Zathras said:
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