Filed under: 2017, climate change, futurism, Speculation | Tags: 2017, predictions
Over Christmas, we had all the relatives over, and our beloved nieces gave us their colds. Well, I’m not sure it’s just a cold, because I’ve been spiking a fever every evening for the last week, but we loved seeing them anyway.
All this is in explanation for why I haven’t said anything over the holidays.
Anyway, 2017 predictions. I’ll throw mine out, and feel free to add yours at the end.
BEFORE I START, HERE’S A WARNING: if there’s any US online publication that you need for climate science or anything else, download that sucker before January 20th. There’s no reason to think it will be available on the 21st, although hopefully the Wayback Machine and international mirror sites will help.
Filed under: 2016, climate change, Hot Earth Dreams, Speculation, Uncategorized | Tags: News Year's predictions
As 2016 waits for the knackers, I figured I’d go back to the predictions I made last January to see how far off I was. While yes, I understand that I’m not supposed to look backwards, because the past is gaining on us and they’ve got the original papers on what we owe the future, well, I’m still a pessimist, so let’s see what I got wrong. Or right. Continue reading
Got to hot link this one (here’s the permanent link). I suspect some climatologists will grumble about how smooth that line is, and I caught one probable error and a couple of maybes (dates in the middle). Otherwise, it’s his usual thought provoking work.
Filed under: Altithermal, climate change, futurism, Speculation, Uncategorized | Tags: climate change, Labor Day thought experiment, New US capitol
While I don’t want to kill the previous conversation, I’d like to post a rather silly question, if you’ve got some down time this weekend and want to swat at it. The idea is based on the USA kind of following in the caligulae of the Roman Empire as it crashed. The question is, when Washington DC floods due to sea level rise, what city becomes the new capital, the American Constantinople?
Filed under: climate change, deep time, Hot Earth Dreams, science fiction, Uncategorized, Worldbuilding | Tags: Hot Earth Dreams, Space Opera
I was going to post this on Charlie Stross’ Antipope, where there’s another interesting discussion developing on space opera. So as not to chunk 1,450-plus words onto that message board, I thought I’d post my thoughts over here, for those who are interested.
Filed under: climate change, futurism, Real Science Content, Uncategorized | Tags: ammonia, climate change, N2O
I’ve been advocating for a partial switch to an ammonia-based economy, on the theory that, while NOx is an air pollutant, it’s better than CO2.
Facepalm time: N2O, good ol’ nitrous oxide, which is another thing that comes out of of using ammonia for fertilizer or burning it, is a greenhouse gas 100 times more potent per pound than CO2. Right now, it’s 5.9% of US greenhouse gas emissions. It supposedly lasts about 114 years in the atmosphere, until it gets broken down by some process or other (I’m being lazy about all the bits and bobs in the nitrogen cycle, because it’s hot here, and with a flex alert on, I’m not running the AC). Unlike CO2, it doesn’t look like it sequentially saturates large sinks and stays around for hundreds of thousands of years in the atmosphere. Rather, it just breaks down slowly. About 40% of the N2O emitted in the world is from human activities, and it can be cut, in some circumstances, through catalytic conversion technology.
Here’s some really basic information on it (link to EPA)
The basic sources for atmospheric N2O are:
- conversion of nitrogen fertilizers to N2O by bacteria. This is the big one, and more efficient fertilizer use and better land management can cut this to some degree.
- it’s a combustion byproduct, so it comes out the tailpipes of gas-burning cars. Catalytic convertors can help with this.
- various industrial processes produce N2O as a byproduct.
Now, the simplistic solution is hydrogen, except that (IIRC) burning hydrogen using air also may release some N2O, because there’s a lot of nitrogen in the air. Converting to fuel cell-type devices that do electrochemistry rather than combustion and using catalytic convertors on combustion-powered systems probably is the way to go.
It does get more complicated than that. While catalysis is the simple-minded solution, it’s also prey to the usual simple-minded problems with polluters who don’t keep that part of their car (or other system) working, and thieves after the platinum in the convertors. It’s the usual, intractable problem: environmental problems, greed, and stupidity don’t mix.
So, what do you think? Pitch any desire for an ammonia economy out the window and pray for hydrogen and better batteries? Double-down on catalysis, which catches NOx better than CO2, and start prospecting for platinum at the side of the local highways? Stick with fossil fuels and assume we’re all doomed? Some combination of all three?
Oh well, tonight I get to watch the latest episode of the newest superhero series: Suit Woman vs. Generalissimo Cantaloupe. I’m not sure binge watching is the right word for it (more the opposite), but it does seem to be the thing everyone’s talking about this season.
Filed under: climate change, Real Science Content, Speculation | Tags: climate change, Speculation
So I’ve finished reading 1177 B.C., The Year Civilization Collapsed, as I mentioned in the last post. It’s a good book, and it’s also a good lesson in why I might want to wait until I’m done reading a book before blogging.
It turns out there’s multiple lines of evidence that there was a drought in the eastern Mediterranean around 1177 B.C. However, if you know anything about Mediterranean climates, you’ll know that droughts happen. Was this one different? That part’s unknowable, but a book I read earlier this spring does point to how the eastern Mediterranean can get into a big problem when two droughts coincide, and that’s the little lesson for today: it’s not just the local drought that’s the problem.
Sorry about the long silence, but I’ve been researching a new story setting, just for fun.
The news is that I’ve got another guest blog up on Charlie Stross’ Antipope. It’s about the possible consequences of Mark Jacobson’s plan to power the US using only renewable electricity.
And now for something completely different, what I’m doing on my summer “vacation.”
Filed under: California, climate change, economics, futurism, Legacy Systems, livable future, Preludes, Water | Tags: Speculation, sustainability, water politics
Well, I finally finished reading Mark Reisner’s Cadillac Desert (Amazon link), and I highly recommend it, if you haven’t read it already, even though the original text was written in the 1980s. For those who haven’t read it, the thumbnail is that it’s a muckraking history of water works in the US, primarily in the western US in the 20th Century. The reason I strongly recommend it is not just for what Reisner got right (or apparently got right), but also what he got wrong, like his prediction of the huge water crisis of 2000.
I’m not going to do a book review here. Rather, I’m going to talk about some of the things I got out of it, including how hard it is to predict when water crises will hit.
Filed under: alt-future, California, climate change, futurism, livable future | Tags: California, climate change, Mark Jacobson
Wow, the last three weeks were not fun, but that’s not what this entry is about. I’m back, and regular entries are resuming until the next little crisis kicks up.
Putting the life back in science fiction 