82 replies to this topic

[Snoqualmie guy]

So you base that the world is getting warmer by just eight years? Maybe it's just a cycle. Eight years doesn't make a huge difference when the world has been around for about six thousend.

[k2skier]

Skier, on May 12 2008, 02:19 PM, said:

Well I hope no one is denying that the Earth is warming. The 8 hottest years in this century were in the past decade, even if some places are actually getting cooler.

The bigger questions are whether humans are causing it and whether it is more extreme than any natural variation. I don't know the answer to these questions, but I do know that we are altering the planet in ways I think we shouldn't. So I choose to believe the scientists who are warning us about this. Even if it turns out that the Earth can somehow absorb the excess carbon that we are creating without getting warmer, I would rather our government acted now and turned out to be wrong than to ignore the problem until it is impossible to fix.

As far as ozone and rainforests, those problems didn't simply go away on their own. The ozone problem is fixed because the world powers got together and banned CFC's. And since when is rainforest deforestation a problem that we are no longer concerned about? It is unfair to link these completely unrelated world problems to global warming.

As for environmentalism being a religion, sustainability is something I wish we would all think about without government intervention. However, as with the ozone example you mentioned yourself, it took government regulation to fix the problem. The Clean Air Act and the Clean WaterAct are other examples.

100% Spot on! SUSTAINABILITY!!!!!!!!!!!! I laughed out loud, and cried a little inside, when callao compared the "global weather anomalies effected by planetary warming" (which is what has happened since our planet has warmed up, and is a more accurate description than "global warming") to deforestation.

[k2skier]

Snoqualmie guy, on May 12 2008, 04:00 PM, said:

So you base that the world is getting warmer by just eight years? Maybe it's just a cycle. Eight years doesn't make a huge difference when the world has been around for about six thousend.

All real scientists are using recorded data starting from 1880's, when the first temptratures were being recorded. What Skier said was the hottest years ever (last 100 years) have occurred in the last 8. Reread the post and don't take Skier's wording out of text, you start to sound like a Republican when you do.

6,000 years, LOL LOL LOL. You flat earther No wonder you don't believe the scientists, because they say the earth has been around about 4.5 billion years.

This post has been edited by k2skier: 12 May 2008 - 03:32 PM

[Peter]

Snoqualmie guy, on May 12 2008, 04:00 PM, said:

So you base that the world is getting warmer by just eight years? Maybe it's just a cycle. Eight years doesn't make a huge difference when the world has been around for about six thousend.

I am really trying not to lose it with you.

The Earth is 4.54 billion years old, not 6,000!

And no, the planet is not warming just in the past 8 years.

Here is the very basic evidence for global warming:

This is a graph showing CO2 and Temperature over the past 400,000 years. Clearly there is a correlation.
 co2_vs_temp.jpg (80.12K)
Number of downloads: 11
The CO2 level has never gone above 300 parts per million in the past 400,000 years, and today we are at 385 ppm and rising by 3 ppm per year. (The graph is a few years old)

So, the big assumption is that now that the CO2 level is way up, the temperature will rise too because they have historically correlated. I can't tell you whether that is actually going to happen, but the prudent thing to do in my opinion would be to act as if it will happen unless we act.

This post has been edited by Skier: 12 May 2008 - 03:32 PM

[k2skier]

On the page that opens with this link it show the North Pole ice sheet from 1979 to 2007. When the ice melts the planet also loses much of the solar reflectivity associated with the white coverage and the planet warms even more. I've aways said, this isn't a "chicken little" situation where the world is coming to an end and we need to resort to drastic measures, but we should error on the side of caution and take steps toward more sustainable living practices.

http://nsidc.org/abo...e/overview.html

[Snoqualmie guy]

Mjturly, what was your point?

Skier, how do you know the world is 4.5 million years old?

[SkiBachelor]

Snoqualmie guy, on May 12 2008, 10:29 PM, said:

Mjturly, what was your point?

Skier, how do you know the world is 4.5 million years old?

Because this is what Carbon Dating has proved from rocks coming up from the mantle. Also, an easy to tell how the World is older than 6000 years is from fjords, especially the ones in Norway. The rate that ice moves to carve out a valley would take a super long time, more than 6000 years.

http://en.wikipedia....i/Carbon_dating

[Emax]

"Eight years doesn't make a huge difference when the world has been around for about six thousend."

"...how do you know the world is 4.5 million years old?"

RED FLAG !

Oh, please tell me that you don't buy into this sort of nonsense. If you actually do, then I suspect that you also doubt the macabre events that took place in Germany and Austria between 1935 and 1945... that Dwight Eisenhower's films were fakes.

[Snoqualmie guy]

Emax if you are refering to WWII, I know what that is but if you are not, then you lost me.

Mjturley, I wish I knew everything, but just like everyone else, I don't.

[tram mechanic]

wow, this thread has really gone south. I think most of us actually care about the environment here, even though our work, with ski areas, essentially, scars it, abuses it, morphs it into something more...still, we may hike or ride lifts, but we like gravity sports, and Ipods, and the internet....

Anyways, there was a presentation at RMLA of Jiminy Peaks' wind turbine project and I sat next to a bearing rep who told me of their sales to TMA Wind, which is a company doing vertical axis turbines, and he also told me of back-orders of 3 years for bearings for some of the mfgrs. of mega-watt turbines.

Sustainability is the key here, cost analysis by you number crunchers out there, watt-for-watt energy use for all of what we do.

Here is an example of a smaller scale installation by folks I know in Scotland. It's a Proven, down-wind, horizontal turbine on a tilt-up monopole tower. Small installations like this can make a difference for small areas.

Attached File(s)

•  ProvenRona4.jpg (64.66K)
  Number of downloads: 11
•  ProvenRona2.jpg (50.07K)
  Number of downloads: 12

[Callao]

k2skier, on May 12 2008, 05:14 PM, said:

100% Spot on! SUSTAINABILITY!!!!!!!!!!!! I laughed out loud, and cried a little inside, when callao compared the "global weather anomalies effected by planetary warming" (which is what has happened since our planet has warmed up, and is a more accurate description than "global warming") to deforestation.

Tram mechanic is right--this thread has fallen in quality. K2skier, I never said such a thing--but you put my name on the above "quote". How unprofessional. Please refer back to post #59 and review what I really said. Can't we disagree, and still be decent and respectful? I'm seeing a lot of childish jabs here--especially from the more-seasoned and "mature role-model" members of this forum.

The earth is warming-- at least the data I've seen at sites around Utah suggests so. Can we so quickly pin a cause to the apparent effect? Correlation does not imply causation. Many in the forum are stating that we should be more careful with the environment. I agree! But I would call on these conservative thinkers to also be more careful in their hasty conclusions. Sustainable conclusions are very important--but they can only be based on a foundation of sustainable information.

The climate is definitely something to watch. As a problem, however, it pales in comparison to a greater societal problem which is being manifest right here in this very thread. Let's be as careful with each other as we would to the environment in which we live. For it is we that must be united if any good conclusion or goal is to be carried out successfully.

[k2skier]

That was my quote, not yours. I apologize for the confusion in my post

This is what you said.

Callao, on May 4 2008, 11:36 PM, said:

Surely we can drop the population explosion thing by now. Consider that news people have to have something to report about, and the topics have changed over the course of the decades. Through the 1970's, the world was concerned about the population explosion. In the 1980's we were all concerned about the disappearing ozone, and the disappearing rain forests in the 1990's. Each time, people charted graphs, and then made huge extrapolation errors simply because of the lack of data. Now that we have more data, we aren't so concerned--so lets get concerned about a new problem.

Awe, Enter global warming. This is a trend! I've seen the data (not by personal observation, which is a stupid way to track change, but by looking at the hard numbers) for a few local sites, and I see warming. And I can also see why there is dispute about what is going on. Thousands of data points (ie daily temperature observations) over decades and decades--and not just at one site, but at thousands more. True, we've seen warming at many sites here in Utah, after a cooling period during the 1960's and 70's. Let's blame it on something.

Don't you see? This is the latest fad! We extrapolate and extrapolate--and then extrapolate some more for interesting news. At the rate of warming that occurred this morning between 9:00 and 11:00, we will hit a million degrees by 2009, and all the polar bears will have drowned in the Arctic Ocean. "Green" is the newest purr-word. If you are not green by now, you are ignorant--or so they say. Sure, why don't you just save my farm from me, its steward? Sure, tell me what I can and cannot do. Who do you think you are? If you want to be green, then go ahead and do it. Stop pushing your religion on me.

WorldPop.JPG
Figure 1. Long-term world population growth, 1750-2050. (Source: United Nations Population Division, ''The World at Six Billion'')

You try to make a point about global warming being a trend, using overpopulation (which is still a global problem now), the ozone (which could have been catastrophic if CFC's weren't banned), and deforestation (which is a HUGE problem we face now with Korea,Thailand and Brazil (and others) mowing down ancient forests) as examples of said trend.

I said that I don't like the label "global warming", I prefer to use the term "global weather anomalies". Heating up the planet causes many dynamic changes in our planets weather. And to say it's nothing more than a trend (media driven?) is absurd, (it's also a very selfish and short-sighted viewpoint). The only debatable part of global warming is; "how much is influenced by man?"

I am also blown away with the number of folks in this business (IE;outdoor lifestyle) that are dependent on a good snow pack who say we need to wait and watch to see if this warming up of the planet will be a problem. If we don't act now some say we will reach a tipping point in 10-15 years when it may it will be irreversible. We are reducing the planet's carbon sinks, while increasing carbon sources at an alarmingly fast rate.

The key to this planet's survival lies in it's water quality. The frozen ends are what keep it in balance. If the ice caps don't rebound within a few years...

As many trying to disprove human caused global warming have shown, the planet's temperatures have fluctuated widely in 4.5 billion years, BUT, there have been few rapid increases like were seeing now that haven't caused serious effects on the life/living things on the planet.

This post has been edited by k2skier: 14 May 2008 - 08:14 AM

[k2skier]

Can anyone discredit NOAA's data?

http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/oa/climate/resear.../mar/mar08.html

Global Highlights
The global surface (land and ocean surface) temperature was the 2nd warmest on record for March in the 129-year record, 1.28° F (0.71° C) above the 20th century mean of 54.9° F (12.7° C). The warmest March on record (+1.33° F/0.74° C) occurred in 2002.

The global land surface temperature was the warmest on record for March, 3.3° F (1.8° C) above the 20th century mean of 40.8° F (5.0° C). Temperatures more than 8° F above average covered much of the Asian continent. Two months after the greatest January snow cover extent on record on the Eurasian continent, the unusually warm temperatures led to rapid snow melt, and March snow cover extent on the Eurasian continent was the lowest on record.

Although the ocean surface average was only the 13th warmest on record, as the cooling influence of La Niña in the tropical Pacific continued, much warmer than average conditions across large parts of Eurasia helped push the global average to a near record high for March.

Northern Hemisphere snow cover extent was the fourth lowest on record for March, remaining consistent with boreal spring conditions of the past two decades, in which warming temperatures have contributed to anomalously low snow cover extent.

Some weakening of La Niña, the cold phase of the El Niño-Southern Oscillation, occurred in March, but moderate La Niña conditions remained across the tropical Pacific Ocean.

This post has been edited by k2skier: 14 May 2008 - 01:02 PM

[Snoqualmie guy]

mjturley34, on May 13 2008, 07:36 PM, said:

Ok Sgt. Schultz. It's too bad you think you know something

And I assume you are saying that I no nothing?

[zeedotcom]

Going back to the chart correlating carbon dioxide and temperature in post 65. Yes, increases in temperature appear to come from increases in carbon dioxide (or the reverse, but it is irrelevant to my point). We also see that temps seem to go up rapidly and then cool down again. It is a cycle. Are we screwing up our planet? Almost definitely. But it does seem that global warming is a cycle of sorts. What we need to do, as the cycle looks to be inevitable (seeing as there were no cars 400,000 years ago to produce emissions) is determine how best to prepare for the change, and how to keep it from being so severe as to wipe out populations, etc.

Another point of discussion, seeing as how everyone is correcting everyone else about stuff: Carbon dating. I was a physics major for a year (before being a math major for a semester and then going to Breck for a weekend) and I seem to recall (though it has been a while so I may be wrong) that it is based on the number of atoms of a certain radioactive isotope of Carbon that has stayed, theoretically, constant. As this passes its "half life" and decays into other isotopes or elements, we can measure the amount of this isotope left (I believe it is carbon-14) and calculate how many "half lives" have elapsed. 2 issues, this only works with carbon based life forms that obtain air from the environment and store carbon, so minerals can't be carbon dated. The other is that after a certain amount of time, all of the unique isotope as expired. Eight divided by 2 is 4. 4 divided by 2 is 2. 2 divided by 2 is 1. Eventually that 1 disappears so you can only carbon date back to a certain point, which I don't recall being anywhere near 4 billion years.

[skierdude9450]

It's amazing what a topic turns into if you don't watch it for a month!!!! Just a random topic about turning your lights off for an hour turned into a literally heated discussion about global warming and various earth science. Who'd a thunk it? If you didn't spend so much time arguing over minor points such as the age of the earth while your computers are using up to a KW per hour we might not be in this mess.

$0.03