global warming

[Crusader]

so the new data that came out on May 31 on CO2 emissions condemning Earth to levels not seen in 50 million years , states that we need to curb the growth of fossil fuel use now.......so we all know this will never happen because no other country on Earth will ever stand up to China who is by far the worst offender of greenhouse gas emissions on the planet. So posting any article or passing any regulations in the U.S is fruitless.

 

[sam85geo]

Carbon dioxide, methane, water vapor are the big three of global warming. Irrespective of country, if new regulations, different resource use and recycling can be made to work economically, those "polluting" countries would readily adopt such methodologies/technologies. Economics is the key to implementing successful change(s).

 

[Crusader]

Carbon dioxide, methane, water vapor are the big three of global warming. Irrespective of country, if new regulations, different resource use and recycling can be made to work economically, those "polluting" countries would readily adopt such methodologies/technologies. Economics is the key to implementing successful change(s).

China will do what China wants to do and will have no regard for anything or anyone else. They just "allowed" their citizens to have a third child. They control everything and if they had any care about Earth they would be exhibiting that now. They know they are the big polluters .
But I agree with you that as a species we need to control our impacts, but China will not. Just my opinion

 

[sam85geo]

China has the most people and the least arable land. If global warming and climate change generate a decrease in global food production, and if the human population keeps increasing, China will have to resort to a diet more unsavory than what is currently eaten, and depend on whatever food they will be able, to beg, borrow or steal from other countries. Change for China would be difficult, but not as difficult as starvation. Sadly, the portend is being between a "rock and a hard place" for the world.

 

[CRES]

China has the most people and the least arable land. If global warming and climate change generate a decrease in global food production, and if the human population keeps increasing, China will have to resort to a diet more unsavory than what is currently eaten, and depend on whatever food they will be able, to beg, borrow or steal from other countries. Change for China would be difficult, but not as difficult as starvation. Sadly, the portend is being between a "rock and a hard place" for the world.

The problem is: per capita footprints are much greater in developed countries, UAE and Qitar.
China can have lower ecological footprint per capita, still.

 

[Ken Fabian]

so the new data that came out on May 31 on CO2 emissions condemning Earth to levels not seen in 50 million years , states that we need to curb the growth of fossil fuel use now.......so we all know this will never happen because no other country on Earth will ever stand up to China who is by far the worst offender of greenhouse gas emissions on the planet. So posting any article or passing any regulations in the U.S is fruitless.

No, it is not pointless. Pointless would be having no efforts in the US - historically having emitted more than China and still a huge emitter - whilst calling on China to reduce emissions. Pointless and hypocritical. Pointless because it is hypocritical. Doing nothing whilst blaming China is not how to induce action from China or any other nations.

Because China has so much to lose from the world failing on climate it has a lot to gain by becoming more ambitious on emissions and even more to gain as the biggest manufacturer and exporter of low emissions energy technology in global ambition. The growing cost effectiveness of renewable energy works there too; their planners might take time to shift from the (not unique) lingering belief that only fossil fuels are capable of sustaining the economic growth that is pulling hundreds of millions out of poverty, but they probably will abandon many of the planned new coal plants, as is happening elsewhere.

They may be nationalistic and autocratic but China's government is not stupid. The assumptions of indifference look like self justifying assumptions - assumptions mostly by Americans who don't really want America to have ambitious emissions policies and want to use China as their excuse.

 

[Clovis]

China,

 

[Catastrophe]

I am trying to be very careful here, and restrict my comments to matters of fact (without any intended GRAPE violation).

In any situation, whether we are talking bacteria or pterodactyls, any degree of overpopulation will eventually rebound on that group. In the event of unnatural global warming (that initiated by a living species) it is likely, though not automatic, that an overpopulated species would be most hit. This would seemingly be expected in the case of epidemics (as opposed to pandemics).

The effects of global warming would not be expected to be so localised, but I think the same reasoning might be sound. But it still might be a case of "sic transit H.sap." anyway.

Cat

 

[Helio]

AGW is certainly real, so the appropriate question is how sensitive is our planet to changes? There is good reason to question both data accuracy and modeling variables.

The complexity in climate modeling warrants serious scrutiny by all of science, but some in power are able to unfairly limit dissent as we are currently witnessing regarding the allowance (finally) of open ideas to the Covid origin, and don’t forget Climategate.

Here is an interesting article regarding allowing open debate, including finding a facility to even have a debate. Science must not become an ideology (scientism).

I fear too much cherry-picking is being done with data to get attention, and possible big funding. This topic is way too political to assume rational minds will prevail, IMO.

 

[Catastrophe]

"Climategate". Yeah! I like that. Now where did I put that beer?

Cat

 

[Ken Fabian]

I fear too much cherry-picking is being done with data to get attention, and possible big funding. This topic is way too political to assume rational minds will prevail, IMO.

Taking the IPCC and abundance of other reports seriously is entirely rational. Dangerously irresponsible to presume such reports are biased and refuse to take them seriously. Dangerously negligent of people in Office to dismiss or ignore that advice. There is money at stake and willingness to fight dirty about it - fossil fuel wealth, that is only really wealth as long as the climate consequences are not counted as a cost.

I think it is exposure to cherry picked and not representative examples of climate science getting things wrong, presented by opponents of strong action that lead to the view that climate science is presenting a biased and exaggerated view of the seriousness of the climate problem - I see far more commitment to misleading and misrepresenting the science from opponents of taking strong action than the science agencies that do climate science. Look to the IPCC reports - that are reviewed and endorsed by top science agencies around the world and are consistent with their independent work.

 

[12526sw09]

China will do what China wants to do and will have no regard for anything or anyone else. They just "allowed" their citizens to have a third child. They control everything and if they had any care about Earth they would be exhibiting that now. They know they are the big polluters.
But I agree with you that as a species we need to control our impacts, but China will not. Just my opinion

I agree that it's the population of China that's the problem. There's a ton of people living there, but each person has a really low carbon footprint. Maybe if they just lowered the number of children each person has... and maybe if they took notice of the impact they're bringing on our planet.

 

[Vincent Peri]

I agree that it's the population of China that's the problem... Maybe if they just lowered the number of children each person has... and maybe if they took notice of the impact they're bringing on our planet.

And maybe I'll flap my arms and fly to the moon...

Hmm... Charlie Brown said
that first...

 

[Ken Fabian]

I disagree that the climate problem is a China specific problem. We are beyond where population control (short of crimes against humanity) can fix global warming - and China's government has raising people out of poverty as a high priority. As it should. And whilst more people making high emissions adds to the problem, shifting to low/zero emissions works irrespective of population; other constraints to population growth still apply but much lower emissions, approaching zero per capita with prosperity is achievable.

The same favorable economics for renewable energy that has made new coal plants unviable in most of the world apply there too - their system may take time to reach the same conclusion but almost certainly will.

I think blaming China for collective failures on global warming is more about others seeking justifications for not committing to zero emissions than China's emissions being intractable.

 

[Catastrophe]

Quote
Oil Reserves in China
China holds 25,132,122,000 barrels of proven oil reserves as of 2016, ranking 14th in the world and accounting for about 1.5% of the world's total oil reserves of 1,650,585,140,000 barrels. China has proven reserves equivalent to 5.4 times its annual consumption.
Quote [Google]

5.4 years before it has to buy? From whom? Alternatives?

Cat

 

[Helio]

5.4 years before it has to buy? From whom? Alternatives?

This likely has a lot to do with why they have almost as many coal-fired plants operational than the rest of the world combined.

New plants puts them at about 3x that of the rest of the world. Here

I found this statement, "China has been the world’s largest carbon emitter for 20 years " from Here. This site also claims China finances more than 70% of the world's new coal power plants.

The bigger issue, once again, for me is to understand just how sensitive our planet is to the myriad number of variables, many interdependent, that must be understood to determine the impact of CO2, and other, increases.

But another problem is how much freedom we can give scientists to work together for all of our sakes.

Getting those answers, unfortunately, involves additional distorting burdens from politics and others. Here is a disturbing report stating that academic freedom is in "crisis".

 

[Catastrophe]

Coal reserves:

"China has proven reserves equivalent to 34.7 times its annual consumption."

OUCH!

 

[CRES]

Should we track why are ecological footprints per capital significantly higher in Qitar, Luxembourg, Canada then in China?

 

[Catastrophe]

Facts? Data? Figures? Substantiation?

 

[CRES]

Facts? Data? Figures? Substantiation?

Fact:

Open Data Platform

data.footprintnetwork.org

Checking beyond the indexes is a must.
Due to dependence on oil and gas and desalination, the Middle East generally has major ecological deficits.
China can probably decrease its ecological footprint further; the urge for frugality is probably a good thing.

 

[Catastrophe]

If you want to talk about REAL global warming, look at Venus!

Cat

 

[Misha Marchuk]

Global warming is what all people are to blame, not just one country. We are all to blame, deodorants, exhaust fumes from cars, factories, thermal power plants and so on. This all affects the temperature on our planet. Earlier, I somehow did not really betray this value and, one might even say, I did not even believe in global warming. But now I am thinking about it. In my childhood, the air temperature in my latitudes in the summer was an average of 20 to 25 degrees Celsius. Now I have grown up, and I see that now it is much hotter, and the temperature is from 30 to 35 degrees Celsius. So, whatever one may say, we are unlikely to defeat this phenomenon, but we can at least slow down it.

 

[Helio]

Global warming is what all people are to blame, not just one country. We are all to blame, deodorants, exhaust fumes from cars, factories, thermal power plants and so on. This all affects the temperature on our planet. Earlier, I somehow did not really betray this value and, one might even say, I did not even believe in global warming. But now I am thinking about it. In my childhood, the air temperature in my latitudes in the summer was an average of 20 to 25 degrees Celsius. Now I have grown up, and I see that now it is much hotter, and the temperature is from 30 to 35 degrees Celsius. So, whatever one may say, we are unlikely to defeat this phenomenon, but we can at least slow down it.

A 10 deg. Celsius increase in that short of time is far greater than any prediction than I'm aware, so it seems unlikely. Have you researched the data?

 

[Misha Marchuk]

A 10 deg. Celsius increase in that short of time is far greater than any prediction than I'm aware, so it seems unlikely. Have you researched the data?

It was in conditions of an average temperature in the middle of the month, precisely on cloudless days, that I did not take into account those days when it rained. last year the temperature on such days was on average 33-35 degrees Celsius, and my childhood was 14 years ago). I judged only by my own observations.

 

[Ken Fabian]

If you want to talk about REAL global warming, look at Venus!

Cat

Actually any real global warming - runaway greenhouse effect - on Venus happened aeons ago; Venus isn't warming now. It's surface temperatures are remarkably stable - the same temperature at night as day, the same whether at the poles or the equator iirc. Global warming on Earth is real right now.

In my childhood, the air temperature in my latitudes in the summer was an average of 20 to 25 degrees Celsius. Now I have grown up, and I see that now it is much hotter, and the temperature is from 30 to 35 degrees Celsius.

Arctic warming is approaching those kinds of levels of average warming in places but policy makers cannot base responses on anecdotal accounts. We need better than that - and climate scientist do require and do use better. The frequency and intensity of extremes are significant data, along with the temperature averages and other indicators; climate science does look to all kinds of data.

Still, our personal observations and experiences do matter - they impact our sense of how important the issue is.

Having recently been through the most intense period of drought on record here (Eastern Australia - we got less than 30mm of rain across a whole year), that included exceptional bushfires, that got out of control in Winter, global warming stopped being something hypothetical, for some far future. Unprecedented in timing, unprecedented in intensity as fires continued through Spring into Summer. According to firefighters, unprecedented in fire behavior - there were more and more intense fire tornadoes, and more fires creating pyro-cumulus clouds and storms with dry lightning, that started even more fires.

If you live in a cold climate a few degrees of warming may not seem like much - may seem beneficial even (although I doubt it actually will be) - but where I live Summer heatwaves already get unbearable and fire risks are reaching unprecedented levels with 1.4C of local average warming (from 1C of global average warming); adding another 4 or 5C degrees cannot be viewed as anything but catastrophic. I suspect that could be enough for heatwaves to kill crops, livestock and wildlife outright.

Even the warming of Winter temperatures has problem impacts here, from perennial noxious weeds that were kept in check by frosts, now growing all year (once we got some rain again), requiring more work and expenditure to deal with them, to making Winter burning of grass and bushland for bushfire fuel reduction difficult (to reduce hot weather fire risks) with additional labour and equipment and expenditure requirements to do it safely. I cannot treat it as some kind of hypothetical possibility any more.