Climate Change

[cheesehead]

"Natural mechanism for medieval warming discovered"

http://www.newscientist.com/article/...iscovered.html

Europe basked in unusually warm weather in medieval times – so much so that wine was produced in England – but why has been open to debate. Now the natural climate mechanism that caused the mild spell seems to have been pinpointed.

The finding is significant today because, according to Valerie Trouetat the Swiss Federal Institute for Forest, Snow, and Landscape Research in Birmensdorf, the mechanism is not now of sufficient strength to explain current warming.

The finding scuppers one of the favourite arguments of climate-change deniers. If Europe had temperature increases before we started emitting large amounts of greenhouse gases, the theory goes, then maybe the current global warming isn't caused by humans, either.

[MooooMoo]

Me and a couple other guys had a carbon belching contest back when the economy wasn't so bad. We met in January to record everyone's names and to explain how co2 emissions were counted (example: one kWH of electricity was counted as 1.4 lb co2). We wanted to emit as much co2 as possible within a day, and the deadline was the end of the year. Rewards were bragging rights, freedom from environmental guilt, and 100 gallons of free gas if anyone bought a new vehicle that got less than 12 MPG.

Anyway, the most I emitted a day was 345 pounds of co2. It involved:

- milk, bacon, and eggs for breakfast (2 lb)
- a round-trip to a mountain, which used 10 gallons of gas (195 lb)
- eating a pound of steak to replace calories lost from driving and cross-country skiing (15 lb);
- setting the thermostat at 75 degrees the whole day so I wouldn't be cold after coming back (about 4.5 therms of gas, or 50 lb)
- going on a run and eating a pound of pork to replace calories lost (5 lb)
- turning on various energy-hogging devices like incandescent bulbs, making the fridge extra-cold, leaving all the TVs and computers on, etc (about 50 kWH, or 70 lb)
- taking a 20-minute-long relaxing shower (5 lb)
- breathing (3 lb).

I didn't even get in the top three, though. The winner managed to push his total a bit over 600 pounds by doing some energy intensive things in summer (flying back home before noon, super-cooling the house, hosting a barbeque, lighting a campfire, and going boating were some of them). No one bought a new gas-guzzling SUV, although quite a few did drive their old Hummers and Ford Explorers a lot in an attempt to win the contest.

So what's the point in telling all this? It's to show that most of the things and activities that emit co2 increased our quality of life and shouldn't be demonized. In the end, eveyone was a winner. We all had a great time, various energy and tourist companies profited, people living in the far north got more warmth, and plants grew faster with the increased co2. We'd be doing this almost every day if cost wasn't an issue, and I bet that the vast majority of people would prefer this lifestyle instead of one advocated by some environmentalists (live in cramped apartments to reduce heating and cooling needs and to make everything within walking distance, become a vegan, let the government ration water, put a huge tax on electricity to discourage energy use, etc).

Note: Most of us did support renewable energy and energy-efficient goods. But that was not because we thought that global warming was a serious threat; it's because fossil fuels will eventually peak and run out, and because efficient items that do the same with less energy will cut our utility bills.

[AES]

Originally Posted by MooooMoo

enenergy-efficient goods.

Interesting.

Without explaining how an extremely damn hot 75 watt conventional bulb can send one in a drunken stupor to the ER: Compact fluorescent bulbs are superior to conventional bulbs in many ways.

I replace all blown bulbs with nice cool burning compact fluorescent bulbs now.

[IronBits]

CFLs, the ones with all the toxins in them and that we didn't find out about until many had switched all bulbs over in their houses, and will now pollute our landfills even worse.

It's not a hoax and it's already too late, the sky is falling, earthlings will pay with their lives... The earth can not sustain these population levels...

[xilman]

Originally Posted by AES

Interesting.

Without explaining how an extremely damn hot 75 watt conventional bulb can send one in a drunken stupor to the ER: Compact fluorescent bulbs are superior to conventional bulbs in many ways.

I replace all blown bulbs with nice cool burning compact fluorescent bulbs now.

Unfortunately, my migraines are strongly correlated with the presence of fluorescent lighting.

Note, I'm not claiming a perfect correlation, neither am I saying that all fluorescent bulbs are as effective as others at triggering migraines, but there's no doubt that the correlation is positive.

Paul

[philmoore]

Originally Posted by xilman

Unfortunately, my migraines are strongly correlated with the presence of fluorescent lighting.

Note, I'm not claiming a perfect correlation, neither am I saying that all fluorescent bulbs are as effective as others at triggering migraines, but there's no doubt that the correlation is positive.

Paul

Interesting observation, Paul, and given the 60 Hz flicker of fluorescents (OK, 50Hz where you come from) not implausible, given the identified neural activities at multiples of this period. I remember reading that 20 Hz strobe lights can trigger epileptic fits in approximately 2-3% of people. Have you noticed whether the effect is as strong with the newer compact fluorescents as with the traditional type?

I appreciate being able to work in my office under natural light most of the day rather than using the fluorescents - I have noticed that my eyes seem to not tire so easily.

[cheesehead]

Originally Posted by philmoore

the 60 Hz flicker of fluorescents (OK, 50Hz where you come from)

Since incandescent bulbs have exactly the same flicker frequencies, the difference is that thermal inertia in the incandescents keeps their light variation amplitude to only a small fraction of their maximum, whereas fluorescents have a wider amplitude of variation.

[cheesehead]

Originally Posted by MooooMoo

So what's the point in telling all this? It's to show that most of the things and activities that emit co2 increased our quality of life and shouldn't be demonized.

... and reasonable AGW activists want merely to find and substitute less carbon-intensive ways of going about our daily business.

In the end, eveyone was a winner. We all had a great time, various energy and tourist companies profited, people living in the far north got more warmth, and plants grew faster with the increased co2.

... and the coastline crept up a tiny bit around Bangladesh, Florida, and low-lying Pacific atolls.

We'd be doing this almost every day if cost wasn't an issue, and I bet that the vast majority of people would prefer this lifestyle instead of one advocated by some environmentalists (live in cramped apartments to reduce heating and cooling needs and to make everything within walking distance, become a vegan, let the government ration water, put a huge tax on electricity to discourage energy use, etc).

So ... let's not let extremist strawmen be the only alternatives envisioned.

Note: Most of us did support renewable energy and energy-efficient goods. But that was not because we thought that global warming was a serious threat; it's because fossil fuels will eventually peak and run out, and because efficient items that do the same with less energy will cut our utility bills.

There you go -- it's possible to curb AGW with many measures which also make sense for other reasons, too.

[xilman]

Originally Posted by philmoore

Interesting observation, Paul, and given the 60 Hz flicker of fluorescents (OK, 50Hz where you come from) not implausible, given the identified neural activities at multiples of this period. I remember reading that 20 Hz strobe lights can trigger epileptic fits in approximately 2-3% of people. Have you noticed whether the effect is as strong with the newer compact fluorescents as with the traditional type?

I appreciate being able to work in my office under natural light most of the day rather than using the fluorescents - I have noticed that my eyes seem to not tire so easily.

In fact, 100 Hz or 120 Hz. Think about it.

(There may be a small component at 50 or 60Hz for the fluorescents --- I've not measured it but can hand-wave myself into proposing a plausible mechanism --- but I'm pretty sure that incandescents have essentially no component at the lower frequency.)

The compact devices do seem to be a bit better, but not enormously so.


Paul

[davieddy]

Originally Posted by cheesehead

Since incandescent bulbs have exactly the same flicker frequencies, the difference is that thermal inertia in the incandescents keeps their light variation amplitude to only a small fraction of their maximum, whereas fluorescents have a wider amplitude of variation.

I can remember using a disk with spokes on it to adjust the
speed of a gramophone, using incandescent light as a stroboscope
(100Hz as Paul points out). AFAIR the static image was quite vivid,
suggesting that the variation in luminosity was a large fraction of
the maximum.

A calculation I have done in my time is to divide the thermal energy of
a white hot light bulb filament by 100W to get a time constant.
As you might guess, it wasn't very long.

[cheesehead]

Originally Posted by davieddy

I can remember using a disk with spokes on it to adjust the speed of a gramophone, using incandescent light as a stroboscope (100Hz as Paul points out). AFAIR the static image was quite vivid, suggesting that the variation in luminosity was a large fraction of the maximum.

A calculation I have done in my time is to divide the thermal energy of a white hot light bulb filament by 100W to get a time constant. As you might guess, it wasn't very long.

I'm still skeptical, but perhaps you're right. But what do you suggest as explanation for "my migraines are strongly correlated with the presence of fluorescent lighting" -- assuming that means migraines are _not_ strongly correlated with incandescent lighting?

Perhaps it's simply that the illumination level is usually higher where fluorescents are used than where incandescents are used, and that the illumination level is the real correlation?