Climate Change 2022: Mitigation of Climate Change

But not really because of the day temperatures. The main reason for the jackets is that the temperature can drop a lot (20 f or more) in the evening, and because of the almost constant humid wind. I used to work downtown, literally across the street from the Transamerica Pyramid. I could go outside almost any time of the year for a smoke without a jacket, because our smoking area was well protected from wind. But when traveling a few blocks away for lunch, I generally took my jacket because then I was outside of the shelter and the wind chill is what makes it so damned cold.

The actual temperature in downtown is actually around 75-80 most summer days. But then when you factor in the 60-70% humidity and the 10 mph wind, and it feels 10 degrees or more colder.

 

Yet, all of the EU and Canada combines do not even come close to the volume donated by the US. And I am only talking donations, not the amount exported for profit.

 

The US is the largest contributor, by far, to the IMF and World Bank.

 

And notice, I challenged him to give us the amount donated by "non-capitalist nations", and got absolutely nothing. Of course, most of those actually have deficits in food production, but I guess that does not matter.

When a single nation donates more than the following 10 nations combined, the argument about the percentage of production donated is absolutely meaningless. And I would still love to see a reference giving us the combined total of all "non-capitalist nation" donations combined.

Imagine the effect on global food prices if the US did not simply give that much food away, but instead sold it. After all, is that not what "capitalism" means? At least to the brainwashed and braindead idiots it does.

And one must not forget that the "perfect" example of Socialism for over half a century was the Soviet Union. Which the US propped up for decades by selling them wheat, corn, and other grains at cost. And their economy went into a tailspin in 1979 when President Carter cut off all grain exports to the USSR.

After the embargo was lifted by President Reagan they still relied on large imports of grain, but Argentina, Venezuela and Brazil largely replaced the US as their primary source. But all the way through the collapse of the Soviet Union, they relied heavily on imported grain as they simply could not produce enough themselves. Which is still a problem, and many experts are pointing at as a major reason for their invasion of Ukraine.

And notice, that "Communist China" (which is one of the largest food producers in the world) also donates very little. Coming in at number 36 in the world, behind even such nations as Pakistan, Mali, even Chad donates twice as much food as China does.

 

I’ve had PF members recommend geoengineering to me with a straight face. Members you idolize. There are people out there that consider themselves to be rational and intelligent who are all in on these plans. Never mind the flocks that will accept anything if it is labeled “science” and marketed with fear of climate change.

As usual, none of what I posted is my opinion. There is a new push to actually start stratospheric aerosol injection. Here is one article on a recently published paper where the scientific community makes the case for starting “small”.

https://interestingengineering.com/...ide-into-the-atmosphere-to-refreeze-the-poles

People who actually care about climate realities need to come to grips with the fact there are people who would embark on these endeavors tomorrow. All it would take is a couple serious natural disasters to wind up the proles and their media masters and even Republican politicians would be off to the races on geoengineering—especially if there was federal money coming to their state to facilitate the operation. Republican politicians aren’t any more rational than Democratic ones on climate. I doubt 2% of politicians from either side of the aisle have the knowledge or intelligence to make the right calls on climate action. A huge percentage of what they all believe is easily shown to be false at this point.

No, you do not have serious methods of quickly warming the planet in a scenario where a volcanic eruption, geoengineering, meteor strike, etc. quickly cooled the planet. Don’t delude yourself on that score. There are no band aids for that and even though it’s not PC to talk about, cooling is orders of magnitude more detrimental to human (and all life) than warming. For example I’ve posted voluminously about how several times as many humans die from cooler than optimal temps than above optimal temps today—even after decades of warming. A LIA type event would be catastrophic and irreversible for quite some time. The voting public should be aware of this fact, but as usual few have a clue.

 

Oh dear me, "Interesting Engineering"? A site that is half junk science and 80% click bait.

That site is only slightly more accurate than a David Avocado Wolf posting.

 

Perhaps you would like a link to the study directly?

https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/2515-7620/ac8cd3

Many publications are writing about the study. That’s what makes it concerning.

https://canadatoday.news/ca/scienti...ing-sulfur-dioxide-into-the-atmosphere-72153/

https://www.zmescience.com/about/

https://www.popularmechanics.com/sc...pheric-aerosol-injections-refreeze-polar-ice/

The sources of coverage aren’t the issue. The problem is the idea is becoming mainstream and acceptable to the public and the results of application of such technology could be much more detrimental to humans and the planet than any projected warming.

 

Resources.

<sigh> The point is that resources have alternative uses. If one use becomes a higher priority, other uses will get lower priority.

My point was about carrying capacity, not politics.

 

I don't know what you're point is here, as this thread is about mitigation of climate change, with food being the immediate issue.

Do you think we're going to mitigate climate change or feed more people by changing the economic systems of China and Russia?

 

Yes, I think we should know what can be done with geoengineering. We should know all our options.

Remember I pointed out that this is a not something we could do in the short term even if we wanted to, as both the engineering and the politics would be seriously time consuming. Some projections of climate change clearly show that in the future, humans might be WAY better off if there is a possibility of mitigation.

Plus, these methods can be tested and they also naturally degrade as material decomposes or falls from the atmosphere. It's not like CO2 or other materials that have long life cycles. So, if it works it would undoubtedly require repeated application.

 

Oh, please.

Tell me, why are you absurdly and disingenuously pretending that a quantitative observation about the global potential for greenhouse agriculture is a proposal to realize that potential personally?

That depends on where you are.

Similar claims were made about cucumbers, tomatoes, bell peppers, and other crops. Now most of them are grown in greenhouses. There are plenty of sources, youtube videos, etc. about growing potatoes in greenhouses, so someone is doing it. It can be economic wherever land is at a premium.

Which is all true when, as in Idaho, there is plenty of good, cheap land available.

You are still not paying attention -- and I now suspect that is deliberate. I was not proposing to replace open-field farming with greenhouses under current economic and supply conditions. I was simply making a factual observation about how much more food could be grown on the earth if we needed to grow it.

I am not responsible for your inability to understand clear, simple, grammatical English.

Greenhouse operators also use machinery, just different machinery. The production model is quite different.

I didn't propose to. You simply made that up, like most of what you attribute to me.

Nonsense.

Silliness. Apiarists would still provide bees for crop pollination in greenhouses.

Yep.

The land area needed for greenhouse agriculture is far less because it is so much more productive than open-field agriculture. Also, a huge fraction of farmland is devoted to livestock, which is not relevant to greenhouse production capacity.

As they say in Japan, "It's mirror time!"

The amount of land currently devoted to farms in the USA is not relevant to the productive capacity of greenhouse agriculture.

<yawn>

No, you simply made that up. Here:
"The cost to build a greenhouse will increase as its square footage increases. That said, prices per square foot actually decrease as the overall square footage increases. It still makes for a higher total, but the cost increase won’t be exponential.
Standard mid-sized greenhouses cost $25 per square foot on average. Large commercial greenhouses that consist of plastic or fiberglass over a steel framework, and may or may not include ventilation and plumbing, cost between $2 and $4 per square foot."

https://www.forbes.com/home-improvement/garage-enclosures/greenhouse-cost/

No it doesn't. Even if your $35 figure were accurate (it isn't), that would only be ~$1.5M/acre. The more realistic Forbes number indicates only $90K-170K/acre.

You are so far out of your depth, you should be conducting tours of the Titanic.

 

Well, carrying capacity has to include resources such as water - not just land area.

I was pointing out that carrying capacity is only one issue. And, the overall problem involves issues of politics and economics. In fact, politics and economics are probably the larger percent of the problem.

I think carrying capacity is useful in studying the limits of human population on Earth. But, it doesn't answer the questions of other requirements (such as water) or distribution. So I think it's more like an upper bound.

 

Greenhouse agriculture uses ~1/10 of the water open field agriculture requires, depending on the crop and the climate, because it is enclosed, so the water can be recycled instead of dissipating out into the atmosphere.

 

Malthus would be so proud that you are one of his acolytes... When your geoengineering creates a ice cap around the globe are you still going to be concerned about carrying capacity?

 

While quite possibly true, that is not good enough unless you are subtracting all land areas that don't have the required water to support greenhouse agriculture. Also, we do need grass and other crops that require vast acreage - we can't just decide no to have wheat.

In the end, I like your general idea. Greenhouse footprint is increasing. But, I think you need to be careful concerning what problem you believe you are solving.

 

You seriously need to read and think before responding.

 

Look up swamp cooler.

 

When a greenhouse heats from the sunlight the humidity drops to near zero. The cheapest way to cool them....and they do need cooling to keep the temperature down.....is to evaporate water to bring up the humidity and lower temperature.

 

A greenhouse is much more labor intensive than field agriculture. All water used in the greenhouse must be accessed and moved through the system by mechanical means. Water just falls out of the sky for most farm fields. But there is a place for greenhouse agriculture. I can probably get 10.00 a pot for good looking hydrangeas or 5.00 for a pot of creeping phlox. And at the very , very most 2.00 for a head of lettuce, the only vegetable that I am pretty sure would sell. So, ten dollars a square foot or 2.00 a square foot?

 

I have been wondering if a closed shed with artificial lights might be the best way to go. I am experimenting. I have my LED lights on a timer have absolute control over day length. With this setup I could have a good environment for head lettuce...in the winter. I might try it sometime.

 

That’s not nearly enough information. The public should be well aware of the dire consequences of cooling the planet. The public should be educated on the acidification of global precipitation from some of the proposed aerosols. Parts of the globe now unaffected by acid rain would be affected with aerosol injection of sulfuric based aerosols.

The public should also be made aware that geoengineering can not be tested to scale and there may be negative unintended consequences we can’t conceive of today.

The plan I’ve linked to is not for the distant future. It’s doable now. And some want to do it now.

I would be very wary of embarking on the geoengineering path based on projections. “Projections” we see daily on things like food security and heat related deaths are not based on reality (science if we wish to invoke the term). We shouldn’t even be considering geoengineering based on the projections I see bandied about.

Yes, one major concern is widespread acidification of precipitation when it “falls from the atmosphere”. Another is that geoengineering is not a solution, it’s a band aid that must be re-applied indefinitely. So we must consider a scenario where politics or economics would force cessation after a prolonged period of injection. This would have severe negative implications as well.

Hopefully the “testing” doesn’t end up like nuclear weapons testing that was done on the sly upwind of densely populated US areas and ended up killing thousands and harming millions. “Testing” in these cases is actually implementing the process and seeing what happens. There is no “scale model” or lab bench simulation that can predict results on a global scale.

 

I fully agree. I would point out that these geoengineering ideas have no other option BUT to scale, as the Earth's atmosphere would take a long time to change. So, part of the plan would be how and where to test these ideas when we arrive at a point where Earth decides they are necessary.

Well, they are NOT doable now. For one thing, we don't have the engineering to deliver these products to the upper atmosphere. For another, we aren't in a bad enough state to justify geoengineering. For another thing, we won't do that until there is world wide agreement, and that most certainly does not exist.

If someone is telling you that we should start actually delivering material to the upper atmosphere today, they are just plain NUTS.

If they are telling you that we should scope out the possibilities and what the ramifications might be, then we shouldn't be opposed to that, as a time could come in the future where it's important.

Yes, I totally agree. These ideas need to be thoroughly thought through - something we don't have a great record with.

 

Expensive energy is a choice. The intent is to destroy fossil fuel energy.

A Comprehensive Roundup Of Official Energy Madness
October 06, 2022/ Francis Menton

• 
  At this website, I try to give readers a steady flow of the latest instances of official energy madness, the ongoing efforts of our politicians, bureaucrats, academics and journalists to undermine and destroy the energy infrastructure that is the basis for our prosperity and our comfortable lives.
  
  
• But if you just read these examples one by one, however outrageous they may be individually, you can lose track of the overall picture. In the big picture, our government, aided and abetted by academics and journalists, is conducting a full scale war on the energy sector of the economy.
  
  
• Now comes along a guy named Joseph Toomey, who has published a relatively long piece at RealClearEnergy with the title “Energy Inflation Was By Design.”
  

READ MORE

 

Obama started this crap. Higher energy costs. Why? Dependence. Dependence on the providers. Who are the providers of electricity? Government mandated highly regulated providers that have the ability to throttle and "manage" your energy consumption.

It's actually about freedom. Mobility. Choice. Biden ran on destroying the freedom provided by oil and gas products. It is a choice. It is part of the paternalistic idea that the elite must induce the pain to achieve the green goals they are devoted to.

 

The moment they first moved from discouraging consumption of fossil fuels to blocking their production, I knew it would end in disaster. They have learned nothing, they refuse to learn anything, and it is only going to get worse.