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(Climate) Scientists aren't actually that helpful in proposing solutions, just predicting how screwed we are if we do nothing. Moving from fossil fuels is actu

(Climate) Scientists aren't actually that helpful in proposing solutions, just predicting how screwed we are if we do nothing. Moving from fossil fuels is actually quite hard. There is nothing to replace oil as fuel for global trade (i.e. fuel for airliners, cargo ships, long-haul trucking). There are tens of thousands of petroleum-based products without an obvious replacement. The environmental movement is still spreading FUD on nuclear (the only non-carbon emitting power source along with hydro and geothermal), preferring to push solar and wind even though those need natural gas backup to be viable. At this point it's probably more practical to start planning for mitigations to climate change effects.

nxpnsv 7y ago
They are doing exactly what is expected of climate scientists. They are not policy makers, they gather and process data to build predictive models. Now they are scared of what they predict. Why require that they also come up with solutions, before sounding alarms?
- macspoofing 7y ago
  But that was my point. Right now I think we have a good handle on the severity of the problem. The policy is much harder and 'listening to the scientists' doesn't help.
  - nxpnsv 7y ago
    I have the feeling that some policy maker are not aware of the severity. But let's say they are. Now they make a new policy. How do we gauge what the impact of this policy? This falls within the realm of said scientist. How to suggest new policies etc, that requires another skill set. We also should listen to those guys.
Certhas 7y ago
This is utter nonsense. There are things that are hard to replace, but all of what you talk about is being studied by scientists extensively. Obviously not climate scientists, becasue, duh, they are experts on cimate, not on long haul shipping. But renewables are scientifically a solved problem (all the predictions on the long term technological development of renewables also turned out to be far far to conservative). For the last 10% or so you need synthetic gas for long term storage of energy, but actually with the electrification of the heating sector, it turns out that nuclear would need synthetic gas for long term storage, too, for economic reasons. Further, it is is clear that a lot of R&D is still required, but again, environmental economists have discussed in detail that the best way to incentivize the R&D spending required would have been a solid carbon tax. The problem is not the lack of solutions, the problem is the lack of political will to implement them. It's disruptive, powerful lobbies have been funding climate denialism for decades, and people are unwilling to suffer even a minimal drop in living standards in order to stop climate change. The technical hurdles are all doable, but whether we as a species can collectively act on the knowledge that we collectively have is an open question. It's the hardest question, and it's infused with ideological battles on all sides. The US can't even operate an efficient public health system. It accepts enormous inefficiencies and human suffering for ideological reasons. And that's for its own citizens. Climate change will affect the poorest countries most.
- macspoofing 7y ago
  >But renewables are scientifically a solved problem I don't think so. Whenever there is huge investment in solar and wind, you see a comparable investment in natural gas to bridge the intermittency issues (e.g. Germany). That isn't a solved problem. That solar and wind require huge amounts of rare earth minerals, have huge land-use requirements, and are largely unrecyclable, is not a solved problem. >For the last 10% You sure that shouldn't be the 'last 50%'? >so you need synthetic gas for long term storage of ener These discussions always seem to go this way. When presented with major challenges to large scale deployments of solar and wind, an unproven, unavailable or unworkable workaround is propsed. No, synthetic gas is not a solution, just like pumped/gravity or Li-ion storage isn't either. >The technical hurdles are all doable To be clear, this is an expression of hope for the future (after more R&D), and not reality today, correct? Today, we don't have a way to fully move off of fossil fuels. >It's disruptive, powerful lobbies have been funding climate denialism There are powerful lobbies all over the place. For example, did you know that natural gas companies are one of the biggest lobby groups for solar and wind deployments? Why is that?
  - Scarblac 7y ago
    Even though all that is true, in reality our output of CO2 is still increasing. The scientific problems that remain are so far away from our current effort that the question of whether it's the last 10% or last 50% is almost irrelevant.
  - keanzu 7y ago
    > Today, we don't have a way to fully move off of fossil fuels. If we are talking just electrical grid power then Sweden is 95% there on a mix of nuclear and hydro. Edit: I acknowledge that hydro only works if the geography gods have been extremely kind.
    - macspoofing 7y ago
      Yes! So is my home province (http://live.gridwatch.ca/home-page.html http://live.gridwatch.ca/home-page.html). No point in investing in solar and wind here (but we still do because it makes people feel good) Hydro and geothermal is great if you have the right geography. Nuclear works everywhere. Places that achieved this level of carbon-free emissions always have a mix of some or all three technologies, like my province, Sweden, Costa Rica, France, and unlike Germany (which doubled down on solar and wind and Russian natural gas).
pfisch 7y ago
I don't know why we aren't going full bore on developing a sun shade that we have some control over so regardless of the cause we can just regulate the temperature of the planet. You can say it is risky to engage in terraforming projects like that but we have already been engaging in terraforming for hundreds of years now with no plan at all. Also humans are pretty good at uniting around one singular huge project, but pretty bad at the millions of small projects that are required to fix this problem the correct way.
- keanzu 7y ago
  Even at projected SpaceX lift prices of $1000/lb access to space is still prohibitively expensive. The Earth is big and a big mirror would be needed: millions of tonnes size range. Not only that but it would have to be delivered to the L1 Lagrange point, SpaceX prices are for lift to LEO only. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Space_sunshade https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Space_sunshade Conceptually it would work fine, economics are a problem.
tremon 7y ago
We did global trade before we had combustion engines, you know. So that is not impossible, just takes longer. And I remember reading about using cellulose-based packaging (corn husks I believe) to replace plastic some fifteen years ago. Agreed on nuclear though, I think it's essential to have. And yes, I agree that we're well past the "avert" scenario, we need to start planning mitigations.
- macspoofing 7y ago
  >We did global trade before we had combustion engines, you know Indeed. Going back to pre-industrial way of doing global trade is certainly a kind of a solution. Not sure how reasonable that is.

nxpnsv 7y ago

They are doing exactly what is expected of climate scientists. They are not policy makers, they gather and process data to build predictive models. Now they are scared of what they predict. Why require that they also come up with solutions, before sounding alarms?

macspoofing 7y ago
But that was my point. Right now I think we have a good handle on the severity of the problem. The policy is much harder and 'listening to the scientists' doesn't help.
- nxpnsv 7y ago
  I have the feeling that some policy maker are not aware of the severity. But let's say they are. Now they make a new policy. How do we gauge what the impact of this policy? This falls within the realm of said scientist. How to suggest new policies etc, that requires another skill set. We also should listen to those guys.

Certhas 7y ago

This is utter nonsense. There are things that are hard to replace, but all of what you talk about is being studied by scientists extensively. Obviously not climate scientists, becasue, duh, they are experts on cimate, not on long haul shipping. But renewables are scientifically a solved problem (all the predictions on the long term technological development of renewables also turned out to be far far to conservative). For the last 10% or so you need synthetic gas for long term storage of energy, but actually with the electrification of the heating sector, it turns out that nuclear would need synthetic gas for long term storage, too, for economic reasons. Further, it is is clear that a lot of R&D is still required, but again, environmental economists have discussed in detail that the best way to incentivize the R&D spending required would have been a solid carbon tax. The problem is not the lack of solutions, the problem is the lack of political will to implement them. It's disruptive, powerful lobbies have been funding climate denialism for decades, and people are unwilling to suffer even a minimal drop in living standards in order to stop climate change. The technical hurdles are all doable, but whether we as a species can collectively act on the knowledge that we collectively have is an open question. It's the hardest question, and it's infused with ideological battles on all sides. The US can't even operate an efficient public health system. It accepts enormous inefficiencies and human suffering for ideological reasons. And that's for its own citizens. Climate change will affect the poorest countries most.

macspoofing 7y ago
>But renewables are scientifically a solved problem I don't think so. Whenever there is huge investment in solar and wind, you see a comparable investment in natural gas to bridge the intermittency issues (e.g. Germany). That isn't a solved problem. That solar and wind require huge amounts of rare earth minerals, have huge land-use requirements, and are largely unrecyclable, is not a solved problem. >For the last 10% You sure that shouldn't be the 'last 50%'? >so you need synthetic gas for long term storage of ener These discussions always seem to go this way. When presented with major challenges to large scale deployments of solar and wind, an unproven, unavailable or unworkable workaround is propsed. No, synthetic gas is not a solution, just like pumped/gravity or Li-ion storage isn't either. >The technical hurdles are all doable To be clear, this is an expression of hope for the future (after more R&D), and not reality today, correct? Today, we don't have a way to fully move off of fossil fuels. >It's disruptive, powerful lobbies have been funding climate denialism There are powerful lobbies all over the place. For example, did you know that natural gas companies are one of the biggest lobby groups for solar and wind deployments? Why is that?
- Scarblac 7y ago
  Even though all that is true, in reality our output of CO2 is still increasing. The scientific problems that remain are so far away from our current effort that the question of whether it's the last 10% or last 50% is almost irrelevant.
- keanzu 7y ago
  > Today, we don't have a way to fully move off of fossil fuels. If we are talking just electrical grid power then Sweden is 95% there on a mix of nuclear and hydro. Edit: I acknowledge that hydro only works if the geography gods have been extremely kind.
  - macspoofing 7y ago
    Yes! So is my home province (http://live.gridwatch.ca/home-page.html http://live.gridwatch.ca/home-page.html). No point in investing in solar and wind here (but we still do because it makes people feel good) Hydro and geothermal is great if you have the right geography. Nuclear works everywhere. Places that achieved this level of carbon-free emissions always have a mix of some or all three technologies, like my province, Sweden, Costa Rica, France, and unlike Germany (which doubled down on solar and wind and Russian natural gas).

pfisch 7y ago

I don't know why we aren't going full bore on developing a sun shade that we have some control over so regardless of the cause we can just regulate the temperature of the planet. You can say it is risky to engage in terraforming projects like that but we have already been engaging in terraforming for hundreds of years now with no plan at all. Also humans are pretty good at uniting around one singular huge project, but pretty bad at the millions of small projects that are required to fix this problem the correct way.

keanzu 7y ago
Even at projected SpaceX lift prices of $1000/lb access to space is still prohibitively expensive. The Earth is big and a big mirror would be needed: millions of tonnes size range. Not only that but it would have to be delivered to the L1 Lagrange point, SpaceX prices are for lift to LEO only. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Space_sunshade https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Space_sunshade Conceptually it would work fine, economics are a problem.

tremon 7y ago

We did global trade before we had combustion engines, you know. So that is not impossible, just takes longer. And I remember reading about using cellulose-based packaging (corn husks I believe) to replace plastic some fifteen years ago. Agreed on nuclear though, I think it's essential to have. And yes, I agree that we're well past the "avert" scenario, we need to start planning mitigations.

macspoofing 7y ago
>We did global trade before we had combustion engines, you know Indeed. Going back to pre-industrial way of doing global trade is certainly a kind of a solution. Not sure how reasonable that is.