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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."
Just going to note that here's what this means in terms of how the global average temperatures have been changing, and how rapidly so compared to the past:
http://xkcd.com/1732/
That'd take nuclear - something that intelligent people understand and support, but unfortunately that's a tiny fraction of the voting population.
Rising sea levels will be gradual and we have plenty of time to cope with them. Aside from the climate change aspect the more immediate problem is acidifcation and warming of the sea which has already killed off a quarter of the barrier reef and is having serious effects elsewhere with plankton. If the ocean food chain starts collapsing from the bottom up we're in deep deep shit and thats before you consider the reduction of fish stocks by overfishing and the destruction of the ocean floor by drag net trawling.
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"
We just see it as a round number because we use base 10.
So it is actually nothing special.about 400. It is all numerology crap/superstition.
If we instead of 10 fingers, only had 7 fingers, the number would be ... Oh crap ... 400 in base 7 is actually 1111.
The world will end.
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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Preserving rain-forests doesn't help as much as hippies would like you to think since they are mostly carbon neutral.
See? That's one of those misconceptions floating around. Yes, rain-forests are mostly carbon neutral. But your conclusion is wrong nevertheless. Because while rain-forests are mostly carbon neutral, cutting them down isn't. Each piece of organic matter that is destroyed adds to the carbon foot print, as long as it is not replaced by a piece of organic matter of the same size.