Global Warming/Climate Change Discussion Thread

[James2097]

Hey I had to put a few things in there that were easy to attack! (none of them my actual point of view however.)

Famine, now of course you wouldn't specifically condone putting crap into the environment, I know that, but 'seeming' to root for the less than super cautious approach (going by certain pie charts you seem to like) tends to undermine your environmental concerns - as seen by some folk.*

*who read your posts very quickly.


As far as I know there is no real solution as to what to do with nuclear waste. We can be very careful about it, but can we garauntee 0% nasty damage to ourselves or the environment over however long we'd be producing waste (and however long it remained harmful)?

Somewhat pessimistically, I believe humans are, well.. human. We are fallible and make mistakes. Widespread nuclear power is asking for another Chenobl. It wouldn't be a matter of "if", it'd be a matter of "when". I have decidedly less trust in the human race than perhaps I should. Oh well.

 

[Famine]

It's Devil's Advocate. Like in the disability discrimination thread. I am of the opinion that on private property the owner has the right to decide who can enter and who cannot - including not providing wheelchair access. I wouldn't dream of NOT providing wheelchair access outside my own business, as I'd want as many customers as possible, but that's me exercising my right to choose - and someone else in the same position must be free to choose to be an ass.

 

[TheCracker]

Oh, and for the record, it turns out we were all wrong about the pirates. We thought it was the decreasing number of them that was causing global warming and the melting of the Arctic ice cap. Not so:

A pirate's a pirate, whether he uses a cutlass or an AK-47

Turns out there may be more of them than ever now, so its their increasing numbers that are doing all this.

Just wanted to bring everybody up to speed...

This graph just shows the amount of piracy incedents - there are still only 17 (or 18) pirates left - they're just much busier these days. These asian kids with their AK-47's and rubber dingies arn't real pirates. Real pirates have eye patches, parrots, wooden legs and strippy jumpers.

This guy 'Villar' doesn't know jack'*








*One Eyed Jack

 

[Zardoz]

What about Plutonium-based reactors and fast-breeders (which make... nuclear fission fuel)?

We can only hope. They're the answer, of course, but will it ever really happen? How much progress is actually being made?

 

[Zardoz]

...Real pirates have eye patches, parrots, wooden legs and stripey jumpers.

Oh, and how do you know for sure those AK-packin' homeboys don't wear stripey jumpers, Mister Smarty? And I'll bet some of them have parrots, too!

 

[Danoff]

Take a cautious approach: 100% chance of survival into the foreseeable future, perhaps with a slight hit to the economy, until clean forms of energy become the norm for the industry, then its kick arse human race forever.

With an ice age coming up, the sensible thing to do might just be to dump as much C02 into the atmosphere as possible. It still may not have much of an effect, but who knows, it could work out to our advantage.

For all we know, not altering the environment could be the gamble.

(By the way, from looking at that pie chart, the best way to reduce greenhouse gasses is not to prevent humanity from producing it, but to go after some of the natural sources)

 

[James2097]

It might be a bit hard to convince environmental groups that in order to save the planet we all need to eat as many baked beans as possible to increase our fart rates, and that we need to build extra coal power-plants to pollute as much as possible, hopfully to the extent where we need oxygen masks to breathe (from all the farting and other pollution).

It seems to make a bit more sense that living in an environment that ISN'T polluted like a bastard, where we can go outside without full-body reflective suits, oxygen tanks and sunglasses might be a little more condusive to a good lifestyle. Sure, we'd possibly heat up the Earth enough to get slightly better survival potential in preparation for the next ice age (still damn far away) but we'd also create a place that we don't want to live in anyway, and most people (without fancy suits) would die. Probably just from skin cancer initially, then other side-effects from breathing pollution 24/7.

In Aus, we already get WAYY more burnt out in the sun than years ago (even in my lifetime). The sun just seems to cut through better, it really stings. I'd hate to see a purposeful increase in temperature and UV light in Aus, it would seriously make Australia uninhabitable.

I'll take the blue sky, still able to go surfing option thanks.

 

[Zardoz]

Or we could induce an ice age ourselves, if this guy is on the right track:

The two-mile-long ice core

He thinks the ice core data indicates that there have been some very abrupt climate changes in the past, which means that it doesn't take all that much to initiate them.

Many are concerned that melting of the Artic ice will interfere with the flow of the Gulf Stream in the Atlantic, which might radically alter the climate in the north, and suddenly turn everything around and start a very cold period.

Plenty of theories to go around, huh? Hard to keep track of all of them...

 

[FoolKiller]

Or we could induce an ice age ourselves, if this guy is on the right track:

The two-mile-long ice core

He thinks the ice core data indicates that there have been some very abrupt climate changes in the past, which means that it doesn't take all that much to initiate them.

Many are concerned that melting of the Artic ice will interfere with the flow of the Gulf Stream in the Atlantic, which might radically alter the climate in the north, and suddenly turn everything around and start a very cold period.

Plenty of theories to go around, huh? Hard to keep track of all of them...

This creates a hard to determine fact though. By saying that global warming will lead to an ice age it creates two options: 1) we have to stop burning fossil fuels because we are creating global warming and hence an ice age, or 2) ice ages run in cycles and we are due one, so is it possible current global warming is natural as the beginning of an ice age?

We will probably never know because if we cut back and there is an ice age then people (however many survive) will say we didn't do enough. If we don't cut back and nothing happens then people will use Danoff's argument or say it never mattered anyway. No matter what the eventual outcome people will forever argue whether or not we did or didn't do the action that caused it. With current technology we won't know the truth.

Oh well, I welcome an ice age. I like snow.

Although I do like Danoff's argument for fun.
These two posters about it are funny though.

Poster 1 Poster 2

 

[Zardoz]

Oh well, I welcome an ice age. I like snow.

These two posters about it are funny though.

Poster 1 Poster 2

That dumb-ass, lame-brained movie really seemed to annoy and upset a lot of people. Hard to understand how, though, considering how idiotic it was.

 

[FoolKiller]

That dumb-ass, lame-brained movie really seemed to annoy and upset a lot of people. Hard to understand how, though, considering how idiotic it was.

Probably because before it came out Al Gore and other activists were telling everyone to go see it because it was the truth. I even got handed a flier at the theater, which I promptly took to a garbage can.

 

[Swift]

Probably because before it came out Al Gore and other activists were telling everyone to go see it because it was the truth. I even got handed a flier at the theater, which I promptly took to a garbage can.

The only recent movie that I can think of that had significant basis in truth and history was the Passion of the Christ. But it's HISTORY, not a fortune telling story.

It's amazing what people will believe when they have little information.

 

[Kylehnat]

I must chime in about the nuclear energy...

(sorry, but that doesn't include nuclear guys, besides there ain't enough uranium (or a good form of disposal of waste) to last indefinately - surely the description of time we want humans to be around).

What about Plutonium-based reactors and fast-breeders (which make... nuclear fission fuel)?

Sorry to rain on your parade, but plutonium is synthesized from, yup, you guessed it, uranium. As the uranium supply goes, so goes plutonium. However, since fissionable plutonium can be made from uranium-238 (which is not fissionable; uranium-235 is the fuel in reactors), it would certainly extend the time we can use nuclear fuel. On the flip side, plutonium is much less stable than either uranium isotope (which is why it is used in weapons), so a plutonium reactor would be much more difficult to control properly (it could surely be done, but at this point, it's a bit risky). I don't know much about fast-breeders, so I can't comment on that.

Somewhat pessimistically, I believe humans are, well.. human. We are fallible and make mistakes. Widespread nuclear power is asking for another Chenobl. It wouldn't be a matter of "if", it'd be a matter of "when". I have decidedly less trust in the human race than perhaps I should. Oh well.

No. Chernobyl was an isolated incident. The Chernobyl reactor had a critical design flaw in its graphite cooling system, which gave it a positive void coefficient. Simply put, this means that when the control rods were inserted into the system to slow the fission, it actually sped up, setting off a chain reaction. Two things here: 1)this was a VERY stupid design (sorry Russians) that will never be copied or tried again and 2)the initial fission surplus (to steal a euphamism from the Simpsons) was caused by an unapproved, experimental test run by engineers at the site.

In fact, most nuclear incidents have been caused by human negligence. The system itself is inherently safe and contained. Current designs have numerous safety backups, so that if something does go wrong, it is very unlikely that it will escalate to something much worse. In fact, with these designs, total reactor meltdowns can be controlled and completely contained (as long as someone is paying attention), so that no radiation will leak out into the environment.

However, the public is scared ****less about nuclear energy because they know nothing about it (like most things), so any talk of re-implementing nuclear energy in this country will lead to protests and Congressional deadlock.

It's too bad, because generating power from nuclear energy creates zero emissions. The only drawback is the waste, which is difficult to contain for long periods of time.

 

[Zardoz]

...It's amazing what people will believe when they have little information.

Yes, it is, isn't it?

 

[Famine]

I must chime in about the nuclear energy...

Sorry to rain on your parade, but plutonium is synthesized from, yup, you guessed it, uranium. As the uranium supply goes, so goes plutonium. However, since fissionable plutonium can be made from uranium-238 (which is not fissionable; uranium-235 is the fuel in reactors), it would certainly extend the time we can use nuclear fuel. On the flip side, plutonium is much less stable than either uranium isotope (which is why it is used in weapons), so a plutonium reactor would be much more difficult to control properly (it could surely be done, but at this point, it's a bit risky). I don't know much about fast-breeders, so I can't comment on that.

Fast Breeder Reactors (FBRs) get their fuel from - yup, you guessed it - Uranium 238. In fact, this is the only technology capable of using U238, which forms 99.3% of all Uranium deposits found naturally - so our Uranium supplies for use as nuclear fuel is about a thousand times more abundant than you think it is, since only U235 is classified as fissile...

Better yet, part of an FBR's fuel (~20%) is made from plutonium. Weapons-grade plutonium is acceptable. Remember all those nukes decommissioned for START? Fuel.

Better better yet, an FBR's products are fuel-grade plutonium and U235.

So an FBR uses the massive part of Uranium left after enrichment for conventional fission power and old nukes to make Uranium for conventional fission power and fuel-grade plutonium which can be plumbed into plutonium-based reactors (they exist) - or enriched and slapped into nukes to stop us being wiped out by 1950DA - or back into the FBR.

 

[Danoff]

It's too bad, because generating power from nuclear energy creates zero emissions. The only drawback is the waste, which is difficult to contain for long periods of time.

Actually nuclear power generates water vapor which is the single largest source of greenhouse effect.... not that I think that's a big deal - but water vapor is a greenhouse agent. There go the hydrogen cars too...

 

[Famine]

Of course, if we can get a viable (and stable) fusion reactor up and running, we can suck that bastard water vapour out of the atmosphere and use it to play Tetris, or something else more useful than giving Australians skin cancer.

 

[Zardoz]

Fast Breeder Reactors (FBRs)...

What's their development status? How far away are they?

 

[Swift]

Of course, if we can get a viable (and stable) fusion reactor up and running, we can suck that bastard water vapour out of the atmosphere and use it to play Tetris, or something else more useful than giving Australians skin cancer.

Are there any possibilites for such a thing right now?

 

[Famine]

FBRs are in use NOW. They've been in use since at least 1957, when the first Dounreay reactor in Scotland (6MW or so) - which has since been replaced with a second 150MW FBR and decommissioned - came online. There's several in France (Superphenix and Phenix), India, Japan - all over the shop.


Fusion is 15-20 years off being stable. It's another 15-20 years off being stable and self-sustaining (putting out more energy than it requires to start it - a fusion bomb requires a fission bomb to start it). Commercial viability is... shaky. You'd have to build fusion plants, which would be bloody hard to design in the first place, which no doubt people would reject because they've seen "Chain Reaction" (which is horse****). It's often said to be "expensive" and that expense is the potential deterrent - but the existing infrastructure for supplying oil/coal to power stations is probably worth just as much (and thus, inflation-adjusted, cost as much to put in place).

And the only fuel would be water.

 

[Swift]

And the only fuel would be water.

Cool, does it have to be a specific type of water or should I say does the water need special properties to be used?

 

[Famine]

Yes and no.

The water would require a little treatment, but, potentially, any water is suitable.


The fuel would be deuterium oxide - or tritium oxide. This is basically water, but with a slightly different hydrogen. Hydrogen is one proton with one electron. Deuterium adds a single neutron to the nucleus, tritium adds two.

Fun fact - anti-deuteron (a nucleus of an anti-proton and an anti-neutron) has been created, but anti-deuterium (with an anti-electron - or positron) has not yet been successfully created. Technically, a D-T fusion reaction might provide enough power to form and stabilise anti-deuterium long enough for it to take part in a matter/anti-matter reaction with deuterium, releasing colossal amounts of energy. This is Star Trek made flesh.

 

[Swift]

Yes and no.

The water would require a little treatment, but, potentially, any water is suitable.

Interesting, I hope we get to that point in my lifetime.

 

[Zardoz]

...Fusion is 15-20 years off being stable. It's another 15-20 years off being stable and self-sustaining...Commercial viability is... shaky...

Yeah, that's what I thought. Dang...

 

[Kylehnat]

Yes and no.

The water would require a little treatment, but, potentially, any water is suitable.


The fuel would be deuterium oxide - or tritium oxide. This is basically water, but with a slightly different hydrogen. Hydrogen is one proton with one electron. Deuterium adds a single neutron to the nucleus, tritium adds two.

That's a tiny bit of an understatement. Deuterium oxide exists naturally in water (about 1 part in 1000, if i remember correctly), and is expensive to isolate (D2O costs about $2,000-$3,000/liter). Perhaps more than just a little treatment of tap water . Tritium does not exist naturally, so it must be synthesized (expensive). It's also highly unstable, so it is questionable whether it would really be used for such an application, when D2O would accomplish the same thing.

(Nuclear reactors are really awesome systems )

 

[James2097]

No. Chernobyl was an isolated incident. The Chernobyl reactor had a critical design flaw in its graphite cooling system, which gave it a positive void coefficient. Simply put, this means that when the control rods were inserted into the system to slow the fission, it actually sped up, setting off a chain reaction. Two things here: 1)this was a VERY stupid design (sorry Russians) that will never be copied or tried again and 2)the initial fission surplus (to steal a euphamism from the Simpsons) was caused by an unapproved, experimental test run by engineers at the site.

So crappy tin pot dictator countries with nuclear programs are incapable of being JUST AS SILLY as the Russians (most likely cutting way more corners) in a bid to save costs and/or they're just inexperienced? Do you really think there is zero chance of an accident? ZERO?

In fact, most nuclear incidents have been caused by human negligence. The system itself is inherently safe and contained.

You said it yourself, human negligence is always the cause, which is the point. Never underestimate our ability to screw things up. Of course in a perfect world nuclear energy would be 100% reliable. I don't necessarily think a meltdown would occur (it might given the right circumstances), I'm just giving a general concern with dealing with radioactive materials and our awesome record at stuffing something up. Murphy's Law if you will. When building a house of cards its still the human's fault if it falls down. Doesn't mean its a good idea. (I know bad analogy). I'd wager that China, South Korea, Iran, etc would build a house of cards out of pretty questionable quality cards, they'd possibly be pretty slippery under the table style ones, without the same regulations in place as a country such as the US. As nuclear energy spreads the globe, you can't garauntee EVERY country with a nuclear program will be super careful.
So none of these countries have ANY possibility of screwing it up?

It's too bad, because generating power from nuclear energy creates zero emissions. The only drawback is the waste, which is difficult to contain for long periods of time.

The waste IS an emmision, and one thats hard to deal with.

I'm not saying we can't use nuclear power safely (we do), I'm just saying its not the answer-all to the globe's energy needs long term. Especially when you can't police how other countries potentially go about it.

 

[Zardoz]

Here's a nasty little surprise:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/4362760.stm

Of course, the Brazilian government says its "hard to believe". They probably feel the same way about this statement:

They also found that about 25% more carbon had been released into the atmosphere than estimated - possibly enough to affect climate change.

 

[Vasco]

This has been a very informative read. 👍

I was just wondering about your argument Famine. So you agree that this global warming is happening, however you disagree with a statement that humans are a major cause of this?

And also there is no real hole in the ozone layer, just a naturally thinner part of this ozone layer? And it's not getting thinner at all?

 

[Famine]

The global average temperature is indeed changing, yes, and the most recent trend has been upwards. However, there is no correlative link between human activity and the change. There is little to suggest that it is anything but natural.

The thinning of the ozone was, on the other hand, mostly our fault and, though some degree of thinning may well be natural, what happened wasn't. Now, while we have pretty much solved this, there are knock-on effects which may well be perceptable for the next 25 years or so.

 

[Zardoz]

Good BBC synopsis of the "state of the ice", worldwide:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/4315968.stm

"Back in geological history, about 55 million years ago, the Arctic was a warm (possibly 20C) shallow sea that would have been ice-free without the intervention of a human-enhanced greenhouse effect.

Natural variations may be playing a role in the picture seen now; but, as with other parts of the planet, it is the speed of change which alarms many researchers as much as the change itself."

And these rapid changes have occurred precisely when human activity has become so vast and far-reaching. Not that there's anything we can do about it, of course, because we're just going to become more and more "active", no matter what, and there's going to be more and more of us. We're not going to stop being the way we are, for any reason, in spite of what the consequences might be.