Global Warming & Climate Change Lies #2 plus Peak Oil
Yesterday, on my drive to a meeting, I saw an incredible sight: gasoline prices of $3.25 per gallon! On was so shocked at the high price, I stopped on my way home, and took a picture of the $3.25/gal sign at the BP station. Then, I stopped at another gas station, and took another picture of $3.25/gal sign.
I thought to myself that it is time to do another peak oil presentation. The last one I did was in August. I've learned a lot since then, and am ready to create a new presentation. I've actually been thinking about designing a course, similar to a college course, about peak oil.
Of course, global warming and peak oil can not be seperated. In the NPR story from Friday, it was very clear that burning anything with carbon will create CO2. Peak Oil is all about the rate at which we are burning fossil fuels. Global Warming is all about the impacts that CO2 is having, and will have on the world, and humanity. The two topics are like two sides of the same coin. There is no way to seperate them while giving the entire story.
The lie about global warming that I just realized is the following...
"We can reduce global warming by conserving and reducing our use of fossil fuels."
LIE!!!
This lie is insidious because it leads people to believe that reducing consumption will lead to less greenhouse gas emmissions. Let's step back for a second and think about that.
1. There is an absolute total of all fossils fuels. That fossil fuel represents a massive amount of carbon that has been stored in the earth.
2. We humans are burning the fossils fuels up at the fastest rate in the history of earth. We are on track to burn every bit of fossil fuels that we can manage to extract from the earth.
3. If we burn all the fossil fuels, we will probably destroy the earth, by pushing the temperature so high that almost all life on earth will die.
So, the only way we can save the earth is to STOP BURNING up the fossil fuels. It is not enough to slow down our individual consumption. We must slow down the TOTAL burning globally. In fact, our goal must be to NEVER burn up all the fossil fuels.
What that means is that we have to leave the fossil fuels in the ground. The more we leave in the ground, the more global warming we will have prevented. We have to leave the coal where it is. We have to leave the petroleum where it is. We have to leave the shale rock (oil shale) and bituman (tar sands) where they are. If we burn them all up, we will be the ones that get burned... and our children... and humanity... and all life.
In fact, we have zero evidence that there is life anywhere else in the Universe. Who knows, if we burned it all up, we might extinguish all life from the Universe.
Hmm, well, maybe not. There may be bacteria and other lower organizms that can survive. Or perhaps burning up all the fossil fuels will only raise Earth's temperature by 10 degrees. I'd like to know the answer to this.
The lie is that we can continue to burn up the fossil fuels and also "combat" global warming.
The truth is that practically everything that we burn (fossil fuels, bio-mass, anything with carbon) creates carbon dioxide. The more we burn, the more CO2. The more CO@, the warmer the atmosphere and the earth. Period.
Now, there is one thing that is proposed as an alternate solution to this problem, specifically, capture the CO2. How to do that? With power plants, the idea is to pump the CO2 into the earth. This sound like an interesting idea. I would like to know more about it. As far as I know, this idea has not prevented even 1% of CO2 from going into the atmosphere. So, I would mark this in the "fantasy" column at the moment.
The other option is reforesting the planet. Over the past few thousand years, and particularly in the last few hundred, humans have deforested the planet. Almost every one of us is currently living in a place that once was lush forest. Forests absorb massive amounts of carbon dioxide. Again, I don't know the exact figures, and am quite curious, but this seems like a solution that deserves intense exploration.
The lie, that we can stop global warming by slowing the burn.
When thinking of global warming, ask yourself... how much of the total fossil fuels should humanity be allowed to burn? All that they can get to? Half of that? A quarter of that? No more than twice we've burned thus far? No more than 50% more?
Then ask yourself, will the solutions that are being proposed get us to that goal? Will lowering the speed limit get us there? Will putting up wind turbines get us there? What do we have to do to get to that goal?
I thought to myself that it is time to do another peak oil presentation. The last one I did was in August. I've learned a lot since then, and am ready to create a new presentation. I've actually been thinking about designing a course, similar to a college course, about peak oil.
Of course, global warming and peak oil can not be seperated. In the NPR story from Friday, it was very clear that burning anything with carbon will create CO2. Peak Oil is all about the rate at which we are burning fossil fuels. Global Warming is all about the impacts that CO2 is having, and will have on the world, and humanity. The two topics are like two sides of the same coin. There is no way to seperate them while giving the entire story.
The lie about global warming that I just realized is the following...
"We can reduce global warming by conserving and reducing our use of fossil fuels."
LIE!!!
This lie is insidious because it leads people to believe that reducing consumption will lead to less greenhouse gas emmissions. Let's step back for a second and think about that.
1. There is an absolute total of all fossils fuels. That fossil fuel represents a massive amount of carbon that has been stored in the earth.
2. We humans are burning the fossils fuels up at the fastest rate in the history of earth. We are on track to burn every bit of fossil fuels that we can manage to extract from the earth.
3. If we burn all the fossil fuels, we will probably destroy the earth, by pushing the temperature so high that almost all life on earth will die.
So, the only way we can save the earth is to STOP BURNING up the fossil fuels. It is not enough to slow down our individual consumption. We must slow down the TOTAL burning globally. In fact, our goal must be to NEVER burn up all the fossil fuels.
What that means is that we have to leave the fossil fuels in the ground. The more we leave in the ground, the more global warming we will have prevented. We have to leave the coal where it is. We have to leave the petroleum where it is. We have to leave the shale rock (oil shale) and bituman (tar sands) where they are. If we burn them all up, we will be the ones that get burned... and our children... and humanity... and all life.
In fact, we have zero evidence that there is life anywhere else in the Universe. Who knows, if we burned it all up, we might extinguish all life from the Universe.
Hmm, well, maybe not. There may be bacteria and other lower organizms that can survive. Or perhaps burning up all the fossil fuels will only raise Earth's temperature by 10 degrees. I'd like to know the answer to this.
The lie is that we can continue to burn up the fossil fuels and also "combat" global warming.
The truth is that practically everything that we burn (fossil fuels, bio-mass, anything with carbon) creates carbon dioxide. The more we burn, the more CO2. The more CO@, the warmer the atmosphere and the earth. Period.
Now, there is one thing that is proposed as an alternate solution to this problem, specifically, capture the CO2. How to do that? With power plants, the idea is to pump the CO2 into the earth. This sound like an interesting idea. I would like to know more about it. As far as I know, this idea has not prevented even 1% of CO2 from going into the atmosphere. So, I would mark this in the "fantasy" column at the moment.
The other option is reforesting the planet. Over the past few thousand years, and particularly in the last few hundred, humans have deforested the planet. Almost every one of us is currently living in a place that once was lush forest. Forests absorb massive amounts of carbon dioxide. Again, I don't know the exact figures, and am quite curious, but this seems like a solution that deserves intense exploration.
The lie, that we can stop global warming by slowing the burn.
When thinking of global warming, ask yourself... how much of the total fossil fuels should humanity be allowed to burn? All that they can get to? Half of that? A quarter of that? No more than twice we've burned thus far? No more than 50% more?
Then ask yourself, will the solutions that are being proposed get us to that goal? Will lowering the speed limit get us there? Will putting up wind turbines get us there? What do we have to do to get to that goal?