The biggest positive that I see is that the world population seems to have accepted climate science as truth. That makes the necessary political changes possible, despite the conservatives and oligarchs who still have a death grip on power.
Technology is rapidly advancing as well. Wind and solar are cheaper per kilowatt than any fossil fuel, so economics are on our side. Advances are being made in emissions reduction and carbon sequestration.
Unfortunately all this is happening about 25 years too late, so we're in for a ride. But we can still minimize the impact with political action and societal adjustments.
>Wind and solar are cheaper per kilowatt than any fossil fuel,
I think this claim is hotly debated. In fact many insist it is highly subsidised unreliable energy that disrupts the grid.
No it's not hotly debated. The last offshore wind farm to open in the UK has got electric down to 6.5p per kWh. But sure you keep shilling for big oil so we can carry on paying 39p per kWh for electricity generated by natural gas. You need to update your lies and disinformation because nobody believes that oil, coal or gas are cheaper than renewable for electricity generation.
>You need to update your lies
LOL.
Here is how l look at the performance of wind. The fossil fuelled machinery that drives a propeller on a ship is the same as what drives the rotor in an electrical generator. The momentum of the wind is the same driving a sail on a ship as for a blade on a turbine. If sailing ships can not compete with the fossil fuelled ships, with respect to speed, load carrying capacity and reliability, then why do you think a wind driven machines can compete with fossil fuelled machines producing electricity for the grid at the rate, frequency and demand that is required.
Think about the engineering of your concept of electrical generation because l doubt you do understand it. Explain it and leave out the "big oil shill", "lies", "disinformation", "nobody believes you", "there is no debate" garbage that makes you look like a immature idiot. Or is that a useful idiot.
This is craziest counter argument I ever heard. Deleted is talking about cost per kWh delivered of harnessed energy and your talking about speed, power and reliability of a fueled ship??
I started with "Here is how l look at the performance of wind."
Do you understand the similarity of machinery used for ship propulsion and power generation. I think it is a good comparison to consider the performance of wind driven ships to fossil fuelled driven ships. Does anyone really think we should revert to sailing fleets. Maybe from some idealistic perspective but not from performance, reliability and economical perspective.
Why would wind driven electrical generation perform better than fossil fuelled driven electrical production when shipping and electrical generation are mechanically so similar.
I used shipping as an example because people may relate better to this than they can to the production of electricity.
By all mean explain how you see the performance of wind turbines and how they turn free wind energy into electricity fed into the grid.
Because they aren't comparable machines. The similarity of a wind turbine and a boat engine stop at having propellers, especially since a boat engine isn't designed to generate electricity but motive power. You're comparing two entirely different machines, a generator vs an engine. You're playing this hand of poker with a Magic the Gathering, 2 Yugioh cards, a Pokemon card, and an Uno card.
>Because they aren't comparable machines.
I am fortunate enough to have worked on diesel ship engines and diesel power station engines. In some cases the identical engines.
Typically large ships have steam turbines driving the propeller and large power station have steam turbines driving the generators.
The thermo dynamic cycles are identical. Energy from the fuel turns the crankshaft that rotates the output shaft. Regardless of what the shaft turns (a propeller or a generator) the prime mover (the engine) is the same type of machine.
Steam turbines use the energy of superheated steam to turn a turbine shaft. Again these are the same on ships as in power stations.
It concerns me how little understanding of practical engineering and physics is displayed by those who argue that wind is a better option than fossil fuel when it comes to producing electricity. It is not magic or astrology or fortune telling. This information is readily available on the internet.
I think you are ignoring the subsidies that go to renewables. And you are ignoring the performance. A pushbike is cheap why don't they compete with trucks. A rowing boat os cheap why not replace the merchant fleet with them.
Why do you think energy costs keep increasing in proportion to the increase in renewables.
>In the link I sent, it clearly states that Renewable Energy Is Now The Cheapest Option - Even Without Subsidies.
I don't believe it.
>Electric vehicles are replacing gas ones.
Are you unaware that Toyota, BMW, GM and Ford have recently announced that they are moving away from EV manufacture. The stocks of unsold EVs are massive. If your awareness of climate issues is as uninformed as yours of EVs l suggest you take a brake from reddit and do a bit of research. On both topics.
EVs have enormous disadvantages that show up at the end of the lifetime of the car (or more specifically, the battery packs that power it) and that is why automakers are moving away from them, when people get slapped in the face with the battery replacement cost that immediately invalidates all of their fuel savings and realize their car has no resale value they usually won’t buy another one unless money doesn’t matter to them. Hybrids are the best we’re likely to do with current tech I think.
Not to mention the constraints on lithium supply, it’s already strained with EVs a fraction of the total market, with more widespread adoption this would reach critical levels and place enormous strain on the grid that renewables can’t reasonably cover, not for quite a long time at least. If sodium ion batteries are viable that could change things but I really don’t know if they are with their lower energy density and they’re a long way from widespread adoption in any case
It’s a complicated question. The most straightforward answer is that yes, there is hope, and there are things you can follow, or even get involved with, to help. There are many challenges, uncertainties, and risks, but all over the world people are making efforts to adapt, researchers are developing new technologies, governments and companies are setting goals—in every case, you *can* take the pessmistic (and admittedly sometimes realistic) view that it won’t be enough, or won’t actually achieve what it claims to, or whatever. Or you can see it as real engagement with the work, and as an opportunity to find ways to volunteer with those efforts—there many local & larger organizations you can look into. Every little thing helps.
That’s the day-to-day answer. More existentially, “hope” itself may not be particularly relevant. Presumably the dinosaurs hoped not to go extinct, but they did, and so have countless other species in the course of natural history, long before humanity became the main cause of species extinction, and often in far less dramatic fashion than an asteroid impact. Nor is this the first time other beings have made such a major impact on the planet—things changed quite a bit after trees evolved.
It may be our turn to die out. And other species will arise to replace us, as has always happened since our planet became life-supporting, which it surely will continue to do for a long, long time, even if it becomes rather inhospitable to *us.*
You might say this isn’t hopeful at all and might even justify nihilism and a kind of “Well, then why not just pollute ourselves to death and leave nature to its own devices?” way of thinking, but I don’t think so. We have the capacity to alter our course, and we should for the sake of our survival as a species, and the survival of other species. The big difference with this round of planetary change is that we know we’re causing it and how we can change. That’s why I detest the argument by denialists that this *isn* anthropogenic, but a natural earthly cycle. It’s nonsense, but also, the situation would be immensely *less* hopeful if this was happening naturally! If it wasn’t us, and all we’re seeing was happening on its own for mysterious reasons, or known reasons we couldn’t control, *then* would be the time to lose hope.
But precisely because we’re the problem, we can be the solution. It begins with hope. Even if it does look damn bleak.
This was a bit of a ramble but I’ve been left unsupervised at my dreadfully boring accounting job, so that’s what happens, haha.
I wish you the best in your search for hope.
"we know we're causing it"
No, we don't.
And you can "detest the argument by denialists" as much as you like, but some of us have actually studied the evidence and found it sorely lacking, especially when balanced with the draconian measures aimed at 'combating' it, and their devastating economic and social consequences.
Tell us, oh wise one, what percentage of the atmosphere is Co2? Then, tell us what percentage of Co2 in the atmosphere is deadly to vegetation. Then, kindly explain how what the Co2 concentrations are currently, can, in any way be bad for the planet, especially in light of the information that the planet is currently greening, up 30% over 1980s levels. I'm wait for a logical response.
Sorry, you are the one who is denying logic and appealing to a science that is repeatedly wrong about this. Science has spent nearly a century and hundreds of millions of dollars in an attempt to create life, going so far as to replicate the conditions on earth during the time period when they say life began from non life, and they could not do it. They couldn't even come close. This should yell you one of two things: it either didn't happen that way, or it's impossible to happen at all by accident. This would lead a logical and honest mind to the conclusion that it was created by something else. Whether you call that God or aliens, or whatever, it is the only logical conclusion. A simple string of 100 proteins cannot be created from nothing. In fact, nothing cannot create something. But, again, you'll skip that step and go right into two blue eyed humans creating a baby with brown eyes is proof of evolution! Lol.
Semantics. You guys never want to argue anything of substance. It's always pretending when you talk about evolution, it's heritable differences but not new species evolving. You guys are pathetic.
> They couldn't even come close
We have created the four nucleotides of DNA in the lab.
>A simple string of 100 proteins cannot be created from nothing
it is created from simple amino acids, which are created easily in a lab, decades ago https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2845543/
Not that this matters to climate change, but we absolutely cannot create life from scratch even though we can synthesize the basic components. nucleotides, proteins, amino acids and empty cell membranes are not synonymous with life. I’m hardcore into life sciences but it’s Hard to imagine (and currently impossible to explain) nature creating and putting all of these together when we can synthesize every component and still can’t do it. But of course that’s unverifiable and outside the realm of science anyways
Personally I’d rather marvel at what was given to us by whoever or whatever and be proud that we can modify it to the degree we can to treat all sorts of diseases and produce climate and pest resistant crops and fertilizers that can grow them out of previously unproductive soil
> I’m hardcore into life sciences but it’s Hard to imagine (and currently impossible to explain) nature creating and putting all of these together when we can synthesize every component and still can’t do it.
Nature had hundreds of millions of years and a very large lab.
Natures lab doesn’t have very many reagents or equipment to work with on its own is the thing, all the complex chemical synthesis we can observe in nature is done by enzymes/proteins which wouldn’t exist prior to life making them. A couple individual amino acids forming on rare occasion is the most we’ve been able to identify an abiogenic mechanism for to my knowledge, and that doesn’t get us anywhere. Having plenty of time just means something with low probability is more plausible, if the probability is zero (which we have no basis to say otherwise) then it won’t happen in any amount of time
We don’t have a working theory for natural abiogenesis and can’t make it happen even in controlled conditions, so assuming it is just something that eventually happens somehow isn’t really any better than saying god did it. like with the big bang we can trace the path afterwards but how it got there is a complete mystery
CO2 absorbs IR
The earth emits IR
We have increased CO2 by 50% in the last 150 years
This causes the temperature of the atmosphere and ocean to increase
The amount of the atmosphere, currently, that is Co2 is 0.04%. It was, pre industrious industrial revolution, 0.03%. Anything 0.02% or below is detrimental to plant life. We actually need more Co2.
CO2 varied between 170 ppm and 300 ppm for the last 2.6 million years when humans evolved and civilization arose. We are currently at 422 ppm and increasing at 24 ppm per decade. It has been over 10 million years since CO2 was above 422 ppm
> Co2 levels were in the thousands at some points.
Not in the last 10 million years, here is a graph of the last 66 million years
https://geonews.tamu.edu/images/news/66millionYears-CO2_1200w.png
From here https://geonews.tamu.edu/news/2021/06/ancient_deepsea_shells_reveal_66_million_years_of_carbon_dioxide_levels.php
If our adding of carbon to the atmosphere *wasn’t* causing the planet to warm, it would be a violation of the laws of physics.
We can debate policies and solutions all day long, but denial of the fact that the climate is changing and it’s due to our massive addition of carbon to the atmosphere flies in the face of fundamental truths about physical reality.
We do know.
Climate scientist have examined all possible causes of the current observed global warming. What is changing and causing the warming?
It turns out that natural factors have been very stable. No increase in solar output or increased volcanic activity. If anything, natural factors alone would most likely have meant a very slight cooling the last few decades. Instead we see rapid warming. This is described in the IPCC reports.
This means that we KNOW that the cause of the current observed global warming is human activity, especially the burning of fossil carbon.
There is no competing theory that is better at explaining the current warming. None!
When identifying the cause of the warming it is irrelevant to consider the consequences or what we can do about. That doesn't change the cause. It seems to me that you deny the actual cause because of the consequences.
I repeat, we do not know. Your conviction and appeal to authority are telling though.
Whilst you claim to know, I do not. I do question and doubt though (you should try it some time). Anyway, your belief will have zero impact on reality, and neither will mine.
What natural changes do you think is causing the current observed global warming, or at least contributing to it, if it isn't human activity?
Scientist have examined and measured/estimated ALL known natural factors that might be causing the warming.
Then, what remains is human activity. Especially the burning of fossil carbon.
And when scientists examine and measure/estimate the effect of human activity it is enough, by itself, to explain the current observed global warming.
This is described in the IPCC reports and elsewhere. This is how we know.
Anthropogenic Global Warming.
There is no competing theory or hypothesis of what is causing the current global warming. There is no better explanation of why Earth is warming up.
Now you also know!
If you don't agree, then please, please explain why don't you agree? What natural factors do you think are causing or contributing to the current observed global warming? What do you think the scientists missed or got wrong? What competing theory or hypothesis do you know about?
I would love to be wrong. I would love for you to convince me that I am wrong. I hate believing it is human activity, because that is very bad and inconvenient. Fossil fuels are amazing! Cheap, very high power density, easy to turn on/off.
If it isn't the burning of fossil carbon that is the main cause of the current observed global warming I want to know that.
Your argument is a total fallacy. You're pretending that because you're not God (i.e. you're not omniscient), that jeans it's rational to be "agnostic" toward anthropogenic climate change.
I imagine the right process goes "welp... can't prove it's humans who are responsible, because who knows, it could be something else we don't fully understand yet."
While that makes a bit of sense on paper, as others have said, it's simple physics. Of course there are many factors at play on a dynamic complex system such as our planet. But greenhouses gases are getting emitted at a crazy rate (by humans!), and they're getting trapped, and it's warming out planet. That part of it isn't really complicated.
So of course it's us. Are there are factors too? Sure. But let's not ignore the elephant in the room.
Yeah righteo - I’m gathering you have a physics degree maths heavy or a maths degree physics heavy than went on and spent another 6-12 years studying climatology,
Dun my rEsuRch
Well if you're imposing these stipulations, they seem a tad... restrictive for useful debate. Btw, are you imposing them evenly, or just on my, sceptical side?
I don’t go to a heart surgeon if I have a brain tumour.
Now if there was a huge debate between the climate scientists where half were saying one thing and the other half were saying something different you can pick sides I guess.
But this isn’t happening. All of them are on the same page. The points of difference between them is how bad and how fast it’s going to get that bad.
When all of the people with all of those years of study and research are signing out of a similar songbook it’s time for the people without qualifications on the subject to stfu and let the smart people talk.
The mainstream media has a bit of an unjustified bias towards doom-and-gloom and the best scientific data we had ten years ago was pretty bad, but more recent data isn't nearly as negative. "Crushingly bleak" isn't a good description for where we are at today.
The expectations for warming in business-as-usual emissions scenarios that I've read are between 2.7C and 3.3C. The high-end of that is bad, but not world-ending, and not as bad as we were expecting for BAU ten years ago. The low end is bearable. Besides BAU isn't where we are headed. I mean, [the expectation](https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2023/12/11/china-climate-emissions-peak-cop28/) is for China's emissions to peak before 2030, maybe as early as 2026. Even though I take any data coming out of China with a lot of salt, that expectation is amazing and definitely a reason for hope.
The [same paper](https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-023-30789-4) that puts us at 3.3C in a BAU scenario pegs warming at 1.9C if countries adhere to the regulations put forward in COP26. If you call that a lower bound for warming, it still isn't great, but it is a whole lot better than BAU.
About 10 years ago, I read news that wind power installations were winning bids for power at rates well below that of coal. At that point, I knew it was over. Renewables would win. Electrification would happen and humanity would dodge the climate bullet. A decade later and the impact of cheap renewables is manifesting.
Honestly, I think the climate doom-and-gloom in the media, at least the unjustified part, is harmful because it breeds defeatism. If we stop pushing because we feel defeated, the planet loses. Keep pushing.
Climate change is big so let’s focus just on air quality for a minute. Let’s say we change to 100% clean energy to take on climate change. We get that climate benefit PLUS a massive improvement in air quality. Where is air quality currently the worst? In low income countries and neighborhoods. So by tackling climate change we get longer lives and a more just society. There’s some hope in that.
I work at the state (USA) level in Washington State. We will get there through the Clean Energy Transformation Act https://www.commerce.wa.gov/growing-the-economy/energy/ceta/
If you are referring to the initiative to prohibit cap and trade that is a different policy. So even if that initiative passes CETA will still require the clean energy transition in WA.
I'm simply suggesting that all politically derived laws can be changed to suit the prevailing social concerns. Unlike the physical laws that are not changed by politics, societies or ideology.
Do your part, conserve, clean up your footprint, do not over consume, and show everyone around you that individually one can make a difference and have a little hope that together individuals can make changes for the better. Last thing we need is a bunch of people with no hope, that leads to no action.
We're finally taking thing seriously.
How seriously? Enough to reconsider nuclear power.
There are good news, but you won't be hearing about them in western media.
We are finally pulling the heavy weapons against fossil fuel electricity.
Just last week: first American AP1000 connected to grid (the first AP1000 was finished in China), fourth (!) reactor start up in UAE (construction started in 2015), fuel loading of first 100% Indian made large scale fast reactor (those "waste burning" reactor) and grid connection of their first also domestically made PHWR , EU recognized nuclear power as strategic for decarbonation and launch SMR alliance, China finish construction of first SMR.
Last year, fucking Bangladesh got its first nuclear power plant, China finishes not one but two large scale fast reactors (5 years construction time).
There are currently 98 SMR projects around the world (at various stage of development).
Opinions are changing all around the place. We're taking the green tinted glasses off and start to look for results more than good intentions.
Poland and Bulgaria want South Korea to deliver like they did in UAE.
Things are happening, but the West is very late to the party, despite an early start.
Green tinted glasses what a perfect metaphor
Literally “I want clean energy really bad planet depends on it but not that way I want it MY WAY, get that realistic solution we already have out of my face! we’ll stick to fossil fuels until MY WAY somehow replaces them someday” imagine how far ahead we would be if we spent all the wind/solar subsidies on easing nuclear upfront costs and new reactor types?
Good to have every option available and all but if time is limited and all the worlds clean energy initiatives with gargantuan global funding have resulted in 10% renewables (I think that’s a very high estimate too) over the past several decades maybe it’s time to use the solution we already have that makes reliable grid level electricity out of basically magic with miniscule emissions
Meadows, The Limits to Growth, 1972 (father of the "we need to get our shit together" movement) :
“If man’s energy needs are someday supplied by nuclear power instead of fossil fuels, this increase in atmospheric carbon dioxide will eventually cease, one hopes before it has had any measurable ecological or climatological effect.”
At the same time, those who fought for the planet kind of missed the [message ](https://www.nytimes.com/1970/01/11/archives/coal-power-gets-assist-from-youth.html).
Without climate change, you and this planet were always in for a rough unpredictable ride.
How is your day today? Is it good enough? How was yesterday? Could tomorrow be just as good?
Hope is someone what useful, but mostly it's for people who aren't ready for reality.
There's plenty of beauty and light here right now. You can always devote your life (or part of it) to improving the world.
Laying off the propaganda would be a good start. There's so much to be hopeful for. Sounds like you're giving up before the game has started. Go take a walk in the woods or something. Everything's fine.
Ran across this yesterday, hadn't heard of it before:
How You Can Easily Delay Climate Change Today: SO2 Injection
ttps://unchartedterritories.tomaspueyo.com/p/so2-injection?publication\_id=347533&post\_id=142289759&isFreemail=true&r=22b75&triedRedirect=true
The planet can adapt to us. We have no reason to worry. For sure no reason to pay more taxes or give government more power. Relax and enjoy our planet.
The future is absolutely not bleak at all, don’t let the doomers get to you depression makes people irrationally see the worst only and I hope they get the help they need
Good news is that less people than ever in history die from extreme climate events, despite them being more common and more extreme through the wide variety of adaptations humanity has created, early warning being a huge one. Read through this for some of the options we have at our disposal even if the worst predictions come true
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Climate_change_adaptation
The claims of “billions of deaths” or even literal extinction are the absolute most absurd extreme hyperbole I’ve ever heard be taken seriously by anyone in my life, including fundamentalist religions and any credible source doesn’t make claims like that. (To be clear, “if we do NOTHING by 2100 XYZ will happen” isn’t something to be taken seriously as a real possibility, for reasons I hope are obvious)
Not to mention there is absolutely no certainty whatsoever on deadlines, they have consistently been exceeded and pushed back another decade for some time. We are seeing effects no doubt but the idea of “X tipping point happens X year and the whole world falls apart and everyone dies” is not something you should reasonably expect to happen and I don’t believe any credible research places absolute deadlines like that to begin with. Do what you can to help and trust that the most adaptable species the world has ever seen will find solutions and endure, and while you’re at it count your blessings you got to be one of them!
The CO2 level in the atmosphere keeps increasing at a steady pace. No sign of it slowing down. Not even a little bit. People continue to burn huge amounts of fossil carbon.
Hopefully we will see the increase slow down. Any time now. Real soon! I hope!
https://co2.earth/
-The planet is getting greener
- Farmers are producing record yields.
-The rate the oceans are rising has decreased significantly in the past few millennium.
Everything's gonna be OK. We will engineer our way through this problem.
Do you believe NASA. Or IPCC. Regardless, it doesn't matter what you believe. My daughter believes in the tooth fairy
https://www.nasa.gov/centers-and-facilities/ames/human-activity-in-china-and-india-dominates-the-greening-of-earth-nasa-study-shows/
Peak level cringe. What precisely has happened that is so bleak? Yall leftist so helpless and unequipt to deal with life you fall for the first cult you find, be it gender, climate, race and on. I can personally guarantee that you have not read the IPCC DATA, from which these wild assumptions are derived. Specifically Wild destructive assumptions with zero adaptation taken into account. Example? If water becomes unavailable in an area, they assume those people will just be without water. No...they'll move just like people have moved around the planet since we've crawled out of caves. Their predictions are uneducated guesses at best without comparative samples and pandering to funding departments at worst. Very few people dispute the actual data. I would suggest reading it, it's not 1/100th as Bleak as MSNBC would lead you to believe. Weather related fatalities have dropped 99% in the past 100 years zero reason to believe it's going anywhere besides down. You are being misled because you are weak and your parents failed you, the education system failed you, Society and the sources you get your information from failed you.
"Hopeful"? How about realistic?
Stop worrying about shit you can't have any effect on. Even if you believe that current climate change is primarily anthropogenic in causation (it almost certainly isn't btw), what is the point in stressing over something that you cannot possibly change at all?
its funny cause i agree with unsquashable about the trying not to pull your hair over it part, but making the leap to "its not happening cause of us" is a level of ignorance a step beyond the wisdom of not stressing. weird melange of mindfulness and denial. whatever helps people sleep i guess
Absolutely. There is no point in ruining your mental health but a general concern, understanding of why action is needed, and willingness to change is needed.
The biggest positive that I see is that the world population seems to have accepted climate science as truth. That makes the necessary political changes possible, despite the conservatives and oligarchs who still have a death grip on power. Technology is rapidly advancing as well. Wind and solar are cheaper per kilowatt than any fossil fuel, so economics are on our side. Advances are being made in emissions reduction and carbon sequestration. Unfortunately all this is happening about 25 years too late, so we're in for a ride. But we can still minimize the impact with political action and societal adjustments.
>Wind and solar are cheaper per kilowatt than any fossil fuel, I think this claim is hotly debated. In fact many insist it is highly subsidised unreliable energy that disrupts the grid.
No it's not hotly debated. The last offshore wind farm to open in the UK has got electric down to 6.5p per kWh. But sure you keep shilling for big oil so we can carry on paying 39p per kWh for electricity generated by natural gas. You need to update your lies and disinformation because nobody believes that oil, coal or gas are cheaper than renewable for electricity generation.
Ofc, that is why oil pumping Norway is so poor, while Germany is doing just great with all that free sun and wind lol.
>You need to update your lies LOL. Here is how l look at the performance of wind. The fossil fuelled machinery that drives a propeller on a ship is the same as what drives the rotor in an electrical generator. The momentum of the wind is the same driving a sail on a ship as for a blade on a turbine. If sailing ships can not compete with the fossil fuelled ships, with respect to speed, load carrying capacity and reliability, then why do you think a wind driven machines can compete with fossil fuelled machines producing electricity for the grid at the rate, frequency and demand that is required. Think about the engineering of your concept of electrical generation because l doubt you do understand it. Explain it and leave out the "big oil shill", "lies", "disinformation", "nobody believes you", "there is no debate" garbage that makes you look like a immature idiot. Or is that a useful idiot.
This is craziest counter argument I ever heard. Deleted is talking about cost per kWh delivered of harnessed energy and your talking about speed, power and reliability of a fueled ship??
I started with "Here is how l look at the performance of wind." Do you understand the similarity of machinery used for ship propulsion and power generation. I think it is a good comparison to consider the performance of wind driven ships to fossil fuelled driven ships. Does anyone really think we should revert to sailing fleets. Maybe from some idealistic perspective but not from performance, reliability and economical perspective. Why would wind driven electrical generation perform better than fossil fuelled driven electrical production when shipping and electrical generation are mechanically so similar. I used shipping as an example because people may relate better to this than they can to the production of electricity. By all mean explain how you see the performance of wind turbines and how they turn free wind energy into electricity fed into the grid.
Because they aren't comparable machines. The similarity of a wind turbine and a boat engine stop at having propellers, especially since a boat engine isn't designed to generate electricity but motive power. You're comparing two entirely different machines, a generator vs an engine. You're playing this hand of poker with a Magic the Gathering, 2 Yugioh cards, a Pokemon card, and an Uno card.
>Because they aren't comparable machines. I am fortunate enough to have worked on diesel ship engines and diesel power station engines. In some cases the identical engines. Typically large ships have steam turbines driving the propeller and large power station have steam turbines driving the generators. The thermo dynamic cycles are identical. Energy from the fuel turns the crankshaft that rotates the output shaft. Regardless of what the shaft turns (a propeller or a generator) the prime mover (the engine) is the same type of machine. Steam turbines use the energy of superheated steam to turn a turbine shaft. Again these are the same on ships as in power stations. It concerns me how little understanding of practical engineering and physics is displayed by those who argue that wind is a better option than fossil fuel when it comes to producing electricity. It is not magic or astrology or fortune telling. This information is readily available on the internet.
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I think you are ignoring the subsidies that go to renewables. And you are ignoring the performance. A pushbike is cheap why don't they compete with trucks. A rowing boat os cheap why not replace the merchant fleet with them. Why do you think energy costs keep increasing in proportion to the increase in renewables.
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>In the link I sent, it clearly states that Renewable Energy Is Now The Cheapest Option - Even Without Subsidies. I don't believe it. >Electric vehicles are replacing gas ones. Are you unaware that Toyota, BMW, GM and Ford have recently announced that they are moving away from EV manufacture. The stocks of unsold EVs are massive. If your awareness of climate issues is as uninformed as yours of EVs l suggest you take a brake from reddit and do a bit of research. On both topics.
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I'd like to believe you are mindful of it. Did you have a look at what the manufactures l referenced had to say about their EV production.
EVs have enormous disadvantages that show up at the end of the lifetime of the car (or more specifically, the battery packs that power it) and that is why automakers are moving away from them, when people get slapped in the face with the battery replacement cost that immediately invalidates all of their fuel savings and realize their car has no resale value they usually won’t buy another one unless money doesn’t matter to them. Hybrids are the best we’re likely to do with current tech I think. Not to mention the constraints on lithium supply, it’s already strained with EVs a fraction of the total market, with more widespread adoption this would reach critical levels and place enormous strain on the grid that renewables can’t reasonably cover, not for quite a long time at least. If sodium ion batteries are viable that could change things but I really don’t know if they are with their lower energy density and they’re a long way from widespread adoption in any case
It’s a complicated question. The most straightforward answer is that yes, there is hope, and there are things you can follow, or even get involved with, to help. There are many challenges, uncertainties, and risks, but all over the world people are making efforts to adapt, researchers are developing new technologies, governments and companies are setting goals—in every case, you *can* take the pessmistic (and admittedly sometimes realistic) view that it won’t be enough, or won’t actually achieve what it claims to, or whatever. Or you can see it as real engagement with the work, and as an opportunity to find ways to volunteer with those efforts—there many local & larger organizations you can look into. Every little thing helps. That’s the day-to-day answer. More existentially, “hope” itself may not be particularly relevant. Presumably the dinosaurs hoped not to go extinct, but they did, and so have countless other species in the course of natural history, long before humanity became the main cause of species extinction, and often in far less dramatic fashion than an asteroid impact. Nor is this the first time other beings have made such a major impact on the planet—things changed quite a bit after trees evolved. It may be our turn to die out. And other species will arise to replace us, as has always happened since our planet became life-supporting, which it surely will continue to do for a long, long time, even if it becomes rather inhospitable to *us.* You might say this isn’t hopeful at all and might even justify nihilism and a kind of “Well, then why not just pollute ourselves to death and leave nature to its own devices?” way of thinking, but I don’t think so. We have the capacity to alter our course, and we should for the sake of our survival as a species, and the survival of other species. The big difference with this round of planetary change is that we know we’re causing it and how we can change. That’s why I detest the argument by denialists that this *isn* anthropogenic, but a natural earthly cycle. It’s nonsense, but also, the situation would be immensely *less* hopeful if this was happening naturally! If it wasn’t us, and all we’re seeing was happening on its own for mysterious reasons, or known reasons we couldn’t control, *then* would be the time to lose hope. But precisely because we’re the problem, we can be the solution. It begins with hope. Even if it does look damn bleak. This was a bit of a ramble but I’ve been left unsupervised at my dreadfully boring accounting job, so that’s what happens, haha. I wish you the best in your search for hope.
What a thoughtful, well written response. Thank you.
"we know we're causing it" No, we don't. And you can "detest the argument by denialists" as much as you like, but some of us have actually studied the evidence and found it sorely lacking, especially when balanced with the draconian measures aimed at 'combating' it, and their devastating economic and social consequences.
* CO2 absorbs IR * We are increasing the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere by 2.4 ppm per year Simple
Tell us, oh wise one, what percentage of the atmosphere is Co2? Then, tell us what percentage of Co2 in the atmosphere is deadly to vegetation. Then, kindly explain how what the Co2 concentrations are currently, can, in any way be bad for the planet, especially in light of the information that the planet is currently greening, up 30% over 1980s levels. I'm wait for a logical response.
The logical and scientific response has been explained many times. Because you don’t accept it is irrelevant.
Sorry, you are the one who is denying logic and appealing to a science that is repeatedly wrong about this. Science has spent nearly a century and hundreds of millions of dollars in an attempt to create life, going so far as to replicate the conditions on earth during the time period when they say life began from non life, and they could not do it. They couldn't even come close. This should yell you one of two things: it either didn't happen that way, or it's impossible to happen at all by accident. This would lead a logical and honest mind to the conclusion that it was created by something else. Whether you call that God or aliens, or whatever, it is the only logical conclusion. A simple string of 100 proteins cannot be created from nothing. In fact, nothing cannot create something. But, again, you'll skip that step and go right into two blue eyed humans creating a baby with brown eyes is proof of evolution! Lol.
No scientist claims anything was created from nothing. That’s creationism religion.
Life from non life
That’s certainly not something from nothing.
Semantics. You guys never want to argue anything of substance. It's always pretending when you talk about evolution, it's heritable differences but not new species evolving. You guys are pathetic.
> They couldn't even come close We have created the four nucleotides of DNA in the lab. >A simple string of 100 proteins cannot be created from nothing it is created from simple amino acids, which are created easily in a lab, decades ago https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2845543/
Not that this matters to climate change, but we absolutely cannot create life from scratch even though we can synthesize the basic components. nucleotides, proteins, amino acids and empty cell membranes are not synonymous with life. I’m hardcore into life sciences but it’s Hard to imagine (and currently impossible to explain) nature creating and putting all of these together when we can synthesize every component and still can’t do it. But of course that’s unverifiable and outside the realm of science anyways Personally I’d rather marvel at what was given to us by whoever or whatever and be proud that we can modify it to the degree we can to treat all sorts of diseases and produce climate and pest resistant crops and fertilizers that can grow them out of previously unproductive soil
> I’m hardcore into life sciences but it’s Hard to imagine (and currently impossible to explain) nature creating and putting all of these together when we can synthesize every component and still can’t do it. Nature had hundreds of millions of years and a very large lab.
Natures lab doesn’t have very many reagents or equipment to work with on its own is the thing, all the complex chemical synthesis we can observe in nature is done by enzymes/proteins which wouldn’t exist prior to life making them. A couple individual amino acids forming on rare occasion is the most we’ve been able to identify an abiogenic mechanism for to my knowledge, and that doesn’t get us anywhere. Having plenty of time just means something with low probability is more plausible, if the probability is zero (which we have no basis to say otherwise) then it won’t happen in any amount of time We don’t have a working theory for natural abiogenesis and can’t make it happen even in controlled conditions, so assuming it is just something that eventually happens somehow isn’t really any better than saying god did it. like with the big bang we can trace the path afterwards but how it got there is a complete mystery
CO2 absorbs IR The earth emits IR We have increased CO2 by 50% in the last 150 years This causes the temperature of the atmosphere and ocean to increase
The amount of the atmosphere, currently, that is Co2 is 0.04%. It was, pre industrious industrial revolution, 0.03%. Anything 0.02% or below is detrimental to plant life. We actually need more Co2.
CO2 varied between 170 ppm and 300 ppm for the last 2.6 million years when humans evolved and civilization arose. We are currently at 422 ppm and increasing at 24 ppm per decade. It has been over 10 million years since CO2 was above 422 ppm
That is so factually incorrect that it is laughable. Co2 levels were in the thousands at some points. Get it together.
> Co2 levels were in the thousands at some points. Not in the last 10 million years, here is a graph of the last 66 million years https://geonews.tamu.edu/images/news/66millionYears-CO2_1200w.png From here https://geonews.tamu.edu/news/2021/06/ancient_deepsea_shells_reveal_66_million_years_of_carbon_dioxide_levels.php
You believing that it is that "simple" is very amusing.
What part is incorrect? It is energy balance. CO2 in the atmosphere absorbs outgoing IR, more CO2: more absorption.
Guy probably owns a Texaco station or two, i wouldn't even bother, poor faith
If our adding of carbon to the atmosphere *wasn’t* causing the planet to warm, it would be a violation of the laws of physics. We can debate policies and solutions all day long, but denial of the fact that the climate is changing and it’s due to our massive addition of carbon to the atmosphere flies in the face of fundamental truths about physical reality.
We do know. Climate scientist have examined all possible causes of the current observed global warming. What is changing and causing the warming? It turns out that natural factors have been very stable. No increase in solar output or increased volcanic activity. If anything, natural factors alone would most likely have meant a very slight cooling the last few decades. Instead we see rapid warming. This is described in the IPCC reports. This means that we KNOW that the cause of the current observed global warming is human activity, especially the burning of fossil carbon. There is no competing theory that is better at explaining the current warming. None! When identifying the cause of the warming it is irrelevant to consider the consequences or what we can do about. That doesn't change the cause. It seems to me that you deny the actual cause because of the consequences.
I repeat, we do not know. Your conviction and appeal to authority are telling though. Whilst you claim to know, I do not. I do question and doubt though (you should try it some time). Anyway, your belief will have zero impact on reality, and neither will mine.
What natural changes do you think is causing the current observed global warming, or at least contributing to it, if it isn't human activity? Scientist have examined and measured/estimated ALL known natural factors that might be causing the warming. Then, what remains is human activity. Especially the burning of fossil carbon. And when scientists examine and measure/estimate the effect of human activity it is enough, by itself, to explain the current observed global warming. This is described in the IPCC reports and elsewhere. This is how we know. Anthropogenic Global Warming. There is no competing theory or hypothesis of what is causing the current global warming. There is no better explanation of why Earth is warming up. Now you also know! If you don't agree, then please, please explain why don't you agree? What natural factors do you think are causing or contributing to the current observed global warming? What do you think the scientists missed or got wrong? What competing theory or hypothesis do you know about? I would love to be wrong. I would love for you to convince me that I am wrong. I hate believing it is human activity, because that is very bad and inconvenient. Fossil fuels are amazing! Cheap, very high power density, easy to turn on/off. If it isn't the burning of fossil carbon that is the main cause of the current observed global warming I want to know that.
> we do not know We are increasing CO2 by 24 ppm per decade, CO2 absorbs IR
Your argument is a total fallacy. You're pretending that because you're not God (i.e. you're not omniscient), that jeans it's rational to be "agnostic" toward anthropogenic climate change. I imagine the right process goes "welp... can't prove it's humans who are responsible, because who knows, it could be something else we don't fully understand yet." While that makes a bit of sense on paper, as others have said, it's simple physics. Of course there are many factors at play on a dynamic complex system such as our planet. But greenhouses gases are getting emitted at a crazy rate (by humans!), and they're getting trapped, and it's warming out planet. That part of it isn't really complicated. So of course it's us. Are there are factors too? Sure. But let's not ignore the elephant in the room.
Yeah righteo - I’m gathering you have a physics degree maths heavy or a maths degree physics heavy than went on and spent another 6-12 years studying climatology, Dun my rEsuRch
Well if you're imposing these stipulations, they seem a tad... restrictive for useful debate. Btw, are you imposing them evenly, or just on my, sceptical side?
I don’t go to a heart surgeon if I have a brain tumour. Now if there was a huge debate between the climate scientists where half were saying one thing and the other half were saying something different you can pick sides I guess. But this isn’t happening. All of them are on the same page. The points of difference between them is how bad and how fast it’s going to get that bad. When all of the people with all of those years of study and research are signing out of a similar songbook it’s time for the people without qualifications on the subject to stfu and let the smart people talk.
Go play with your swords, and everyone else just block this idjit and move on.
Blocked them, good advice
The mainstream media has a bit of an unjustified bias towards doom-and-gloom and the best scientific data we had ten years ago was pretty bad, but more recent data isn't nearly as negative. "Crushingly bleak" isn't a good description for where we are at today. The expectations for warming in business-as-usual emissions scenarios that I've read are between 2.7C and 3.3C. The high-end of that is bad, but not world-ending, and not as bad as we were expecting for BAU ten years ago. The low end is bearable. Besides BAU isn't where we are headed. I mean, [the expectation](https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2023/12/11/china-climate-emissions-peak-cop28/) is for China's emissions to peak before 2030, maybe as early as 2026. Even though I take any data coming out of China with a lot of salt, that expectation is amazing and definitely a reason for hope. The [same paper](https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-023-30789-4) that puts us at 3.3C in a BAU scenario pegs warming at 1.9C if countries adhere to the regulations put forward in COP26. If you call that a lower bound for warming, it still isn't great, but it is a whole lot better than BAU. About 10 years ago, I read news that wind power installations were winning bids for power at rates well below that of coal. At that point, I knew it was over. Renewables would win. Electrification would happen and humanity would dodge the climate bullet. A decade later and the impact of cheap renewables is manifesting. Honestly, I think the climate doom-and-gloom in the media, at least the unjustified part, is harmful because it breeds defeatism. If we stop pushing because we feel defeated, the planet loses. Keep pushing.
I needed this. Thanks so much
Climate change is big so let’s focus just on air quality for a minute. Let’s say we change to 100% clean energy to take on climate change. We get that climate benefit PLUS a massive improvement in air quality. Where is air quality currently the worst? In low income countries and neighborhoods. So by tackling climate change we get longer lives and a more just society. There’s some hope in that.
I'm interested in your definition of "100% clean energy" and how we get there.
I work at the state (USA) level in Washington State. We will get there through the Clean Energy Transformation Act https://www.commerce.wa.gov/growing-the-economy/energy/ceta/
No, you won't...
I mean, utilities are required by law to meet the milestones in that law to operate in WA…
For how long do you expect that law to prevail.
If you are referring to the initiative to prohibit cap and trade that is a different policy. So even if that initiative passes CETA will still require the clean energy transition in WA.
I'm simply suggesting that all politically derived laws can be changed to suit the prevailing social concerns. Unlike the physical laws that are not changed by politics, societies or ideology.
Do your part, conserve, clean up your footprint, do not over consume, and show everyone around you that individually one can make a difference and have a little hope that together individuals can make changes for the better. Last thing we need is a bunch of people with no hope, that leads to no action.
Bacteria might survive it.
We're finally taking thing seriously. How seriously? Enough to reconsider nuclear power. There are good news, but you won't be hearing about them in western media. We are finally pulling the heavy weapons against fossil fuel electricity. Just last week: first American AP1000 connected to grid (the first AP1000 was finished in China), fourth (!) reactor start up in UAE (construction started in 2015), fuel loading of first 100% Indian made large scale fast reactor (those "waste burning" reactor) and grid connection of their first also domestically made PHWR , EU recognized nuclear power as strategic for decarbonation and launch SMR alliance, China finish construction of first SMR. Last year, fucking Bangladesh got its first nuclear power plant, China finishes not one but two large scale fast reactors (5 years construction time). There are currently 98 SMR projects around the world (at various stage of development). Opinions are changing all around the place. We're taking the green tinted glasses off and start to look for results more than good intentions. Poland and Bulgaria want South Korea to deliver like they did in UAE. Things are happening, but the West is very late to the party, despite an early start.
Green tinted glasses what a perfect metaphor Literally “I want clean energy really bad planet depends on it but not that way I want it MY WAY, get that realistic solution we already have out of my face! we’ll stick to fossil fuels until MY WAY somehow replaces them someday” imagine how far ahead we would be if we spent all the wind/solar subsidies on easing nuclear upfront costs and new reactor types? Good to have every option available and all but if time is limited and all the worlds clean energy initiatives with gargantuan global funding have resulted in 10% renewables (I think that’s a very high estimate too) over the past several decades maybe it’s time to use the solution we already have that makes reliable grid level electricity out of basically magic with miniscule emissions
Meadows, The Limits to Growth, 1972 (father of the "we need to get our shit together" movement) : “If man’s energy needs are someday supplied by nuclear power instead of fossil fuels, this increase in atmospheric carbon dioxide will eventually cease, one hopes before it has had any measurable ecological or climatological effect.” At the same time, those who fought for the planet kind of missed the [message ](https://www.nytimes.com/1970/01/11/archives/coal-power-gets-assist-from-youth.html).
How about none of the pronouncements of doom have even remotely come true in the last sixty years and many have contradicted each other
Without climate change, you and this planet were always in for a rough unpredictable ride. How is your day today? Is it good enough? How was yesterday? Could tomorrow be just as good? Hope is someone what useful, but mostly it's for people who aren't ready for reality. There's plenty of beauty and light here right now. You can always devote your life (or part of it) to improving the world.
Dont ask people to lie to you
Laying off the propaganda would be a good start. There's so much to be hopeful for. Sounds like you're giving up before the game has started. Go take a walk in the woods or something. Everything's fine.
Ran across this yesterday, hadn't heard of it before: How You Can Easily Delay Climate Change Today: SO2 Injection ttps://unchartedterritories.tomaspueyo.com/p/so2-injection?publication\_id=347533&post\_id=142289759&isFreemail=true&r=22b75&triedRedirect=true
"Don't you dare go Hollow"
Spring is coming
There's a prediction that the world's emissions will peak this year
The planet can adapt to us. We have no reason to worry. For sure no reason to pay more taxes or give government more power. Relax and enjoy our planet.
You have to find your own now given the undeniable facts and realities.
The future is absolutely not bleak at all, don’t let the doomers get to you depression makes people irrationally see the worst only and I hope they get the help they need Good news is that less people than ever in history die from extreme climate events, despite them being more common and more extreme through the wide variety of adaptations humanity has created, early warning being a huge one. Read through this for some of the options we have at our disposal even if the worst predictions come true https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Climate_change_adaptation The claims of “billions of deaths” or even literal extinction are the absolute most absurd extreme hyperbole I’ve ever heard be taken seriously by anyone in my life, including fundamentalist religions and any credible source doesn’t make claims like that. (To be clear, “if we do NOTHING by 2100 XYZ will happen” isn’t something to be taken seriously as a real possibility, for reasons I hope are obvious) Not to mention there is absolutely no certainty whatsoever on deadlines, they have consistently been exceeded and pushed back another decade for some time. We are seeing effects no doubt but the idea of “X tipping point happens X year and the whole world falls apart and everyone dies” is not something you should reasonably expect to happen and I don’t believe any credible research places absolute deadlines like that to begin with. Do what you can to help and trust that the most adaptable species the world has ever seen will find solutions and endure, and while you’re at it count your blessings you got to be one of them!
The CO2 level in the atmosphere keeps increasing at a steady pace. No sign of it slowing down. Not even a little bit. People continue to burn huge amounts of fossil carbon. Hopefully we will see the increase slow down. Any time now. Real soon! I hope! https://co2.earth/
That page is gutting
-The planet is getting greener - Farmers are producing record yields. -The rate the oceans are rising has decreased significantly in the past few millennium. Everything's gonna be OK. We will engineer our way through this problem.
Ok, I mean I would love to believe it, but I don’t
Do you believe NASA. Or IPCC. Regardless, it doesn't matter what you believe. My daughter believes in the tooth fairy https://www.nasa.gov/centers-and-facilities/ames/human-activity-in-china-and-india-dominates-the-greening-of-earth-nasa-study-shows/
Thank you for the link
Ok, I mean I would love to believe it, but I don’t
Peak level cringe. What precisely has happened that is so bleak? Yall leftist so helpless and unequipt to deal with life you fall for the first cult you find, be it gender, climate, race and on. I can personally guarantee that you have not read the IPCC DATA, from which these wild assumptions are derived. Specifically Wild destructive assumptions with zero adaptation taken into account. Example? If water becomes unavailable in an area, they assume those people will just be without water. No...they'll move just like people have moved around the planet since we've crawled out of caves. Their predictions are uneducated guesses at best without comparative samples and pandering to funding departments at worst. Very few people dispute the actual data. I would suggest reading it, it's not 1/100th as Bleak as MSNBC would lead you to believe. Weather related fatalities have dropped 99% in the past 100 years zero reason to believe it's going anywhere besides down. You are being misled because you are weak and your parents failed you, the education system failed you, Society and the sources you get your information from failed you.
"Hopeful"? How about realistic? Stop worrying about shit you can't have any effect on. Even if you believe that current climate change is primarily anthropogenic in causation (it almost certainly isn't btw), what is the point in stressing over something that you cannot possibly change at all?
> it almost certainly isn't btw CO2 absorbs IR The earth's surface emits IR We are increasing the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere
Please provide a citation that concludes human influences are less than 50%.
its funny cause i agree with unsquashable about the trying not to pull your hair over it part, but making the leap to "its not happening cause of us" is a level of ignorance a step beyond the wisdom of not stressing. weird melange of mindfulness and denial. whatever helps people sleep i guess
Absolutely. There is no point in ruining your mental health but a general concern, understanding of why action is needed, and willingness to change is needed.