The climate change consensus extends beyond climate scientists

[redpoint5]

In my 3rd attempt to discuss positive vs negative consequences of global warming, I present this graphic from the NYT which discusses the matter in relation to the US, color coding those areas predicted to benefit (green) to those predicted to suffer (red) in the year 2090.

... I should buy up property in Montana now, while it's cheap.



https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/...e-effects.html

[niky]

Originally Posted by redpoint5

So, we need to remove the particulate traps and catalytic converters from our diesels and let the coal roll

Blow up a few more Pinatubos. Krakatoas. Burn coal as dirtily as possible. Lob a few hundred megatons of nuclear ordnance up in the air and dance in the radioactive snow.

Originally Posted by redpoint5

Nice post niky. My other question is whether global warming, at least at its current form, might have more positive than negative consequences for humans. It's a topic almost not discussed at all.

1 site I mentioned above said we would observe net positive effects until 2080. Nobody commented on it.
https://www.spectator.co.uk/2013/10/carry-on-warming/

If we reap positive benefits until 2080, and then gradually begin to experience negative consequences, the rational thing to do would be to leverage science/technology to keep conditions somewhere around 2080 levels to maximize human well being. I expect we'll have much better technology in the next 60 years.

Remarkably rosy picture.

The thing is... has anyone compared the net positives to the net negatives?

That 200,000 starving due to ethanol production... is it ethanol production that is causing starvation? Or is it the fact that farmgate prices are so low in some places that farmers themselves would starve if they grew food crops instead of fuel crops (there's a lot to be read into Indian farmer suicides and studies on farmer starvation in previous decades... before biofuels came in). And, note, the science on biofuels has always been iffy... a lot of "mainstream" scientific opinion is divided on them. Politicians like them precisely because it helps enrich local farmers while reducing foreign oil dependence, giving them political capital. Greenwashing is just a bonus.

As for the cost of electricity related to deaths, that's a more difficult topic to tackle. And should be compared to the respiratory deaths (hundreds? thousands? hundreds of thousands?) caused by fossil fuel burning. Both numbers being imaginary and derived from statistical modelling.

Which reminds me of a passage in Larry Niven's "Rainbow Mars"... where, after decades of Svetz the Time Traveller stories, Niven bookends it with a story in which the Ministry of Space takes over the Ministry of Time Travel, and grimly reminds them that every time they travel through time, the massive amount of energy used kills off hundreds, if not thousands of people. A blackout here leading to an ICU unit failing, or food spoiling in stockage, or any of a number of things.

When we start counting the costs of everything, we should be counting the cost of *everything*. Every choice we make contributes in one way or another to the possible life or death of another human. Every purchased iPad or fruit slushie contributes either to the starvation of some African villager, the uplift of some Chinese factory worker, or the poisoning of his or her thrice removed cousin from poisoning due to pollution from a nearby mine.

We could, likely, feed, clothe, medicate and heat/cool everyone properly with very much less than we use now. Whether we use fossil fuel or "renewables." But we spend literally trillions of dollars on useless frivolities, instead. What percentage of energy or food scarcity deaths do we attribute to those numbers?

-

Also, it is very optimistic to claim there will be net benefits. There's a reason colder countries are more prosperous, on average:

Fat Knowledge: The Key to Increasing GDP? Move Away From the Equator

(that one is old, note the Chinese industrial revolution hasn't taken yet... delayed for decades, as it was, by the cultural revolution and the enormous set-back in terms of education and science it caused)

https://www.theguardian.com/environm...climate-change
(hell, I've never read this study or link before I looked it up, but it's a common observation out here... the richer and more prosperous Asian nations are typically colder ones like China, Japan and Korea. NoKor is a special situation... a political tangle of Chinese and Western interests creating a hermit kingdom.)

Then you get the black swan events... and droughts and famines in equatorial and near-equatorial countries... how many more economic refugees can the world absorb? How many more Syrias?

Could there be benefits? Yes, maybe. To the coldest countries. But there's a reason cold countries are typically richer than the rest of us. And it has everything to do with not being so hot you're sweating buckets while sitting inside an air-conditioned office trying desperately to be productive instead of dying of dehydration.

[redpoint5]

...and I thought it was because tropical coastal places are so pleasant that people were content to eat coconuts and bananas. It's the cold climates we have to struggle to survive. Then we need something to occupy our attention while the sun is hiding, and the environment forbidding.

[NeilBlanchard]

Originally Posted by oil pan 4

There is plenty of evidence out there man isn't the driving force behind climate change. The believers just chose to ignore it.
The biggest one is solar forcing.

Main reason being the only solar forcing related papers the belivers will even look at is from the mid 1990s and agrees with their narrative.

But that's going to all change in 2021. There is a satellite going up that will specifically study the interaction between the solar wind and the earths atmosphere, weather, jet stream, ect.
This will absolutely confirm the suns impact on weather at first and climate as the data piles up.

I will have a tombstone made.

"Man made climate change
197? - 2022"

Solar forcing is included in the models, and it is not causing climate change. Do you think that scientists are that dumb as to leave out the sun? Really?

We have a new satellite that is looking at the sun. We are learning a lot. But the data show that the sun's output is slightly less than it might be, given the long term trend of it increasing - as is expected for all stars of its type.

We are seeing warming DESPITE the lull in the sun's output.

[NeilBlanchard]

Originally Posted by redpoint5

I'm curious if there has been any research on what the ideal (for human life and activity) ppm for CO2 is, and if others have found similar results?

The ideal is probably what it was for the last 420 thousand years - between 170 and 280 ppm. This seems to be a very stable period, and it covers most of human existence.

[oil pan 4]

Dumb no, politically motivated yes.

Still doesn't address the issue that china is convinced they suffer historic drought in their most productive farm land during grand solar minimums and are going all in on weather control.

Man made climate change and dark matter are going to go down as the biggest shams in late 20 and early 21st century science.

[NeilBlanchard]

Originally Posted by redpoint5

In my 3rd attempt to discuss positive vs negative consequences of global warming, I present this graphic from the NYT which discusses the matter in relation to the US, color coding those areas predicted to benefit (green) to those predicted to suffer (red) in the year 2090.

... I should buy up property in Montana now, while it's cheap.



https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/...e-effects.html

What drives ocean currents?

What temperature is better for ocean fishing?

When will the ocean start releasing carbon dioxide - AND OXYGEN - because warmer water can hold less gas in solution?

How much methane and carbon dioxide will be released as the tundra melts?

Will the clathrates (methane ice) that are on the Arctic sea floor melt - and if so, when?

Crops grow in particular temperature zones and particular latitudes, and they are dependent on particular soil chemistries and they need certain pollinators - can we move our crop production and still maintain productivity?

How many more climate refugees will we see each year?

When will we have to abandon our coastal cities and towns?

When will insurance companies stop underwriting storm and fire damage?

How long can we keep pumping water out of aquifers faster than they are being refreshed?

How big will the ocean dead zones be next year - and the year after that, and the years after that?

How many reefs will die each year?

How many jellyfish does it take to clog cooling water intakes on a nuclear power plant?

When will hydrogen sulfide overtake tropical waters?

[NeilBlanchard]

Originally Posted by oil pan 4

Dumb no, politically motivated yes.

How did scientists back in the 19th century get in on the conspiracy?

[redpoint5]

Originally Posted by NeilBlanchard

What drives ocean currents?

What temperature is better for ocean fishing?

When will the ocean start releasing carbon dioxide - AND OXYGEN - because warmer water can hold less gas in solution?

How much methane and carbon dioxide will be released as the tundra melts?

Will the clathrates (methane ice) that are on the Arctic sea floor melt - and if so, when?

Crops grow in particular temperature zones and particular latitudes, and they are dependent on particular soil chemistries and they need certain pollinators - can we move our crop production and still maintain productivity?

How many more climate refugees will we see each year?

When will we have to abandon our coastal cities and towns?

When will insurance companies stop underwriting storm and fire damage?

How long can we keep pumping water out of aquifers faster than they are being refreshed?

How big will the ocean dead zones be next year - and the year after that, and the years after that?

How many reefs will die each year?

How many jellyfish does it take to clog cooling water intakes on a nuclear power plant?

When will hydrogen sulfide overtake tropical waters?

If that was your attempt at discussing the positive benefits of global warming, I'd be curious what you consider to be negative.

[oil pan 4]

Aside from trying to come up with a hypothesis that would make them famous, put their name on something, get them funded they had no reason at all.
But I wasn't talking about 19th century.