Gulf Stream slowdown

[Hippocampus]

To bring it into human terms. Before the year is out (very likely in the next few months) I’m going to buy and use a 55,000 lb piece of plastic to liberate hydrocarbons and CO2 into the atmosphere for no other reason than my amusement. I can rationalize at least it’s not a monster sportfish making several runs out to the canyons every week but it’s still not a green activity. Sure my total footprint is trivial and in very large measure offset by my dirt dwelling which is very green. I’ve evolved. No more pick up truck getting 8mpg in 2 wheel and worst when playing in mud in 4 wheel. My next probably will be electric.
So after all the yelling, posturing and stiff backs why not try to live a greener life? What’s the downside for you personally?

 

[O C Diver]

To bring it into human terms. Before the year is out (very likely in the next few months) I’m going to buy and use a 55,000 lb piece of plastic to liberate hydrocarbons and CO2 into the atmosphere for no other reason than my amusement. I can rationalize at least it’s not a monster sportfish making several runs out to the canyons every week but it’s still not a green activity. Sure my total footprint is trivial and in very large measure offset by my dirt dwelling which is very green. I’ve evolved. No more pick up truck getting 8mpg in 2 wheel and worst when playing in mud in 4 wheel. My next probably will be electric.
So after all the yelling, posturing and stiff backs why not try to live a greener life? What’s the downside for you personally?

My pickup gets 23 MPG. My boat gets 3.5 NMPG. My SW FL house electric bill is <$1,000 per year. So I'm already there and doubt it will make any difference.

Ted

 

[Northern Spy]

Academic science is as cut throat political as it can get. Scientists are humans and from me or Pilou you can stories how ego, self interest, interpersonal animosities make it hard to move forward. Still there are constrained formats that permit and in fact force forward movement.
The IPCC reports evolve. With each one the understanding is deeper and the predictions have better confidence levels so improve.science forces you to admit incorrect assumptions, accepted confounders and improve. This is very obvious if you’ve been following those reports.
Why does this occur in spite of the venality of the parties involved? First it’s publish or perish. If you don’t get your grants approved you don’t have monies coming into your lab and even if you have life long tenure you’re not a player. Getting grant approval depends on where your project is prioritize on a list. Funding agencies start at the top and work their way down until all funds are dispersed. You may spend weeks or even months writing a grant proposal only to have it not funded.
Sure the granting agencies may be influenced by politics but they are under great pressure to meet their mandate. If they don’t they get fired. Their mandate is to fund good science that furthers the advancement of knowledge in their field. So they pick studies that are of interest and inform the research of other scientists in that field. They don’t want to waste money so look at length at the validity of the methodology that grant proposal will use. They look at the supporting literature. But they often fund grants with novel thinking looking for paradigm shifts.
In academic science if you don’t get grants you don’t publish. That means if you don’t publish your soon out the door. Your institution judges your performance by your publications. Where they where published, how many, how often your studies are cited by other scientists. In short your production and reputation.
Editors of the journals will send out a proposed article about a study to other scientists in that field (peer review). Depending upon that critique (mostly aimed at whether the methodology meets standards) they will then prioritize it in view of their judgment as to its interest to their subscribers. Once they run out of space in their journal it’s shelved. But the first step in all fields is making the cut on the strength of the science. This is usually determined by methodology.
All papers in all fields have variations of the same basic format.
Introduction-brief recount of what’s known and not known. Why you undertook the study. What you’re trying to prove or disprove. Why that’s important to know.
Methodology- exactly how you ran your study. Exactly how you’re going to look at the results (usually your statistics). You need to do this before the study as determining this beforehand gets rid of the opportunity for many of the biases referred to in prior posts.
Results- your data set and your statistics.
Conclusions- what your study proved or disproved and the limitations of your study in making inferences.
Discussion- where to go from here. How this result fits into the big picture. What would be interesting to look at now you have the result from this study.

The big bugaboo in science is to eliminate bias. Observation bias, sampling bias, incorrect statistics applied, so called type 1 or type 2 errors etc. in science bias has a somewhat different usage than in common speech. It’s anything that distorts your data collection so your observations don’t reflect what’s really going on. Papers are not published or are withdrawn if bias that could influence results are detected. Climate science is the same as other science. A poor study is a poor study. A bad paper is a bad paper. As new things are shared old ways of thinking are discarded. It’s very messy and quite argumentative. From the outside it looks like everything is being questioned and nothing is agreed on. But that’s not true. Overtime a consensus is achieved. Sure there are those that remain outside that consensus.
The overwhelming consensus is that MMCC is occurring and will result in deleterious results for mankind. What to do about that is up to agencies outside the scientific community. Science can help inform multinationals, governments, and the public in the hopes we make good decisions. But it’s not science’s purview to make those decisions.

Agree with every word you wrote.

It isn't science that concerns me, it is the acedemic system (driven ultimately by money) that it is currently constrained by.

 

[Hippocampus]

Good on you. Every month our electric company says given we are self sufficient and sell monthly back to the grid we have the impact of 8(winter) to 20 (summer) trees. We have no electric bill. They give us a monthly check.
My diesel gets 30mpg but as said next will be an electric.
My house requires no maintenance. Haven’t had a service man in it yet except to fix the door on the subzero.
Our town recycles (if you read about that that’s an area that needs huge improvement) and we do what we can to avoid disposable plastic. We compose our wet trash and it goes into our veggie and herb and blueberries gardens.
None of this has anything to do with politics. Just leads to a nicer life and is totally consistent to what my very Republican scout master taught me as a kid. Just like the blow back I get on the Covid thread just don’t see this as a red/blue thing.
Surely you’re right it’s the big players in transportation (including marine shipping), energy production, factory farming and such that is where the action is. But residential housing and personal transportation isn’t totally insignificant either.

 

[O C Diver]

None of this has anything to do with politics. Just leads to a nicer life and is totally consistent to what my very Republican scout master taught me as a kid. Just like the blow back I get on the Covid thread just don’t see this as a red/blue thing.
Surely you’re right it’s the big players in transportation (including marine shipping), energy production, factory farming and such that is where the action is. But residential housing and personal transportation isn’t totally insignificant either.

We do it because it's the right thing to do and we can.

Hopefully some day the economy of scale will reach SW FL residential solar. Just can't justify $30K to $40K to offset a $1,000 annual electric bill.

Ted

 

[RT Firefly]

Greetings,
Mr. OC. Re: Your post #62. Thanks for the link. I see where you're coming from, now. I still don't agree with your synopsis.


Waste and energy will still be mismanaged. You'll only be delaying the inevitable. Economies of scale for production of certain items will be lost, costs will subsequently rise and standards of living will fall IMO.


There IS enough of everything to go around it's simply concentrated in certain areas to the bereft of those who need it.


That being said, IF the needs of the current world population could be met, you still have to deal with the "throwaway" mindset of society. That WILL be a problem.

 

[mainer]

It’s not the weather.

It could be the thousands of lost containers are piling up and slowing the gulf stream

 

[O C Diver]

Greetings,
Mr. OC. Re: Your post #62. Thanks for the link. I see where you're coming from, now. I still don't agree with your synopsis.


Waste and energy will still be mismanaged. You'll only be delaying the inevitable. Economies of scale for production of certain items will be lost, costs will subsequently rise and standards of living will fall IMO.


There IS enough of everything to go around it's simply concentrated in certain areas to the bereft of those who need it.


That being said, IF the needs of the current world population could be met, you still have to deal with the "throwaway" mindset of society. That WILL be a problem.

Mr. RT,
Conceptually I don't think we're that far apart. Reality is that most emerging nations aren't going to get onboard. Without China and India, I don't think it matters how green Canada and the USA get.

A pessimist is an optimist with experience.

Ted

 

[RT Firefly]

 

[Lou_tribal]

A man is brought into a hospital with low blood pressure. The doctor orders a drug to raise it. The nurse says, "shouldn't we address the severed foot from which he is bleeding out?"

The climate continues to change without the impact of man. Man has an impact on the climate. At what point do the scientists follow the science to the logical conclusion that there is an over population of humans on the planet and an impact on the climate is one symptom. I guess that's politically incorrect. Tell me again science isn't impacted by politics.

Btw, reduce the human population of the planet to the level in 1928 and over 75% of human impact on the planet and environment goes away.

Ted

Except that a good % of these 75% are irreversible.

L

 

[O C Diver]

Except that a good % of these 75% are irreversible.

L

One can debate that. Irregardless, the 75% referred to on going activity such as power generation, consuming water and food, using raw materials, etc.

Ted

 

[socalrider]

Without China and India, I don't think it matters how green Canada and the USA get.

It's not an easy problem and it's now almost certain that things are going to get a lot worse climate-wise over the coming century even with drastic actions today.

But the countries that are going be relatively okay are the ones who are able to invent, manufacture, integrate & deploy the technical, financial, and organizational solutions to these problems. That's why China is spending huge $$ on the sector. They realized that they're never going to catch the western OEMs in auto manufacturing, for example, but they have a shot with EVs.

That's why it's so infuriating to me to see so-called patriotic Americans clamoring for a return to coal. We've got to get ahead of this or we're not going to have any industry left to power!

 

[boathealer]

That's why it's so infuriating to me to see so-called patriotic Americans clamoring for a return to coal. We've got to get ahead of this or we're not going to have any industry left to power!

That's not what I hear them saying. I hear them saying (pleading) don't throw the baby out with the bathwater ---- "All of the above".

 

[socalrider]

That's not what I hear them saying. I hear them saying (pleading) don't throw the baby out with the bathwater ---- "All of the above".

"All of the above" is not what Trump was going for. His administration was advocating for *subsidizing* coal through BS modifications to the market rules written specifically to do this. They were all thrown out by the courts. If implemented, they would have made our electricity more expensive and our air quality worse.

There is zero justification for coal at this point. Coal is why pregnant women can't eat seafood. AND it's vastly more expensive than natural gas - which is the primary reason why plants have continued to shut down across administrations. Coal is a baby that should be thrown out with the bathwater.

I honestly cannot understand the motivation for supporting it, other than "owning the libs".

 

[sunchaser]

"All of the above" is not what Trump was going for. His administration was advocating for *subsidizing* coal through BS modifications to the market rules written specifically to do this. They were all thrown out by the courts. If implemented, they would have made our electricity more expensive and our air quality worse.

There is zero justification for coal at this point. Coal is why pregnant women can't eat seafood. AND it's vastly more expensive than natural gas - which is the primary reason why plants have continued to shut down across administrations. Coal is a baby that should be thrown out with the bathwater.

I honestly cannot understand the motivation for supporting it, other than "owning the libs".

SoCal
Coking coal ok with you?

 

[O C Diver]

"All of the above" is not what Trump was going for. His administration was advocating for *subsidizing* coal through BS modifications to the market rules written specifically to do this. They were all thrown out by the courts. If implemented, they would have made our electricity more expensive and our air quality worse.

There is zero justification for coal at this point. Coal is why pregnant women can't eat seafood. AND it's vastly more expensive than natural gas - which is the primary reason why plants have continued to shut down across administrations. Coal is a baby that should be thrown out with the bathwater.

I honestly cannot understand the motivation for supporting it, other than "owning the libs".

Most of the coal fired power plants shutdown because updating to the clean air requirements can't be realistically done with the older technology plants. Can new plants be built with emission scrubbing to make them safe? I don't know. I would guess we can burn coal hot enough to eliminate most of the bad discharge and then scrub the exhaust gas. In case you're not familiar with it, the catalytic converter on a car was designed to raise the exhaust gas temperature to a point where the impurities were being burned away at a high temperature. Unfortunately there's no objectivity in the press to answer that question.

Ted

 

[SteveK]

The United States has the most operational nuclear reactors on the planet – 96. Together they have a capacity of 97,565 MW, and last year nuclear energy made up about 20% of the country's electricity generation

In 2019 there were 241 coal powered units across the United States which generated 23% of the United States electricity in 2019, an amount of electricity similar to that from renewable energy or nuclear power but about half of the amount generated by natural gas plants.

In 2015 there was around 1800 natural gas power stations in the United States. In 2019, these natural gas plants produced 38% of the United States electricity production, the highest percentage of any source above coal, nuclear and renewables

Shut down nuclear 20%, shut down coal 23%, shut down Natural gas 38% and build them windmills pronto. Shut down 81% of power production.
No one owns the libs

 

[socalrider]

SoCal
Coking coal ok with you?

Met coal is not going away anytime soon. That's fine.

Most of the coal fired power plants shutdown because updating to the clean air requirements can't be realistically done with the older technology plants. Can new plants be built with emission scrubbing to make them safe? I don't know. I would guess we can burn coal hot enough to eliminate most of the bad discharge and then scrub the exhaust gas. In case you're not familiar with it, the catalytic converter on a car was designed to raise the exhaust gas temperature to a point where the impurities were being burned away at a high temperature. Unfortunately there's no objectivity in the press to answer that question.

Ted

I hold a patent on catalytic conversion for diesel combustion. There's no conspiracy here - the rules are written in a technology-agnostic manner. If it were economic to retrofit or build new coal capable of meeting the air quality regs, they would do so. It is not, so they don't.

The challenge with just raising the combustion temp (or leaning out the mix for ICEs) is that N2 and O2 start to react at high temps, creating NOx, a precursor to smog. For coal plants, it's the mercury that's really expensive to remove (my understanding - less familiar with these details).

Shut down nuclear 20%, shut down coal 23%, shut down Natural gas 38% and build them windmills pronto. Shut down 81% of power production.
No one owns the libs

I don't know what you're on about. Nobody is suggesting we turn off the old stuff before the new stuff is built.

 

[sunchaser]

On a global basis China is the biggest thermal coal consumer by far, 5 times as much as US. Over the next five years China's increased coal consumption will equal all of US production. It is easy to beat up on the beleaguered US coal producers, but nigh impossible for those strapped to their US computer desks to effectively change China's coal consumption.

This conundrum seems currently irresolvable, ie, China. And not at all addressed by Paris Accords. China is happy as US and Europe industry power needs get ever tighter as energy production becomes unsettled.

Energy intensive industrial production of all sorts is headed to the world's number power consumer - China. The hoped for green movement improvements are headed towards a worldwide impasse at best and industrial economic issues outside China at worst.

 

[socalrider]

On a global basis China is the biggest thermal coal consumer by far, 5 times as much as US. Over the next five years China's increased coal consumption will equal all of US production. It is easy to beat up on the beleaguered US coal producers, but nigh impossible for those strapped to their US computer desks to effectively change China's coal consumption.

This conundrum seems currently irresolvable, ie, China. And not at all addressed by Paris Accords. China is happy as US and Europe industry power needs get ever tighter as energy production becomes unsettled.

Energy intensive industrial production of all sorts is headed to the world's number power consumer - China. The green movement is headed towards an impasse at best and economic calamity outside China at worst.

I agree with sothe first part. But the reason China has been building coal is because they have no natural gas. The fracking boom has tremendously advantaged US industry, and has actually reversed a lot of the industrial production offshoring you describe above. It has also been more responsible for driving coal out of business than anything else (air quality regs is the second leading cause).

We are lucky to have natural gas as a bridge to renewables. China only has coal, which is more expensive and vastly more polluting. It sucks that they're building this infrastructure but it's hard to argue that they should have kept their people in the dark.

They know that coal isn't sustainable & are working on the transition. I wish they were going faster. But this argument that "we can't do it because China has a lot of coal plants" doesn't follow.

Ideally we'd get our stuff together and tax the snot out of carbon-intensive imports to equalize the playing field.

 

[RT Firefly]

Greetings,
Mr. s. An astute observation and I tend to agree with you. I heard (don't know the validity) that China will be bringing a nuke plant on line every year for the next 20 years and shutting down their coal plants BUT I'll believe that when I see it.

 

[sunchaser]

Greetings,
Mr. s. An astute observation and I tend to agree with you. I heard (don't know the validity) that China will be bringing a nuke plant on line every year for the next 20 years and shutting down their coal plants BUT I'll believe that when I see it.

It appears China currently has 12 nukes under construction. They are amazing at the speed at which they can build these, little opposition from citizens and no government interference helps the construction schedule a lot.

 

[sunchaser]

I agree with sothe first part. But the reason China has been building coal is because they have no natural gas.

Huge gas import capability exists with Russia with imports ramping up and a $400 billion pipeline project moving ahead. LNG shipments and gas pipelines between the two countries are a big win win. At some point the newer thermal coal plants can be switched to gas, if available.

 

[catalinajack]

No, sir, not true. Science deniers are self-evident. Your equation is nonsensical. Forrest Gump was correct.

Um, you know exactly when/how that got started. It is shameful.

If you do not agree with every last government billion-dollar cost adder, you are automatically a science denier and a domestic terrorist.

 

[catalinajack]

Big tech is not a source of information. It creates no content. It is merely a clearinghouse of information derived from other sources no different than a print library.

"There is a lot of junk published, where we laugh privately and say to ourselves "no one could possibly be foolish enough to believe THAT."


This is the science of PM.

Perception Management, in the past only a few had the pull to create what folks will think/believe about a subject
.
Kings, Popes. Dictators had the megaphone and supporters to create the "truth".

Today big tech has replaced governments as the source of information and so creates the "truth".

Anyone with a differing viewpoint is silenced by not having a voice.

If we wish to continue as a democratic republic the internet must be reopened to all.


As always, Eternal Vigilance is called for.

 

[catalinajack]

As, yes, a solution then could be massive genocide. So, any volunteers?

A man is brought into a hospital with low blood pressure. The doctor orders a drug to raise it. The nurse says, "shouldn't we address the severed foot from which he is bleeding out?"

The climate continues to change without the impact of man. Man has an impact on the climate. At what point do the scientists follow the science to the logical conclusion that there is an over population of humans on the planet and an impact on the climate is one symptom. I guess that's politically incorrect. Tell me again science isn't impacted by politics.

Btw, reduce the human population of the planet to the level in 1928 and over 75% of human impact on the planet and environment goes away.

Ted

 

[catalinajack]

And, oh, how about the buggy whip makers? Times change. The market adapts. So, let's see. Let's pass a law that requires coal as our heating source so miners can have jobs. Preserving obsolete jobs is not in the public interest.

Maybe ask the thousands of pipeline workers who are just now out of a job? How should they feed their families? Or the coal miners now on welfare from the last wave of "green" decisions. I guess they should all go out and "learn how to code" or go make solar panels in China.

There is a real-people and economic side to all this "science" that none of the decision-makers seem to care about. There is a way to do this without cannibalizing current technologies and industry, but it is not politically-expedient to research and investigate the solutions.

 

[catalinajack]

The only transition strategy that will ever work is the "market". The job market is ever evolving. Who among us knows what a linotype operator did before their job became obsolete? Transition training is a fool's errand as is worrying about certain jobs becoming obsolete. Evolve or be left behind.

First of all, coal is going away for dozens of reasons. The last administration tried to revive the industry and more plant shut down than under the previous administration (both terms combined). Should we keep putting mercury in the air in perpetuity so that people are guaranteed a job that makes them sick?

Second, I agree that we need to do better in helping people through the transition. The Dems have talked a big game on this but have not delivered (partly but not wholly because of the other party blocking legislation). Hopefully the new admin will do better. In a healthy political environment there would be competing ideas for how to do this. As it is, we have one party with its head in the sand, denying that the energy transition is necessary, denying that it is happening at all, yelling and screaming about fraud, conspiracy, and the "extreme left" - no ideas at all.

The death of the Republican party here in CA has *not* been good for the state! The death of the Democratic party in TX has *not* been good for that state.

 

[catalinajack]

They don't matter. Nor do the coal miners. Those 50 guys can get a job driving those trucks you mentioned.

OK - its jobs, not workers - no less relevant, IMHO. No planning, no foresight, just "sign here, Joe." Never mind that now we'll be bringing in the same oil in by rail and/or truck..... There are secondary businesses/jobs in the surrounding communities also affected, BTW.



Yeah, since its only 50, they are not really peoples' lives, are they?

 

[catalinajack]

Ted. Thoughtful way? What are your thoughts on how to get rid of 75% of the world's population? Which goes first? Using your logic, the US should be wiped out 100% based on the percentage of resources we consume. Will you step up and volunteer?

Mr. RT,
With all do respect, you need to stick your head in the ocean. I've done it all my working life. We are systematically depleting the oceans of their animal diversity and polluting them in the process. 100 years ago the Chesapeake bay was clear, teaming with life and vegetation. It's now a brown cesspool. The third world countries are doing the same thing to their jungles. When you deplete species like the salmon population to the point where you have to farm them in the ocean, that should be a clear message that the problem goes far beyond fossil fuels and water.

Regarding 1928 / 75%:
In 1928 the estimated world population was 2 billion. Less than 100 years later, it's very close to 8 billion. If you removed 75% of the population and associated stuff, theoretically you remove 75% of man's impact on the planet. If done in a thoughtful way, the reduction would be greater as you would likely leave all the green energy power generation and likely eliminate coal, nuclear and fuel oil power production, leaving natural gas to cover shortages. Taking that approach to the rest of man's impact on the planet, might get you above 80%.

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Ted