Carnegie Researchers Say Geotech Can't Cure Ocean Acidification

CarnegieScience writes "Plans to stop global warming by 'geoengineering' the planet by putting aerosols in the atmosphere to block sunlight are controversial, to say the least. Scientists are now pointing out that even if it keeps the planet cool, it will do almost nothing to stop another major problem — ocean acidification. The ocean will keep on absorbing carbon dioxide from the atmosphere (making carbonic acid) and the water's pH will get too low for corals and other marine life to secrete skeletons. So this is another strike against a quick fix of our climate problems."

Comments

What Climate Problem?

[jayme0227]

I'm still using my will to suppress your evidence that global warming is a problem.

Re:What Climate Problem?

[Rei]

As I understand it, methane is a bigger problem them CO2

You understand wrong. It is a large problem, but CO2 is larger by over threefold.

They tell us to not fart anymore.

Who, your roomate? Certainly not the scientific community. Most animal-based methane emissions come from ruminants. And not from "farting", but "belching" (the initial breakdown occurs in the rumen, and the bolus moves back and forth between the mouth and the rumen). "Farting" isn't even the second leading cause of ruminant methane emissions -- that goes to manure decomposition.

Livestock-sourced methane is only one significant anthropogenic component. Others include rice agriculture, peatland/wetlands development, the oil and gas industry, landfills, and biomass burning. Other significant human-sourced methane emissions, including ruminant raising, are nearly double those of natural emissions. Ruminants may be the largest single anthropogenic component, but they're less than a sixth of total human-sourced methane emissions.

And yet, when those monster Apatosaurus, including the popular, but obsolete synonym Brontosaurus roamed the earth. I dare say one herd/tribe/pod produced a much methane as all the cattle that currently populate the earth.

Little is known that could lead one to draw any conclusions about the large sauropods in terms of methane emissions. They weren't ruminants, although they did eat large quantities of plant matter. We don't know their herd size, and haven't even conclusively shown that herding behavior was significant for them. And more importantly, we don't know their total worldwide population. However, as large herbivores, one thing can be certain: they didn't have a particularly high global population density. It just wouldn't support them.

There are approximately 1 trillion cattle worldwide. This is just cattle -- not counting other ruminants. These average about 1.5 tons at adulthood. An adult apatosaurus is estimated to weigh about 30 tons. If we assume a weight equivalence, that's the equivalent of 50 billion apatosaurus. It is extremely unlikely that there were that many apatosaurus -- or even total sauropods. We support this much cattle mass cattle via modern intensive agriculture and research.

Furthermore, your notion is based on a premise -- that either the atmosphere is static or it's always changing harmlessly. But that's not the reality. The atmosphere has changed dramatically over history. Generally these changes are very slow; that's not a problem. It's when changes are rapid that there are problems. The last atmospheric change similar to what we're forcing nowadays was the PETM (Paleocene-Eocene Thermal Maximum). The causes are still unknown, but one thing is known: over the course of hundreds or thousands of years (the blink of an eye by geologic standards), there was a CO2 and heat spike. This triggered a methane spike, which amplified the heat spike. The total warming input was approximately what we'll have locked in to if we continue the "business as usual" scenario through 2100. The results were dramatic and catastrophic. Entire ocean currents shifted. The climates of regions across the planet dramatically altered. Forests became plains became deserts became forests. The ocean became acidic, and most of the world's corals and carbonate-shelled plankton died, causing a massive upheaval in the oceanic food chains. The planet was left such a changed place that we give it a different name -- the Eocene.

Now, my question to you is this: do you really want to create the Anthropocene?

Re:if i remember well from high school chemistry

[DoofusOfDeath]

the ocean is a sort of buffer solution

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Buffer_solution

what is major component of this buffer? us. living critters and how they react to an increase in CO2

http://oceancolor.gsfc.nasa.gov/SeaWiFS/TEACHERS/CHEMISTRY/

which means the oceans will maintain their pH over a wide range of abuse and this notion of ocean acidification is hysteria

You're probably right. I'm sure what you remember from high school is a good reason to dismiss the Carnegie Melon research team's results.

Re:Volcanoes

[Anonymous Coward]

Good thing you thought of that - you should probably send them an email right away! You discovered the missing forcing that will keep our planet cool and our oceans pH balanced! Turns out that in all this freaking out about climate change, nobody who was even somewhat competent got involved at all.

Re:Volcanoes

[Rei]

Do these climate models take into account the fact that Volcanoes erupt from time to time, spewings tons of ash into the atmosphere, which reflects sunlight, and thereby cools the earth?

Yes. And it's not the ash that primarily reflects the sunlight; it's the SOx. And the cooling is only temporary. And volcanoes also emit CO2. But a small fraction as much as humans release.

And yes, volcanic ash is acidic.

I have the answer.

[yttrstein]

http://image52.webshots.com/152/1/14/3/518111403JQgFmi_ph.jpg

Re:Idea

[TnkMkr]

Wait... I have a better idea, lets engineer some sort of biological creature that will live off collecting the
carbon from our atmosphere and sequesting it into some sort of solid state. We should engineer it to be solar powered and
should be deployable over the entire surface of the earth.

Don't worry, I'm sure technology will save us by developing this totaly new and radical solution.

Global experiments with us as guinea pigs

[RichMan]

Ok, the whole solution of Geo-engineering is a WTF moment.

We did not understand the global bio-sphere to begin with so we are in the Global-Environment change state. Now we propose attacking the symptoms without a full understanding of the dynamics.

It is like we have are playing russian roulette here and we don't know how many chambers are loaded.

Look at most attempts to "fix" environmental problems by introducing others. The bio-sphere is just way more interconnected than we can account for.

The best solution is to reduce our foot-print as rapidly as we can. And make sure it stays that way.

Re:if i remember well from high school chemistry

[Rei]

what is major component of this buffer? us. living critters and how they react to an increase in CO2

Wow! Amazing that all of those egghead boffins living in their ivory towers with their hoity-toity "science" missed that one! Thank you so much for pointing it out!

Except for the fact that most ocean life is not primarily constrained by CO2, but nutrients, especially iron. Whoops.

I never ceased to be amazed at people who insist that something must be wrong with the science on a subject when they haven't done even the most rudimentary amount to educate themselves on what the science of the subject actually is. You could at least start by reading the relevant sections of the IPCC technical reports to see what actually has been studied and how. I guarantee you, it's way, way more than you ever expected.

There's a reason why people go to college for years to get a degree in these fields. This isn't high school baking-soda-and-vinegar-volcanoes here. It's an incredibly complex science that you need a solid background in. At least spend a week reading peer-reviewed papers on the subject before you put fingers to keyboard. You're coming across like if someone who had never used a computer started talking about how programmers should make every piece of software be run by voice commands in spoken English sentences like "Could you open up the letter to my grandmother and edit out the part where I told her about my chihuahua?", and have the software figure out what you want it to do. You're broadcasting ignorance on the topic like a beacon.

Pffft! Who are you going to believe?

[StefanJ]

Micheal Crichton, whose best-selling techno-thriller disproved global warming hysteria with copious footnotes . . . or so called "scientists" working for a "university" producing "peer reviewed research?"

I tell you, these "facts" and "evidence" are trouble.

Re:if i remember well from high school chemistry

[Red Flayer]

Hey, why not go back and re-examine your textbooks from high school chemistry? It seems you slept through the second part of that lecture.

Remember the lab where you had to determine the concentration of a buffer in solution that had pH-sensitive dyes in it?

And how you could pipette huge amounts of an acid (or base) into the solution without a notable change in pH? But then you add one more drop and *presto* your solution was now purple (or orange, etc)? And with each drop added after that, there was no buffering effect?

Buffer systems in the ocean are like that, though more complex.

Re:straw man argument

[Yvanhoe]

In the climate change debate, there are no places for sanity anymore. For years scientists have tried to warn politicians that *maybe* we ought to be *careful* about some *possible* consequences of our wastes and pollution. Every one dismissed them. Then, for right or wrong (I think for right but who knows), comes the IPCC and Al Gore. They put the scientific argument in the closet, took a deep breath and shouted PAAAAAANIIIIIICC ! And finally got some politicians to take actions. In the 70s you were a irresponsible hippy if you studied sea level rises or the downfall of biodiversity, now you are a irresponsible lackey of oil interest if you examine the various cataclysmic claims and propose to refine a model in the way that seems to minimize the IPCC conclusions.

Big financial and political interests have now come into play, rational public debate is out.