Thread: Is The Sky Falling ?

Originally Posted by gssixgun

I am seeing a slight dichotomy of thoughts here

Not really, I realize what is happening and mans contribution to it. I just don't buy that it is "all" a consequence of a naturally occurring cycle. I view anyone trying to sell me that as akin to having someone whizzing on my boots and telling me it is raining out. Realizing something and doing something about it are two entirely different things. So really no dichotomy.

Bob

yeah I hear ya Jimmy

and Bob also I was not just pointing at you,, and everyone has things they can and can't do


But here is the big picture I see from many sources


"Everyone else needs to become Green"

Originally Posted by gssixgun

But here is the big picture I see from many sources


"Everyone else needs to become Green"

For sure but it is that way with most things that by rights ought to be done but isn't.

Bob

Originally Posted by BobH

For sure but it is that way with most things that by rights ought to be done but isn't.

Bob

+1 When I think of all the guys on this forum, over the years who didn't agree with me ........ Sheesh ! .........

Originally Posted by JimmyHAD

+1 When I think of all the guys on this forum, over the years who didn't agree with me ........ Sheesh ! .........

If you want to see some thing that will generate more disagreement, take a gander at the Oxfam report on wealth. They will present it at Davos 2015 World Economic Forum meeting. Considering who attends these meetings it ought to go over well, yea right.

Bob

Originally Posted by BobH

You might not have had the dust bowl days despite the years of hot and dry conditions if the original top cover of prairie grasses had not been stripped away for intensive farming. You needed both conditions combined to have a dust bowl era. Another case of man's practices aggravating a bad situation.

Bob

I certainly agree that the poor soil conservation methods and the loss of the prairie grasses led to the dust bowl days when the climate turned hot for an extended period. My point was that global hot spells have occurred in the past as has global cold spells. If anything that is for sure, it is that there will be variation in weather, locally and globally. It bugs me when a warm spell, like 2014 had globally, is taken by some to portend disaster. Probability is that with time the future global temperature will come closer to the historic average. 2014 was a slight outlier.

Originally Posted by DoctorSaul

I certainly agree that the poor soil conservation methods and the loss of the prairie grasses led to the dust bowl days when the climate turned hot for an extended period. My point was that global hot spells have occurred in the past as has global cold spells. If anything that is for sure, it is that there will be variation in weather, locally and globally. It bugs me when a warm spell, like 2014 had globally, is taken by some to portend disaster. Probability is that with time the future global temperature will come closer to the historic average. 2014 was a slight outlier.

Portend Disaster?Look at my state (Calif) bear in mind Calif Grows 80% of the vegitables sold in the U.S.
Farmers have no water,hundreds of thousands of acres of farm land is being left Fallow.
We are on water Rationing (wash a car,go to jail).
Our major Dams are at 50% capacity,our rivers are drying up,our huge Salmon fisherys are at all time lows.
The ground in many areas is subsiding do to pumping ground water.
That my friend is a disaster and only the beginning,as Calif go's so go's the nation.

Originally Posted by Splashone

And the whole population of Israel lives within 45 miles of the sea? Desalination (reverse osmosis) is far too expensive for most of the population. It also require a lot of energy (oops that's even more carbon). It is also proposed as a solution to non-potable water away from the sea as well. It just leaves you with some really toxic crap after you remove the water. Where do you dump that?

It is not a practical solution and to what end? So that we can fool ourselves into thinking we can support an even larger non-sustainable population. Here in the desert southwest, where we pump water 320 miles up hill from the Colorado river (based on some pie in the sky guessitmate of available water), the builders are saying "don't worry about water shortages. All you have to do is convert that farm land into houses." They figure an acre of houses uses about the same water. Great idea until you ask where will we get our food if this idea catches on! It doesn't matter they will have made their money...

I wish I could find the references that show that pumping water from the Colorado River to California, or moving it by tanker truck, is very expensive in terms of infrastructure maintenance and energy use. Reverse osmosis requires some rather expensive membranes and a pump. The real energy outlay is to maintain the pump and keep it energized (electricity, gas, solar, nuclear). Interestingly, not much pumping energy is needed, only a low constant flow of contaminated water through the osmosis corridor... and that is not a very high energy requirement. It's not like pumping water from the Colorado River uphill for several hundred miles like LA does now, which requires a pipeline infrastructure and a lot of pumping energy. Surely, after initial outlay, reverse osmosis desalination of ocean water would be a cheaper alternative for most of Southern California, and other drought prone places in the Western USA. Israel has shown that reverse osmosis can produce relatively cheap water from the sea. I've seen the desalination plants outside of Tel Aviv and they are not as complex as one might think. They are also not as expensive to build, maintain, and produce potable water, as I thought before I became enlightened.

Originally Posted by pixelfixed

Portend Disaster?Look at my state (Calif) bear in mind Calif Grows 80% of the vegitables sold in the U.S.
Farmers have no water,hundreds of thousands of acres of farm land is being left Fallow.
We are on water Rationing (wash a car,go to jail).
Our major Dams are at 50% capacity,our rivers are drying up,our huge Salmon fisherys are at all time lows.
The ground in many areas is subsiding do to pumping ground water.
That my friend is a disaster and only the beginning,as Calif go's so go's the nation.

Nope, the "disaster" is that California chose to ignore alternative ways to insure adequate water supplies....like installing reverse osmosis plants. There has been and always will be drought periods in Southern California. Knowing that, the State should have been prepared to have alternatives to well water and pumping water from the Colorado River., as part of a master plan. Without such a master plan, "disasters" like you describe are inevitable. So, from my point of view, the "disaster" in California, as you put it, was caused by poor governmental planning.

Originally Posted by DoctorSaul

Nope, the "disaster" is that California chose to ignore alternative ways to insure adequate water supplies....like installing reverse osmosis plants. There has been and always will be drought periods in Southern California. Knowing that, the State should have been prepared to have alternatives to well water and pumping water from the Colorado River., as part of a master plan. Without such a master plan, "disasters" like you describe are inevitable. So, from my point of view, the "disaster" in California, as you put it, was caused by poor governmental planning.

Like building a city like Las Vegas in the dessert? As you point out, many of these things are self-inflicted rather than the result of nature.