CO2 and the global temperatures

[Suff]

As you know I've been tracking CO2 levels as well as global temperature rise and the arctic ice extent and area.

It's another month gone and time to check the CO2 emissions levels again. I pulled up the table and the global one finally had December 2015 in it. It looked high to me so I checked the long run results table and got a surprise..

These data are here .

To digress a little, we've had some pretty intense hot periods, globally, over the last few decades. Checking out the table for those I know returns a fairly predictable result. In the hot years there is a spike of CO2 either in the year of the heat or the year before.

If we go to 1988 we see a huge spike in 1987 followed by a high year in 1998 also. That huge spike in 97 is really huge as it was only the second time that CO2 levels raised more than 2ppm (2.6 in 87) over the entire record to that time.

Then we come to 1998 which, I'm sure, we all remember. You might also remember the forest fires in 97 in Indonesia and the peat burning which choked half of Asia for 4 months. 98 was the highest growth level of CO2 in one year ever recorded (2.82) and also a 100 year spike in global temperatures.

Wind forward to 2003 and you get the same thing but in a much lower value.

So, after that long winded diatribe, what is it about 2015 that got me? Well it goes like this. 2014 was the warmest year on record to that time at about .08C higher than the long term average. 2015, on the other hand, was immediately following with a warmest year on record. But it broke two records. It was the warmest year on record and also the largest jump over the long term average by 1.6C.

So why did I write this story. Because when the December figures came in, the jump I noticed was clearer in the numbers. It hit a third record in 2015. 3.01ppm CO2 increase in one year. That's a few billion tonnes of CO2 MORE than we put in the year before.

All those fancy low power light bulbs. All that solar stuff. All that biomass, all those EV cars and what do we have to show for it? We put more CO2 into the atmosphere in 2015, in one year, than we have ever put in it before... If you look at the long term trend, when Kyoto was agreed, the average rise per year, per decade, was 1.5. This year the average for the 2010's based on 5 years only is 2.3. Some progress. I'm pretty sure that when we hit the end of the 2010's that 2.3 is going to be much more like 2.5. Which will be a full 1ppm average annual increase over what we saw before Kyoto.

Just to put a nice slant on it. ALL of the UN climate models assume we will slow down and stop increasing our CO2 output. ALL of them. All the projections they make are based on the premise that we won't keep digging our own grave faster.

Tells you how accurate those predictions are going to be doesn't it. There is nothing rosy in this story. The news is all bad all the way.

[Aggers]

Like you, Suff, I haven't much hope that the human race will change their ways to tackle this problem.
We will all go on in exactly the same way until it is too late.

When one considers the millions of cars on the move, worldwide, and the number of planes and ships, one cannot help thinking that planet Earth, to an alien visitor, would bear a resemblance to a disturbed ants' nest. A lot of this activity is really unnecessary, but because it can be done we have to keep doing it, and with no thought for the consequences.

It can't go on like this indefinitely, surely? I certainly don't envy future generations. The time will come, probably sooner than we think, when it will become too late to resuscitate Planet Earth. There will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.

[Suff]

I like to point out the discrepancy between what is being said and what is being done and also what is happening against the stated goals for what is being done.

Only by understanding that can we demand the right action from our politicians.

However I have no faith that the human race will step back from the brink and change what it is doing. Not just the industrialised countries but also the poor countries who consume the output of those industrialised countries and keep producing ever more people they can't afford to feed.

[Workingman]

Reading an article on premature deaths due to air pollution I came across this from Chandra Venkataraman, from the Indian Institute of Technology Bombay, in Mumbai:

"Despite proposed emissions control, there is significant growth in the demand for electricity as well as industrial production.

"So, through to 2050, this growth overshadows the emissions controls (in our projections) and will lead to an increase in future air pollutant emissions in 2050 in India."

Between them India and China (with others) are becoming (have become) the World's producers and polluters by proxy. We clever so-and-sos in the 1st world might be patting ourselves on our backs, but all we have really done is moved our pollution overseas.

Global population continues to rise and, as the man says, this will inevitably lead to more production and more pollution not to mention the depletion of Earth's resources.

[Aggers]

Between them India and China (with others) are becoming (have become) the World's producers and polluters by proxy. We clever so-and-sos in the 1st world might be patting ourselves on our backs, but all we have really done is moved our pollution overseas.
.

That is very true, but what can we do about it - stop buying from these new World's producers and
go back to ancient lifestyles without all the mod-coms we now expect? The answer would undoubtedly
be, 'Not on your Nelly'. I'm afraid I can't see any reasonable answer to this situation.

[Workingman]

I'm afraid I can't see any reasonable answer to this situation.

Nor can I, John.

I have come to the conclusion that scientists and politicians can have as many conferences, meetings, debates and symposiums as they like, but we will only stop when the raw materials run out. Even that might not be enough.

I was reading the other day that plans are approaching the advanced stages to mine asteroids for their rare-earth metals needed to make our electronic gadgets and gizmos. A few "scientific" mission have already proved the technology exists.

[Aggers]

I was reading the other day that plans are approaching the advanced stages to mine asteroids for their rare-earth metals needed to make our electronic gadgets and gizmos. A few "scientific" mission have already proved the technology exists.

Good gracious! What ever next ?

[Suff]

Given that there is a whole planets worth of minerals, water and gasses out there in the asteroid belt, I would be surprised if there were not plans to mine them. After all, it would be simple to nudge them into Lunar orbit, smelt or break them up using solar power from 24x7 on solar grids, then drop the refined materials down into the gravity well for use, or even manufacture in space and only drop the finished articles back into the gravity well.

There are two major drawbacks to mining the asteroids so far.

1. The sheer time required to get there and back
2. Solar flares which are life threatening without artificial Van Allen belts to ward them off.

The first is being dealt with by trying to create engines which emit small amounts of gasses close to the speed of light. I'm convinced the other one is being addressed by a combination of robotics and advanced bases on the Moon and Mars. Mining the asteroids via teleoperation from Mars would be much easier than Earth.

None of these are insuperable barriers to our current level of technology. Only our current level of funding. When the first solid Gold or Platinum asteroid is brought in, the rush will begin and the money will be found. Although diamond bearing carbon asteroids may be easier to get back and still cause the same rush.

What would be of bigger import to our current state of materials would be an asteroid of a few hundred square miles which was almost completely Iron. Ditto a few of the more scarce metals, Titanium, Copper, etc...

[Workingman]

Yes, Suff, all of it technically possible and it all ties in well with the other thread.

So, we have driverless cars, pilotless drones, a huge amount of work with artificial intelligence (AI) the same with robotics. And what exactly are the experiments being carried out on the space station?

I see that Luxembourg has placed itself as the de facto issuer of space mining permits.

What all this will do for, or against, planet Earth and its inhabitants is anybody's guess.

[Suff]

What all this will do for, or against, planet Earth and its inhabitants is anybody's guess.

Seems I was a bit ott about the size of the belt. The mass is about half Pluto’s moon. But still significant for all that.

I always get suspicious when government “bodies” set themselves up to “license” large chunks of the solar system….