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Global CO2 Concentration Passes Threshold of 400 ppm -- and That's Bad for the Climate (time.com)
The average concentration of CO2 in the atmosphere hit the symbolic level of 400 parts per million (ppm) for the first time in 2015 and has continued to surge in 2016, according to the World Meteorological Organization. From a report on Time:Scientists say humans may need to take some carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere to stop global warming. The carbon dioxide concentration is unlikely to dip below the 400 ppm mark for at least several decades, even with aggressive efforts to reduce global carbon emissions, according to the WMO report, which confirms similar findings reported last month. Carbon dioxide can last in the atmosphere for thousands of years without efforts to remove it. "The year 2015 ushered in a new era of optimism and climate action," said WMO Secretary-General Petteri Taalas, referring to the landmark Paris Agreement to address climate change. "The real elephant in the room is carbon dioxide, which remains in the atmosphere for thousands of years and in the oceans for even longer."
I agree with you the time for conservation is past. We are at least if we want to continue to enjoy the standard of living we do beyond the natural carrying capacity of the globe. The answer is geo-engineering. I don't agree with your assessment we can remove carbon in sufficient quantities from the atmosphere. Do you have any evidence to site? I would argue the opposite, given we have been able to put a sufficient amount of carbon into the atmosphere to account for at least some of the temperature and ocean acidification changes we are seeing, it stands to reason we should be capable of removing it as well.
Technologies exist to efficiently (in terms of volume) remove carbon from air today. It just requires lots of input energy. There are a sources that could provide such energy at hand. Fission as well as that big fusion ball we call the sun could provide a enough power. We just need to get serious about doing it. We should reallocate the resources currently being used on carbon reduction to carbon removal efforts. It would go a long way.
Repeal the 17th Amendment TODAY! Also Please Read http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/right-to-read.html
Dare I say it?
Replace coal plants with nukes.
Then replace natural gas plants with nukes.
Then keep on building nukes till we have enough electricity being generated to replace all those gasoline/diesel automobiles (trucks, trains, etc) with electric versions.
And while we're doing that, replace oil-burning ship power plants with nukes.
Note that the steps after "coal plants" can be rearranged to taste. There are good arguments that we'd be better off getting the cars/trucks/trains replaced with all electric versions before we replace gas-fired power plants.
As long as the people getting worried about AGW are chanting "no nukes, no nukes", I'm going to continue ignoring the AGW problem as "not very serious, really"....
"I do not agree with what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it"
Actually, with excess nuclear power, we can produce eDiesel. We've got new catalysts and high-pressure processes making eDiesel highly-efficient, about 70%; that means pipelines fed from eDiesel plants placed near nuclear and geothermal power plants would come in slightly less-efficient than electric cars at 15% transmission loss and 85% charging efficiency.
We can stockpile eDiesel; we can use it for airplanes (no way to make those battery-powered); we can generate eMethane or otherwise use eDiesel to run fuel cells, creating liquid fuel electric cars (possibly airplanes, but it's a tough job for an electric motor); we can use it to drive factories which need more power than the grid provides.
Newer tweaks to battery technology are targeting high-surface-area electrodes. Lithium ion batteries grow tin whiskers internally, creating more surface area for reaction, thus higher and longer power output; current research targets new structures and new battery chemistries to maximize this, essentially attempting to create an activated-carbon-style surface as the battery consumes itself. The processes in eDiesel similarly use catalyzed hydrolysis, and it's non-consuming: if we can manufacture high-surface-area electrodes using current or improved catalysts, we can raise eDiesel efficiency. The two efforts are semi-parallel, in that efforts in one give insight to the other, yet they're distinct in significant ways and so can't directly translate.
That means more-efficient batteries and more-efficient eDiesel generation in the future. If the overall efficiency exceeds 85%, eDiesel will beat any electric vehicle: transmission loss is 15%. At the same time, low-cost eDiesel will immediately replace more-expensive petroleum, as it's compatible with current, unmodified gas turbine technology; and eDiesel can feed or be modified to feed hydrogen fuel cells, which provide electricity, giving a method of feeding electric vehicles with a liquid or heavy gas (not hydrogen, which has storage and transport issues) fuel tank rather than a battery.
At the same time, plant and atmospheric petroleum (e.g. eDiesel) products such as polyester, rayon, plastic, and lubricating oil (PAO, Group-3) will sequester oil. Recycling carries costs and complexity; cheap atmospheric petroleum, once expended, can be incinerated for power or dumped into expended oil wells. Deep well dumping provides an attractive option: the expended liquid petroleum becomes a feed stock for later mining and refining, while effectively removing the carbon content from the atmosphere.
This is all stuff that will happen naturally, eventually. eDiesel will scale; a reduction in cost of nuclear, geothermal, and solar will outcompete oil; and refining waste oil into recycled stock will be less-efficient than producing new oil at the point where atmospheric petroleum has become cheaper than oil. The only question is when.
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Its been interesting to watch the climate debate over the years. The talk has always been about reducing emissions and economic measures. If remediation (and clean energy) had been tackled with the kinds of efforts that won WW2 and put a man on the moon, this problem would be orders of magnitude less now (plus my cellphone charge would last weeks and I'd like that.) Instead "climate change" became all about economic rebalancing and geopolitical issues. We already have technologies that would deal with a lot of the CO2 in the atmosphere but they typically need energy and without clean energy (solar, wind, tidal, nuclear, etc) to power them, they don't do much. Now no one is willing to divert the massive amounts of money needed because that might interfere with the bread & circuses everyone wants.
Suppose you were an idiot. And suppose you were a member of congress. But then I repeat myself. -- Mark Twain
or the other 99%ers that live in towns that are at or below sea level. The US has plenty of cities that could disappear. Eventually the Earth will recover on it's own (assuming we don't screw it up more), but I wont be around thousands of years from now when it does.
Archaeologists have found the remnants of ancient Indian villages out in what is now the waters of the Gulf of Mexico. Back in the tail end of the ice age, water levels were far lower.
For that matter, a change of sea level of just one foot in the Florida Keys would drastically change the map.
We may see a gradual rise in sea level, but not everything is a straight line. We could see a series of incursions and withdrawals, with each incursion going higher than the last.
Also, not all of the destructive flooding may be oceans rising. Hurricane Matthew, was, thankfully, not as destructive in terms of wind as had been feared (a mere 20 miles further West would have been different, though). However, like many storm systems, the sheer amount of rain caused far more damage inland in North Carolina than the winds or storm surge, as places above sea level flooded.
I understand that one of those "we-make-up-the-news-and-you-believe-us" sites has accused the US Government of "redefining" what a hurricane is "in order to promote the Global Warming Scam, er Scare", but in actuality, weather people started talking about making a distinction between Category 5 windstorms and Category 5 rainstorms several years ago. Sometimes the less windy storms can do more damage.
So what is the Equilibrium Climate Sensitivity again?