Now This Is Just Funny--An Environmental Alert!

Here's proof that it's basically impossible to go green. (Well, it's as much proof as you get about most environmental issues these days anyway, particularly global warming.) As long as people and cows exist, the planet is doomed no matter what. You might as well buy a Hummer and fill it up with plastic bags and non-biodegradable Styrofoam peanuts...

Worried About Global Warming?

Changing your lifestyle to save the planet? Here's a new one for you. Greenpeace says, "Eat more kangaroo!!" It's your low-gas nutrition alternative. Apparently, kangaroos don't have the flatulence problem that cows and sheep do. Flatulence is, as we know, a major greenhouse gas producer, and, short of giving Beano to all our hamburger-on-the-hoof, there's not much we can do about it--if we want to remain carnivores, that is. Greenpeace's solution is to suggest we stop raising cattle and start harvesting the hoppers. Of course, if you don't live down under, there's all that fuel oil it'll take to get this methane-efficient meal to your dinner plate, but hey, anything for the cause, right? Then again, maybe Beano for livestock isn't such a bad idea after all...

Hat tip: Best of the Web

While We're Talking Economics, Let's Throw Some Climate Science Into The Mix ...

A comment on my last little toss-out post, which listed a couple of articles on economics that I found interesting, pointed the way to this post by John Tierney, pitting economists against ecologists as predictors of climate change. Not a fair fight? Well, the match-up may surprise you. By Tierney's reckoning, economists have the shinier resume when it comes to examining potential global crises. He gives some track record comparisons that certainly lend credence to his point of view. The really good news there is that the economist crowd also seems to be a lot more optimistic:

The classic example is the “population crisis” of the 1960s and 1970s, when biologists like Paul Ehrlich were convinced humanity was about to suffer massive famines and devastating shortages of energy and other resources because the growing population would exceed the planet’s “carrying capacity.” This concept seemed obvious to biologists who study ecosystems, but economists realized there’s a big difference between animals and humans: Humans are remarkably adaptable and creative. When confronted with shortages and environmental problems, they have a long history of coming up with solutions — new methods of farming, new and cheaper sources of energy, cleaner technologies — that leave them better off in an environment that’s less polluted.

Of course, population sustainability and climate are clearly different animals, but the point remains the same. Humans adjust, and even manage to think about the rest of the ecosystem occasionally. Now, if you read the Meow at all, you probably know that while a thermometer (and common sense) can tell you that the climate has changed over time, and will continue to change, I'm a pretty big skeptic of the idea that human beings can be pegged as the source of that change. (Click on the climate science label below to get a Kat-centric view of the topic.) Nonetheless, since there are plenty of folks out there determined to blame humanity, and determined to find a solution to the weather, I'm glad to see some other disciplines chiming in on this debate. They may not have the scientific background of the "experts," but just might have a valuable word or two to contribute as the global powers mull our future. Have a look.

Note: Thanks for the link, Rich.

Update: Thought I'd throw this one out there for fun...

Is It Getting Hot Out Here?

Maybe not so much. This is anecdotal, but interesting.

HT: Instapundit

How Cars Help The Environment

Here's an interesting article that goes along with my theory that technology will be the solution to our environmental issues, and has already contributed greatly to environmental improvements, despite the blame it gets for modern day pollution. Dwight R. Lee, at TCS Daily, spends some time delving in to one of the main sources of the environmental woes of yesteryear, and concludes that one of our most prevalent current technologies, the internal combustion engine (ICE), is a Godsend when compared with the primary sources of horsepower from the past--i.e. horses, and oxen, and mules. Those of us who grew up with cars instead of wagons don't contemplate very often how much of a difference the automobile has made to the pollution levels of cities, or, I should say, we tend to think that the effect has been negative. All that car exhaust is dreadful. There used to be fresh air, by golly! We think of that pollution and forget that before the car, when folks rode into town on noble steeds, there was pollution of an entirely different sort.

Livestock flatulence, according to a report from the U.N.'s Food and Agricultural Organization, cited by Lee, accounts for 18% of today's greenhouse gases, and all the cars, planes, trucks, trains, boats, and every other form of transportation in the world added together don't equal that level of greenhouse gas output. Livestock produce methane, too, which Lee points out is a much more potent greenhouse gas than the carbon dioxide which gasoline engines emit. Greenhouse gases, as we all know, are the favorite whipping boy for those concerned about global warming, so this should make the world look more favorably on modern transportation. Gasoline engines produces less gases, and less potent gases than their animal counterparts. Score one for the ICE.

Now, if livestock flatulence produces 18% of the greenhouse gases of today, imagine what they were producing a hundred years ago, when horses filled our cities and our farms. Indeed, the general level of pollution created by a culture dependant upon animals for transport and food production, as well as food, goes beyond just dealing with the gases. The manure itself was a pollution nightmare:

Consider the effects of horse emissions in our towns and cities at the beginning of the last century. The air and water pollution from horse manure contributed to a death rate far greater than that generated by the pollution from cars and trucks. No one denies that photochemical smog from gas powered vehicles is a health risk, but it is not nearly the health risk of cholera, typhoid, typhus, yellow fever, diphtheria and malaria. These diseases killed tens of thousands of Americans in the early 20-century and these deaths began to decline as cars and trucks replaced horses and wagons.

And the improvements in the environment weren't limited to just the towns and cities. Before gasoline power arrived, beasts of burden were polluting agricultural communities along with meat producing animals such as cows, chickens and pigs. By eliminating horses, mules and oxen on farms, tractors and other types of gas-powered farm machinery greatly reduced the problem of animal waste that environmentalists, with justification, still complain about. This also eliminated the need to grow the food required by millions of farm animals. It has been estimated that it took about 93 million acres of land in 1900 to grow the food to fuel the farm animals that were soon replaced by motorized farm machinery. Much of that land has now gone back to woodlands.

Score two for the ICE. Lee isn't finished with his defense of the engine, either. He addresses one more aspect of the flap over flatulence, and how the ICE isn't getting the credit it deserves when it comes to protecting the environment:

Instead of giving credit to internal combustion for its contribution to environmental quality, the news on the harmful effects of animal flatulence has resulted in another culprit being blamed for global warming; meat eaters. According to a recent article in the "Christian Science Monitor," some environmentalists are urging people to become vegetarians to combat global warming. There is no mention that this vegetarian solution, if taken seriously, would make the internal combustion engine even more critical to environmental protection. Imagine the amount of animal manure and methane that would be produced growing all those extra vegetables without motorized farm equipment.

Score three for the ICE. Lee goes on to discuss improvements in ICE technology which are reducing transportation's pollution production all the time. He also predicts that someday a superior technology will come along to replace the combustion engine, further limiting the pollution cost of human transport. My prediction is that his prediction is correct.

Global Warming--On Mars

Both Mars and Earth are experiencing Global Warming right now. Did you know that? Earth ain't the only one of Sol's satellites experiencing climate change. The polar ice cap at Mars' south pole is melting, and if there were people on the Red Planet, they would be turning down the thermostat. Of course, if there were people on the Red Planet, they would be the default setting in explaining why Mars is getting less chilly--people burning things is, after all, getting most of the credit for influencing Earth's climate these days--but there are no pesky humans on Mars, so what's the deal? Planets don't just warm up on their own, now do they? Is there some reason for both planets to be experiencing their own little heat waves in sync, or are their mutual bikini days strictly a case of freaky happenstance, like when you and your best friend both turn up at the same restaurant, in the same dress, at the same time, but with different reservations?

Well, there are people involved in figuring that out, so you can bet there are conflicting opinions. Kate Ravilious, at National Geographic News, is reporting that "mainstream scientific opinion" is dismissing any connection between the warming of the Earth and the warming of Mars, laying it down to coincidence, since the majority of climate scientists believe that Earth is being warmed by greenhouse gasses and Mars' is being warmed by a possible wobble in his orbit of the Sun. There is another perspective coming out of Russia, however:

Habibullo Abdussamatov, head of the St. Petersburg's Pulkovo Astronomical Observatory in Russia, says the Mars data is evidence that the current global warming on Earth is being caused by changes in the sun.

"The long-term increase in solar irradiance is heating both Earth and Mars," he said.

Abdussamatov believes that changes in the sun's heat output can account for almost all the climate changes we see on both planets.

Mars and Earth, for instance, have experienced periodic ice ages throughout their histories.

"Man-made greenhouse warming has made a small contribution to the warming seen on Earth in recent years, but it cannot compete with the increase in solar irradiance," Abdussamatov said.

By studying fluctuations in the warmth of the sun, Abdussamatov believes he can see a pattern that fits with the ups and downs in climate we see on Earth and Mars.

Abdussamatov believes that the irradiance of the Sun has been dropping since the 1990s, and that it will be reaching it's lowest point sometime around 2040, causing "a steep cooling of the climate on Earth in 15 to 20 years." Abdussamatov is the head of the space research sector of the Russian Academy of Sciences, and he's made the pages of the Meow before. I've written about Russian scientists predicting the onset of Global Cooling, and Abdussamatov's belief that efforts to limit greenhouse gas emissions should be put on hold for the next century or so, because the fluctuations in Earth's temperature are part of natural cycles resulting from variations in the Sun's temperature, and Abdussamatov says the Sun's going to turn down the heat, and won't be making things get this toasty again until some time in the 22nd century. As Ravilious explains in her National Geographic article, he sees the concurrent warming on Mars as support for his theories about warming, and cooling, on Earth.

So, who's right, Abdussamatov or the many scientists who support the theory of anthropogenic global warming? We don't know yet. Despite the authority of "mainstream scientific opinion," the scientific community is by no means united on this topic, and more scientific observation will be required to make a definite determination. As Michael Crichton has noted, "science" and "consensus" are not equivalent terms, and theories like those of Habibullo Abdussamatov cannot be ignored if man-made global warming theory is to be found credible over the long term. Can Mars' temperature spike be due to a wobbly orbit? Of course, that's possible. Can it be due to an increase in solar radiation, which is also raising the heat index here on Terra? Yes, that's possible, too. It would be great to see the scientific community investigating Abdussamatov's theories, rather than dismissing them. If experiments and observation prove Abdussamatov correct, then they will have determined one of the contributing factors to our climate's ups and downs. If they prove false, then they will have something they can strike from their "possible causes" list with assurance, instead of with the ill-defined repudiation that comes from refusing to acknowledge a possibility because it is in conflict with what they themselves hold to be true.

Things are warming up on Earth and Mars at the same time. Abdussamatov believes that the causes are the same in both cases: The Sun's got a lot of power, and he's flexing his muscles. On it's face, this is a reasonable argument, since our planet gets all the heat that keeps us alive from this source. It makes sense that shifts in the amount of heat the Sun is throwing our way would send our thermometers on a little joy ride. It's simple and logical, and meets Occam's razor (from this non scientist's perspective, anyway.) If one is not already in the "humans are the catalyst" camp, Abdussamatov's theories seem at least worth investigating. However, we are told by "mainstream scientific opinion" that they are not viable, that Mars and Earth are separate cases, influenced by disparate powers, and we can strike the Sun off the list of possible climate culprits.

I would like to understand why, and I'm sure I'm not alone. So, I'll put in a request as a representative from the non-scientific community. I would like to see the evidence that Earth and Mars cannot be linked in this way, and a deeper exploration of why this theory, among others, doesn't work. Run experiments that will confirm the dismissal of conflicting theories. Publish those experiments with explanations a layperson can understand. If we are to discount the conclusions of everyone who comes up with an alternative theory to man-made global warming, why we should discount those conclusions warrants a fuller explanation, complete with experimental evidence, to those of us who are counting on the scientists to get it right. I don't have a whole lot of hope that these experiments and explanations are forthcoming, because we have long passed into the "this is fact because everybody who's important agrees" stage of the climate discussion, but it is what we should be demanding from the people who could influence the course of human development. Earth and Mars have the same heat source, and they are warming at the same time. Abdussamatov says he knows the reason why. Want to convince me Abdussamatov is wrong? Prove it--with verifiable experiments. Want to convince the world that man is the cause of global warming? Prove it--with verifiable experiments, not "everybody knows this." Everybody knew the Earth was flat, too. Not good enough.

Update: This is interesting. Apparently, there is global warming occurring on Jupiter, Saturn, Pluto, Venus, Enceladus and Triton, as well. Just thought I'd pass it on as more food for thought. (I apologize for the snarkiness of the graphics, but I thought the information was worth a gander.)

Another Scientist Refusing To Jump On The Man-Made Global Warming Bandwagon

I just read this post from a fellow Oregon blogger, at The Doc Is In, and wanted to pass it on while it was fresh. It's another look at global warming, adding to the growing supply of evidence that not every reasonable and articulate scientist on Earth is in lockstep with the notion that people are causing the planet to warm, or even that a warming planet is a bad thing:

Timothy Ball is no wishy-washy skeptic of global warming. The Canadian climatologist, who has a Ph.D. in climatology from the University of London and taught at the University of Winnipeg for 28 years, says that the widely propagated “fact” that humans are contributing to global warming is the “greatest deception in the history of science.” Ball has made no friends among global warming alarmists by saying that global warming is caused by the sun, that global warming will be good for us and that the Kyoto Protocol “is a political solution to a nonexistent problem without scientific justification.”

Read the rest. Some of the more interesting bits are where Ball explains that the oceans can't rise as much as alarmists predict, and how historically, based on the ice core record, temperatures rise, then CO2 follows--not the other way around. Ball also provides some web addresses where people who want more scientific information (from real scientists who are focusing on the science part of global warming science) can go to get a deeper look.

Update: It just occurred to me that the fact this particular scientist is Canadian might have something to do with why he's willing to consider the warming of the planet as something less than a crisis. Just goes to show, perspective is everything.

Predicting The Future

If you read my whiny post last week, you know that I was very frustrated that weather forecasters are wrong so much of the time. Even with all their fancy radar and satellite images, the possible permutations in local weather patterns, let alone global ones, thwart predictive accuracy on a very regular basis. (Unless, as I rantingly suspect in my previous post, the reporters are intentionally messing with our heads for their own amusement.) Yet, long-term prognosticators would have us believe that they not only know what's coming, but they can map its effects for the next hundred years. According to Kate Ravilious, at NewScientist.com, scientists in Switzerland have created a series of maps to show the ways in which Global Warming Will Rule The World:

Think back to the hottest summer you can remember. Now imagine a summer like that every year. For those of us who are still around by the end of the 21st century, this is what we can expect, according to a new index that maps the different ways that climate change will hit different parts of the world. The map reveals how much more frequent extreme climate events, such as heatwaves and floods, will be by 2100 compared with the late 20th century. It is the first to show how global warming will combine with natural variations in the climate to affect our planet.

"We hope it will help policy-makers gain a quick overview of the scientific facts without getting lost in the detail," says Michèle Bättig of the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zurich, who created the index with colleagues after talking to delegates at the 2005 UN Climate Change Conference in Montreal, Canada. The index allows anyone to compare the severity of the predicted effect of climate change on a chunk of the Amazon rainforest, for example, with its effect on a corner of Antarctica.

I'm not buying it. Note how, in its very first paragraph, the article states with authority what will happen, and references pretty global charts to make it more convincing, but, as I've noted here at the Meow before, "all right thinking people" do not agree that this view of the weather world is accurate. Just last week I linked to a speech by Michael Crichton about the weaknesses in the "everybody knows this" approach to science and the issue of global warming, and only three days ago I sent you to another article, coming out of Russia, about how scientists from the Russian Academy of Sciences are concerned, not with global warming, but with global cooling. The New Scientist article, of course, conveys the standard calls for all the usual limits on greenhouse gasses, and speaks of all the science that shows how many weather crises we are in for, without providing any of that supposedly overwhelming science to back up their position. As is often the case with claims about global warming, it is simply treated as fact, and something that, since every "right thinking person" clearly already agrees, there is no need to provide actual scientific proof, and the maps provide all the credibility and solemnity deemed necessary to carry their point. However, pretty graphics, created to show what a certain set of people postulate is going to happen, are still somebody's guess, based on computer models that extrapolate current weather trends out for a hundred years.

They can't be accurate over a year, and they think they can get it right over a hundred years? I remember reading dire warnings about what a bad hurricane season the U.S. could expect in 2006. Needless to say, that didn't materialize. Why? Because weather patterns shift and change over time. You can't plug the weather data for a year, or ten, or even fifty, into a computer, and then expect it to spit out the forecast for the next hundred. It'll do a bang-up job of making the pattern clear over the course of the period of data you already know, but that's not very predictive, is it? Do we know yet what all the things are which affect our climate? (Besides the uber-culprit of human existence, I mean.) Solar flares, cosmic rays, the Sun's magnetic field, and volcanic activity have all been fingered by various scientists as playing an important climate-shaping role. (As a science refresher, go have a look at this post about scientists in Denmark who have proven a link between cosmic rays and cloud formation.) Other weather influences may still be out there undiscovered. If we don't even know yet all the factors that influence our weather, how can we possibly be making maps of what will happen a hundred years from now in terms of the consequences of global warming?

I usually love New Scientist, despite their tendency to buy into some scientific fads, but this treatment of global warming as a fact that can be charted into the distant future, without providing actual proof, really set me off today (as I'm sure you can tell.) I really loved (sarcasm making a brief appearance here) how in the quote above, the Swiss scientist hopes his maps "...will help policy-makers gain a quick overview of the scientific facts without getting lost in the detail." In other words, he doesn't think leaders--policy-makers--need to really understand the issue, as long as he can tell them what they're supposed to believe, and scare them into acting on it with his "guessing at the future in pretty pictures" maps. Such "science" is irresponsible, and the more of it there is, the more possibly unnecessary and rash actions could be taken by world leaders, stifling economies and leaving underdeveloped nations in poverty, for fear that bringing them into the twenty-first century will somehow damage the climate and hasten our doom--in which case, lots of people will die, thus no longer harming the planet, and allowing it to return to its natural state, whatever that is--so I don't see the problem, really. (Okay, another sarcastic moment over.) I'm not saying there is no global warming. I'm not saying there is. We don't know yet, because, besides the fact that enough time hasn't gone by to really understand the patterns, scientists are spending their time making maps to show how things will look in a future that they can't possibly know at this point, rather than proving their theories right or wrong by engaging in investigative science, and truly understanding what has happened already. I'm saying they should gather all the relevant data before they start prognosticating and demanding proscriptive changes. For all they know, greenhouse gasses are the only thing holding off another ice age.

Update: A reader just left a link that is a good one for this topic. It's a blog post from Marc Morano at the U.S. Senate committee on Environment & Public Works site, looking at efforts to silence global warming sceptics:

The Weather Channel’s most prominent climatologist is advocating that broadcast meteorologists be stripped of their scientific certification if they express skepticism about predictions of manmade catastrophic global warming. This latest call to silence skeptics follows a year (2006) in which skeptics were compared to "Holocaust Deniers" and Nuremberg-style war crimes trials were advocated by several climate alarmists.

Not only is there no science in some of their science, now they want to shut up any opposition to their take on things. Read the rest. It's an eyeful. (note: For some reason the link isn't working right, nor is the one in the comments. Hope they fix it. It's quite a read.)

Update II: Just checked again (Jan. 19, at 4:44pm) and Morano's post was up and running. Here's the link to an update on the topic of decertification of global warming sceptics. I hope this one is a bit more reliable than the last one.

A Good Time To Buy Stock In Burlington Coat Factory

I knew we were having a cold winter in Oregon, but I never expected it to be a foreshadowing of things to come. There's too much talk of global warming to have a cold snap be anything but an aberration, right? Here's a climate newsflash for you. According to MosNews.com, a Russian Academy of Sciences’ astronomical observatory’s report is warning the world of the eminent dangers of impending Global Cooling. How's that for the road less travelled? Russian scientists, including Khabibullo Abdusamatov, the head of the space research sector, have drawn conclusions, based on researching solar emissions, that the Earth has reached the maximum of her temperature range, and thermometers worldwide are going to start reflecting sharply declining temperatures within the next fifty years, possibly as early as 2012. They expect this to precede another warming trend to come in the 22nd century.

This is quite a change from the predictions we are used to hearing these days about killer heat waves and the melting of the polar ice caps. Indeed, Abdusamatov and his colleagues are much more concerned that we are facing glaciation. MosNews reports that the extra cold climate of 17th century brought frozen canals to the Netherlands and made Greenland uninhabitable, and Abdusamatov said we could be facing similar conditions soon:

He said he believed the future climate change would have very serious consequences and that authorities should start preparing for them today because “climate cooling is connected with changing temperatures, especially for northern countries.”

The Russian scientists recommend that efforts at greenhouse gas limitation, like the Kyoto protocols, be put on hold for a century or two. It reminds me of the slightly futuristic science fiction book I recommended a few weeks ago, Fallen Angels by Larry Niven, Jerry Pournelle & Michael Flynn (available--for free--online through the link), about how all those greenhouse gases everyone was blaming for causing global warming were the only thing holding off an oncoming ice age, and once they were eliminated, the ice age descended with authority. If these Russian scientists are right, maybe Fallen Angels is a little heavier on the science than the fiction.

Hat tip: Roger Simon at Pajamas Media

Science, Or Group-think?

Michael Crichton gave a speech in January of 2003, at the California Institute of technology, entitled "Aliens Cause Global Warming" which was so good I had to pass it on, despite the fact that it's three years old--an eternity in Internet years. He addresses the religious aspect of modern science--where science stands when "scientific" claims are based on consensus, rather than proof--and what happens when public policy is based on such shaky conclusions.

His speech takes us through an incomplete, but fascinating, history of the last two hundred years, or so, and how faulty conclusions by the majority have held back advances in scientific and medical knowledge, which, in the end, consistent scientific test results proved to be true. (It took 125 years for consensus to accept that the fever which used to kill off one in six women, after childbirth, was infectious in nature, something which one forward-thinking scientist proposed in 1795. A few other mavericks supported his conclusion, and showed the fever was both contagious and preventable through sanitary measures, but the consensus opinion denied this truth for more than a century.)

Crichton explains how "consensus" and "science" are mutually exclusive terms, and how the acceptance of consensus as a substitute for proof has led to the recent widespread adoption of questionable theories as fact, which in reality either do not hold up to scientific scrutiny, or have not received the scrutiny that science demands. Why the lack of adequate scrutiny? Crichton says this is because of science being too intertwined with public policy, and the nature of scientific funding, with research dollars too often coming from organizations that are driven by specific agendas, and looking for specific outcomes. Some examples he gives of such widely accepted, but unproven and questionable, theories include Nuclear Winter, Second-hand Smoke as a Group A Carcinogen, and the always pressing global issue of Global Warming. Crichton also offers some suggestions for how science, and scientists, can move away from the consensus method of drawing conclusions and back toward the scientific method. The speech is long, but jam-packed. I really recommend this one.

Note: I would love to give a hat tip for this, but I got the link off of a comment on another blog, and can't for the life of me remember where. My abject apologies to the offended commenter. I repent in sackcloth and ashes.

A Giant Sunbrella

Do you ever stop and ask yourself, "What if all the climate prophets-of-doom are right?" What if all the worst fears about global warming come to pass and the world is threatened with killer temperatures, droughts, floods, and all the other scenarios that would make this time of partisan politics and the global War on Terror look like the good old days? One possibility, of course, is that a whole lot of humans would die off, and if people and their greenhouse gas-producing ways really are the root cause, then the Earth would balance itself out again with less pesky humans to mess things up. It could be, though, that humans aren't the culprits. It entirely possible that cosmic rays affect our climate, and phytoplankton could play their role, as well. Theories, theories, everywhere. Whether humans are the cause, or natural phenomenon over which we have no control, if the climate does warm up significantly (and I do believe that the words if and significantly are pretty important here), we might want to come up with some options to keep ourselves from becoming barbecue.

This is where the "smart people" enter the picture. NASA's Earth Observatory reports that University of Arizona astronomer Roger Angel has come up with a plan, a sort of emergency cooling system for the planet, which won him and his colleagues a NASA Institute for Advanced Concepts grant. The grant will be used to further study the possibility of sending trillions of small spacecraft up into orbit, to form a giant cloud that would act as a sunshade, diverting a portion of the Sun's rays away from the Earth:

The spacecraft would form a long, cylindrical cloud with a diameter about half that of Earth, and about 10 times longer. About 10 percent of the sunlight passing through the 60,000-mile length of the cloud, pointing lengthwise between the Earth and the sun, would be diverted away from our planet. The effect would be to uniformly reduce sunlight by about 2 percent over the entire planet, enough to balance the heating of a doubling of atmospheric carbon dioxide in Earth's atmosphere.

One cannot fault the scientific community for lacking ambition, wouldn't you agree? Angel has the specs all worked out for composition, steering and delivery, and if the plan flies "as is," with all the current concepts intact, it will only cost about $100 billion a year to turn on the global air conditioning, "about two-tenths of one percent of the global domestic product." It sounds as if, were the Earth in such dire straits that implementation of emergency plans became necessary, the world's economy could afford to pony up that much, especially if the alternative was going to be factor 2,000 sunscreen, and/or a return to a pre-Industrial Revolution way of life.

In "science time" it wouldn't even take too long to pull the shades, once we were sufficiently motivated. According to NASA, it would only take about ten years to deploy all the flyers necessary for the job, if they can get the twenty electromagnetic launchers up and running that they would need to send the little life-savers into position. Twenty-five years could see the whole project developed and installed, and with a useful life of approximately fifty years, we'd only have to replace it once or twice a century for the duration of the heat wave. How's that for value, huh? Your average patio umbrella certainly doesn't last that long. Of course, your average patio umbrella doesn't cost $100 billion a year, either.

It's kinda comforting to know that whether or not all our technology is the cause of the potential climate crisis that's got the world in a dither, all our technology may also be the thing that saves the day. Wouldn't it be amazingly sci fi if we did end up with the equivalent of a giant parasol keeping the Earth's head cool? Mind you, since the global warming and cooling fears trade off every few decades, in a few years time we're going to be hearing about scientists who are figuring out ways to catch a few extra rays from the Sun, amplify them, and turn on the equivalent of a global heat lamp. Either way, it will be scientists who come up with the schemes to save mankind. Smart people are so useful.

Climate Science--Emphasis On Science

A friend asked me to keep an eye out for articles about climate science (emphasis on the science, and not the hype.) I'm happy to oblige. It's a topic I keep an eye on anyway. Beside the fact I have a genuine interest in the state of our planet, both the alarmists and the total naysayers have their entertainment value, after all. However, I frequently can give little credence to what I read, because so little of it is based on experimentation, and so much of it on anecdotal evidence and politics.

At first much of the debate rested in whether the Earth is warming at all. Then it shifted to the cause, as weather records over the last few decades do show a decided warming trend. Some people are still heavily engaged in the "why" debate, but many have moved on to what, if anything, we should/can do about it. Much of the world has simply accepted--It's Our Fault. Eliminate humans and you eliminate the problem. (Making the assumption, of course, that it is a problem.) Since ridding the world of humanity is hardly practical, the next best solution offered by some is to make people stop living the modern life, something very few of the uncooperative scourges of the Earth are willing to do (except the ones who want to take us back to the seventh century, but that's a different topic altogether.) So we spend a lot of time blaming and very little time checking our facts.

Sometimes, however, we get a look at actual verifiable science on the topic. It's very refreshing. Here's an example. SpaceDaily has a look at experiments performed in Denmark that conclusively link cosmic rays to cloud formation, and thus Earth's temperature:

It is already well-established that when cosmic rays, which are high-speed atomic particles originating in exploded stars far away in the Milky Way, penetrate Earth's atmosphere they produce substantial amounts of ions and release free electrons.

Now, results from the Danish experiment show that the released electrons significantly promote the formation of building blocks for cloud condensation nuclei on which water vapour condenses to make clouds.

Hence, a causal mechanism by which cosmic rays can facilitate the production of clouds in Earth's atmosphere has been experimentally identified for the first time.

Here's the lowdown. Scientists filled a large reaction chamber with the appropriate gases to approximate the chemistry of the lower atmosphere. They used ultraviolet lamps to perform the function of the Sun's rays in the equation, and as the "penetrating cosmic rays" did their thing, the scientists monitored the chemical reactions in the chamber with instruments that only "really smart people with degrees and stuff" know how to use. The experiment proved that cosmic rays help facilitate the development of the "stable, ultra-small clusters of sulphuric acid and water molecules which are building blocks for the cloud condensation nuclei. A vast numbers of such microscopic droplets appeared, floating in the air in the reaction chamber." Turns out the rays are very effective at producing these building blocks, and there is now empirical evidence that cosmic rays can have an effect on Earth's climate because of the clouds they help form.

It's interesting how that works. The more rays that get through to Earth's atmosphere, the more low-altitude cloud cover we get. Less rays equal less clouds. Those low altitude clouds drop the temperature here on Terra Firma. Here's the really intriguing bit:

Interestingly, during the 20th Century, the Sun's magnetic field which shields Earth from cosmic rays more than doubled, thereby reducing the average influx of cosmic rays.

The resulting reduction in cloudiness, especially of low-altitude clouds, may be a significant factor in the global warming Earth has undergone during the last century. However, until now, there has been no experimental evidence of how the causal mechanism linking cosmic rays and cloud formation may work.

Did you catch that? When the Sun's magnetic field is strong, we get less cosmic rays. Therefore, one can conclude that when the Sun's magnetic field is strong we get fewer clouds, and the Earth warms. That would link global warming to the cycles of the Sun, wouldn't it? I have read the theory before, and seen data that clearly showed that over the last four hundred years, as the Sun has cycled, so has Earth's temperature, and this experiment is some solid support for that theory. Unfortunately, I can't remember where I read the theory in the first place, but hopefully the SpaceDaily article will give you a good start on the subject.

I still think, of course, that we need to follow all the scientific leads, and find out for sure whether humans really are effecting the climate, or whether natural cycles such as the flux in the Sun's magnetic field are the reason for the temperature shifts we experience over the years. I don't think, however, that we ought to be making rash decisions that shut down the economies of the world because of fears that are as yet unproven. If global warming is a temporary and natural phase of the planet, caused by forces as far away as the Sun, no amount of turning off the air conditioning, riding the bus to work, or staying off of airplanes is going to change that natural rhythm. Of course, theories come and go. I remember being warned as a child that we were going to enter another ice age soon. We see how accurate that prediction turned out to be. I'm all for scientific investigation of the facts, but histrionics are pointless. I read recently that Al Gore told a group at the U.N. that cigarette smoking is a significant contributor to global warming. You tell me which of these two theories--cigarettes, or cosmic rays as realistic causes--has the most likelihood of veracity? Until I see solid scientific proof that smoking is the cause, I'm sticking with cosmic rays.

Hat tip: The Anchoress

Global Warming

An inconvenient scientist? (via Instapundit)

Nuclear Reactions

I've been following mental rabbit trails today. I read a couple of articles at TCS Daily, one about global warming alarmism and greenhouse gas emissions trading schemes, and the other about energy constraints in America, in the face of recent heat waves, that are being met with pleas for conservation rather than policies aimed at generating more energy. The two articles seemed inextricably linked to me. The fears of global warming and other environmental consequences are really a complicating factor in the search for the cheap, abundant energy solutions that developed nations already need and developing nations are growing to need more and more. (The same environmental consequences apply to underdeveloped countries as well, but since their situations are complicated by their limited financial resources and lack of infrastructure, let's stick to talking about the more technologically advanced nations, shall we? After all, if you count China and India as at least rapidly up-and-coming, these are the countries most to blame for the carbon emissions which some scientists fear will upset the climate balance of our planet.) Every form of energy currently available to man comes with some environmental cost. Were there no environmental constraints, petroleum, natural gas, bio-fuels, coal, hydroelectric, solar and nuclear energy would all be competing unfettered for their place in the power pantheon. As it is, they're all still players, but regulation determines more and more how affordable and plentiful they are.

Regulations aren't all bad. I like clean air. I'm sure you like to breathe too. There's a story in my husband's family about a particular time when he was a small child, three or four years old. He lived with his parents in Riverside, California, a suburb of Los Angeles. This was in the late sixties, before low emission vehicles were a Californian passion. While on a family vacation, they came up north, to western Washington State. Legend has it (and from my understanding this is a pretty accurate legend) that upon looking up at the open sky, my cute and adorable husband innocently inquired, "Mommy, what's that blue stuff?" Living in the Los Angeles basin of the sixties, he had not known the sky was supposed to be blue. Like I said, regulations aren't all bad, even if some of them do go overboard.

Given that none of us want to breath toxic fumes, nor kill off all the Salmon, nor experience a Chernobyl-style meltdown, what are our energy options? Is conservation the only ecologically and morally acceptable alternative? Are we simply supposed to get used to a little more heat in summer, and chill in winter, as we adjust our thermostats to avoid further straining power grids already pushed to the limit? Are we all going to be ultimately driven to turn in our driver's licenses for bus passes? Is the energy gobbling technology that makes our lives more comfortable going to become less and less supportable as more of the world's populations can afford it? Are we out of options? (I think that is the most questions I have ever asked in a single paragraph.)

All these questions prompted me to do a little searching online for clean power alternatives. One thing I kept coming back to was nuclear power. Nuclear power doesn't have the best reputation in the States, or in Russia either, for that matter. No one wants to see a nuclear disaster, and most of us are pretty aware of the problem of nuclear waste. Nor are the sane among us really keen on the idea of the by-products of nuclear processes being used to create weapons of mass destruction for proliferation among the terrorist set. (I do not count anyone in power in Iran as sane.) However, there have been a lot of advances in nuclear technology since the rather memorable accidents that have shaped our views of nuclear power's potential for providing our daily energy needs.

One such advance is the development of the pebble bed reactor. I remember reading some time back about pebble bed nuclear technology. I can't remember where, but I do recall being impressed with the great improvements in safety that have been achieved over the last two decades. Since I don't know where to find the piece I originally read, I'll send you to the Wikipedia entry about pebble bed reactors. It's a good place to start if you find the topic interesting. Other concepts developed over the years continue to work the fringes of making nuclear power more palatable to Americans. I've read, for example, about ways to eliminate the danger from nuclear waste. One such notion being a scheme to bury nuclear waste deep in the earth where things are pretty much radioactive anyway. I have no link, but a Google search ought to provide you with a wealth of information. I've never really seen a foolproof answer about how to keep nuclear by-products from falling into to hands of the power hungry. In any case, I've seen a lot of approaches to nuclear power that address one problem or another of the list I mentioned above, but what if there were a way to address them all at once?

What I read about today, was a new approach to nuclear that just may deal with all those issues that currently keep it from appealing to those of us who don't want a meltdown, waste with an intolerably long radioactive half-life, or a by-product that can be turned into Earth-destroying bombs. It even eliminates some of the waste we already have lying around. Tim Dean, writing in Cosmos, examines the potential of the thorium reactor:

What if we could build a nuclear reactor that offered no possibility of a meltdown, generated its power inexpensively, created no weapons-grade by-products, and burnt up existing high-level waste as well as old nuclear weapon stockpiles? And what if the waste produced by such a reactor was radioactive for a mere few hundred years rather than tens of thousands? It may sound too good to be true, but such a reactor is indeed possible, and a number of teams around the world are now working to make it a reality. What makes this incredible reactor so different is its fuel source: thorium.

Thorium is also much more abundant here on Earth than uranium, and according to the blog Advanced Nanotechnology, there's even a plentiful supply on the Moon. (The post at AN also informs me that thorium reactors could provide energy that's five times cheaper than that from natural gas.) Sound intriguing? Dean's article is long, but I'm not going to try to synopsize it. If the topic interests you enough to have read this far, maybe you'll find it worth the time to read the rest of Dean's piece. If not, maybe it will merely comfort you to know that strides are being made all the time to come up with viable, environmentally sustainable, affordable energy sources. I hope that Americans don't turn their backs on a potentially clean power source just because it bears the dreaded name of nuclear. We do need power. I don't want to return to the days of my husband's youth, when a kid could live in LA and not know the sky was supposed to be blue, but I don't want to return to a world without air conditioning and convenient travel, either--and I definitely don't want to give up my laptop. Perish the thought. Perhaps, if scientists continue to investigate every avenue, and we retain (or acquire) an open mind about the "n" word, we won't have to choose.

Stepping Back To Get A Clearer Picture

Sometimes things just aren't how you think they are, and it takes extraordinary measures to find out what's what. Sometimes getting the whole picture can take seeing things from a distance, and in the case of the enormous Amazon rain forest, this can even necessitate getting off the planet. Satellite images are providing surprising new information as scientists try to understand the climate's effect on the rain forest, and the forest's effect on the climate. In a lengthy, but interesting, article from NASA's Earth Observatory, Rebecca Lindsey examines surprises that have been forthcoming from the study of images of Amazonia, taken over the last two decades, in the process of mapping Earth's vegetation patterns. The article focuses on University of Arizona remote-sensing ecologist Alfredo Huete, the data processing and mapping techniques he and his team developed for NASA, and the unexpected turn their view of the rain forest took after data began to be accumulated and analysed.

Lindsey spends a good deal of time looking at how Huete developed his techniques for mapping vegetation, and the hoops he jumped through to ensure the model's accuracy at capturing changes in the Earth's vegetation throughout the year. As testing went along "...the maps matched real-world seasonal changes in vegetation in different ecosystems, from African savannas to eastern North American forests." As the program developed, Huete became more and more confident of his methods, but there was one consistent problem; the Amazon didn't seem to be behaving properly. Images seemed to indicate that the rain forest actually gets greener during the dry season, which, as anyone who has spent time watering their lawn in the summer can tell you, makes no sense. Huete did a great deal of tweaking to try and locate the source of the problem, but kept coming back to the same result, and observations on the ground confirmed the conclusion. The Amazon does indeed experience its growing season when the rains stop falling. The bad season in the Amazon is the time of year when the rest of the Earth's fields and forests come to life, when life-giving water penetrates the soil and reaches thirsty roots.

So, how to explain the anomaly? You have to get pretty far into Lindsey's article to get to the reasons why it does, in fact, make sense for the Amazon to follow a separate growing pattern than the rest of the world. Fortunately, if you are time-challenged, I have done the necessary reading for you. There are three factors that affect plant growth: precipitation, sunlight and temperature. The key to Amazon vegetation growth is the sunlight factor. During the rainy season, there is increased cloud-cover, limiting light, and thus growth. The dry months provide the added light that the forest needs, and the growing commences. In fact, the longer the dry season, the more the rain forest greens up. Odd, huh? The secret lies in the giant Amazon trees. According to Lindsey, they have root systems that go down up to sixty feet into the soil, so they retain access to the rainy season's water during the dry season's burst of sunlight. Thus they have the perfect combination to help them stretch a little farther up into the heavens. This holds true for the undisturbed forest lands, but for the harvested lands it's not the same story:

...the dry-season green-up only happens in undisturbed forests, stresses Huete. At locations where the forest has been converted to pasture or farmland, the dry season has the more intuitive effect: the vegetation “browns down” in response to decreased soil moisture. Once the deep roots of the mature trees are lost, the access to the water stored deep in the soil is lost as well.

So different rules apply to the undisturbed rain forest than apply to any other area of land. It is unique in how it functions in the world.

This changes the way scientists must look at the rain forest and climate change. The Amazon is so huge, it can't help but affect the balance of carbon dioxide in the air. Most models that don't take the reversed seasonal shift of forest growth into account see ecosystem collapse in the future if global warming, affected by airborne carbon, causes the region to dry, and predict that eventually the area could become a savanna. The new model, however, where the forest thrives during the dry season, calls those conclusions into question, not refuting them, but clearing indicating the need for further study before proclaiming the forest's imminent demise. Ecologist Scott Saleska was a part of a research group which designed and operated instruments "... as part of NASA’s contribution to a Brazilian-led international research project called “LBA,” short for the “Large-Scale Biosphere-Atmosphere Experiment in Amazonia.” His research helped Huete draw his conclusions. Saleksa says the new information means they have to reexamine the old models:

“But if these models are getting the seasonality wrong, then the impacts [of climate change] may not be what we expect,” he continues. Predictions of ecosystem collapse are based on the idea that the dry season is a time of stress and declining greenness. If that isn’t true, then perhaps the Amazon will be more resilient than the models predict. On the other hand, a typical dry season isn’t the same as a lengthy El Niño-induced drought. Previous studies, including a drought-simulation experiment conducted during LBA, indicate that the more severe, extended declines in rainfall that can happen during strong El Niño events do produce stress in the forest, especially fragmented or damaged areas. With forest disturbance on the rise and predictions by some climate models that El Niño events may increase as climate warms, the fate of the Amazon is unclear.

So, the forest may be more resilient than previously feared. That's good. It's hopeful, anyway, and I always like hopeful. Of course, as Saleska indicates, the jury's still out about how climate change will affect the Amazon rain forest, and how with its treasure trove of carbon, the forest will affect the climate. Long-term drought may still cause as much damage as it's been feared it would. Further study is needed. Fortunately, further study is planned. Saleska and Huete will soon be collaborating to analyse the data gathered thus far, and "...come up with a basin-wide estimate for the flux of carbon in the Amazon." Hopefully this will provide a reliable gauge for comparing future ecosystem changes. So now we need a good long dry spell to test some theories:

In the meantime, says Saleska, everyone is keeping their eyes out for the next strong El Nino because observations collected during the event could provide the next key piece of the puzzle of how the Amazon responds to large-scale climate variation and change. Knowing the Amazon’s baseline seasonal response should help scientists judge when and how future climate events may disturb the balance of such an important and sensitive ecosystem.

It'll be interesting to see whether this information is picked up by any of those who are especially worried about climate change. I'm not hopeful on that front. The data gathered by Huete and Saleska doesn't necessarily contradict their point of view, but it doesn't support it either, so chances are it will go unnoticed. You never know, though, people can sometimes surprise you. Of course, global warming advocates (I mean advocates for the position, not the event. I'm pretty sure the latter don't exist) may see reasons why this information makes things appear much worse rather than better. I don't know. I just know I'll keep watching the process as the experts collect and sort the data. I'm glad we have the ability to see thing from a distance, to step out into space, so that we can get information that was unavailable to us just a few short decades ago. Now we just have to figure out what it all means.

Inconvenient Or Not, We Want The Truth

As some of you might know, Al Gore has a new movie out, on the topic of global warming, called An Inconvenient Truth. It's receiving some praise and some censure from scientists and non-scientists alike. This TCS Daily article called "Questions for Al Gore" caught my eye today. Climate scientist Dr. Roy Spencer, while complimenting Mr. Gore on an effective presentation, has some rather pertinent queries for the former Vice President turned town-crier. Among them are the following:

Why did you make it look like hurricanes, tornadoes, wildfires, floods, droughts, and ice calving off of glaciers and falling into the ocean, are only recent phenomena associated with global warming?

Why did you make it sound like all scientists agree that climate change is manmade and not natural?

Why did you make it sound like simply signing on to the Kyoto Protocol to reduce our greenhouse gas emissions would be such a big step forward, when we already know it will have no measurable effect on global temperatures anyway?

These are just a few of Dr. Spencer's rather detailed questions, of which there are eight, and as he asks them he expands on the reasons why he believes Mr. Gore's film presents an inadequate view of the complicated topic of climate change. Some of his questioning is a tad snarky. He's not playing neutral here, but they're also valid questions. I for one would like the answers. Seriously, I would, and I'm sure I'm not alone. There seems to be so much of politics, and so little open-minded science regarding the topic of global warming. Not that there isn't plenty of science being done, but much of it seems to be directed at proving a predetermined point, rather than discovering truth. What I read about the subject is frequently "your camp, my camp" oriented. Surely, there must be scientists and documentarians out there ready to look at all the relevant data, even when it doesn't shore up their particular opinion. (I'm not so optimistic about politicians.) The issue is one that requires long term study. We can speculate all we want about whether the climate is being damaged by humans, or just moving through natural cycles, but really it's time and observation that are going to answer the questions, and I don't mean years; I mean decades, centuries even. I understand the desire of people who believe that the cause is man-made to get started fixing the problem as soon as possible, but that doesn't justify ignoring questions or evidence that might prove inconvenient to their "Inconvenient Truth."

Update: Assuming with Al Gore that humans are, in fact, at least partly to blame for climate change, by artificially producing greenhouse gases, what would be some effective measures to counter the human factor? There's a common misconception that the Bush Administration has done nothing about them. Ready for a list of accomplishments?

Update II: Semi-related topic--NASA has some good news for us about Earth's ozone layer. The ozone layer isn't exactly global warming related. It's more about radiation, skin cancer, cataracts, crop damage, etc., but it is man-made effect related, at least in part, so I thought I'd toss it in here.

Update III: Here's another look at the science of global warming in response to Al Gore's movie.