Global warming and financial positioning

[wabmester]

One of the problems here is the language that scientists are forced to use - because science is a moving target, they have to couch their findings in terms like "balance of probabilities" and "risk", which leaves the door open for opponents to scream "haha! they don't really know". The opponents usually have no problem being 100% confident in their own opinions of course.

It has nothing to do with science being a "moving target." They really don't know, can't know, and never will know. It has to do with complexity.

 

[arandomwalk07]

It has nothing to do with science being a "moving target." They really don't know, can't know, and never will know. It has to do with complexity.

Fair enough, but when my children and grandchildren are spending billions to shore up flood defences 30 years in the future, and when we have 100% proof that global warming was in fact manmade, I reserve the right to say "I told you so, we should have used the best models we had available at the time"

 

[ERD50]

Why do people keep repeating this? It will SAVE you money to use a cfb instead of incandescant bulb. It will save you money to conserve energy.

Many conservation efforts have a quick payback - no problem there. But, remember that chart I posted that showed a CO2 sequestering power plant will use 25% *more* fossil fuel? Plus the cost of the sequestering infrastructure. That is going to cost plenty. And, if natural cycles are also contributing, we need to spend money on the effects anyhow.

Knee-jerk reactions can cost us plenty too. Greenies are on a pro-ethanol kick, but does it really improve the environment? Doubtful, and it really can't be expanded before we run out of crops. Again, this 'feel good' stuff is detracting from real solutions. And the Greenies hate Nuclear, which just might be a significant part of a solution.

If you don't like the people that say it will cost the public tons of money, criticise THEM, not the underlying issue.

We need the numbers. They are probably right.

Following that logic, would you also hold that we can't prevent any forest fires, because they have happened before mankind has been around?

There is plenty of evidence that when man interferes with the normal cycle of natural forest fires, the problem gets worse. Brush builds up beyond normal levels and the fires that do start are worse then ever. There may be a lesson in that.

It seemed like a good idea at the time though. I'm sure there was a consensus on it.

CO2 is a greenhouse gas.
We are adding CO2 to the atmosphere.
The concentration of CO2 in the atmosphere is increasing.

These are really the basics. To claim mankind is not contributing to GW, one must falsify one of the above claims. Forget all the rest, it is really pretty simple.

But it is also true that we are in a natural warming cycle. We are going to have to spend money to adapt to that cycle, regardless of our contribution to GW.

See my post above - we need to understand what our *incremental* contribution is to GW, what the *incremental* cost of adapting to our contribution is, and what the cost savings would be from mitigating some of our contribution is.

Let's put it in simple terms. If my basement floods with 6 inches of water, I've got a mess on my hands, and a cost. If my basement floods with 12 inches of water, there is little additional damage. So, if I realistically could not stop the flood, how much would I spend to keep it down to 6 inches instead of 12? Not much, especially if I was told there was a chance that it may do nothing at all to help. It would be cheaper and less painful to adapt to a 12 inch flood than to mitigate 12 inches down to 6 inches.

From what I've gathered, this is the situation we are most likely faced with. So, unless you have a plan to reverse the *natural* global warming cycle, better start adapting.

-ERD50

 

[al_bundy]

Fair enough, but when my children and grandchildren are spending billions to shore up flood defences 30 years in the future, and when we have 100% proof that global warming was in fact manmade, I reserve the right to say "I told you so, we should have used the best models we had available at the time"

the world was a lot warmer back at the height of the roman empire than it was 100 years ago. only time i ever read of coastal flooding is when earthquakes hit

 

[Texas Proud]

Why do people keep repeating this? It will SAVE you money to use a cfb instead of incandescant bulb. It will save you money to conserve energy. There are a ton of things you can do on an individual level that cost you nothing, or even save money.

If you don't like the people that say it will cost the public tons of money, criticise THEM, not the underlying issue.

Following that logic, would you also hold that we can't prevent any forest fires, because they have happened before mankind has been around?

CO2 is a greenhouse gas.
We are adding CO2 to the atmosphere.
The concentration of CO2 in the atmosphere is increasing.

These are really the basics. To claim mankind is not contributing to GW, one must falsify one of the above claims. Forget all the rest, it is really pretty simple.

I am 'repeating' what I read about the cost... It is not all CFB etc. that is the cost... it is spending money to remove CO2 from our byproducts... which cost money. I am all for the conservative approach that will save us money AND make the air clean... but if everybody replaced all lights with CFB, I don't think that would be enough...

BTW, WE CAN NOT PREVENT FOREST FIRES!!! They happen every year and destroy a lot of property and usually kill people every year...

The 3% was in one of the articles that was on the 'man is causing global warming' articles.. it is a COST. If we spend money of stuff we do not need it is taking away from something we do need.. As an example... spending money on a missle defense shield is a waste of good money... yes, it was spent, but what did we get for it... and, I think the article was saying that we would NOT have as much GDP as before, so in fact it would not be 'going someplace else', but never exist in the first place..

 

[greg]

janeeyre:

Some funds to look at:

http://biz.yahoo.com/cnw/070411/algonquin_acquisition.html?.v=1

http://biz.yahoo.com/prnews/070410/nytu089.html?.v=83

and a list of stocks that might interest you:

http://www.ardourglobalindexes.com/indexes_agi.php

 

[Zoocat]

I have seen studies on the internet with regard to endangered populations and reduced sea ice but I haven't read them. Below is a study by the US Fish and Wildlife where they are asking to place the polar bears on the endangered specie list. They only mention the reduction of habitat and food due to ice melting but they don't say WHY or WHO (page 1072..).

While the WHY/WHO debate will continue, the fact remains that global climate change is happening and it looks like steps will be taken to attempt to reverse it whether we like it or not.

http://frwebgate4.access.gpo.gov/cg...SdocID=99534017247+41+0+0&WAISaction=retrieve

Because of melting ice bergs, Polar Bears have to swim farther and have been drowning.

When you have cancer, noone would expect you to start taking courses in biochemistry in order to decide whether or not to start your chemo treatment. We can't all be climate scientists. There must be a certain amount of intelligent trust in scientific opinion in order for our society/culture to continue to flourish.

I agree that the way global warming is presented is alarmist because I think that those who are talking about it are genuinely alarmed. I think they, scientists and politicians, deserve respectful consideration.

At the very least, everyone could just buy low energy light bulbs and be open to the idea of buying a fuel efficient car.
We need to reduce our consumption of oil for other good reasons anyway.

 

[wabmester]

I think they, scientists and politicians, deserve respectful consideration.

I have a lot of respect for glorified lab techs scientists. But they are trained observers, not fortune tellers. And I'm sure most of them understand the social trap we're in even if their predictions are accurate. I like the idea of reducing our environmental footprint, and not just for CO2 (in fact, that should probably be a relatively low priority compared to other emissions), but I prefer to view that as a Grand Moralistic Pursuit rather than a knee-jerk reaction to alarmist cries of doom. It's all in how you frame the problem, solutions, and timeframe of implementation.

If we're going to re-engineer the world, let's do some top-down design from a well-articulated philosophical basis rather than random ad-hoc panic-driven band-aids applied in a hostile us-vs-them environment.

Let's make "Zero Footprint" our new "Space Race." I think everybody could get on board to such a high-minded pursuit.

 

[Zoocat]

If we're going to re-engineer the world, let's do some top-down design from a well-articulated philosophical basis rather than random ad-hoc panic-driven band-aids applied in a hostile us-vs-them environment.

Let's make "Zero Footprint" our new "Space Race." I think everybody could get on board to such a high-minded pursuit.

Friedman has an article in the NY Times Magazine that says basically the same thing. He makes some very interesting points, especially about how the USA could take the lead and solve our economic enslavement problem to China, Japan, and the Middle East. He points out a few US companies that have had success (such as the more energy efficient locomotive) which might be an investment opportunity.
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/04/15/m...em&ex=1176868800&en=6d53d735b961773d&ei=5087

 

[Texas Proud]

Some interesting reading..... here is a section that talks about what we can do... think of the costs of these... so, tell me which ones we should do?? I still say NUCLEAR is my #1 as it improves air quality... I also don't mind the cars getting better gas mileage as long as the cost does not go whacky (which to me it is)...

To convey the scale involved, Socolow and Pacala have created a pie chart with 15 different wedges. Some wedges represent carbon-free or carbon-diminishing power-generating technologies; other wedges represent efficiency programs that could conserve large amounts of energy and prevent CO2 emissions. They argue that the world needs to deploy any 7 of these 15 wedges, or sufficient amounts of all 15, to have enough conservation, and enough carbon-free energy, to increase the world economy and still avoid the doubling of CO2 in the atmosphere. Each wedge, when phased in over 50 years, would avoid the release of 25 billion tons of carbon, for a total of 175 billion tons of carbon avoided between now and 2056.

Here are seven wedges we could chose from: “Replace 1,400 large coal-fired plants with gas-fired plants; increase the fuel economy of two billion cars from 30 to 60 miles per gallon; add twice today’s nuclear output to displace coal; drive two billion cars on ethanol, using one-sixth of the world’s cropland; increase solar power 700-fold to displace coal; cut electricity use in homes, offices and stores by 25 percent; install carbon capture and sequestration capacity at 800 large coal-fired plants.” And the other eight aren’t any easier. They include halting all cutting and burning of forests, since deforestation causes about 20 percent of the world’s annual CO2 emissions.


So, cost of cars... 2 billion X 2,000 per (current cost approx)... $4 Trillion
1,400 gas fired plants.... (don't know how much, but lets say $100 mill each)... $140 trillion...

anybody have any clue on the costs of the others (or shoot mine down)



EDIT...

Hmmmm... later in the article... "The total world fleet today is 800 million vehicles!" So we can not even do the first one!!!

 

[Nords]

I still say NUCLEAR is my #1 as it improves air quality...

I think the Chernobyl folks are a good example of why nuclear power doesn't sell its air quality harder. It's like an airline selling its safety record-- 'We haven't killed anyone in months!!"

I've spent way too much time in the Pearl Harbor Emergency Control Center to shill for civilian nuclear power. And if it was run to the safety/incident standards of the Navy's nuclear propulsion program then no one would want to pay for it.

 

[samclem]

Friedman has an article in the NY Times Magazine that says basically the same thing. He makes some very interesting points, especially about how the USA could take the lead and solve our economic enslavement problem to China, Japan, and the Middle East. He points out a few US companies that have had success (such as the more energy efficient locomotive) which might be an investment opportunity.
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/04/15/m...em&ex=1176868800&en=6d53d735b961773d&ei=5087

Oldbabe,
Thanks for the link. Friedman's article is interesting, and he makes some good points (especially about the linkage between oil price and growing authoritariansism). The crucial point he mentions but quickly glosses over is that reducing carbon emissions provides no direct benefit to the person/company/country that pays the cost of cutting these emissions. Yes, America can compete well in developing green technologies, but who will pay more for them and why? His example of the US locomotive producer is not relevant--China is buying these US locomotives only because it makes economic sense due to their lower fuel costs. If they didn't save fuel but had dramatically lower CO2 output, nobody would be buying them.

The previous big natonal endeavors (the space program, interstate highways, mobilization for WW-II, higher defense expenditures during the Cold War, etc) were all done because we were in a struggle with a competitor, and by making sacrifices we increased our chances of surviving/winning. Real competitors are still out there, and if we go "green" at huge cost and they don't, our standard of living will decline. Even worse, our competitors will continue to pollute even more as they become more prosperous, produce an ever-increasing portion ofthe world's goods, and as their own populations demand cheap energy and products with higher embodied energy content. Given this, sacrifices by US consumers and companies could have the perverse effect of increasing global warming, as "dirtier" global competitors win out.

The atmosphere's ability to absorb human-produced CO2 may be a finite resource. Per Wikipedia's "Tragedy of the Commons" entry " . . .free access and unrestricted demand for a finite resource ultimately dooms the resource through over-exploitation. This occurs because the benefits of exploitation accrue to individuals, each of which is motivated to maximize his or her own use of the resource, while the costs of exploitation are distributed between all those to whom the resource is available (which may be a wider class of individuals than those who are exploiting it).
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tragedy_of_the_commons

 

[Texas Proud]

I think the Chernobyl folks are a good example of why nuclear power doesn't sell its air quality harder. It's like an airline selling its safety record-- 'We haven't killed anyone in months!!"

I've spent way too much time in the Pearl Harbor Emergency Control Center to shill for civilian nuclear power. And if it was run to the safety/incident standards of the Navy's nuclear propulsion program then no one would want to pay for it.

Yet France get's 80% of their electricity from nuclear and has some of the cleanest air in the industrial world...

And wasn't Chernobyl an old design with no water etc. etc. And of course the good ole Russian safety.... Did I not read that they did not use shielding (or maybe not much) in their nuclear subs so they had more speed then ours

Also, has it not gotten 'safer' with the newer plants??

BTW, I had read that the French 'recycles' their nuclear waste many times because there is so much energy left in the rods... so their 'waste' is a lot less than ours...

 

[Texas Proud]

Yes, America can compete well in developing green technologies, but who will pay more for them and why? His example of the US locomotive producer is not relevant--China is buying these US locomotives only because it makes economic sense due to their lower fuel costs. If they didn't save fuel but had dramatically lower CO2 output, nobody would be buying them.

I think that was his point... that going green in and of itself will not work. It MUST be done with better products such as the locomotive... and is it not the better fuel economy that produces less CO2??'

And also that if you put incentives in place, they must be there for the long term... short term will not work..

 

[samclem]

. . . and is it not the better fuel economy that produces less CO2??'

In this case the lower CO2 output is because the locomotive burns less fuel. But sometimes reducing pollution increases energy use (for example, your car might get better fuel economy of you took off that pesky catalytic converter). Granted, with CO2 there's a fairly linear relationship between fuel burn and pollutant production.

I saw a good estimate somewhere of the billions of tons of CO2 we could prevent from entering the atmosphere if we all just took 1/3rd fewer breaths . . .

 

[Zathras]

I saw a good estimate somewhere of the billions of tons of CO2 we could prevent from entering the atmosphere if we all just took 1/3rd fewer breaths . . .

I would prefer to reduce the CO2 contribution in a simple, painless way rather than trying to breath less

 

[HFWR]

I saw a good estimate somewhere of the billions of tons of CO2 we could prevent from entering the atmosphere if we all just took 1/3rd fewer breaths . . .

Closing Congress would dramatically reduce the expulsion of "hot air"...

 

[ERD50]

Another example of just how little we know...

I was listening to a 'Science Friday' podcast today about 'Climate Action Day', the environment, global warming, carbon reductions, etc, etc, etc.

Climate Action Day - SciFri Podcast - 2007041312 4/17/07 10:32 AM 4/13/07 35:31 14.3 MB Planning for a day of rallies aimed at encouraging Congress to act on climate change. Plus, reducing your carbon footprint. MPEG audio file 56 kbps

One of the guests talked about the concept of, 'leave the car at home, walk, or ride a bike when you can'. He claims that the combination of our body's utilization of food, along with an energy inefficient food supply means that walking creates *more* pollution and greenhouse gas than driving your car!

I know, there are a million ways to spin the numbers, but it makes you wonder. And of course, most of us could use that walk w/o 'refueling' our bodies to compensate for the calories burned, but I still thought it was an interesting observation.

-ERD50

 

[Texas Proud]

Where was the article that I read that said a Hummer had less of a 'footprint' than a Prius.... seems that mining for all the metals in the batteries, manufacturing them and disposing of them is 'worse' than a Hummer.... it seems far fetched to me, but what do I know about this narrow aspect...

 

[Nords]

Yet France get's 80% of their electricity from nuclear and has some of the cleanest air in the industrial world...

There are those strange correlations masquerading as causality again. How the heck do we know that France's air cleanliness is a result of nuclear power generation and not weather patterns or Bangladesh butter production?

And wasn't Chernobyl an old design with no water etc. etc. And of course the good ole Russian safety....

The Chernobyl design wasn't much of an improvement over the Manhattan Project, with graphite moderation and a lack of water to flood/cool the core.

But when a gas plume escapes, the physics of pressurized water reactors breaking down U235 is pretty much the same everywhere. Once a valve pops open (whether it's material failure or operator error) there'll be a huge plume of radioactive isotopes floating over the downwind area. Some are short-lived, some build up in the human body, others tend to get into the food supply. TMI released less radioactivity than most coal-burning plants & granite office buildings, yet the public impression was that the Eastern seaboard would be irradiated, any unlucky survivors would die of cancer, and their children would never be able to drink the milk.

As for the Russian submarine force, given the options of reducing exposure by time/distance/shielding, they chose to rely heavily on the first two. Given what we knew at the time it was a great way to boost power & speed. We weren't much better in the 1950s & 60s because everyone's dose-effects predictions were based on scarce anecdotal data. I don't think the world health organizations boosted their estimates of radiation danger (effectively tripling them) until the late 1980s or early 1990s.

Also, has it not gotten 'safer' with the newer plants??

Pebble-bed reactor designs are getting a lot of publicity because of their inherent stability, much lower neutron activiation of materials, and reduced radiation release in the case of accidents. They're a lot easier to refuel. They're much safer than pressurized-water reactor designs. But we have over 50 years' experience with the latter and I'm not sure how many PBR plants are actually operating at utilities around the world. Even if they were among the safest designs ever built there'd be a humongous "China Syndrome" credibility image to overcome and a whole lot of NIMBY issues. Neither of the those two are based on logic or engineering-- just public impressions and media spin.

BTW, I had read that the French 'recycles' their nuclear waste many times because there is so much energy left in the rods... so their 'waste' is a lot less than ours...

I'm curious what the nation's nuclear waste "stockpile" is made up of. I'm pretty sure that a large part of it comes from decommissioned naval nuclear plants (with extremely high enrichment and lots of crapped-up plant materials) as well as nuclear warheads. Not much that you can do with a hunk of stainless steel piping whose neutron-activiated cobalt alloys will be emitting high levels of gamma radiation for the next 25 years. I'm sure a lot of the first- and second-generation civilian PWR designs were pretty messy, too.

But everyone recycles to the extent that it's considered cost-effective. If we all started swapping nuclear-waste credits like carbon credits then I bet a lot more companies would be clamoring to get into the business...

 

[Texas Proud]

Thanks Nords.... I always like reading your posts....

Let me go on with the recycle aspect... and of course, this is coming from someone being brainwashed by public tv....

But, they 'say' that the fuel rods used in the power plants are removed and stored in their water bath (whatever it is called)... but not sent to be reprocessed (refined re-whatever) and put into 'new' rods to put back in the reactor (I hope you can read thru the muck here).... they just sit in the water even though there is nuclear fuel still there... something to do with being able to get weapons grade material if you refine it or something...


But, France says 'why waste good nuclear fuel' and does refine it and reuses it... so they get more electricity out of the same amount of nuclear fuel...

Also (from the brainwashed)... the pebble bed was supposed to be 'China Syndrome' proof... the fuel never got hot enough to melt... also easier to transport etc...

 

[samclem]

But, France says 'why waste good nuclear fuel' and does refine it and reuses it... so they get more electricity out of the same amount of nuclear fuel...

This may also be a reference to the French fast breeder reactor FBR progam. Whereas a conventional light water reactor is able to use only 1% of the available energy in fissionable uranium, a liquid metal FBR gets 75% of the available energy AND produces more fuel than it consumes (so, at the end of a 20 year cycle you've got enough fuel to load up another reactor.) Several other nations have active FBR progras, but the US no longer does. The downside of these reactors:
1 ) They use some very esoteric technology to operate. Imagine cooling a large radioactive core using high-pressure liquid sodium and you've got some idea of what this is about. They just can't be made as safe as a light water reactor or a pebble bed reactor.
2) They pose nuclear fuel proliferation issues--they produce prodigious amounts of plutonium--great for making weapons.

Still, the US has enough easily acccessed uranium fuel for only about 50-100 years of light water reactor operation if we produce 30% of our domestic energy from nuclear power. We could go on for hundreds of years if we used FBRs.

Caveat: Every syllable above is subject to correction by Nords. I have been smacked down on the subject of hose bib valve types, I am taking a big risk in commenting on nuclear plants.

 

[Nords]

But, they 'say' that the fuel rods used in the power plants are removed and stored in their water bath (whatever it is called)... but not sent to be reprocessed (refined re-whatever) and put into 'new' rods to put back in the reactor (I hope you can read thru the muck here).... they just sit in the water even though there is nuclear fuel still there... something to do with being able to get weapons grade material if you refine it or something...

I've been looking for more info on that too, and I haven't been able to find any.

The Navy cores are highly highly enriched and I thought those were sliced up for re-use. I haven't been able to find any source (UNCLAS or otherwise) on it and it just never came up when I was on active duty. I have huge gaping holes in my knowledge of civilian nuclear plants but I thought that Westinghouse was in the commercial-reactor recycling business in the 1970s before my dad quit his job in their nuclear division. But I could be wrong from those teenage memories, and the fuel in civilian reactors isn't so highly enriched that it would make much of a difference to try recycling.

Also (from the brainwashed)... the pebble bed was supposed to be 'China Syndrome' proof... the fuel never got hot enough to melt... also easier to transport etc...

Absolutely right, but this is a public-relations problem and not a safety or design problem. And there's still the issues of cooling-water towers, helium leaks, operator training, being good neighbors to the community while carrying out emergency drills, and so on.

1 ) They use some very esoteric technology to operate. Imagine cooling a large radioactive core using high-pressure liquid sodium and you've got some idea of what this is about. They just can't be made as safe as a light water reactor or a pebble bed reactor.

The first USS SEAWOLF (SSN 575) used a high-temperature core cooled by liquid sodium. It has a number of advantages (much higher temperature, much higher steam pressure, more speed, special neutron-moderating effects of sodium) but operationally the rest of it was a disaster.

Imagine that every time your reactor coolant pumps stopped you had to take special precautions to keep the loop's sodium from solidifying. And whenever the coolant leaked out of a valve or a fitting, if it hit water (on a submerged submarine, go figure) it'd combine explosively to form highly caustic sodium hydroxide. (The primary loop's sodium coolant exchanged its heat in a steam generator filled with the secondary loop's water.) SEAWOLF crew members were looked upon as rugged pioneering nuclear gods or idiots, depending on your perspective on whether they volunteered for that duty.

Caveat: Every syllable above is subject to correction by Nords. I have been smacked down on the subject of hose bib valve types, I am taking a big risk in commenting on nuclear plants.

Several of the mechanics & torpedomen I served with would be very surprised to hear that I had some valve knowledge to demonstrate... it's probably the one area of nuclear technology in which my skills & experience haven't been rendered obsolete. Yet.

 

[Texas Proud]

Absolutely right, but this is a public-relations problem and not a safety or design problem. And there's still the issues of cooling-water towers, helium leaks, operator training, being good neighbors to the community while carrying out emergency drills, and so on.

If the show I saw (and I will admit I only saw about 5 minutes before I had to go...) there was a guy holding a metal ball... like a big ball bearing... they insinuated it was 'real'... but I don't think I would want to be that guy carrying around a "hot 'ball'.... (leaving that there for all the puns )

 

[Nords]

If the show I saw (and I will admit I only saw about 5 minutes before I had to go...) there was a guy holding a metal ball... like a big ball bearing... they insinuated it was 'real'... but I don't think I would want to be that guy carrying around a "hot 'ball'.... (leaving that there for all the puns )

Yep, that's a fuel pellet. But guys, don't carry it in your front pockets.

When I was growing up I had a tie bar made from a piece of the spent fuel rod of a Westinghouse commercial reactor. Presumably these things are frisked clear of radioactivity before they're released for souvenirs. Yeah, that's it. Sure. No problems.