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.... The other thing is you don't know what is around the corner next....
Yea, think about how insane an engineer would have had to have been to think he could control an explosion of volatile fuel inside a small container in order to produce automotive power? Maybe someday we'll all have miniature nuclear reactors under the hood and will have to stop to refuel every few decades or so.
New technology has always seemed to save us in the past, but how long can we count on that? It only took 55 yrs to go from Kitty Hawk to the Moon, but we haven't been back there in almost 50 yrs.
The stone age didn't end because we ran short of rocks. Oil based economies are 20th century technology. Time to move on.
It was time to move on 40-50 years ago, but the oil companies aren't copacetic. You need real leadership for that. President Carter put solar panels on the White House roof. Reagan took them down. And here we still are, muddling along.
Location: We_tside PNW (Columbia Gorge) / CO / SA TX / Thailand
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Yes, the shot across the Bow in 1974 was adequate (and well timed).
We have the technology and reason... just not the incentive (yet).
We had our warning, and we have squandered many an opportunity.
Could be changed tomorrow! I heard the NPR blurb for the great 2024 10% carbon emission reductions (we have been working on for 15 yrs already...) This could be accomplished tomorrow(in a purposed society). (for FREE, rather than hundreds of billions of $ and millions of hrs time wasted (20 yrs!!!) on EZ objectives)
We have the technology and reason... just not the incentive (yet).
One more time, folks (Please try to stay informed.):
Since 1996, despite govt fudging the data and two unusually warm El Nino outlier events, world temps have gone up <0.1deg (that's less than the error range), while atm [co2] rose from 362 to 410 ppm. (If we cherry pick the data and start with 1998, we actually had cooling, not warming.)
Whatever influence co2 has on climate, it's minuscule compared to other factors. Controlling co2 levels should not be a consideration in how, or if, we use our fossil fuels.
While we do have the technology to produce power in alternative ways, those ways are still more expensive, less convenient and have their own set of adverse effects on Nature compared to using fossil fuels.
As the supply of fossil fuel becomes depleted over the next few centuries, its price will rise and unless battery/energy storage technology takes giant steps forward, future generations will need to contend with the adverse consequences of not having a cheap & convenient energy source to power their economy.
Actually temperature is up about 1/2 ° C since 1980.
True.... But my comment was about the last 20 yrs ("The Pause" since 1996)-- essentially no warming despite a 15% rise in co2 levels.
And we're up 2 deg since the end of the Little Ice Age, but the LIA was 4deg cooler than the Medieval Warm Period.
But we've been cooling after the warming ending the last glaciation to the present: the planet passed thru the Holocene Optimum (6degC warmer than now) and we've been cooling off since then. The Little Ice Age was a period of exceptionally cold weather for a century or so (Maunder Minimum Sun cycle and a couple big volcanic eruptions). The recent warming is merely a return to the less severe cooling trend.
True.... But my comment was about the last 20 yrs ("The Pause" since 1996)-- essentially no warming despite a 15% rise in co2 levels.
And we're up 2 deg since the end of the Little Ice Age, but the LIA was 4deg cooler than the Medieval Warm Period.
But we've been cooling after the warming ending the last glaciation to the present: the planet passed thru the Holocene Optimum (6degC warmer than now) and we've been cooling off since then. The Little Ice Age was a period of exceptionally cold weather for a century or so (Maunder Minimum Sun cycle and a couple big volcanic eruptions). The recent warming is merely a return to the less severe cooling trend.
You're wrong about the last 20 year too. Look at the graph. This is the warmest period of recorded history. We are not cooling.
DC- find yourself a graph with better resolution. I've posted them here somewhere for you before. Since 1996, AFTER the NOAA twice "revised" (ie- cheated and changed) the data, there has been only 0.1degC warming--and that's less than the margin of error (ie- statistically non-existent).
Even your graph can be eye-balled to see the 1996 - present interval is flat.
BTW-- Two points (among many considerations) one should note when looking at graphs of temp records:
1) virtually all the yearly warming seen when monthly data is averaged out can be attributed to 1 or 2 extremely warm months each year, with the rest of the year showing no warming at all (cf- a .250 hitter has a quirk 6 for 6 game and his average for the yr finishes at .258 Is he really a better hitter now?) and...
2) the warming trend seen since the late 19th century occurred in steps: several yrs of stable temps followed by 1 or 2 yrs of rising temps, followed by several more yrs of temps stable at the higher average....This is unexplained and could be due strictly to statistical variation and not some fundamental change in the input factors. Accurate records have not been kept for a long enough period to make any definite conclusions.
" The difficulty is to detach the framework of fact—of absolute undeniable fact—from the embellishments of theorists and reporters. Then, having established ourselves upon this sound basis, it is our duty to see what inferences may be drawn and what are the special points upon which the whole mystery turns."-- Sherlock Holmes in The Adventure of Silver BlazeMemoirs of Sherlock Holmes, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
New technology has always seemed to save us in the past, but how long can we count on that? It only took 55 yrs to go from Kitty Hawk to the Moon, but we haven't been back there in almost 50 yrs.
Technology is hardly at stand still. We haven't sent manned missions to the moon because it's enormously expensive, has high risks and has no point. Highlights of space exploration since going to the moon would include a reusable spacecraft, an unmanned rover on mars, ISS, our fist close up glimpse of Pluto, extensive explorations of Saturn/Jupiter and probably most importantly the array of telescopes starting with Hubble that have provided us with more information about the universe than everything else combined.
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