And now brace yourself for an ice age

NikB

I don't understand the gotcha bit - is that because I used a Wikipedia reference? It was just the first one I found but there are others.

I appreciate the majority of publishing climate scientists will believe in agw. However some of them don't and they must have their reasons. How many other non-publishing scientists also don't agree?

deckingman

I too have absolutely no problem with that. My only concern is that nuclear power may be seen as the only viable, short term solution. Indeed, there is evidence to suggest that this is the route we are taking.

If the science of AGW is subsequently found to be flawed, what then do we tell our Grandchildren. "Well the scientists told us we had to act fast....... Yes we know the evidence was sketchy but.......Yes, we knew about Chernobyl and Long Island but the Scientists told us it would be safe - I'm sure you'll get used to having 3 legs and two heads.......... Yes we knew all about the terrorist threats but didn't really think Bin Laden's followers would get hold of enriched Uranium - sorry about North America....... Yes we knew about the problems of radiactive waste but I'm sure you'll eventually find a way to deal with it - the tell me they have found ways to reduce the half life to a couple of thousand years or so."

GasDad

I meant it might reduce GDP by 3% - not to spend that much - a subtle difference.

To me the best way to force the change it is simply to tax carbon - this will then let the market do what it's best at; seek growth in the cheapest way best way possible. Otherwise we have government departments trying to bet on the right horse - and they always seem to choose the  donkey.

NikB

They're already taxing carbon and that's what many people are opposed to especially as the money will not end up where it is required.

SyStemDeMoN

Your wasting your time mate, trying to get some of these enviro-mentalists to see sense is a waste of time.

You would have better luck convincing the pope that he has wasted his life, and really should go out to bingo.

I think the latest drug debarcle should prove that the government only listen to scientists that say what they WANT them to say.  And if any scientist gets close enough to PROVING CC is not man related, they are fired or ridiculed.

I must point out that the sceintist that predicted an ice age in  the late 60's early 70's were never ridiculed when they were shown to be wrong.

There are many, MANY sceintists that are saying that CC is nothing to do with man, but they, like us, just get shouted down, and any factual evidence is debunked without being looked at.

Just look outside now, its bloody cold.  Last year it was cold, but this year it is colder.  However, as the op pointed out, CC nutters will swear it is warmer now than it was last year.  But its not, its colder.  It was the summer of 1976 (when i was born) after a blinding hot summer, that sceintists decided that maybe an ice age wasn't coming after all.  But at that time, the government wasn't taxing the crap out of everybody so the change was harmless.

If they told everyone tomorrow, that they were wrong, and we were all quite safe from the bogey man, what would the result be ??  The government would probably be broke in one night.

Do you think they would have to pay eveyone back their green tax ??

johntheexpat

Unless you are an Australian.
But then why bother about the whole planet?

johntheexpat

Radioactive waste?  Do you realise that a power station like Drax belches out 1 tonne of uranium for every million tonnes of coal burnt?  




From the same source:

Total U.S. releases in 1982 (from 154 typical plants) amounted to 801 tons of uranium (containing 11,371 pounds of uranium-235) and 1971 tons of thorium.

The thought of all that radioactive fallout should convince everyone.  Ban coal power stations NOW!

DPinBucks

I don't have fixation with CO2. I simply:
Used it as a shorthand for 'Greenhouse gases'. Would it help if I editted all my posts and changed 'CO2' to 'greenhouse gas'?That being said, CO2 is and has been far and away the most important greenhouse gas on Earth and elsewhere, such as Venus. Water vapour is a GHG, true, but the amount in the atmosphere is largely constant, and does not occur at all in air below 0C (clouds are not water vapour). The other one which is often cited is methane, but that readily oxidises to CO2 and water, so its steady state value tends to be rather low. The worst case scenario for methane is a sudden release of vast quantities, as sometimes happens with submarine volcanoes, or the melting of Arctic tundra.It's more than possible: at low temperatures (say below -10C) the air is very dry: it cannot hold moisture. The sort of event which you describe would have had to be on a cataclysmic scale to release enough water to stay gaseous long enough to warm the atmosphere. There is no evidence of any such event. Methane is a possibility, but CO2 is far and away the most likely culprit: it stays in the atmosphere and keeps on adding heat.

I'm not sure what you mean by 'reversal of the albedo effect'. Is it that ice stopped reflecting light?

It seems to me that you might be confusing science with a 'belief system'. Nothing in science is unquestioned; nothing is down to simple 'belief'; nothing is certain. Science is based on the results of research and experimentation, and is at any time the best explanation we have for the Universe and how it works. It cannot and must not be assumed that because science professes uncertainty that it follows that all alternative explanations are equally valid, nor that scientific theories are simply 'beliefs'.

The greenhouse effect is not a bias; it is not a belief.  It killed Venus.

deckingman

No I didn't know that. My post was written "tongue in cheek" as the wording should have indicated. However, just because coal power stations emit radioactive waste doesn't mean that it's OK to cover the globe with nuclear ones does it?

I suppose it depends on what is your greater fear. The possible effects of a warming of the climate or the possibility of mankind being wiped out by a nuclear hollocaust. Either way we could be stuffed. What's your poison?

NikB

I've seen you quote Venus in several posts as a model for climate change on Earth. How can it be valid though when it is 24 million miles closer to the sun than we are which must surely have a greater effect on it's atmosphere than our own.