CLIMATE CHANGE AND GLOBAL WARMING

[Stanley]

Those rocks will still be sitting there when the human race has gone the way of the dinosaurs.... There's a thought to conjure with.

[Tizer]

Analysis by Matt McGrath, BBC Environment correspondent...
`Why the US election could decide battle against climate change' LINK

[Stanley]

That is intensely depressing Peter.

[Tizer]

Only if Trump gets in again and my money is on Biden now.

[Stanley]

I agree, I think there is a hint of panic in the Trump campaign at the moment. I have my fingers crossed, Biden may not be perfect but given the alternative he is beginning to look attractive. I suspect many voters are thinking the same.

[Tizer]

This will help explain what's happening with methane...
`Satellites picture methane across the globe' LINK

[Stanley]

The thing that strikes me about the images is that on the face of it Australia is squeaky clean and yet it exports enormous amounts of coal and iron ore to China which send China into the red when they are used there. Where do you allocate blame for that?
Covid soaks up all the media attention while climate change continues unabated. I wonder how many 'events' are slipping under the radar. In that respect Covid is also a threat to the planet.

[Tizer]

I'm glad to see this article analysing critically some of the claims we see about tackling climate change. For example the coal industry supporters are always banging on about using carbon capture as if it's the answer to everything but we're nowhere near having any useful or even economically feasible such technology...
`Climate change: Technology no silver bullet, experts tell PM' LINK

[Stanley]

I agree Peter. The politicians are suckers for the 'quick fix'. Show them a simple to understand immediate solution and they will always fall for it. Carbon capture is a good example. We know it works when combined with natural carbon sinks like wetlands but nobody has ever made it work economically by injecting it back underground. Trouble is that a peat bog is not photogenic and you can't make money out of letting it do its thing.

[plaques]

Passed a few minutes watching a YouTube of separating hydrogen from water by electrolysis. Hydrogen. A back yard demonstration before going into the advantages of hydrogen storage against battery storage. The system only becomes viable with cheap renewable energy but suffers from the high capital costs of storage plants. The big problem as I see it is that to be cost effective it has to use surplus electricity that can't be used immediately in the grid. Once you've reached the point of constant surplus renewable energy then the long term storage potential of hydrogen may replace the more carbon intensive supplies of coal and gas.

[Stanley]

It's like scanning the future looking for flying objects.... how many are actually pigs?

[Tizer]

The system only becomes viable with cheap renewable energy but suffers from the high capital costs of storage plants.

New, lower energy methods using catalysts are being developed.

[Tripps]

As an unintended consequence of another thread, I find myself writing about my school days for a blog. I'm currently 'doing' the Latin teacher, and saying what a difficult subject it was. Seeing 'nullius in verba' reminded me of that, and I would say it could possibly equally well be translated as ' don't write anything down'.

[Stanley]

I was never taught Latin David but have brushed against it occasionally and I'd say you could be right.
As practised by dodgy politicians having meetings they would rather never became public.

[Tizer]

Now that the waters of the Atlantic are warmer they're passing this heat to the Arctic Ocean and causing the methane hydrates to release the gas...
`'Sleeping giant' Arctic methane deposits starting to release, scientists find: expedition discovers new source of greenhouse gas off East Siberian coast has been triggered' LINK

There's another potential tipping point that we hear little about but I hope there are scientists keeping an eye on it. I'm referring to the Gulf Stream. As we all know, if it were not for that warming ocean current the presently mild maritime areas of north-west Europe would be plunged into a Newfoundland-type climate due to our high latitude. The seas and rivers frozen over in winter etc. It might sound like science fiction but it happened a number of times in the warm periods between the individual Ice Ages. I recently read a book by Chris Stringer, a leader in human evolution and archaeology at the Natural History Museum London, describing the Ice Ages. He wrote that the Gulf Stream collapsed or moved away several times during the late Ice Ages and each time the change in climate of the British Isles was abrupt, taking only a few years - instantaneous on a geological time scale.

[Tripps]

Gulf Stream collapsed or moved away several times during the late Ice Ages and each time the change in climate of the British Isles was abrupt, taking only a few years - instantaneous on a geological time scale.
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Did he give any reasons as to why this happened? I need to know how worried to get.

[Stanley]

I've been pointing out for years that we are on the same latitude as Labrador. That's why 1000ft altitude in the UK make such a difference to the weather. I always understood it was driven by the temperature difference between the heat of the Tropics and the cold of the Arctic. Have I got that right?

[plaques]

Why do we get ice ages etc: A YouTube on the Milankovitch cycle about ice ages Ice Ages explains the cycle of events leading up to an ice age. More snow, more sunlight reflection, = more snow, ice age ..... The reverse is true. Add more green house gasses, less snow. less reflection..... Therefore no ice cold from water from the northern ice cap to drive the gulf stream. In spite of what Trump says.

[Stanley]

And reports from Siberia seem to indicate that some sort of tipping point has been reached and methane is 'boiling' out of strata it has been trapped in for millennia. (LINK)

[Tizer]

All depends on the result of the US election...
`Climate change: US formally withdraws from Paris agreement' LINK

[Stanley]

Watch and wait.....

[Tizer]

By the BBC's environment analyst, Roger Harrabin - he knows more than most people about environmental issues and has been reporting on them for 40 years!
`Climate change: Why the UK's carbon-free future will need rules' LINK

[Stanley]

Biden is perfectly clear, as soon as he is in the White House the US gets back into step with reality.

[Whyperion]

He will have to deal with Brazil with forest loss. It will be a reduction in people's freedoms - and profits - to trash and take to excess for their own gratification, a difficult new reality.

[Tizer]

Perhaps Donald Trump will retire to Brazil...or Russia...or North Korea!