consensus" if you ignore the growing body of dissent. I notice a shift in terminology, by the way. The "scientists" used to be calling it global warming, and now they're calling it climate change. Having seen the start of the next cooling phase they've changed their nomenclature to get ahead of the curve.

Except that many of the skeptics are starting to change their mind and become believers - take Bjorn Lomborg's recent coming out as a convert to AGW for example.

And as for calling it climate change. The fact is that it only takes an average temperature change of a couple degrees to have major effects on habitats, sea levels etc. The average person wont notice that its 85F instead of 83F in the summer, but will notice when the sea rises 3 feet or the number of hurricanes each year doubles. So they are just pointing out the more important and more noticeable issue.

If increasing concentrations of CO2 inexorably make the world warmer, then why was it cooling from the 40's to the 70's? If there aren't other factors involved, then why was it so much warmer in Roman times? And in the medieval period? (Things easily established by archeology) Why is there a total disconnect between CO2 and temperature over the last 600 million years?

I know the mid century cool does puzzle researchers. I think one theory is that particulate pollution during that period was overpowering CO2, but the effect started to reverse after the clean air act. So I guess we should all burn wet wood and stop climate change!

And yes, we know that earths temperature has varied significantly over time, but most of the changes happened slowly over thousands of years - wildlife had time to migrate and evolve to adapt. Today we are force 10,000 years of change in a few decades and the natural world cannot adapt to that pace.




But maybe you are right not to worry. Its more and more looking like resource depletion and/or financial collapse will kill us off before this does