Interesting stuff.

I hope every one takes an action.

(I buy low power consumption computers, built energy efficient house, use solar&geotherm heating energy and buy only "green" electricity (generated 100% without fossile energy source or Uranium), and use sensibly fuel consuming car (7L/100km))

(I think also recycling is very recommendable, even though it does not directly affect "global warming" that much.)

Last edited by KimmoK on 28-Oct-2009 at 06:43 AM.

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@Tomas

Quote:

Tomas wrote: @BrianK Quote: 2008 and now 2009 disprove the Anti-GWers who try to claim a Global Cooling trend. Uh?? How would that disprove anything? The skeptics that believe sun is one of the main driver dont expect temps to cool so suddenly. It is expected to take around 10~ years after a prolonged minium/weak cycle before temps start dropping noticeable. This was also the case during previous prolonged/grand minimums. Climate wont just magically cool over night...

There's a difference in definitions here. The one I used was the one of Anti-GW who claim we are presently in a cooling trend. The one you used was that in the near future we will be in a cooling trend.

10 years? Heating and cooling of the earth have roughly a 12 year cycle, as do solar cycles. From what I recall the present understanding of science says that heating and cooling track closer to a present cycle than a past cycle. EDIT: Post #15 in this thread by Noel might be a good start at a reading point.

Last edited by BrianK on 28-Oct-2009 at 12:21 PM.

@BrianK
You only need to look at past temperatures to see that there is a lag. One of the theories is that oceans store alot of heat which will then slowly be lost when solar activity is low for prolonged times while the opposite happens during strong cycles. I think what matters most is the duration of low/high activity as well as the length of the solar cycle. Going to be interesting to see what happens in the next 5-10 years.

One thing that bothers me a little is that the proponents for that the temperature increase is caused by natural effects have been very quiet when it comes to the solar radiation lately. A few years back they strongly argued that solar output has increased and that is the strongest contributing factor to the increased temperature on Earth. To begin with, the solar radiation has not increased at all during the time span they claim (I could find a link if anyone is interested) and during the last years we have had an extreme solar minmum with no sunspots at all as the sun is producing less energy. The scientist are baffled, they did not expect such and extremely low solar activity.

Could this be why the "natural causes proponents" have been so quiet about the sun lately? The current state does not favour their cause. The fact is that the last two winters have been fairly normal up here in the north. I am a little worried what will happen when the sun returns to normal, will it get really hot? And what if the sun repels into an as extreme solar maximum? Then we could be in real trouble.

Last edited by Niolator on 28-Oct-2009 at 03:07 PM.

@Niolator

Quote:

Niolator wrote: One thing that bothers me a little is that the proponents for that the temperature increase is caused by natural effects have been very quiet when it comes to the solar radiation lately. A few years back they strongly argued that solar output has increased and that is the strongest contributing factor to the increased temperature on Earth. To begin with, the solar radiation has not increased at all during the time span they claim (I could find a link if anyone is interested) and during the last years we have had an extreme solar minmum with no sunspots at all as the sun is producing less energy. The scientist are baffled, they did not expect such and extremely low solar activity. Could this be why the "natural causes proponents" have been so quiet about the sun lately? The current state does not favour their cause. The fact is that the last two winters have been fairly normal up here in the north. I am a little worried what will happen when the sun returns to normal, will it get really hot? And what if the sun repels into an as extreme solar maximum? Then we could be in real trouble.

You must remember that we have had decades of "unusual" high solar activity not seen for thousands of years. The sun only started going "unusually" quiet only during the last few years. It will take time before temps come down which was also the case during maunder minimum, dalton minimum, damon minimum. The temps did not start lowering before years later, so i dont see why it would be any different now. There has been some interesting "weather" already for last few years with jet streams being more south than normal during last few summers, though it is still too early to say if that has anything to do with the sun or if it is just coincidence due to weather.
The global warming could easily also be explained by those decades of higher than "normal" sun activity as well as recovery from LIA and later cold periods. Climate had great natural fluctuations even before we started adding co2 to the atmosphere.

It is just simply to early to tell if the current low activity will affect temperatures.

Last edited by Tomas on 28-Oct-2009 at 04:44 PM.

German RWE pulls out of Bulgarian nuclear project

The owner of a number of highly polluting coal-fired plants, RWE needs to either diversify its electricity production or enter the expensive trade of CO2 emissions.

RWE's withdrawal from the Belene project is also considered a hard blow to the company's ambition to invest in nuclear energy in order to lower its CO2 emissions record.

just not build them in Germany

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@Interesting

In Finland there's a 1GW nuke plant being built. The plant is built in guidance of French company (Areva) and the work is done by a lot of subcontractors. And finnish radiation officials are trying to observe/review the work...
It seems to be extremely sloppy work and Areva does not like that there are inspections of the work quality. etc... etc...

IMO: it's very insane to let foreigners to build nuke device in our/other country. They give rat's *ss if it fries(causes nuke disaster) our country.

and there are applications for three more reactors....

Update...

In real life electricity needs do not climb as much as is predicted.
There are several GW of wind power being built that those Nuke companies dismiss and just demand more and more and MORE.

IMHO: "Capitalism" is the best way only to certain point.

Last edited by KimmoK on 29-Oct-2009 at 01:38 PM.

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@KimmoK
What is up with the anti nuclear anyways? Todays nuclear plants are on of the cleanest and safest energy sources currently available. Wind mills or solar power is currently not enough to power a whole country. Solar power would not even be possible in scandinavia since the latitude is to high. Wind mills have drawbacks as well. It takes alot of space which will ruin the habitat of many lifeforms and is also a threat to bird life.

@Tomas

Even if there is an increase in solar radiation, which no one has been able to convince me of, I can't understand why anyone could expect it to last. The solar output has decreased during the last 2 billion years and are going to continue to do so until the sun starts to burn helium in about 5 billion years. We can in fact consider ourselves lucky. If we would have evolved 2 billion years later it would have most likely been too cold for us to survive for long.

I had written about statisticans handling of the 'Global Cooling' arguement. Here's an article I found discussing it LINK

@BrianK

Quote:

On the radio today they talked about 2008 being the 8th hottest year on record. 2009, assuming it doesnt take a big nose dive, will end up about the 6th hottest year on record.

On the subject of predictions I became rather fascinated by the GISS global temperature analysis for 2008 in that it made predictions for 2009 and beyond. http://data.giss.nasa.gov/gistemp/2008/
Quote:

. . . the La Niña may be almost over, but the anomaly fell back (cooled) to -0.7°C last month (December). It is conceivable that this tropical cycle could dip back into a strong La Niña, as happened, e.g., in 1975. However, for the tropical Pacific to stay in that mode for both 2009 and 2010 would require a longer La Niña phase than has existed in the past half century, so it is unlikely. Indeed, subsurface and surface tropical ocean temperatures suggest that the system is "recharged", i.e., poised, for the next El Niño, so there is a good chance that one may occur in 2009. Global temperature anomalies tend to lag tropical anomalies by 3-6 months.

Note that lag time!
In fact La Nina did go into a deeper phase through early 2009 influencing our weather in NZ very noticeably through to and including July. Although the predicted El Nino had already begun to build several months earlier, it did not cut in according to my body thermometer, or Global temperature Records until August 2009. You will have seen my running comments in the previous incarnation of this topic.

Quote:

All 4 statiticans predicted the sequence results in 2010 to be hotter than 2009 and shy of hottest yet. It'll be interesting to see the results of this approach.

You will get an interactive approach to this business of plotting trends if you look at the java applet a short way down this page: http://hot-topic.co.nz/keep-out-of-the-kitchen/
You will not be able to see it while using OWB or any other Amiga browser because we do not yet have java installed. Use a windows machine or you may get it on a linux installation provided you have installed the necessary java support for Firefox. Using this applet you can decide on different periods over which to plot trend lines and then see the result.

Reverting to the GISS analysis and now the subject of Solar irradiance:
Quote:

The solar output remains low (Fig. 4), at the lowest level in the period since satellite measurements began in the late 1970s, and the time since the prior solar minimum is already 12 years, two years longer than the prior two cycles. This has led some people to speculate that we may be entering a "Maunder Minimum" situation, a period of reduced irradiance that could last for decades. Most solar physicists expect the irradiance to begin to pick up in the next several months - there are indications, from the polarity of the few recent sunspots, that the new cycle is beginning. However, let's assume that the solar irradiance does not recover. In that case, the negative forcing, relative to the mean solar irradiance is equivalent to seven years of CO2 increase at current growth rates. So do not look for a new "Little Ice Age" in any case.

After considering several other factors, which one should get ones head around as you probably have, they come to their prediction:
Quote:

Given our expectation of the next El Niño beginning in 2009 or 2010, it still seems likely that a new global temperature record will be set within the next 1-2 years, despite the moderate negative effect of the reduced solar irradiance.

However, consider a more laid back prediction from NOAA
http://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/products/analysis_monitoring/enso_advisory/index.shtml

Hmm . . . I have been saving up for a heat pump in anticipation of rising temperatures over the next summer or two, but rising prices and certain other factors have put this off a bit. Some well placed trees have been growing up in a position that may keep the worst of the heating of the westering sun out of our lounge in the meantime, although I have often wished my mother, who planted them, had understood that deciduous trees would have been preferable for year round advantages - warmer in low winter sun as well as cooling shade in summer.

Finally, have a look at these year by year animations of global temperature anomalies from 1881 to present. What fascinated me was the buildup in the northern regions. http://data.giss.nasa.gov/gistemp/animations/

Noel

@Tomas

Quote:

The skeptics that believe sun is one of the main driver . . .

Everyone believes the sun is our main climate driver, that is where the energy comes from whether it is irradiance, or the product of earth's orbit round the sun, and rotation on its axis as that generates internal motions.

It is a bad idea to adopt a label, it means people assign to you their beliefs as to the content of that box, and it also means you limit yourself to those contents. I am sure that you would not be comfortable with many of the people who call themselves skeptics.

Everyone has a world view of some kind, a model really. Everyone is therefore automatically skeptical of anything that is not part of that model. So what is it you are skeptical of ? and have you actually examined the evidence thereof ?

Noel

@KimmoK

Quote:

I hope every one takes an action

but what kind of action? I'm taking your comment as a philosophical cue, to be thought on rather than reacted to personally. Of course the consequence of thought should be decision. I have lined up here some very entertaining reading, food for thought.

People who trouble to trace the evidence regarding anthropogenic global warming have confirmed that our various greenhouse gas emissions are both cause and target for modification, this having a very widespread scientific consensus in contradiction to the widespread and continuing disinformation on the point. Therefore two kinds of action can be taken:

• modifying one's own demands on the environment and one's own impact by reducing emissions, which you have been working on
  
• supporting larger scale actions which are necessary but require considerable research and in some cases such as geo-engineering proposals, large doses of numerically supported skepticism.
  A case in point has just been published on RealClimate wherein an open letter is published attacking a particular claim made in the book "Superfreakonomics"
  http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2009/10/an-open-letter-to-steve-levitt/#more-1488
  this is worth a read for starters.

@Tomas
>What is up with the anti nuclear anyways?

Nuclear is not 100% without problems. There are things to consider starting from mining, enrichment, electricity generating and waste disposal, as well as powerplant ramp down (that cost as much as the building phase, IIRC).

In finland I think it's ok to build the plant that is being built (I'm just disgusted of how it's being built).

> Todays nuclear plants are on of the cleanest and safest energy sources currently available.

Sure. But I for example recently learned that coal plants could be made pollution free. They really have not been improved in last 40 years. Sciece mags hint that theres easily room for 10% increase in efficiency and with that 10% extra power, CO2 exhaust could be cleaned (and O2 recycled).

So. Also the using of existing coal mines and new coal plants (cheaper than nuke ones) would be ok as the adjusting power source beside wind mills etc...

(sure, modern nuclear power is ver very clean and even nuclear disasters sound like a drop in an ocean, when one considers what has been done in the 60's
http://www.cddc.vt.edu/host/atomic/images/tstmap1a.gif
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_weapons_testing
http://maps.google.com/maps?f=q&source=s_q&hl=fi&geocode=&q=nevada+test+site&sll=37.0625,-95.677068&sspn=57.902911,85.957031&ie=UTF8&hq=Nevada+Test+Site&hnear=Nevada+Test+Site,+Nevada&ll=37.11899,-116.063347&spn=0.115527,0.167885&t=h&z=13 )

> Wind mills or solar power is currently not enough to power a whole country.

But they could be. And for example wind mill maintenance would bring work for local people (forever or at least untill Fusion power steps in).

>Solar power would not even be possible in scandinavia since the latitude is to high.

Right. Solar power can only partly help things.

> Wind mills have drawbacks as well. It takes alot of space which will ruin the habitat of many lifeforms and is also a threat to bird life.

Yes they have some drawbacks, but also those can be developed. There has been wind mill solutions that do not risk bird's life. Not sure how they did it with those propelled mills, but by using vertical axel mills it is also possible.
http://images.google.fi/images?hl=fi&lr=lang_fi&um=1&sa=1&q=vertical+wind+mill&aq=f&oq=&start=0

etc...

For example in finland the trend has been that R&D on other possibilities are put down because nuclear power is marketed as "easily available" etc.

Last edited by KimmoK on 02-Nov-2009 at 07:31 AM.

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@KimmoK

Quote:

Wind mills or solar power is currently not enough to power a whole country. But they could be. And for example wind mill maintenance would bring work for local people (forever or at least untill Fusion power steps in). Solar power would not even be possible in scandinavia since the latitude is to high. Right. Solar power can only partly help things. Wind mills have drawbacks as well. It takes alot of space which will ruin the habitat of many lifeforms and is also a threat to bird life.

These windmills may make a significant difference with respect to energy density:
http://news.cnet.com/8301-11128_3-10350718-54.html


With respect to solar energy there is a rather big project that may make a difference to the whole of Europe, based in the Sahara it is called Desertec
http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg20427311.400-solar-superpower-should-europe-run-on-sahara-sun.html

This is a solar thermal project of which a number are already in hand elsewhere. The great advantages are production of power station quantities of electricity at lower cost than photovoltaic technology can achieve, and continuous production through 24 hrs because heat can be stored.

When talking about alternate energy production it is desirable in continental regions to think of production over the whole region rather than within the confines of national boundaries. Somewhere the wind is blowing, somewhere the sun is shining, somewhere demand is increasing while elsewhere it is falling or low - smart transmission systems, such as China is already getting on with, can tie systems in so the intermittent nature of wind turbines for example, is compensated for.

Noel

@NoelFuller

Quote:

NoelFuller wrote: @KimmoK ... With respect to solar energy there is a rather big project that may make a difference to the whole of Europe, based in the Sahara it is called Desertec http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg20427311.400-solar-superpower-should-europe-run-on-sahara-sun.html

Yeah, I know.
When I heard the news I had conflicting feelings about it.

Although I really appreciate emission-free production of electricity at such a big scale, I would have preferred they did it with an solar panel in an orbit.

Admittedly this would be more expensive, but would have the advantage of keeping exactly that amount of solar energy away from planet earth, that we would use to produce electricity this way.

Keep in mind that from consuming electricity heat is always a by-product.
The idea is to hinder that amount of heat from the sun to reach the surface, that is reased to the environment by using the electricity.

This way energy production would not contribute to the GW - rather in contrary - it could have a net "cooling effect" (as not all of the used electricity is transformed to heat - the other part is transformed to work and the "work part" has the "cooling effect").

Quote:

NoelFuller wrote: ... and continuous production through 24 hrs because heat can be stored.

For "my" solar panel continuous production through 24 hrs also would be no problem - in an appropriately calculated orbit the sun shines 24 h on all 365 days of the year - no clouds - nothing.

Furthermore - if the orbit is calculated accordingly - it is possible to reduce the amount of sunlight that heats up desert areas.

That way it might be possible to generate low pressure areas, which normally bring rain.

So this could be a way to reforestate desert areas and to inprove climate, air- and water quality.

Quote:

NoelFuller wrote: When talking about alternate energy production it is desirable in continental regions to think of production over the whole region rather than within the confines of national boundaries.

It could help the entire human race if we all could stop thinking within the confines of national boundaries.

Quote:

NoelFuller wrote: Somewhere the wind is blowing, somewhere the sun is shining, somewhere demand is increasing while elsewhere it is falling or low -

Yeah - that's why I think we should try to utilise every clean way of energy production in order not to have to rely on a single power source.

Quote:

NoelFuller wrote: smart transmission systems, such as China is already getting on with, can tie systems in so the intermittent nature of wind turbines for example, is compensated for.

Yes.
Also the method of transferring electricity wireless has to be improved in order to transfer the electricity from the orbit down to earth.

As far as I'm informed, wireless transfer of electricity currently works over a distance of roughly 30 km.
That range would at least have to be improved by the factor 10 - 100 (depending on the orbit that is going to be used).

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@Dandy

Quote:

For "my" solar panel continuous production through 24 hrs also would be no problem - in an appropriately calculated orbit the sun shines 24 h on all 365 days of the year - no clouds - nothing.

Japan to power 300K homes from space As for 'nothing' don't forget about eclipses, though they are realitively short lived.

Quote:

Furthermore - if the orbit is calculated accordingly - it is possible to reduce the amount of sunlight that heats up desert areas.

Seems a bit too far fetched this would have to be a large item (let's call it a shield). This shield would need to be constructed which means more pollution on earth, a large consumption of natural resources, and the pollution to get it to space. I doubt there's enough money to make this a realistic project.

Quote:

It could help the entire human race if we all could stop thinking within the confines of national boundaries.

I disagree. Nature abhores a vacuum. The world would be run by corporations.

Quote:

Also the method of transferring electricity wireless has to be improved in order to transfer the electricity from the orbit down to earth

Not much improvement needed to a laser or maser.

Last edited by BrianK on 11-Nov-2009 at 03:32 PM.

@Dandy

>Although I really appreciate emission-free production of electricity at such a big scale, I would have preferred they did it with an solar panel in an orbit.
>Admittedly this would be more expensive, but would have the advantage of keeping exactly that amount of solar energy away from planet earth, that we would use to produce electricity this way.

You have got it wrong here.
If energy is collected in space and transferred to earth to be used, it increase earth overheating by delivering even more energy to earth. UC, eventually all used energy tend to turn to heat, energy never disappears, it transforms.

>Keep in mind that from consuming electricity heat is always a by-product.

Mainly it is the end product.

>The idea is to hinder that amount of heat from the sun to reach the surface, that is reased to the environment by using the electricity.

So you mean that the solar panels in space would shadow earth?
It is not possible because those solar panels need to be relatively stationary with the energy receiver antenna on earth. So it needs to spin around (on a geo-stationary orbit) as earth spins around. So it can not shadow earth (except for a few minutes per day or something like that).

BUT. If those panels are on top of sahara desert (10m above the sand). They recycle the energy that already came to earth. Also they shadow the earth beneath the panel, so plants would have better chance in surviving below the panel, instead of being in direct sun light.

>This way energy production would not contribute to the GW - rather in contrary - it could have a net "cooling effect" (as not all of the used electricity is transformed to heat - the other part is transformed to work and the "work part" has the "cooling effect").

There is no cooling possibility. Unless sahara is covered with aluminium folio that reflects heat back to space. (unless there's clouds/CO2 that captures the heat)

Last edited by KimmoK on 11-Nov-2009 at 05:37 PM.

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My god, you pro-Climate Change Myth freaks get more and more scary by the day. You're literally talking about artificially plunging the planet into darkness.

btw, this link is for those even mildly sceptical about this entire "Global Warming" fantasy story.

A bunch of quotes relating to the intentions and agenda of some of the key players in this entire global warming farce. Click Here The already fully brainwashed need not click.