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Comments · 8

  1. Re:externality by Albinoman · · Score: 1 · on National Academy of Science Urges Carbon Tax

    Not all plants react the same way .

  2. Re:I'm gonna miss yellowstone.. by Wyatt+Earp · · Score: 1 · on Yellowstone Supervolcano Larger Than First Thought

    My comment about ash fall and crops was based on what happened downwind of St Helens to Idaho grain.

    http://jeq.scijournals.org/cgi/content/abstract/13/1/91

    Looking around, apparently it didn't hurt or help.

  3. Re:Plants eventually die by afidel · · Score: 2 · on Toyota Develops New Flower Species To Reduce Pollution

    Lots of it. According to this paper 10.2 ± 2.8 kg m^2 in the upper 1-m depth.

  4. Re:Good Luck... by nebosuke · · Score: 1 · on China to Build a Zero-Carbon Green City

    Interestingly, I see you didn't really address the fertilizer issue. Do you know if "organic" farming tends to use the same volume of fertilizers as traditional farming? One of the big problems with traditional farming is the runoff of large volumes of fertilizer into lakes and river, which causes all sorts of damage due to algae blooms, etc. It'd be interesting to know if "organic" farms are any more sustainable in that regard.

    In order to get yields comparable to conventional methods using organic methods you'd need to amend the soil with the same amount of nutrients. The differences are only in the sources of those nutrients. Typical organic sources like manure will still result in runoff under the same conditions as non-organic fertilizers. Also, as I mentioned in a separate branch of the thread, cheap manure fertilizer is often a byproduct of non-organic production.

  5. Re:What consumers really want to know... by RexRhino · · Score: 2, Informative · on US FDA Deems Cloned Animals Edible

    Show me a source other than TMNT, the DC universe, or the marvel universe that describes the use of radiation and mutagenic (carcinogenic) agents in order to produce viable food. I would be ever so entertained.


    Well, normally I tell smarmy dorks to type "mutation breeding" into Google, but that might be too complicated for you:

    http://www.amazon.ca/Mutation-Breeding-Theory-Practical-Applications/dp/0521036828/ref=sr_1_6?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1200536610&sr=1-6
    https://www.vedamsbooks.com/no38082.htm
    http://www.fnca.mext.go.jp/english/mb/mbm/e_mbm.html
    http://www.springerlink.com/content/jt5063wpq6673044/
    http://www.springerlink.com/content/w8651q494j1w6721/
    http://crop.scijournals.org/cgi/content/full/41/1/253

    So now, when faced with incontrovertible proof that the use of radiation and mutagenic agents to produce viable food is widespread, will you change your position? Probably not, because once people have invested a certain amount of time and passion into hating and fearing something, they rarely change their minds for something as trivial as irrefutable evidence.

    Unfortunatly, since mutation breeding is completly unregulated, I can't tell you specificly what crops are or aren't created with mutation breeding - There is no legal obligation for the breeder to report any such thing, as it is all grandfathered in as "safe", "organic", and "natural". But have no doubts when you pay extra for your "non-GM" food, that much of it has been artificially geneticly modified.
  6. Re:Sounds promising... by farmerj · · Score: 1 · on Methane-Eating Bacteria Could Combat Global Warming
    By chance I was at a climate change talk hosted by the Irish EPA. The talk was given by Dr Martin Manning, Head of Technical Support Unit, IPCC Working Group 1, who by chance is as a native of New Zealand. As Ireland is a large livestock producer, one of the questions which came up was why methane produced by ruminants is produces net global warming.

    The way it works is that carbon that's absorbed by the growing plants that the ruminants eat is converted to methane in their rumen. This is then burred by the animal during the day. The problem is that methane is a much more potent green house gas then CO2. Methane has a global warming potential of 25. This means that methane has 25 times the global warming potential of CO2.

    Methane has a lifetime in the atmosphere of 9.6 years, so during that time it can cause significantly more warming then the same quantity of CO2.

    There has been work done with ruminant diet to reduce methane production here and other work done to reduce total green house gas production from livestock using LCA here. It's no use reducing the methane emissions if by doing so you increase your total global warming potential...

  7. Re:Someone remind me... by Pius+II. · · Score: 1 · on Dodging the Negative Reaction To GE Crops

    The problem I have with GM food is the fact that the genes used are patented by large corporations.
    The crops on totally unrelated farmer's fields are being cross-pollinated by GM plants, and the farmers are sued afterwards (for "using" the patented genes). This sucks.
    Even if you believe in the (to my eyes, silly) idea that something as basic as genes should be patentable [1], there should never be any possibility for people to sue others after letting their own "property" escape in the wild. Yet this exact case happens.
    Of course I am against it!

    [1] Who am I kidding? Remember the case of that guy who started growing yellow Mexican beans in the US, then proceeded to sue everyone who imported those same "patented" beans? Just patent anything, genes or not...

  8. Re:One minor problem ... by general_re · · Score: 1 · on Iraq law Requires Seed Licenses
    The claim that crops like wheat and barley aren't wind-pollinated is not quite accurate. (A better term might be "disingenuous".) Like all grasses, they are fundamentally wind pollinated. The claim that they're not is based on the fact that seed producers keep the strains sufficiently separated so that they can't cross-pollinate.

    No. An even better term might be "you don't know what you're talking about." Spring barley tends to be closed-flowering, which creates an inherent mechanical barrier to anything other than self-pollination. And even if you choose open-flowering varieties of barley, the rate of cross-pollination is exceptionally low even under favorable conditions, and easily controlled through existing means.

    Also, it would be easy enough for someone to toss a handfull of GM seed into your field. It would cross-pollinate with your grain, and next year's seed would be contaminated with GM DNA. It's real hard to defend against this.

    Hey, the moon might crash into the earth too, and render the whole discussion moot.

    It's easy to imagine doomsday scenarios. Whether or not they'll actually happen is a whole other matter, and considering that pre-empting flights of fantasy isn't itself free, I suggest we wait for some hard data before proceeding.