global warming?

[Worff]

While this fact might from his writing might be true ( which is just a fact pretty much everyone knows to be true ):

The atmosphere is primarily composed of nitrogen (78 percent), oxygen (21 percent), argon (0.93 percent), and CO2 (0.04 percent). Many other gases are present in trace amounts. The lower atmosphere also contains varying amounts of water vapor, up to four percent by volume.

It's statements like these that totally give him away as a person intent on demonizing any efforts to acknowledge a problem:

Gore’s “inconvenient truth” is that — there’s no tactful way to say this — we gas-guzzling, SUV-flaunting, comfort-addicted humans, wallowing in our own self-indulgences, have screwed up the planet. We’ve hauled prodigious quantities of fossil fuels out of the ground where they belong, combusted them to release carbon dioxide (CO2) into the sky where it shouldn’t be, and now we’re going to burn for our sins.

He is clearly mocking this issue. Here is another example of his writings that just give ya that warm and fuzzy :P You can tell he understands the implications of this.

Needless to say, there have been no glaciers reported in Iowa as long as anyone can remember. It’s warmer now. And if it would just warm up a bit more, fewer Iowans would need to trot off to Florida, Texas, and Arizona during deepest winter.

He doesn't seem to think anything will happen, and as long as he can live his personal life like nothing will happen he doesn't seem to care.

Here are a few agencies and entities that at least agree that there is indeed a problem, and that it is a serious problem (intentionally leaving out that they also agree WE have something to do with it's severity):

National Academy of Sciences
World Meteorological Associations's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change
National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration
US Environmental Protection Agency
US Dept. of Energy
NASA's Goddard Institute
Union of Concerned Scientists
World Resources Institute

There seems to be a reluctance to try anything except things that allow money to behave as it has been, like Zyzz said. FOr example, Wal-Mart just said publicly it would do anything it could for the environment, as long as it didn't decrease earnings for shareholders or make them less competitive on retail prices. Don't get me started on Wal-Mart anyway haha that was another thread.. but it's related because this "mindset" we are in of turbo-capitalism is part of the problem.

Humans and animals exhaling CO2, volcanos, decomposition CO2 and methane, etc... these are are normal and are probably what eventually tips the balance of natural cycles after massing for centuries. Mass quantities of trees and vegetation are designed to offset that... but we've depleted many of those resources as well to use as building materials for elaborate structures, as well as clearing land to build said structures. That isn't the main point tho... what the industrial age has done has compounded that issue by introducing an artifical insertion of CO2 and other gasses that dwarfs that of natural emissions, not the other way around as this race car driver is saying. I supposed the population booms have increased CO2 exhaled by humans as a whole, but not to the extent that it is at.

Anyway .. ONCE AGAIN .. all I'm saying is to be aware of your consumtion and not be wasteful. Most of the ideas I had were for companies and governments to step in on, that would ultimately lead to a better place to live anyway.

[Goofydoofy]

Bush should send troops to the Artic to combat the global warming threat.

[Bilnick]

The problem with the whole arguement is that it is only focusing on one thing....CO2. The earth has been as warm as it is now just a few hundred years ago....what were the CO2 levels then?

I am very skeptical of any predictions of doom and gloom, because the science isnt there yet. Remember the predictions of massive hurricanes in 2005? Well the predictions were right!.....The same prediction was made in 2006, and 2007. How many hurricanes hit the US last year? Scientists who cant predict the climate 12 months in advance I am supposed to beleive they have a handle on 20, 50, 100 years in the future? I would be happy if they could tell me accurately what is going to happen tomorrow!

Wait...there are too many variables to predict the weather accurately tomorrow, or next week right? Those variables don't exist for long term?

The earth has been warming staedily for a while now....before power plants, before 6+ billion people, before SUVs.

I linked a NASA statement about the junk in the air reflecting sunlight back into space has dropped steadily 20% over the last 20 years. Is CO2 cleaning the air too?

All I am saying is don't be quick to point ALL the blame on rising temperatures on CO2 levels. The earth is far too complex to even begin to point all the fingers at one issue. At best all that can be said is that CO2 is only helping to accelerate the warming that was already happening.

[Worff]

Bush should send troops to the Artic to combat the global warming threat.

HAHAHA he would say that if you buy marijuana, that you support global warming :P

[Goofydoofy]

I think the simple fact of this whole matter is we are polluting the fuck out of the air, water and land. That is a simple fact. So, stopping that can't be all bad.

[Worff]

Wait...there are too many variables to predict the weather accurately tomorrow, or next week right? Those variables don't exist for long term?

First, we have collected data, have weather stations, and radar satellites that make predicting the weather fast.. so you, a TV watchin' American, will know "there is a 30% chance I should bring an umbrella today". This work has to be done fast so it will be timely, as you don't need to know next year about rain tomorrow. It's more accurate now than it was 30 years ago, but still their focus is on having info fast, not necessarily accuracy.

Scientists working on this issue, have painstakingly massed data for decades focusing on the task at hand, not daily weather reports. After all the theories, all the brainstorming, and all the dust settles... far more groups and individual scientists agree on this than disagree. I doubt you would wait 50 years to get a simple weather prediction. This has been meticulous and thorough over a long time, and extremely advanced techniques have been used to focus on accuracy rather than speed.

As shown earlier, most of the theories line up with each other in harmony. Do we still have unanswered questions? yes. CO2 is focused on because of it's huge quantity, its large effect, a large portion is created by humans, and because it's in such greater amounts now that in past global events. Yes there are other factors, CO2 is just a big piece of the puzzle. Aerosol and R12 Freon were also addressed vigorously and seems to be under some control with tight regulations.

Meanwhile, while we debate who's fault is is (irrelevant) it's only going to get worse. I really believe it is possible to minimize this problem, I'm just not sure it will happen because not many seem to want to try anything, saying it doesn't exist.

Think about it... most Americans don't think anything could ever happen to them. You see it on the news all the time, they live in a beach home and act totally shocked when a hurricane whisks their house away /boggle. They build houses near bases of volcanos, and act totally surprised when it covers their shit in molten lava and ash. omg we can't believe this happened to us!! We're American's paying taxes and having lotta disposable income, how could this happen to us? How could that clean-cut nice looking young man turn serial killer? Aren't serial killers all ugly beasts? I'm making jokes, but really think about this... our perception of the way life and everything should be has been so clouded by TV and movies, most of which all have happy endings, that we are indeed "sleepwalking" into the future (to quote an earlier article). We need to wake up and just be at least a little realistic... it's nice and fun to live in disneyland but one day the park will close for repairs.

Again... just asking to be more aware of your consumption (including myself) and not be wasteful. I'm not saying you have to get rid of your 4x4 lol... just find small ways that you ARE willing to help try this. In the past I've been told to offer solutions rather than just screaming there is a problem.. well I began this thread with possible solutions that would help. I don't know if they are all correct... but I carefully came up with solutions that would also address other issues we face, so even if you don't believe in global warming they are still good ideas imo.

[Worff]

I think the simple fact of this whole matter is we are polluting the fuck out of the air, water and land. That is a simple fact. So, stopping that can't be all bad.

Very true

[Bilnick]

I am not sure the rising CO2 levels are the biggest piece. The earth has been warming long before the industrial age. Whatever the reason(s) for the rise in temperatures for the last 4-5k years probably play a larger part. Is there any evidence that lowering or leveling CO2 will lower temperatures anyway? (just asking, I do not know myself)

There probably are no reasonable solutions for reducing CO2 anyway. Nuclear power is a clean (but expensive) alternative to fossil fuel power plants, but fear and government regulations make them too expensive to be practical. Hydrogen powered vehicles? Takes an awful lot of energy to make hydrogen from water, that energy would come from fossil fuel fired plants anyway. Most of the current hydrogen comes from fossil fuels (methane) anyway. Wind and solar energy? Will work in some places, but not everywhere has alot of sun or wind.

Jahras mentioned nuclear fusion, maybe if it can be perfected for use on a massive scale, but is still a lab experiment at the moment.

Human breathing produces 6 times the CO2 than it did 200 years ago. That figure will rise to 10x before we stop contributing to global warming.

I agree Worff conservation is a good thing. You just will not see me driving a hybrid vehicle (which are a joke anyway) anytime soon. The thing is most devices that we use are far more efficient than the same devices were 5, 10, 20 years ago. Refrigerators, air conditioners, cars, etc all use less power than they did 20 years ago. There are just more of them today.

[Worff]

Agreed, sheer numbers of these devices have contributed to this. There really isn't a reason for that many vehicles to even exist tho, imo. I can't remember the exact point in time that both husband and wife (average folks) pretty much had to work to make ends meet, but of course vehicles on the road have been exponentially increased ever since. I'll get into the term "make ends meet" and what that covers some other time lol.

Good ideas on wind power and solar power.. yeah some areas couldn't benefit from that much, but if it's feasable it's a great way to supplement power needs with the remaining needs coming from power company. Man it sure would feel good to tell power company to take a hike hehe, but most of us consume more power than basic wind and solar power setups could provide. Great supplement tho

Methane: Landfills full of our garbage decomposing generates huge amounts of methane. This one company capped a landfill and actually uses it to power a significant portion of his manufacturing plant (after some processing). Way to go $$$ Takes that methane out of the air (rather saves from leaking into air) and actually uses it for power .. that kicks ass.

My first 2 ideas (paper junkmail ban / make products last longer and easier to repair) would reduce landfill intake overall across the country, even worldwide. Fear not... there will still be plenty of trash to make methane out of if it can be harnessed for a power supplement.

[Jahras]

Is there any evidence that lowering or leveling CO2 will lower temperatures anyway? (just asking, I do not know myself)

There probably are no reasonable solutions for reducing CO2 anyway

Yes, I'll break this effect down.

Light comes at the earth in the huge spectrum of wave lengths, and what gets reflected is generaly the longer wave lengths of the spectrum. Now on the light's way back out to space, we have greenhouse gasses + water vapor (separating it from the others for this) that display a black body radiation effect. Black body radiation is named for what black objects do, you shine light at it, and most all wave lengths coming at it get absorbed as heat, and very very little is reflected. CO2, methane, CFC, N2O all display this quality, and it's very testable. Now when you have one of these gases raising atmospheric temp that way, higher temperatures foster more humidity and water vapor, magnifying the effect of the other gases.

There are reasonable solutions for reducing CO2, just a lot of people don't know about them aside from the "use less power/gas." The problem with them is the economics of them.
Most of them are designed around reducing factory carbon output, since that's a whole lot exiting one spot, and easier to work with. At the moment, the laws on factory pollution output are done by permits, and companies can buy and sell these permits to and from each other, and it's more cost effective for them to buy more permits than it is to setup something like a serpentine crystal lattice to filter out pollution. In more extreme cases, it has been cheaper for them to dump their pollution illegally, and just pay the fines when they get caught doing it. This is the area where government needs to step in, but I bet they'd be formfitting any campaign contributions from a lot of factory owners doing so.

The biggest provable problem is that more CO2 is going into the atmosphere than nature can re-absorb, and we know that it contributes to warming the planet. Exactly how much it contributes, no real scientist will tell you that we can know that for just, just that it does increase temperatures, and we should not be producing more than is being cleaned out

I am not sure the rising CO2 levels are the biggest piece.

They are not the biggest, piece, the earth's orbit is. But CO2 levels are the biggest piece that humans cause, and can fix. And they most certainly do not help the ecosystem. CFCs used to be one of our major detriments to the atmosphere, but we have removed them from almost all products, and are on a huge down slope of levels of them. The graph of CFCs is a real testament to how we can do something right to correct our damage to the ecosystem.

Personally I think the major CO2 drop offs will occur when gasoline gets into the $6-8 a gallon range, and people take much more into consideration into how often they drive, and what kind of vehicle they buy, and it becomes more economical for factories to use alternate means of power, instead of burning hydro-carbons. One example of a huge carbon source is Pilkington in NC (http://www.pilkington.com/) They make glass, and my uncle is a machinist there with all their stats... they use over 50% of all the natural gas consumed by the state of NC to run their furnace, with no carbon filtration system, they just have enough permits.

Bush should send troops to the Artic to combat the global warming threat.

This made me laugh way harder than it should have.

[Worff]

Another idea hehe... if you actually own a vehicle that can legally run on E85 .. you can make your own fuel with an E85 Ethanol "Moonshine" Still. They cost anywhere from 1k-2k for kits and consumer pre-built versions. The issue I have with this is what fuel to use to run the still. If you burn a fossil fuel, I dont see it as much help... if you use a gas like propane it could raise the cost per gallon too high (depending what bulk you buy in). Another answer for that (much rarer) is solar-powered stills. Corn similar to deer-feed would be used to actually make the moonshine, then the trick to making it legal (must get permit which isn't that much) with the Feds, is adding a poison to it so it cannot be consumed. All in all depending on bulk prices you can get in your area for consumable components, you can make the fuel for about $1 to $1.50 a gallon... maybe slightly less.

Add: the 2k version cranks out about 3 gallons per hour .. which should be enough to fuel most familes' vehicles.

[Bilnick]

Once gas gets to 4-5$ a gallon you will see more of a push for domestic ethanol production. That wouldn't effect CO2 emissions all that much though.

[Worff]

Bush should send troops to the Artic to combat the global warming threat.

This made me laugh way harder than it should have.

lol me too

[Jahras]

push for domestic ethanol production. That wouldn't effect CO2 emissions all that much though.

You're correct that it will have the same CO2 emissions, but in order to make ethanol, we have to remove that same amount of CO2 from the atmosphere by growing corn, which is a big plus.

It's the same principal if you grow a tree, then burn it down. The most CO2 that can be released can not exceed how much the tree removed from the atmosphere in the first place. No net increase or loss in atmospheric CO2.

[Goofydoofy]

If masterbating added to global warming, my actions would have killed us all long ago.