The world changes. It has been changing since before there were men and it will be changing long after we're gone. These changes occur at such a slow rate that noone is in danger of drowning from rising seas. It changes so slowly that residents who live by the sea can enjoy their homes for their whole lives and leave their homes to their children. Then their children's children need must make their homes a few hundred feet inland and if my own experience is a guide to keep your children so close is unlikely at best.
Except for places like South Florida, where thousands of square miles of swamp will become kelp beds instead. This is a big deal, but it's a good thing. We'll want those kelp beds for the algae farms we need to replace the depleted oil, and the vast area of Florida inundated by rising seas is just the place to put that algae farm. Even then we're talking about nearly a thousand years hence. A thousand years ago there weren't but a few hundred people in south Florida.
This very overwrought alarmism is shown in the third link in the fine summary:
If we continue on our current trajectory, which you apparently think is an acceptable one, scientists say there is strong risk temperatures will rise by 5C by 2100. If that happens, the planet will roast, deserts will spread, ice caps will melt, coastal regions will suffer devastating floods and billions will be left homeless. The world's misery will be unparalleled. - Robin McKie to Benny Peiser
The planet will roast, really? The claim that deserts will spread ignores that vast realms of tundra presently under permafrost will become arable land for every acre lost to desertification. Ice caps will melt, and the land presently under glaciers will be ripe for agriculture and human settlement. The "billions will be left homeless" claim ignores that the unborne grandchildren of unborne children do not as yet have homes, and are unlikely to choose homes that are under the sea except in scientific projects to mirror the effects of interstellar colonies. That some fraction of humans must move from unpleasant to more pleasant conditions is just part of the human condition, a burden implied in the survival instinct.
These scientificalist alerts ignore a number of things, chief among them that humans are by nature blessed with the gift of perambulation. Humans are free to not wait by the shore for ten generations for the sea to rise two meters and wipe out their genome. In fact, for humans to so wait requires a multi-generational commitment to geolocation superlative to their survival urge that there is no historical basis for, and a level of external support for same since a useful active human needs must travel in pursuit of food, travel or work at least a few meters per year. In fact, one might assume that such a preference implies personal preference for elimination from the gene pool.
As warmists might reference Hurricane Katrina as a devastating storm caused by global warming I would point out that preventing human domiciles in locations on the coast that are below sea level is one of the main purposes and moral justifications for zoning ordinance. There was no time in the history of human settlization that these locations were above the level of the sea. As the easements of your local zoning board don't define the laws of nature, so they don't repeal the basic physical law - known since Archimedes' time - that water seeks its own level. New Orleans was the site where the word "hurricane" was coined and the nature of the phenomenon was documented as the first three human settlements at that location were wiped out.
Human settlements are by their very nature migratory according to the geographic trends over time. Human constructions are temporal and transitory. Except for things like the pyramids, they're designed to wear out and be replaced over time. For goodness' sake, they're built of wood - and sometimes steel, occasionally concrete but only seldom non-metamorphic stone
Fortunately, since it is a result of human actions, there is actually something we can do about it
The assertion that "we" can do something about it requires a "we" with sufficient coherence to engage in global action at this level without sufficient dissent to defeat that action. I'm afraid I'm going to want a citation for that, as it seems unlikely in the extreme.
Windows is the only one of the set with a multibillion dollar malware ecosystem that makes every browser click and received email a perilous adventure. To the rest, malware is a rare and infrequent nuisance at worst.
And if you need antivirus on your computer, you're doing it wrong.
Fusion power generation requires technologies we do not currently possess. Geothermal does not. These are the officially published figures of the responsible US Government agencies, direct from the source. I don't have to defend them - you got the citation you asked for.
If/when fusion becomes commercially viable, that may be nice too unless it turns out to be too dangerous. But this is now.
If the government permits the defense evidence to be destroyed they may as well give up their case right now. No judge or jury is going to convict after that.
Oh, yeah. Wikipedia is nice and all but since this is a question about geology and energy, let's ask the relevant government agencies, shall we?
This document from USGS shows 550 GWe potential. The science has improved a bit since then. And of course the US was generating 247 GWe of hydroelectric in 2007. Nobody is proposing we get rid of that (well, nobody who's going to get anywhere).
So that's 3/4ths of total power generation needs as baseload power. More than we need until the science improves some more, without cracking a single atom or burning a single gram of hydrocarbon fuel to produce electricity. There is every reason to believe that as we develop enhanced geothermal systems we will improve on the science and efficiency. And the geothermal resources are special in that they're highly dynamic: they can compensate for production changes or outages in non-baseload power like wind and solar in ways that nuclear cannot.
Of course exploiting these resources requires investment, as other energy production technologies do. But enhanced geothermal generation costs less even than nuclear just to get started per GWe, and there aren't the trailing costs and risks. It requires less water than the other methods also. It's geographically distributed, so transmission costs and losses can be lessened. It's a closed loop, so it's as environmentally friendly as it can get. It's no danger to birds or lizards.
Incidentally the EGS hardware can be adapted to capture industrial waste heat also.
I should mention that searching for excess geothermal heat in the near term isn't even necessary. It is quite often found incidental to ongoing oil and natural gas exploration. We know where more than enough resources are to keep engineers busy for a good long time.
This energy transfer from the deep earth to the atmosphere has been going on since the planet was formed. What is proposed is that we stop wasting it.
Once those in control of the climate science debate gained domination of their little corner of acadamia they began to consolidate their position by being abusive toward dissent until they had a core group within which they could shape the academic discourse and control peer review and publication. They had won.
Now of course they go out to sell their strategy to the wider world and they just can't act like courteous, rational folk. They are still in "drive out the heretics" mode who believe they can just tell the world what to believe and how to act based on their authority as the high priests of climate. And that doesn't go over well with the rest of us. You have to sell it until you get enough of a base of consensus in the wider population that you have control in the larger population and can move back into consolidation mode and begin driving out the heretics again.
It's about messaging. To become the tyrant you must first stroke the public with your velvet glove until they are docile and accepting. Then you unglove the iron fist. Not the other way around.
This is the part where the logic fails for me. It's a form of self-hatred to assume that everything that comes of Man's impact on the environment is necessarily unnatural and therefore bad. "Man is causing warming, therefore it must be stopped!" Setting aside for the moment the proof of the assertion, the logical progression requires proof too.
There is also the under-explored question of the consequences of reversing warming.
Above this post is talk of concerns about the flooding of Manhattan as sea levels rise, and that truly is a concern. The other side of that concern though is that in the geologically recent past and in the reversed warming future proposed, kilometer-high glaciers sweep down from Canada and scrape from the bedrock all evidence of life on the Eastern seaboard into the Atlantic ocean. Vast regions of arable land are capped below impenetrable ice. Most of our seven billions die. Maybe even all of us die - we've had a few close calls in the past.
But we don't want to talk about that as being a bad thing. That is the right and natural course and we should aspire to getting back on it no matter how bad it hurts.
There are more than enough geothermal resources in the US to provide the baseload electrical power requirements for the forseeable future without tormenting the demons of the atom and making them angry.
I'm going to go ahead and agree with all of the above commenters that the level of discourse about climate change on both sides is harming our ability to approach the issue rationally and with a purpose.
The americum was. Improving it to dubnium doesn't change the history most of those protons had in the heart of a star. If you've an example for Chlorine fused into Irridium that might be a counter to my initial statement. But you don't because outside of certain types of supernovae, it does not happen.
Patents are "to promote the progress of science and the useful arts."
Unfortunately this phrase is due to its position taken as a null phrase for the purpose of legal action. It doesn't guarantee us our natural right to "progress of science and the useful arts." We're going to have to earn that, probably by force of arms.
Ah, it's silly season again, when the astroturfers for products and companies are displaced somewhat by the astroturfers for politicians. I always hated this part of the cycle. But it is what it is.
The americium-243 was almost certainly formed inside of a star, so... yes. Heavier than iron elements are typically formed in supernovae fusion processes. They may be created in nuclear fusion bombs or experiments also, but not in your specifically referenced experiment - which involved fission.
Myriad wonders the universe has. Bacteria that live two miles beneath the surface of the Earth. Bacteria that subsist on an energy cycle of direct heat conversion. Natural Fission Reactors that can provide energy for such bacteria for billions of years. Frost in interstellar space that condenses on the outside of anything passing through to impossible thickness. Supernovae that blast their planets to smithereens, spreading them across the galaxy.
Snort. We are still not over the ISO corruption scandal. And at this very moment the manchurian CEO is pitching the retirement funds of the entire nation of Finland off of his burning platform, driving unemployment to obscene levels. Finland may never recover, but at the least it will be a generation. Those are only two of many ongoing issues. Let's not talk about how they have changed until they have actually changed.
It's about offering due respect and approaching the Redmond giant with the proper posture. Here is an article from Redmond Channel Insider on minding your Microsoft manners that will be instructive in the proper approach.
You will find that when treated in this civilized way they will treat you about as well as can be expected. Be sure and mention Vista. A LOT. They love that.
Slashdot Mirror
The world changes. It has been changing since before there were men and it will be changing long after we're gone. These changes occur at such a slow rate that noone is in danger of drowning from rising seas. It changes so slowly that residents who live by the sea can enjoy their homes for their whole lives and leave their homes to their children. Then their children's children need must make their homes a few hundred feet inland and if my own experience is a guide to keep your children so close is unlikely at best.
Except for places like South Florida, where thousands of square miles of swamp will become kelp beds instead. This is a big deal, but it's a good thing. We'll want those kelp beds for the algae farms we need to replace the depleted oil, and the vast area of Florida inundated by rising seas is just the place to put that algae farm. Even then we're talking about nearly a thousand years hence. A thousand years ago there weren't but a few hundred people in south Florida.
This very overwrought alarmism is shown in the third link in the fine summary:
If we continue on our current trajectory, which you apparently think is an acceptable one, scientists say there is strong risk temperatures will rise by 5C by 2100. If that happens, the planet will roast, deserts will spread, ice caps will melt, coastal regions will suffer devastating floods and billions will be left homeless. The world's misery will be unparalleled. - Robin McKie to Benny Peiser
The planet will roast, really? The claim that deserts will spread ignores that vast realms of tundra presently under permafrost will become arable land for every acre lost to desertification. Ice caps will melt, and the land presently under glaciers will be ripe for agriculture and human settlement. The "billions will be left homeless" claim ignores that the unborne grandchildren of unborne children do not as yet have homes, and are unlikely to choose homes that are under the sea except in scientific projects to mirror the effects of interstellar colonies. That some fraction of humans must move from unpleasant to more pleasant conditions is just part of the human condition, a burden implied in the survival instinct.
These scientificalist alerts ignore a number of things, chief among them that humans are by nature blessed with the gift of perambulation. Humans are free to not wait by the shore for ten generations for the sea to rise two meters and wipe out their genome. In fact, for humans to so wait requires a multi-generational commitment to geolocation superlative to their survival urge that there is no historical basis for, and a level of external support for same since a useful active human needs must travel in pursuit of food, travel or work at least a few meters per year. In fact, one might assume that such a preference implies personal preference for elimination from the gene pool.
As warmists might reference Hurricane Katrina as a devastating storm caused by global warming I would point out that preventing human domiciles in locations on the coast that are below sea level is one of the main purposes and moral justifications for zoning ordinance. There was no time in the history of human settlization that these locations were above the level of the sea. As the easements of your local zoning board don't define the laws of nature, so they don't repeal the basic physical law - known since Archimedes' time - that water seeks its own level. New Orleans was the site where the word "hurricane" was coined and the nature of the phenomenon was documented as the first three human settlements at that location were wiped out.
Human settlements are by their very nature migratory according to the geographic trends over time. Human constructions are temporal and transitory. Except for things like the pyramids, they're designed to wear out and be replaced over time. For goodness' sake, they're built of wood - and sometimes steel, occasionally concrete but only seldom non-metamorphic stone
Fortunately, since it is a result of human actions, there is actually something we can do about it
The assertion that "we" can do something about it requires a "we" with sufficient coherence to engage in global action at this level without sufficient dissent to defeat that action. I'm afraid I'm going to want a citation for that, as it seems unlikely in the extreme.
Windows is the only one of the set with a multibillion dollar malware ecosystem that makes every browser click and received email a perilous adventure. To the rest, malware is a rare and infrequent nuisance at worst.
And if you need antivirus on your computer, you're doing it wrong.
The bad guys are definitely after Apple and Android now. They had better not get caught with corporate sponsorship or things will go very badly.
Fusion power generation requires technologies we do not currently possess. Geothermal does not. These are the officially published figures of the responsible US Government agencies, direct from the source. I don't have to defend them - you got the citation you asked for.
If/when fusion becomes commercially viable, that may be nice too unless it turns out to be too dangerous. But this is now.
If the government permits the defense evidence to be destroyed they may as well give up their case right now. No judge or jury is going to convict after that.
Oh, yeah. Wikipedia is nice and all but since this is a question about geology and energy, let's ask the relevant government agencies, shall we?
This document from USGS shows 550 GWe potential. The science has improved a bit since then. And of course the US was generating 247 GWe of hydroelectric in 2007. Nobody is proposing we get rid of that (well, nobody who's going to get anywhere).
So that's 3/4ths of total power generation needs as baseload power. More than we need until the science improves some more, without cracking a single atom or burning a single gram of hydrocarbon fuel to produce electricity. There is every reason to believe that as we develop enhanced geothermal systems we will improve on the science and efficiency. And the geothermal resources are special in that they're highly dynamic: they can compensate for production changes or outages in non-baseload power like wind and solar in ways that nuclear cannot.
Of course exploiting these resources requires investment, as other energy production technologies do. But enhanced geothermal generation costs less even than nuclear just to get started per GWe, and there aren't the trailing costs and risks. It requires less water than the other methods also. It's geographically distributed, so transmission costs and losses can be lessened. It's a closed loop, so it's as environmentally friendly as it can get. It's no danger to birds or lizards.
Incidentally the EGS hardware can be adapted to capture industrial waste heat also.
I should mention that searching for excess geothermal heat in the near term isn't even necessary. It is quite often found incidental to ongoing oil and natural gas exploration. We know where more than enough resources are to keep engineers busy for a good long time.
This energy transfer from the deep earth to the atmosphere has been going on since the planet was formed. What is proposed is that we stop wasting it.
For the history we have the emails. For the rest, just look about you here. Do you see calm persuasion going on or browbeating, insults and abuse?
Once those in control of the climate science debate gained domination of their little corner of acadamia they began to consolidate their position by being abusive toward dissent until they had a core group within which they could shape the academic discourse and control peer review and publication. They had won.
Now of course they go out to sell their strategy to the wider world and they just can't act like courteous, rational folk. They are still in "drive out the heretics" mode who believe they can just tell the world what to believe and how to act based on their authority as the high priests of climate. And that doesn't go over well with the rest of us. You have to sell it until you get enough of a base of consensus in the wider population that you have control in the larger population and can move back into consolidation mode and begin driving out the heretics again.
It's about messaging. To become the tyrant you must first stroke the public with your velvet glove until they are docile and accepting. Then you unglove the iron fist. Not the other way around.
This is the part where the logic fails for me. It's a form of self-hatred to assume that everything that comes of Man's impact on the environment is necessarily unnatural and therefore bad. "Man is causing warming, therefore it must be stopped!" Setting aside for the moment the proof of the assertion, the logical progression requires proof too.
There is also the under-explored question of the consequences of reversing warming.
Above this post is talk of concerns about the flooding of Manhattan as sea levels rise, and that truly is a concern. The other side of that concern though is that in the geologically recent past and in the reversed warming future proposed, kilometer-high glaciers sweep down from Canada and scrape from the bedrock all evidence of life on the Eastern seaboard into the Atlantic ocean. Vast regions of arable land are capped below impenetrable ice. Most of our seven billions die. Maybe even all of us die - we've had a few close calls in the past.
But we don't want to talk about that as being a bad thing. That is the right and natural course and we should aspire to getting back on it no matter how bad it hurts.
There are more than enough geothermal resources in the US to provide the baseload electrical power requirements for the forseeable future without tormenting the demons of the atom and making them angry.
I'm going to go ahead and agree with all of the above commenters that the level of discourse about climate change on both sides is harming our ability to approach the issue rationally and with a purpose.
Stuxnet was seeded by CIA agents littering the playing fields of Iranian nuclear plant personnel with abandonded pen drives. I suggested it.
The americum was. Improving it to dubnium doesn't change the history most of those protons had in the heart of a star. If you've an example for Chlorine fused into Irridium that might be a counter to my initial statement. But you don't because outside of certain types of supernovae, it does not happen.
Patents are "to promote the progress of science and the useful arts."
Unfortunately this phrase is due to its position taken as a null phrase for the purpose of legal action. It doesn't guarantee us our natural right to "progress of science and the useful arts." We're going to have to earn that, probably by force of arms.
Ah, it's silly season again, when the astroturfers for products and companies are displaced somewhat by the astroturfers for politicians. I always hated this part of the cycle. But it is what it is.
Dubnium was reportedly first discovered in 1968 at the Joint Institute for Nuclear Research at Dubna (then in the Soviet Union). Researchers there bombarded an americium-243 target with neon-22 ions.
The americium-243 was almost certainly formed inside of a star, so... yes. Heavier than iron elements are typically formed in supernovae fusion processes. They may be created in nuclear fusion bombs or experiments also, but not in your specifically referenced experiment - which involved fission.
Myriad wonders the universe has. Bacteria that live two miles beneath the surface of the Earth. Bacteria that subsist on an energy cycle of direct heat conversion. Natural Fission Reactors that can provide energy for such bacteria for billions of years. Frost in interstellar space that condenses on the outside of anything passing through to impossible thickness. Supernovae that blast their planets to smithereens, spreading them across the galaxy.
where are these life-seeding bolides coming from?
Did you know that all of the elements on Earth heavier than iron were once inside a star? It's true - and not our star, either.
A little over the top? You really think so? I thought it was subtly done. A very nice piece of work.
Snort. We are still not over the ISO corruption scandal. And at this very moment the manchurian CEO is pitching the retirement funds of the entire nation of Finland off of his burning platform, driving unemployment to obscene levels. Finland may never recover, but at the least it will be a generation. Those are only two of many ongoing issues. Let's not talk about how they have changed until they have actually changed.
It's about offering due respect and approaching the Redmond giant with the proper posture. Here is an article from Redmond Channel Insider on minding your Microsoft manners that will be instructive in the proper approach.
You will find that when treated in this civilized way they will treat you about as well as can be expected. Be sure and mention Vista. A LOT. They love that.
The most important lie is the one you tell to yourself.
If you're good at sales you don't need to be working at Best Buy. There are more productive ways to fill your day.