The Environment Thread

[Mark F]

Quote

 the Ohio Conservative Energy Forum, released the results of a survey last week suggesting that support for renewables is no longer a politically exploitable issue. In a survey of 400 Ohioans who self-identify as conservative, two-thirds of respondents said they believe their state needs to diversify its energy portfolio by having at least half of its energy come from renewable sources. Nearly the same percentage of respondents said they were more—not less—likely to support a politician who voted for or otherwise expressed support for renewable energy or energy efficiency legislation. Ohio, just as a reminder, currently ranks 11th in coal production among U.S. states, and its coal industry directly or indirectly supports about 33,000 jobs. It also ranks fourth among states in coal consumption.

https://www.ecowatch.com/renewable-energy-coal-politics-2629963814.html

 

Renewable energy sources will be the world’s main source of power within two decades and are establishing a foothold in the global energy system faster than any fuel in history, according to BP.

The UK-based oil company said wind, solar and other renewables will account for about 30% of the world’s electricity supplies by 2040, up from 25% in BP’s 2040 estimates last year, and about 10% today.

In regions such as Europe, the figure will be as high as 50% by 2040. The speed of growth was without parallel, the company said in its annual energy outlook.

 

 

Edited March 16, 2019 by Mark F

[Mark F]

Two climate related sites  

http://floodlist.com/

Weather and climate.... Dr. Jeff Masters

 

https://www.wunderground.com/cat6

Edited March 17, 2019 by Mark F

[Wanna-B-Fanboy]

On 2019-03-16 at 10:59 AM, Mark F said:

https://www.ecowatch.com/renewable-energy-coal-politics-2629963814.html

 

Renewable energy sources will be the world’s main source of power within two decades and are establishing a foothold in the global energy system faster than any fuel in history, according to BP.

The UK-based oil company said wind, solar and other renewables will account for about 30% of the world’s electricity supplies by 2040, up from 25% in BP’s 2040 estimates last year, and about 10% today.

In regions such as Europe, the figure will be as high as 50% by 2040. The speed of growth was without parallel, the company said in its annual energy outlook.

 

 

Well that is wonderful news- no gloom and doom. 

[kelownabomberfan]

On 2019-03-16 at 8:59 AM, Mark F said:

https://www.ecowatch.com/renewable-energy-coal-politics-2629963814.html

 

Renewable energy sources will be the world’s main source of power within two decades and are establishing a foothold in the global energy system faster than any fuel in history, according to BP.

The UK-based oil company said wind, solar and other renewables will account for about 30% of the world’s electricity supplies by 2040, up from 25% in BP’s 2040 estimates last year, and about 10% today.

In regions such as Europe, the figure will be as high as 50% by 2040. The speed of growth was without parallel, the company said in its annual energy outlook.

 

 

I can see hydro-electricity being the main driver of this move, but wind and solar make no sense economically, and so therefore are just not sustainable.

[Mark F]

Quote

 

Flooding from melting snow overwhelms Midwest 

(CNN)The flooding in Nebraska has gotten so bad it's breaking ( seventeen ) records across the state.

About 9 million people in 14 states along the Mississippi and Missouri rivers are under a flood warning, according to CNN meteorologist Karen Maginnis.

Some of the records go as far back as 1960 and some are as recent as 2011, according to a press release from the Nebraska Emergency Management Agency, or NEMA. The majority of the records NEMA listed involved the Missouri River, which crested between 30 and 47.5 feet in different areas throughout the state since Tuesday, breaking previous records by 1 to 4 feet

 

watch the short video to get an idea how bad /widespread this is.

https://www.cnn.com/2019/03/17/us/nebraska-flooding-sunday-wxc/index.html

Edited March 18, 2019 by Mark F

[pigseye]

The unsustainable expansion of smartphone emissions

A recent analysis by Belkhir and Elmeligi (2018) determined that the greenhouse gas emissions from the Information and Communication Industry (ICT) – smartphones and mobile devices, prominently – will grow from 1% of total global emissions in 2007 to 14% by 2040. That’s more than half of today’s relative contribution from the globe’s entire transportation sector.

In 2010, smartphone use added 17 megatons of CO2 equivalent (17 MT-CO2-e) to annual global emissions. By next year (2020), smartphone emissions are expected to reach 125 MT-CO2-e/year – a 730% explosion in just 10 years.

Last year (2018), there were 2.5 billion smartphone users.  Belkhir and Elmeligi suggest that if there aren’t serious efforts to reduce or eliminate smartphone use in the near future, the number of smartphone units across the globe may reach 8.7 billion by 2040.

This is unsustainable, dramatically undermining global efforts to reduce CO2 emissions.

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S095965261733233X

Now this really sucks. 

[Mark F]

Temperatures surged above 70 degrees in Alaska and northern Canada this week.

All-time March records were shattered in these northern latitudes.

Seattle nearly hit 80 degrees, their warmest day anytime from November through March.

The warmth extended into western and northern Canada in places you'd usually expect to be ice- or snow-covered in late March.

Yohin Lake, less than 400 miles from the Arctic Circle in the Northwest Territories, soared to 21.8 degrees Celsius (about 71 degrees Fahrenheit) Tuesday, the first time on record a location in the Northwest Territories warmed to at least 20 degrees Celsius. Neither Denver, nor Kansas City, had yet to reach 70 degrees in 2019.

This was just one of 10 locations in northwest Canada smashing new March records, according to Patrick Duplessis, a doctoral candidate at Dalhousie University in Halifax, Nova Scotia.

https://weather.com/news/weather/news/2019-03-20-march-record-warmth-alaska-canada-seattle

and

NASA

Decades of NASA data show the Earth is warming. According to NASA's Goddard Institute for Space Studies in Manhattan, the Earth has warmed about 1.44 degrees Fahrenheit during the last 40 years. But the poles are warming even faster; the Arctic has warmed by more than 3.5 degrees Fahrenheit during the same time period.

https://www.nasa.gov/topics/earth/features/warmingpoles.html

Scientific American:

An Arizona utility said last week it plans to install more (battery) energy storage in the next six years than had been built in all of the United States prior to 2018.

The announcement by Arizona Public Service Co. represents a breakthrough moment for the storage industry. While utility-scale storage announcements have been building in size and frequency, none of them matches the 850 megawatts proposed by the Phoenix-based company.

It also heralds a shift for APS. Last year, state regulators rejected the utility’s long-term power plans, saying they called for too much new natural gas.

Company officials now say batteries are the cheapest way to meet peak demand traditionally served by natural gas peaking units 

scientific American. https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/an-arizona-utility-is-betting-big-on-energy-storage/

Edited March 22, 2019 by Mark F

[FrostyWinnipeg]

https://www.theweathernetwork.com/ca/news/article/glacier-melt-on-mount-everest-exposes-bodies-of-dead-climbers-khumbu-icefall

[Wanna-B-Fanboy]

Well... this is reassuring. Nice to see.

https://www.theatlantic.com/science/archive/2019/01/do-most-americans-believe-climate-change-polls-say-yes/580957/

Quote

These changes show up in both new polls. The AP survey found that seven out of 10 of Americans understand climate change is happening. Even more notable: A slim majority of Republicans—52 percent—understand that climate change is real. (The AP asked questions about “climate change,” while Yale polled about “global warming.” The difference in language didn’t seem to change how people replied

 

[Mark F]

22 minutes ago, wanna-b-fanboy said:

Well... this is reassuring. Nice to see.

https://www.theatlantic.com/science/archive/2019/01/do-most-americans-believe-climate-change-polls-say-yes/580957/

 

yes, after being repeatedly slapped on the face by nature,  eventually most people don't need anyone to tell them what's happening. They can figure it out themselves.

Also, I read about renewable energy a fair bit.

It really is rapidly growing, in the USA, notwithstanding the efforts of the Trumps and others like him. 

And whatever they think about climate change, people like to have a job.

Quote

 

The recently published Department of Energy 2017 U.S. Energy and Employment Report shows that clean electricity jobs are no doubt the engine that drives America’s electric energy economy, outstripping the number of paychecks provided by the fossil fuel industry by at least five to one. While that doesn’t mean fossil fuel generation is gone, it certainly means that if you are a politician looking for ways to grow jobs for the long term in your community, clean energy is the path to take.

 

https://www.nrdc.org/experts/lara-ettenson/us-clean-energy-jobs-surpass-fossil-fuel-employment

Edited March 22, 2019 by Mark F

[FrostyWinnipeg]

Yeah but the Repubs don't believe in it or if they do jobs > environment.

[Mark F]

Nearly six months after Hurricane Michael slammed into the Florida panhandle, many people living there are still trying to put their lives back together. The Category 4 storm made landfall last October, killing 43 people. It caused more than $6 billion of damage.

Parts of the panhandle look like the hurricane hit just yesterday, reports CBS News' Manuel Bojorquez. Some people have not been able to start rebuilding, others simply left. With an estimated 40,000 homes either damaged or destroyed here, the most critical need is housing.

Shelly Summers isn't just cooking for her family -- she feeds 17 men, women and children who live in her backyard, a tent city for those who have nowhere else to go.
 
"They lost their homes and they needed a sense of security and a sense of belonging. That was the biggest thing for me," Summers said. 
 
The hurricane left Lori Hogan and her husband Gino homeless. They were staying in a hotel for a little while but when the money finally ran out, they found a new shelter in Summers' backyard. They said they don't know where'd they be if it wasn't for her. 

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/hurricane-michael-six-months-later-people-are-still-living-in-tents/

article about the hurricane itself.

https://www.wunderground.com/cat6/Potentially-Catastrophic-Hurricane-Michael-Nearing-Landfall-Florida-Panhandle

Edited March 24, 2019 by Mark F

[blue_gold_84]

I meant to post this the other day but forgot. My apologies.

https://cabinradio.ca/14118/news/environment/for-first-time-since-records-began-nwt-hits-20c-in-march/

Quote

Most of the territory sweltered in record or near-record temperatures, triggering concern over rapidly disintegrating ice roads, a call in some quarters for government action on climate change...

The week’s weather was exceptional on a century-long scale.

“The dataset at Yohin Lake goes all the way back to 1959. Other datasets go back to the early 1900s and nothing in the data is above 20C in March. This hasn’t happened for at least a good 100 years, so it’s pretty rare,” said Patrick Duplessis, an atmospheric scientist at Dalhousie University, who closely follows northern weather records.

[Mark F]

59 minutes ago, blue_gold_84 said:

I meant to post this the other day but forgot. My apologies.

Quote

 

Huge slabs of Arctic permafrost in northwest Canada are slumping and disintegrating, sending large amounts of carbon-rich mud and silt into streams and rivers. A new study that analyzed nearly a half-million square miles in northwest Canada found that this permafrost decay is affecting 52,000 square miles of that vast stretch of earth—an expanse the size of Alabama.

Permafrost is land that has been frozen stretching back to the last ice age, 10,000 years ago. As the Arctic warms at twice the global rate, the long-frozen soils thaw and decompose, releasing the trapped greenhouse gases into the air. Scientists estimate that the world's permafrost holds twice as much carbon as the atmosphere.

 The disintegration of the permafrost was visible in 40- to 60-mile wide swaths of terrain, showing that, "extensive landscapes remain poised for major climate-driven change." 

"Things have really taken off. Climate warming is now making that happen. It's exactly what we should expect with climate change," said Steven V. Kokelj, lead scientist on the Canadian mapping project.

 

https://insideclimatenews.org/news/27022017/global-warming-permafrost-study-melt-canada-siberia

Edited March 24, 2019 by Mark F

[Wanna-B-Fanboy]

27 minutes ago, Mark F said:

https://insideclimatenews.org/news/27022017/global-warming-permafrost-study-melt-canada-siberia

Funny- Remember reading about these worries 10 years back:

https://www.nytimes.com/2011/12/17/science/earth/warming-arctic-permafrost-fuels-climate-change-worries.html

https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/1748-9326/2/4/045016

 

Those scientist know nothing- bunch of money grabbingassholes. 

[Mark F]

25 minutes ago, wanna-b-fanboy said:

Funny- Remember reading about these worries 10 years back:

Yes.

all of these things were known decades ago, and well within the time needed to do something about it, with much less disruption. 

Now we have about 12 years.

 

Edited March 24, 2019 by Mark F

[Wanna-B-Fanboy]

2 minutes ago, Mark F said:

Yes.

 all of these things were known decades ago, and well within the time needed to do something about it, with much less disruption. 

 Now we have about 12 years.

  

I wish those ******* merchants of doubt were held accountable. 

[pigseye]

I wish the weather was that nice in Winnipeg. 

[Wanna-B-Fanboy]

1 hour ago, pigseye said:

I wish the weather was that nice in Winnipeg. 

give it another six weeks.

[pigseye]

+8 on Wednesday woohoo 

[Mark F]

 

 China moves aggressively into renewable energy.

 

Quote

 

China expects to have 100,000 cars powered by clean-burning hydrogen cells on its roads within five to six years as it challenges such countries as Japan and South Korea for dominance of the emerging carbon-free automotive markets.

There are already more electric vehicles in China than anywhere else, but an expert in new energy sources with the Chinese Academy of Sciences told Xinhua that the research and production focus was now shifting to hydrogen fuel cells. With their outstanding energy-conversion efficiency and zero carbon emissions, the cells are tipped to replace fossil-fuel engines and rechargeable batteries as the global power source for transport.

The blueprint for the program will be China’s successful marketing of electric cars: There were almost none 10 years ago, but a million electric and hybrid cars were sold to the public and private sectors last year, more than the rest of the world combined.

Lured by government research and production subsidies, domestic automakers such as Great Wall Motor, Yutong Bus and Foton Motor have rushed into the promising hydrogen automotive sector since last year

 

https://www.asiatimes.com/2019/03/article/beijing-wants-100000-hydrogen-cars-by-2025/

 

Aftermath of record setting snow storm .....record setting Nebraska flooding:

 

 

 

Edited March 26, 2019 by Mark F

[pigseye]

More weather news, thanks for keeping me up to date. 

It's -72.4 C in Vostok Antarctica today  

[pigseye]

Interesting study on the power of clouds,

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/308043423_A_Hiatus_of_the_Greenhouse_Effect

This work suggests that the greenhouse effect hiatus can be served as an additional factor to cause the recent global warming slowdown.

I'm so glad the science is settled. 

[blue_gold_84]

Yeah, totally interesting... A study from September 2016. But of course the infallible No Tricks Zone posts it today, and being ever obedient to that garbage website, you decide to follow suit on here. Why not just be honest with yourself and post the original link? (http://notrickszone.com/2019/03/28/scientists-the-co2-greenhouse-effect-was-cancelled-out-by-clouds-during-1992-2014/)

https://www.nature.com/articles/nature22315

There was no hiatus; temperatures actually continued to increase, but at a slower rate than anticipated. Using the word hiatus in a title is misleading and insincere.

The science isn't settled. Unless one thinks controversy equates to something being settled, in which case I'd have to seriously question that person's understanding of basic concepts, much less scientific ones.

Nice try, comrade.

[pigseye]

That's a great study you posted, you probably should have read it:

Look at their Fig 1 showing trends in global temperature data sets. It shows that since about 2000 the trend in all data sets has been decreasing. This was only halted by the recent El Nino. Note that all the variations on the graph are said to be within the bounds of natural variability according to the authors, indicating that nothing unusual has happened over the duration of the graph.

Consider also their figure 2b and c. It shows HadCRUT3 from 1980 -2008 and points out the recent pause period. It then shows five global temperature data sets from 1980 – 2015 showing that the pause has gone away. Never mind that the reason why the pause has stopped is not a climatic one, but due to the short-term El Nino.

Look also at their Fig 5 which is said to reconcile observations and computer models showing that there is no discrepancy. Again it is the recent El Nino that brings models and data together. Without the introduction of this short-lived weather event the climate models would obviously be running too warm.

Good work!

Watts and the boys ripped that thing apart.

And the study I posted was good enough for Harvard and the same site you cited

https://www.nature.com/articles/srep33315

http://adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/2016NatSR...633315S

It completely backs up that CO2 is logarithmic and the law of dimishing returns.

 

Edited March 28, 2019 by pigseye
f