Pollution Cuts Have Diminished 'Ship Track' Clouds, Adding To Global Warming (science.org) 134
Paul Voosen writes via Science: Regulations imposed in 2020 by the United Nations's International Maritime Organization (IMO) have cut ships' sulfur pollution by more than 80% and improved air quality worldwide. The reduction has also lessened the effect of sulfate particles in seeding and brightening the distinctive low-lying, reflective clouds that follow in the wake of ships and help cool the planet. The 2020 IMO rule "is a big natural experiment," says Duncan Watson-Parris, an atmospheric physicist at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography. "We're changing the clouds."
By dramatically reducing the number of ship tracks, the planet has warmed up faster, several new studies have found. That trend is magnified in the Atlantic, where maritime traffic is particularly dense. In the shipping corridors, the increased light represents a 50% boost to the warming effect of human carbon emissions. It's as if the world suddenly lost the cooling effect from a fairly large volcanic eruption each year, says Michael Diamond, an atmospheric scientist at Florida State University.
The natural experiment created by the IMO rules is providing a rare opportunity for climate scientists to study a geoengineering scheme in action -- although it is one that is working in the wrong direction. Indeed, one such strategy to slow global warming, called marine cloud brightening, would see ships inject salt particles back into the air, to make clouds more reflective. In Diamond's view, the dramatic decline in ship tracks is clear evidence that humanity could cool off the planet significantly by brightening the clouds. "It suggests pretty strongly that if you wanted to do it on purpose, you could," he says. The findings are available in a new preprint in Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics (ACP).
By dramatically reducing the number of ship tracks, the planet has warmed up faster, several new studies have found. That trend is magnified in the Atlantic, where maritime traffic is particularly dense. In the shipping corridors, the increased light represents a 50% boost to the warming effect of human carbon emissions. It's as if the world suddenly lost the cooling effect from a fairly large volcanic eruption each year, says Michael Diamond, an atmospheric scientist at Florida State University.
The natural experiment created by the IMO rules is providing a rare opportunity for climate scientists to study a geoengineering scheme in action -- although it is one that is working in the wrong direction. Indeed, one such strategy to slow global warming, called marine cloud brightening, would see ships inject salt particles back into the air, to make clouds more reflective. In Diamond's view, the dramatic decline in ship tracks is clear evidence that humanity could cool off the planet significantly by brightening the clouds. "It suggests pretty strongly that if you wanted to do it on purpose, you could," he says. The findings are available in a new preprint in Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics (ACP).
Yes, but also, no. (Score:1)
What has actually happened is the the short-term effects of sulfates has dissipated and as a result, we are experiencing the full impact of our atmosphere. Ships generate and incredible amount of CO2 (one ship can emit the same as millions of cars) so this is an improvement. So yes, in the short-term it's warmer but CO2 it's not emitting will make it even hotter in the long-term.
You still amputate an arm because while it may be painful in the short-term, the alternative is worse in the long-term.
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You still amputate an arm because while it may be painful in the short-term, the alternative is worse in the long-term.
Indeed. We can forget about those 1.5C though, as the calculations that still see us making them do not really include that effect. On track for 2C now. That will get really uncomfortable.
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How do you reconcile the impact of your actions with the suffering they cause?
We can build more production more rapidly and with lower ecological impact by using solar and wind. How do you reconcile your bullshit with reality?
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How do you reconcile your bullshit with reality?
Speaking of reality: one country deeply decarbonized its electricity grid with nuclear, hydro and solar/wind nowadays, in the 70s. That's France, and that's reality. Took them ~10 years.
How many countries deeply decarbonized their electricity grid with only solar/wind? Oh yeah, zero. Germany has been going at it for the last 30 years (and 500 billion), and is still emitting ~8-9 times more than France per kWh.
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ARE YOU FUCKING STUIPID OR WHAT? France nearly had country-wide grid failure last winter 21 and winter 22 again because of their failed nuclear strategy. They got _very_ lucky with the weather. Those coal plants in Germany morons like you keep harping on about? They were up to prop up fucking _France_, the Germans did not need them at all. Those reactors that had their run-times extended in Germany? There as emergency reserve for fucking _France_ again, zero German need form them. The reason I pay more for
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o rly? Momentary issue due to required maintenance is NOT failure of the system
AND France continues to supply energy to German [ceicdata.com], which has in-advisably shut down their nuclear power plants in favor of dirty brown coal that makes global warming worse
PARIS, Dec 14 (Reuters) - France's Finance Minister and a leading executive at the country's RTE grid system stepped up messages of reassurance on Wednesday that the country can avoid power cuts this winter, even as a spell of freezing cold weather swept across Eu
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France nearly had country-wide grid failure last winter 21 and winter 22
Mate, 2021 saw no issues (net exporter of electricity, 43 TWh). 2022 they had to import ~1.3% of their electricity usage (16 TWh) in July/August/September... Not even in winter, as you like to believe. More details in this report [euractiv.com] (oh dear, a link with actual sources, you should try that sometimes). That was after being net exporter for 50 years (I guess it's easier to forget that), and being net exporter again in 2023.
And even in 2022, they didn't have "nearly country-wide grid failure". They put a country-
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Unless you have a time machine and are going to distribute solar panels in the past it does little to change the situation that we are in now
In all cases, it is worthwhile to figure out how we got here by rejecting nuclear power and rapidly expanding the use of coal and other fossil fuels, in order to avoid similar problems in the future
Lesson of the day: Anti-nuclear opposition resulted in current situation, learn from past and avoid being mislead by emotional arguments from enviro groups paid off by fossi
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You bear direct responsibility, not only for the discomfort, but also for the loss of real lives.
thats not what "direct responsibility" means. if he knifed someone, thats direct. emmitting some CO2 isnt. its the same as thinking not eating a sausage somehow saves a cows life
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Nope. But I will call out liars like you. Nuclear is not "low CO2". Invest the same money into renewables and much less CO2 will get emitted and the reduction will start much earlier. Also, nuclear generates massive amounts of CO2 in construction and fuel mining. Some estimates find nuclear generates more CO2 than natural gas when used to generate energy, but that includes natural gas also providing heating and not only electricity and hence is not completely fair.
Stop deflecting. Stop trying to blame other
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Invest the same money into renewables and much less CO2 will get emitted and the reduction will start much earlier.
*cough* As we can see from Germany *cough*, which invested 500 billions in the last 30 years, just to emit 8-9 times more per kWh [nowtricity.com] than France [nowtricity.com]. I know, you will say that's not true, that the whole world is against you, that every reports and statistics sources are lies, .... That doesn't change facts and reality: Germany keeps burning coal, lignite and gas, with promises that they will stop in 2045 (22 years from now... I guess climate change is not an urgent topic for them).
Also, nuclear generates massive amounts of CO2 in construction and fuel mining. Some estimates find nuclear generates more CO2 than natural gas when used to generate energy
Are those estimates made by fairi
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You need to stop emulating Trump on facts.
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Nope. I have noticed however that whenever I provide evidence you people very quietly fade away to spread your poison somewhere else. You are nothing but fanatics with the insight-level of flat earthers and no integrity, honor or decency.
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We can forget about those 1.5C though, as the calculations that still see us making them do not really include that effect. On track for 2C now. That will get really uncomfortable.
gweihir: "I have committed my life to combating nuclear power, a low-CO2 emitting energy source that could have postponed climate change significantly."
also gweihir: "It's disheartening to think about how uncomfortable a +2C temperature rise will be."
You bear direct responsibility, not only for the discomfort, but also for the loss of real lives. In a +2C scenario, approximately 2 billion people residing around the equator will experience life-threatening conditions (a combination of high temperature and humidity) for about half of the year. How do you reconcile the impact of your actions with the suffering they cause?
Gweihir stop downmodding with your sock puppets. If you don't, I'm going to repaste this reply on every comment you make on every energy article until you stop with your misinformation.
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Gweihir stop downmodding with your sock puppets. If you don't, I'm going to repaste this reply on every comment you make on every energy article until you stop with your misinformation.
You are deranged and paranoid. I have no sock puppets. You are getting down-modded by people that agree with me. I also do not post AC.
However you would not be the first no-honor stalker that cannot take that I am right.
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Re: Yes, but also, no. (Score:2)
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Sounds like we need to speed up the process on getting nuclear powered ships to move cargo.
Here's one example of this process moving along: https://www.maritime-executive... [maritime-executive.com]
Another example out of the UK: https://www.seatrade-maritime.... [seatrade-maritime.com]
As we work out the legal issues and infrastructure for civilian ships running on nuclear power we should get more military vessels running on nuclear power. We used to have nuclear powered frigates, destroyers, and cruisers in the US Navy, we can do that again. The US Coas
Yes, it's going to take stuff like this (Score:2)
That has been known for a while (Score:2)
Which is why 1.5C is long past. We will get about 0.5C (the estimates I have seen) in addition from less pollution. As pollution kills people (fine dust does a lot of horrible things including reducing the intelligence of children and adults), this is probably still better than the alternatives, but realistically we have 2C "locked in" at this time, i.e. _nothing_ will prevent that anymore. Civilization survival is still possible if we make a real effort. Species survival is only threatened if we do not mak
The issue with aerosols (Score:5, Insightful)
Blowing sulphur particulates into the atmosphere causes 'global dimming', which reduces the energy input into the system, keeping temperatures down despite the increasing levels of greenhouse gasses. However, the entire process and its results are bad for the environment in ways other than mere temperature.
The simple answer appears to be 'throw something else up there that is not bad for us that will still block some sunlight', but the problem is this is too simple an answer.
I can't see that doing anything but allowing the short-sighted to continue pumping CO2 into the air and heating up the planet, which means the aerosol injection becomes permanent if we want to have comfortable temperatures. And CO2 does more than heat us up - it is acidifying the oceans and I'm going to make a wild-ass guess that there are other less well-known effects we should also be concerned about.
We may well need to do some solar shielding as a stop gap measure, but if we're not sucking the last 140 years of CO2 production out of the atmosphere and sequestering it (and cease to keep adding more, of course), we're delaying the inevitable and making it worse at the same time.
The advantage of low level aerosols (Score:3)
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The major disadvantage is if it works we constantly have to be doing it.
Sounds like jobs to me.
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Neal Stephenson's Termination Shock [wikipedia.org] is a thought experiment on a massive effort to put sulfur into the upper atmosphere and some of the potential outcomes
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I can't see that doing anything but allowing the short-sighted to continue pumping CO2 into the air and heating up the planet
It seems to me we're doing that anyway. If we were clearly on track to go carbon neutral in the next few decades I would agree, but it looks to me like the choice is between continuing to spew CO2 and not mitigating it, or continuing to spew CO2 and mitigating it with aerosols or something. I think at some point the situation will get so bad that it will become clear we have no choice but to try remedial geoengineering of some kind.
This entire article is false (Score:2)
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In order for sulfur compounds to cool the Earth, they have to reach the stratosphere
No, they are effective regardless of altitude. However lower altitude aerosols get washed out of the atmosphere quickly, so in essence you are right.
so that's already incorrect. Also, do you know why it gets so cold in the desert?
Actually I do. Deserts have low humidity, and water vapor is a potent greenhouse gas, so without the greenhouse gas re-emitting infrared, the surface cools rapidly.
No clouds to reflect infrared. So saying sulfur-based cloud seeding causes clouds which causes cooling it completely false.
Deserts may or may not have clouds. You're right, however, the net effect of clouds tends to be to cool daytime temperatures and increase nighttime temperatures. Which one wins depends a lot on deta
giant misters (Score:2)
Fit the ships with giant misters and have them spray sea water into the air as they go, presumably behind the ship or in the down-wind direction.
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Better to let the cargo ships handle cargo and built dedicated autonomous misters. The misters can run on solar and/or wind ... they don't have to get anywhere in a hurry.
David Keith makes the case (Score:2)
"The Case for Climate Engineering", by Keith, is a short, digestible read on the ups and downs of spraying sulfur into the stratosphere. Frankly, it's very compelling that we already are experimenting with climate engineering - the ship fuels were an experiment to apply them, another to remove the sulfur.
Pretending that "climate engineering" is not just *another* experiment, like every single tonne of CO2 is already an experiment, is just silly.
So... (Score:1)
If the ocean carrier sulfur emissions were masking what should have been warming (shipping booming really since the 1960s) and since the environmental movement has had major success in removing/scrubbing widespread particulates from the atmosphere as well....then what we SHOULD have been seeing is a gradual slope general systemic warming really since the latter industrial revolution to now, right?
Since this was masked until recently, it makes sense that "suddenly" temperatures spike upwards, say, in the las
Termination Shock (Score:2)
Anyone interested in this might enjoy the novel "Termination Shock" by Stephenson.
https://www.amazon.com/dp/0063... [amazon.com]
Lots of interesting speculation on geoengineering, wrapped in a good story. A very plausible future.
Predictable - and Predicted (Score:2)
Some of us had predicted pretty much that result.
Re: What the hell? (Score:2)
Looks like there is a huge profit motive underneath all of this âoepollute the atmosphere to stop global warmingâ BS:
https://www.transparency.org/e... [transparency.org]
Re: What the hell? (Score:2)
And a good article summarizing the players behind the geo-engineering funding mechanism:
https://www.solargeoeng.org/ec... [solargeoeng.org]
Re: What the hell? (Score:2)
Another area of idiocy is where some researchers are using the guise of climate science to claim that jet engines designed for fewer emissions are actually causing more contrails, which they claim is causing more global warming.
Complete idiocy.
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Looks like there is a huge profit motive underneath all of this âoepollute the atmosphere to stop global warmingâ BS:
Really the huge profit motive comes from the oil companies, who have trillions of dollars at stake. Anybody saying "we can solve the problem without stopping burning fossil fuels" is somebody they like.
They may not be the people actually making the proposals, but they certainly are interested in amplifying those voices.
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Re:Ironic (Score:5, Insightful)
Efforts to curb climate "crisis" ends up adding to it. Seems as myopic with the cure as the cause.
The fuel regulation was an effort to improve air quality, not fight climate change.
Further, I'm not really getting your angle here. Given your scare quotes around "crisis", I'd guess you either think climate change isn't real, isn't caused by humans, or doesn't matter either way.
If it's either of the first two, why would you not accept evidence of anthropogenic climate change, but then accept the findings of this paper, which indicate that, actually, human emissions from tanker ships affect the climate.
If you think climate change doesn't matter, then I'd think you'd be equally unmoved by the fact that the pollution reduction increases warming.
Re:Ironic (Score:5, Interesting)
I knew this would be the aspect focused on, but the far more interesting part is that it demonstrates that we can have a measurable effect on climate change through engineering, such as cloud brightening. Given that we have already reached the point where catastrophic changes are inevitable, we should look seriously at engineering options.
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I don't think anyone has ever said we can't geoengineer.
They said we shouldn't because it is arrogant and dangerous to fuck with Mother Nature on the only planet we've got. If it isn't the scientific method, it isn't science and doing random unknown shit to our only home in an untestable way can not follow the scientific method.
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Unfortunately we already fucked with mother nature far too much anyway.
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Yes we have already inadvertently made mistakes so what the hell, right?
Double down! Yay!
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100% disagree. Having already made mistakes the answer is not to do more random shit. The answer is to stop doing shit. Absolutely no one has any idea how much of doing what, where, for how long might be helpful and/or harmful over the short or long term.
Geoengineering our only planet is fucking nuts. Just stop doing shit.
Humanity has a piss poor record of messing around in every other way. What makes you think we'll somehow get it right this time?
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While I agree that the idea is fundamentally flawed and that human history is a very strong indicator this would make things worse, don't worry about it. Any geoengineering that would make a difference is so far out of reach of the human race it is not even funny anymore.
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I think some geo-engineering is unavoidable if we want to avoid catastrophe,
Not doable. The scale needed is several orders of magnitude beyond what the human race can do. The only reason geoengineering gets pushed as a possible solution is because some people want to profit a bit longer from the damage they do. Also, getting climate back over a tipping point takes several orders of magnitude more effort than getting it over that tipping point in the first place.
I do agree that catastrophe is unavoidable by now. The question is how large. Everything up to extinction is still on the
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I do agree that catastrophe is unavoidable by now. The question is how large. Everything up to extinction is still on the table with the present "intensity" of the countermeasures.
So your saying you are finally ready to let us build nuclear reactors again? And new designs too? Because if not, you are full of BS. But then again, you are always full of BS.
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The scale needed is several orders of magnitude beyond what the human race can do.
Right there in the summary is an example of something we did that had a major effect: "In the shipping corridors, the increased light represents a 50% boost to the warming effect of human carbon emissions. " So clearly this is within the reach of current human technology.
Re: Ironic (Score:1)
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Sure go ahead, develop anything you want. Don't experiment putting more random shit in the atmosphere of our home.
That's retarded.
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Not possible. Steering climate, as highly desirable as it would be, is completely out of reach of the human race.
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No? I have said it on multiple occasions and I say it again: We cannot geoengineer. No chance. Completely forget about it.
Just put the needed scale, cost and effort in comparison to what effective CO2 reduction would cost. The latter is peanuts in comparison and we cannot even do that anywhere near to the degree needed.
The second problem is once we have crossed a tipping point (and it looks like we already have done that, possibly several times), geoengineering cannot get us back even when we make it the si
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We've also seen that engineering on a large
Re: Ironic (Score:2)
If all of the greenhouse gas emissions can be accounted for in real time, and there would be a technical ability to either release the emissions in the atmosphere or divert them somewhere else, it would be possible. This can be one result of all of the work.
The climate is a chaotic system and tinkering with one part can have unintended consequences though. At least we will have a good idea how world reacts to extra greenhouse gas input. But to add more complexity in that by doing something extra, I dunno, s
More Evidence and Wrong Message (Score:3)
...the far more interesting part is that it demonstrates that we can have a measurable effect on climate change through engineering
Climate change itself is clear and overwhelming evidence that we have a measurable effect on the climate through engineering so it's something we already knew and did not need any demonstration of. Even if you discount that evidence, the hole in the ozone layer would be the first evidence that we can effect change since CFCs produced it and the worldwide reduction in CFCs has already caused it to shrink.
What's more both our two previous successes in dealing with human-caused global environmental impact
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Well the fossil fuel industry and politicians did manage to brainwash a generation into hating nuclear power, which has gotten us where we are right now
The idiotic association between nuclear power generation and nuclear weapons has resulted in the use of coal for power generation over the past 50 years as "environmental" lawsuits resulted in the failure to build enough nuclear power plants to supply the needed energy, which then resulted in further dependence on fossil fuels and the current state of global
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OH NOES!!! Children had double amount found in people not next to a plant that not only generated power (from 1956 relatively ancient), but also did waste and fuel processesing
Of course, double almost nothing is still almost nothing, but it sure was used effectively to scare you into posting rubbish
Fun fact, EVERYBODY on planet Earth has elevated levels of radioactive elements due to above ground nuclear testing in the 50's
Also, all nuclear plants (outside of a few in France) use uranium not plutonium, so y
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No, you are taking an isolated issue of slight impact and trying to generalize it across the entire planet
That is idiocy and deserves to be called out as such
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There's a difference between not accepting AGW and not accepting GW that has an A aspect.
The message for years is that all GW is AGW and there is no other non-A cause for any of it which is obviously clap trap nonsense. 100% of GW is not A.
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From here: https://sgp.fas.org/crs/misc/R... [fas.org]
IOW, the crisis is caused by humans, as the OP stated.
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Typical AC posts a link without reading or understanding it. I actually read and understood your link. You did neither.
Turn off the "I know I'm posting garbage" box if you want to discuss further, otherwise we're done.
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The link and reply weren't primarily for you - I've seen your posts. That was for anyone else who might come across your statement and think there's any truth to it.
For that audience: Virtually all of warming that we are seeing is anthropogenic. In fact, it's possible that human-emitted greenhouse gasses account for more than 100% of the temperature rise we've seen, if you factor in cooling from various aerosols.
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I still wonder if this way smarter ass clown is just a master of sarcasm ala The Onion, but I am starting to think he really is stupid enough to think anybody buys his crap
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Thank you for presenting yet another logical fallacy you fucking moron
btw, your pen name is the most apt demonstration of Dunning-Kruger that I could imagine
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>>You don't know what a logical fallacy is. Not surprising you'd just toss random words around in a failed effort to feel smart.
This is called Projection [wikipedia.org]
You really are funny, intentional or not
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lol, and then you resort to:
>>Your inability to see that is pure DK. "I know you are, but what am I?" Welcome to slashdot, dummy. Irony ftw.
ironic isn't it?
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FYI, you really cannot impress me with your insults because they obviously come from a deeply seeded self hatred where you are simply sharing what you feel about yourself
I honestly wish you were playing this character for laughs and not living through this
There is help out there, do some googling and get some counseling
GW but not AGW?? No. [Re:Ironic] (Score:2)
There's a difference between not accepting AGW and not accepting GW that has an A [anthropogenic] aspect.
To quote William James, "a difference that makes no difference is no difference."
We measure the carbon dioxide put into the atmosphere. We measure all of the other inputs to the energy budget of the Earth and see that none of the other inputs are sufficient to cause the observed warming. Saying "global warming exists but I don't accept that it's anthropogenic" is just a slightly different flavor of your basic denialism.
The message for years is that all GW is AGW and there is no other non-A cause for any of it which is obviously clap trap nonsense. 100% of GW is not A.
There are certainly other inputs to the climate. This has been known for centuries. Howe
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1) all GW is AGW:
Nobody is claiming that all global warming is anthropogenic. Science has, however, pretty well demonstrated that the currently observed warming is due to human effects (primarily, but not entirely, the effect of human generation of greenhouse-effect gasses).
therefore we must focus entirely on the A.
uh, instead of focusing on things we can control, you're proposing focusing on things we can't control?
some GW is A: therefore we must further examine to determine how much is A, how much is other things
We've done that. Exhaustively. You're describing the last forty years of climate science. That was what my previous post, that you don't seem to have
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I don't know what you've been reading but I read a lot of this stuff and GW=AGW is everywhere and an incredibly common statement these days from scientists, politicians and fandoms.
I don't know what you're reading, but you should stop reading that and go find some actual factual things to read.
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I've been reading science papers, news articles quoting scientists and politicians through videos and news articles.
"Politicians through videos" is not a good way to get your science. When you say confidently "GW=AGW is everywhere and an incredibly common statement these days from scientists, politicians and fandoms", you're reading pretty poor sources.
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That is, at this time, a completely retarded statement, nothing else. You need to have your head examined.
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Further, I'm not really getting your angle here. Given your scare quotes around "crisis", I'd guess you either think climate change isn't real, isn't caused by humans, or doesn't matter either way.
Here's another interpretation, global warming is happening, it is caused by human activity, will cause bad things in the future, but it is not a problem so large that it needs to be considered a crisis. I believe this interpretation of events are commonly referred to as "global lukewarming".
We are not going to solve this problem overnight, we have time to think this through rationally and make out plans that could take decades to complete. Even the worst estimates tell us it will take a century for the wo
Acid Rain (Score:2)
The fuel regulation was an effort to improve air quality, not fight climate change.
Partly, but a lot of it, particularly the reduction in sulphur, was more about reducing acid rain [wikipedia.org] which was lowering pH levels in lakes and killing fish and the ecosystem in general. It's actually a climate success story since we reduced sulphur emissions and stopped the problem albeit with a knock-on effect of making global warming worse.
Re: Ironic (Score:2)
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but silver bullets are never the way to go to solve a very complex problem
Unless it involves werewolves.
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Re: Ironic (Score:2)
Not just acid rain was the issue. Air pollution also causes asthma and cancers. Plants are very much ok with fine dust and other waste products of combustion, our lungs much less.
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Efforts to curb climate "crisis" ends up adding to it.
Reducing the sulfur in coal and fuel oil was never suggested as a method to end the climate crisis.
Seems as myopic with the cure as the cause.
There is some irony, though, in the fact that solving one problem (pollution from sulfur oxide emissions) has exacerbated a different one.
Re: Ironic (Score:5, Insightful)
Honestly, it seems to me like a very nice piece of science. It's doing exactly what it should do - study the effects based on data, not on ideology in either direction.
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I don't feel the coverage is saying that. It seems to me that no-one is advocating for a return to sulfurous clouds, but that they are noting and observing the effect of removing them. Following that, they are postulating that replacing cloud cover using far less toxic chemicals is a potential viable way to reintroduce cloud cover without polluting.
TFA:
In Diamond's view, the dramatic decline in ship tracks is clear evidence that humanity could cool off the planet significantly by brightening the clouds. "It suggests pretty strongly that if you wanted to do it on purpose, you could," he says.
Re: Ironic (Score:4, Informative)
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Actually, this effect has been modelled and has been expected for quite some time. The only ones surprised are the usual clueless ones and the usual deniers.
Re: Ironic (Score:1)
I don't feel the coverage is saying that
Here's what I'm hearing. They say "climate change" is caused by pollution, so we reduced the pollution and it gets warmer. It gets warmer, so they reduce the pollution more. This is a classic feedback cycle. The answer is more pollution, particularly lead and sulphate based particulates, and we can reverse the past 30 years of naive curbs on industry and the consumer.
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Bad argument [Re: Ironic] (Score:2)
Here's what I'm hearing. They say "climate change" is caused by pollution,
"Pollution" is general; you're not really saying anything here. What kind of pollution?
so we reduced the pollution and it gets warmer. It gets warmer, so they reduce the pollution more.
Bad argument.
"People are dying because of arsenic pollution in the water supply." "But we reduced the lead pollution of the water by a factor of two, and people are still dying! So reducing pollution doesn't stop it, and therefore there's no reason to stop dumping arsenic waste."
Sulfur oxides are a form of pollution. Carbon dioxide is called (by some) a form of pollution. But they are not the same.
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Honestly, it seems to me like a very nice piece of science.
Good job, commentators who didn't take or pass Chemistry 101 should reflect more and comment less. I know chemistry is just stamp collecting compared to Physics, but its a start.
Re: Ironic (Score:5, Funny)
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This is why diesel suddenly got as expensive as gasoline about 10 years ago, because of new refinement requirements to remove sulfur from it during refinement in order to basically eliminate SOx emissions from trucking (and the attendant need to add new lubricant molecules to replace the lubricant action
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Diesel fuel got more expensive than gasoline in the 80s, the year after I bought a diesel car, of course.
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The people promulgating spraying sulfur dioxide (yes, the acid rain sulfur dioxide) into the air to cool the planet loosely overlap the people pushing to reduce the amount of greenhouse gases being pumped into the atmosphere.
I haven't seen that overlap; they seem to be different people.
The opposite may be true: people promulgating solving the climate warming with sulfate aerosols seem to be backstopping the people who say "nah, global warming isn't a problem," with their arguments "it's not a big deal because we'll just solve it with aerosols or orbiting sunshields."
I do not know who is paying for this media coverage encouraging spraying old school pollutants into the atmosphere to try to solve the climate crisis, but I suspect that there is a strong profit motive.
That would implicate the oil companies, the ones with the huge profit motive.
Yes, it would make sense for them to argue "we don't need to stop burning oil, we'll
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Re: A better way would be to place solar collector (Score:2)
For years Man has yearned to destroy the Sun. I plan to do the next-best thing...In SpAcE!
In all seriousness folks, the parent is either being very subtly facetious or is an severely unquantitative individual with a complete lack of understanding of the costs and capabilities of space launch vehicles and a general inability or unwillingness to distinguish between reality and science fiction.