They "lost" the heat. (Rant)

Ok I derailed my own thread on purpose for this reason:

The cause for the TEMP increase could have been the Ozone layer depletion.

It would also explain why Temps have gone down the last 10 years. (Ozone layer has recovered somewhat).

 

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So the oceans, volcanic eruptions, our atmopshere etc have no effect? We'd have the same weather if we had no oceans?

The climate is a complex system. Whenever anyone says "the only things that determine our weather are X and Y" they are pretty much guaranteed to be wrong.

Nor do you have any evidence that it is due to water vapor.

However, measurements reveal that, on average, CO2 is rising, as are temperatures. Water vapor, on average, is not. Therefore water vapor cannot be causing the difference.

On the other hand, CO2 is rising, and temperatures are rising at a rate corresponding to the warming. Therefore CO2 CAN be causing the difference.

 

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Ozone is a greenhouse gas. If you deplete it temperatures will go down.

 

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Source?

The rates for US non-smokers haven't changed since the 30s, but we have cleaned up our air, so it would appear more likely that there are other primary causes besides the particulate quality of our air.

http://www.plosmedicine.org/article/info:doi/10.1371/journal.pmed.0050185

 

No only in the higher atmosphere, on the surface they go up...particularly if there is more greenhouse gases(including water vapor affecting it more even if there is no increase in water vapor).

 

Well.....

The Ozone Layer as nietzschefan was discussing is composed of Stratospheric Ozone and that is not considered a greenhouse gas.

http://www.ucsusa.org/global_warming/science_and_impacts/science/ozone-hole-and-gw-faq.html

The Ozone that IS a considered a GHG is the Ozone found in the upper Troposphere.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ozone#Ozone_as_a_greenhouse_gas

 

OK. Nevertheless, it absorbs UV radiation and converts it to heat. Reducing it could reasonably be expected to reduce heat absorption.

 

Power plant pollution:
http://www.catf.us/coal/problems/power_plants/existing/

===================
Dangerous power plants? Study fuels debate
Thousands of early deaths tied to emissions


6/9/2004 5:56:35 PM ET

WASHINGTON — Health problems linked to aging coal-fired power plants shorten nearly 24,000 lives a year, including 2,800 from lung cancer, and nearly all those early deaths could be prevented if the U.S. government adopted stricter rules, according to a study released Wednesday.

Commissioned by environmental groups and undertaken by a consultant often used by the Environmental Protection Agency, the study concluded that 22,000 of those deaths are preventable with currently available technology.
=======================================

Or that we have cleaned up auto emissions drastically, but have gotten worse on coal power emissions. Not because of technology, which is improving, but due to the sheer volume of coal being burned; we burned 400 million tons a year in 1960, and we're up to almost 1200 million tons a year.

 

Old Coal plants certainly need to die. Who could argue against that...? Let's get rid of them...then next problem. See what I mean? Start solving shit instead of worrying about the huge unsolvable macro problem(the cause of which is , like it or not very much in argument).

All we can do is our best to reduce our emissions. Start with the worst. Start with the ones that directly affect our health. the solutions to these will spin off to combat a host of environmental problems. I.E the solutions are renewable energy and efficient generation. It will get bigger and bigger. Start small, be successful and grow. Tackling a problem like global warming with a broad "carbon tax" is a fucking anathema to me.

 

No, reducing Stratospheric Ozone would allow more UV to get to the surface, warming it and it's too high to radiate any absorbed heat back to the surface.

 

?? I don't get your position. Closing coal fired power plants would help with both CO2 emissions and pollution overall, and that's a great approach. It even solves your "unsolvable macro problem".

Again, I agree.

OK. Nevertheless it will help accomplish your objective of reducing coal power plant pollution. Use all the tools we have to start solving shit and reducing emissions. Start small, be successful and grow.

 

Except the report that was based on does NOT include any data about Lung Cancer or anything about rates from Non-Smokers.

This is what they tracked:

Chronic Bronchitis Abbey et al. (1995c) 27-99
Acute Myocardial Infarction, Nonfatal Peters et al. (2001) 18-99
HA, All Cardiovascular (less Myocardial Infarctions) Moolgavkar (2000b) 18-64
HA, All Cardiovascular (less Myocardial Infarctions) Moolgavkar (2003) 65-99
HA, Congestive Heart Failure Ito (2003) 65-99
HA, Dysrhythmia Ito (2003) 65-99
HA, Ischemic Heart Disease (less Myocardial Infarctions) Ito (2003) 65-99
HA, Pneumonia Ito (2003) 65-99
HA, Chronic Lung Disease (less Asthma) Moolgavkar (2000a) 18-64
HA, Chronic Lung Disease Ito (2003) 65-99
HA, Chronic Lung Disease Moolgavkar (2003) 65-99
HA, Asthma Sheppard (2003) 0-64
Emergency Room Visits, Asthma Norris et al. (1999) 0-17
Minor Restricted Activity Days Ostro and Rothschild (1989) 18-64
Acute Bronchitis Dockery et al. (1996) 8-12
Work Loss Days Ostro (1987) 18-64
Lower Respiratory Symptoms Schwartz and Neas (2000) 7-14
Asthma Exacerbation, Cough Ostro et al. (2001) 6-18
Asthma Exacerbation, Shortness of Breath Ostro et al. (2001) 6-18
Asthma Exacerbation, Wheeze Ostro et al. (2001) 6-18
Upper Respiratory Symptoms Pope et al. (1991) 9-11
Asthma Exacerbation, Cough Vedal et al. (1998) 6-18

http://www.catf.us/resources/public...Powerplant_Impact_Estimator_Software_Tool.pdf

 

Not effectively.

If your goal is to reduce coal power plant pollution, then legislate maximum pollution levels.

Indeed the link you provided earlier indicates that in just 6 years, from 2004 to 2010, the number of deaths attributable to pollution from coal was cut almost in half by reducing particulate emissions even as the amount of coal being burned went up.

But a carbon tax doesn't mean a coal power plant has to be clean, and since running an existing coal plant is so much cheaper than building a new alternative, a carbon tax (which is very non-specific) would have to be very high to have the desired impact on reducing particulate emissions from coal, and would have lots of undesireable impacts on cost of food and basic materials as a carbon tax is HIGHLY regressive.

Sure you can hit a bullseye with a blunderbust, but is that the way to write legislation?

 

Thank you. What I was trying to say.

 

We've done that; unfortunately the new source review loophole allows a great many to operate far outside pollution limits.

And note that even strict enforced limits do not solve the problem; they just move the problem. Even excellent stack scrubbers don't eliminate heavy metals, particulates etc from the waste stream, they just move them from the air to the water or the land. Even now we have so much coal waste that occasionally it spills and destroys a town or a river, and it's one of the leading sources of water contamination in the US.

Now, if you wanted to require a coal fired power plant to reduce its pollution (of all forms, not just air) to those of a natural gas power plant, then great, do that. That will effectively close them, so same outcome.

OK. So don't do it via a tax. Simply require a coal power plant to emit no more CO2 than a natural gas plant.

 

From http://american_almanac.tripod.com/cfc.htm

 

Ya I love how they think they can figure that one(1973) in light of his Timely 1959 empirical evidence. EDIT- oh nice site..total woowoo

 

No, that just slows down adoption, but as the figures show, the plants are in fact much cleaner then they were just a decade ago.

So?
Once on the land they can be more easily dealt with.

You want to deal with regs for handling of coal waste then that can also be done.

That would be horribly regressive.
Gas costs 5 to 6 times as much as coal and if you drove up the gas use you would drive the cost even further.

You are for really making the price of electricity high aren't you?

The impact on the economy would be devestating.
The regressive nature would throw millions more into poverty and totally do in the US ability to compete in the global market.

 

Yes, they are. And yet a great many still do not comply with EPA regulations.

===================
Kingston Fossil Plant coal fly ash slurry spill

The TVA Kingston Fossil Plant coal fly ash slurry spill occurred just before 1 a.m. on Monday December 22, 2008, when an ash dike ruptured at an 84-acre (0.34 km2) solid waste containment area at the Tennessee Valley Authority's Kingston Fossil Plant in Roane County, Tennessee, USA. 1.1 billion US gallons (4,200,000 m3) of coal fly ash slurry was released. The coal-fired power plant, located across the Clinch River from the city of Kingston, uses ponds to dewater the fly ash, a byproduct of coal combustion, which is then stored in wet form in dredge cells. The slurry (a mixture of fly ash and water) traveled across the Emory River and its Swan Pond embayment, on to the opposite shore, covering up to 300 acres (1.2 km2) of the surrounding land, damaging homes and flowing up and down stream in nearby waterways such as the Emory River and Clinch River (tributaries of the Tennessee River). It was the largest fly ash release in United States history.

The spill killed a "tremendous" number of fish, according to the Chattanooga Times Free Press. . . . On January 1, 2009 the first independent test results, conducted at the Environmental Toxicology and Chemistry laboratories at Appalachian State University, showed significantly elevated levels of toxic metals (including arsenic, copper, barium, cadmium, chromium, lead, mercury, nickel, and thallium) in samples of slurry and river water.
=============================

Right - but you suggested we just "legislate maximum pollution levels." Set one standard for power plants; require them all to meet it. Coal _could_ meet those standards using sequestration, coal mine ash return etc. It would simply be expensive, and companies would voluntarily choose cheaper technologies.

There ain't no such thing as a free lunch. Every mitigation has a price. (And the higher the cost of power, the more attractive alternatives are.)

External costs are already devastating; what price would you put on the deaths of 20,000 americans a year? Again, there's no free lunch.

 

Fine.

Not necessarily. You'd have to prove that "all things are equal" over the last 150 years except for CO2 levels in order to have a legitimate argument. I could claim that it's the disappearance of pirates causing our problems. Also, as I'm sure you know, billvon, the extent of #2 has been recently called into question. If I were feeling snarky I may request that Al Gore show some leadership and personally stop emitting CO2 as a sign of his commitment to this crisis.

Christ I can't believe I got sucked into posting about AGW on an Internet forum...again. AGW is to scientists what abortion is doctors...a subject so rife with politics, emotion, and personal agendas that no true, mature discussion can even be had.