Rising Sea Level Could Put East Coast Nuclear Plants At Risk

mdsolar (1045926) writes with news that global warming may make it more difficult to use modern power sources that rely upon being near large bodies of water for cooling. From the article: "During the 1970s and 1980s, when many nuclear reactors were first built, most operators estimated that seas would rise at a slow, constant rate. ... But the seas are now rising much faster than they did in the past ... Sea levels rose an average of 8 inches between 1880 and 2009, or about 0.06 inches per year. But in the last 20 years, sea levels have risen an average of 0.13 inches per year... NOAA) has laid out four different projections for estimated sea level rise by 2100. Even the agency's best-case scenario assumes that sea levels will rise at least 8.4 inches by the end of this century. NOAA's worst-case scenario, meanwhile, predicts that the oceans will rise nearly 7 feet in the next 86 years. But most nuclear power facilities were built well before scientists understood just how high sea levels might rise in the future. And for power plants, the most serious threat is likely to come from surges during storms. Higher sea levels mean that flooding will travel farther inland, creating potential hazards in areas that may have previously been considered safe." The article has charts comparing the current elevation of various plants with their estimated elevations under the various NOAA sea level rise estimates.

Comments

Where does 7 feet of water come from?

[SuperKendall]

If you think about it a seven-foot rise in water is not very reasonable to predict - it has to come from somewhere and there is just not that much water locked up in ice anymore.

They are talking about four-five centuries for a massive ice wall in the arctic to melt to MAYBE bring us to four feet of rise. There is other talk of a whole anoretic ice sheet melting and giving us a few inches per century or rise.

Will those nuclear plants still be around in 400 years when a 2-4 foot rise might start to get closer to impacting them? Or will we be laughing at the water from our hover boards as beings of translucent energy ourselves?

Re:Where does 7 feet of water come from?

[Anonymous Coward]

I vote we do the second one.

Re:Where does 7 feet of water come from?

[pitchpipe]

If you think about it a seven-foot rise in water is not very reasonable to predict - it has to come from somewhere and there is just not that much water locked up in ice anymore.

Really?! Are you even fucking trying anymore?

If all land ice melted, sea level would rise approximately 70 meters (230 feet) worldwide.

Re:Where does 7 feet of water come from?

[Anonymous Coward]

Water like other materials expands when it gets warmer.

Re:Where does 7 feet of water come from?

[Anonymous Coward]

Fuckwit.

Re:Where does 7 feet of water come from?

[SuperKendall]

But it's not all going to melt, is it? That's the point. The amount that people are thinking will melt, even at the most panicky, doesn't come near to being seven feet worth of water.

Re:Where does 7 feet of water come from?

[Oligonicella]

Not by half.

Re:Where does 7 feet of water come from?

[AK Marc]

It's mostly glacier/ice sheets. There are lots of theories that small rises in temp will greatly affect average ice depth. What evidence do you have that all of those predictions are wrong?

Re:Where does 7 feet of water come from?

[SuperKendall]

We're looking at an increase overall of 2-4c for the atmosphere. Since the water temperature can't increase beyond ambient, how do you get multiple feet of water level rise out of just a few C difference in water temperature? To see any visible change in a flask of water requires a far larger swing in temperature.

Also remember that underground volcanic action is already dumping a lot of heat into the ocean here and there, so you probably would not even get the total atmospheric rise embodied in ocean temperatures that are already moderating much greater heat.

And also that greater heat means faster evaporation, which in turns means natural cooling...

Re: Where does 7 feet of water come from?

[Anonymous Coward]

No, what you said was that there wasn't that much.

You are off by a large amount on that estimate. Why are we to trust you on the melting now?

You are also leaving off continental subsidence, but that is a separate consideration.

Re:Where does 7 feet of water come from?

[Opportunist]

Don't worry, 5-10 meters should do to flood pretty much anything remotely close to a beach.

Re:Where does 7 feet of water come from?

[unimacs]

Not by half.

Not by half of what? The oceans are thousands of feet deep and cover 2/3 of the planet.

Re:Where does 7 feet of water come from?

[unimacs]

We're looking at an increase overall of 2-4c for the atmosphere. Since the water temperature can't increase beyond ambient, how do you get multiple feet of water level rise out of just a few C difference in water temperature? To see any visible change in a flask of water requires a far larger swing in temperature.

Also remember that underground volcanic action is already dumping a lot of heat into the ocean here and there, so you probably would not even get the total atmospheric rise embodied in ocean temperatures that are already moderating much greater heat.

And also that greater heat means faster evaporation, which in turns means natural cooling...

How many flasks of water would you have to stack up to get to the average depth of an ocean? Now imagine the water in each of those flasks expanding by just a little bit. Don't you think the cumulative amount would be noticeable?

Until recently most of the rise in ocean depth has been due to thermal expansion. Now that the ice sheets are melting at an accelerated rate, that is starting to be the main factor, but thermal expansion is still occurring.

Re:Where does 7 feet of water come from?

[Anonymous Coward]

The melting is primarily happening at the *bottom* of the ice, where it floats on liquid water.

There, the pressures are high (thus decreasing the temperature at which water melts), surface temperature really doesn't come into play, and small changes in the temperature of the water flowing under the ice can have huge impacts on how fast that ice melts (vs. how much is added back to the top of it each year in precipitation).

Re:Where does 7 feet of water come from?

[Anonymous Coward]

Sure it does .... so I guess doing your own test will prove that.

Put a plastic cup with 1/2 full of water in your freezer. Mark the level on the cup before you put it in. Next day take it out, and see if the water (ice) level is the less or more.

Mark the ice level, and then just let it melt under the sun. And then tell me if water "expands" when it gets warmer.

Re:Where does 7 feet of water come from?

[Anonymous Coward]

So? Much of that melting ice is not floating on sea, but is on ground. On top of that water is heating up, so it's expanding in volume. And there is a lot of it to expand. On top of that some places might simply be sinking, but I'm sure this piece of news has nothing to do with that. Also, in some places the ground is still raising back after the last ice age, or at least that's the best quess as to why it is raising. Might as well be the continents just moving(althought this is happening in an area where that shouldn't be a factor). Things happen. IF they have measured the sea leves locally at some place there is no reason to doubt them. The best quess is the seas will keep their trend. Just build a wall on the shoreline. Ask the dutch how it's done.

Re:Where does 7 feet of water come from?

[bill_mcgonigle]

But it's not all going to melt, is it? That's the point.

I thought the point was to have the working poor in Middle America build Montgomery Burns a seawall for his seaside mansion?

Re:Where does 7 feet of water come from?

[SuperKendall]

How many flasks of water would you have to stack up to get to the average depth of an ocean? Now imagine the water in each of those flasks expanding by just a little bit.

Ok then, where are the calculations showing how much EXACTLY that increase is for 2-4c rise in surface temp? How far down do changes surface temp propagate? Where are those facts?

Re:Where does 7 feet of water come from?

[WhiteZook]

That is only partially true. As you increase temperature from 0 to 4 degrees C, you are correct that water contracts. But for temperatures above 4 degrees, the water starts expanding again. Above 8 degrees, water takes up more volume than ice.

Re:Where does 7 feet of water come from?

[mc6809e]

Water like other materials expands when it gets warmer.

Just a nit-pick, but water's maximum density is actually at about 4C.

That means as it cools below 4C, it begins to expand again. If it didn't, ice wouldn't float!

Re:Where does 7 feet of water come from?

[WhiteZook]

And despite bitter cold temperatures on Antarctica, it is losing ice at an accelerating rate. Please explain.

Re:Where does 7 feet of water come from?

[Barsteward]

i'm afraid that most of these deniers brains cannot compute those sorts of sizes, its the same with creationists not being able to visualise more than a few years

Re:Where does 7 feet of water come from?

[Barsteward]

do your research for the formula. don't keep the attitude that because you don't know it, its not true or possible

Re:Where does 7 feet of water come from?

[Anonymous Coward]

It isn't. The GRACE study is invalid due to calibration issues.

When it comes to sea ice - it's at record levels:

http://nsidc.org/data/seaice_i...

Re:Where does 7 feet of water come from?

[marcello_dl]

If you think about it a seven-foot rise in water is not very reasonable to predict

This reminds me of an usenet post circa 1996, which talked about chernobyl and the Bible.

"And the third angel sounded, and there fell a great star from heaven, burning as it were a lamp, and it fell upon the third part of the rivers, and upon the fountains of waters; And the name of the star is called Wormwood: and the third part of the waters became wormwood; and many men died of the waters, because they were made bitter."

In the post it was remarked that Chernobyl is linked to Wormwood, and that a star is essentally a nuclear reactor, and it thought the bible might predict the collapse of the sarcophagus built around reactor 4 in the river, *or a nuclear accident involving water*. It exactly describes Fukushima if the catastrophists are right.

Now, before you steer this into a religious debate consider that the abilities of making predictions are obvious consequence of an hypothetical god, but are not proof of it. In fact IIRC in the Bible, possibly to prove that God > Destiny, God's predictions are not fulfilled (except the one in Genesis: Adam indeed dies because with the knowledge of good and evil he made himself responsible, able to sin instead of driven by instinct).

Re:Where does 7 feet of water come from?

[Anonymous Coward]

http://oceanservice.noaa.gov/facts/oceandepth.html

AVERAGE depth of the ocean is 2.65 MILES or 167904 inches so 8 inches is a change of 0.0047% change

Re:Where does 7 feet of water come from?

[erikkemperman]

Wait, a seven-foot rise is not a reasonable prediction but our being beings of translucent energy in 400 years is? Allrighty then.

Re:Where does 7 feet of water come from?

[WhiteZook]

You must have missed the Cryosat data, then. Antarctic sea ice is pretty much irrelevant in the discussion. It is mostly seasonal, and it has negligible impact on sea level. What we care about is the the grounded ice, and we care about the volume, not the area.

Re:Where does 7 feet of water come from?

[riverat1]

It doesn't have to thaw in place, it just has to slide into the ocean.

Re:Where does 7 feet of water come from?

[Anonymous Coward]

The total collapse of the vulnerable parts of West Antarctica’s ice sheets would raise sea levels by at least 3 metres . The possibility of this happening has now moved from the hypothetical to an unfortunate reality. The ends of many of the glaciers that drain these ice sheets are already significantly below sea level, and the ice sheets are not hemmed in by mountains, as Greenland’s ice sheets are.

Without an anchor on land, the ice sheets' collapse is inevitable and cannot be slowed. We can now only watch as West Antarctica’s ice sheets collapse. The best we can now hope for is that this collapse will be slow and stately, and take centuries to unfold.

If this is the case, then civilizations can probably adapt to the havoc this will cause to coastal communities. However, we have evidence from prehistoric warm periods that this could occur over decades. At this point we don’t know long it will take, but we do know that the climate forcing today is much stronger than at any time in over 50 million years.

Given we have made so little progress on limiting our global carbon emissions, the odds are that ice-sheet collapse will only accelerate. Once this sort of collapse begins, it will not stop. Satellite measurements compiled by UK researchers have shown that Antarctica is losing 160 billion tonnes of ice per year, mainly through thinning of West Antarctica’s ice sheets. The ground beneath the ice is being held down like a massive spring, and as the ice gets lighter the ground will rise quicker leading to more accelerated thinning.

Another way of putting it is that we appear to have crossed a tipping point. There are many other fuses that could be lit, and probably will be, if the collapse markedly accelerates - and these would add to the rate and magnitude of the sea level rise. One of those potential fuses is the Totten Glacier, on the margin of the East Antarctic Ice Sheet. In this area, a rift in the Antarctic crust allows sea water to extend hundreds of kilometres under the ice, literally undermining the ice.

Re:Where does 7 feet of water come from?

[riverat1]

Here's a test for you.

Take a cup with water at 4 degrees C (it's maximum density) and heat it up and measure the change. Then you tell me if water expands when it gets warmer. To help you out here is a graph of how the density of water changes with temperature. Hint, lower density means larger volume.

Re:Where does 7 feet of water come from?

[geogob]

I find it very enjoyable, yet irritating, to see people take every single effect/cause independently, somehow analyse them (while actually having no clue at all what they are doing) and come to the conclusion they are too small to be related to a trend, while missing the obvious point that independent effect can be cumulativ. Worse, different effect can promote other and accelerate the trend. And they cook up a counter arguments (again while having no clue, even of the oders of magnitude) and propagate their ignorance to others ready to believe their pseudo scientific facts.

I really have to stand on the side of other posts I read here, stating that most people are simply not open minded or bright enough to understand the data and analyse it. A large part of this is to blame on education, but when basic logic and analytic skills fail (either due to intellectual capacity or to unwillingness to use those skills) I doupt even that would help.

Re:Where does 7 feet of water come from?

[geogob]

Please stop with the half-assed facts. The average temperature of the coldest region of Antractica is -57C. That has nothing to do with the average temperature overall on the continent. What you wrote is just as stupid as saying nobody will get a heat stroke anytime soon in Pheonix; the average temperature in Vail is 11C (52F) after all.

Re:Where does 7 feet of water come from?

[Anonymous Coward]

i'm afraid that most of these deniers brains cannot compute those sorts of sizes, its the same with creationists not being able to visualise more than a few years

Actually, thanks to Bishop Ussher, god will refrain from smiting us if we visualise anything up to 6000 years you insensitive clod.

Re:Where does 7 feet of water come from?

[Jane Q. Public]

Then by all means, enlighten them. Explain these sorts of sizes, and similar sizes to which they are relative.

I'll wait.

Re:Where does 7 feet of water come from?

[geogob]

And why to you assume it is always bitter cold everywhere on Antarctica. All the time. Did TV say that?

Re:Where does 7 feet of water come from?

[Savage-Rabbit]

It's mostly glacier/ice sheets. There are lots of theories that small rises in temp will greatly affect average ice depth. What evidence do you have that all of those predictions are wrong?

Shhhhh.... you are messing up his Neocon fantasy about drilling for oil and digging for minerals once all the ice melts.

Re:Where does 7 feet of water come from?

[WhiteZook]

All the information to understand the thermal expansion of ocean water is available with a few google searches, so why should you lean back and wait for somebody to enlighten you ?

Re:Where does 7 feet of water come from?

[petermgreen]

Not sure why i'm replying to an anonymous retard but anyway.

Water does have the strange property of expanding significantly when it freezes (and expanding slightly just before freezing). However above about 4 degrees centigrade it expands with temperature. Of the order of 0.04% per degree centigrade (depending on the current temperature)

0.04% doesn't seem like much but the oceans are about 4km deep so a 1 degree centigrade rise in average ocean temperature would be of the order of a 1.6m rise in sea level.

however the bigger concern is the release of water that is currently locked up in ice on land (ice on the water floats and so has a negigable impact on sea levels when it melts).

Re:Where does 7 feet of water come from?

[Anonymous Coward]

Yeah, not to mention, in four or five centuries, I'd expect current nuclear reactors to be decommissioned. LMFAO at global warmism scam.

Re:Where does 7 feet of water come from?

[Anonymous Coward]

Yep - but this is about expanding water in the REST (non-arctic) of all earths oceans, and combine THAT with the melting Antarctic ice...

Don't be focused on what's happening in the arctic circle alone...
 

Re:Where does 7 feet of water come from?

[Anonymous Coward]

Deniers? When you have data points that don't jive with the theory (Antarctic Ice being at a record breaking *MAXIMUM* ?) and you don't re-work or discard the theory, the only people that're deniers are the ones bitterly clinging to the busted theory and calling it "science" at that point.

Want to back up and re-think your remarks? Mods...Insightful MY ASS . Should be marked flamebait- but since it's not science and is blind faith based on what you all believe to be "truth"...I'm unsurprised.

Re:Where does 7 feet of water come from?

[jimbolauski]

According to a US geological survey there are 332,519,000 cubic miles of water in the oceans and they have a surface area of 129,444,000 square miles a rise of 7 feet is 171,611 cubic miles of water or a 0.05% increase. The average temperature of the ocean is 39F to get that increase in volume the average temperature would need to be 46F. That's 4.06e25 Joules to achieve that over 86 years or 4.83e23 J per year which is half the total energy of the sun that strikes the earth each year. I just have a hard time believing that greenhouse gases trap 50% more of the sun's energy and put it directly into the ocean.

Re:Where does 7 feet of water come from?

[hxnwix]

Haha, no, I don't think I'm going to spend my time explaining such things as "the oceans are large." You are pig ignorance exemplified.

Re: Where does 7 feet of water come from?

[hxnwix]

It comes from ice sitting on land that melts. There's enough of that to raise the sea level by seventy meters.

Re:Where does 7 feet of water come from?

[hxnwix]

Yep - but this is about expanding water in the REST (non-arctic) of all earths oceans, and combine THAT with the melting Antarctic ice...

Don't be focused on what's happening in the arctic circle alone...

They're intentionally missing that point. No need to explain it - they can't understand it.

Re:Where does 7 feet of water come from?

[hxnwix]

Indeed. Global warming, a scam, has been disproven! DIS-PROVE- (gigantic wave washes over you)

Re:Where does 7 feet of water come from?

[Truth_Quark]

The west Antarctic Ice Sheet is past the point of no return and will collapse. Antarctic glacier melt is unstoppable.

That will give you seven feet alone. In time it will give about 13.

But Greenland ice sheet is losing mass too, as are glaciers on the less icy continents.

Re:Where does 7 feet of water come from?

[WhiteZook]

I found the following numbers: volume = 1.3 billion km^3, expansion coefficient = 250 ppm/K, heat capacity = 3.993 kJ/kg/K. Average depth = 3.68 km. So, to get a rise of 7 feet, a temperature rise of 2.32 K is required, which requires 1.3E21 * 3993 * 2.32 = 1.2E25 J total, or 1.4E23 per year. That's quite a bit less, but still a lot of heat. But of course, not all of the 7 feet rise will be due to thermal expansion. Over the last couple of years, about 75% of the rise in sea level was due to melting ice, and only 25% due to thermal expansion.

Re:Where does 7 feet of water come from?

[Truth_Quark]

Your wet clothes when you hang them on the line only reach an average of 30C. The water won't be evaporating soon.

Re:Where does 7 feet of water come from?

[daninaustin]

At the rates they just reported this week, the west Antarctica glaciers will be adding something like 1.7" per century. Not sure it's really something we have to worrry about. The sky isn't falling. Nuclear reactors have a finite lifetime. the sky isn't falling.

Re: Where does 7 feet of water come from?

[caveqat101]

Its not the warming water I'm nervous about, its the frozen water expansion. Try growing something on ice. Generally polar bears do good then,but humans have a hard time with limited food production. Meaning less education, and more warfare over limited resources. Warm,means education, production, and resources available, more life. More diversity.

Re: Where does 7 feet of water come from?

[caveqat101]

But the crysosat data missed lake superior. They had to look there by a standard photo sat. Record ice. Why, or is the data filtered to present a viewpoint? Why? Canadians were late getting their breaker out, to the saint Lawrence, why? Ice in the harbor? And had to use their ocean branch to break in first, not enough warming there? Or did they believe the hype, instead of being prepared like usual. Alarmist crap means more problems, not being prepared for tomorrow.

Re: Where does 7 feet of water come from?

[caveqat101]

The unfortunate thing they forget to mention, much of the Antarctic is ice over water, not land. There are several thousand foot of ice cube in your ocean already. Same with the Greenland islands. Look at the maps. Where they drill is over water,

Re: Where does 7 feet of water come from?

[WhiteZook]

How is this relevant for Antarctic ice loss ?

Re: Where does 7 feet of water come from?

[Teranolist]

mirror mirror dafuq

Re:Where does 7 feet of water come from?

[Anonymous Coward]

Global Warming scam is a tax grab for low cost clean energy, Solar is the new Nuclear...

the,
Solar Industry

Re: Where does 7 feet of water come from?

[Anonymous Coward]

there is just not that much water locked up in ice anymore.

That's the claim. It's been refuted.

Not that it wouldn't melt, but that that much water was not locked up in ice anymore.

SuperKendall was wrong on that. Now why are we to trust SuperKendall on the melting?

Re:Where does 7 feet of water come from?

[Jane Q. Public]

All the information to understand the thermal expansion of ocean water is available with a few google searches,

Yes, it certainly is.

so why should you lean back and wait for somebody to enlighten you ?

Who said anything about ME?

The point here is that GP was talking out his ass, and actually doesn't know any of these specifics himself. His comment was nothing but a personal insult aimed at an entire category of people. Seems to me that isn't supposed to be socially acceptable these days.

Re:Where does 7 feet of water come from?

[Curunir_wolf]

If this is the case, then civilizations can probably adapt to the havoc this will cause to coastal communities. However, we have evidence from prehistoric warm periods that this could occur over decades. At this point we don’t know long it will take, but we do know that the climate forcing today is much stronger than at any time in over 50 million years.

Assuming you are referring to radiative forcing, all we have are forcing assumptions and climate models that use them, and it appears so far from observations that the assumptions of warming based on forcing are not accurate. A recent paper in the Journal of Geophysical Research demonstrates that global temperatures are entirely independent of radiative forcing.

Re:Where does 7 feet of water come from?

[Anonymous Coward]

His comment was nothing but a personal insult aimed at an entire category of people.

Welcome to Slashdot.

Re:Where does 7 feet of water come from?

[MichaelSimpson77]

The water level used to be MUCH lower. So much so that a land bridge connected Asia and America. It's where the Eskimos and Indians came through. And then, without any help from mankind, the water rose and flooded the land bridge.

Glacier bay used to be green in the 1700s. The indians lived there. And then the glacier came and filled the bay to where the wall of ice was 2 miles from the entrance. Without any help from mankind, over the next 200 years it receded. By the mid 1800's, it had retreated 44 miles and by the early 1900's it had retreated 65 miles.

The earth undergoes a constant state of change.

Climate change and all of the knee jerk reactions to save our planet are merely a scam to extract more money from the world serfs. Cap and Trade. California passed it. Electric rates are going up. The net effect for California's CaT is to take more from the middle and lower class.

http://wattsupwiththat.com/201...

is a nice rebuttal to the whole climate warming...eh no...climate change...eh no....climate chaos and we must do something....anything in the next 500 days or it will be too late group..

People are stupid sheep.

Re:Where does 7 feet of water come from?

[MichaelSimpson77]

Or maybe the alarmists don't have the brain capacity to see the bigger picture on geological time scales.

Re:Where does 7 feet of water come from?

[budgenator]

I'm sure you vastly underestimate the amount of heat required to raise sea-levels that much by melting ice.
consider 7 feet in the next 86 years. or 2,133.6 mm,
1 mm / (2.78 microns / Gt) = 10-3 m / (2.78 x 10-6 m / Gt) = 360 Gt, Conversion factors for ice and water mass and volume,
2133.6mm * 360 GT/mm = 768,096 GT,
334 Kj/Kg, 10^12 kg = 1 GT;
768,096 GT * 334*10^12 Kj/GT = 2.56544064e+20 Kj OR 61,315,502,868.069 kT nuclear explosion!

Re:Where does 7 feet of water come from?

[budgenator]

You forgot to say that the collapse has been going on for 22,000 years!

Re:Where does 7 feet of water come from?

[budgenator]

My understanding is the ice is flowing down hill into the ocean, forming the Ross Ice Shelf, parts of the glacier that's over land is actually below sea-level, and in the past scientists were argueing over whether the sea-level would drop as sea water filled the depression left by the glacier. The melting is caused by a combination of warm sea currents and newly discovered underwater volcanoes.

Antarctica is a desert only getting 8 inches of precipitation on the coast and 4 inches at the pole so any losses add up quick. While Ice is unlikely to melt, it does sublimate, put a tray of ice cubes in the freezer for a few months and see how much they shrink.

Re:Where does 7 feet of water come from?

[AK Marc]

Maybe at some point the ocean will heat up enough that we can eat the ocean like stew.

Re: Where does 7 feet of water come from?

[budgenator]

Great Lakes had 5.3% ice cover on May 15th, totally insane, lake Huron still looks like a parking lot just north of Port Huron because they can't get through the Sault Ste. Marie locks to get into Superior. The local farmers have just turned over the fields on corn rotation, hoping the reduced albedo will warm up the ground enough to plant, corn will not germinate until the ground is up to 50F, everything is way late this year. Now when I say "weather is not climate" I add "I hope".

Re:Where does 7 feet of water come from?

[HiThere]

A) That's the worst case scenario. You don't expect those to be very reasonable.
B) Antarctica has shown signs of melting a lot faster than was projected as reasonable. And some of the factors that have sped it's melt are still increasing.

FWIW, I don't think of that as a worst case scenario. I can imagine scenarios that would be a lot more drastic. It's the worst one they wanted to make in a public prediction. You could get a lot worse, however, with a large meteor impact in various different places. Or some forms of vulcanism under Antarctica. Etc. There's lots of ways, each highly improbable. But just remember, the current situation was highly improbable a couple of decades ago. (Not just "we thought of it as highly improbable", we wouldn't be here without a tremendous number of improbable events. Each person conceived is highly improbable. Granted, many of the alternative possibilities would be very like the current one...at least as far as we could tell.)

So people don't try to predict what WILL happen, but rather what's most likely to happen, and what kind of spread can we expect. "Worst case scenario"s are one edge case that are given a low probability of occurence. But they aren't really the worst that could happen. If the worst really happens, we won't be around to be upset by it...or not for long.

Re:Where does 7 feet of water come from?

[stenvar]

It's the AGW activists who are thinking like young-earth-creationists, reasoning as if the world has always been like it's today, and that it is man's sinfulness that causes it to change and deteriorate. It's people like you who can't wrap your head around the fact that the Earth is actually a lot older than 6000 years.

"Deniers", on the other hand, know that trying to do anything about climate change is futile, and we know that the relative stability and warmth of the last few thousand years is an aberration. That is, "deniers" are scientifically minded people like me who accept global warming as reality but deny that we should take action.

Re:Where does 7 feet of water come from?

[stenvar]

I find it very enjoyable, yet irritating, to see people take every single effect/cause independently, somehow analyse them (while actually having no clue at all what they are doing) and come to the conclusion they are too small to be related to a trend, while missing the obvious point that independent effect can be cumulativ

Just as irritating as people who pick out every single thing that might happen when it gets a little warmer, total it all up, ignore the positive effects and negative feedback loops, and predict global disaster.

Re:Where does 7 feet of water come from?

[stenvar]

On this planet, water melts at around 0C. Unless a "small rise in temp" raises temperatures above that, it won't melt.

Furthermore, it takes a long time and a lot of heat to melt the Antarctic and Greenland. We're talking around a millennium even in the worst case.

Re:Where does 7 feet of water come from?

[AK Marc]

On this planet, water melts at around 0C.

Water under a glacier is liquid at temperatures much colder than 0C. Perhaps you should learn more about chemistry and such before commenting on it.

Furthermore, it takes a long time and a lot of heat to melt the Antarctic and Greenland. We're talking around a millennium even in the worst case.

To melt it, maybe. To warm up the glaciers such that they flow faster than they build up, resulting in large masses of ice flowing into the ocean, nope, you are 100% wrong. Again.

Re:Where does 7 feet of water come from?

[stenvar]

Water under a glacier is liquid at temperatures much colder than 0C. Perhaps you should learn more about chemistry and such before commenting on it.

The dependence of melting point on pressure for ice is slight (I believe around 0.01C every 10m of depth), or around 2C at the very bottom; hardly "much colder". Of course, increases in air temperature don't make it down that far anyway for a long time.

To melt it, maybe. To warm up the glaciers such that they flow faster than they build up,

I.e., you now recognize that melting point has nothing to do with it; it's the properties of the ice itself that change with temperature and cause it to flow faster. But that effect isn't dramatic and it's mostly at the surface.

resulting in large masses of ice flowing into the ocean

Ice speed increases a few percent per degree Celsius increase in air temperature on normal glaciers, not exactly a dramatic change.

nope, you are 100% wrong. Again.

Oh, please, you're funny!

Re:Where does 7 feet of water come from?

[AK Marc]

Ice speed increases a few percent per degree Celsius increase in air temperature on normal glaciers, not exactly a dramatic change.

http://www.livescience.com/454... Sometimes a small change can have a large effect.

Re:Where does 7 feet of water come from?

[Truth_Quark]

You forgot to say that the collapse has been going on for 22,000 years!

I doubt it. We reached the climatic optimum about 8000 years ago. It would have been growing overall between then and the industrial era.

Re:Where does 7 feet of water come from?

[Anonymous Coward]

First, you claim melting point depression due to pressure will cause glaciers to melt. Nonsense.

Then you claim that warmer air temperatures cause problems because of faster flow, but the effect is quite small.

Now you point to something yet different, namely how warming may cause a particular ice sheet to destabilize. Yeah, it destabilizes alright, and then takes leisurely millennia to actually make it into the sea. And it's out of our control anyway, hence irrelevant to climate change discussions.

You keep getting the science wrong, and whenever people point it out to you, you invent another bogus story.

Re:Where does 7 feet of water come from?

[AK Marc]

First, you claim melting point depression due to pressure will cause glaciers to melt. Nonsense.

Where did I claim that?

Then you claim that warmer air temperatures cause problems because of faster flow, but the effect is quite small.

Where did I claim that?

Now you point to something yet different, namely how warming may cause a particular ice sheet to destabilize. Yeah, it destabilizes alright, and then takes leisurely millennia to actually make it into the sea. And it's out of our control anyway, hence irrelevant to climate change discussions.

Where did I say that?

Rather than lying when summarizing my words, just quote them directly.

You keep getting the science wrong, and whenever people point it out to you, you invent another bogus story.

Complaining that they don't like what I'm saying isn't pointing out errors in science.

Re:Where does 7 feet of water come from?

[jimbolauski]

Water does not have a linear density ratio with respect to temperature so your number are suspect. At 4c, 370bar and 35 psu, the average temperature, pressure, and salinity of the ocean the density is 1029.502 kg/m^3 at 8c the density is 1028.957 about a 0.057% increase in volume which is what is needed for the 7 foot rise. I think in my original calcs I forgot to convert my delta F to delta K so I was off by a factor of two, that's still 25% of the sun's energy that hits earth. If you say that only 25% of that is due to expansion that's an increase of 1/8 of the suns energy that hits earth. That's still way too high to be plausible.

Re:Where does 7 feet of water come from?

[Anonymous Coward]

Skeptics want to see it with their own eyes so have them live at the coast. When their home goes underwater, they will be the first to whine about the unfairness of that. Truth is a lot of the coast line of the USA will be affected when, not if, the ocean levels rise and it is not just coastal communities, it will also affect those living upstream of rivers that flow into the ocean.

Where does 7 feet of water come from?

[unimacs]

water also expands as it warms.

Re:Explain the data

[Anonymous Coward]

Just stick with "LA LA LA can't hear you!!! LA LA LA".

86 years

[Kohath]

How can anyone expect to move anything in only 86 years?

Re:86 years

[X0563511]

Go ahead. Let's see you move a hot reactor, safely, any appreciable distance - along with any other auxiliary equipment required to keep it safe and non-melty.

B-b-but!

[Anonymous Coward]

Rush told me climate change is a myth!

Re:B-b-but!

[Anonymous Coward]

So, HuffPost and the vast consensus of climatologists are in agreement then.

Re:B-b-but!

[Opportunist]

*flips coin*

Re:B-b-but!

[Truth_Quark]

And how many people is that?

Probably about 30,000

Are each of their opinions independent of one another?

Most of them read the same climatology journals. Much like any other science.

Do any of them have vested interest?

The biggest one is publishing good research that is true. Particularly well regarded is if you're right and most people were mistaken. Much like any other science. And a few will have other conflicts of interest.

Re:B-b-but!

[Truth_Quark]

Yeah, they are in consensus that it's been getting a little warmer

A lot warmer, if you're interested in ecology. Take eucalyptus species for and example. 25% of species have a range that spans less that 1C in mean temperature. That means that a 1C change in temperature puts the new long-term survivable range completely outside their current range. That comes with a significant extinction risk, and where movement is blocked by the edge of continents, tops of mountains, or human land use, it get this think called "committed to extinction"

...and humans contributed a little to that.

The consensus is probably contributed the majority of that.

I think most people would say likely all of it, or slightly more. (We are in the cooling part of the Milankovic cycle, having hit the peak about 8000 years ago, so many reconstructions of natural climate is that it would be in a slow cooling ... other things being equal.)

Re:B-b-but!

[Anonymous Coward]

Is this your source?
http://tigger.uic.edu/~pdoran/012009_Doran_final.pdf

Re:B-b-but!

[Truth_Quark]

I loosely based it on this: http://rabett.blogspot.com.au/...

Re:B-b-but!

[Anonymous Coward]

That's a blog post that doesn't link anywhere.

Re:B-b-but!

[kenh]

Untold billions and billions of plants and animals went extinct long before man ever appeared on the planet (thank you Neil Degrase-Tyson & Cosmos) - just because a particular plant that exists today is having problems as the climate changes doesn't mean anything, really. Is there a reason to believe the eucalyptus species won't evolve and adapt to the new climate? Why won't species that feed on the eucalyptus plants "evolve" and start eating something else? Can you not imagine a world without the eucalyptus plants or the animals that eat them? The planet is evolving over time, and, it's quite possible that if they eucalyptus plants and the animals that feed on them can't evolve along with the planet, the planet will go along without them just fine.

Maybe, if the temperature rising just one degree kills you, maybe you're supposed to die.

BTW, how do you know what "the right temperature" is for Earth? It used to be much hotter than it is now, and it also used to be a lot colder than it is now, who decided what the right temperature is, and how? How can scientists pretend to know what the "proper" temperature is for Earth? Is there a "Creator's Manual" somewhere that outlines the proper temperature? Has the planet ever been the same temperature for an extended period, or hasn't it constantly changed over millennia?

OK, so the planet is getting warmer - maybe it is supposed to be warmer? Our current temperatures are far from any planetary record. So the oceans will rise? And? Who decided that the current sea levels are the proper level, and that they should never change?

Please explain to me how we "know" that the "proper" temperature of the planet is/should be?

Re:B-b-but!

[Truth_Quark]

Untold billions and billions of plants and animals went extinct long before man ever appeared on the planet (thank you Neil Degrase-Tyson & Cosmos) - just because a particular plant that exists today is having problems as the climate changes doesn't mean anything, really.

The time scales involved are difficult to comprehend.

The problem is that the mean extinction rate is probably about one species every five years, and it is currently probably about 1 species every hour.

So we are seeing a reduction in biodiversity, and that means a reduction in intellectual resources, and a risk of knocking out parts entire groups upon which entire ecosystems depend on. Including the risk of making staying alive as a human very difficult and expensive.

Why won't species that feed on the eucalyptus plants "evolve" and start eating something else?

It works that they go extinct, and then there is an ecological niche that can be filled at some point in the coming millions of years. But probably not until something else replaces the extinct trees.

But the problem for humanity is that we won't be here in this form in the million years or so it takes for that to happen. So we have to live in a world with a lower biodiversity, and that imposes limits on our physical in intellectual resources that have a cost.

OK, so the planet is getting warmer - maybe it is supposed to be warmer?

"Supposed to be?" What does that mean?

Our current temperatures are far from any planetary record.

Not with any of the species that are alive now on it.

So the oceans will rise? And?

And we have a lot of our most expensive infrastructure near the coast, and even if we can gather the resources to rebuild it all, that will dramatically reduce what we can do in terms of new projects.

And this will keep being applied. The sea will keep rolling in for the foreseeable future.

Please explain to me how we "know" that the "proper" temperature of the planet is/should be?

What it was when we built our infrastructure and decided on our land use would be best for us. In terms of biodiversity, changing slowly enough for species to move is very important, but within the range that it has been for the past couple of million years would also be good. Unfortunately we are warming from near the warmest part of the Milankovich Cycle, and so many species won't have the geographical resources that they usually use to adapt to climate change over those cycles. (Meaning they will be pushed off the pole end of continents and islands and/or the tops of mountains). So downwards from here would be better than upwards as well.

Re:B-b-but!

[Truth_Quark]

The link is working for me.

Re:B-b-but!

[Anonymous Coward]

derp

Re:B-b-but!

[Anonymous Coward]

I think most people understand this point. We are top of the food chain now so let us not rock the boat... The problem arises when certain people act like they know exactly what to do when any reasonable person knows there is a plethora of unknowns.

Re:Explain the data

[AK Marc]

The sun will rise tomorrow. I have no data for that. So by your logic, that's proof the sun will never rise again.

Re:Explain the data

[Anonymous Coward]

Is this what you mean to refer to? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sunrise_problem

That has nothing to do with useful scientific reporting, which this article lacks.

Re:Explain the data

[Anonymous Coward]

It's risen for millions of years. That's sure is a lot of data.
So by my logic you're a fucking moron.

Re:Explain the data

[Opportunist]

Why do I get reminded of the dead parrot sketch?

A: The sea levels are rising.
B: No, that's just the tide.
A: Look, I know a flood when I see one and I'm looking at one right now!
B: No, no, the levels ain't rising, it's just the tide. Isn't the sea so incredibly blue today...
B: Blue or not, it's rising!
A: No, I told you, it's the tide.
B: Allright, so if it's the tide, the water should be gone in 6 hours!
(waiting, A builds up walls of sandbags to keep the water at bay)
A: There, it's gone.
B: No it's not, you just built a wall!
A: I never!
B: Yes you did!
A: I never, never did anything.
B: (tears down wall of sandbags, water floods the floor)
B: Now that's what I call a flood!
A: No, it's just ... a canal.
B: A CANAL?
A: Yes, you dug a canal through the bags.
B: Yeah, you dug a canal just as the water was retreating.

(and so on, you know the routine)

Except nobodies doing that

[publiclurker]

but the deniers that are desperate for any excuse to avoid admitting the obvious.

Re:Except nobodies doing that

[Anonymous Coward]

So then why provide them with fodder like these reports of the science that leave out all the crucial information?

Re:Except nobodies doing that

[Anonymous Coward]

Because it's not for them? NOBODY CARES WHAT THE DENIERS ARE DOING. THis is for people who have the brains to taka facts as facts. Sea levels have risen more than estimated. This is measured data. They are not going to protect the nuclear plants by reversing global warming or whatever, but by elevating the ground, or building floodwalls, or something. If someone wants to deny rising sea levels please sell them flat land by the shoreline. They can then deny there all they want.

Re:Except nobodies doing that

[Anonymous Coward]

THis is for people who have the brains to taka facts as facts. Sea levels have risen more than estimated. This is measured data.

I repeat my original questions to you:

What is the data? How was the data gathered? What technical difficulties are there in gathering the data? What assumptions were made when extrapolating from the data?

As two reasonable people who "take facts as facts" we should be able to agree that the answers to these questions are important. Do you agree or disagree?

Re:Except nobodies doing that

[Barsteward]

you aren't smart enough to deal with the data when you actually look for it and read it hence the stupid posts

Re:Except nobodies doing that

[Anonymous Coward]

I don't mean to put words into your mouth, so correct me if I am wrong about the following. You seem to be implying that you (Barsteward) are smart enough to "deal with the data when you actually look for it".

In that case, please explain to the rest of us less smart people:

1) What is the data?
2) How was the data gathered?
3) What technical difficulties are there in gathering the data?
4) What assumptions were made when extrapolating from the data?

Re:Except nobodies doing that

[WhiteZook]

No, most lay people are not smart (or educated in the subject) enough to correctly analyse the data. And the people are capable of analysing the data, are also capable of finding the data. It's not that well hidden, actually.

Re:Except nobodies doing that

[Anonymous Coward]

So... if you are smart enough please answer the four questions posed above. If no one here is smart enough then what is the point of telling us?

Re:Except nobodies doing that

[flyneye]

What could really be the problem? Shut down the plants and start building wind farms.....Oopsy! The Kochs and other special interests have been busy getting special taxes on green energy instituted to sustain their utility production operations and make it so green energy is not likely adopted.
Seen any Citizens for Prosperity ads recently? Ever wonder whose prosperity they meant? Now you know.

Re:Except nobodies doing that

[flyneye]

Because it is useful to stir up a bunch of chicken-littles to run around panicking about the sky falling. Then D.C. is obliged to begin another round of legislation , probes and programs that wont work, but will create a nice diversion to cover other activities.
The useful parts of the report are probably classified so they dont fall to terrorist hands, like anyone who would vote them out of office.

Re:Except nobodies doing that

[nospam007]

"If someone wants to deny rising sea levels please sell them flat land by the shoreline."

If it's cheap, I know a few people from the Netherlands who'd buy it.

Re:Except nobodies doing that

[Anonymous Coward]

"THis is for people who have the brains to taka facts as facts"

Spelling deniers are going to ruin the world.

Re:Except nobodies doing that

[Anonymous Coward]

Is this the data before or after it has been corrected?

I've been to a number of AGW/Skeptic websites. The raw data was all closed off.
They were only willing to offer post processed data that supported their agenda.

Re:Except nobodies doing that

[Mr D from 63]

So then why provide them with fodder like these reports of the science that leave out all the crucial information?

MOD THIS UP!

In particular this nuclear FUD. It seems that certain submitters peruse for anything they can find that sounds remotely anti-nuke and post it regardless of any credibility or truth. In reality, most coastal nuclear plants are quite a bit above sea level already, and several feet of rise would likely make no difference at all to the main facility. The intake structures could easily be modified, if even needed, for higher water elevation. The intakes are by nature under water to start with. In truth, if the intake is actually further under water, the water would be a bit cooler, and would improve the efficiency of the turbine generator.

ironically, the most effective, fastest, and cost effective way to offset Co2 contributions and thereby reduce that impact on GW is to build more nuclear.

Re:Except nobodies doing that

[Anonymous Coward]

If someone wants to deny rising sea levels please sell them flat land by the shoreline.

Millions, even tens of millions, of people own exactly that.

Re: Except nobodies doing that

[caveqat101]

So, they failed to add in subsistence of land, when they added the rebound? Or the unknown volcano's of the world? How dare those people not know settled science! Off with their heads! More witch Doctors!

Re:Except nobodies doing that

[MichaelSimpson77]

Why are all the alarmist Anonomous Cowards? Barsteward put his name on it? It'r really hard to take the sheep seriously when they post anonymously.

http://wattsupwiththat.com/201...

A rebuttal for the Obama's FUD piece.

Re:Except nobodies doing that

[kenh]

Why didn't they build a wind farm off the coast of Massachusetts? Was it the Koch brothers or Ted Kennedy?

Please describe the foot print of a wind or solar farm that generates electrical output equal to the 24x7 production capability of one nuke reactor plant... Your alternative isn't much of an alternative, really.

Each of the two reactors at Three Mile Island generate about 852 MWe, a comparable wind farm occupies about 9,000 acres (about 14 square miles) and the largest solar power plant takes up 2,400 acres just to generate 290 MWe, so to replace TMI you'd need to dedicate enough space for six such facilities, or about 14,400 acres (about 22.5 square miles)...

The Three Mile Island reactor occupies less than three square miles.

I leave it as an exercise for the reader to determine if either facility can generate that much electricity 24x7 as Three Mile Island can.

Re:Except nobodies doing that

[budgenator]

If your asking about the rise in sea-level its after adjustment; and the adjustments have been bumped up a couple times, Watts published an article on it with lots of links to the "value added product" over at CU Sea Level Research Unit if you want to crunch data on your own.

Re:Except nobodies doing that

[flyneye]

Having lived in Mass a bit too long, I would say it was the general opinion of the sheeple that they didnt want to mess up the views from the castles of their overlords. No one would do enough there if they could. Depends on which way the wind blows, figuratively. Salem still sucks.

Do you meant the footprint of acreage, that doesnt damn matter out in the ocean, or the print of the general nuisance it creates from waste? I can not imagine generating the expensive ,dangerous,overhead from waste would be a viable alternative to free and renewable with literally no danger compared to nuclear. If you believe so, I know a load of tire shops that would pay you to tote off their old flats. Really, you can make money by doing that, but you have to figure out what to do with the tires, but I see that sort of thing doesnt concern you. You GO girlfriend!

What is that you say 3 mile island generated how much waste? Previous and since the meltdown? How much will it cost to store it for the several lifetimes it will have to be kept from the environment? At whose cost? Dont be a dumbass Beavis!

Perhaps when you can eliminate graft, felonious building contractors,bribe-able politicians and inspectors, keep the help off crack,launch waste into the sun and follow directions, then nuclear power will be viable energy source in more than THEORY. In practice it is one fuck of a FAIL.

Really, you need to take in far more rigorous details than the financial reports before sounding off like a Billy Bob at a Gun show.

Re:Except nobodies doing that

[TheRealLifeboy]

If someone wants to deny rising sea levels please sell them flat land by the shoreline. They can then deny there all they want.

*Give* me the land on the shore you don't want because you're in denial. Denial of the facts about natural cycles. Denial about the political nature the Global Warming scam that you now refer to as "Climate Change" in a last ditch effort to prevent the collapse of the house of cards. Denial about the fear you and your fellow weaklings have to stand up against megalomanic bullies like Michael Mann.

Many years from now, me and my friends will sit on my shorefront property as old people, laughing and telling stories about the fools that gave away the shorefront properties for next to nothing because they weren't able to discern between a fake and reality.

Re: Except nobodies doing that

[jbee02]

Its the oil and coal industries that are providing false scientific studies and propaganda. They spend billions of dollars every year on a false information campaign against man made climate change.

Re: Except nobodies doing that

[jbee02]

But when it come to net energy gain (usable energy minus energy spent on generate/capture it, on facility maintinence, and to transport it) wind is by far superior. Out of all available energy sources, wind has the highest net energy while nuclear has the lowest. Nuclear power plants have a limited life span before they have to be decomisioned. They are extremely expensive to decomision and there is no economicaly feasable way to do it. Thats why their net energy is so low. Forget all concerns about the saftey of nuclear power. It for reasons purely economical that we should be going away from nuclear power.

Re:Except nobodies doing that

[catprog]

Do you include the area for the wind plant between turbines that are used for other purposes?

Also do you include the uranium mine?

Re:Except nobodies doing that

[catprog]

Cost of nuclear station subsidy £96-£97 per megawatt hour
http://www.independent.co.uk/n...

Cost of wind
£100 per megawatt hour
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/ear...

Cost wise they are about the same.

  Currently in countries such as South Korea and China, typical construction times range from 4 to 6 years
https://www.oecd-nea.org/press...

Construction time is usually very short – a 10 MW wind farm can easily be built in two months. A larger 50 MW wind farm can be built in six months.
http://www.ewea.org/wind-energ...

Add in the time for planing etc and wind is faster.

Re:Except nobodies doing that

[Mr D from 63]

Cost of wind £100 per megawatt hour

The article says that "wind farms built until March 2017 would receive a subsidized price of £100 for every 'megawatt-hour' unit of power they produce..."

So this is the subsidy in form of forced purchase. That on top of subsidies for construction which are often greater than 30%

As for the nuclear subsidy, it is a for a specific plant, not a general subsidy. It can be shown that nuclear has generated many times more tax revenue than it has ever been subsidized. Wind and Solar are tax negative big time. Its easy to cherry pick numbers to make a case, but it does not change the overall cost picture, like the cost of keeping reserve plants ready to make up for when the wind stops or the sun isn't shining.

Re:Except nobodies doing that

[catprog]

And the benefit of dropping wholesale costs of electricity?

Re:Except nobodies doing that

[Mr D from 63]

Add in the time for planing etc and wind is faster.

Faster to build one small unit compared to a large nuclear plant, yes. But faster to offset CO2, no even close. In the US, in 2013, after the billions spent on solar, Solar PV accounted for less than 0.5% of the electricity generated in the US. That is after over a decade of heavy solar investment. In that same timeframe, the construction of only a few nuclear units would have the ability to surpass all that solar in short order. In reality, the amount of CO2 free electricity generated by nuclear in 2013 is greater than the expected solar contribution for the next 10 years.

Now, wind is better than solar. I like wind, and it makes sense to a certain extent. But, it is non-dis patchable, and must be backed up by natural gas or coal, so there are limits to the percentage of power we can depend on wind for.

Re:Except nobodies doing that

[Mr D from 63]

Everyone benefits from the dropping of wholesale cost. That means the price can be reduced.

Re:Except nobodies doing that

[catprog]

So that needs to be considered in the for column for wind.

Re:Except nobodies doing that

[catprog]

If you want an example of wind power

total cost of $0.062 per kWh composed of $0.04 production and $0.022 tax credit (or ~ £40 / MWH )

http://cleantechnica.com/2013/...

Re:Except nobodies doing that

[Mr D from 63]

I am all for equivalent subsidies for CO2 free power sources. But make it across the board, with similar percentage construction/installation subsidies as well as production or power purchase subsidies.

Re:Except nobodies doing that

[catprog]

Or a broader option is to charge per CO2 emitted and use that money to reduce other taxes.

Re:Except nobodies doing that

[Mr D from 63]

Well, that is not exactly cheap, and it represents the lowest "contract" sales price for power in some of the best wind generation areas. It is not an average by any means. And, once again, it doesn't factor in the cost of spinning reservce.

Like I said, I like wind. I like it a heck of a lot more than solar. But it has limits in what percentage of our supply it can produce and not cause grid stability issues, or incur great costs to limit them. Right now, solar and wind ride on the backs of coal, gas, and nuclear when it comes to grid stability and reliability.

Re:Except nobodies doing that

[catprog]

You mean the same spinning reserve for large changes in demand such as the ad breaks in popular shows as people make a cup of coffee or in case a large power station has a problem and shuts down?

Integration impacts are not exclusive to wind and solar. Nearly all generators can impose costs on the power system or other generators when they are added to the power system.
These impacts are seldom calculated as integration costs and never applied to conventional generators as integration costs.
http://www.nrel.gov/docs/fy11o... (page 11)

Re:Except nobodies doing that

[catprog]

As for the percentage limit

http://www.aweablog.org/blog/p...

with wind farms at one point providing 35.05 percent, or more than a third, of the system's power.

It's important to note that these new marks are being set without any utility system reliability problems, as system operators make use of their standard techniques for balancing supply and demand.

Re:Except nobodies doing that

[Mr D from 63]

Large power plant shutdowns are actually easier to deal with. Its still a big cost, but on a percentage basis, you may have a large plant tripping once or twice a year, while wind is up and down many times even in a day. Its not even remotely comparable. If large plants tripped daily, then it would be a fair comparison, but many plants run for over a year straight with no unplanned trips.

In addition, the transmission grid was designed to manage large plants tripping, with key transmission lines between large generators so that a few can ramp up a bit to handle the lost one. Since the power can be brought in from generators over a large area, the deficit can be made up with little grid stability problems. Sometimes a major trip does cause problems though. Wind brings the issue to areas that don't have the transmission infrastructure, and the wind generators are not yet willing to pay for that infrastructure.

Re:Except nobodies doing that

[Mr D from 63]

That 35 percent was momentary, possibly only for a few seconds or minutes, which means other plants had to make up for it right after dropping back to lower percentage. There is a cost associated with that, one that I know you conveniently like to ignore. You also assume no grid issues were experienced, but you'd better talk to the dispatchers before you jump to that conclusion.

Also, note that it was 35 percent, for a short duration, at a time when power demand was relatively quite low.

Who paid the fixed costs for those gas plants to be ready to spin up to meet that demand? How much less would power have cost overall if it was just produced by existing plants and the wind was never built? Probably quite a bit less. But those total costs are never calculated.

Re:Except nobodies doing that

[catprog]

When you spread wind turbines out over a large area you also smooth out the variability.

The problem with allocating that cost to wind is that the other power plants do not pay for the spinning reserve.

My reading of the 6c/kwh is that includes transmission to the grid.

Re:Except nobodies doing that

[catprog]

From your earlier comment "But it has limits in what percentage of our supply it can produce and not cause grid stability issues"

I have shown that it can get to 35% without causing those issues .

Is the cost for spinning reserve paid for by the current power stations

Assuming power demand has not increased and thus no new plants would need to be built normally.
(I.e Wind is replacing existing instead of instead of new)
The marginal cost of coal and gas appears to be 50-80 putting the wind about equal. (And for your spinning reserve well we have gas power that is no longer running due to wind)

Re:Except nobodies doing that

[Mr D from 63]

When you spread wind turbines out over a large area you also smooth out the variability.

You smooth at a little, but the problem is that the distance itself. Moving large amounts of power back and forth over distribution rather than transmission lines becomes the problem. Those lines are not sized to handle that type of load.

The problem with allocating that cost to wind is that the other power plants do not pay for the spinning reserve.

The cost is included in the total generation cost by the utility or power provider. So, yes, it is priced in. When a utility signed a normal power purchase agreement from another generator, it typically requires a certain amount of power and there is a reliability requirement. They power must be provided at the time and rate specified in the contract, or there are penalties. Most generators can supply at nearly a hundred percent reliability because they factor in the spinning reserve, and that is included in the contract price. But utilities are forced to buy from solar and wind at high rates, but they cannot ask for the same reliability, and if fact, they have to cover that deficiency themselves. So, solar and wind get to have their cake and eat it too, and then go off and boast about how they are competitive.

obsolete

[stenvar]

The idea that these nuclear power plants are still relevant in 86 years should scare people more than any sea level rise. All those nuclear power plants are completely obsolete. If they need to be torn down and rebuilt elsewhere with new, safer, more efficient technology, we're all better off.

Re:obsolete

[Anonymous Coward]

because we have such a great record in actually decommisioning sites to the extent where they are allowed to get flooded...

Even after the site is decommissioned, the site is still a mess. It needs to remain quarantined for tens (hundreds?!) of years beyond when things are dismantled and you've got to make sure that storm surges aren't sloshing through the area for that time too.

Just ask the British how their decommissioning program is going... (Hint: it sounds a lot like "Oh my, what a mess, can we talk about it later instead?")

Re:obsolete

[Anonymous Coward]

The article was about flooding during a storm and if you bothered to read the article, it used 2046 as a reference date.

Re:obsolete

[SeaFox]

If they need to be torn down and rebuilt elsewhere with new, safer, more efficient technology, we're all better off.

You say that like decommissioning a nuclear power plant and moving it wouldn't take the better half of a century.

Re:obsolete

[stenvar]

I did bother to read the article:

NOAA's worst-case scenario, meanwhile, predicts that the oceans will rise nearly 7 feet in the next 86 years.

NOAA worst case for 2046 is 21.48 in, or less than 2 ft. The graph below is misleading, and the "0.9 ft Storm" bar is a guess by the HuffPost journalists, not a scientific result.

The whole thing is pure FUD anyway. Nothing magical happens when nuclear power plants end up below sea level; you can build a dike around them, a negligible expense compared to the rest of the plant. The Dutch have built nuclear power plants below sea level to no ill effect.

Fukishima's problem wasn't flooding, it was poor design and outdated safety measures.

Re:obsolete

[stenvar]

It's unfortunate that there really isn't a threat of impending flooding and disaster; maybe if there were, it would spur the bureaucrats and "environmentalists" into action. Causing a bit of sea level rise would be worth it just for that.

In any case, decommissioned or not, these plants won't be producing power anymore in 30 years, let alone 80 years.

Re:obsolete

[SeaFox]

It's unfortunate that there really isn't a threat of impending flooding and disaster...

But there is. If it's predicted that the sea level will rise this much by the end of the century, and given how log it's going to take to actually shut down and clear a nuclear power plant site to a level it's safe to let it flood, the time to start is now for those plants we believe to be effected by such a oceanic rise.

No action is being taken because the people responsible don't look out that far in the future. Like every other environmental issue that has appeared for the last half-century, the folk just don't care to do anything about it because it will be inconvenient and require money and manpower, but they will be dead before it really comes to pass. So it joins the list for "the next generation" to deal with.

Re:obsolete

[Anonymous Coward]

LOL in the navy yards it takes less than six months, idiot

Re:obsolete

[coinreturn]

The graph below is misleading, and the "0.9 ft Storm" bar is a guess by the HuffPost journalists, not a scientific result.

It is NOT a guess. If you bothered to read the fine print, you'd see that it's based on a previous peak storm tide.

Re:obsolete

[nojayuk]

you're lying, or maybe you're just ignorant or you got your "information" from bullshit anti-nuclear blogs and such, but...

a) nuclear power reactors are decommissioned to "greenfield" status, that is the land is fit to grow crops on afterwards. It's a lot more work than brownfield where the ground will be repurposed for industry but it's a cost the nuclear industry has to bear unlike, say, coal mining.

No a nuclear site doesn't need to be quarantined for "hundreds of years". Heck, even after Chernobyl burned its core to the atmosphere the other three reactors on the site were kept in operation. No quarantine.

Storm surges affect ex-nuclear sites in the same way they affect farmland since they present the same levels of threats of toxicity. If you're really worried about flooding then look to coal mines and coal power stations which regularly dump millions of tonnes of poisonous effluent into streams and drinking water after flooding takes out their inadequate levees and dykes. Nobody cares much though because it's not scary radioactivity.

As for the British SafeStor decommissioning system, it's an alternative method to prompt disassembly of a power reactor -- tear down everything around the containment since it's not radioactive and then wait about 60 to 80 years for the remaining radioactivity in the pressure vessel and surrounding structures to decay to the point where it can be dismantled with minimal precautions. Other countries deal with this differently, in the US the reactor vessel is usually extracted promptly and put in a pit to "cool down" for about the same length of time so the entire site can be cleared more quickly.

Re:obsolete

[stenvar]

But there is. If it's predicted that the sea level will rise this much by the end of the century, and given how log it's going to take to actually shut down and clear a nuclear power plant site to a level it's safe to let it flood, the time to start is now for those plants we believe to be effected by such a oceanic rise.

The obstacles to decommissioning a nuclear power plant are entirely administrative; you treat them like laws of nature. That's what makes your alarmism so ridiculous even if the predictions were sound and proven.

Anyway, there is nothing wrong with having a nuclear power plant even below sea level; the Dutch do.

No action is being taken because the people responsible don't look out that far in the future.

Good! I hope they will continue to act rationally rather than give in to FUD.

but they will be dead before it really comes to pass. So it joins the list for "the next generation" to deal with.

Good!

Re:obsolete

[Anonymous Coward]

Look up shippingport in Pennsylvania. It took much less than 50 years.

Re:obsolete

[Anonymous Coward]

Can't say for the UK, but in Germany we're currently talking about this too and it does look more like what you AC parent said. We're thinking about a sarcophagus for the first stage, just to let it "cool off" for some time before sending in the crews to do any dismantling at all. During that stage, a flooding would be really bad, unless your sarcophagus takes all of this into account. Also, the only long term nuclear waste storage site in Germany, an old salt mine, turned out to not be that ideal, as waste containers were rusting away in it. All of that will probably throw off any estimates for how much the whole thing would cost to do.

Oh btw, the big power corporations also want to get rid of the financial risk involved by outsourcing the money they had to already shelve for dismantling costs into a new foundation type thingie that would ultimately be the government's responsibility. And that information is taken from prime time news, not some anti nuclear blog.

Re:obsolete

[aoteoroa]

But there is. If it's predicted that the sea level will rise this much by the end of the century, and given how log it's going to take to actually shut down and clear a nuclear power plant site to a level it's safe to let it flood, the time to start is now for those plants we believe to be effected by such a oceanic rise.

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) states clearly that these numbers are not predictions, and are little more than what-if scenarios to get policy makers thinking about what needs to be done. The figures quoted for sea level rise shouldn't be confused with scientific fact.

Quote from the original climate study published by NOAA publication :

This report provides scenarios to help assessment experts and their stakeholders analyze the vulnerabilities and impacts associated with possible, uncertain futures.

Probabilistic projections of future conditions are another form of scenarios not used in this report because this method remains an area of active research. No widely accepted method is currently available for producing probabilistic projections of sea level rise at actionable scales (i.e. regional and local). Coastal management decisions based solely on a most probable or likely outcome can lead to vulnerable assets resulting from inaction or maladaptation. Given the range of uncertainty in future global SLR, using multiple scenarios encourages experts and decision makers to consider multiple future conditions and to develop multiple response options.

i.e.

[publiclurker]

LA-LA-LA. I can't hear you, now take your facts and go away before I hold my breath.

Re:Explain the data

[davester666]

Obviously, we can only wait and see what happens. I've got ten dollars on the sun rising.

Re:"NOAA's *worst case scenario*"

[flaming error]

"This is like the military drawing up plans for kaiju attacks and zombiepocalypses.":

No, those are tongue-in-cheek thought experiments.

What we have here is scientists using empirical data to project a range of future possible outcomes. No mythical creatures involved.

Re:seriously

[pitchpipe]

Climate change - go away,
Come again another day.
Koch brothers want to play.
Climate change - go away.

Climate change - go away,
Come again another day.
Don Blankenship wants to play.
Climate change - go away.

Climate change - go away,
Come again another day.
Exxon Mobil wants to play.
Climate change - go away.

Climate change - go away,
Come again another day.
Lord Monckton wants to play.
Climate change - go away.

Climate change, go away,
Come again another day.
James Inhofe wants to play.
Climate change - go away.

Climate change - go away,
Come again another day.
Congress wants to play.
Climate change - go away.

CO2 and climate: my take

[TheRealHocusLocus]

I am a fan of both Anthony Watts' site Watts Up With That *AND* John Cook's Skeptical Science... both are run by real people who go the extra distance find the best links to their sources (not some blog chain) and both are considerate of the reader.

Here's a small research journey: Direct CO2 rise causes temperature rise (CO2drivesT)? YES or NO?

There has been a demonstrated correlation between CO2 and temperature shown by Antarctic ice core data (within ~800-1000y). If a rise of CO2 in this data should consistently lag behind rises in temperature then CO2drivesT is not ruled out (both may be responding to some other factor but at different rates) BUT CO2drivesT has fallen down a notch... it now requires more extraordinary proof.

Even though human-driven global CO2 has risen 'terrifyingly fast' to 400ppm -- empirically speaking I am not terrified -- because the temperature rise that should accompany such a SHOCK by any reasonable interpretation of CO2drivesT, and to any reasonable extent, has not arisen. The effects of this 'causation' are missing.

Which is to say the historical correlation is broken.
That is not necessarily a bad thing. It's a thing,
Something we should be concerned about.
The rise to 400ppm is definitely humans' fault. It is 'massive'.
Temperature has not risen.
So such a causation, if any may exist, is unlikely to be significant.
We'd see it by now.

For example, head for Skeptical Science [SS] [SS] CO2 lags temperature - what does it mean which acknowledges that CO2 lags behind temperature but introduces 'CO2 amplification' which asserts a feedback where "the increased CO2 in the atmosphere amplifies the original warming.". This in itself is another extraordinary claim. While such a feedback might certainly exist I cannot just swallow it as a flat-fact when pursuing a simple answer to the CO2drivesT question. Where are the computer models incorporating this feedback that match observed temperature?

There is a stir these days among CO2drivesT proponents that some mechanism must exist that is hiding or delaying the warming that the models predict. Immature 'skeptics' jeer at this, implying that it is all about protecting the sacred forced-feedback hypothesis at any cost. Immature CO2drivesT proponents accuse them of attempting to derail the scientific method. There is a germ of truth in both. I think everyone should grow up a little.

Aside from the modern lack of warming, one thing seemed odd about amplification. In the Vostok ice core CO2+T graph clearly at ~75,000YA there is a massive injection of CO2 (~225-230ppm) that I think is Toba era volcanism. If such amplification exists and is significant, that would have been a fine time for CO2 feedback to jump in and 'save the day' with a slowing or a plateau of the declining temperature trend. Or even a rise? But 6,000 years after its onset -- on the Vostok graph at ~220ppm temperature and CO2 are once again in lock-step, both in steep decline. After some six millennia of 'higher' CO2 and 'lower' temperature. Plenty of time for particulates to settle and 'amplification' to occur. If it does. Did it?

But never mind, it's all changed, that [SS] Lag, what does it mean? page also said something astounding: "In fact, about 90% of the global warming followed the CO2 increase." 90%... is that a fact.

Since when?

Which led me to the next step where the game-changer is supposed to be [SS] Shakun et al. Clarify th

Re:CO2 and climate: my take

[WhiteZook]

If CO2 is following temperature, what is your explanation for the fact that CO2 is now at a milion-year record high ?

Re:CO2 and climate: my take

[SuperKendall]

If CO2 is following temperature, what is your explanation for the fact...

If CO2 is *NOT* a following temperature, what is your explanation for the fact that temperatures are not rising along with it?

That's what I've been saying for a while. Enough time has past and lots of CO2 has been emitted, to know with certainty that CO2 is not doing what it is claimed to do - cause a greenhouse effect. Which could have been foreseen anyway by the very low percentage of CO2 in the atmosphere compared to water vapor which plans a far greater role in any such effect... historically we are at a very low point in atmospheric CO2 and temperatures did not runaway uncontrollably then either.

If there is no uncontrollable increase in heat from CO2 it eliminates a lot of reason to panic, and instead simply leads one to mull over what changes will come and how to adapt to them - which should be quite easy given the actual slow rate of change.

Re:CO2 and climate: my take

[SuperKendall]

Thank you for the clear and thoughtful post. Like you, I prefer to read multiple sources, not just ones that are attached to one side or the other.

Re:CO2 and climate: my take

[WhiteZook]

But temperatures are rising. Your argument is invalid.

Re:CO2 and climate: my take

[Anonymous Coward]

They haven't risen in 17 years. That's longer than the period used to claim that temperatures _were_ increasing due to CO2 (15 years).

http://www.forbes.com/sites/pe...

Re:CO2 and climate: my take

[Anonymous Coward]

CO2 has been rising sharply in the past 17 years.

Meanwhile temperature has remained flat.

If CO2 were so directly linked to temperature we would have seen obvious effects from the large increase in the (nearly) two decades since warming decided to take a break.

The problem is that none of the alarmist models predicted this, at all - they all relied heavily on more CO2 = more warm. The fact that this has failed means the models are failures and need re-thinking from scratch. Even IF the heat is being held somewhere else magically, the models still did not claim that beforehand so they are invalid.

Re:CO2 and climate: my take

[Anonymous Coward]

"Multiple sources", that's pretty rich. He's referenced exactly two, both of which are essentially vanity sites from people who feel butthurt because the scientific concensus is they're crackpots.

Re:CO2 and climate: my take

[WhiteZook]

Depends on where you look. Part of the heat has temporarily gone into the oceans. This becomes clearer when you separate the La-Nina years from the El-Nino years, and plot separate trend lines for them: http://blog.chron.com/climatea...

Re:CO2 and climate: my take

[dave420]

If the only thing which affected temperature was CO2 you'd have a point. As there are many things which affect global temperatures, you are not only wrong, but wrong and you managed to show everyone you know very little about this. Well done.

Re:CO2 and climate: my take

[riverat1]

If CO2 is *NOT* a following temperature, what is your explanation for the fact that temperatures are not rising along with it?

Short term natural variability. The 17 years of supposed no rise in temperature is too short a period for the signal to rise above the noise and that can be proven statistically.

Re:CO2 and climate: my take

[LynnwoodRooster]

If the only thing which affected temperature was CO2 you'd have a point. As there are many things which affect global temperatures, you are not only wrong, but wrong and you managed to show everyone you know very little about this. Well done.

One subtlety that you may have missed - apparently those other tings which affect global temperatures not only equal, but exceed the effect of CO2 (as would be the logical conclusion from your statement above). Making the concern over CO2 a concern over a relatively minor (at best) cause of any climate change. Perhaps we'd be better served in identifying and quantifying these other things since they are apparently the drivers of climate change?

Re:CO2 and climate: my take

[LynnwoodRooster]

If CO2 is *NOT* a following temperature, what is your explanation for the fact that temperatures are not rising along with it?

Short term natural variability. The 17 years of supposed no rise in temperature is too short a period for the signal to rise above the noise and that can be proven statistically.

Not according to noted climatologist Dr. Benjamin Santer. Seventeen years is, in fact, plenty of time to "discriminate between internal climate noise and the signal of human-caused changes in the chemical composition of the atmosphere".

Re:CO2 and climate: my take

[WhiteZook]

The other things have been identified and quantified. The biggest one is the El Niño–Southern Oscillation (ENSO), which is an effect that fluctuates fairly unpredictably over multi-year time scales. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/E... for pretty graphs. During La-Nina years, the extra heat is stored in deeper ocean waters, so on the surface it appears cooler. However, during El-Nino years, the stored heat rises again, and heats up the atmosphere.

Because the ENSO effect is oscillating around the mean, it only provides a temporary relief from CO2-caused warming. The long term trend is still rising.

Re:CO2 and climate: my take

[ideonexus]

If you're interested in the science of Anthropogenic Global Warming, I suggest you read the science, not blog posts. I've read both WattsUp and SkepticalScience, and they are both very poorly written and lack rigorousness. If you are reading these two blogs, you are reading the work of bias amateurs.

Here's what you should be reading:

• the peer-reviewed Journal "Nature Climate Change," which includes and references thousands of scientific papers on the subject.
• he IPCC's 1,500-page "Physical Science Basis" report, clearly states what we know, don't know, and how we know it. It reviews its past predictions, notes where its models have errored, and takes into account an incredible wealth and scope of scientific observations over 150 years. I highly recommend downloading this 0.5 GIG report and at least skimming it. I consider it the model of good science.
• The IPCC also makes all of its data and models available for review. So you can see for yourself. Take this data and give it to a machine-learning algorithm. The science of AGW is actually shockingly simple.
• The US Government also recently updated it regularly scheduled report written by over 300 experts.
• If you don't trust the government, then I recommend The Berkely Earth Project. It was funded by the liberal's favorite bad guys, the Koch Brothers, but its results were so compelling that the lead Climatologist, Richard A. Muller, wrote a piece for the New York Times announcing he no longer a skeptic.
• Of course, it's always good to have a contrarian viewpoint in the mix, and for that, I recommend AGW skeptic Judith Curry, who presents valid challenges to the consensus with her strong scientific background. I don't find her convincing, but her challenges make for good food for thought.

Science, published peer-reviewed science, not blogs, is where we should keep this discussion.

Re:CO2 and climate: my take

[WhiteZook]

The 17 graph is still showing a positive trend. http://www.woodfortrees.org/pl...

Re:CO2 and climate: my take

[locofungus]

I don't know why I bother but:

I took the GISS monthly data from May 1997 to April 2014. Spreadsheet gives me a slope of 0.001828 - or approximately 0.02C per year or 0.2C per decade.

This might not be significant, I can't be bothered to do any more, but to say there has been no rise in temperature is disingenuous at best and an outright lie at worst.

The strongest (negative) statement that can honestly be made would be that "there might not have been a statistically significant increase in warming over the last 17 years."

Re:CO2 and climate: my take

[locofungus]

Oops, Sorry, the GISS figures I got are in 0.01C increments so it's still positive but 100x smaller.

Re:CO2 and climate: my take

[mbkennel]

| Enough time has past and lots of CO2 has been emitted, to know with certainty that CO2 is not doing what it is claimed to do - cause a greenhouse effect.

This is false. The increase in greenhouse effect has been directly measured by balloons, satellites aircraft and ground instruments.

Which is no surprise since it is based on indusputable atomic physics.

Re:CO2 and climate: my take

[argStyopa]

That's a terrific and well-documented analysis.

Of course, you understand that you're arguing religion - the remaining individuals whose mind might be converted by evidence is a vanishingly small %.

But your effort is sincerely appreciated. All we can do is keep telling the truth.

Re:CO2 and climate: my take

[coinreturn]

OMG, not that stupid 17-year number again. You can't start with a local maxima data point and make a valid argument. If you take any other number of years, it has risen. Stop being intentionally misleading.

Re:CO2 and climate: my take

[coinreturn]

You don't understand. He WANTS to read just blogs that agree with him. That's how deniers work.

Re:CO2 and climate: my take

[tp1024]

The accuracy of global temperature measurement is +- 0.1K. CO2 concentrations rose by a bit more than 10% over those 17 years. Logarithmically speaking (which is all that counts), that's 14% of a doubling. Suppose a doubling would cause a rise of 1.5K (low end of IPCC projections), then we should have seen a rise of 0.2K. That's easily detectable, very well above noise level over a period of two decades (you can take 5 year averages) and just didn't happen.

Suppose a doubling would cause a rise of 4.5K (high end of IPCC projections), the rise should have been 0.6K or about as much as in the last 80 years. Any idiot can see that this didn't happen either in the last 17 years.

Re:CO2 and climate: my take

[WhiteZook]

The temperature rise as a result of doubling CO2 that is referenced in IPCC reports is the steady state result. It will take several decades for the earth to reach that new equilibrium, due to enormous heat capacity of the oceans. By the way, where did you get the numbers for the noise ?

Re:CO2 and climate: my take

[tp1024]

Your argument is treated in the IPCC report as "Cold Start" - the fallacy of failing to account for the rise of CO2 in previous decades which would have already started to heat up the oceans. In their estimate, this effect has already been accounted for. So, then how come the First Assessment Report of the IPCC gives a best estimate of a rise of 0.3K (0.2K-0.5K) per decade since 1990?

Global temperatures are also below every single projected scenario of the Third Assessment Report 13 years ago, that also took everything into account which you are complaining about. The scenarios included an immediate stop of the rise of CO2 emissions in the year 2000.

Reality consistently contradicts the models. The models are wrong.

Re:CO2 and climate: my take

[WhiteZook]

For starters, the models can't predict the influence of aerosols, the sun, or ENSO cycles. 1998 was a peak El-Nino year, with a record heat, so this skews the results for the interval starting at 1998. It is instructive to look at the temperature data, but compensate it for those three factors. The result shows an unmistakable trend, that has not paused at all: http://tamino.files.wordpress....

Re:CO2 and climate: my take

[riverat1]

What Santer said is that it takes at least 17 years for statistical significance to emerge. Tamino wrote a good post about the current situation called Uncertain-T.

Re:CO2 and climate: my take

[tp1024]

> For starters, the models can't predict the influence of aerosols

Then why does the First Assessment Report waste so much paper on the influence and modelling of aerosols? Also, wasn't the sun supposed to have neglible influence? Also, if 1998 skews the results of the Third Report, why are its models essentially the same as those of the Second Report in 1996 and the first in 1991?

Re:CO2 and climate: my take

[riverat1]

As WhiteZook said you have to take into account the effects of natural variability (the noise) to realistically understand the temperature trends.

Re:CO2 and climate: my take

[WhiteZook]

You can model the effect of aerosols, but you can't predict when the next volcano erupts, or how much Chinese coal plants will generate in the next decade. I don't know if "negligible" is the right word. It is true that the influence of the sun is rather small, but it's still there. Of course, the output of the sun has diminished since the 80's, so you can't use it to explain the warming.

Re:CO2 and climate: my take

[Layzej]

Even though human-driven global CO2 has risen 'terrifyingly fast' to 400ppm -- empirically speaking I am not terrified -- because the temperature rise that should accompany such a SHOCK by any reasonable interpretation of CO2drivesT, and to any reasonable extent, has not arisen.

"Since IPCC’s first report in 1990, assessed projections have suggested global average temperature increases between about 0.15C and 0.3C per decade for 1990 to 2005. This can now be compared with observed values of about 0.2C per decade, strengthening confidence in near-term projections." - http://www.ipcc.ch/publication...

So temperatures have risen, and continue to rise, exactly as much as we would have expected. Although the temperature wobbles about the mean, the trend has not changed and remains above 0.2C/decade since 1970: http://woodfortrees.org/plot/g...

Re:CO2 and climate: my take

[Sockatume]

It states that 17 years is the minimum amount of time you would need, not the maximum. This is why you shouldn't read WUWT.

Re:CO2 and climate: my take

[Archangel Michael]

The CO2 Alarmists are incapable of rational thought. Of all the Global Greenhouse Gases in the Atmosphere, CO2 is only a small percentage of total Global Greenhouse Gases

http://www.geocraft.com/WVFoss...

Water is approximately 95% of all Greenhouse gases in the atmosphere, and CO2 is roughly 3%. Life needs greenhouse gas CO2 to survive; plants need at least 200-300OPPM to survive, and actually thrive with higher levels (meaning grow bigger faster). Increasing CO2 is not proven, nor even likely, to be the catastrophic problem the Alarmists claim it to be.

http://wattsupwiththat.com/201...

The problem I have, is that while everyone is saying CO2 is bad, the only "bad" they can come up with are leaps in judgement and assumptions, none of which are fact, but rather simply opinions. This is why the whole "Global Warming is bad" thing is at best a "guess", and at worst pure Myth and the newly rediscovered "mother earth" Religion of the left.

That being said, there are greater issues related to our planet, and our poisoning of it. The amount of debris, trash and other waste is what is going to kill our planet, long before CO2 does. We should be addressing THAT problem first IMHO.

Re:CO2 and climate: my take

[LynnwoodRooster]

Look at the confidence interval. You'll find we're well within the error bars - meaning the change could be up or down.

Re:CO2 and climate: my take

[LynnwoodRooster]

Yes, the minimum time. Meaning we should need 17 years or more. Well, we're at 17+ years - and no warming. How long is the maximum?

Re:CO2 and climate: my take

[LynnwoodRooster]

Now compare that to the error range, the confidence interval of the data. You'll find the "trend" is so far buried in the noise you could pick out just about any signal you wanted - including sinusoidal signals.

Re:CO2 and climate: my take

[locofungus]

Yes, of course. Which says that we need to use a longer interval to get a significant trend.

I'm not sure what the point you're trying to make is. If the signal is sufficiently noisy it's easy to find intervals with almost any desired trend, they just won't be significant.

The last 17 years are consistent with the long term trend which is, itself, statistically significant (and positive). Over the last 17 years the trend is (probably - I haven't actually done the calculation) not significant but it's still positive.

Re:CO2 and climate: my take

[riverat1]

I have to defend SkepticalScience a bit. Most of their articles have cites directly to peer reviewed literature to support their assertions, something that WUWT seldom does. But your other cites are good as well but I'd take Curry with a grain of salt.

Re:CO2 and climate: my take

[tp1024]

If natural variability can be large enough to prevent the warming from happening, for 17 years on a scale of 0.3K per decade. That is, it not only varies randomly by 0.5K. No, in the last 17 years the natural variability happened in a consistent enough way to produce a flat-line in temperatures against an assumed linear and very strong warming trend.

If this is so, then all the warming we've seen in the last 150 years (~0.8K) can easily be explained by precedents of this exact same kind o natural variability happening in the past, when CO2 variability was much less than today. Because you should remember that the 0.5K virtual cooling through natural variability that you claim has offset another 0.5K of virtual warming, is on the scale and shape(!) of all REAL warming that happened over the last 80 years.

You can't have it both ways. Either natural variability is very much larger than currently admitted (remember any natural variability in terms of warming on this scale has been absolutely ruled out) or the warming models are wrong.

Re:CO2 and climate: my take

[tp1024]

The last major eruption happened in 1991. Emissions of aerosols were less than expected, because the reduction efforts in industrial counties (where an increase was expected) and the collapse of the Soviet Union reduced them more than recent economic progress in China inreased them. (And the Chinese are much more concerned about their emissions today than industrial countries 40 years ago, when they were at similar levels.)

We're talking about predicitons made 13-23 years ago and compare them with the outcome today. The result: they are wrong.

Re:CO2 and climate: my take

[Sockatume]

We're at 17 years, now, in 2014. So it's literally as early as it could possibly be.

Re:CO2 and climate: my take

[riverat1]

Your post was pretty confusing to me. I think that's because you don't really understand what natural variability is and that it can easily overwhelm global warming for a decade or two. Natural variability consists of a lot of quasi-cyclical things that can't be easily predicted ahead of time, that vary on multi-year and decadal scales. That includes things like the solar cycle, ENSO, the PDO, the AMO, volcanic eruptions and other things. These are things that can cause greater than 1K of temperature variation at the extremes but in the long run average out to zero effect on the temperature. For instance to say that temperatures have flat-lined for the last 17 years you have to cherry pick the extreme outlier super El Nino year of 1998. Since then the ENSO cycles have been dominated by La Nina's, the solar cycle has been weak, there have been enough moderate volcanic eruptions to keep things a bit cooler and the PDO was in a cool phase. But sooner or later those things go back the other way. Meanwhile the underlying forcing of global warming continues unabated.

So I can have it both ways. Natural variability can have large effects in the short run but on climatic time scales (30 years or more) they largely cancel out and have zero effect. If you run climate models with the actual natural variability as inputs rather than the parametrized effects they use when they make projections of the future they come a lot closer to matching the actual temperatures observed in the real world. That says to me that they're getting it mostly right.

Re:CO2 and climate: my take

[catprog]

What happens when water vapor gets out of balance, it falls as rain or their is an increase in evaporation.

The mean temperature of the moon is 220K , about 60K lower then the earth.

If you increase the CO2 contribution to 4% you get a degree of warming.

What do you say to the studies showing that high CO2 leads to worse food(more poisons and less nutrients)

Also plants need water to survive but a flood will wipe them out.

Re:CO2 and climate: my take

[catprog]

There has been a demonstrated correlation between CO2 and temperature shown by Antarctic ice core data (within ~800-1000y). If a rise of CO2 in this data should consistently lag behind rises in temperature then CO2drivesT is not ruled out (both may be responding to some other factor but at different rates) BUT CO2drivesT has fallen down a notch... it now requires more extraordinary proof.

All you have shown is evidence for A causing B.

It says nothing about B causing A either for or against.

If we have a seesaw with weights on each end , and I keep adding and removing weight from A.

According to your logic B does not affect A at all.

Re:CO2 and climate: my take

[tp1024]

Well,

could it be the ENSO? No. It is too variable to explain anything lasting for over a decade.

Could it be the Atlantic Multidecadal Oscillation? No, if anything, it should have reinforced the warming, given that previous negative deviations coincided with cooler climate.

As for the Pacific Decadal Oscillation? That too does not show any significant departures explaining any kind of trend over the last 17 years.

Volcanic eruptions? If you look at the years since 1990, you'll find the only big ones at VEI 5 ("Very Large") and VEI 6 ("Colossal") eruption in 1991, the well published eruption of Pinatubo and mostly forgotton eruption of the Cerro Hudson. The largest and the third largest eruption of the last 100 years happend in 1991 on roughly opposite ends of the world. Since then? Nothing. VEI 4 eruptions are a dime a dozen and equally distributed over time, they cannot explain any trend whatever.

You're trying to fix a theory and it isn't working.

Re:CO2 and climate: my take

[locofungus]

And now I've realized why my original number looked right. My original calculation was per day, not per year.
The trend is 0.007C/year over the last 17 years or around 0.11C increase over the last 17 years.

Re:CO2 and climate: my take

[riverat1]

I simply refer you to these to expositions on the subject:

What ocean heating reveals about global warming

The global temperature jigsaw

Re:CO2 and climate: my take

[tp1024]

Do you even realize that your source off-handedly says that ocean heating responds to surface temperatures and not the other way around? What's more, the graphs prove it. Since atmospheric temperatures stopped rising, so did ocean temperatures.

So, now what about the "explanation", that has been brought forward countless times, that the lack of warming in the atmosphere is just an illusion, because in fact, the heat is being trapped in the oceans? Well, it's just plain wrong. Because in this case, the energy content of the oceans should have risen much faster in the last 10 years than at any time before. But in fact, the opposite is the case. Less heat is being trapped in the oceans while atmospheric temperatures stagnate. All that at a time when there is supposedly a much greater forcing by CO2.

So where is the energy hiding? Not just the energy that explains the lack of warming of the atmosphere, but also the energy that explains the lack of warming of the oceans?

The numbers don't add up. The theory is wrong and your attempts to fix it just make it worse.

Re:CO2 and climate: my take

[riverat1]

Do you even realize that your source off-handedly says that ocean heating responds to surface temperatures and not the other way around?

Where did you get that from? In fact this quote from the first cite contradicts you:

This recent slower warming in the upper ocean is closely related to the slower warming of the global surface temperature, because the temperature of the overlaying atmosphere is strongly coupled to the temperature of the ocean surface.

Did you not notice the increased energy in the 0-2000 m graph? The oceans are still absorbing heat.

The numbers don't add up for lack of warming either.

Re:CO2 and climate: my take

[tp1024]

The oceans as a whole are absorbing heat at about half the rate there was at the time when the temperatures were rising 20 years ago. For the last 10 years, the 0-700m figure has been completely flat.

But what has been said publicly is the opposite of that. The heating of the oceans was supposed to be the *reason* why the air temperatures didn't rise. That is, while the air wasn't heating up, the oceans took up the slack and thus warmed all the more! Now that is just plain wrong. And given that those people knew about the graphs you've shown me for a much longer time than did, it is impossible to avoid the conclusion that what they said was intentionally wrong.

They lied.

Re:CO2 and climate: my take

[riverat1]

Do you realize that the 700-2000 m depth is nearly twice as deep therefore nearly twice as much water and nearly twice as much potential for storing heat as the 0-700 m depth? The heat it is gaining has to come from somewhere. It is being convected down from the surface in places like the Western Pacific because of the water that's been piling up there in the La Nina dominated past decade.

If you look at the first and third chart in the first cite the 0-2000 m heat content lines have hardly leveled off at all. Only the 0-700 m chart shows a leveling off of the heat content. Since that is included in the 0-2000 m chart the lower 1300 m must have gained even more heat to compensate for the leveling off of the 0-700 m heat content gain. Since air temperatures over the oceans are coupled to ocean surface temperatures it's not surprising that since the upper 700 m of ocean have not warmed as much lately that air temperatures would follow. But the rate of rise of total heat content of the 0-2000 m depth has hardly slowed at all.

Re:CO2 and climate: my take

[tp1024]

> Do you realize that the 700-2000 m depth is nearly twice as deep therefore nearly twice as much water and nearly twice as much potential for storing heat as the 0-700 m depth?

Not only did I realize that, even the author realized it and thus used "energy content" and not temperature. You didn't.

As for the portion of 700-2000m, it's going to stop heating up in due time. Judging from page 2 of the NOAA report that the article was based on, the change in heat content of 700-2000m is delayed by about 15 years vs. 0-700m. The heat content of the 0-700m layer seems to lag by about 6 years behind global temperatures. So you'd expect the heat content of the 700-2000m layer to keep rising for another 5 years and then stop - 21 years after the atmospheric temperatures stopped rising in 1998. And that's that.

Re:CO2 and climate: my take

[riverat1]

You're making some pretty facile assumptions about how it all works. Of course there is a lag in the response of oceans to increased forcing. The oceans have something like 1000 times the thermal mass of the atmosphere.

Saying temperatures stopped rising in 1998 is a massive cherry pick. On any graph of surface temperatures you look at 1998 stands out as an extreme outlier. If you look at decadal averages the 2000's were still warmer than the 1990's by a substantial amount. I see no reason to believe that trend won't continue.

Time will tell but for now I'll continue to go with the scientists who study this stuff and I think surface temperatures and ocean energy content will continue to rise.

Re:CO2 and climate: my take

[tp1024]

Those facile assumptions have some merits. First: they work.

Yes, 1998 is a bit of an outlier, but in fact temperatures rose back to this level within 2-3 years. And being an outlier, you can easily find in a graph. You'll find the same outlier repeated in 2004. .

My facile assumptions have another advantage: they can be tested. If you don't see the pattern repeated in the 700m-2000m data in another 7 years, well, I'm wrong. And I won't claim my model is outdated. I also won't claim you just have to modify my model or you just have to introduce yet another mechanism. It'll just be wrong.

The point is, my "model" makes the assumption that the heat from the surface speads by some kind of heat transport that is linearly proportional to the vertical distance and difference in temperature. It's nothing fancy. But at least I'm not sitting here saying that nobody can understand the models anyway and then go back to fix the model in three different mutually exclusive ways each purporting to explain exactly what happened, while maintaining that there is no disagreement or doubt.

Gulf Coast in trouble

[Animats]

The US areas that are in trouble are mostly the Gulf coast, especially the Mississippi River flood plain and Florida. Florida is just barely above sea level now, and is very flat.

Slight rises in sea level cause problems all along the Mississippi. Hurricane and storm driven flooding are already getting worse.

The West Coast isn't so bad off, because there are cliffs along most of it. SF, LA and San Diego do have low spots, but they're a few miles long, and seawalls could be built. It might be necessary to dam the SF bay, with something like the Thames Barrage at the Golden Gate.

Re:Gulf Coast in trouble

[Anonymous Coward]

I have a few Florida time shares to sell.

Re:Gulf Coast in trouble

[k6mfw]

Florida is just barely above sea level now, and is very flat.

Does that mean they have to build levees around Kennedy Space Center? There was a news report that talked about impact at KSC with rising sea levels. yikes.

Re:Explain the data

[Anonymous Coward]

Guess that water was pining for the fjords!

Re:Explain the data

[Barsteward]

you can start here http://news.slashdot.org/story...

With more water comes...

[Anonymous Coward]

With more water on Earth, comes more clouds, and more rainfall inland. Warmer temperatures allow for longer growing seasons. Can you imagine if the reverse were true? Would you prefer an ice age? Who needs to grow food? Stay warm? WTF cares about sea level rise? Here's a thought, pick up and move. No one said your land 2 inches above sea level in Florida was gonna stay above sea level. New Orleans? Why yes, by all means, we'll keep the ocean out. Lemme get my pail. We are humans, and to sit here and throw a fit and panic over such stupidity is just absurd. Deal with it. If the Earth froze over, then yes, we'd have a problem. Damn hard to feed 10 billion people on ice cubes.

Re:Explain the data

[TheRealHocusLocus]

Or Princess Bride...

But if there can be no arrangement, then we are at an impasse.
I'm afraid so -- I can't compete with your solar and ocean causation. And you're no match for my atmosphere.
You're that effective?
Let me put it this way: have you ever heard of Venus?
Yes.
Forcing at it's finest.
Really? In that case, I challenge you to a battle of wits.
For the Climate Treaty?
Yes.
To the death?
I accept.
Good. Then pour the biosphere.
Inhale this, but do not touch.
I smell nothing.
What you do not smell is called carbon dioxide. It is odorless, dissolves instantly in liquid, and is among the more deadlier poisons known to man.
Hmm.
All right: where is the poison? The battle of wits has begun. It ends when you decide and we both drink, and find out who is right and who is dead.
But it's so simple. All I have to do is divine from what we know of paleoclimate, is this the kind of planet that would be driven by CO2, or merely show indications of varying levels as a consequence of other factors.... now, a clever planet would have evolved several effective 'coping mechanisms' for runaway warming such as a smooth atmospheric gradient and Tropopause water vapor, to dampen and oscillate between extremes. It would not put all its eggs in a trace gas basket or its fate would have been more likely to have been that of one of the dumber planets.
Truly, you have a dizzying intellect.
I'm just getting started!

[... much later...]

You fell victim to one of the classic blunders! The most famous is "Never get involved in a land war in Asia." But only slightly less well known is this: "Never go in against a SCIENTIST when DEATH is on the line."...

[...thump....]

Re:Explain the data

[AK Marc]

Your sources are biased pro-sun activists. They sent emails to someone once, and got paid for it. It's a scandal. A scandal related to pro-sun zealots is proof that they've always been lying.

Non-issue

[Stardner]

Floating nuclear power plant technology will resolve this issue long before it even becomes a problem; there are already prototypes in production. There are far more pressing issues brought about by rising sea levels... All the more reason to join the Seasteading movement and be among the first to migrate to a floating city!

Re:Non-issue

[perpenso]

Prototypes? We've had operational floating mobile nuclear power plants for about 50 years, US Navy. :-)

Re:Non-issue

[Stardner]

I don't know how much energy a nuclear sub could provide, but there must be a good reason why we don't normally wire them into the power grid? I was referring to the floating nuclear plants that have been getting more attention lately. Using the ocean as a heat sink certainly won't help with rising sea levels, though!

Re:Non-issue

[perpenso]

Actually in Russia they did wire some into city power grids, these ships weren't going to sea anymore.

Re:Non-issue

[Stardner]

Do these smaller reactors found on nuclear subs not require significantly higher fuel enrichment than the average power plant? Is this cost-effective, or even safe, to use on a large scale?

Re:Non-issue

[perpenso]

Do these smaller reactors found on nuclear subs not require significantly higher fuel enrichment than the average power plant? Is this cost-effective, or even safe, to use on a large scale?

The sub was paid for, the fuel was paid for, these were essentially sunk costs. However they couldn't afford to send the ship to sea anymore and the city could really use some power. They were just making due with what they had. Was it cost effective for the navy, no, they weren't getting their desired value (combat power, deterrence, etc) from the sub. Was it cost effective for the city, perhaps, the sunk costs were not their problem and whatever the navy charged them was probably less than building a new power plant of any type (nuclear, natural gas, coal, ...).

That said, I'm just mentioning the subs as a working example of sea going nuclear power plants. I'm not suggesting we use sub reactor designs for commercial plants.

Re:Explain the data

[AK Marc]

No, I'd never seen that. It was just coincidence that I picked a problem that's been looked at but not solved before. That's considered an unsolved problem. The answer is "1" but it can't be proven. It's obvious from the data, and questioning the data won't change the outcome. But it makes for a "controversy". A fake one invented by the mega-rich trying to confuse the issue.

No mounds, no wall, etc needed

[perpenso]

Because it's not for them? NOBODY CARES WHAT THE DENIERS ARE DOING. THis is for people who have the brains to taka facts as facts. Sea levels have risen more than estimated. This is measured data. They are not going to protect the nuclear plants by reversing global warming or whatever, but by elevating the ground, or building floodwalls, or something. If someone wants to deny rising sea levels please sell them flat land by the shoreline. They can then deny there all they want.

OK. So we pick sites with higher natural elevations for the 3rd generation reactors that are about to begin construction. Similar story for the 4th generation reactors when they go commercial in 30 years. 1st and 2nd generation reactors at risk can be take off line and the waste stored on these sites can be transferred to the 4th gen reactors to be used as fuel (a nice benefit of 4th gen, consuming old waste).

The at risk 1st and 2nd gen reactors can be replaced, taken off line and their sites cleaned up many decades before we get near that 7 foot increase in 86 years.

It seems as if at risk reactors will be phased out via their normal life cycle, no mounds, walls, etc are needed.

Re:Explain the data

[Anonymous Coward]

I really don't know how your point is related to the original post. It asked the basic questions any reasonable person would need to ask in order to come to an informed opinion of their own.

Re:A MUCH more important matter....

[Anonymous Coward]

Considering the lack of men's rights when it comes to what happens when that batter ends up in the right receptacle, I'll stick to fapping, thanks.

Re:Explain the data

[SomeoneFromBelgium]

The /. article links to an article in the Huffington Post. If that is not enough the article links to a report of NOAA on which the aticle is based. If this report is not enough (its 25 pages, 6 of which are references) you will have to look into the souces of this report.

The data is explained. Now it's up to you to read the explanation.

Re:Explain the data

[AK Marc]

The point is anyone who asks such questions in that manner is objecting. It's a stupid rhetorical "trick" to claim [citation needed] without expressing an opinion themselves, nor supporting their obvious opinion. It's just lazy.

If only!

[tlambert]

If only (Holland) some country (Holland) could come up with a way (Holland) so that areas (60% of the population of Holland) could remain viable (half of Holland's land area) in the face of (dikes in Holland) rising sea levels (Holland) so that we didn't (Holland) have to worry about this (Holland).

Doesn't the necessary (Holland) expertise (Holland) exist anywhere on Earth (Holland)?

Re:If only!

[coinreturn]

And I'm sure Holland's coastline is the same length as the USA's.

Re:If only!

[swillden]

And I'm sure Holland's coastline is the same length as the USA's.

That's irrelevant.

What matters is the ratio of coastal area to be protected (which isn't the same as all coastline) to the economic resources available to protect it. The US has 44 times as much coastline as the Netherlands, but it's GDP is also 20 times larger. Considering that much of the US coastline is relatively sparsely settled, and can simply be allowed to move inland, displacing a few people, and that some other portions of the coast are steep and can take the rising water, we can handle the 2X difference in ratios.

The region of US coastline that will be hardest to deal with is the southeastern US, where we have large low-lying coastal regions that regularly get pounded with hurricanes. Building dikes that can withstand hurricanes is much harder than just building dikes. Those are the areas where we will probably have the biggest populations that have to move to higher ground. Or maybe we'll figure out how to build dikes around Miami that will stand up to anything mother nature can dish out. Actually, there's no question that we can build such dikes; the only question is whether it's cheaper to build the dikes or to abandon the region.

Re:If only!

[coinreturn]

displacing a few people

That word doesn't mean what you think it means.

Re:If only!

[Anonymous Coward]

That depends on how long a stick you use to measure it.

Re:If only!

[mdsolar]

England has planned for that kind of thing. In parts of the US, the ground is too porous for that approach to work.

Re:If only!

[swillden]

displacing a few people

That word doesn't mean what you think it means.

It's all relative.

Re:If only!

[swillden]

displacing a few people

That word doesn't mean what you think it means.

Also, I should point out that you took that quote out of context. That's a very slimy method of argumentation.

In context, I was talking about the sparsely-settled regions of the coast which -- by definition! -- contain few people. For heavily-settled regions the cost of dikes is likely to be less than the cost of resettlement.

WUWT is denier nonsense

[tota]

You claim that both are run by real people who go the extra distance find the best links to their sources, and blatantly they're not.
It is well known in climate circles for being written by a former TV weatherman, and regularly "falls" for basic mistakes like muddying weather and climate, shifting the goalposts, referring to "climategate" despite the fact that the results have been vindicated again and again. And politics, don't forget money and politics: if the statistics don't go your way, cherry pick the data, prey on people's fear of taxation, the UN, Al Gore and what not. That way, they won't bother listening to the actual scientists and their data (which is all too complicated - let me simplify that for you: conspiracy!).
You make it sound like this is valid source of information on climate science, when the vast majority of climate scientists have moved on from the false "debate" they claim to be having. Like, 10 years ago or more.

Re:WUWT is denier nonsense

[Archangel Michael]

The most well known Pro AWG proponent, Al Gore is a fucking lunatic, hypocrite, and scam artist, regularly making illogical arguments. Lets judge all of AGW by him, okay?

Or more specifically, you ignore what you don't want to believe, and hold onto the nutjob pervert Al Gore. Or the tyranny of the majority that flat out rejects anyone that doesn't walk in goosestepping harmony with them.

Your side is a religion. There is no "fact" about the "results" you are claiming, since they are hypothesis at best, and the worst kind of fear mongering on the down side. Every previous doomsday prediction coming from these so called experts has failed so far. I'm sure that one day, one of them will be right, but random chance has a better outcome than these "predictions sure to go wrong".

Re:WUWT is denier nonsense

[riverat1]

Why is it that the only people who really care about Al Gore are the climate change deniers. If you can't effectively counter the science he presents then all you have to fall back on is to vilify him. The same technique is used on real scientists like Michael Mann and Phil Jones.

Noah .... rising sea levels ...

[Anonymous Coward]

Panic!

Re:"NOAA's *worst case scenario*"

[Anonymous Coward]

If these totally awesome "scientists" are able to reduce massive, chaotic and nondeterministic datasets to completely predictable and simple closed forms, why don't they apply that expertise to solving some even simpler problems than predicting far fetched climate outcomes from weak hypotheseis? you know, solve some stuff that would be a toy problem, comparatively: the riemann hypothesis, p vs np, birch and swinnerton dyer, etc etc. Those should be child's play for these infallible intellectual giants that can perfectly predict what the weather is going to be 100 years from now.

Fuck earth, lets keep focus on mars

[Anonymous Coward]

It has worked well so far, why stop now?

Re:Fuck earth, lets keep focus on mars

[Anonymous Coward]

Fuck it. We can land a golf cart on the moon but we can't extend a nuclear exhaust pipe in japan.

Re: Explain the reasoning

[Mr D from 63]

What does this have to do with nuclear? Nothing. Here's news.....sea rise will impact solar installations that are on the coast. It will also affect donut shops.

Is the solar lobby really this desperate? Why are the stupidest articles with desperate attempts to twist reality to make some kind of statement about nuclear energy generally posted by the same person?

So let me ask

[Anonymous Coward]

Is it still so fucking cute for you all to keep pumping out kids?

Re:So let me ask

[Anonymous Coward]

somehow you lefty psychopaths never bitch about each turd worder in african shithole "countries" pumping out 50 kids each. Yup, real "green, harmonious lifestyle" they live. Dumbfuck

Re: Explain the reasoning

[WhiteZook]

The difference is that nuclear is often situated at the coast to get access to plenty of cooling water, as well as limiting risk of radiation exposure over land.

Re:"NOAA's *worst case scenario*"

[Chas]

It's still classified a "worst case scenario".

Meaning that, things would have to go seriously, MYTHICALLY wrong for it to happen.

Re: Explain the reasoning

[Talderas]

If, in 86 years, these nuclear plants are at risk, I think I would be more concerned about the fact that they're in operation for a length of time that is approximately 3x what they were initially supposed to be used for more so than them getting flooded.

Re: Explain the reasoning

[Mr D from 63]

There are plenty of inland plants. Yes, some coastal plant could affected in decades if waters rise at the worst predicted rates, but the point is that everything else on the coast will also be affected. Its not a nuclear issue.

BTW, plants are not sited on the coast to "limit the risk of radiation exposure over land".

Re: Explain the reasoning

[WhiteZook]

It's not like there will be no risk for the next 85 years, and then all of a sudden they'll be exposed to flood risk. Rather, the risk will gradually increase as the sea level rises, depending on their exact location and many other factors.

Re:Explain the data

[necro81]

The /. article links to an article in the Huffington Post

That was the first problem.

I kid, I kid. But, really, we should have skipped HuffPo and linked directly to the NOAA article. If I want data, I'll go to the source. If I want spin, snark, and misinterpretation, I'll go to the media.

Re: Explain the reasoning

[necro81]

If, in 86 years, these nuclear plants are at risk, I think I would be more concerned about the fact that they're in operation for a length of time that is approximately 3x what they were initially supposed to be used for more so than them getting flooded.

They don't have to still be operating 86 years from now for there to still be significant risk. The decommissioning plans for a nuclear power plant extends into decades, and there are risks and vulnerabilities all during that time. The plans call for leaving the spent fuel there for years or decades after the operational lifetime of the plant. At the rate the U.S. is dealing with the problem of radioactive waste (that is, not at all), I wouldn't be surprised if some decommissioned plants still had spent fuel hanging around 86 years from now. Any nuclear facility that hasn't been decommissioned back to a green field state, and gets inundated in a flood, presents a risk that's worth looking into.

It is not as though the intervening 85 years are free from risk, either - rising sea level and a serious storm could flood a nuclear plant in the next decade. There is a risk today, and the risk will increase gradually and inexorably for decades.

Re:"NOAA's *worst case scenario*"

[hxnwix]

Indeed, I also can not accept such "theories" as "water is wet," "the sky is blue." Clearly, the science isn't in yet on the wetness of water.

More Than Nukes

[JimSadler]

South Florida has a population of greater than 6 million. Not only do we have nukes right on the beach we also have garbage mountains, graveyards that go back 150 years, chemical wells, and every other pollutant that a city tends to have. All of this is less than five feet above sea level. Most of it may be only two feet above sea level. The topography is such that the area will flood from the Atlantic all the way to the Gulf of Mexico. The region will not be habitable inland or on the coasts. Keep in mind we get high tides, spring tides, and hurricanes with surges as well as very tall waves. In other words a house on stilts would not help. Houseboats would have about a two year life span as tropical storms are common. So what you may say. Who gives a hoot about South Florida? the catch is that the pollution that would take place may well be enough to destroy the Atlantic ocean completely. South Florida also produces fruit and vegetables even in winter and there is no other part of the continental US that does that. On top of that the investment and mortgage value of south Florida is on a scale large enough to completely destroy the US economy if we go under.

Re:"NOAA's *worst case scenario*"

[Anonymous Coward]

Those are highly qualitative statements, and fairly non technical at that. In contrast, claiming that one has a deterministic model of processes of dynamical systems at vast scales of time and space such as in TFA, would REQUIRE being able to easily solve lesser questions of mathematical non-determinism. Such things are not required for saying "water is wet" or whatever cutesy bullshit you throw out there off the top of your head.

I still say these "scientists" should prove the viability of their mathematical methods by PROVING lesser open questions in mathematics, namely riemann, p vs np, etc

hockey stick

[jlgreer1]

Sea level rise - kind of like the hockey stick model.... kind of like a hockey puck or just plain bull hockey....

Re: Antarctic Ice Sheet

[Anonymous Coward]

Yea, no big news, this is the latest roll out of old news to supplement the new global wierding narrative the administration is pushing.
This was known and predicted in 1999.

And the collapse of the ice will be ....in 300 -1000 years !
I think we have time to adapt.

Also, the sealevel rise quoted is not accurate...
"... Sea levels rose an average of 8 inches between 1880 and 2009, or about 0.06 inches per year. But in the last 20 years, sea levels have risen an average of 0.13 inches per year... "

Check out http://sealevel.colorado.edu/

No acceleration in the rise, they quote 3.2mm/year which is 0.11 inches/year, and this is on top of their "adjustments" added of 0.3mm/year.

Nuclear waste and the NRC

[mdsolar]

The NRC is responding to a court order to show that the nuclear waste issue is under control. They are trying to claim that it can be stored for a long long time at nuclear power plants. It seems pretty clear that climate change makes that claim false in some cases.

Turkey Point

[mdsolar]

One of the most severely affected plants is Turkey Point, yet Florida just approved and expansions. http://www.pennenergy.com/arti... Why new power would be needed when the customer base is eroding hard to fathom. http://www.nytimes.com/2014/05...

Re:Explain the data

[Anonymous Coward]

I simply want the relevant information included in these reports. Without the answers to those four questions it is not possible for me to understand what is going on. There is no rhetorical trick about it.

Re:Explain the data

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes, the purpose of the news article is to summarize the important points (which were asked in the OP) so we don't need to go through 20 pages to find out. As it stands the news article is worthless other than as a link to NOAA.

Re: Antarctic Ice Sheet

[Truth_Quark]

Yea, no big news, this is the latest roll out of old news to supplement the new global wierding narrative the administration is pushing.

Which administration are you talking about? You are aware that the authors of the SAM papers are from: (1) British Antarctic Survey, Natural Environment Research Council, Cambridge CB3 0ET, United Kingdom, (2) Research School of Earth Sciences, Australian National University, Canberra, Australian Capital Territory , Australia, (3) Institut de Recherche pour le Développement, Laboratoire HydroSciences Montpellier et Laboratoire des Sciences du Climat et de l’Environment, 91191 Gif-sur-Yvette, France, and (4) Climate Change Research Centre and ARC Centre of Excellence for Climate System Science, University of New South Wales, Sydney, New South Wales 2052, Australia?

So unless this is an administration of Australia, France and the UK, you're mistaken.

This was known and predicted in 1999.

There are new findings about the relationship between the Southern Annular Mode (the winds around Antarctica's latitude and speed), and the ice mass loss. And there are new proxy data for this SAM, showing the current effect the strongest in the past 1000 years. So mass loss acceleration is expected.

No acceleration in the rise

The acceleration is more visible in the data here: http://www.cmar.csiro.au/seale...

South Texas Project

[mdsolar]

This is the most interesting one. What is threatened is the artificial cooling pond. Wave action at the base of the levy used to hold the pond may undermine it. A design decision to avoid the perilous coast and its storms has been overcome by the coast coming to the power plant.

Dont worry. Contingency plans exist.

[140Mandak262Jamuna]

Dont worry about what is going to happen in the next 86 years or 100 years. They have plans to destroy humanity well before that.

moral hazard

[Thud457]

Just don't be stupid and sell them flood insurance.
Or really, really stupid an give government subsidies for flood insurance.

Re:Explain the data - An inconvienent truth

[MichaelSimpson77]

http://wattsupwiththat.com/201...

What's up with all the climate alarmism on Slashdot. Next, we'll have horoscopes and astrological papers.

You call this science?

[kenh]

Even the agency's best-case scenario assumes that sea levels will rise at least 8.4 inches by the end of this century. NOAA's worst-case scenario, meanwhile, predicts that the oceans will rise nearly 7 feet in the next 86 years.

They really can't seem to nail it down, can they?

As a serious question, how much longer does everyone think we are going to keep using our current 30-40 year-old reactors? If, as the best estimate suggests, the water rises about 8 inches by the year 2100, do we still plan on running 1970's reactors?

Re:You call this science?

[otis wildflower]

If, as the best estimate suggests, the water rises about 8 inches by the year 2100, do we still plan on running 1970's reactors?

I doubt they'd PLAN for it, but with greenies and NIMBYs it would not be beyond the realm of possibility.

Re: Explain the reasoning

[Anonymous Coward]

MDSolar is. Shill of Shills.

Re:"NOAA's *worst case scenario*"

[kenh]

With straight-faced results that range from 8 inches to 8 feet over the next hundred years.

That's like a fortune teller telling a young man that his future wife will weigh between 100 and 1,000 pounds - only no self-respecting fortune teller would give such a wide-ranging answer.

The inability to estimate results within an order of magnitude is a hurdle such predictions will have to overcome if they are to be believed/acted upon...

Shelf Life

[Anonymous Coward]

NOAA's "predictions" are based on Obama's Nigerian Bring-Our-Black-Girls-Back politics.

On January 22 2017, Obama will be evicted from the White House, many of his cronies will be arrested, many of his "mandates an executive orders" will be void and NOAA's "predictions" will be dead and soon forgotten.

That gives as Shelf Life of 32 months. And the light-water reactors will be safe.

Ha ha

This looks like a job for... Mega Maid!

[HellYeahAutomaton]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?...

Then we can just dump the water somewhere it is needed like D.C. or the Sahara.

Replace them all with LFTRs

[otis wildflower]

LFTRs would take up less space, be more efficient, and rather than consuming water for cooling they could use low-grade leftover process heat to desalinate water. So, instead of being a massive freshwater sink it would be a freshwater source for piping inland (or, depending on the site, a river could be reversed for that task?)

You'll all die...

[Anonymous Coward]

...horribly in searing pain!

Missing the broad picture...

[Anonymous Coward]

Sea levels are expected to eventually cover the entire state of Florida. Of course this would put various power plants, dwellings, etc. at risk. Cherry picking Nuclear Power Plants out of an affected area that could include literally everything may be whats required to bring attention to their issue, but I would question the authors real agenda here as this should be more about the dangers of global warming (as opposed to the dangers of nuclear power.)

Re:Missing the broad picture...

[Anonymous Coward]

Yup, I'm old enough to remember in grade school when the "progressive" psychopaths terrorized us with the claim that Florida would be underwater by the year 2000. They also said we would be completely out of oil by 1990.

Re:Explain the data

[Opportunist]

*bow*

I concede.

wooops

[Anonymous Coward]

Sea level fell during 2010-11 at a rate three times that which global warmists claim it rises annually:

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2013/08/20/climate_change_made_sea_levels_fall_in_2010_and_2011/

So much for global warmism pseudo-science!!

Failed hypothesis is a failed hypothesis is a failed hypothesis. Suck it you neo-pagan psychopaths!

uhr

[Anonymous Coward]

Oh yeah........why did Al "high priest of global warmism religion" Gore buy a house right on the beach for millions and millions of dollars if its going to be completely flooded in a few years like he's been screeching? You global warmists religious nuts are completely irrational.

Re:"NOAA's *worst case scenario*"

[X0563511]

Blue is pretty vague, yes - but it does define a perceived color. This suggests a particular peak of spectrum. "Wet" actually means something very specific.

Re:Explain the data

[AK Marc]

The report was examining NOAA data in relation to nuclear plants. You are questioning the source. The answer is NOAA. The report has nothing to do with NOAA, and it's outside the study's scope. The relevant information is included. NOAA. If you have an issue with NOAA's estimates, then take it up with them, not the people pointing out that the best case under NOAA's projections is still a Very Bad Thing.

I don't understand how you don't get this. You are asking for [citation needed] They gave one. Where's you issue again? That the conclusion doesn't agree with your personal opinion?

Read the article

[HiThere]

FWIW, all the plants listed were above predicted storm surges in the worst case scenario. Probably they should have their protection improved, dikes with pumps to keep them dry, protected electrical generators, etc., but even without that failure isn't really to be expected from that cause.

FWIW, I'd be more worried about the Hanford plant on the Columbia. And not because of rising sea levels.

THAT said, these plants are all nearing, or beyond, their designed end of life. That they have been given extensions to continue operation is more due to politics than to safety. It would be expensive to replace them, nobody has properly budgeted to decommission them. (*That's* an expensive process.) And there's no agreed upon location to dispose of nuclear waste. Whoops!

Yeah, there are problems with these plants, but I don't expect rising sea level to be a major one. There are too many other problems.

Re:Explain the data

[Anonymous Coward]

So you agree that the HuffPost article was pointless? All of the information is contained in the NOAA report?

The HuffPost article failed to summarize the important aspects of the report, which could be its only possible purpose.

Re:Explain the data

[AK Marc]

The HuffPost article was to visualize results of the NOAA report. Why do you hate it when someone explores the meaning of a report? It should be buried and we should burn more oil to compensate for any carbon in the buried report?

Re:Explain the data

[Anonymous Coward]

You should be able to understand that it is impossible to meaningfully interpret data without knowing the assumptions and limitations of the study. It is pretty straightforward, I'm not quite sure what is stopping you from getting my point.

Re:Explain the data

[AK Marc]

That you have the source. You are attacking an intrepretation without addressing the data. If you have a problem with the data, state it. Instead, you complain that the article cites all sources for data, but doesn't include a detailed analysis of the data. What's the point of a cite is some A/C is too lazy/stupid to follow a cite? I'm not quite sure what's stopping you from getting my point.

Re:Explain the data

[stenvar]

The post you responded to asked questions anybody should be asking about any scientific result.

Your response is the response of a Luddite and someone who is ignorant of science.

Re:Explain the data

[Anonymous Coward]

The purpose of a summary is to summarize the important info of the longer report. The important info is missing from the huffington post summary, it is a pointless article. If you are satisfied with the quality of the journalism so be it. I am telling you it is poor. You seem to be arguing against some strawman created in your head that does not exist here.

Re:Explain the data

[AK Marc]

Then say "In my opinion, I feel that the journalism in this article to be poor." whining about the lack of sources when they are clearly there makes you a liar.

I'd go back and quote your inconsistent and lying statements, but whenever I do, the A/C says "that one wasn't mine" or otherwise weasles out of responsibility for ones words.

Re:Explain the data

[Anonymous Coward]

All the ACs in this thread are by this AC typing now. Please point out where I was inconsistent.

Re:Explain the data

[AK Marc]

The questions asked were answered quite plainly in the article. Asking them and hoping people won't read the article to realize they were stupid questions is the anti-science of a Luddite. The article was an analysis of the result of a NOAA study. They credit the NOAA study, and anyone questioning the data should take it up with NOAA, not those that use NOAA's numbers. Or do you not even know the basics of how cites and attributions work?

I'm ignorant of science? Tell us again how water under pressure melts only at 0C.

Overplayed

[Anonymous Coward]

They're intentionally missing that point.

Water rising by 1-2c is not going to rise as much as you seem to be expecting. Would you care to give us all figures as to how much expansion a few hundred meters of water undergoes with a 1c rise in temperature?

Re:Explain the data

[stenvar]

The questions asked were answered quite plainly in the article.

No, sorry, they were not.

I'm ignorant of science? Tell us again how water under pressure melts only at 0C.

It's roughly 0.01C melting point decrease per 1 atm of pressure. Please do tell how that somehow results in glaciers melting faster.

Re:Explain the data

[AK Marc]

No, sorry, they were not.

The questions asked were about the source of the data. The source of the data was given. What was the problem?

Re:Explain the data

[Anonymous Coward]

"The questions asked were about the source of the data."

Just give it up, you read something into the post that wasn't there and now this is pointless arguing about your behavior.

Re:Explain the data

[AK Marc]

The post clearly objected to the article by challenging it with a question already answered. It was a stupid challenge, thus obviously nothing other than a shittily worded: "My opinion is the opposite of fact, so I object to reality."

Here's the source data...

[knorthern knight]

Source data is at http://sealevel.colorado.edu/ The graph shows an average rise of 3.2 mm / year. You can download the data in ASCII format, suitable for plotting at http://sealevel.colorado.edu/f...

Note that this includes a fudge-factor called GIS (Glacial Isostatic Adjustment). They give a long-winded explanation. tl;dr they've added a 10% fudge factor. From http://sealevel.colorado.edu/c...

> We apply a correction for GIA because we want our sea level time series
> to reflect purely oceanographic phenomena. In essence, we would like
> our GMSL time series to be a proxy for ocean water volume changes.
> This is what is needed for comparisons to global climate models, for
> example, and other oceanographic datasets.

So they talk out of one side of their mouths about how much sea level is rising. Out of the other side of their mouth, they admit that their numbers aren't really sea level rise.

Another question... what type of effing idiot approves nuclear reactors located such that a sealevel rise of a few inches, let alone a few feet, would cause problems? Anybody ever heard of tsunamis (like at Fukushima)? They're rarer in the Atlantic, but they do happen.

Free Coolant!

[tmjva]

What's the risk! Just think of all the free salt water coolant!

Then we can set up the mind controlled laser sharks as guards.

How long?

[Anonymous Coward]

By the way all scientific theories require predictions. So to all who think that CO2 controls the climate I ask the following question:

How long with rising CO2 and flat or falling temperatures before you admit CO2 does not control the climate? 20 years? 30? 50? Never?

For some accurate predictions that have withstood the test of time check out Dr Libby's prediction from the 1970s (3+ decades of accuracy), Dr Easterbrook's (12 years), Dr Abdussamatov (8 years). They all have correctly called for a cooling period of varying depths and lengths. So far they have been correct and the IPCC models wrong.

So now I'm supposed to be worried about centimeters of ocean rise when a landslide in the Canary Islands could wipe out the entire northeastern seaboard with a wave 100-200 feet high?

North Carolina to the Rescue!

[Anonymous Coward]

They need to move the nuclear power plants here to North Carolina. In it's infinite wisdom the legislature passed a law last year that climate change isn't proven, and you cannot take into account projected sea level increases.

So it's against the law for the sea to rise here, come on down y'all!

Re:Explain the data

[Anonymous Coward]

There was no challenge. The article linked to failed to summarize the important info. If you had an argument you would have pointed out where they answered the OP questions by now (Oh they linked to it... if that is all they did then the summary is worthless). Anyone who bothers to read this will see that.