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You can write a 1000 year plan with GMO. Try that with mined fertilisers.
by paulkrush 4y ago
You can write a 1000 year plan with GMO. Try that with mined fertilisers.
- aaron695 4y agoThe only people who think you can accurately plan more than 50 years ahead are environmentalists and economists in the heads of environmentalists. But if we got everyone to first world conditions we still could be using mined fertilisers in 1000 years, along with using fossil fuels to run the planet in a fine utopia. Of course I and a lot of others want to be visiting space in decades. Along with the population will start to explode again in decades. And lots of other things like traveling to the nearest star within 1000 years would take a lot of fossil fuel using current tech. 1000 years is a pointless thing to think about.
- vosper 4y agoI disagree that it's not worth thinking about the next 1,000 years, but I think you're right that right now we can't realistically plan more than 50 years ahead. (I vouched for your comment)
- xattt 4y ago1,000-year planning falls apart when future humans don’t want to follow what some old stogies wanted them to do.
- dv_dt 4y agoI think you could make a plan with renewable energy produced fertilizers.
- nielsbot 4y agoThere are more problems with fertilizer than CO2 emissions.
- photochemsyn 4y agoSlow-release fertilizers solve a lot of those problems, and you can indeed make NH3 without fossil fuels, using solar / wind power to split water to generate the necessary hydrogen for the Haber-Bosch process. Mining the potash might be the more serious long-term issue though.
- Andys 4y agoare we able to do away with phosphorus?
- paulkrush 4y agoThat’s a really good point. The article was talking about nitrogen and I conflated this with phosphorus and potassium with my “mined fertilizers” comment.
- Andys 4y agoUnderstood, but I also wondered if someone had figured out how to genetically engineer away the need for this element in fertilizer.
- bell-cot 4y agoWell...since phosphorus atoms are essential parts of DNA, RNA, ATP, and a <cough> few other slightly-important molecules in most cells, that might be difficult. And the humans or livestock eating the crops also need those molecules in their cells...
- formerkrogemp 4y agoPotash or "pot ash" can be produced at home with firewood and, well, a pot. It doesn't scale well though. Not enough to meet demand.
- blingscramble 4y agoAbsolutely. There are plenty of naturally occurring beneficial microbes currently being applied/utilized in US Ag to accomplish this. P is different than fixed N as the P is currently in a plant unavailable form in the root zone ie soil. Microbes solubilize thru enzymatic processes this unavailable P into a plant available form. With decades of MAP/DAP application and/or manure there is an abundance of locked up P in the soil and beneficial microbes hold an immediately accessible set of keys!
- worik 4y ago> You can write a 1000 year plan with GMO. Try that with mined fertilisers. Been doing agriculture for >10,000 years without either
- JadeNB 4y ago> > You can write a 1000 year plan with GMO. Try that with mined fertilisers. > Been doing agriculture for >10,000 years without either. Not necessarily endorsing the GP's point of view, but most of that 10,000 years was spent with much smaller populations ingesting much fewer calories per capita.