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> All the discussion is about reducing CO2 emissions. But we have nothing to show for it. Even the during the Covid lockdowns, CO2 emissions were reduced by onl
by lr1970 3y ago
> All the discussion is about reducing CO2 emissions. But we have nothing to show for it. Even the during the Covid lockdowns, CO2 emissions were reduced by only 10%
I am not sure that many here know the fact that man-made CO2 emissions are only about 10% of the natural CO2 emissions [0]
> That total dwarfs humanity’s contribution, amounting to ten times as much CO2 as humans produce through activities such as burning fossil fuels.
The problem with man-made CO2 emissions that even though they are small relative to natural CO2 emissions, they change careful CO2 balance in atmosphere and over decades tips the CO2 balance.
Unfortunately, only relying on reducing man-made CO2 makes for a lousy control variable precisely because man-made CO2 is only 10% of total CO2 emissions (kind of a second-order effect). Any effect of reducing it will only show up decades later and we do not know what the new CO2 equilibrium point will be. We need to think out of the box and develop alternative and active climate engineering methods. It will not be easy but we should study, discuss and debate all alternative without exceptions.
[0] https://climate.mit.edu/ask-mit/how-much-carbon-dioxide-does-earth-naturally-absorb https://climate.mit.edu/ask-mit/how-much-carbon-dioxide-does...
EDIT: grammar & some wordings.
- soco 3y agoAll fine but if say 2% is the tipping quantity (I'm pulling numbers out of my arse here) and it happens so that those 10% are the only percents we as humans can influence, shouldn't we push to reduce those 10% and keep an enjoyable planet for our grandchildren? Only a couple hundred years ago the equilibrium was without any human 10& so we have pretty clear numbers here. Decades later is nothing on the scale of the humankind and we claim all the time we are pushing our species forward (remember the saying "one small step for the man..."?) while currently doing things the majority agrees are harming ourselves. It's only that this majority won't agree to even try to do anything about it.
- lr1970 3y ago> All fine but if say 2% is the tipping quantity (I'm pulling numbers out of my arse here) and it happens so that those 10% are the only percents we as humans can influence, shouldn't we push to reduce those 10% and keep an enjoyable planet for our grandchildren? Of course, we should do it and reduce our carbon emissions as much as we can. But in addition to it we should be researching additional ways to control the climate -- reflectivity of the oceans, stratospheric reflecting particulates, methane control, etc. Putting all the eggs in the CO2 control basket might not solve climate for this or next generations.
- soco 3y agoI mentioned that because reducing CO2 is the only known and proven way to solve climate as for now. Research? Sure. But let's not claim we don't know what to do and use that as a reason to wait until the hypothetical research results are in to do anything.