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NASA Launching Satellite To Track Carbon
An anonymous reader writes A NASA satellite being prepared for launch early on Tuesday is expected to reveal details about where carbon dioxide, a greenhouse gas tied to climate change, is being released into Earth's atmosphere on a global scale. From the article: "The $468 million mission is designed to study the main driver of climate change emitted from smokestacks and tailpipes. Some of the carbon dioxide is sucked up by trees and oceans, and the rest is lofted into the atmosphere, trapping the sun's heat and warming the planet. But atmospheric CO2 levels fluctuate with the seasons and in different regions of the Earth. The natural and human activities that cause the changes are complicated. The Orbiting Carbon Observatory-2, or OCO-2 for short, will be able to take an ultra-detailed look at most of the Earth's surface to identify places responsible for producing or absorbing the greenhouse gas."
carbon has nothing to do with the temperatures on earth
The Scientists will just fudge the data anyway. Why doesn't NASA do the responsible thing and spend money helping people on Earth?
How on earth did they miss this one, Science? Hogwash
XCOM launching satellite to track aliens.
CO2, a greenhouse gas, is tied to climate change but is also expected and always-present part of our atmosphere. Why do we need satellite to know this?
Can we have a better summary?
"The $468 million mission"...could have been used to research how to get rid of it or alternatives to fossil fuels.
"carbon dioxide, a greenhouse gas tied to climate change, is being released into Earth's atmosphere on a global scale."
And here was me thinking it was being released on a inter-galactic scale.
In an argument between two sides, one of which says the science has been studied for a long time and is well understood and the other that says "no, it's all confusing," I'll be on the side that says "let's get more data."
http://www.geoffreylandis.com
Ironically, that would be the side saying the science has been studied for a long time, and is well understood.
How about we...um....you know...STUDY OUTER SPACE?! It disgusts me to see me tax dollars going to fund some idiotic garbage like perpetuating the myth of man made global warming. CLIMATE CHANGE IS CYCLICAL!
Remove first 'A' from NASA
Why? The science is settled right? We know that manmade CO2 emissions are causing warming. We also know exactly how much the sea levels rise, and the effects of it.
So isn't this a waste of $468 million?
In an argument between two sides, one of which says the science has been studied for a long time and is well understood and the other that says "no, it's all confusing," I'll be on the side that says "let's get more data."
Ironically, that would be the side saying the science has been studied for a long time, and is well understood.
That would be logical, wouldn't it? But it's not. That would be true if the side saying "it's all confusing" actually was confused, and actually wanted the understanding to improve. But, in fact, the people saying "let's not get data to try to learn more and understand the science better" are the same as the ones who tell us that we don't understand the science.
It's almost as if they don't want the science to be better understood.
http://www.geoffreylandis.com
Most of CO2 emmissions come from China and India. There, saved you 467 million.
Remember, sending up this satellite might just help us learn that AGW is not a problem, proving that you were right all along.
Don't be mad at Science. Someday, your incomplete in freshman physics will not matter any more.
You are welcome on my lawn.
So we dump a bunch of carbon into the atmosphere getting a satellite up there and then measure the results. I'm not sure if this is a deliberate invocation of the Observer affect, or not. I would imagine trying to use the Observer effect to your observation works about the same as washing your car to make it rain.
If you are not allowed to question your government then the government has answered your question.
The obstructionist party somehow let something to study global warming got launched? What the fuck? Are they asleep?
Too busy obsessing over Benghazi and executing retards to notice?
This is a project that would only make sense to people who have no understanding of 1) how large and detailed the planet's surface is, and 2) how numerous and complex the sources of carbon dioxide are. These are people who think of carbon dioxide as a 'pollutant' to be eliminated rather than as an essential molecule for all life on the planet. In the landscape of their thought processes, they likely imagine that they are searching for hidden smokestacks from coal-burning power plants. It is absolutely unbelievable that this project got funded and shows the depths to which some scientific inquiry has sunk.
@sinij
"To science denialists above, I hope you apply equal skepticism to medicine and health and food safety aspects of scientific knowledge. This way your views will have self-correcting, instead of humanity-correcting impact."
So tell me, please, if your opinion applies equally to all, including NOAA and NASA who we now know are guilty of manipulating temp data since the 30's????
NOAA and NASA are now infamous.
Perhaps you meant as a greenhouse gas, but then you dismiss water vapor?
Less than half what humans create in hydrocarbon buring and cement making stays in the atmosphere. The ocean is suspected as the major sink, as it turns into something like soda. A more active plant biopshere could be another sink.
Furthermore we dont know all the non-human sources. Is there a significant amount being released from melting permafrost marshes? Some onsite studies suggest the possibility. Volcanoes, melting sedimate methane hydrates too. This satellite could help constrain unkown sources and sinks.
The resuting data is likely to fuel both pro and anti AGW factions. A significant group prefers not to know whatis happening at all and blocked these kind of satellites in the 1990s and 2000s. I wish to know what is happening.
What about the amount of pollutants released with the launch of this satellite? Solid rockets and hydrazine aren't exactly environmentally friendly when you burn a million pounds in 12 minutes. The production of H2 and LOX is pretty dirty also, even if the final product is water.
I may sound a little pedantic, but at least I'm not roaming the globe looking like Chuckles the CO2 clown...
I said no... but I missed and it came out yes.
And we got zippo for that expenditure.
Hey, maybe we can start using "Solyndra" as a unit measuring government waste.
It's not that they don't want the science to be better understood, it's that they are convinced that government funding of scientific research is one of the factors contributing to their tax liability. For these folks we should leave scientific research to private industry, such as Koch Industries.
This was the coldest winter this country has ever seen. Fact.
Not a fact.
The winter of 2013 - 2014 was one of the ten coldest winters in history in the Midwest U.S.
It was the warmest winter on record in California, and set records for high temperatures in Alaska.
Overall, it was the 34th coolest winter in the contiguous U.S. since records began in 1895. The contiguous United States comprises 1.5% of the surface area of the Earth. One season, in 1.5% of the Earth's surface: this is weather, not climate
http://www.wunderground.com/bl...
http://www.weather.com/news/wi...
http://www.geoffreylandis.com
The contempt for curiosity held by one side of this conversation is alarming. You start by noting how numerous and complex the sources of carbon dioxide are but conclude that gathering data on this is pointless.
I'm glad the US government is doing something like this, but not with NASA. Our space agency needs to get this message: "Put humans on other worlds, or go home. If we want robots or science or satellites or anything else, we'll do that with another agency. For you, concentrate on putting living humans on other chunks of rock, and if you can't manage to do that once per decade then just pack up and save us the money."
The last time NASA did that was fifty years ago. In my space-exploration-loving opinion, NASA should have been disbanded in the late 1970s. Everything since then has been stupid.
"Hey, look, NASA built a space plane call the 'shuttle'! Wow! And they used it to go.... nowhere!"
"Hey, look, NASA built a little remote-controlled car and put it on Mars. Then after that they... well... they built two more and did the same thing... then after that they... uh.... well they built another one and did the same thing..."
"Hey, look, NASA built a satellite and pointed it at... earth..."
"Hey, look, NASA built a telescope and... took pictures of stars... again..."
None of that was worth it. Pack your bags, NASA, because you aren't hitting your numbers. You've been a failure since the Apollo days. Put humans on other worlds. Make it happen or go home, which to me means you need to go home.
Given that methane is known to have a larger immediate effect one would have thought that a multimillion dollar mission would carry more than one instrument to nail down which of the many green house gases are having the most impact ... rather than assuming the models are right and that it's the CO2
"... they are convinced that government funding of scientific research is one of the factors contributing to their tax liability."
The people who say that are just making up excuses to dismiss the conclusions of scientific research.
... And they don't even consistently apply their "government money" argument: You never hear them make those sorts of complaints about the results from the LHC (that costed about ~$9billion split across many nations).
In that way they're no different than Creationists who claim that Evolution is "just some secular hoax to fool the faithful".
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Don't write or post stories about stuff like this until after it's basically a done deal. The more air time and attention it gets, the more it reaches the public consciousness of the unwashed masses. Unfortunately, a significant portion of those unwashed masses includes supporters of climate change deniers in congress with the power to continually reject funding for such scientific endeavors. Once this rabid supporter base gets a taste of something like this it has a good chance of spreading to become an epidemic, basically forcing the aforementioned deniers in power to move against it.
So, please, for the love of science, keep stories like this on the down low until their basically about to launch (most of the funding is already spent), sharing it with only your closest and most trusted scientific allies. Let your giddy fancy slowly evolve to the point of nerdgasm as a close precursor to the final objective. Then, and only then, is it safe to share this news with those who cannot or will not appreciate it.
Without a doubt the climate does naturally vary, but you can't dump Gigatonnes of CO2 into the atmosphere a year and not expect some kind of effect. CO2 levels have spiked to almost 400 PPM, a level that hasn't been seen for more than 400,000 years (it usually spikes at about 285). What kind of effect it will have on our planet is still up for debate, but there will be some kind of effect.
I assume you are aware that the current 380ppm CO2 in the Earth's atmosphere is pretty much an all-time geological low?
It's lower than in much of the Earth's history, but no, not anywhere near an all-time low. The all-time low is about half the current value... which, as it turns out, also was a much colder time in Earth's history.
Earth's CO2 levels over the past 600 million years or so have averaged about 1,500ppm, with peaks up to perhaps 7,000+ ppm:
And temperatures were much hotter, too. For most of Earth's history, the planet does not have ice caps.
There has historically been much more CO2 in our atmosphere than exists today. For example, during the Jurassic Period (200 mya), average CO2 concentrations were about 1800 ppm or about 4.7 times higher than today.
And temperatures were about 3 degrees C above what they are today.
The highest concentrations of CO2 during all of the Paleozoic Era occurred during the Cambrian Period, nearly 7000 ppm -- about 18 times higher than today.
And temperatures were 7 degrees C above current temperatures.
Carbon dioxide, on the average, was higher during the Ordovician, and average temperature during Ordovician period was 2C above modern levels (with sea levels 180 m higher). There was indeed a brief ice age-- about half a million years-- during the Ordovician. (for reference, the Ordovician lasted about 45 million years) But, guess what? That ice age corresponded to a low level of carbon dioxide. http://www.newscientist.com/ar...
Every single one of the examples you cite supports the basic observation that increased carbon dioxide correlates with increased temperature.
Yes, correlation is not causation. Nevertheless, you certainly can't point to this as evidence that carbon dioxide isn't related to global temperature
http://www.geoffreylandis.com
...lot of pinheads posting anonymously.
In the past, Democratic and Republican administrations issued some contracts without competitive bidding for speed and to save money. When seeking the highest office in the land, Mr. Obama explicitly stated that he would not tolerate such practices. “I will finally end the abuse of no-bid contracts once and for all,” he thundered to a Grand Rapids, Mich., audience on Oct. 2, 2008. “The days of sweetheart deals for Halliburton will be over when I’m in the White House.” After becoming president, Mr. Obama continued the attack and promised on March 4 to “end unnecessary no-bid and cost-plus contracts. In some cases, contracts are awarded without competition. And that’s completely unacceptable.”
That was then; this is now. Last week, the Army revealed that KBR, a former subsidiary of Halliburton, was awarded a no-bid contract worth as much as $568 million through next year. This deal was announced only hours after the Obama Justice Department informed the public that it was joining a suit filed by whistleblowers who allege KBR used kickbacks to get foreign contracts.
http://www.washingtontimes.com...
What about the amount of pollutants released with the launch of this satellite? Solid rockets and hydrazine aren't exactly environmentally friendly when you burn a million pounds in 12 minutes. The production of H2 and LOX is pretty dirty also, even if the final product is water.
OK, what about it?
I have a challenge for you. Using google, or your other favorite index-search tool, find out how much carbon dioxide is released by a single Delta-II launch. Then, look up how much carbon dioxide is put into the atmosphere per year by fossil fuel burning. Compare these two numbers. Do they differ by orders of magnitude? How many orders of magnitude?
Based on your findings, do you think that a rocket launch has a significant impact on global carbon dioxide levels? Do you think it has a measureable impact?
http://www.geoffreylandis.com
Its just a typo in the article. Really it's just an NSA project to track you and since your tinfoil hats aren't carbon there's nothing you can do to hide. Except maybe crawling in a pile of pencils.
Wait, doesn't your rebuttal show that the earth's temperature will not spiral out of control leading to the death and destruction predicted? :P
I don't recall ever making such a prediction.
To be honest you make great points for the view that we are really in a geologic cold period and global warming is just returning us to average temperatures for geologic time frames.
Yep, that's pretty much correct. The Earth is, on the average, quite a bit cooler than it has been in the geological past. It does not always have ice caps.
It happens that this is the climate that we humans are used to, and we've rather built our habitats and our agriculture around. But, on a geological scale, a few degrees of warming, and melting the polar ice caps. is no big deal. It's not the end of the world.
--unfortunately, when we return the planet to the climate conditions of the Jurassic, we probably don't get the dinosaurs back. But then, if biological research keeps on track, we'll just make new ones.
http://www.geoffreylandis.com
this would seem to be moot to me. Humans have only been here for the briefest of very *recent* moments, but we do have a particular interest in keeping earth habitable for *human* life.
Assuming your numbers are correct, it still doesn't do us any good to say that gosh, a few million years ago there was a lot more carbon dioxide, if for the purposes of *human* life a particular (and lower) level is necessary.
The goal is for us, not for the earth itself, to survive.
STOP . AMERICA . NOW
It is interesting that the same crowd that echos the "we just don't know" refrain gets upset whenever we invest in reducing uncertainty. Ideology will be the death of curiosity.
Wanna bet the satellite will give promising "global warming" data? Also, ever notice they complain about the Ozone hole in the winter, for the North, and for the South, in the summer? I'm sure the position of the SUN has NOTHING to do with it of course. "man made" global warming has ALWAYS been a hoax. We've been cooling since the 30's. Also, a decade, in relation to the age of the earth, is but a blink of the eye. People's views of history, pretty much start at the time of their birth, since god knows, schools don't have time to teach world history, when they have other pressing needs such as common core, teaching kids conflict resolution, homosexual behavior, the USA is bad, capitalism is bad, socialism is good...they don't have time to "learn em good" about things like the atmosphere, how the SUN affects our world and the Co2 is an element that plants use, to produce the oxygen we breathe.
It's obviously all those diamonds that are evaporating. Somebody has to do a paper that we can show our wives/girlfriends, that clearly demonstrates that diamonds are bad for the environment.
Lets see, globally I think there are about 9 Gigatonnes of CO2 created by human activity, even assuming that half of the mass of the rocket was created in CO2 during its construction, transport & launch (extremely unlikely) that would be about 0.0000011% of the global human output of CO2. To know how, where, and in what quantities CO2 is being generated I don't think this launch will matter much.
Almost 97% of CO2 comes from natural sources. Will this satellite be able to magically distinguish between sources? No. More wasted $.
It's not, and it also annoys me when people say that.
No single hurricane, heat wave, tornado, flood, wildfires due to drought, storm surge, hot summer, rainy winter is due to global warming, just as no single cold snap, hurricane free season, unseasonably cool spring, early winter storm is evidence that global warming isn't real.
Those are all weather. Climate is long term.
http://www.geoffreylandis.com
I've seen people complain that physicists are making things up to get more grant money, such as people complaining about hypotheses about multiple Higgs bosons or super-symmetry. This is a dangerous trend. If it becomes a popular notion that scientists regularly publish fraudulent results just to get more money, people will stop accepting the results obtained from science and we'll all suffer. I'm certain that some scientists actually do participate in flagrant fraud, but the worst offenders are caught and their reputations are ruined. I think an entire stem cell research lab is going to be closed because of rampant fraud. Funny thing is, I don't see anyone claiming that means all stem cell research is fraudulent.
What a fool believes, he sees, no wise man has the power to reason away.
The fact is, that this sat will show which nations produce CO2 and in what levels.
And the world is in for a shock.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.