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Nice to see this topic survive the flagging process on HN.. Would be great to have a discussion of some other promising non-carbon energy sources, such as dri
by jgord 2y ago
Nice to see this topic survive the flagging process on HN..
Would be great to have a discussion of some other promising non-carbon energy sources, such as drilled geothermal.
Slightly off-topic - gen pop are often surprised when I mention that NET-ZERO == MAX-CO2 == MAX-HEAT. People often assume that getting to net-zero is 'mission accomplished' .. but its the area under the curve that counts, the total CO2/GHG equiv put up there, as it stays around for a long time.
If we are nearing +1.5C today, with temp rising at around 0.25C to 0.3C per decade, at current long plateau of max emissions.. we will likely be somewhere in range +2.5C to +3.0C by the time we reach net-zero, possibly by 2050.
I'm not sure that +2.5C is survivable for large human populations .. hence the above concerns prompt one to look at things like SRM - putting up sulphur particulates to increase cloud cover, so less sunlight is absorbed by the oceans, exerting a net cooling effect [ as we did with container shipping fuels until recently - until the fuel was mandated to contain less Sulphur ]
IMHO, we engineered our way into this mess by geo-engineering a CO2-rich hot biosphere, and we will need to engineer our way out of it - it could be worse, we seem to have a lot of technologies that can replace carbon-fuel and store energy and arguably reduce heat.
- consumer451 2y agoI agree that we may require sulfur injection, but it needs to be strictly tied to two things: 1) Compulsory reduction in CO2, methane, etc. SRM is just kicking the can down the road. It cannot be band aid for more pollution. 2) The system needs guaranteed constant funding, as again, it's kicking the can down the road. If you suddenly stop SRM after 20 years, you get 20 years of climate change increase all at the same time. Also, it needs the greatest diplomatic push in human history to get nearly every country on-board with the plan. All countries will be affected by this. Without buy-in, it could lead to conflict. For example, Russia is looking forward to higher temps and a longer crop growing season.
- robertlagrant 2y agoWhy would it be stopped by a flagging process?
- jgord 2y agoI dont know why or how often articles on HN get flagged and then hidden/removed. I do know that I personally was typing a comment on a climate change related thread and after posting, noticed the post had been flagged and removed. Also.. another HN user commented that "political" articles on climate change are flagged, which they saw as a good thing. .. I think by law of averages there should be more articles on climate change science / tech on HN. I think the community is mature enough to disagree and discuss... and down-voting is a better way to remove low quality posts than flagging. I would like to see stats on flagging.. and maybe a word cloud or sentiment analysis on what posts are flagged .. a public registry of flagged articles and reason for flagging would be ideal.