Are humans really responsible for climate change?

[cannuck]

On 8/2/2019 at 11:13 AM, Shady said:

Um, China's burning more and more coal.

Um...no, they are not.

It is true that several years ago, when China was developing in exactly the same way everyone else did, they did exactly what everyone else did at that stage and built a lot of coal fired power plants.  Beijing becoming the most polluted city on the planet pointed out to them that there were environmental consequences to doing what we did, they did and everyone else did, so they moved on long ago.  You can NOT build a new coal fired plant, and as gas infrastructure spreads, intermediate solution to the problem is not to convert older plants, but to replace them with gas fired generation capacity...until their nuclear power programme gets into high gear.

The DO, however, use a lot of coal, but it is broken down for use as synfuel and also as feedstocks for other petrochem processes.

[eyeball]

31 minutes ago, cannuck said:

Not trying to be a jerk about this, but where do you get the idea that the Athabasca sands contain any significant CO2???? 

The Scientific American article I linked to.

[cannuck]

sorry, I missed that. will go back, read and comment

 

 

[cannuck]

On 5/25/2019 at 6:32 PM, eyeball said:

Burning all the Tar Sands oil that is currently recoverable by today's technology will release 22 billion tons of CO2 into our atmosphere.  It is a far greater source of CO2 than any other conventional source of oil in the world.  If humanity must continue to burn oil to get out of the inaction pickle its in then surely it shouldn't be burning the worst oil available to do so.

That's just plain stupid.

 

 

To begin with "Scientific" American is not exactly what one would call a respected scientific journal.  Articles tend to be sensationalized editorial pieces rather than balanced and objective.  This is a perfect example.  The writer, as one can tell by the endless technical errors, is certainly not familiar with petroleum industry or chemistry.   As I told you in an earlier post, the Athabasca sands have very little associated gas and virtually no CO2.  You would produce CO2 by burning the oil, but in only a slightly higher amount (due to C/H ratio) than any other crude.  Where they ARE correct is that the current methods of extraction FOR SAGD NOT FOR MINING (which are the projects they quote) involved in situ heating, which today is done mostly by burning natural gas.  Everyone knows how expensive and inefficient this method is, but that is the technology that is for the time in use.   There are many, many far more environmentally and resource use friendly technologies under development.  If our collective head wasn't so far up or collective ass on the subject, common sense and good engineering practice would mean using a nuclear plant to generate electricity to do in situ EMF (RF) heating of the reservoir.  Russians do it a fair bit, so not like we have to re-invent the wheel.

One glaring error in the article - to the point of pure stupidity - is that "all that carbon has to be removed from the bitumen, etc."   Absolute bullshit.  In the mineable areas (the really large projects) oil sands are trucked to an upgrader that simply (OK, not so simple, but not that complex either) adds hydrogen to improve the H/C ratio and fracture the long C-C bonds to make shorter, lighter, saturated molecules (light crude called "Syncrude" or "synthetic crude").  Yes, there IS petcoke made at the cracker (petroleum coke, mostly carbon) as it is essential for the steelmaking industry where it is made into electrodes and also combined with iron, NOT burned)  When it IS burned (power, cement) it is about 15% higher in CO2 emissions than other fuels.

If there IS a really stupid thing being done with the Athabasca sands (and there IS) it is allowing dilbit to be shipped.  Dilluted Bitumen is a very wasteful way of shipping and takes the first step in the value added chain to the other end of the pipeline (or rail line in some cases).  Doing this puts a heavy element into a pipeline, dilluted with a very light element.  Spills of those result in a heavy bit going to the bottom of water, and very, very slowly degrading and an extremely light fraction spreading far and wide.  Also, in shipping presenting an extreme fire/explosion hazard as well.  By opposing pipelines, eco freaks force shipment into railroads, which have a HORRIBLE safety record (remember Lac Megantic??  I believe more deaths from that one incident than ALL pipeline deaths in the history of the entire North American petroleum industry).

I am getting to the stage watching the opposition to Athabasca and pipelines to really believe that the impetus behind such efforts is purely economic, and the environmental movement schill it without any idea WTF they are speaking about.

Edited August 7, 2019 by cannuck

[cannuck]

Let's see how serious and open minded the participants in this thread can be.

Here is a link about one of my personal heroes.  This is a guy who is extremely capable technically and about as honest as honest can be (hallmark of a great engineer).  I have known of him for 40-odd years since one of my best friends built his first design, and found many ways to improve it.  My buddy is a Swedish engineer (also internationally reknown) who gave the younger engineer some good advice that I imagine contributed to his future successes.  I will leave it to those who read the article to comment, but IMHO, this is about the most honest, thorough and accurate summation of the subject you will find.

forbes.com/sites/larrybell/2012/09/09/a-cool-headed-climate-conversation-with-aerospace-legend-burt-rutan/#2a1c00cf7e03

[dialamah]

40 minutes ago, cannuck said:

To begin with "Scientific" American is not exactly what one would call a respected scientific journal.

Not so. Scientific American has a long history of presenting quality and groundbreaking science to the public.  They wrote articles about radio technology, air travel and space travel well before those things became reality. They've published articles from scientists such as Albert Einstein, Linus Pauling, Jonas Crick among others.  150 Nobel laureates have published in Scientific American, usually before they received awards for their work.

From Scientific American:  "Generally speaking, Scientific American and Scientific American MIND present ideas that have already been published in the peer-reviewed technical literature."

AllSides (Media Bias site) gives SciAm a rating of "Center".  (For comparison, AllSides rates CNN as Left Center and Fox News as Right Center, Vox as Left and National Review as Right).

Media Bias Fact Check says it is Pro-Science.    Pro-Science sources "consist of legitimate science or are evidence based through the use of credible scientific sourcing.  Legitimate science follows the scientific method, is unbiased and does not use emotional words."

So why is Scientific American on the partisan conservative kill list?  According to Wikipedia, SciAm had the audacity to criticize a book called The Skeptical Environmentalist, and in 2016 an editorial criticized Trump.

[Michael Hardner]

21 minutes ago, cannuck said:

Let's see how serious and open minded the participants in this thread can be. 

I glanced it.  Yes, this person has some points to make: the Medieval Warm period hasn't been explained, for example.  And Climate Change has some definite benefits as well, that are under-reported.  This is why the overall impact of climate change is estimated where it is.  There are potential unknown effects though.

And more importantly, an interview with a stray 'smart guy' who 'looked at the data' is on the edge of disinformation when there is a global body of expertise who are doing open research on this.  This article is from 7 years ago, so it seems to have had no impact.  I googled the response to his article.  He decries the personal comments, but there seem to be substantive responses also.

https://www.google.com/search?q="burt+rutan"+"scholars+and+rogues"&oq="burt+rutan"+"scholars+and+rogues"&aqs=chrome..69i57.8199j0j4&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8

In conclusion, : Climate change is real, and caused by human activity; the impacts are not known; it's likely prudent for us to collectively formulate a response.  The governments of the world have now largely been convinced of the situation and signed an agreement to try to curtail production of greenhouse gases.

 

[dialamah]

37 minutes ago, cannuck said:

Let's see how serious and open minded the participants in this thread can be.

Here is a link about one of my personal heroes.  This is a guy who is extremely capable technically and about as honest as honest can be (hallmark of a great engineer).  I have known of him for 40-odd years since one of my best friends built his first design, and found many ways to improve it.  My buddy is a Swedish engineer (also internationally reknown) who gave the younger engineer some good advice that I imagine contributed to his future successes.  I will leave it to those who read the article to comment, but IMHO, this is about the most honest, thorough and accurate summation of the subject you will find.

forbes.com/sites/larrybell/2012/09/09/a-cool-headed-climate-conversation-with-aerospace-legend-burt-rutan/#2a1c00cf7e03

This is an engineer, not a climate scientist.  Climate deniers dismiss Susuki because he's a zoologist and not a climate or environment scientist, but an engineer should be taken seriously?

 FYI I read the article anyway, and can only say I hope he's right and that there is no catastrophe headed our way. 

But it's pretty hard for me to believe that scientists and governments all over the world are out to deceive us and that they've been working towards this for over 100 years now.

"In the late 19th century, scientists first argued that human emissions of greenhouse gases could change the climate. Many other theories of climate change were advanced, involving forces from volcanism to solar variation. In the 1960s, the warming effect of carbon dioxide gas became increasingly convincing. Some scientists also pointed out that human activities that generated atmospheric aerosols (e.g., "pollution") could have cooling effects as well. During the 1970s, scientific opinion increasingly favored the warming viewpoint. By the 1990s, as a result of improving fidelity of computer models and observational work confirming the Milankovitch theory of the ice ages, a consensus position formed: greenhouse gases were deeply involved in most climate changes and human-caused emissions were bringing discernible global warming."

 

[Michael Hardner]

44 minutes ago, dialamah said:

  I read the article anyway, and can only say I hope he's right and that there is no catastrophe headed our way.  

I would like to point out that climate scientists are much out of their element when they talk about impacts, especially economic impacts also.

[egghead]

On 8/6/2019 at 6:57 AM, cannuck said:

Um...no, they are not.

It is true that several years ago, when China was developing in exactly the same way everyone else did, they did exactly what everyone else did at that stage and built a lot of coal fired power plants.  Beijing becoming the most polluted city on the planet pointed out to them that there were environmental consequences to doing what we did, they did and everyone else did, so they moved on long ago.  You can NOT build a new coal fired plant, and as gas infrastructure spreads, intermediate solution to the problem is not to convert older plants, but to replace them with gas fired generation capacity...until their nuclear power programme gets into high gear.

The DO, however, use a lot of coal, but it is broken down for use as synfuel and also as feedstocks for other petrochem processes.

stop reading People's Daily, otherwise you will turn to be an useful idiot. China gov't don't care climate change. They built new gas infrastructure because of GDP and forced people stopped using coal in winter when there was no LNG. 

Anyway, I always wonder why there is no CO2 absorption technology on the table.

Edited August 8, 2019 by egghead

[SpankyMcFarland]

This is the thing the skeptics don’t understand. Most people who believe in man-made Climate Change don’t want to be proven right - it is going to seriously complicate our lives - but unfortunately that is where the evidence points ever more strongly. 

[dialamah]

10 hours ago, egghead said:

Anyway, I always wonder why there is no CO2 absorption technology on the table.

There kinda is.  This plant in Squamish BC sucks about a tonne out of the air daily, but just releases it back,  I guess it's kind of a prototype.

There's another similar one in Switzerland, but so far these techniques are not economically viable.

[Shady]

On 8/6/2019 at 9:57 AM, cannuck said:

Um...no, they are not.

Um, yes they are.

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-china-coal-climate/china-coal-mine-approvals-surge-despite-climate-pledges-idUSKCN1UW0EM

https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-45640706

 

[egghead]

13 hours ago, dialamah said:

There kinda is.  This plant in Squamish BC sucks about a tonne out of the air daily, but just releases it back,  I guess it's kind of a prototype.

There's another similar one in Switzerland, but so far these techniques are not economically viable.

wow, that is worse than "capacitor-less solar-powered flashlight." 

Anyway, may be we all shall look into co2 recapture technology instead now.

[egghead]

18 hours ago, SpankyMcFarland said:

This is the thing the skeptics don’t understand. Most people who believe in man-made Climate Change don’t want to be proven right - it is going to seriously complicate our lives - but unfortunately that is where the evidence points ever more strongly. 

ya,  we all should change to plant based diet.

Quote

Change your diet to combat climate change in 2019

https://www.cnn.com/2018/10/18/health/plant-based-diet-climate-change-food-drayer/index.html

With or without human, climate is changing. 

Edited August 8, 2019 by egghead

[cannuck]

On 8/8/2019 at 11:05 AM, Shady said:

Um, yes they are.

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-china-coal-climate/china-coal-mine-approvals-surge-despite-climate-pledges-idUSKCN1UW0EM

https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-45640706

 

That is quite disturbing.  I will discuss with my Chinese business partner, who toes the party line and is my source of "official" policy information.  No, not a communist, VERY much a capitalist, but a realist and above all, Chinese (which means a lot more than it seems to suggest).  Thanks for posting.

[SpankyMcFarland]

On 8/8/2019 at 7:23 PM, egghead said:

ya,  we all should change to plant based diet.

With or without human, climate is changing. 

Without humans, slowly. With humans, well, take a look. 

[scribblet]

A lot of people won't want to read this or repeat it, but there are benefits

https://business.financialpost.com/opinion/joe-oliver-heres-a-truth-few-dare-to-utter-canada-will-benefit-from-climate-change

Canada is a very large, cold country, with 90 per cent of its population huddled within 100 miles of its southern border and an enormous agricultural potential if the land warms up. There will also be new opportunities for oil, gas and mineral development in the Arctic. And let’s not ignore the greater personal comfort of living in a more hospitable climate.

According to a CBC story about Moody’s study, “when all the changes to things like tourism demand, crop yields and the growing season are factored in, there’s a slight net positive.”

 

[dialamah]

2 hours ago, scribblet said:

A lot of people won't want to read this or repeat it, but there are benefits

https://business.financialpost.com/opinion/joe-oliver-heres-a-truth-few-dare-to-utter-canada-will-benefit-from-climate-change

Canada is a very large, cold country, with 90 per cent of its population huddled within 100 miles of its southern border and an enormous agricultural potential if the land warms up. There will also be new opportunities for oil, gas and mineral development in the Arctic. And let’s not ignore the greater personal comfort of living in a more hospitable climate.

According to a CBC story about Moody’s study, “when all the changes to things like tourism demand, crop yields and the growing season are factored in, there’s a slight net positive.”

 

Could be true and if it is, how long do you think we'd remain Canada?  War on our soil would be a pretty serious hardship, along with losing our sovereignty.   

Long term, though, it hardly matters.   Change happens. 

Edited August 15, 2019 by dialamah

[egghead]

5 hours ago, SpankyMcFarland said:

Without humans, slowly. With humans, well, take a look. 

No one know the correct rate 

[dialamah]

25 minutes ago, egghead said:

No one know the correct rate 

They are hints in the length of time precious cycles have happened.  Our current cooling cycle ought to have continued for considerably longer than it has.  Instead, human activity has been counteracting the natural cooling cycle and making the earth warmer.  Link.

[dialamah]

Turns out, India is on track to meeting their Paris Accord commitments, one of only a few countries to do so.  One less excuse for "do-nothing" crowd to use justifying inaction.

Even as Trump undermines action to mitigate climate change, a coalition of American States, cities and businesses have formed a coalition to meet the Paris Accord; that coalition represents 65% of US citizens and 70% of GDP and will reduce US emissions between 17% and 24% by 2030.  An admirable example of people who don't sit on their backsides, whinging about "the other guy".

Link.

[Guest]

6 minutes ago, dialamah said:

Turns out, India is on track to meeting their Paris Accord commitments, one of only a few countries to do so.  One less excuse for "do-nothing" crowd to use justifying inaction.

Even as Trump undermines action to mitigate climate change, a coalition of American States, cities and businesses have formed a coalition to meet the Paris Accord; that coalition represents 65% of US citizens and 70% of GDP and will reduce US emissions between 17% and 24% by 2030.  An admirable example of people who don't sit on their backsides, whinging about "the other guy".

Link.

The Paris Accord lets them continue to increase emissions until 2030.  We can do that.

[Argus]

On 9/21/2019 at 11:50 AM, bcsapper said:

The Paris Accord lets them continue to increase emissions until 2030.  We can do that.

Yes, in fact they are increasing emissions so fast and so high that they're basically adding multiple Alberta oil sands worth of CO2 emissions every year. But the lefties don't care about that. Let the Indians build as many coal power plants as they want. The lefties only care about Alberta because if they continue IT'S GAME OVER FOR THE PLANET! AAAAGH! AAAAAGH!

Edited September 22, 2019 by Argus

[WestCanMan]

On 8/7/2019 at 4:58 AM, cannuck said:

To begin with "Scientific" American is not exactly what one would call a respected scientific journal.  Articles tend to be sensationalized editorial pieces rather than balanced and objective.  This is a perfect example.  The writer, as one can tell by the endless technical errors, is certainly not familiar with petroleum industry or chemistry.   As I told you in an earlier post, the Athabasca sands have very little associated gas and virtually no CO2.  You would produce CO2 by burning the oil, but in only a slightly higher amount (due to C/H ratio) than any other crude.  Where they ARE correct is that the current methods of extraction FOR SAGD NOT FOR MINING (which are the projects they quote) involved in situ heating, which today is done mostly by burning natural gas.  Everyone knows how expensive and inefficient this method is, but that is the technology that is for the time in use.   There are many, many far more environmentally and resource use friendly technologies under development.  If our collective head wasn't so far up or collective ass on the subject, common sense and good engineering practice would mean using a nuclear plant to generate electricity to do in situ EMF (RF) heating of the reservoir.  Russians do it a fair bit, so not like we have to re-invent the wheel.

One glaring error in the article - to the point of pure stupidity - is that "all that carbon has to be removed from the bitumen, etc."   Absolute bullshit.  In the mineable areas (the really large projects) oil sands are trucked to an upgrader that simply (OK, not so simple, but not that complex either) adds hydrogen to improve the H/C ratio and fracture the long C-C bonds to make shorter, lighter, saturated molecules (light crude called "Syncrude" or "synthetic crude").  Yes, there IS petcoke made at the cracker (petroleum coke, mostly carbon) as it is essential for the steelmaking industry where it is made into electrodes and also combined with iron, NOT burned)  When it IS burned (power, cement) it is about 15% higher in CO2 emissions than other fuels.

If there IS a really stupid thing being done with the Athabasca sands (and there IS) it is allowing dilbit to be shipped.  Dilluted Bitumen is a very wasteful way of shipping and takes the first step in the value added chain to the other end of the pipeline (or rail line in some cases).  Doing this puts a heavy element into a pipeline, dilluted with a very light element.  Spills of those result in a heavy bit going to the bottom of water, and very, very slowly degrading and an extremely light fraction spreading far and wide.  Also, in shipping presenting an extreme fire/explosion hazard as well.  By opposing pipelines, eco freaks force shipment into railroads, which have a HORRIBLE safety record (remember Lac Megantic??  I believe more deaths from that one incident than ALL pipeline deaths in the history of the entire North American petroleum industry).

I am getting to the stage watching the opposition to Athabasca and pipelines to really believe that the impetus behind such efforts is purely economic, and the environmental movement schill it without any idea WTF they are speaking about.

Sensationalized is good for the people who want to shut down Alberta oil. Writing stories like that is probably very lucrative.

The sensationalized stories, plus the new Trudeau-era anti-pipeline legislations where a single elected or hereditary chief is all it takes to shut down an entire pipeline, plus the wealthy lobbyists who pay protestors [and maybe the occasional hereditary chief?] are working 100%. Even the fact that we are paying $.60 per litre more for gas in BC than they pay in Alberta doesn't really sway people's opinions much.