The Truth About Global Warming?

The sun for some reason is getting hotter. Much hotter in fact than it was to be expected. Across the globe children today paint a white sun - we were painting yellow suns back in my youth.

According to the New Scientist (will look up article for reference) warming over time enormously increases CO2 in the atmosphere as it has done several times over in previous geological eras. It had likely become a feedback already. The output of this circuit is presently small but may grow rapidly. On this both deniers and Global Warming supporters agree.

Update: here is the reference: http://www.newscientist.com/article/..-rising-temperatures-bring-their-own-cosub2sub.html , just found following Sepp's reply in the discussion about reconsidering Carbon Credit on openmoney.ning.com.

Another point of agreement it seems is that a huge amount already in the atmosphere has been caused by human activity. Where the two party don't agree is what may be the primary cause of runaway CO2 increase. Warming of the sun - as the entire solar system moves onto higher energy plains in our galaxy - or the industrial level output of humans.

My take is that this Warming - however inconvenient - comes at a crucial point. For years, we have ignored that Earth resources have been over consumed. (Check out my other blogs on the subject.) If we don't stop that practice, we will surely keep adding to the warming feedback circuit by the virtue of unmitigated economic growth. And again, this feedback circuit is directly coinciding with major climatic changes in Earth weather system -- a point that both deniers and supporters agree on.

So the truth about Global Warming is that no matter how unpredictable the final outcome may be, that one of the very first steps of intervention should aim at evening out consumption between nations of the opposing ends of the production chain. Out of mutual interest, these nations will likely be willing to agree on similarly mutual CO2 targets. (See my other recent post on forced Population Reduction - the planetary alternative that has a different approach to life altogether.)

Electric Sun Brightening

The cause for the Electric Sun is a very interesting one. Today I gave some serious thoughts to so called climate change sceptics or global warming sceptics as labelled in the media. And I came away with a mixed bag of thoughts.

The predominant among them is the consequence of an electric weather system on Earth caused by the activities of an ELECTRIC Sun.
But close second is that 'sceptics' don't seem to deny that something is profoundly changing. Instead, they emphasise two plausible axioms: (1) Changes may NOT be irrevocable; and (2) We humans may not contribute to the current rapid climate change as much as we think we do.

In other words, vast greenhouse component in the atmosphere in the past may have been the consequence of global warming and not the cause. Indeed, just thawing permafrost alone could have contributed to a runaway warming that stopped the Gulf stream so many times in the past and in the end triggered ice ages. The cause? Electric Sun proponents possible answer: Vastly increased Sun activity out of literally nowhere. And it comes and goes they say.

We still need to become self-sufficient, as the current overconsumption of Earth is tragically unsustainable. The last time I looked the US was 9-11 times overconsuming Earth's resources per capita. Even Switzerland was overconsuming it 5 times. This means that if the rest of the world would be consuming so hard and fast, we would need 5-11 Earths every single year to meet those demands.

Make no mistake. We WILL run out of affordable oil pretty soon, then gas, then a little later coal. Global warming is occurring and it WILL dramatically reduce the amount of potable fresh water. And we DO contribute to it with all the greenhouse gases that we emit in rapidly increasing quantities.

The only thing different with a view to a vastly brighter Electric Sun is the Sun's contributions to our unfolding drama. But it IS playing out at a scale that is indeed planetary.

If it is any consolation they say, ALL the planets are warming up. And our Sun HAS become vastly more bright in the past decades literally out of nowhere. It was expected to be more intense as the 11 year clockwork period for it has come. But NOT as much as it is NOW.

The Sun in recent decades must be channeling OTHER energy they say, we don't know what kind.

We also don't know, they say, to what extent out weather is electric in nature. But if so, which is not proven but increasing hypothesised, our climate including perhaps the more intense El Nino Southern Oscillation (or ENSO) is a much more a consequence of a so much brighter and more intense electric Sun then previously thought.

Do we need to prepare for a change. Oh yes. Is it going to be big? Oh yes. Will it take at least a millennium (1000 years!) for things go back to normal? You bet! (For instance there may be at least a 1000 years natural delay in the feedback between the Atlantic and the Southern Pacific thermohaline circulation.

So what's the difference between what scientists labelled 'sceptics' say from the vantage point of an Electric Sun. Nothing in terms of what we need to do to slow our appetite and change to renewables. But the difference is big in terms of our guilt and inability to change things back.

Because what they say is that (a) We are not guilty as charged - the Sun is the culprit; and (b) no matter how hard we try, we cannot work against the Sun and hence cannot change climate back.

Quite a food for thought. And the fact that we should not be shameful for all of the current changes as they say is a helpful ploy to ACT. Indeed, it would be so much easier without guilt.

Community Gardens

Community gardens and City Farms are not just about changing climate back. They are about adapting to changing climate in such a way that could be exemplary even after climate consolidated. http://www.placemark.com.au/community-gardens.html
Why you ask? Because the loss of agricultural land is already a reality as well as genetically tempered produce that is out of public control (in part because companies make the the production "blue-print" commercially confidential.)

Add to it that we may start assigning increasing amount of land to growing crops for burning it as fuel just to get from A to B (that is for bio-ethanol or bio-fuel.) That takes them out of the zero sum game, that is the amount of land available globally for agricultural produce. As a result, the intensity with which the public will require clean and controlled production of food produce (and possible hobby plants and cut flowers that are not toxic or contaminated) may in turn increase dramatically - no matter what.

The extending drought and the shortage of irrigation water bringing these gardens to life and making them ever more popular. My hunch is that as they will grow in size they will inevitably specialize. But until then I would like to see them managed for growth or just simply better managed in the face of inherent conflicts of interest implicit in running many of them.

Related links and posts:
Serious problems inside community gardens: http://forums.gardenweb.com/forums/../msg0314133824873.html?15
Over-consumed land and other resources:
changeclimateback.blogspot.com/../problem-with-overconsumption.html

The problem with overconsumption

The problem with overconsumption is the overuse of global resources NOT local products. There is only so much resource the Planet can afford for a person. That amount is a zero sum (what goes in should come out) and the Planet is pretty unapologetic about that. Presently we are overeating that amount by an unhealthy margin. There is little offering solace for change.

The area needed to support one person including aquaculture, mining, agriculture and energy generation is called a per capita global hectare. It has been calculated and the figures are not pretty. Equally spread accross countries our Earth can afford 1.8 hectare per person. Presently we are using 2.2 per capita - that is 122% of all available global resources. And we cannot stretch the Planet to make it 22 percent bigger just to fit.

Now let's put that into perspective ...

If you are eating more than your body can burn - recycle it in the form of useful energy - you go fat. Then is a good idea to lose weight. But what if you that frequently. Well, the bad news is that if you can't sustain weight loss, you are going to consume EVEN MORE global resources. You will frequently spend your hard earn money for EXTRA the global resources that go into your weight loss package. It's that simple even though the calculations I imagine would be quite complex.

Similarly, if we were to go off oil globally and change to ethanol this in itself could be a poor result. Why? Because the impact on global resource consumption could actually INCREASE. Because we would need to grow immense amount of canola and other crop additionally to what we already consume just to burn it for getting from A to B. Don't get me wrong. I do think we need to use less oil. That would definitely impact LESS our global resources - no one argues that. But we would need to take that reduced usage state and convert it into someting else with similarly REDUCED loads on global resources My hunch is that if the amount of cars used keep increasing - which is likely given that the largest economies are predicted to double in the foreseeable future - then the amount of global resources consumed per capita is on the increase.

Positive growth and increase in consumption ...

Currently we measure growth with the increase of consumption. If consumption grows most economists are happy as Larry. They look at a basket of stuff we consume and they measure positive changes. By the way, in that basket cars figure prominently. And it is not likely to change any time soon.

Keep that unchanged and the planet may keep going to be overconsumed. If we just get drunk on food and fuel - and it doesn't really matter if that food or fuel is designed to trim - overconsumption is here to stay.

If your belly grows when you want to trim it you register that as a negative change. Similarly, some growth should count negative if it goes into overconsumption. So even though there would be so and so much more cars produced a portion of it should count as a negative growth, not positive.

Change your life-style - so you can GET a life ...

Now there is a good thing to be learnt from diet designers' pitch.
They all talk about the need of life-style change. Change your life so you can GET a life, the chant goes.

Actually, same should go for the Planet WITH US INCLUDED.

Change your lifestyle to GIVE life to the Planet first - and we'll all get a life BACK.