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Burning All Fossil Fuels Would Scorch Earth, Says Study (phys.org)
mspohr quotes a report from Phys.Org: A new study published in the Journal Nature Climate Change shows our precarious climate condition: "Using up all known fossil fuel reserves would render Earth even more unlivable than scientists had previously projected, researchers said on Monday. Average temperatures would climb by up to 9.5 degrees Celsius (17 degrees Fahrenheit) -- five times the cap on global warming set at climate talks in Paris in December, they reported. In the Arctic region -- already heating at more than double the global average -- the thermometer would rise an unimaginable 15 C to 20 C." This would make most of Earth uninhabitable to humans (although the dinosaurs seemed to do fine with it 65 million years ago). The report also stated that if fossil fuel trends go unchanged, ten times the 540 billion tons of carbon emitted since the start of industrialization would be reached near the end of the 22nd century. For comparison, "older models had projected that depleting fossil fuel reserves entirely would heat the planet by 4.3 C to 8.4 C. The new study revises this to between 6.4 C and 9.5 C," writes Phys.Org.
" In the absence of global mitigation actions, five trillion tonnes of carbon (5 EgC), corresponding to the lower end of the range of estimates of the total fossil fuel resource" i.e. assuming we take no action and keep burning fossil fuels at the current rates. From the time scales talked about on the first page, it looks like they assume burning it over the next couple of hundred years. Maybe some one want to give the full article a read?
Don't worry, I'm sure all your answers will be answered if you $32 to access the full text of the article. Then again maybe it won't and the study is complete bullshit and you'll have spent that money for nothing.
We seriously need a shift in the way we share scientific data with each other. The system we have now is broken.
If you burned it all tomorrow, yes the planet would burn.. burn it over a millennia, no, it won't.
What are you basing that on? CO2 in the atmosphere is CO2 in the atmosphere whether it gets there quickly or slowly (unless you're talking the millions of years it takes to be transformed back into fossil fuels, which we are not). And speaking of time-scales, economists seem hell bent on exponential growth in everything, including energy consumption. And they genuinely don't seem to give a damn where that energy comes from and at what environmental or human cost: ergo it will be the cheapest available source. So while it's not guaranteed it seems highly probable we'll do our darnedest to burn as much as we can as fast as humanly possible.
Something else might (and probably will at the rate we're going) do it in in that thousand years, but it would not be emissions from fossil fuels.
And you might trip in front of a bus tomorrow, but that is not a good argument for taking up smoking today.
The article makes absolutely NO MENTION of time frame, and no mention of preventative measures that may be (and are) taken.
Because that is not what the research is about. It is a simple if a then b projection: *if* we burn all our available fossil fuel resources *then* we are monumentally screwed afterwards (whenever that is). The hope, presumably, is that the bare facts will motivate people to take (further) action, but really that is outside of the scope of the research.
What, get smaller and grow feathers?
systemd is Roko's Basilisk.
Nope, 'Dino sludge' was a one-shot deal. On the timescales needed for new fossil fuel, the sun will have died to the extent that Earth CO2 levels will have dropped below the level needed to sustain plant life (and thus animal life).
"I bless every day that I continue to live, for every day is pure profit."
Err, the "if nothing changed" scenario was kind of the point. And people modded this idiot up?
It is say that *if* we do nothing to reduce fossil fuel use and continue to emit as we do today, what is likely to happen. Its not predicting that we do nothing. The best guess is that at least some countries keep the Paris pledge and reduce emissions. But, if everyone decided that they could not be bothered to make the changes required, then we can expect significant warming.
A serious question about the squabble. Even if GW is not AGW, even if GW is not real, why should we not as a species work to reduce our impacts everywhere?
Silence is a state of mime.
. . . they are very difficult to get rid of. Give 'em a scorched Earth . . . they'll figure some way to survive in it.
Will a lot of folks suffer and die in the process? Hell, yeah. But there will still be some humans around who have figured out how to thrive in that environment.
People like to joke about cockroaches being the only living critter that will survive the nuclear apocalypse.
When I think of the post-nuclear apocalypse world, I see a creepy looking humanoid, munching on cockroaches.
McCockroaches, indeed.
"Would you like some fries with your roaches?"
Schroedinger's Brexit: The UK is both in and out of the EU at the same time!
The article makes absolutely NO MENTION of time frame
Absolutely no mention, except for the six mentions of time frame in the article: "by year 2300", "in 2300" (twice), "during the 2100-2300 period" (twice), "to the year 2300", plus 3 mentions of the 2100 time frame. And I stopped to count before even reaching the end of the first page (out of 6)
Wrong. Fossil fuels took about 300-400 million years to form according to the DoE, and your own link states that it'll be 600 million years before plants die off due to lack of carbon dioxide. Our successors will have another shot at destroying the world with fossil fuel.
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Considering the rate at which new reserves are discovered as it becomes profitable to look for them in more difficult places, it wouldn't surprise me if we could find enough fossil fuels to last a millennium. That would of course make the Earth considerably hotter than this projection.
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CO2 in the atmosphere is CO2 in the atmosphere whether it gets there quickly or slowly (unless you're talking the millions of years it takes to be transformed back into fossil fuels, which we are not).
ignorant much ?
why do you want it back as fossil fuels?
have you heard of photosynthesis? it takes far less time than "millions of years" for plants to remove CO2 from atmosphere.
so unless we burn the fossil fuels all at once, or at a very rapid rate, and remove most of the plants as well, earth is not going to be "scorched"
you are not going to make a rational case for a sustainable climate, and for less fossil fuel use, successfully, by peddling alarmist ignorant nonsense like this.
Anyone who doesn't make predictions based on nothing changing for 200 years will never learn what changes are needed in the next 200 years.
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If by "livable" you mean "pockets of humanity are able to eke out a subsistence living in a post-apocalyptic wasteland" then sure!
Because, the trend remained unchanged in their minds. Modeling and fortune telling are more art and religion than actual science.
Um, no, the study isn't predicting that fossil fuel usage will go unchanged, it's predicting what will happen IF fossil fuel usage goes unchanged. That's a very important difference.
ten times the 540 billion tons of carbon emitted since the start of industrialization would be reached near the end of the 22nd century.
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Hey, I live in Iceland, where the average January low is -3C and the average July high is 13C. Such warming would make us the new California. Bring it on ;) I own some land, you can start booking your timeshares now.
It's funny, when you hear people talking about forestry here, they talk about things as if they only apply to our current climate. They plant douglas fir, sitka spruce, etc, trees that can become true giants in the right climate, but insist that they'll stay (comparatively) short and grow slowly because our climate is too cool for their optimal growth. Yes, our current climate, but these are trees that can live for much of a millennium. Heat up the country 4-5 degrees and you've turned the climate into that of coastal Washington / British Columbia where they reach their record heights; we have similar sun, soil, precipitation, summer/winter temperature differences, etc (windier, but that's in large part due to the shortage of trees).
Iceland once even had redwood forests. Washington/British Columbia species are not going to stay short forever if the climate keeps warming.
Friends! Help! A guinea pig tricked me!
300-400 million years to form supposedly. The Oregon Rainforest Coal Deposits tell a different story- they're only a few feet down, possibly two or three millenia old, and are constantly replenished by the living forest sitting on top of them.
SJW: a person who perceives an injustice, and while correcting it, commits a greater injustice.
Stop peddling your bullshit anon:
They can't explain the mechanism
Bullshit: http://scied.ucar.edu/carbon-d...
nor can they explain why Earth was so much colder during times when CO2 concentration was 10 times what it is today.
Bullshit: https://www.skepticalscience.c...
They talk out of both sides of their mouths and are bullshitting for money, lots and lots of taxpayer money. Why do they need taxpayer money?
Bullshit: Fossil fuels recieve considerably more taxpayer money than renewables, and they only reason climate science needs funding is that fossil fuel interests insist on continuously pushing back on scientists recommendations.
You think there would need to be reports like this if, in the 70s, governments had simply agreed that yes, they do need to reduce and stabilise CO2 production? The only reason climate scientists continually need to prove themselves is because of big oil shills and IDIOTS LIKE YOU who are drinking their koolaid.
I mean hell you're not even honest enough to use your account.
[...]it wouldn't surprise me if we could find enough fossil fuels to last a millennium.
Me neither. I think we are getting nearer to the turning point where fossil fuels are not seen as viable anymore. Demand will start to drop rapidly such that, in the end, most of the remaining reserves will simply stay where they are...
Models being too extreme? Hardly.
Forecast: 1990 IPCC sea level rise predictions vs. actuality
Forecast: 1988 Hansen temperature predictions vs. actuality (Scenario B was described as most likely)
Forecast: IPCC temperature predictions vs. actuality vs. contrarian models
Backtest: IPCC AR1 sea ice loss models vs. actual
Temperatures are tracking, on long running average, right on what has been forecast. Sea level rise is well on the high end. As it stands, our arctic sea ice models predict significantly less loss than we actually see (we're not very good with sea ice right now, and this is well acknowledged by the IPCC).
I know there's been this contrarian myth circulating claiming that climate models predicted warming that never occurred. There's a nice, well-referenced debunking of it here.
Friends! Help! A guinea pig tricked me!
So, what, research teams aren't allowed to publish single scenario papers so they can be integrated into the wider body of research? Are you going to raise the funds required to run multiple scenarios for them?
Photosynthesis only removes carbon from the atmosphere for a short period of time. The plants eventually die and decay. When they do, that carbon is released back into the atmosphere. The problem is that all of this carbon was locked out of the usual carbon cycle by being buried deep underground (in the form of coal or oil). We're pulling it out of the ground, burning it, and putting it back into the normal carbon cycle. The only way to restore the carbon cycle to the normal (pre-industrial age) amounts of carbon would be to bury it again - an endeavor that would either be highly expensive (use some sort of atmospheric scrubber to remove the carbon and then pump it deep into the Earth) or would take millions of years (wait for the same process that formed the oil in the first place).
My sci-fi novel, Ghost Thief, is now available from Amazon.com.
Those who are in "policy making" are bad at math and physic. I always get a sense that low IQ or low persistence people become politicians that always want to control others. It was always like that through ages, since the times when everyone knew that earth is being held by three giant whales or elephants.
Most of fossil fuels represent energy of sun converted to carbohydrates or coal. Of course burning all of it would heat up mother Earth. But burning it slowly, won't.
Those models that calculate carbon dioxide emitted to earth always, and I say, always, fail to take into account intricacies on how fast carbon dioxide is consumed by the oxygen making living organisms of the earth. Have there been any studies that demonstrate marginal increase in carbon dioxide absorption compared to the increase of the output of carbon dioxide.
If there are any serious studies, such studies will never be mentioned by policy makers. Nobody is denying that a lot of carbon dioxide is emitted to the atmosphere, and that the climate is changing (it always changing).
To battle climate change by wearing green shirt and driving Prius, is similar to the rainmaking rituals of Zuni: one most wear blue feather and avoid staring to the buffalo on the day of the ritual. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...
Yes indeed, if only scientists could establish a mechanism.....
You mean the Precambrian? Where every bloody factor involved in our planet's climate system was also different? Or were you under the impression that there's only one factor that determines Earth's surface temperature, carbon dioxide?
The most important factor is that the sun emitted much less light early in Earth's history. Here's a graph. Lest you think that those sorts of differences don't matter much, it should be pointed out that a 10% increase in solar radiation is predicted to be capable of boiling off Earth's oceans. Over the scale of hundreds of millions of years, the light from the sun changes by quite relevant amounts, as it slowly progresses towards its inevitable end as a red giant. Over the scale of hundreds of years? Not so much. It's also one of the most observed objects in the universe; when something changes with the sun, we know about it, and have for quite a long time.
I'm sorry, I interrupted your rant about all those idiot scientists and their pre-kindergarten education... please continue.
Friends! Help! A guinea pig tricked me!
Burning all the fossil fuels on the planet at once in a large thruster will SAVE the planet. All we need to do is move the planet further out in orbit from the sun and it will counteract all effects of global warming.
These scientists today are only looking for problems and not solutions.
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
The environment is a complex thing. While we have forces creating carbon and other pollutants into the atmosphere (Humans and Volcanos). There are other forces that take them out (Plants and Oceans). Now there is also a problem with deforestation and water pollutants where we are double hindering our carbon footprint by polluting and removing things that can clean the pollutants.
So if we were to slow down our rate of pollution and increase forest growth than over time we could burn all the fossil fuels and not raise the temperature to obscene levels. As the carbon in the air will be absorbed to the mass of vegetation.
If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
Firstly, "Purchase article full text and PDF $32", fuck that shit, if those whoremongers really believed that my actions was going to destroy the world their Greatgrandchildern need to live in, they would be paying me to read it!
Secondly,
Every other modeler since Jean-Baptiste Joseph Fourier, and especialy Svante Arrhenius uses logarithmic relationship
These guys are claiming the entire body of Climatological "Settled Science" is wrong and they are just throwing it out there like a bunch of assholes trolling click-bait; at least on Facebook the click-bait trolls give you some side-boob or camel-toed yoga-pants.
Apocalypse Cancelled, Sorry, No Ticket Refunds
And I don't know where you get the notion that a slower release would make things better.
I'm not a denier, by any means, but it does make some sense that a slower release would be better. There are processes (photosynthesis being the most obvious) that take CO2 out of the atmosphere. Conceivably, there is some rate of fossil fuel use that is sustainable, but maybe that rate is so low that it's irrelevant on a global industrial scale.
Only crack the nuts that crack. You don't put the ones that don't crack in the sack.
AFIAK, we have passed peak coal, where anthracite (the highest quality coal) is almost impossible to find, so a lot of coal plants burn lignite (one step up from peat.) Peak oil is long since behind us, especially with the pushback from fracking. Then, you get reports of solar actually being cheaper than fossil fuels, especially for maintenance.
There are three things which would kill fossil fuels dead that are still out there:
1: Nuclear power becoming accepted, or re-accepted.
2: Battery density getting near current fossil fuels.
3: A usable, efficient way to put energy in, suck out CO2 from the air, and make an easy to store fuel like synthetic diesel, fuel, ethanol, or even propane. Hydrogen is mentioned, but that is not a real soliution as making it requires a lot of energy, and storing it for the long term is difficult due to how it embrittles tanks and has a tendency to escape.
>> This would make most of Earth uninhabitable to humans
Are you sure you're counting the large landmasses in Canada and Siberia?
Secondly,
Every other modeler since Jean-Baptiste Joseph Fourier, and especialy Svante Arrhenius uses logarithmic relationship
These guys are claiming the entire body of Climatological "Settled Science" is wrong and they are just throwing it out there like a bunch of assholes trolling click-bait; at least on Facebook the click-bait trolls give you some side-boob or camel-toed yoga-pants.
You're confusing two different things -- Fourier and Arrhenius (and everyone else) say that there is a logarithmic relationship between the increase in CO2 concentration and the increase in temperature.
This paper (as do many others) claims that there is a (near) linear relationship between emissions and temperature.
That's because doubling the amount we emit will more than double the atmospheric concentration, as the oceans will be taking up a smaller part of what we emit. Look for articles that talk about the TCRE "transient climate response to cumulative carbon emissions", e.g. Le Duc et al 2015
(Also, by the way, the highest temperatures in the Jurassic were about 10 warmer than the current era. So, 15-20C would, in fact, be higher than temperatures in the era of dinosaurs.)
So, in summary, what you are saying is that you didn't read the article, but you are sure it's wrong. Plonk.
No, they're claiming that the well known and verified properties of CO2 will inevitably lead to heating of the lower atmosphere and surface of the planet, because, you know, they don't believe there's a magic heat sink that just makes all that trapped solar radiation go away.
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
The point of the pseudo-skepticism is put off that day as long as possible. There are great fortunes founded on fossil fuels, and those that have those fortunes want to maximize profits. Of course, they have a lot of witless mindless soldiers who they've convinced that climatology is really a communist fantasy, and those brainless idiots run around the intertubes with oft-repeated memes and a near total ignorance of the actual science (though some of these people are a little more capable and thus have rehearsed a somewhat more complex version of the pseudo-scientific drivel).
But make no mistake, when Saudi Arabia is creating the largest sovereign wealth fund in history, it's not because it sees a bright future for oil.
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
Okay, fine, I didn't mean to leave you Libertarians out, so I'll rephrase:
It has to be wrong, because the Invisible Hand wouldn't let the wonderful substances known as oil and coal be harmful.
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
The plants eventually die and decay. When they do, that carbon is released back into the atmosphere.
You do realize that carbon is not a gas, right? And that it happily bonds with A LOT of things other than oxygen? Also, dead plants don't break down into a gaseous state, any one with a compost pile can show you that. Some is given back into the atmosphere as CO2 and methane when the plants die, but not all of it. We can sequester a notable amount of CO2 as soil through decaying plant matter in a relatively short period of time (as in months given the right conditions).
And I don't know where you get the notion that a slower release would make things better.
Of course slower release is better. The atmosphere is not a bottle! There are many feedback mechanisms, both positive and negative, at work. The danger is not the total amount released, but entirely the speed.
The major carbon cycle for the earth is the geological cycle. All the carbon in the air, water, all life, and all fossil fuel reserves, all of that is a rounding error compared to the carbon bound up in the crust, slowly released by volcanic activity and reclaimed by erosion. That's a feedback loop that brings temps and CO2 levels away from extremes, and one that wouldn't even notice if we burned all the fossil fuels. Sadly, it's a geological cycle, so it might take 100M years to recover, but that's just the biggest such cycle.
At every time scale, there some feedback mechanism. The problem is that we're overwhelming those in human timescales, and we care more about the climate in 100 years than 100k or 100M years.
Socialism: a lie told by totalitarians and believed by fools.
Here is the press release from the University of Victoria:
www.communications.uvic.ca/releases/tip.php?date=23052016
and here are some sources that discuss the paper without quite as much in the way of scare words and hype:
www.reportingclimatescience.com/2016/05/23/unmitigated-emissions/
www.metronews.ca/news/vancouver/2016/05/23/uvic-researcher-models-worst-case-climate-change.html
FYI, for equivalent time frames, cars in Europe emit more CO2 than all volcanoes on earth. That's just cars in Europe. Nevermind power plants, cement production...or all the bigger CO2 emitters in the whole rest of the world. Also, volcanic CO2 is part of that balanced system you referenced. Human CO2 emissions are not. We could change that by increasing forest growth as you say but unfortunately the opposite is happening. Best to slow down fossil fuel use with the intent of ending it entirely, asap.
btw, I heartily approve of your sig.
Which is little more than a recipe for fucking over future generations. Maybe you don't give a rats ass about your children and grandchildren, but I happen to care about mine, and I think, considering we are the dominant species on this planet, that we have a duty to be good stewards, and not just keeping doing bad things out of expediency.
Beyond that, it's already beginning to fuck up a lot of people, and it's only going to get worse.
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
By 2015, the growing share of renewable energy in the national electricity market (26% in 2014, up from 4% in 1990) and the government's mandated CO2 emission reduction targets (40% below 1990 levels by 2020; 80% below 1990 levels by 2050) have increasingly curtailed previous plans for new, expanded coal power capacity.
... taken verbatim from the source you cite.
A few month ago I looked through all available data for Germany's coal plants, and I found that since 1997, no new coal plant has been licensed, and all coal plants that are under construction now were already licensed before 1997. And all of the current coal plants under construction are to replace older coal plants, but will not increase total capacity.
If you live in America, I'd be more worried about debt and the current political clusterfuck than any emissions from burning fossil fuels... Those are much more likely to affect the quality of life for your children and grandchildren than any small changes in average global temperature.
Yes it's an anecdote! Were you expecting original research in a Slashdot comment?
My child is living pretty damn well, and doing so in enormous part due to the technological advances over the last 200 years. My kid could well have died from smallpox or another of thousands of ailments or conditions that killed millions of kids world wide before industrialization and commercialization. So before you decry all that has come before as evil, perhaps consider that it has set a stage making it possible for mankind to [i]continue[/] technological evolution, and find new, better, cleaner, cheaper and easier ways to live.
Of course 500 years from now I'm sure some other self-righteous self-appointed Earth savior will be yelling at my decedents because they use that is killing the planet and putting all their grandchildren at risk of genocide. That is of course if the nearly inevitable planet-killing asteroid or plague or super-volcano or world war hasn't beaten them to it.
In the end its much like a wise man once said:
We're going away. Pack your shit, folks. We're going away. And we won't leave much of a trace, either. Thank God for that. Maybe a little styrofoam. Maybe. A little styrofoam. The planet will be here and we'll be long gone. Just another failed mutation. Just another closed-end biological mistake. An evolutionary cul-de-sac. The planet will shake us off like a bad case of fleas. A surface nuisance. - George Carlin
"But we have to pass the bill so that you can find out what is in it,..." - Nancy Pelosi
Oh I'm worried about debt. I'm worried about my auto loan, though that will be paid off soon enough. I'm more worried about my children's student loans and the long-term impact on their finances (postponing retirement savings, home buying etc.)
Did you mean the "public debt"? I don't worry about that, I worry about politicians who use it as an excuse to cut social programs and ensure those who live in poverty remain in poverty. The US is a sovereign nation with a fiat currency. They literally issue currency to cover federal spending, and match it by issuing bonds on the open market to create the illusion they are "borrowing" to cover their spending.
In other words, the risk of the public debt to our grandchildren is no greater than the risk on our generation due to spending from the era our grandparents were alive (including massive spending during WWII which fostered a generation of prosperity).
It's bad enough our politicians and their paid economists start lies about the debt. It's worse when responsible citizens spread the lies.
Regardless, if Earth is too damaged to be inhabitable in 500 years, I think humans will have far greater worries on their hands than political boundaries. Stop fretting over the debt and who is in office, and work instead on FIXING THE PROBLEM.
Thank you.
We're not talking 500 years from now. We're talking in the next half century to 75 years.
You can keep trying to make believe this isn't a problem now, but it is. I realize you just want to throw anything in the air to get out of admitting the issue, but by the end of your post, you're just being a fucking idiot. It's like debating a five year old.
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
You're confusing two different things -- Fourier and Arrhenius (and everyone else) say that there is a logarithmic relationship between the increase in CO2 concentration and the increase in temperature.
This paper (as do many others) claims that there is a (near) linear relationship between emissions and temperature.
That's because doubling the amount we emit will more than double the atmospheric concentration, as the oceans will be taking up a smaller part of what we emit. Look for articles that talk about the TCRE "transient climate response to cumulative carbon emissions", e.g. Le Duc et al 2015
So they are saying that since the atmosphere contains over 2,996×10^9 tonnes of CO2, adding an addition 29*10^9 tonnes of CO2 will cause the atmosphere to contain over 6,000 *10^9 tonnes? I think you are grossly underestimating increased primary production; CO2 is a fertilizer, not a growth imhibitor.
Apocalypse Cancelled, Sorry, No Ticket Refunds
45% of our power is coal. If you closed down coal plants and kept the nuclear you would decrease your total CO2 output more than you are now.
See my blog http://ilovecookes.blogspot.com/ for light hearted technical information.