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Energy Production Is As 'Dirty' As Ever
kkleiner writes "A recent report (PDF) from International Energy Agency delivers some dire news: despite 20 years of efforts toward clean energy and a decade of growth in renewable energy, energy production remains as 'dirty' as ever due to worldwide reliance on fossil fuels. With the global demand for energy expected to rise by 25 percent in the next 10 years, a renewed effort toward cleaner energy is desperately needed to avoid detrimental effects to the environment and public health. The report says, 'Coal technologies continue to dominate growth in power generation. This is a major reason why the amount of CO2 emitted for each unit of energy supplied has fallen by less than 1% since 1990. Thus the net impact on CO2 intensity of all changes in supply has been minimal. Coal-fired generation, which rose by an estimated 6% from 2010 to 2012, continues to grow faster than non-fossil energy sources on an absolute basis.'"
We are producing more pollution because we are using more energy. The fact that it hasn't risen and is in fact falling in many places is due to us cleaning up and using more renewables.
I suspect this is just a lame excuse anti-environmentalists will use to justify inaction.
const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
Just imagine how bad dirty it would have been if instead of ramping up energy production by coal, we would have added more nuclear power plants.
Luckily governments decided to step away from it.
Oh, wait.
The article had one fact of which I was unaware, but should be entertaining:
"The boom in natural gas availability [mainly from fracking] pushed natural gas prices down last year to a 10-year low in the US. But the drop in US demand for coal sparked a drop in the price of coal, which in turn sparked a shift in Europe where coal replaced much of the more expensive gas to supply power stations."
"First they came for the slanderers and i said nothing."
CO2 is food for plants.
You know what, you're right! And I don't know why those folks in Fukushima got all upset about their nuclear reactor getting water washed all over it! I mean, the darn thing needs water to work anyway, right? Plus plants and people drink water, why were they upset that they got extra from the ocean? It's just water!
Big whoop. Warming up this damn freezer I live in is NOT being "dirty".
Right because the possibilities of water wars, refugees, failing economies, destruction of the food chain, droughts and general destabilization of the planet will have no effect on you whatsoever.
My work here is dung.
Well, let's hear you repeat your utterly stupid statement in a few decades when the survival of the human race looks a lot worse than now.
Most ACs are not even worth the keystrokes to insult them. Be generically insulted by this and ignored otherwise.
OK. Let's seal you in an airtight chamber with 100% pure carbon dioxide. After all, it's "clean", so it must be good for you, right?
After all, the standard toxicology test employed by scientists puts a person in an airtight chamber with 100% pure substance. That's how we know, for example, that the state of California finds things toxic and to cause cancer.
"First they came for the slanderers and i said nothing."
CO2 is a colorless gas. It doesn't look, smell, taste, feel, or sound like "dirt".
I hear you, friend. CO2 isn't even the end of dirty's improper use. There are thousands of girls all over the internet that are also called "dirty", even "very dirty". But upon close inspection, most of them don't have any dirt on them at all! And you can seriously inspect everything. Whats wrong with our society?!
Well you can do whatever you want in a few decades because words won't mean anything any more.
But right now words mean something. And if you want to use words without us berating you, you need to use them accurately instead of blasting sensationalism everywhere.
“Common sense is not so common.” — Voltaire
Since we are producing more and more energy, the absolute amounts of pollution emitted each year is still increasing.
Basically all the "green" energy is offsetting the increase in "dirty" energy.
...when your country completely discounts nuclear as the best option for an environmentally friendly energy source. Solar and wind can never be primary energy sources - they are not constant power sources. They can only supplement a steady power source. And they waste so much real estate compared to the alternative that even environmentalists don't like them, especially wind farms. I live in the shadow of one of the biggest wind farms in the United States, and it's an obnoxiously terrible use of land with comparatively little energy in return. At least now they're required to cover the cost of their eventual removal and land restoration.
Frankly I'd rather live next to a modern, safe nuclear power plant. China is appropriately proceeding with caution on the development of their next plants based on lessons learned with Fukishima (see recent slashdot posting) but they did not have a knee jerk "OMG nuclear is bad!" reaction. You fix it, you evolve the design, you move on. That's engineering. You don't go hide in a cave. Even Japan is coming round to the fact that ditching their nuclear reactors wholesale would result in an unacceptable level of energy dependence, plus they'd be burning dirty.
Nuclear is the only future in which we can have the energy abundance we have now, and do it clean. We CAN have both, unlike what some people may like to tell you.
Where did you dig up that link? It's comedy gold! Successfully nailed every denialist cliche I could think of.
I'm gonna have to add this "Nongovernmental Planel (sic) on Climate Change" to my Humour feed for my morning chuckle.
Why would anyone engrave "Elbereth"?
That's what happens when you ship your manufacturing to the third world and refuse to build nuclear plants at home.
Wow, that's just retarded. Beijing pollution has nothing to do with CO2. You can't see, smell or taste CO2. In Beijing you can definitely see, taste and smell the pollution.
In small concentrations it is necessary for plants - but it isn't what is typically considered a "nutrient". But CO2 has a strong effect on global heating and the low concentrations confuse people who don't understand just how powerful an infrared absorber it is, or what happens when you disturb an equilibrium.
eldavojohn is totally correct when he mentions "water wars, refugees, failing economies, destruction of the food chain, droughts and general destabilization of the planet". These are all consequences of a warming planet.
Some areas will have far too much water at times - like the midwestern US that is flooding now. But then it can go into drought and crops wither like they did last year. Other areas simply suffer prolonged drought. Right now the Rio Grand has slowed to nothing but stagnant water in the southern part of New Mexico and the pecan and chile farmers are looking at big crop failures. People are already fighting over water rights in a number of areas as what is becoming a scarce resource is now the difference between a farm surviving or failing.
Scoff and deny all you want, but those of us old enough to remember the weather in the 60's and 70's know that the weather has changed and that what we are seeing now simply is not normal.
If just one thing of what he said was wrong I am sure you can point it out rather than blabber about some apocalyptic nonsense you have dreamed up inside the deranged mind of yours.
God, you are quite dumb. Let's say I dunk your head into a chamber filled with pure fresh water for say, 10 minutes. Then you can come out afterwards and tell me how good pure fresh water is for you. Were you born this dumb or did someone hit you repeatedly over the head with a heavy object throughout your childhood?
That's not CO2 causing the smog in Beijing. Those are actual "dirty" particulates. Black Lung stuff. Burning coal in the last 50 years has become drastically better. Saying there have been no improvements is a lie. CO2 production isn't dropping but the truly poisonous stuff has largely been curtailed in the US. CO2 is a greenhouse gas not something causing Acid Rain. True it's helping warm the planet and disrupting the climate but then climate change is a fact of life on this planet. If you look at the output of a volcano such as the eruption of Mt. Pinatubo in the Philippines you'll see just how dirty mother nature can get. The incredible amount of sulfur dioxide pushed out by this one eruption was over 20 million tons. I think you'll see little reduction of CO2 without a massive change to another power source and currently the only viable alternative is Nuclear power but that comes with it's own problems.
And they're all great, right? Can never have too much water washing over your cities and farmland, and the more extreme weather, drought & crop failure, species extinction, refugees and political turmoil, the better.
Embrace the climate change! The tsunami of costs to adapt will wash over us, leaving us clean of funds and fresh of heart, ready to tackle the warm new challenges that await us!
Why would anyone engrave "Elbereth"?
what exactly is being added to the CO2 to make it poisonous?
CO, NOx, SO2, Hg, soot and fly ash mostly.
"I've got more toys than Teruhisa Kitahara."
Let's see how you survive in an airtight chamber with pure oxygen
And you're a food for bacteria. Is it OK if I rub some salmonella on you?
Where did you dig up that link? It's comedy gold! Successfully nailed every denialist cliche I could think of.
I'm gonna have to add this "Nongovernmental Planel (sic) on Climate Change" to my Humour feed for my morning chuckle.
Please, I don't deserve all the credit, thank H. Leighton Steward and coal baron Corbin Robertson. And from the looks of it, the Koch brothers somewhere up that chain ... did you know it's a 501(c)(3) and has a sibling (but separate!) ad-buying 501(c)(4) named CO2 is Green?
My work here is dung.
Tragedy of the commons. Whoever abuses the resource first wins.
Learn to love Alaska
Until nuclear is no longer suppressed for political reasons energy generation will be dirty.
Environmentalists need to take their heads out of their asses.
The darn thing needs normal ground water to cool.
You cannot cool a nuclear reactor of any significant size with ground water. You need a proper source of water, i.e. large river or the ocean, or you have to use cooling towers. Nuclear reactors are typically less than 1/3 efficient, so for 1GW electrical output you need to get rid of 2GW of heat.
Fukushima was not placed near the ocean just because the engineers loved the view.
Finally! A year of moderation! Ready for 2019?
While I don't think this warrants an explanation, "dirt" in this context is synonymous with "contaminant."
I am very small, utmostly microscopic.
and for chrissake turn your damn computer off.
I've been turning this one on and off for going on 5 years and it hasn't died or fried a drive yet.
I am very small, utmostly microscopic.
Mexico is just getting us back for the All American Canal.
I am very small, utmostly microscopic.
So what does nuclear waste have to do with CO2 there?
That would coming mostly from China now, if you can find someone over there that cares.
The real problem is not that we are polluting more, the problem there are a lot more people. Get rid of half the population and you'll get rid of half the pollution. Feel free to go first to set the example.
That would coming mostly from China now, if you can find someone over there that cares.
They are easy to find. The prisons are full of them.
Any insufficiently advanced magic is indistinguishable from technology.
Right because the possibilities of water wars, refugees, failing economies, destruction of the food chain, droughts and general destabilization of the planet will have no effect on you whatsoever.
Nice of you to point out the consequences of the "Green" agenda. Thankfully, now that the whole Global Warming Hoax has been exposed for what it is, perhaps we can avoid that train wreck.
In times of universal deceit, telling the truth gets you modded -1 Troll
I've always thought that environmentalism is really just selfishness of the human species. The Earth doesn't feel or give two shits about how we treat it. It will keep on trucking until the sun explodes. So, by trying to save the environment, you really mean you want to save the environment for humans to keep living on. Possibly packing as many people on it as possible. I say find another suitable planet and a way to get there and pillage the place.
In small concentrations it is necessary for plants - but it isn't what is typically considered a "nutrient". But CO2 has a strong effect on global heating and the low concentrations confuse people who don't understand just how powerful an infrared absorber it is, or what happens when you disturb an equilibrium.
When has there been equilibrium on this planet exactly? I'm not saying we shouldn't try to cut CO2 emissions and be smarter about pollution than we are now, but unless you're looking to make the planet more like Mars, you're not going to get "equilibrium".
eldavojohn is totally correct when he mentions "water wars, refugees, failing economies, destruction of the food chain, droughts and general destabilization of the planet". These are all consequences of a warming planet.
It would also be a consequence of a cooling planet.
Some areas will have far too much water at times - like the midwestern US that is flooding now. But then it can go into drought and crops wither like they did last year. Other areas simply suffer prolonged drought. Right now the Rio Grand has slowed to nothing but stagnant water in the southern part of New Mexico and the pecan and chile farmers are looking at big crop failures. People are already fighting over water rights in a number of areas as what is becoming a scarce resource is now the difference between a farm surviving or failing.
It's always been that way, and probably will be for the foreseeable future. Go read about the dust bowl of the 1930's.
Scoff and deny all you want, but those of us old enough to remember the weather in the 60's and 70's know that the weather has changed and that what we are seeing now simply is not normal.
Are you fucking kidding me? This is exactly what I hear deniers excoriated for saying. I remember those times too. And I also remember my elders talking about how the weather then wasn't what it used to be like and how milk and bread were 5 cents. How do you know the weather you and I remember was "normal". It's just what we remember as kids, nothing "normal" about it. The climate has changed many times before the industrial revolution. That's how it works. That doesn't mean that we shouldn't try to be better stewards of the planet. But we have no where near enough knowledge to control the climate at this point in time. And frankly I'd be scared of how badly we'd screw it up if we could control it.
Want more stupid bullshit? TFS only compares the past twenty years. Let us go back to my high school days.
The place is West Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Penn Power's electric plant in West Pittsburgh emitted a black column of smoke, 24/7, 365. Back in the day, it was common for housewives to do laundry at home, then hang laundry out on a clothes line. Not in West Pittsburgh, though. Clothes hanging outside would come back inside grungy on the best of days, and when the wind was blowing directly from the electric plant, clothes would turn black.
I can't remember the exact year - it may have been 1971 - when the government forced Penn Power to put up a huge chimney, with "scrubbers" inside of it. After the chimney was put up, a few years of normal weather eventually washed 99.9% of all that soot away, or the vegetation absorbed it. Today, West Pittsburgh is as clean and pretty as any other town in the Beaver Valley.
So, the summary is going back to an arbitrary point in time at which government had ALREADY forced industry to clean up their acts.
Granted - "clean" is a relative thing. Until we reach the point where there is zero pollution, there will always be room for improvement. But grabbing an arbitrary point in time, without any comparison to previous times, then claiming that there is little or no improvement since that time is misleading, even dishonest.
"Windows is like the faint smell of piss in a subway: it's there, and there's nothing you can do about it." - Charlie Br
" we've had all those things for thousands of years, except for 'destabilitization' which has gone on for millions of years."
I never have mod points when I really want them. +500 insightful!
"Windows is like the faint smell of piss in a subway: it's there, and there's nothing you can do about it." - Charlie Br
So - you're saying that the couple of decades from your youth are to be considered "normal". We're going to ignore all of the evidence that points to cyclical warming and cooling on planet earth, and use two decades to define "normal".
Does everyone forget that the Native Americans lived on this continent for untold thousand of years, before any Euros showed up? Maybe we should be asking them, "What is "normal" around here?"
"Windows is like the faint smell of piss in a subway: it's there, and there's nothing you can do about it." - Charlie Br
Maybe you're confusing China with the USA.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Prisoner_population_rate_world_2012_map.png
China is a nice pretty green color on that map. The US is some ugly color that I can't identify.
"Windows is like the faint smell of piss in a subway: it's there, and there's nothing you can do about it." - Charlie Br
those all have been the consequences of mere weather too at various times, besides climate warming and cooling which has always been ongoing.
Well the time for " ZPG " is past .
It is time for a negative population growth
or remove some of the population ( or nature will do it for us -- and not in a nice way)
we DO need to be back to PRE World War 2 population levels
that WILL solve the energy and food needs
"I don't pitch OpenSUSE Linux to my friends, i let Microsoft do it for me
*plonk*
Hail Eris, full of mischief...
E pluribus sanguinem
Get rid of half the population and you'll get rid of half the pollution. Feel free to go first to set the example.
You mean, like these people?
In times of universal deceit, telling the truth gets you modded -1 Troll
Damn! Here's the correct link:
The Voluntary Human Extinction Movement
In times of universal deceit, telling the truth gets you modded -1 Troll
compared to climate change effects.
STOP . AMERICA . NOW
The only thing hoax-like around here is the delusion that you have bought into. The planet continues to heat as the increase in atmospheric carbon dioxide continues to go up
Precisely the hoax to which I was referring. You DO know that the planet stopped heating up some 16 years ago, right?
In times of universal deceit, telling the truth gets you modded -1 Troll
That would coming mostly from China now, if you can find someone over there that cares.
They are easy to find. The prisons are full of them.
Nice.
"The greatest lesson in life is to know that even fools are right sometimes" - Winston Churchill
Let's see how you survive in an airtight chamber with pure oxygen
Didn't Michael Jackson used to sleep in this environment? Yep... it's right here in the Daily mail, complete with creepy picture http://www.dailymail.co.uk/tvshowbiz/article-1195845/Michael-Jacksons-world-He-slept-oxygen-tent-best-friend-Bubbles-chimp.html
Gosh I miss that guy.
"The greatest lesson in life is to know that even fools are right sometimes" - Winston Churchill
And those of us old enough to remember the weather in the 50's know that the weather in the 60's and 70's was simply not normal.
In times of universal deceit, telling the truth gets you modded -1 Troll
According to my quick calculation, 2GW is equivalent to boiling off 13 cubic feet per second of water. That's in the range of a large groundwater supply, but would be a poor use of groundwater. 13 c.f.s. is a very modest river. Compare this to the Niagara River at 100,000 c.f.s..
Contribute to civilization: ari.aynrand.org/donate
There's no reason to have prisons for dead people.
Contribute to civilization: ari.aynrand.org/donate
If you bothered to RTFA, CO2 emissions was the only metric used in the report. Hence the context.
All countries that publicly reduced nuclear energy production, makes up the diff with coal. China, is also using more coal, but they are building a large number of nukes too, so I won't blame them.
One problem with coal, is that after you burned coal, there is still more energy in the uranium in the ash, than was produced by burning the coal. So every coal fired plant is effectively a 'dirty bomb' that pollutes our food supply with radio active ash.
Excuse me, but please get off my Pennisetum Clandestinum, eh!
At high enough concentrations, CO2 can be tasted. It forms carbonic acid in water (saliva), and it tastes ... well ... acidic. Before that concentration is reached CO2 can be sensed by the stinging sensation on eyes of the carbonic acid forming in tears.
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I was completely convinced by his argument until you replied with using bold letters and completely blew his argument out of the water. I'm totally on your side now.
It's so sad. "Environmentalists" like you have become so obviously unable to predict the effects of what they're arguing against that their navel-gazing produces contradictory results, and they can't even see the contradiction.
Contribute to civilization: ari.aynrand.org/donate
You really are out of touch with reality. The Rio Grande no longer gets anywhere near Mexico. It pretty much dries up before it even leaves New Mexico. New Mexico is not in Mexico.
I was about to call BS until I looked at Google maps. And indeed the Rio Grande is dried up from west side of Brownsville to the east side of Brownsville. Probably about a 30 mile stretch. But the rest of it still has water. So still BS.
If you are not allowed to question your government then the government has answered your question.
Imagine that an influential member tells you, "If you are concerned about the safety of reactors, then I think it may be time for you to leave nuclear energy." Someone who had just served as chair for the Joint Committee on Atomic Energy.
And the course of history changes, for the worse. It all could have been so different.
But read on. There's still hope.
In 1973 Dr. Alvin M. Weinberg was fired from a position he had held for 18 years at Oak Ridge Labs Tennessee --- in great part because of his concern for safety. Shelving a dream that had become his own personal obsession.
Weinberg held a 1947 patent for the Pressurized Water Reactor (PWR) that is the basis of commercial nuclear power generation today. After the WWII his efforts turned to the peaceful use of nuclear power, and with many others he was excited by the prospect of harnessing the atom. But while these water based reactors had served the war effort so admirably, the thought of scaling them to power the country and world concerned him greatly.
I need not elaborate on the reasons, for they are the same reasons so many fear nuclear energy today. Weinberg envisioned all this in the 50s --- some 60 years ago. He realized that some radical departure from his own PWR design was called for. When a rare opportunity presented itself, a fanciful but well-funded notion for a nuclear powered airplane, Weinberg gathered a few of the most brilliant chemists of the era and set to work.
(My post continues in reply to this post. The lameness filter thinks I'm lame. I don't.)
<blink>down the rabbit hole</blink>
(continued from parent)
And they did it. It was different but so much better. Two prototypes of this new reactor were built, the last operating successfully from 1965-1969. During this time they learned a great deal about the chemistry and operating conditions of this new approach. This reactor was literally "walk away safe", did not use of water as coolant and moderator, or require pressure operation, the two things which drive the design (and present the inherent dangers) of the PWR. It operates principally on a naturally occurring mineral that is so prevalent that even today, mining operations separate and discard it.
So in 1969 Weinberg and his little group are on top of the world. Weinberg has a hands-on success, he has papers describing the process, he sees it working, scaling to power the world safely. It is as weapons proliferation-resistent as any reactor could be, for its waste consists of a small volume of material that is considered undesirable for weapons. Usually a few quick napkin calculations on "wonderful" new energy sources reveal nasty pratfalls --- this will run out in a few hundred years, that won't work unless [unsolved problem], this requires a massive new mining extraction effort, that requires something absent on our continent, this relies on the weather. There are NO this-or-thats. A few small (existing today for other operations) mines here and there could literally supply the essential element to power the entire planet for the foreseeable future.A dream come true.
All this is happening back in 1969. What could possibly go wrong?
(My post continues in reply to this post. The lameness filter thinks I'm lame. I don't.)
<blink>down the rabbit hole</blink>
We can start selling canned air, "pollution, bringing the dream of space balls a little closer to reality"
Good leaders run toward problems, bad leaders hide from them.
(continued from parent)
Planet Earth and the Human Race was screwed over by Four-Star Admiral Hyman G. Rickover, that's what. Let others who are polite and diplomatic jump in to say he was a patriot or wayward visionary or product of his time or good soldier or handsome baby. When I started researching this topic and had the aha-moment, I began to feel a growing sadness but it has now passed, replaced with anger. Rickover and Chester E. Holifield, Democratic Representative of the State of California (the one who uttered the opening quote), were asshats.
To go into fast-forward... they completely snubbed Weinberg's work, pushed the plutonium fast breeder, and pushed Weinberg into the ditch. They did not even respect Weinberg's tenure to the extent of finding a place for him to continue to develop his vision with their copious funds They pushed light water reactors (by default assent), weapons production (by primary objective). They were in full knowledge of Weinberg's vision, he made it and its potential very clear. Gentlemen, this is the Voice of History judging you. You were asshats.
When I am speaking as the Voice Of History my opinions do not necessarily reflect those of my employer.
Has this telling of a turning point of history interested you? Do you know of which technology I am speaking?
I hope not, because it is so damned fun to learn new things. The story continues in this post.
I was hoping for more than a score:2, but the Voice Of History cannot afford to be picky.
<blink>down the rabbit hole</blink>
Soylent Green is people.............. to be continued .............
"I don't pitch OpenSUSE Linux to my friends, i let Microsoft do it for me
That would coming mostly from China now, if you can find someone over there that cares.
Hu cares.
Escher was the first MC and Giger invented the HR department.
The SEGS, a solar thermal plant in the Mojave Desert uses ground water from a rapidly depleting aquifer to run the condensers for their generating station. The NREL report about trough-based solar thermal energy lists the SEGS's water consumption as 1000 gallons (about 3.5 tonnes in real units) evaporated per MWh generated.
http://www.nrel.gov/csp/troughnet/faqs.html
Oceanside nuclear and other thermal power stations do not evaporate any water, they return seawater warmed by a few degrees from the condensers to the ocean.
Where did I say CO2 cannot affect you or kill you, or cannot affect the planet or conceivably kill the planet, Coward? Do try to pay attention. I know it's difficult.
If someone means "contaminant", let them use the word "contaminant". It's a perfectly good word, and using proper terminology will prevent misleading and prevent opening themselves to ridicule.
Merriam-Webster has a lot of definitions for "dirt".
1a. axcrement
1b. a filthy or soiling substance (as mud, dust, or grime)
1c. archaic : something worthless
1d. a contemptible person <treated me like dirt>
2. loose or packed soil or sand : earth <a mound of dirt> <a dirt road>
3a. an abject or filthy state : squalor <living in dirt>
3b corruption, chicanery <vowed to clean up the dirt in the city government>
3c. licentiousness of language or theme
3d. scandalous or malicious gossip <spreading dirt about his ex-wife>
3e. embarrassing or incriminating information <trying to dig up dirt on her political rivals>
Funny; I don't see "contaminant" anywhere in there. Let's face it, the term "dirt" is misapplied to CO2 and the reason it is used is because it is a loaded word, used for the "ewww" factor.
Twit. Ha ha, you didn't see me call you a twit. I must have not done it. I would plonk you back, but I am not an immature fool.
And the irony of this is that you can blame environmentalists for this.
Had they not prevented nuclear energy from being used massively, we would have mostly clean energy, with the added bonus of a better economy that would rely on importing fossil fuels much less.
Mod parent up. He has much more on the ball than most of the signed-in "contributors".
CO2 is correlated with surface environment temperature increase. Experiment suggests the former causes the latter, but I don't think it is firmly establlished. There exists a theory that the increase in temperature forces dissolved CO2 in the ocean out of solution. There are also theories that there are built-in compensating factors in the environment. I am not necessarily pushing these minority theories in this context, but they should be mentioned.
I am also mindful that plants require oxygen as well as provide oxygen. The cycle is complicated.
I am puzzled by your claim about agricultural productivity. What I am finding is that "World agricultural production grew at an average annual rate of 2.4 percent between 2001 and 2010, close to its historical average growth rate since the 1970s of 2.3 percent per year. However, recent years demonstrate a period of accelerated growth that started around 1995, which, in turn, followed more than 20 years of gradually decreasing growth rates."
Growth rates of agriculture in high income countries have slowed (thought they are still positive). Those in transition and developing countries are much higher and have not slowed. Let's face it; the production of just about all physical goods is being exported from the U.S. at a high rate.
Does everyone forget that the Native Americans lived on this continent for untold thousand of years,
Ten or fifteen thousand is not "untold". We know roughly (very roughly, but OK) how long they were here. It is, however, a very long time not just to live somewhere, but live somewhere and help to maintain a stable ecosystem. The Pomo people who live in what is now Lake County, CA used to regularly live to be over 100 years old. That lifestyle is now unavailable due to deliberate actions of the US Government which was attempting to engage in genocide.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
I thought "an abject or filthy state" was fine. And the pollution is due to "corruption, chicanery" and there is plenty of "embarrassing or incriminating information" about the situation. The EPA can find out-of-specification emissions as fast as they can pay people to climb industrial chimneys. Everyone is emitting over the limits. Why not? You get fined maybe once a year tops (and less these days) so there's profit to be made from such a situation.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
There exists a theory that the increase in temperature forces dissolved CO2 in the ocean out of solution.
Where is it supposed to go, right back into the atmosphere?
Let's face it; the production of just about all physical goods is being exported from the U.S. at a high rate.
We still make large and bulky things. That production will come back as factories become more automated, anyway. This is just the rearranging deck chairs phase.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
Of course, a voice of reason gets modded "Flamebait." I know Slashdot's color is green, but come on...
"Those who consume the bulk of goods are those who make them. We must never forget this secret of our prosperity."
Right because the possibilities of water wars, refugees, failing economies, destruction of the food chain, droughts and general destabilization of the planet will have no effect on you whatsoever.
Man, Hollywood's worked you over good.
"Those who consume the bulk of goods are those who make them. We must never forget this secret of our prosperity."
Obviously, the theory is that a rise in temperature of the oceans is the source of the increased concentration of CO2 in the atmosphere, not the other way round. Have you really never heard of that theory?
To be fair there is a counter to the theory.
It is worth noting that the total amount of CO2 dissolved in the ocean is about 50 times greater than the total amount of CO2 present in the atmosphere.
You can certainly make that symbolic stretch. It's rather fitting.
You're begging the question: how do we know what is normal? Who made you the decider of normalcy? What if the weather in the 60s and 70s was the outlier?
I find it ludicrous that we measly humans think we know anything about something as enormously complex as planetary weather and climate over the estimated lifetime of the Earth.
Where did we get this idea that weather and climate are supposed to stay the same? What people really mean is, "The weather should stay the way I like it to be." How arrogant. (Yet these are the people who call others arrogant for "destroying the planet.")
"Those who consume the bulk of goods are those who make them. We must never forget this secret of our prosperity."
Did they keep records back then?
"Those who consume the bulk of goods are those who make them. We must never forget this secret of our prosperity."
No, actually CO2 has a small effect on global heating compared to other gases and particulates. The thing that distinguishes CO2 from other gases and particulates is that it pretty much universally produced by civilization, and therefor is a useful target for politicians wishing to exert control.
The darn thing needs normal ground water to cool.
You cannot cool a nuclear reactor of any significant size with ground water. You need a proper source of water, i.e. large river or the ocean, or you have to use cooling towers. Nuclear reactors are typically less than 1/3 efficient, so for 1GW electrical output you need to get rid of 2GW of heat.
Fukushima was not placed near the ocean just because the engineers loved the view.
Cooling towers use water too. Quite a lot in fact. It is the evaporation of the water that provides the bulk of the cooling effect. If you want a large-scale cooling method that uses no water*, you need to use an air-cooled condenser. There is a good diagram of a cooling tower on this page. An air-cooled condenser is basically a giant car radiator (completely closed system), whereas a cooling tower has water sprays and/or ponds. They can look like the hyperboloid towers, or they can look like large radiators depending on the design.
*Some water in air-cooled condensers must be removed as "blowdown" and then made up with fresh water. Otherwise, contaminants would build up in the system. This is both a water and an efficiency loss, so it is usually as low as possible, less than 3% of the flow.
Even those who arrange and design shrubberies are under considerable economic stress at this period in history.
If only the world could run on pipe-dreams, what a brave brave new world it would be...
I haven't thought of anything clever to put here, but then again most of you haven't either.
The darn thing needs normal ground water to cool.
You cannot cool a nuclear reactor of any significant size with ground water. You need a proper source of water, i.e. large river or the ocean, or you have to use cooling towers. Nuclear reactors are typically less than 1/3 efficient, so for 1GW electrical output you need to get rid of 2GW of heat.
Fukushima was not placed near the ocean just because the engineers loved the view.
Cooling towers use water too. Quite a lot in fact. It is the evaporation of the water that provides the bulk of the cooling effect. If you want a large-scale cooling method that uses no water*, you need to use an air-cooled condenser. There is a good diagram of a cooling tower on this page. An air-cooled condenser is basically a giant car radiator (completely closed system), whereas a cooling tower has water sprays and/or ponds. They can look like the hyperboloid towers, or they can look like large radiators depending on the design. *Some water in air-cooled condensers must be removed as "blowdown" and then made up with fresh water. Otherwise, contaminants would build up in the system. This is both a water and an efficiency loss, so it is usually as low as possible, less than 3% of the flow.
I don't like replying to my own posts, but I forgot to add that air-cooled condensers are avoided as much as possible. They use far less water, but use a lot more power to run the air fans. And the cooling surface must be much larger which also adds cost. And the entire cycle is less efficient with an air-cooled condenser because evaporative cooling can always reach a lower temperature (Carnot-type thermodynamics). In summary, cooling towers use more water per MW, but air-cooled condensers burn more fuel per MW.
If you can get the water permit, cooling towers are the way to go. Recently, I have seen air-cooled condensers becoming more popular for both desert applications and to satisfy permitting concerns.
Even those who arrange and design shrubberies are under considerable economic stress at this period in history.
If you bothered to RTFA, CO2 emissions was the only metric used in the report. Hence the context.
It is still a misleading and inflammatory statement, both in the article and the summary:
But in a recent speech to the Clean Energy Ministerial, International Energy Agency Executive Director, Maria van der Hoeven, had some bad news: “The drive to clean up the world’s energy system has stalled. Despite much talk by world leaders, and despite a boom of renewable energy over the last decade, the average unit of energy produced today is basically as dirty as it was 20 years ago.”
SO2, CO, NOx, particulates, mercury, and all the other nasty stuff has been almost eliminated from fossil plant emissions, at least in all first-world countries (US, Canada, Japan, Europe, UK). Most coal plants have clear or near-clear emissions now. This has happened in the last 30 years. CO2 is a problem, but if you burn anything you get CO2. It is an unavoidable product of burning something. Plus power stations are much more efficient nowadays, increasing in efficiency from an average of maybe 40% to 60%+ today. So less fuel is burned per MW, and less CO2 is emitted per MW.
If I had the choice of living in a 1980 energy world or in a 2013 energy world (ignoring all other technological advancements) I would chose 2013 every time. To say that "the average unit of energy produced today is basically as dirty as it was 20 years ago” is not only misleading, it is wrong. It is propaganda.
Even those who arrange and design shrubberies are under considerable economic stress at this period in history.
Precisely the hoax to which I was referring. You DO know that the planet stopped heating up some 16 years ago, right?
If the planet stopped heating 16 years ago, why did ten of the ten warmest years on record occur in the last 16 years? It is literally impossible for the planet to have stopped heating before it reached those peak temperatures. It is simply not physically possible and it is sheer insanity to claim other wise. Furthermore the decade from 2000-2009 is the warmest decade on record. How does you claim even make the least bit of sense?
It appears that you are either perpetrating the hoax or have fallen for it, global warming continues.
Fanatically anti-fanatical
"CO, NOx, SO2, Hg, soot and fly ash mostly."
And that is one reason why using natural gas for electric generation is better (cleaner) than coal.
It also puts less CO2 in the air per kwh than coal does. Some of the energy comes from the hydrogen in the hydrocarbons...
what exactly is being added to the CO2 to make it poisonous? nothing, it's a necessary nutrient for what we eat.
I tell you what. Place yourself in a closed room with a 5% CO2 solution and then come back to me and tell me its not poisonous.
Part of the problem is that left-wing radicals are allowed to give sensationalistic, ridiculous names to things the media wants to talk about. 'Deniers', 'Dirty Oil', 'Dirty Pollution'. I don't know if I've ever met or read about a scientist who was pro-pollution, but I've met a fair number who can successfully argue that their industries form of pollution is less 'dirty' than their competition's. If the left truly want their arguments to succeed and gain support from the masses they need to switch their focus from sensationalism and the most extreme predictive models and on to moderate ideas that people can get behind. Knowing that the right-wing radicals are wrong is useless if the left-wing radicals are just as prone to lying, exaggerating, or mislabeling the things in this world that they want to see changed. For example, lumping nuclear power plants in with fossil fuel burning power generators dilutes, if not destroys, any argument you were trying to make.
Compare the rate at which CO2 emission was growing between 1900 and 1990 to the rate at which it's growing now and it's quite an achievement. We've leveled off the production of CO2 whilst still increasing the net amount of Electricty produced since 1990. Or am I reading the post wrong?
Many of the coal plants in China I doubt meet any sort of regulations. On top of that I am sure a bunch do, however the fact is coal is used for a lot more than just power generation. The population uses it personally. You can buy cakes or bricks of the stuff and it is used for heating, cooking, etc... none of which is going to have ANY of the environmental scrubbers and the like. Now it does sound like much, but expand that usage to the number of citizens... Even if China refit every one of their power generation plants to be the most environmentally friendly ever, they still have a much larger problem.
The black lung smog over London in the industrial age wasn't only due to factories, but due to the fact that everyone used it for everything. Heck my parents house still has a "coal chute", which was eventually converted to Oil, and that is in Canada.
Not that I have a problem with what you say, but the context was... again that fnj was stating the beginning of your argument, then an AC didn't notice why he was picking out CO2, which I pointed out to him.
It has been demonstrated that oral histories of various tribes around the world are amazingly accurate. But - no, they weren't much into written records. What with all the disease and genocidal wars, much of that oral history has been lost.
"Windows is like the faint smell of piss in a subway: it's there, and there's nothing you can do about it." - Charlie Br
Salt is also used in our food, but in stronger doses the ancient Chinese used it as a poison. Salt in excess or where you don't want it is pollution. CO2 in certain concentrations is good. It's food for plants and helps keep the Earth at a comfortable temperature, but in excess it suffocates animals and causes temperatures to rise. Melting ice may cause sea levels to rise, but it also serves as the earths air conditioner as it soaks up 100 calories to melt 1CC of ice and only 1 Calorie to raise the temp of 1CC of water 1 deg C so while we have enough ice it should counter the warming, but at the cost of sea level rise and contamination of the sea water. That 1 Calorie will raise 1 CC of air at standard temperature and pressure much more. Again fresh water supports animal life on land, but too much fresh water into the sea is a pollution that kills off marine life. We can find the same effect for many things both in nature and man made, but the fact remains that too much CO2 is will cause animals to die and thus becomes a pollutant..
The two statements aren't contradicting, can't you tell an OR condition from an AND condition?
Of course the third option is "it won't change anything." All three are possible for weather in a small enough region.
"When information is power, privacy is freedom" - Jah-Wren Ryel
Build a Dyson Sphere already!!! Out power consumption will need it by the time we finish building it!!! :-)
Sure enough, the cow costume was hanging up next to the superhero outfit and sailors uniform. (S,Spud)
Breeder reactors. Now. End of story.
Social Credit would solve everything...
You are right, I should have said air-cooled condenser, not cooling tower. If you have enough water available you avoid both and simply do heat exchange with the water directly. Of course then you risk the river running dry in summer so your nuclear power plants shut down right when people are dying from heat stroke, as France demonstrated.
Finally! A year of moderation! Ready for 2019?
sorry, "pedanatic" is related to an inside joke of "pedanantic". I managed to type something half-way between the two.
I wish I could claim I was trying to be ironic.
“Common sense is not so common.” — Voltaire
If the planet stopped heating 16 years ago, why did ten of the ten warmest years on record occur in the last 16 years?
And yet, the data is what the data is. Perhaps you should look at the actual data rather than filling your head with Left-wing blog posts and rhetorical questions in which I have zero interest.
In times of universal deceit, telling the truth gets you modded -1 Troll
s/is/are/g
I apologize in advance to the Grammar Nazis
In times of universal deceit, telling the truth gets you modded -1 Troll
It is, however, a very long time not just to live somewhere, but live somewhere and help to maintain a stable ecosystem. The Pomo people who live in what is now Lake County, CA used to regularly live to be over 100 years old.
So what happened to all the large mammals like mammoths, giant sloths, and saber-toothed cats?
So what happened to all the large mammals like mammoths, giant sloths, and saber-toothed cats?
That's funny, I don't see them on any continent.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
The data says you are wrong, and I've already shown you in the most basic way that what you believe is fundamentally and factually incorrect. If you don't want to accept it because "reality has a well-known liberal bias", that's your problem.
Fanatically anti-fanatical
That means nobody maintained a "stable ecosystem".
That means nobody maintained a "stable ecosystem".
Or it means that mammoths and sabertooths were an ecological blip. Stable doesn't necessarily mean unchanging, although it can.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
the atmosphere will never have such concentration, we're talking of less than a half of one part per thousand. not even the level of soda pop belching to tickle the nose.
Maybe we should start by making it more ethical.
Just pay a premium price for ethical fuel.
http://ethics-not-octane.org/
Bram Stolk http://stolk.org/tlctc/
reality has a well-known liberal bias
No, it does not. Quite the opposite, in fact.
In times of universal deceit, telling the truth gets you modded -1 Troll
Dude, that's a joke at your expense. You keep trying to argue around the fact that your "statement of fact" is obviously wrong.
I've provided you a simple and effective demonstration that your belief is not coherent with reality. Even your counter proof says "Trend: 0.14". You do realise that a positive trend indicates warming, right?
Here's a quote from the Met Office:
The atmospheric warming trend has slowed a little, however, the ocean (which absorbs about 90% of the extra incoming heat from the green house effect) continues to warm, Decades of slower warming are expected. Especially, see Figure 2 in the last link. Natural variability laid on top of a trend can always lead to an endless series of plateaus, if you try hard enough.
Fanatically anti-fanatical
Yup, spoken like a True Believer. No matter how many facts are thrown your way, you'll clap your hands over your ears and shout "na na na na I can't hear you!" and keep on believing -- despite mountains of evidence to the contrary -- whatever you want to believe. NO amount of evidence, not even definitive proof (which I posted above), will ever be sufficient....
Just like a Creationist. Just like a Keynesian. Just like a hundred other "isms" that are more about religion than Science (and this includes the Warmists).
I think my work here is done. Have fun in your little Paradise.
In times of universal deceit, telling the truth gets you modded -1 Troll