Mitigation and Global Warming

It seems that there is some question about what I believe. Frankly, not much. I do have some things I know and some theories that come from what I have seen. I don’t understand faith and hope, they seem like tools of deceit. When it comes to global warming we are asked to believe a lot.

Now, I don’t know how much humans have contributed to global warming, I believe a great deal, but not where folks think or tell us. I also believe that some of the science is faulty, not because of errors in the data, but, errors in the question. This leads to misinterpretation of that data or collection of meaningless data. And I believe that there is no mitigation of a problem that hasn’t had a causal definition. I believe there is no mitigation because my numbers show a run-away train that is gaining speed as it heads down the mountain. In my opinion it is stupid to play the game of “greenness” to enrich the oil companies and banks with things like ethanol (that require more energy to produce than is delivered) or “carbon credits”. I believe it is wise and good to be green and a conservationist, both morally and economically: to stop burning fuels, to insulate, to promote solar and wind power, to promote clean air, soil and water, to allow wildlife to be wild. And though, I am a technologist and an acolyte, if not priest, of technology and consumption, I do not believe technology and industry have increased the value of life. Quite the contrary, I believe industry and technology benefit a very, very, few individuals to the detriment of the majority, especially their spirits and appreciation of, or access to the natural.

I know that at least a regional warming trend exists. I know that sea and glacial ice is retreating. I know that several species are nearing extinction. I know that saddens me, for my grandchildren, especially. I believe it is wrong, though, I know extinction is a natural process, that is, should be a natural process.

I have searched high and low for any science of mitigation of this problem. I have found none, just nebulous hopes or outright lies. The most deceiving is that if we begin (in some distant future) to return to some arbitrary point of emissions (a date also in the future, return to the future?) everything will be just fine. This is strange logic and not mathematically sound but probably meets some political need. Another whacky one is the President's absurd connection of “lessening our dependence on foreign oil” to global warming. Hello? Is our domestic oil less emitting? Of course, we hear the ethanol hype which actually works with hand harvested Brazilian sugar cane, but not with Iowa corn. If my math is right(and it may not be but I believe it is) if every drop of ethanol produced went to fuel the tractors and power the distilleries and farms, you would still need several million barrels of oil to make up for the 20% loss, and not one drop of ethanol would be on the market. Nor has one anyone come up with some massive carbon scrubbers, or maybe orbit changing rockets, or even taken my notion of discharging the heat batteries seriously. Where is the mitigation?

Here’s my prediction. I think in the next year or two, probably towards the end of August, a massive heat wave will center over western Pennsylvania. The area covered by this low pressure system will stretch from Chicago to Maine and Montreal to Washington, D.C. Record breaking temperatures of around 103 degrees will stifle the area, even night time temperature will remain in the mid nineties. Most independent elderly and poor will not have air-conditioning, those that do will refuse to turn them on because of the outrageous costs.
On the third day of this heat wave electric companies will begin disconnecting service to any “questionable accounts”. Bodies will begin to stack up in many metropolitan morgues. But on the fifth day of the unrelenting heat the obsolete and poorly maintained power grid will collapse, service to nearly 200 million people will be cut off. Not only air-conditioning but water pumps, sewage plants, all refrigeration, elevators, lighting, security and communications instantly break to a halt. Riots and looting will break out in every city and town through out the east. Of course, the President, vacationing in Texas, will declare a national emergency. Governors will wish there were National Guard troops in this country as overwhelmed police and emergency crews join the mobs. On the tenth day some abatement of the heat will occur as thunderstorms move in from the mid-west. On the twelfth day some power is restored. Crews in scenes reminiscent of Katrina, Soylent Green and the Plague Years begin collecting bodies from streets and alleys in garbage trucks. More than one hundred thousand die. Three months later most power is restored but bodies are still being found.

Can’t happen? I know all this has happened several times, only the scale will be changed I believe by just a few degrees in temperature.

Skinny Whales and Global Warming

Even if our own species does not go extinct in the near future, a sad consequence of global warming may be watching our neighbors on this planet die away.

Ice algae and ice bacteria are the seasonal food for both krill larvae and adults: the base of the food chain. It significantly contributes to the annual bloom of life in the cold polar and sub-polar waters and may be the primary reason polar seas are so abundant in life. The spring rain of this nutritional matter to the sea floor may also contribute to the quantity and health of floor dwelling (benthic) crustaceans; the food of gray whales.

The impact and appreciation of ice algae is a relatively new science spearheaded by Lisa Clough of Eastern Carolina University, and is still being quantified. One thing has become apparent though, ice algae is a “higher” quality food source than phytoplankton and is not replaceable on a one to one scale. Furthermore, while most phytoplankton remain dormant in dark winter months, ice algae can uniquely extract energy and multiply in brine channels in sea ice. This allows polar krill species to feed year round and maintain significant populations not to mention the spring break-up fertilization of the sea floor
.
Krill, too, are affected by water temperatures. A massive coccolithophore bloom in the Bering Sea in 1998 resulted in a substantive decline in krill populations. Krill could not feed on the diminutive phytoplankton. Krill are not the direct food source for gray whales as they are for other baleen whales but presumably the benthic crustaceans which feed the grays have a similar relation to ice algae. Krill may be a signal but the Northern Gray whale is probably a threshold species.

Recently, it has been noted that the Northern Gray whale population is suffering a drastic weight loss with the accompanying reproductive difficulties, morbidity and mortality. The populations suffering weight-loss may be diseased or may be stressed by other environmental factors, but, one possible hypothesis is that there simply isn’t enough food for them. As ocean temperatures rise there is less and thinner ice and a shorter “winter” as well, resulting in appreciably less ice algae, especially in the shallow Bering and Chukchi seas, where new data shows 20% reduction in sea ice in just the past few years. Seasonal sea ice in the deeper Arctic Ocean is becoming more common and ice algae may be forming in quantity there, but, this does not mitigate the gray whales problem as both the gray’s primary food and the gray’s ability to harvest seem limited to a depth of less than 300 feet.

An additional problem may include the increased distance of migration. The gray whale is already considered to have the longest migration of any mammalian species at about 22,000 km adding another 2000 km might simply be a sea too far.