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call to action posted:Why does carbon capture technology matter until we're nearing zero net carbon emissions in the first place? Will it ever be cheaper to capture a ton of carbon vs. prevent its emission in the first place? We need to get to negative carbon emissions, not just zero. Also sequestration can help us reduce overall emissions faster than we can transform an industry. Now this new tech seems very far down the pipeline sadly.
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Jan 10, 2017 19:18
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Hypothetically, I came up with some amazing carbon sequestration technology, it seems like that should be one of the most valuable things on the planet. Obviously a coal plant could buy carbon credits or something from me to offset what they produce. But it seems to me that to really move to negative emissions, I would need to get paid to simply remove carbon on my own dime. If there was a tax on carbon emissions, I could possibly get some of that if the proceeds were saved for such a purpose. To really drive this, it seems like you'd either have to do that or have the entire thing subsidized by the government. It just seems that, technology aside, we aren't really structured in a way that would encourage widespread sequestration as a business. Cap and trade is a bit of a joke and too easily gamed.
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Jan 10, 2017 19:29
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call to action posted:I couldn't possibly agree less. If the choice is 99.999% destruction if I fight and become an ascetic monk to reduce my carbon emissions, or 100% destruction if I chill and live a nice Western life, I'm gonna choose number two. Cool strawman.
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Jan 10, 2017 19:34
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Fangz posted:Cool strawman. False Dichotomy. 
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Jan 10, 2017 19:50
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Nevvy Z posted:False Dichotomy. It's also a strawman, because nobody is telling people to become "ascetic monks".
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Jan 10, 2017 20:36
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And Zudgemud was never seen again.
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Jan 10, 2017 22:28
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Although clearly something to watch out for regions that scrap by on subsistence farming, I don't think warming will have a significant negative impact on crop yields for industrialized nations within the next 50 or so years - at least not one that isn't offset by a mix of tech advances and the positive effect of higher CO2 concentrations.* The problem is the water. Desertification, shift of rain patterns and general scarcity of freshwater from exploitation will have a much heavier effect, and in the context of global food production, the ocean dying will put higher pressure on food costs. *Assuming 2-4 degrees increase. If we keep on a >10C path for end of century, then all bets are off. call to action posted:I couldn't possibly agree less. If the choice is 99.999% destruction if I fight and become an ascetic monk to reduce my carbon emissions, or 100% destruction if I chill and live a nice Western life, I'm gonna choose number two. Cool username.
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Jan 10, 2017 22:48
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call to action posted:I couldn't possibly agree less. If the choice is 99.999% destruction if I fight and become an ascetic monk to reduce my carbon emissions, or 100% destruction if I chill and live a nice Western life, I'm gonna choose number two. Ok, how about the more realistic scenario of saving millions of lives and a large amount of future economic hardship in exchange for supporting policies that will lead to an overall reduction in consumption? or is the point that literally all sacrifices aren't worth it and it's better to let the world burn than give one inch on traditional first world lifestyles
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Jan 10, 2017 23:11
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Paradoxish posted:Ok, how about the more realistic scenario of saving millions of lives and a large amount of future economic hardship in exchange for supporting policies that will lead to an overall reduction in consumption? I was responding to the original post, which was literally talking about the death of 6B people vs 6.001B people. It's not a meaningful difference to me. "Fighting" has a cost, one that I'm not willing to bear if there's no significant difference even if I'm successful. Kinda like how I wouldn't bother saving for retirement if I knew I had a 99% of dying before I retired - I can use that money to live a better life now. Saving/fighting isn't free.
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Jan 10, 2017 23:28
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Conspiratiorist posted:the ocean dying will put higher pressure on food costs. The ocean dying will kill every single one of us. It's a worst case scenario, literal 99% extinction event. Lucky for us it's at the extreme end of absolutely no mitigation and in fact vastly increased emissions. It's the last domino and not the first.
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Jan 10, 2017 23:38
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Nice piece of fish posted:The ocean dying will kill every single one of us. It's a worst case scenario, literal 99% extinction event. Lucky for us it's at the extreme end of absolutely no mitigation and in fact vastly increased emissions. It's the last domino and not the first. Why?
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Jan 11, 2017 00:28
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Most of the planet's oxygen is generated by oceanic bacteria. Ocean dies, everything asphyxiates.
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Jan 11, 2017 00:31
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Oxxidation posted:Most of the planet's oxygen is generated by oceanic bacteria. Ocean dies, everything asphyxiates. But oxygen depletion of the atmosphere below what's survivable by plants and animals would take centuries if not millenia even without the ocean's contribution. I mean, yes, besides the unlikely second Venus that's the worst case long-term scenario, but it's beyond the scope of time humans care about.
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Jan 11, 2017 00:36
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Conspiratiorist posted:But oxygen depletion of the atmosphere below what's survivable by plants and animals would take centuries if not millenia even without the ocean's contribution. There's a lot of things beyond the scope of time humans care about. Such as the day after tomorrow *ominous music starts playing* In a world
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Jan 11, 2017 00:39
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Oxxidation posted:Most of the planet's oxygen is generated by oceanic bacteria. Ocean dies, everything asphyxiates. The ocean is also a pretty major food source. Because, you know, fish.
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Jan 11, 2017 00:41
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Potato Salad posted:At what point, Zudge, do you think we will start capturing carbon faster than we are emitting it? As in, what would be the public awareness tipping point to get someone to start paying for capture in earnest? Probably when the consequences of climate change becomes too large to ignore for the population at large and when the cost of energy and carbon capture technology has become low enough for it to be a politically viable alternative to include in an international "Kyoto protocol #X" type of deal. The real deal maker is probably when renewables/non CO2 emitting powersources become so cheap that they mostly out-compete coal/oil/gas, as a decrese of emissions will have the biggest effect on CO2 levels. Still though, for this long term and slow solution of carbon capture to be seriously considered and implemented, I would assume a majority of powerful nations need to be dramatically squeezed by climate change, so maybe between 50-100 years?
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Jan 11, 2017 00:43
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Oxxidation posted:Most of the planet's oxygen is generated by oceanic bacteria. Ocean dies, everything asphyxiates. On a massive timescale, sure. It's more that we need everything the ocean produces, including its ability to sequester carbon dioxide. Conspiratiorist posted:But oxygen depletion of the atmosphere below what's survivable by plants and animals would take centuries if not millenia even without the ocean's contribution. On the other hand, a massive ocean-wide anoxic event (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anoxic_event) could conceivably happen as a worst case scenario within a few hundred years. And probably on an unprecedented scale, given the multiple stressors on ocean life and biology humans provide, abundant organic material for breakdown... yeah. Better learn to breathe hydrogen sulphate gas.
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Jan 11, 2017 00:44
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call to action posted:I was responding to the original post, which was literally talking about the death of 6B people vs 6.001B people. It's not a meaningful difference to me. "Fighting" has a cost, one that I'm not willing to bear if there's no significant difference even if I'm successful. 0.001 billion is a million people.
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Jan 11, 2017 01:11
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Nice piece of fish posted:On the other hand, a massive ocean-wide anoxic event (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anoxic_event) could conceivably happen as a worst case scenario within a few hundred years. And probably on an unprecedented scale, given the multiple stressors on ocean life and biology humans provide, abundant organic material for breakdown... yeah. Better learn to breathe hydrogen sulphate gas. I'm sure once there's the demand, there will be incentives to provide oxygen creation technologies that will fill in the niche left by our moribund biosphere. That's how the free market works.
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Jan 11, 2017 01:56
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Change comes once someone figures out how to monetize the tech. Until a lot of people can 1. get rich by doing a thing that sequesters carbon and 2. lose money by producing carbon then there will be no change. Governments just exist to protect the industry incumbents so expect them to slow this process of change further.
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Jan 11, 2017 02:25
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cowofwar posted:Change comes once someone figures out how to monetize the tech. Until a lot of people can 1. get rich by doing a thing that sequesters carbon and 2. lose money by producing carbon then there will be no change. Governments just exist to protect the industry incumbents so expect them to slow this process of change further. Change comes when governments implement the correct policies to allow individuals and corporations to monetize tech. It will never be worthwhile to sequester carbon when emitting it carries no consequences, as an example. Or society understands the value for sequestering carbon and will pay people to do it. If I figured out how to sequester 10% of my nations emissions in my backyard, it wouldn't be worth any money unless the policies were in place to allow me to be paid to do it. BattleMoose fucked around with this message at 06:02 on Jan 11, 2017 |
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Jan 11, 2017 06:00
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The biggest push will be when a market forms to use sequestered carbon. Once that "waste" becomes valuable, sequestration will make business sense.
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Jan 11, 2017 14:39
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Fangz posted:0.001 billion is a million people. Indeed it is. If the choice is between a world that has somehow gone through a hyperholocaust and ended up with a million people (presumably the richest on earth) left alive and no one left alive, I don't really care.
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Jan 11, 2017 15:42
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call to action posted:I couldn't possibly agree less. If the choice is 99.999% destruction if I fight and become an ascetic monk to reduce my carbon emissions, or 100% destruction if I chill and live a nice Western life, I'm gonna choose number two. That's actually an interesting and useful wedge between us here. My moral compass operates on a totally different basis.
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Jan 11, 2017 15:45
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For one, excepting for a level of certainty sitting at alpha level that we're going to face "hyperholocaust," it'll be worthwhile to attempt avoiding that scenario. IN all that's lovely about inaction on climate change right now, we're fortunate in that this isn't a single roll of dice fate we're facing. It's not like you or I are straight-up consigned to a fate that was determined decades ago that cannot be changed. We're just mostly hosed by actions we've taken and not taken decades ago if we continue to not act in dramatic ways. The "if I am 99% likely to die before retirement" bit is a false dichotomy and a failure to look at a system analytically. You aren't assigned a death date. If you are thirty right now and someone says, "Based on your present health profile, income, and spending habits, you're 99% likely to die before you can retire," do you throw your hands up in defeat? Well, apparently you do, but perhaps others would exercise, eat healthier, address other specific medical concerns if possible, engineer their lifestyle around saving, and perhaps assess opportunities for career advancement. It's not a binary choice; there's a massive sliding scale of reaction that can be taken. (edit, continue reading below) Potato Salad fucked around with this message at 16:14 on Jan 11, 2017 |
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Jan 11, 2017 15:55
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anonumos posted:The biggest push will be when a market forms to use sequestered carbon. Once that "waste" becomes valuable, sequestration will make business sense. Not sure if there will ever be a productive use for sequestered carbon. Its value is entirely based on its being in the ground and not in the air, and that value needs to be created through laws and regulations that make people pay for emitting carbon and give that money to people who remove carbon from the air.
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Jan 11, 2017 15:58
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Potato Salad posted:If you are thirty right now and someone says, "Based on your present health profile, income, and spending habits, you're 99% likely to die before you can retire," do you throw your hands up in defeat? Well, apparently you do, but perhaps others would exercise, eat healthier, address other specific medical concerns if possible, engineer their lifestyle around saving, and perhaps assess opportunities for career advancement. Those are all things you can do with regard to your own life, which is a small scale situation that any person has the ability to change. This thread is about things that nobody has the ability to change, outside of a few hundred billionaires who don't give a poo poo. It's pretty absurd to compare climate change to the life of a single person. ChairMaster fucked around with this message at 16:04 on Jan 11, 2017 |
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Jan 11, 2017 16:01
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(phone posting, pardon third post) To bring that thinking -- that ACC isn't as simple as your reductive morality would seem to like to pare it down to -- back to the topic of the thread, we can absolutely accept the binary choices of "We totally engage in a global uberfocus on emissions cuts and reversal now" and "we do nothing and go +6C by 2100 full holocaust" if we do so with the mindset that those are extremes toward opposing ends of a broad spectrum of paths we can take. Like, literally paths we can take: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Representative_Concentration_Pathways On the note of paths, Zudgemud posted:Probably when the consequences of climate change becomes too large to ignore for the population at large and when the cost of energy and carbon capture technology has become low enough for it to be a politically viable alternative to include in an international "Kyoto protocol #X" type of deal. The real deal maker is probably when renewables/non CO2 emitting powersources become so cheap that they mostly out-compete coal/oil/gas, as a decrese of emissions will have the biggest effect on CO2 levels. Still though, for this long term and slow solution of carbon capture to be seriously considered and implemented, I would assume a majority of powerful nations need to be dramatically squeezed by climate change, so maybe between 50-100 years? I wanted to reply to you on the note of RCPs. From the wikipedia link above (and from the top of the article) comes a chart of four hypothetical trajectories humankind can take with respect to CO2 concentration in the near future.  That green one? That's a best case scenario, something that the Paris Accord was intended to help us reach. Notice that after 2040, that trajectory's crystal ball hopes humankind can start going negative on carbon emissions per year, as in we're deploying carbon capture or using then-better-understood natural systems to help pull CO2 out of the air. The whole green best-case scenario trajectory that keeps us to just +1C by 2100 -- which is still something of an ecological disaster -- assumes these carbon capture technologies and our governments will be ready for primetime by 2040. When I see an article on a carbon capture tech, I think "Oh thank god, we need that to be commercalized in a little over 2 PhD cycles." I am saddened by the thought that many red-blooded Americans read the same article and probably think, "I knew technology would solve it, I'm glad we didn't wreck are economy on something as stupid as climate change."
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Jan 11, 2017 16:12
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ChairMaster posted:Those are all things you can do with regard to your own life, which is a small scale situation that any person has the ability to change. i know, I'm phoneposting and its a long drat post so I put it into three. 2nd flows into 3rd, above.
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Jan 11, 2017 16:13
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ChairMaster posted:Those are all things you can do with regard to your own life, which is a small scale situation that any person has the ability to change. It seems like the discussion always goes that way, yeah. I don't think it should be what the thread is about. Occasionally, there's some good posts about actions people are taking in their own lives or working with a group. Often, some article about a small advance in a technology or a good policy action somewhere. Quite a bit, people posting new articles about some aspect of climate change. Those are all good contributions. Inevitably, people latch onto the article about a bad thing and melt down about how all is lost, etc. It's really not interesting to read anymore. Posts not about despair are met with "yeah, but it's not enough to make a difference." Well, of course it isn't, by itself. Climate change is a problem that needs a constant stream of small changes that begin to add up. There is no one solution. I think the thread reaction to "hey here's a thing I or some group did" should be celebrate and add to, not denigrate then shitpost. Seems like goons are too edgy for that, though.
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Jan 11, 2017 16:41
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Uranium Phoenix posted:Posts not about despair are met with "yeah, but it's not enough to make a difference." Well, of course it isn't, by itself. Climate change is a problem that needs a constant stream of small changes that begin to add up. There is no one solution. I think the thread reaction to "hey here's a thing I or some group did" should be celebrate and add to, not denigrate then shitpost. Seems like goons are too edgy for that, though. Uranium Phoenix posted:Individual actions, as long as you're not literally the chief executive of a county, are almost entirely meaningless.
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Jan 11, 2017 17:28
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Ok, so what? I don't see how when you reduce it it's different than knowing that everybody dies someday. You're alive now, what are you going to do about it?
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Jan 11, 2017 18:38
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Nice piece of fish posted:On the other hand, a massive ocean-wide anoxic event (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anoxic_event) could conceivably happen as a worst case scenario within a few hundred years. And probably on an unprecedented scale, given the multiple stressors on ocean life and biology humans provide, abundant organic material for breakdown... yeah. Better learn to breathe hydrogen sulphate gas. Your Wiki article seems to suggest these anoxic events are associated with (for our standards) very high CO2 levels in the atmosphere caused by methane releases: quote:Such rises in carbon dioxide may have been in response to a great outgassing of the highly flammable natural gas (methane) that some call an "oceanic burp". Vast quantities of methane are normally locked into the Earth's crust on the continental plateaus in one of the many deposits consisting of compounds of methane hydrate, a solid precipitated combination of methane and water much like ice. Because the methane hydrates are unstable, except at cool temperatures and high (deep) pressures, scientists have observed smaller "burps" due to tectonic events. You're saying this might be a worst case scenario a few hundred years away, but given the rapid meltdown of polar ice chronicled in this thread and the associated danger of huge methane releases, what's keeping us from being confronted with it possibly within our lifetimes? Given how fast we managed to warm the planet with relatively less potent CO2, wouldn't the temporal lag between a clathrate release scenario and such an anoxic event be decades rather than centuries?
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Jan 11, 2017 18:40
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Placid Marmot posted:Uranium Phoenix posted: Uranium Phoenix posted:I think the thread reaction to "hey here's a thing I or some group did" should be celebrate and add to, not denigrate then shitpost. Seems like goons are too edgy for that, though.
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Jan 11, 2017 18:50
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Potato Salad posted:
1° from that green line by 2100? I'd think under that "best case" scenario we'd be extremely lucky to be under 3.5° by end of century. You start totaling up feedback loops very likely to occur in that time span and 3.5° looks optimistic indeed. Albedo reversal alone could potentially eat up that budget.
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Jan 11, 2017 19:22
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BattleMoose posted:Change comes when governments implement the correct policies to allow individuals and corporations to monetize tech. It will never be worthwhile to sequester carbon when emitting it carries no consequences, as an example. Or society understands the value for sequestering carbon and will pay people to do it. If I figured out how to sequester 10% of my nations emissions in my backyard, it wouldn't be worth any money unless the policies were in place to allow me to be paid to do it. Regulations don't precede new tech. CO2 has value, especially since it is produced along with heat. That heat and CO2 can be used to generate value added goods with the right catalysts and substrates. The tech and business case aren't there yet but the moment it is people will be seeking it out like fryer grease or garbage. A previously worthless good discarded in mass and now a limited and expensive resource in places. solar pv + waste heat + CO2 -> algal growth and biofuel production, separate biofuel from liquid fraction and return waste liquid to bioreactor; separate solids (dead algae) from solid fraction and isolate cellulose for industrial production of paper,absorptive products, etc. Waste solids go to fertilizer production. This stuff is already ongoing, just needs it all to come together as tech matures. It's always possible that human civilization could shift from carbon positive to carbon negative and end up with the opposite problem. If we have basically unlimited solar energy and growing trees for carbon goods is slow and inefficient then we could simply extract the CO2 from the air to generate goods and end up sucking out too much due to greed/profits/excess same as before. cowofwar fucked around with this message at 19:42 on Jan 11, 2017 |
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Jan 11, 2017 19:23
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Regulations CAN spur development. While solar was trucking along with significant progress, federal and state regulations increased investment and sped up efficiency gains far sooner than the previous market forces called for. IE. markets do respond to regulation, sometimes positively. Some people take it on faith that regulation always stifles innovation but that is not a truism.
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Jan 11, 2017 19:40
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anonumos posted:Regulations CAN spur development. While solar was trucking along with significant progress, federal and state regulations increased investment and sped up efficiency gains far sooner than the previous market forces called for. IE. markets do respond to regulation, sometimes positively. Some people take it on faith that regulation always stifles innovation but that is not a truism. But no carbon capture tech has as of yet matured enough to gain a legislative following. No one wants to subsidize pumping CO2 in to the Earth's crust since that is political unsalable (and IMO dumb/wasteful). Now if a carbon capture tech matured enough to produce something of value that could create a new industry came along then that would be attractive for legislation and government investment and a focus for regulation.
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Jan 11, 2017 19:48
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CCS is bizarrely one of the few ways to save the coal industry. If we mandate CCS then we'd need to burn 2x the coal for the same amount of power (coal CCS is very energy intensive).
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Jan 11, 2017 20:58
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Sphairon posted:Your Wiki article seems to suggest these anoxic events are associated with (for our standards) very high CO2 levels in the atmosphere caused by methane releases: In an RCP 8,5 scenario (or worse), which is what I understand we're on track for due to vastly too optimistic models? Uhhh... My hopes and dreams?
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Jan 11, 2017 21:26
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