Hottest

Have we passed the tipping point for runaway climate change?

The evidence is still "hotly" debated. (Ow! Pun damage!)

The biggest clue will be a massive release of methane into the atmosphere, due to the melting of permafrost and ocean deposits of ice. Once the methane starts to bubble up from the continental shelves in large amounts, the process escalates on its own. At that point, nothing we do can stop it.

We know what will happen, because it happened before. The PT Mass Extinction Event. (Note: there is a lot of information about this on the internet. Google it and read as much about it as you can stand. It is worth knowing.)

The part about the greenhouse-like warming of the atmosphere and oceans is not hard to grasp. But what caused the oxygen to go away? The O2 content at the end of the Permian was close to 30%. Within a million years it had dropped to 10%. This means it was not the heat or climate change or habitat change that killed off more than 99% of all life on Earth at that time. Most creatures just suffocated, or at least became so weak from lack of oxygen that they could not survive.

Again, methane is the key. When you release methane into an oxygen-rich atmosphere, it degrades over time, becoming CO2 and water vapor.

Huh? How does that happen? And what does that have to do with oxygen?

Methane molecules are the simplest form of hydrocarbon. CH4. That means 1 carbon atom plus 4 hydrogen atoms. The free oxygen in our atmosphere is in the form of O2, that means 2 oxygen atoms bound together to make a molecule. In order for methane to change into carbon dioxide and water, it needs to suck up 2 oxygen molecules. That means each molecule of methane will take 2 molecules of oxygen out of our atmosphere.

Both CO2 and water vapor in the lower atmosphere also act as greenhouse gases, so just because the methane eventually goes away does not mean things go back to normal.

But this whole scenario will take about a million years to play out, right?

Burning fossil fuels has been converting O2 to CO2 since the start of the industrial age, so have seen some loss of oxygen already.

When the methane surge hits, that process will be accelerated.

And remember, once the atmospheric oxygen drops below 19.5%, people will start passing out on the street from hypoxia.

That's not a 20% drop. That's only half a percent.

We don't have a million years.

Burning the Future

Coal supplies over half the electricity used in the United States. Where does all that coal come from?

There is a movie you need to see:

Burning The Future: Coal in America - Trailer from coalmovie on Vimeo.

If you're interested, more information can be found here:

Appalachian Voice Front Porch Blog

Coal Moratorium Now!

Portal: Coal Issues - SourceWatch

700 Mountains

Ohio Valley Environmental Coalition

Fossil Fuel Power Plant

How Stuff Works: How much coal...

We need other ways to make electricity than burning hydrocarbons!

Bio-Fuel FTL

The two biggest problems currently facing humanity are Peak Oil and the Climate Crisis.

These problems would appear to have a similar solution: stop burning fuel.

It doesn't get much simpler than that, right?

There are ways to do that, like investing in solar and wind power, and drive electric cars.

Some people think that bio-diesel and ethanol, used as fuels to replace petroleum-based fuels, are viable solutions as well. Not so.

Millions of acres of rain forest are being cut down to make room for palm-oil and soy bean plantations - to make bio-diesel and ethanol for fuel. But, since we need the rain forests for their photosynthesis (CO2 -> O2), destroying them just makes things worse.

And, in the end, you are still burning fuel that produces carbon dioxide.

Hydrogen Fuel Cells are another power source being proposed. This is great, as long as you don't make the hydrogen out of petro-chemicals, which makes more carbon dioxide during processing. In any case, hydrogen is considered an energy carrier, rather than an energy source, because it requires energy from other sources to produce it. You might as well be running on batteries.

Which brings us to electric cars. Check out these manufacturers:

http://www.teslamotors.com/
http://www.zapworld.com/

and, of course:

http://www.chevrolet.com/electriccar/

Order yours today.

The Earth is Not Enough

Too many eggs for this basket.

Let them eat omelets...

The Most Terrifying Video You'll Ever See!

What's so scary about a geek with a whiteboard?

Nothing.

What's scary is that column B is still being chosen.

(Note: want more? This guy did a whole series of videos. Google "wonderingmind42" and see them all.)

Too much trouble...

Oh, I'm sorry. Are you too busy to save the planet, America?

Live most Americans, I got cable TV, with more channels than I can flip through in ten minutes. (FUCK! My thumb hurts!)

So, the Live Earth concert, 24-hours of live music from top performers all over the globe, for the sole cause of alerting people to the danger of global warming, should be all over the dial, right? RIGHT??

Let's do a quick scan: I can see it on the Sundance Channel (you'd expect that, obviously), BRAVO (another artsy-fartsy channel), and Canadian TV. Canada, in fact, is covering the event with six channels at once, only one of which I can get down here.

I guess American corporate-controlled media thinks the planet is just going to take care of itself, and the only viewers who give a damn are the artsy-fartsy intellectuals.

Does that mean the entire population of Canada is smarter than the people of the USA?

No, only the ones with cable TV.

Weather or not...

The Bellingham/Northwestern Washington area has been beset with some serious snow. The majority of it fell on Sunday, just in time to hinder people coming back from Thanksgiving vacation. Here it is Wednesday, and the white stuff is still here.

Boredom is setting in for the snowbound. Cabin fever, I think it is called.

There is only so much cable TV one can watch. Only so much World of Warcraft one can play.

Maybe I'll post something on my blog...

Nah.

Congratulations!

Survived another year? Good for us!

That's for the glass-half-full crowd. For me, I look at it as another year closer to the eventual end of the world, not to mention one year closer to death for me.

We still have things to worry about:

-- A rampaging budget deficit that shows no sign of slowing the United States' descent into national bankruptsy.

-- We still have a President who lacks any resemblance of common sense or decency. They tried to impeach Clinton for less (Getting a bj in the White House, and lying about it, has no comparison to starting a war on false pretenses - and then lying about it).

-- The media still seems to be more focused on Hollywood gossip than hardline reporting of events that effect the nation. Where are the Woodwards and Bernsteins for this generation?

-- The poor are still getting poorer and the rich are still getting richer. Granted, this has been the way of the world since the days of Babylon and Sumer, but the rate seems to be accellerating at an unprecidented pace.

-- We have 6 more years before the start of the next Mega-Ice Age, unless it is counter-acted by Global Warming (though there is some evidence that Global Warming might actually trigger an Ice Age - the debate continues...).

This is just my opinion, of course. You don't have to worry about any of this stuff.

Have some more bread, and enjoy the circus.

On the other hand...

I did not mean to imply that New Orleans should not be rebuilt. Sorry if that's what came across.

New Orleans should be rebuilt BETTER than it was.

Start by bulldozing the buildings ruined by water, wind, fire, and toxic mold. Then, make those places that were below sea-level into sanitary landfills - to raise them up to a safe level to avoid such further flooding. THEN rebuild on the site.

No more shanty-towns, people. No more substandard housing for the poor. Build low-income housing that is up to code and fit for people to live in.

oh, and strong enough to survive a hurricane, if you please.

Between blows...

Katrina was the worst hurricane to hit NOLA in a very long time. So far.

I've been saying for years that the overall effect of global warning will be to make our weather more energetic - particularly hurricanes, which are essentially heat-driven.

The hurricane season is not over for this year. And what about the next?

New Orleans was a very pretty little city. It will take a lot of money to rebuild it. Even more the next time. And the next.

At what point do you give up and move the tourist traps to Baton Rouge (which is French for red stick)?