New Study Finds Incredibly High Carbon Pollution Costs -- Especially For the US and India (theguardian.com) 190
An anonymous reader quotes a report from The Guardian: A new study led by UC San Diego's Katharine Ricke published in Nature Climate Change found that not only is the global social cost of carbon dramatically higher than the federal estimate ($37 per ton) -- probably between $177 and $805 per ton, most likely $417 -- but that the cost to America is around $50 per ton. That's the second-highest in the world behind India's $90, and is also higher than the current federal estimate for the global social cost of carbon. That's a remarkable conclusion worth repeating. Ricke's team found that the cost of carbon pollution to just the United States is probably higher than its government's current estimate of costs to the entire world. And the actual global cost is more than 10 times higher than the federal estimate.
[The Guardian's Dana Nuccitelli] asked Ricke to describe her team's approach in this study: To calculate social cost of carbon, you need to answer four questions in sequence:
1. How would the economy change with no climate change (including GHG emissions)?
2. How does the Earth system respond to emissions of carbon dioxide?
3. How does the economy respond to changes in the Earth system?
4. How should we value losses today vs. in (for example) 100 years?
The team answered these questions using four "modules": a socio-economic module to answer the first question, a climate module to address the second, a damages module to investigate the third, and a discounting module to tackle the fourth.
That study detailed the relationship between a country's average temperature and its per capita GDP, finding a sweet spot around 13C (55F). That's the optimal temperature for human economic productivity. Economies in countries with lower average temperatures like Canada and Russia would benefit from additional warming, but it would slow economic growth for nations closer to the equator with hotter temperatures. The United States is currently right near the peak temperature, whereas many European countries like Germany, the UK, and France are 3-5C cooler, and a bit below the ideal economic temperature. So, continued global warming is worse for the US economy than Europe's.
[The Guardian's Dana Nuccitelli] asked Ricke to describe her team's approach in this study: To calculate social cost of carbon, you need to answer four questions in sequence:
1. How would the economy change with no climate change (including GHG emissions)?
2. How does the Earth system respond to emissions of carbon dioxide?
3. How does the economy respond to changes in the Earth system?
4. How should we value losses today vs. in (for example) 100 years?
The team answered these questions using four "modules": a socio-economic module to answer the first question, a climate module to address the second, a damages module to investigate the third, and a discounting module to tackle the fourth.
That study detailed the relationship between a country's average temperature and its per capita GDP, finding a sweet spot around 13C (55F). That's the optimal temperature for human economic productivity. Economies in countries with lower average temperatures like Canada and Russia would benefit from additional warming, but it would slow economic growth for nations closer to the equator with hotter temperatures. The United States is currently right near the peak temperature, whereas many European countries like Germany, the UK, and France are 3-5C cooler, and a bit below the ideal economic temperature. So, continued global warming is worse for the US economy than Europe's.
I don't pay those costs at the pump (Score:3, Insightful)
What's frustrating is the folks demanding a "free market" solution to the problem. Maybe there will be one like there was for getting lead out of gas. After decades and decades of damage done to people's health and well being (and if crime statistics are to be believed our entire nation). What I'm saying is the free market is _slow_. I'll be dead before it fixes things. Probably from Lung cancer.
Re: (Score:1, Informative)
You live in a state where each and every one of the goofball things you believe in is voted into office.
Yet they spend $100 billion to, um, not build a monorail or whatever that thing was.
So, if every one of your goofball ideas is supported and voted on --- and it still ain't workin ...
What have we learned today?
Nobody will support public transportation (Score:2)
Re: (Score:1)
Would I like a public transportation system? You bet. Am I going to get one with the level of corruption in my country?
If you can't beat 'em, join 'em -- can't you buy a few buses, grease a few palms, hire a few drivers, and start your own public transit system?
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
... with the level of corruption in my country? Hell no.
What's frustrating is the folks demanding a "free market" solution to the problem.
As you point out, there are times the free market can be slow. However, absent some external distortion (e.g., the tax code, monopoly, burdensome/unfair regulation, etc.) the free market is by far the most effective and efficient (from a utilization of capital perspective) way to achieve an optimal solution.
In the same way that the scientific method is inherently unbiased, the free market is inherently free of corruption. Now, since people manage to bias the scientific method, you can bet that they also m
Re:I don't pay those costs at the pump (Score:4, Insightful)
the free market is inherently free of corruption
If you don't control the free market, you get concentration of power. If you do control the free market, you get corruption.
Re: (Score:2)
If you don't control the free market, you get concentration of power. If you do control the free market, you get corruption.
If you don't control the market, you will get corruption. If you do control the market, you may get corruption.
Do you have any evidence to back that up? (Score:3)
The difference is that public transport isn
Re: (Score:3)
What's frustrating is the folks demanding a "free market" solution to the problem. Maybe there will be one like there was for getting lead out of gas.
We don't call it a "free market" solution when it's driven by legislation and not by demand. The People demanded cheap gasoline, but The Government demanded removal of lead from gasoline.
Awesom (Score:1)
So tax it! (Score:3, Insightful)
Look, I know we've built our societies on CO2 belching cars and CO2 diarrhetic energy production but it's a real problem that we need to fix. We have the technology to build carbon capture systems remove CO2 from the air with 1000x the efficacy of trees (per square meter) [futurism.com] but it needs to be built and maintained. Therefore it seems only logical that there be a tax on all the things that produce CO2 so that money can be used to capture it. Obviously, this will make lower and non-polluting products far more attractive as they will be cheaper.
The solution is known and it's extremely frustrating that there is a total lack of will to implement it.
Comment removed (Score:4, Insightful)
Re: (Score:1)
If you really wanted to tackle CO2, then dump every bit of R&D into Fusion Energy.
There's this thing called a 'market.' And, almost magically, what this market will do in response to internalising the externalities of climate damage (i.e. "cap and trade / carbon tax") will be to dump R&D into those alternatives to fossil fuels the collective mass of market participants deems to have greatest potential (which may or may not lean towards Fusion Energy).
The advantage of using a method such as cap
Re:So tax it! (Score:5, Interesting)
It's a wealth distribution scheme from polluters to non-polluters.
If you really wanted to tackle CO2, then dump every bit of R&D into Fusion Energy.
Yes, let's bet on a single horse that's still far behind.
Re: (Score:2)
If you really wanted to tackle CO2, then dump every bit of R&D into Fusion Energy.
Fusion energy has been 40 years away for the past 60 years. It's a very hard problem to solve and, while it might be great eventually (assuming the reactors are not too insanely expensive to build) it is not something we can rely on for solving our carbon emissions because, while I hope not, it may still be 40 years away a century from now.
Re:So tax it! (Score:4, Interesting)
All schemes involving cap and trade / carbon tax, etc is nothing more than a wealth redistribution scheme
Eh, kind of. Cap and trade is that. Cap and tax without trade, on the other hand, is an effective CO2 reduction scheme. The trading is the problem, not the cap, nor the tax. The tax is the most sensible part of the entire system, because it has been proven to be effective under capitalist systems. The trading is what breaks it.
Re: (Score:2)
All schemes involving cap and trade / carbon tax, etc is nothing more than a wealth redistribution scheme for the globalists to maintain a neo-feudalism form of global dominance, control, and oppression.
If you really wanted to tackle CO2, then dump every bit of R&D into Fusion Energy. NEVER will happen though as it negates the the real purpose as I've just stated above.
So how is that any different to what you just said you don't want? Giving lots of tax money to the globalist big energy firms.
Re: (Score:2)
And the solution is always: exterminate capitalism immediately, implement worldwide socialism, the United States must pay the staggering cost of the whole thing by impoverishing its people, and we need global governance without any voting or input from the deplorables. The whole thing might be more believable if the "solution" wasn't always the same thing.
Basically nobody is proposing that "solution" beyond a few fringe wackos who think it's a good idea regardless of climate change but are happy to jump on this particular bandwagon. Certainly, market-driven approaches like carbon credit trading and carbon taxation are absolutely nothing of the sort, nor are voluntary international agreements like the Paris Accord.
Market-based capitalism is by far the best system we have for accurately optimizing economic activity. The powerful signalling mechanism that pri
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Climate change is the issue our globalist elites
So you admit you are just an anti-semite nut-job, without any arguments.
Re: (Score:2)
Boy, that came out of left field, didn't it? Globalism is quite real.
Yaeh, it is. And it has nothing to do with Global Warming. And "Global Elite" is a dog whistle. Face what you are - I don't care if its a Nazi, an idiot, or both.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
The "Global Elite" exists. Their annual meeting is held at the World Economic Forum in Davos
Even if you actually believe that - it's called Capitalism. Those people meeting there aren't Communists. Get it into your Nazi/Idiot skull.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:1)
(Posting 'Anonymous' to not undo modderations - JiriW).
It's quite simple, really, if you can read.
The $177-$805 ($417 as the top of the probability curve) costs are the GLOBAL costs of every ton of 'carbon' spewed into the atmosphere.
The $50 for the U.S. and $90 for India costs are the LOCAL most probable costs of those countries for every ton of 'carbon' spewed into the atmosphere.
That means, by simple subtraction, the GLOBAL cost minus the LOCAL costs of those two countries makes the most probable costs o
Re: (Score:2)
Im trying to figure out how $50 and $90 falls between $177 and $805. They state a range and then say the second highest country in the world only costs 1/4 of that, and the highest country is only half the lowest value of this range.
Re: (Score:2)
Im trying to figure out how $50 and $90 falls between $177 and $805. They state a range and then say the second highest country in the world only costs 1/4 of that, and the highest country is only half the lowest value of this range.
What's so hard to understand. The range is for the global (=total) cost, the two smaller are just for the US and India alone. How is that hard to understand - unless you admit you have no idea what you are talking about and are in no way qualified to enter a discussion about the costs of climate change.
Nature's P&L statement day of reckoning... (Score:1)
In summary (Score:5, Informative)
By now we should all be familiar with the Hockey Stick Controversy [wikipedia.org]
Under the "Continuing research" section of the above link, emphasis mine:
Marcott et al. 2013 used seafloor and lake bed sediment proxies to reconstruct global temperatures over the past 11,300 years, the last 1,000 years of which confirmed the original MBH99 hockey stick graph.
In cartoon format:
https://rationalwiki.org/w/ima... [rationalwiki.org]
And a free-market reaction to the above, with other considerations [wikipedia.org]: an alternative energy consumption [insideevs.com] and production [wikipedia.org] paradigm seems to be gaining traction, which seems to be related in some way to recent discussions about melting glaciers and sea level rise [slashdot.org].
Re: (Score:2)
That cartoon [rationalwiki.org] would only be a false dichotomy if environmentalism were not linked with a sincere desire to stay alive.
Activities that contribute to the continued existence of humanity are big business, the biggest, or maybe just the oldest of which is sex. Some like it kinky, some like it painful, some like it in groups, and some only like it after being ritualistically mutilated with a knife as an infant, but one way or another, the end result is more people. Some cultures are more balanced than others, w
Correlation != causation (Score:4, Insightful)
Yes, warm countries are on average less economically successful. That doesn't imply that warming will make a country less successful.
Singapore is right in the tropics, sweltering year round, and is extremely successful. So is Hong Kong, which has only a slightly more tolerable climate. So is Israel, which is in a desert region. In the US, ever since the invention of air conditioning it's been the warm areas, not the cool ones, which have the most economic growth. In both the US and China, the cold regions currently form a stagnating "rust belt".
The reasons why, in other places, economic growth is inversely correlated with temperature, are probably due to history and culture, factors that won't suddenly change if a place warms up.
Re: (Score:1)
Re: (Score:1)
Singapore is right in the tropics, sweltering year round, and is extremely successful.
In what area? This same line of thinking turned the USA into an intellectual property and legal powerhouse, which didn't play well for their long term manufacturing prospects.
Singapore may be successful, they aren't very good in farming, but damn are they successful at something. We can't all be successful at the same thing.
Re: (Score:2)
So is Israel, which is in a desert region.
Israel would be a parking lot if not for the protection of the US.
Alternately, Israel would be Palestine if not for the interference of the US.
Either way, holding up Israel as an example of anything other than extreme interference by foreign governments is ridiculous.
Re: (Score:2)
The issue isn't the temperature being higher, it's that the temperature is _changing_ to a higher point.
This way, areas that used to have an ok-ish average temperature for a certain activity will no longer have that. Every other property of that area - infrastructure, soil, population, etc - however will lag behind that change. Adjusting to that change will be what's going to be astronomically expensive.
Imagine moving all the good 200 year old farming topsoil from California to Oregon. Retraining farmers fr
Re: (Score:2)
Imagine moving all the good 200 year old farming topsoil from California to Oregon. Retraining farmers from one crop to another while buying them all new tools.
I grew up on a farm and I see no problem here. Farmers get "retraining" all the time. There's new seeds, new fertilizers, new pesticides, and even just new techniques on old stuff. Farmers buy new equipment all the time. They get bigger stuff, they get newer stuff, sometime they even trade down as they go into a semi-retirement. Equipment wears out and needs to be replaced. A single combine harvester might last 50 years but trade hands 10 times in that period, and be moved across several states. Also
Re: (Score:2)
In statistics class we were warned on correlation not meaning causation, as well as a related concept of confounding factors. A confounding factor, as I understand it, is something not considered in the data but shows up as something correlated to something as part of the data.
There must be dozens or hundreds of factors that are major contributors to the economic output of a nation, above that of climate differences by a few degrees. I have my own theories on why warmer climates are less successful but I'
Re: (Score:2)
We are doomed (Score:3)
This is a poignant quote from WIndfall which is a book about how people are preparing to make money from climate change:
“It’s a message that says, ‘Yes, forty years from now or a hundred years from now, in 2100, things will be really bad—that’s why you shouldn’t use your energy today.’ If people won’t get that if they have unprotected sex today and it’ll kill you in a few years, why should this other message get across any better? It’s morally bankrupt for the pope to say abstinence only for people to fight HIV—it kills people to say that—and I think that’s a worse sin than fucking."
Re: (Score:2)
And another that shows that nothing has changed in the last 6 years from the date of publication:
Perhaps the most magical assumption of the moment is that our growing belief in climate change will lead to a real effort to stop it. But as I discovered in Canada and Greenland and Sudan and Seattle and all over the globe, that is not automatically true. We are noticing that in this new world, there is new oil to find. There is new cropland to farm. There are new machines to be built. From what I have seen in six years of reporting this book, the climate is changing faster than we are.
Nuclear Power (Score:4, Insightful)
If global warming from CO2 production is a problem then we need to consider all solutions to reduce CO2 production. As it is right now, today, nuclear power produced the least CO2 for the most energy. As it is right now nuclear power is by far the safest energy source we have.
Cite: http://cmo-ripu.blogspot.com/2... [blogspot.com]
Anyone that both desires to reduce CO2 immediately and ban the future development of nuclear power is placing us all into an impossible situation. It's possible to both reduce CO2 and not use nuclear power but that means (as shown by the source I linked to above) much more mining of ores for the production of steel, concrete, glass, copper, aluminum, and so many more raw materials. This comes with costs, in money, lives, and standard of living.
Any problems with nuclear power is local, very local, as in limited to the borders of the power plant and the mines. Releases of material beyond these borders are rare, minute, and can be addressed. Issues of CO2 spreading will be global in nature. Any costs of nuclear power must be balanced with the reduced costs of CO2 output it would produce in replacing coal and natural gas.
Wind and solar involve considerable material costs, far more than nuclear. They also have costs in lives from industrial accidents, far less than any from nuclear power per energy produced. Wind and solar are also unreliable and expensive, which when addressing the unreliability means increasing the costs. There may be places where wind and solar are really cheap, and where pumped hydro storage is also cheap, but these places are rare. Suitable sites for nuclear power, especially fourth generation nuclear, are not rare.
I do not believe global warming to be a problem but I will concede that point if it means we get cheap, reliable, and safe nuclear power.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
wow you seem to be ignoring the extend and harm of a few nuclear plant disasters in the past few decades. problems not local at all, cross many countries.
while I'm not anti-nuclear let's not sugar coat the truth
really solar and energy storage tech has become efficient enough we should go that route, we don't need nuclear any more
Re:Nuclear Power (Score:4, Insightful)
wow you seem to be ignoring the extend and harm of a few nuclear plant disasters in the past few decades. problems not local at all, cross many countries.
You appear to assume new nuclear reactors would be built the same as those that created these disasters. Estimates of the deaths from Chernobyl has been reduced considerably, to the point that even if we continued to build nuclear power like we did in the 1970s we'd still see nuclear power as safer than anything else by orders of magnitude. Fukushima was built before Chernobyl, and had design problems that were left uncorrected even though they were known about for decades. No one will build a nuclear power plant like either of those again, if only because new designs are cheaper while also being safer.
I am not ignoring the extent of the harm, only recognizing that this harm was temporary and we keep these exclusion zones only out of an abundance of caution that many measures show are unnecessary. Again, such concerns are not relevant to modern nuclear power because no one is proposing to build nuclear reactors like those at Fukushima, Chernobyl, or Three Mile Island again. Those were all second generation designs, and all had problems of needing power to put in a safe condition. Third generation designs do not need power to be rendered safe. Fourth generation designs are being tested now and will likely be in demonstration prototypes in less than 10 years, and in production in 5 years after that.
really solar and energy storage tech has become efficient enough we should go that route, we don't need nuclear any more
You think storage will make solar power competitive? Batteries don't care where the energy comes from. We can charge them up with nuclear power. Those batteries would serve nuclear power well for load following, backup power, maintaining grid stability, and perhaps more.
If we can agree that CO2 is a problem then we need nuclear power. That's because nuclear power provides power with a lower CO2 footprint than solar. It also means less environmental impact from mining, land covered, and lives lost. Solar power is also quite expensive compared to nuclear, even today and nuclear power keeps getting cheaper with each generation of development. Any complaints of nuclear power being expensive now are matters of politics, not technology. We can fix policy, and at a low cost. Solar power is inherently unreliable, because the sun goes down, and inherently expensive, because of the resources required. Technology might fix the problems with solar power in the future but today nuclear power is more reliable, lower cost, safer, and lower CO2.
while I'm not anti-nuclear let's not sugar coat the truth
If you continue to repeat such lies, as well as claim we don't need nuclear power, then you are demonstrably anti-nuclear power. How can you both say we don't need nuclear power and claim to be not anti-nuclear? Do you not see the contradiction here?
Let's not "sugar coat the truth", nuclear power has a lower CO2 output per energy produced. If we agree that CO2 output is a problem then we need energy from the lowest CO2 energy source, and that's nuclear power.
WTF is wrong with you? (Score:2)
Get off the nuclear obsession! How can there be so many unpaid trolls for nuclear power?? It is not the solution to all our problems! It is a SIDE SHOW that you debate along with all the other issues but in the USA, the moron masses are just now starting to slightly admit global warming exists and have moved on to the next phase in the P.R. playbook in saying "it's not our fault." It doesn't even make much sense in this context but they adapted it from the playbook; liability doesn't matter with physics
Re: (Score:3)
Get off the nuclear obsession!
Stop with the global warming alarmism! I'll stop giving the obvious solution when people stop bringing up the problem.
When I'm presented with a problem then I want to offer solutions. I've investigated this problem and given the data presented to me I see one solution coming up again and again, nuclear power. I also see other solutions, such as wind and solar power, but no one seems to be opposed to those but those solutions are going to be insufficient to solve the problem.
By the time you build a new plant -- which takes a decade-- grid batteries will easily work to scale at a lower price
Okay then, problem solved, rig
What is wrong with you?: Thank you for showing (Score:2)
Now I know, some of the rest of us now do too.
BTW, I am not against practical nuclear power and I'm heavily pro-research.
Re: (Score:2)
Get off the nuclear obsession!
Stop with the global warming alarmism! [...] When I'm presented with a problem then I want to offer solutions.
Global warming is a real problem, and you only want to offer fake solutions.
Concerns on terrorism, the economy, jobs, and so many other problems that shows up in national polling can be, at least in part, be solved with nuclear power.
It's funny you bring up the economy, since there are economic reasons why wind and solar are more desirable than nuclear. Even if there weren't other valid reasons to choose them over nuclear power, that would be enough since we live in the real world, and the real world is capitalistic.
You want me to shut up about nuclear power? Then shut up about global warming.
Yes, and no, respectively. Nuclear power makes sense on literally no level.
Re: (Score:2)
if your goal is to stop buring oil, gas, and coal, then why oppose nuclear? Who said the solution had to be just one? We dont have enough wind/solar to provide power for the planet. Wind power cannot work everywhere. Its geographically limited to how much you can get out of wind. Solar works well in locations that get peak sun throughout the day (like arizona) but I am fairly certain that it isnt going to be worth a shit in Anchorage, AK. So why not use nuclear, instead of coal, while we work on other sourc
Re:Nuclear Power (Score:4, Interesting)
okay, let's forget about reactors, the real danger is the spent fuel ponds. those are a more massive danger than the reactors.
I'm not lying, I speak from reason. I've worked as engineer at nuke plant, have you?
Re: (Score:2)
okay, let's forget about reactors, the real danger is the spent fuel ponds. those are a more massive danger than the reactors.
There's no point in engaging the nuclear playboys because they will either give up at this point, or start blathering about reprocessing that fuel even though it's a non-starter because it is expensive and hazardous. To them, no risk is too great to justify the technology that they are in love with.
Re: (Score:2)
Solar power is inherently unreliable, because the sun goes down, and inherently expensive, because of the resources required.
There are more systems than solar panels, like concentrated solar power. They are built so when the sun does set the power is still flowing.
Re: (Score:2)
That link you posted contains horse shit claims, so I don't believe anything they say. For instance, they claim that wind farms take up a lot of space, which is nonsense. The space "used" by wind and solar farms can be shared with other purposes, so they effectively take up only the square footage covered by footings. It also handwaves away the problem of waste disposal.
Meanwhile, you are handwaving away the problem of water contamination from nuclear tailings as if it didn't exist, but it does. In that reg
Humanity needs to evolve quickly (Score:2)
We don't inherit the earth, we borrow it from our descendants. We have no have right to incur a debt that our descendants must pay. People need to understand that environmental damage is stealing from our descendants.
Unfortunately, humanity has not evolved yet a healthy form of government that the prote
Just fix it already (Score:2)
You crazy Americans need to get over your love affair with coal.
Dam your rivers. Build your nuclear plants. Supplement both with solar and wind arrays. Stop listening to your NIMBY's. Use modern technology for goodness sake.
Re: (Score:2)
Use modern technology for goodness sake.
I prefer to use the best-fit technology, not the newest one simply for newness' sake. Wind power was invented centuries ago, and the wind's still blowing so it still works.
Re: (Score:2)
Yes, perhaps I should have said use modern technology where it makes sense to. Would that have made it more clear for you?
Wind power may have been invented centuries ago, but it has only in the past few decades been used to generate electricity on a large scale. It's getting increasingly difficult for Americans to build anything like a wind farm or hydro dam, because they keep listening to the selfish NIMBY's, thus ensuring the idiotic status quo. The correct course of action is to ignore and marginalise
Re:Cause.. Meet effect. (Score:4, Insightful)
They are making so many cause and effect assumptions here it is just mind-blowing..
1. The Earth is warming.
2. We are probably the major cause.
3. Our actions are certainly the only knob we can control.
4. It is reckless to change how the only life supporting planet you got works, particularly if you have no viable plan to undo the mess once it gets too far.
5. At minimum we need to compute the cost of action vs the cost of inaction to society, which seems to be what the study does.
Re: (Score:2)
They don't calculate the cost of action, that cost is going to be industry specific and the curve will be exponential to the reduction percentage. What percentage of people are you comfortable putting below the cost of living in order to reduce CO2 emissions?
Re: (Score:3)
Fracking destroyed those economies. Cheaper natural gas replaced cheap coal. It was the market at work, not Obama.
Re: (Score:2)
And minorities have less education and are hired less often. It's not racism, it's the market.
Maybe you were just being sarcastic and this was your point, but minorities have less education because of the willful sacking of our education system... along racist lines.
Re: (Score:3)
if any of them mine bitcoins they should be slapped. If their answer is using less energy to reduce output, then wasting it on useless hash algorithms seems rather hypocritical. Something like a few percent of the entire world consumption is attributed to crytocurrency mining. In one day more KWH are wasted on mining that the entire island of Puerto Rico consumes in a year (pre hurricane levels)
Re:Cause.. Meet effect. (Score:5, Insightful)
Ask a farmer if temperatures affect yield.
Re:Cause.. Meet effect. (Score:4, Informative)
Ask a farmer if temperatures affect yield.
Well here in Australia this so-called climate change is having absolutely no effect on farmers [theguardian.com] at all! No wait ...
Re: (Score:2)
I will believe Australia is taking global warming seriously when they start building nuclear power plants.
Nuclear power has the lowest CO2 output per energy produced than any energy source we have currently with a possible exception for hydroelectric. Nuclear power is also the safest energy source we have, as measured by deaths per energy produced. Any other problems anyone might raise are nothing compared to global warming, assuming that there is in fact man made global warming.
cite: http://cmo-ripu.blo [blogspot.com]
Re: (Score:2)
Not quite. Nuclear cannot respond quickly enough to account for fluctuations in wind power.
Neither can coal, and yet Australia burns a lot of coal. As does Germany, another country brought up as an example of the "success" of wind power.
For that, you need spinning reserve, like a hydro dam or a natural gas turbine. Nuclear is a possible solution but has societal tradeoffs that other energy technologies do not have.
Everything has trade offs. Nuclear power has the lowest CO2 produced per energy produced of any energy source we have today. Nuclear power is far safer than even wind and solar. What trade offs are there that go with this? Well, there's the easily addressed waste to be disposed of. This is a far easier problem than the waste from solar power, and perhaps eve
Re:Cause.. Meet effect. (Score:4, Informative)
California farmer or flyover state hayseed farmer?
Temperature affects both.
Higher temperatures can put a California almond farmer out of business.
Higher temperatures will extend the growing season and increase yields for a North Dakota wheat farmer.
Temperature matters.
Re: (Score:2)
Higher temperatures will extend the growing season and increase yields for a North Dakota wheat farmer.
Extend the growing season, yes. But decrease rainfall. Will that increase yields? Nope. Also, in the middle of the growing season you'll get temperatures that actually retard growth, since plants shut down at high temps to protect themselves (largely to retain water by reducing respiration.)
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
It has the capacity to hold more moisture, meaning it can also cause more evaporation.
Re: (Score:2)
Warmer air tends to hold moisture better, doesn't it?
Yeah, that's why it's alway raining in deserts - it's warmer there after all.
Re: (Score:2)
Indeed - and in fact, prevailing weather has an effect on shopping habits. Apparently, we're not so keen to go shopping when it's blowing a gale outside, nor do we like it when it's too hot.
So in fact, GDP is very much linked to temperature. Sure, maybe not all of it, but it has a noticeable effect on it.
Re: (Score:2)
It is 'typical' of most economic reports. The numbers are basically made up.
Yeah. Only the economic reports proving that caring about the environment will ruin the economy have the right numbers.
Re: (Score:1, Troll)
I meant to include this link... slashdot does not permit editing so... here it is:
https://www.technologyreview.c... [technologyreview.com]
Re: (Score:1)
Re: (Score:2)
im waiting to see if that solid-state lithium battery that doesnt require slow charging makes it to market. Rapid charging batteries will overcome one of the largest hindrances to electric vehicles. Price being the other one. Show me a car that is less than $30,000, can go more than 300 miles on a single charge, can be fully recharged inside of 5 minutes, and still looks like a car people want to drive and take trips in(not some bicycle frame or something barely counting) and the problem will solve itself.
Re: (Score:2)
all the fuel savings from switching to LEDs was offset by all the goddamn bitcoin mining
Re:US CO2 emissions are strongly down (Score:5, Insightful)
US NUMBERS FOR CO2 HAVE BEEN FALLING FOR MANY YEARS!!!!!!
When do you expect them to hit zero, with things going they way they are ?
Keep in mind that natural gas replacing coal is just a one time picking of low hanging fruit.
Re: (Score:2)
>"When do you expect them to hit zero, with things going they way they are ?"
With or without crashing the economy? That is the first question to ask, and a very important one. If it is artificially pushed too hard, then we will completely lose the ability to change at all. Solutions that work AND that make economic sense will be those implemented all on their own, without much resistance. Look at LED lighting for an example of a huge win.
Then consider that market forces have been moving on the proble
Re: (Score:3)
>"In just 4hours enough NEW bitmining machines are added to the equation to undermine every milliwatt-hour of energy saved over the last decade from my LED bulbs. "
Well, that is not only true, but very frustrating. At least you know you did what you could, and it will help YOUR energy bill to boot. I agree with you that the whole bitmining thing really is a huge mess.... I imagine the only thing that could help deal with it is to make it uneconomical by constantly step-raising the pricing on such user
Re: (Score:2)
Why do they need to hit zero?
Zero is not enough. The plan set out in the Paris Accord assumes that we'll go beyond zero and begin taking CO2 out of the atmosphere.
so where exactly along this long line of production do you expect to emit a negative value to overcome nature
It's not that we need to "overcome nature", it's that we need to overcome history. We've already put a lot of CO2 into the atmosphere and because the natural processes that remove it are very slow the only way to get the climate back into a normal [*] state and stop the warming effect (much less reverse the warming that has already occurred) is to lower the present CO2 leve
Re: (Score:2)
wasn't there a way to turn coal into oil? I asked because at one time Gasoline was a possible fuel source for hydrogen powered cars. Its full of hydrogen. Instead of buring it the hydrogen was stripped out, by the car, and fed to the combustion chamber. IF they can do that with gas, then, in theory, they should be able to do that with coal.
Re: (Score:3)
If US numbers were climbing then you could maybe argue the US should do its part to cut back. But US numbers are going down. We're doing our part. And that's before you account for all the carbon sink qualities of US territory.
By your reasoning above, a gruesome analogy would be that you would prefer murder by throwing someone off a cliff because it takes orders of magnitude longer to die than simply shooting someone in the head with a gun.
So... Enough. Go whine to China or possibly Europe who's numbers UNLIKE US NUMBERS are not going down.
Look it up.
I looked, and this is what I found:
https://www.reuters.com/articl... [reuters.com]
Maybe global climate change is caused by humans, maybe it's not, but regardless, it does seem to be occurring. So slowing down behavior that is known to be environmentally destructive is good, but patting oneself on the back f
Re: (Score:2)
US numbers are down and consistently down.
Look around the world, very few countries anywhere in the world can make the same claim.
Bitch at them. We're not the problem.
Re: (Score:2)
Yes, the trend in US CO2 emissions is declining. The net emissions of CO2 from the US is still massively positive.
Agreed, many other countries do not have a declining trend. Yet. They have no way to invest in battery gigafactories, or solar cell manufacturing, or high-tech clean energies. They are simply trying to thrive,or just survive, with what they have. We lead, the rest of the world follows. Or would you suggesting we abdicate technical leadership in technologies to mitigate global climate chang
Re: (Score:2)
So, you're in support of nuclear power?
Because we could do that to solve some of the problem.
Re: (Score:2)
So, you're in support of nuclear power?
Because we could do that to solve some of the problem.
So, you're in support of wind and solar? Because they work just as well to solve the problem, but they can built faster and more cheaply even when the cost of storage is accounted for. Surely if you're falling back on the "pragmatism" argument you can agree that we should go with the most pragmatic options, that is to say what we can achieve most rapidly and with the greatest cost benefit — and that is wind and solar power, not nuclear.
Re: (Score:2)
First, nice to know you care more about your anti nuclear position than you do about boiling the earth with CO2.
Second, renewables are not ready for rollout in the developing world and on that basis alone fail to solve the problem. Nuclear with some security concerns addressed could do that. It is why you see this tech happening in China and India but renewables are not economical and thus are not invested in to any great extent in these countries.
Third, the developed world can deploy renewables at great ex
Re: (Score:2)
First, nice to know you care more about your pro-nuclear position than you do about providing solutions that help people more than by just lining the pockets of big energy companies.
Renewable energy in developing Countries [wikipedia.org].
and specifically, in India. [medium.com]
IF you're not willing to be sensible on the matter though then you've more or less outed yourself as not really caring about CO2 or overall long term environmental costs, and you are instead focusing entirely on your own little pet project and myopic view of the
Re: (Score:2)
Renewables cannot do that and even what little they can do is at best highly uneconomical.
The real world economics that I've hinted at in an earlier reply contradicts your statement.
Your god is a lie and I will not drink your koolaid. ;-)
I have no god, only theories and testable data, including economic data.
Lots and lots of data. [wikipedia.org]
Re: (Score:2)
I asked you to point at what you were vaguely suggesting existed... but which you still haven't actually brought forward.
I could as easily say you're wrong and cite: www.google.com
Kindly point at what specifically you're referring to so it can be audited. Whilst some people feel that being vague has rhetorical value in that it is hard to know if someone is wrong and very hard to prove someone wrong when they are very vague... it also renders your argument effectively incoherent.
I say for the second post in
Re: (Score:2)
First, nice to know you care more about your anti nuclear position than you do about boiling the earth with CO2.
I care about not harming the biosphere with CO2 or nuclear power, and I reject your false dichotomy.
Second, renewables are not ready for rollout in the developing world and on that basis alone fail to solve the problem.
Who told you that, and why are you repeating it? Distributed renewables make much more sense in the developing world than exorbitantly expensive capital-intensive projects like nuclear plants, not least because their lack of political instability makes them vulnerable to attack.
Third, the developed world can deploy renewables at great expense. The advocates of these technologies are often create unrealistic projections which ironically retard adoption.
Unrealistic projects? You mean like "too cheap to meter"? You mean like the decommissioning of literally every nuclear power plant ev
Re: (Score:2)
The problem is that you're not going to get CO2 emissions significantly down absent nuclear power.
And anti nuclear activism of which you've apparently completely fallen for is a good litmus test for ideological zealotry on environmental issues.
Nuclear power is actually very safe with most of the problems being extreme outlier contexts. The Chernobyl for example was a very old reactor design that had its safeties intentionally turned off. It was a worst case scenario. It was effectively sabotage some some in
Re: (Score:2)
Your renewables are hardly better environmentally if you consider other pollutants.
What? Yes they are. They are drastically better.
The solar and wind options are increasingly requiring batteries... which tends to mean heavy metals...
The amounts of heavy metals have been decreasing, and the metals are aggressively recycled from batteries.
and the electronics often demand lots of rare earths.
No, they don't. Rare earths are used in minuscule quantities.
Lithium is quite a bit rarer than is petroleum.
Lithium doesn't increase global warming, and can be processed from seawater.
What is more, there are land use issues with your applications.
Name them.
on site solar and wind is dramatically more efficient.
No, it isn't. It's slightly more efficient, and even that only when the point of consumption is also an ideal point of production.
Dumping solar and wind into the general grid is inefficient when the power is defuse,
The word you're apparently looking for is "diffuse", which means in this context
Re: (Score:2)
Want a battery factory in your neighborhood or do you want to walk that bullshit back?
There is a reason most of this stuff is manufactured in places with lax to no environmental regulation.
Which is ironic because you guys seem so keen on the environment... and yet you rely on China and India basically not applying any of those ethics to produce your products with any kind of economy.
And to make things funnier... they power the factories to do this with Coal and Nuclear. You'd think a solar power panel compa
Re: (Score:2)
Want a battery factory in your neighborhood or do you want to walk that bullshit back?
Of course I do. I want there to be more of them all over the place, so that we can move forward with effective technology. Fact is, though, nobody would put one in my neighborhood anyway. I live on the coast.
There is a reason most of this stuff is manufactured in places with lax to no environmental regulation.
Right, that's why Tesla built their battery factory in the USA. Wait, what? True, our environmental protections are being dismantled, but the factory went up before Trump.
As one Californian to another, know that I've had more than my fill of conversations with enviro-cultists.
So what? What does that prove, or even indicate?
I "ACTUALLY" care about the environment.
I'm glad you put that in quotes since you actually don't give a fuck.
And to make things funnier... they power the factories to do this with Coal and Nuclear. You'd think a solar power panel company would be swimming in their own cheap solar. But they're not.
You would think
Re: (Score:2)
Underrated post! May sound stupid but I got halfway through the summary confused before I realized they meant CO2, not Carbon.
Re: (Score:1)
May sound stupid but I got halfway through the summary confused before I realized they meant CO2, not Carbon.
It doesn't sound stupid (as in intellectually disabled), but it's very clear you have not been paying attention for the past decade or two. 'Carbon' in this context, as a short hand for atmospheric carbon in the form of C02 and CH4 is by now very well established. Nor was that the point OP was attempting to make.
Re: (Score:2)
Don't worry, it's just temporary like income tax. Soon as we're done paying for WW2, we'll get rid of the tax, we swear!