Mal4Prez nails the climate change debate...

POSTED BY: kpo
UPDATED: Tuesday, October 11, 2011 04:17
VIEWED: 12057
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BYTEMITE

Saturday, October 8, 2011 2:53 AM

Quote:
science is not opinion

Science is, however, competing ideas and data sets, and I still think people are misunderstanding that DT DOES in fact think that GW exists and people contribute to it.

He just doesn't think people are the primary factor, though one of our actions - slash and burn deforestation - might be.

Quote:
Don't pollute your living space.

I believe I speak for everyone when I say everyone agrees.

M52NICKERSON

Saturday, October 8, 2011 2:26 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by Bytemite:
Science is, however, competing ideas and data sets, and I still think people are misunderstanding that DT DOES in fact think that GW exists and people contribute to it.

He just doesn't think people are the primary factor, though one of our actions - slash and burn deforestation - might be.

It is not an issue of what he thinks, but that fact that how he is trying to back it up does not pan out. Nor do his attacks against the competing ideas.

I do not fear God, I fear the ignorance of man.

BYTEMITE

Saturday, October 8, 2011 3:27 PM

Quote:
but that fact that how he is trying to back it up does not pan out.

Partially. His point about geothermal heat being the primary contribution to air temperature was incorrect, and both Mal4Prez and I corrected him. However, the numbers he's presented about the amount of CO2 in the air, the biomass, and sequestered in carbonate are verifiable (though not concrete). If you mean HOW he's presented them, then yes, he hasn't endeared himself to any of you.

The question here, given the measurements of the amount of CO2 and the sources and sinks, is if DT proposes a valid model for the behaviour of that CO2, the effect on climate, and humanity's role in that, or if anything is overlooked/missing that might then lean more towards humanity having a bigger impact.

While I do believe there is climate change, and humans are driving it, I don't think there is an accepted model yet for how it is acting. That's why I'm willing to listen to alternative models, so long as I think that the logic or basis behind those models raises any valid points. Challenges only build and refine the models we do have. A better understanding of what is happening will give us a better end decision.

KWICKO

Saturday, October 8, 2011 3:35 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by Bytemite:
Quote:
science is not opinion

Science is, however, competing ideas and data sets, and I still think people are misunderstanding that DT DOES in fact think that GW exists and people contribute to it.

He just doesn't think people are the primary factor, though one of our actions - slash and burn deforestation - might be.

Quote:
Don't pollute your living space.

I believe I speak for everyone when I say everyone agrees.

Byte, here's the thing, here's where the disagreement comes from:

If you have a particular chemical in the air in a room that's survivable at 1ppm, but not at 100ppm, and you introduce 99ppm of it into the air, it's a bit ridiculous to try to claim that you had no part in the deaths of the people in that room.

In other words, it doesn't matter HOW the GW is being helped along by human actions; it matters THAT it's being helped along by human actions. Even if we only contribute 1% to the GW, if that 1% makes the difference between reaching the tipping point or not, then we're the last straw.

Arguing that deforestation is worse than industrial output is like arguing that burning to death is better than choking to death. Neither is optimal, because you're still dead at the end of either event. And it's giving us a false choice: You can either worry about pollution, or you can worry about deforestation. What, I can't worry about more than one thing at a time? I can't work for two solutions?

[NOTE: I'm not arguing with you, Byte - I'm trying to show where I think people have an issue with DT's argument.]

BTW, if people aren't a primary factor, but their actions are, then people ARE a primary factor, at least until you get them to stop said actions!

"Although it is not true that all conservatives are stupid people, it is true that most stupid people are conservatives." - John Stuart Mill

M52NICKERSON

Saturday, October 8, 2011 8:14 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by BYTEMITE:
Quote:
but that fact that how he is trying to back it up does not pan out.

Partially. His point about geothermal heat being the primary contribution to air temperature was incorrect, and both Mal4Prez and I corrected him. However, the numbers he's presented about the amount of CO2 in the air, the biomass, and sequestered in carbonate are verifiable (though not concrete). If you mean HOW he's presented them, then yes, he hasn't endeared himself to any of you.

The question here, given the measurements of the amount of CO2 and the sources and sinks, is if DT proposes a valid model for the behaviour of that CO2, the effect on climate, and humanity's role in that, or if anything is overlooked/missing that might then lean more towards humanity having a bigger impact.

While I do believe there is climate change, and humans are driving it, I don't think there is an accepted model yet for how it is acting. That's why I'm willing to listen to alternative models, so long as I think that the logic or basis behind those models raises any valid points. Challenges only build and refine the models we do have. A better understanding of what is happening will give us a better end decision.

DT thinking is pretty sound, the thing is he misses some important facts along the way. Examples...

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One milliliter of TCE in your water can kill you. Doesn't it bother you that the president's energy plan currently calls for pouring a million gallons of it into your water supply?

One milliliter in how much water? Yes if you ingest one milliliter of Trichloroethylene in a day, or a few you will be bad off. Of course at those levels you will be able to smell and taste it. Not to mention that fact that the franking does not pour millions of gallons of anything into any water supply.

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The co2 consumption of photosynthesis is 2,000 times the total human industrial production. The reason co2 is rising is that we cut the consumption through environmental destruction.

The second part of this makes sense, the first part does not take into account that that along with Human industrial production you also have natural CO2 production.

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Any theory involving climate should first know what the fuck it is and how it works. The median temperature of the earth is drawn to a geothermal mean, as per the gradient, by means of convection.

One, convection only happens in liquid or gas mediums. Second, the geothermal mean has little to do with surface temperatures. He does have a point that forested area tend to be cooler and part of that is that there is more water to absorb energy in evaporation. He seems to miss that the oceans would also have this affect and at much larger levels.

The biggest thing he does is to assume that Climate Scientists have not thought about the things he has brought up and considered them. Hell in one place he even questions the greenhouse effect.

I do not fear God, I fear the ignorance of man.

BYTEMITE

Sunday, October 9, 2011 12:04 AM

Good points on those. I only really have one that I want to talk about.

Quote:
One milliliter of TCE in your water can kill you. Doesn't it bother you that the president's energy plan currently calls for pouring a million gallons of it into your water supply?

One milliliter in how much water? Yes if you ingest one milliliter of Trichloroethylene in a day, or a few you will be bad off. Of course at those levels you will be able to smell and taste it. Not to mention that fact that the franking does not pour millions of gallons of anything into any water supply.

I think this one is actually a pretty major concern.

The nytimes predicts that one well can in fact produce about a million gallons of wastewater.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/02/27/us/27gas.html

"With hydrofracking, a well can produce over a million gallons of wastewater that is often laced with highly corrosive salts, carcinogens like benzene and radioactive elements like radium, all of which can occur naturally thousands of feet underground. Other carcinogenic materials can be added to the wastewater by the chemicals used in the hydrofracking itself."

Then you have to be concerned about how you're using that wastewater, such as some counties calling it "brine" and using it to de-ice roads. That puts the wastewater right back in the groundwater, the surface aquifers even, not just stuff deep down that doesn't effect anything (and when you fracture those layers, I'm not sure that's true anymore). And then not all the waste water you put down in a well comes back up.

It's true that the water in places is being set on fire because of the methane being released from the pockets, but that suggests a fairly significant contamination, that surely can't be good to drink... Or breathe, in the case of infiltration.

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There were more than 493,000 active natural-gas wells in the United States in 2009, almost double the number in 1990. Around 90 percent have used hydrofracking to get more gas flowing, according to the drilling industry.

Nationwide that's predicted the industry will double that number of wells in the next two decades.

1 million total wells. Millionish gallons of waste water.

Times together, that's a trillion or more gallons of wastewater being produced, that we have a poor idea how it's being disposed of. One percent of the waste water is some nasty toxic chemicals. Think evap ponds, think loopholes with sewage plants, this stuff appears to be largely being put right back into the ecosystem.

I don't think this is a crank, at all. Calling it a war might be a bit much because I'm not sure the industry is meaning to destroy the drinking water, but I think it's very serious, and I think that could be an end result.

KWICKO

Sunday, October 9, 2011 12:11 AM

Thank you, Byte. You're awesome! Good info there, and something that definitely bears thought.

M52NICKERSON

Sunday, October 9, 2011 12:26 AM

Quote:
Originally posted by BYTEMITE:
I don't think this is a crank, at all. Calling it a war might be a bit much because I'm not sure the industry is meaning to destroy the drinking water, but I think it's very serious, and I think that could be an end result.

It is not crank at all. What is crank is claiming it is a conspiracy. Or ignoring that volatile organic chemicals, such as TCE are not that hard to remove from water. Or claiming that waste water treatment is just dilution.

DT has some good thoughts, he just jumps to far in his conclusions and has gaps in the knowledge that forms the base of his arguments.

I do not fear God, I fear the ignorance of man.

BYTEMITE

Sunday, October 9, 2011 12:36 AM

Quote:
Or ignoring that volatile organic chemicals, such as TCE are not that hard to remove from water.

Actually, that really kind of depends on the horizontal and vertical extent of the spill, and the initial contamination. TCE is a DNAPL, it sinks, but also soluble and able to be mobilized with disturbance by most common forms of clean up.

For a surface spill clean up that IS easy. But say you have degreasing operations that have occurred on an air force base for about a decade, then they switched to a different chemical and started being more careful, but serious TCE impacts exist in downgradient neighborhoods across near an entire city almost forty years later. Or, say you have a dry cleaner from the 1900s that kept several wastewater separator vaults around (about five), and buried them, and concentrations in those vault were about 50% product. You have a continuous leak from the vault over near a century, and contamination all the way down from ten feet to about 100 feet. Even a combined injection of surfactant and microbes has not been sufficient to clean up the mess, and obviously excavation to the furthermost depths is not really feasible.

These are situations I have encountered in the field.

M52NICKERSON

Sunday, October 9, 2011 12:43 AM

Quote:
Originally posted by BYTEMITE:
Quote:
Or ignoring that volatile organic chemicals, such as TCE are not that hard to remove from water.

Actually, that really kind of depends on the horizontal and vertical extent of the spill, and the initial contamination. TCE is a DNAPL, it sinks, but also soluble and able to be mobilized with disturbance by most common forms of clean up.

For a surface spill clean up that IS easy. But say you have degreasing operations that have occurred on an air force base for about a decade, then they switched to a different chemical and started being more careful, but serious TCE impacts exist in downgradient neighborhoods across near an entire city almost forty years later. Or, say you have a dry cleaner from the 1900s that kept several wastewater separator vaults around (about five), and buried them, and concentrations in those vault were about 50% product. You have a continuous leak from the vault over near a century, and contamination all the way down about 100 feet. Even a combined injection of surfactant and microbes has not been sufficient to clean up the mess.

These are situations I have encountered in the field.

I meant removal from water supplies at the water treatment plants themselves. Sorry for not making that clear.

I inspect a handful of water plants that have forced draft, or pack tower aeration systems to strip volatiles now.

I do not fear God, I fear the ignorance of man.

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