If Greens cared about CO2 they would dump renewable targets
http://joannenova.com.au/2017/02/if-greens-cared-about-co2-they-would-dump-renewable-targets/
Those who say they want a “free market” in carbon still don’t understand what a free market is. RET’s or Renewable Energy Targets are screwed (in the head): If Tony Abbotts Direct Action plan was useless, RETS are five times more useless. In Australia the Renewable Energy Target (RET) in theory, helps wind and solar, so we lower CO2 emissions and cool the world, slow storms, things like that. But Tom Quirk calculates it costs $57 a ton (at best) for those “savings”. Since the Direct Action plan cost $11 a ton, we could reduce five times as much CO2 if we blew up the RET scheme. The secret is that the Abbott plan tackled CO2 directly rather than picking winners (see “competition”, “free markets” that sort of thing). Predictably, the Greens hated it — who needs CO2 reduction if you can support big-government-loving industries instead? (Especially the kind who lobby for the side of politics that wants more bureaucrats, more handouts, and less independent competition?) Those who say they want a “free market” in carbon still don’t understand what a free market is. It’s pretty simple, if they want a reduction in CO2, they need to pay for a […]Rating: 0.0/10 (0 votes cast)
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Another Climate Alarm Gets Silenced: Study Shows “Tiny Algae, Hugely Resilient”!
http://notrickszone.com/2017/02/21/another-climate-alarm-gets-silenced-study-shows-tiny-algae-hugely-resilient/
What follows is a press release from the Alfred Wegener Institute in Bremerhaven, Germany. It turns out that microalgae — “an important source of food in the oceans” — are far more resilient to changes in ocean pH than alarmists would like to have us believe. Hat-tip: Die kalte Sonne. =================================== Tiny algae, hugely resilient Microalgae are microscopically small, single-celled algae species and an important source of food in the oceans. Dr Clara Hoppe of the Alfred Wegener Institute examines how changed living conditions as a result of climate change affect Arctic microalgae. Clara Hoppe has been observing how Arctic microalgae react to climate change since years. (Photo: Paolo VeAWI biologist) Dr Clara Hoppe has always had a plan B in place for her Arctic expeditions. “Three years ago, when I started to work in the Arctic, everyone told me to think carefully about what I should do in case the Kongsfjorden area in Svalbard freezes over and I can’t leave with a small ship,” says Clara Hoppe. Many times she ran through the scenario of thick ice blocking the way into the fjord. But plan B never materialised. “So far, I have never experienced ice on the fjord. The water temperature was always above zero degrees Celsius,” the 32-year-old tells us. The factors that make Clara Hoppe’s job easier in practice, are also the subject of her research: She tries to understand how environmental conditions that are changing as a result of climate change, affect the microalgae of the Arctic Ocean. This includes the rise of the water temperature as well as the acidification of the oceans and changed light conditions in the water due to the decrease in sea ice. Unlike macroalgae, microalgae are not visible to the naked eye, they are microscopically small, single-celled algae species. They are so tiny that one millilitre of water can contain thousands of them. Because microalgae are an important source of food, such as for crustaceans like krill, a change in their growth, for example, could have far-reaching implications for the Arctic food web. A special feature about Clara Hoppe’s research: While traditional research on ocean acidification is often carried out in the laboratory, she and her team regularly take several hundred litres of water samples in the Arctic, which allows them to study a diverse community of several dozen …
By Thomas Richard
A new USGS report challenges the consensus belief that a warming climate would lead to an explosive release of methane into the atmosphere from the breakdown of frozen methane hydrates. Climate alarmists like Al Gore have called this the ‘methane bomb,’ where frozen hydrates stored beneath the permafrost and seabed floors warms up, allowing the trapped gas to escape.
The University of Rochester and U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) reviewed nearly a decade of preceding research done by USGS researchers and other scientific organizations studying these gas hydrates. The report said that if continued warming continues unabated, any methane released from hydrates would be negligible and large amounts highly unlikely. The report’s “sober, data-driven analyses” couldn’t find any evidence of a large-scale release of the odorless hydrocarbon.
The methane bomb
Methane hydrate, aka methane clathrate, is a naturally occurring compound in which the gas gets trapped inside a lattice-like structure of water similar to ice. It also remains stable at specific temperature and pressure ranges. Researchers have found significant deposits in undersea sediments greater than 1,000 feet and also beneath the permafrost at higher elevations.
Climate alarmists have long argued that if the permafrost thaws, vast amounts of the gas trapped in hydrates would get released. They have maintained that if the Arctic continued to warm, vast reserves of methyl hydrates would decompose and release the greenhouse gas into the air. But this comprehensive review of the current literature reveals the breakdown of methyl hydrates from #Climate Changeshows little evidence more would enter the atmosphere.
Fuel or folly?
Despite methyl hydrates being found globally and mostly along continental shelves, they are different from conventional natural gas and not used for energy…
A hydraulic fracturing (fracking) rig is seen in Weld County, Colorado. Thanks to fracking and the natural gas it provides, U.S. output of carbon dioxide emissions is crashing. (Bloomberg)
Climate Change: U.S. output of so-called greenhouse gases continues to decline, a new report shows. Even so, global warming activists are likely to be disappointed. The drop has nothing to do with their pet cause, alternative energy.
That’s right. The Environmental Protection Agency’s yearly greenhouse gas emissions report noted that after rising slightly in 2013 and 2014, greenhouse gas output fell in 2015 — the most recent full year for which data are available.
OK, but maybe it was a one-year fluke? Hardly.
First off, the drop was significant in size — 2.2% on an annual basis, far too big to be a fluke or statistical anomaly.
Second, as the folks at The American Interest helpfully point out, “U.S. energy-related CO2 emissions hit a 25-year low over the first six months of 2016, continuing the progress that the EPA says we made in 2015.”
So it’s continuing. More important, The Hill reminds, “The EPA attributed the overall decline to lower carbon dioxide emissions from burning fossil fuels, which itself came about because of less coal consumption in favor of natural gas, warmer winter weather that decreased heating fuel demand and lower electricity demand overall.”
This continues a long-term trend for the U.S. of lower greenhouse gas emissions. Ironically, while the U.S. was pilloried for not ratifying the Kyoto Accord (though then-Vice President Al Gore ostentatiously signed it, despite knowing that the Senate wouldn’t ratify it) to reduce global greenhouse gas emissions, it is the only major industrial nation actually slashing its output.
Since the Kyoto Accord was struck in 1997, Energy Department data show, U.S. output of greenhouse gases plunged 7.3%, even though real U.S. GDP over that time has grown a whopping 52%. We’re greener today than we have been in decades.
Go figure.
For all this progress, we can thank the fracking business, which has given U.S. industry and homes access to massive amounts of cheap, relatively clean natural gas. It may yet make possible a U.S. industrial renaissance — and bring back jobs now done overseas, not by government trade protectionism but by pursuing free-market energy policies that will lead to
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Greenhouse gas emissions in the United States declined by 2.2 percent between 2014 and 2015, federal officials reported on Tuesday.
In its annual draft greenhouse gas report, the EPA said total emissions of climate change-causing gases decreased in 2015 after back-to-back years of small growth. The report uses the most up-to-date data about greenhouse gas emissions.
The EPA attributed the overall decline to lower carbon dioxide emissions from burning fossil fuels, which itself came about because of less coal consumption in favor of natural gas, warmer winter weather that decreased heating fuel demand and lower electricity demand overall.
Carbon dioxide emissions, which make up 82.2 percent of overall U.S. greenhouse gases, decreased by 2.9 percent in 2015, the agency said.
Because fossil fuel consumption accounts for more than 93 percent of those emissions, carbon trends are driven primarily by changes in the energy market. Overall emissions decline when there is decreased demand for energy, as well as a reduction in the carbon intensity of fuels burned for energy.
Those factors have far-reaching implications, given potential changes in American environmental regulations. President Trump, for example, has said he will prioritize policies that support fossil fuel growth, and his EPA is unlikely to pursue the type of power sector carbon regulations pushed by the Obama administration.
Overall, the U.S. produced 6,586.2 million metric tons of carbon dioxide equivalent in 2015, and annual emissions declined for the first time since 2012. Emissions increased 2.2 percent in 2013 and 0.9 percent in 2014.
The EPA’s draft study previews a final version of its annual emissions report, which is due to the United Nations in April.…
President Donald Trump’s plan for a southern border wall will cost billions of dollars and has already sparked a diplomatic rift with Mexico. It’s also going to be bad for the planet.
Concrete is a potent source of greenhouses gas, and Trump’s “great wall” will need a lot of it — more than double the amount in Hoover Dam, according to engineers at New York University and University College London.
A 1,000-mile (1,600-kilometer) wall would require an estimated 275 million cubic feet of concrete. It would release as much as 1.9 million metric tons of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere, according to Christoph Meinrenken, an associate research scientist at Columbia University’s Earth Institute. That’s more than the annual emissions from every home in Pittsburgh.
“The carbon footprint of a wall that size would be huge,” Dan Millis, borderlands program coordinator for the Sierra Club’s Arizona chapter, said in an interview.
Trump’s executive order to build the wall comes as nations around the globe push to reduce greenhouse gases and meet goals set under the Paris Climate accord. Last year was the hottest on the record, with temperatures inching ever loser to the level scientists say would be catastrophic, according to the United Nations.
‘Not Building Walls’
The U.S. needs to invest in infrastructure and many worthwhile projects will require concrete, said Rachel Cleetus, lead economist and climate policy manager at the Union of Concerned Scientists. But those projects should be in line with the broader goal of fighting global warming.
“Let’s talk about modernizing electric grids — not building walls,’’ Cleetus said in an interview.…
If anything proves that the global warming/climate change nonsense has gone too far, this is it. During his first stint as governor of California in the late 1970s Jerry Brown was known by the nickname of “Governor Moonbeam.” Perhaps this go round he should be called “Governor Methane,” as his obsession with the climate change hypothesis is now leading California to regulate cow “emissions.”
In September Brown became the first governor ever to sign a bill that regulates supposed greenhouse gases from livestock operations and landfills. But no one asked the bovine methane moo-ers whether or not they agree. Cattle and other farm animals are major a major source of methane, a greenhouse gas many times more potent than carbon dioxide as a heat-trapping gas as well as being more potent as an aroma. The methane is released when they belch, fart, and release the raw material for cow chips.…
GLOBAL GREENING CAUSED PAUSE IN GROWTH RATE OF ATMOSPHERIC CO2, SCIENTISTS CLAIM
The rate of growth in atmospheric carbon dioxide has slowed, despite an increase in CO2 emissions from human activity, due to an increased uptake of the greenhouse gas by the planet’s plants, a new study has suggested.
Changes in the rates of photosynthesis and respiration in the Earth’s ecosystems have created a larger-than-expected terrestrial carbon sink, an international team of scientists has reported today in Nature Communications.
Co-author and CSIRO research scientist Dr Pep Canadell said increases in atmospheric carbon dioxide levels between 2002 and 2014 had led to enhanced photosynthesis in plants, the process by which plants take up carbon dioxide.
During the same period, a slowdown in the rise of global temperatures over land — known as the hiatus period — led to a slowdown in respiration, the process by which plants ‘breathe’ out carbon dioxide.
These two factors combined meant the world’s vegetation absorbed more carbon dioxide and slowed the growth rate in the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere by about 2.2 per cent a year between 2002 and 2014.
“The take-home message is that we have this incredible climate change discount — like half of the CO2 [humans emit] gets taken in by the natural carbon sinks,” Dr Canadell, executive director of the Global Carbon Project, said.
“So we want to do whatever we can to maintain the sink and enhance it if we can through programs such as reforestation and even before that avoiding deforestation in the first place.”
Oceans and land-based vegetation removed about 45 per cent of the CO2 emitted by humans each year, the researchers noted.
While absolute atmospheric CO2 levels had been increasing since the Industrial Revolution, there was significant year-to-year variability in the rate at which this increase occurred, largely driven by annual differences in plant growth.
Dr Canadell said satellite observations also showed the globe was “greening”, with areas previously too cold or dry now sustaining more plant life and areas with vegetation “greener than they were before”.
However, this increase in vegetation played a minor role in the increased uptake of carbon dioxide.
Slowdown may be temporary
Dr Canadell warned the slowdown in the growth rate of atmospheric CO2 could be temporary because the hiatus period, which was essential for decreased respiration, has now ended.
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Hi http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-3917244/Is-greenhouse-effect-slowing-CO2-atmosphere-plateaued-12-years.html
- Plants have helped soak up greenhouse gases from human activity
- The extra CO2 pumped into the atmosphere has been used by plants
- By acting as a ‘carbon sink’ plant life has dramatically reduced the impact
- But scientists warn that forests and vegetation should not be viewed as the solution to global warming and rising CO2 levels
By PRESS ASSOCIATION
PUBLISHED: 11:00 EST, 8 November 2016 | UPDATED: 14:42 EST, 8 November 2016
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Carbon-hungry plants may have ‘paused’ the growing build-up of greenhouse gas in the atmosphere, scientists claim.
A new study suggests that while human activity continues to pour out increasing amounts of carbon dioxide (CO2), raising the risk of catastrophic global warming, mother nature has come to the planet’s rescue.
Rising CO2 is said to have stimulated the growth of more photosynthesising plants, which in turn have captured more of the greenhouse gas from the atmosphere and kept its levels in check.
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Changes in the growth rate of atmospheric CO2. The black line is the growth rate and the beige line is the modelled rate. The red line indicates a significant increase in the growth rate from 1959 to 2002, and the blue line indicates no increasing trend between 2002 and 2014
Between 2002 and 2014, rising levels of atmospheric CO2 have held steady at about 1.9 parts per million (ppm) per year.
Even though the gas was still accumulating, there was no acceleration in the build-up.
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Photosynthesising plants absorb carbon, which they use to produce sugar and starch using energy from sunlight.
The more carbon there is in the atmosphere, the more plant growth is stimulated.
For this reason, large forested areas of the Earth, such as the Amazon basin, are important ‘carbon sinks’.
Between 2002 and 2014, rising levels of atmospheric CO2 have held steady at about 1.9 parts per million (ppm) per year. Atmosphereic carbon dioxide has increased dramatically compared with pre-industrialisation levels
CARBON SINKS AND HUNGRY PLANTS
As plants photosynthesise they absorb carbon, which they use to …
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