20 Years and it all goes to s*. Climate Change. Hossenfelder.

[IronWing]

The permafrost is mostly marsh land. We’ll be too busy mining areas that come out from under the icecaps to plant trees.

 

[[DHT]Osiris]

I know I’m being flippant, but can’t we just plant new trees/vegetation when permafrost melts and offset the greenhouse gases? Trump: “Do that and sweep the floors to prevent wildfires. Problem solved!”

Unfortunately no. A) too many old growth trees would be required, and b) trees don't remove carbon from the entire carbon cycle, just temporarily sequester it. You need to grow turn carbon into something that won't decompose, or prevent things that do decompose from doing so.

Imagine burying billions of tons of wood pellets in old coal mines and you're on the right track.

 

[akugami]

Unfortunately no. A) too many old growth trees would be required, and b) trees don't remove carbon from the entire carbon cycle, just temporarily sequester it. You need to grow turn carbon into something that won't decompose, or prevent things that do decompose from doing so.

Imagine burying billions of tons of wood pellets in old coal mines and you're on the right track.

Bonus: In a gajillion years, we'll have more of that sweet sweet crude oil to burn!

 

[[DHT]Osiris]

Bonus: In a gajillion years, we'll have more of that sweet sweet crude oil to burn!

Oil, maybe. Interestingly coal/large scale crystallized carbon might be one of the most rare resources in the universe. It only exists on earth due to an obscure half billion year war between fungi and trees (the trees won).

 

[cytg111]

Oil, maybe. Interestingly coal/large scale crystallized carbon might be one of the most rare resources in the universe. It only exists on earth due to an obscure half billion year war between fungi and trees (the trees won).

Thats one of the things my adult ass learned about some years ago, origins of coal and why there'll be no more of it... Yay internet, with AI all that knowledge is at the fingertips of everyone... Why the fuck are we fucking this information thing up so badly when it could be so good??????

 

[Amused]

Thats one of the things my adult ass learned about some years ago, origins of coal and why there'll be no more of it... Yay internet, with AI all that knowledge is at the fingertips of everyone... Why the fuck are we fucking this information thing up so badly when it could be so good??????

I'm confused. I thought coal formed because of a lack of fungus breaking down fallen trees. Massive peat swamps formed everywhere. Once the fungus developed, trees broke down and no more coal?

Where am I wrong?

 

[dainthomas]

Oil, maybe. Interestingly coal/large scale crystallized carbon might be one of the most rare resources in the universe. It only exists on earth due to an obscure half billion year war between fungi and trees (the trees won).

Fun fact of the day: sharks are older than trees.

 

[cytg111]

I'm confused. I thought coal formed because of a lack of fungus breaking down fallen trees. Massive peat swamps formed everywhere. Once the fungus developed, trees broke down and no more coal?

Where am I wrong?

You are not?

 

[[DHT]Osiris]

I'm confused. I thought coal formed because of a lack of fungus breaking down fallen trees. Massive peat swamps formed everywhere. Once the fungus developed, trees broke down and no more coal?

Where am I wrong?

Close, coal comes from fallen trees being compressed under dirt/tectonic plates for hundreds of millions of years. Peat bogs were required for this I think, though there were probably regions where trees got buried without it.

Fungus and trees evolved side by side, but trees evolved bark that took fungus a REALLY long time to figure out what to do with. Trees didn't decompose for a very long time due to bark. Now fungus can deal with bark so no more canyons full of trees (seriously, they would build up to massive depths, just collapsing into valleys, crevices, etc. Would have seemed insane to us).

 

[cytg111]

So. Making plans to move to Greenland.

Sooooooo fucked.

 

[IronWing]

Poor Greenland. Even the intro paragraph on the wiki page for Greenland mentions the great powers interest in mining their land as fast as it comes out from under the ice.

 

[cytg111]

Poor Greenland. Even the intro paragraph on the wiki page for Greenland mentions the great powers interest in mining their land as fast as it comes out from under the ice.

I wonder if those economic predictions/extrapolations is considering the incoming climate apocalypse? Do they have their supply demand equations properly balanced? Cause I dont think they do...

 

[hal2kilo]

I wonder if those economic predictions/extrapolations is considering the incoming climate apocalypse? Do they have their supply demand equations properly balanced? Cause I dont think they do...

There was a show on Discovery a few years ago that has already looked for riches under the retreating ice in Greenland. There was a place where rubies were just lying all over the surface. Grift sniffer Trump apparently knows.

 

[IronWing]

The promise of Greenland is rare metals. The rocks already exposed in the Skaergaard and Ilimaussaq complexes are interesting. Besides, the Ilimaussaq complex hosts fluorescent rocks so mine, baby, mine.

 

[Jaskalas]

So. Making plans to move to Greenland.

Sooooooo fucked.

We appear to have already reached 1.5c.
Full steam ahead to 3c!!! When would we reach that, 2050?

 

[SteveGrabowski]

On a related note, San Antonio just wrapped up its hottest year on record, breaking our one year old record set in 2023. Which is pretty wild considering we had a hot, but far from record breaking hot summer (2023 and 2022 were those).

2024 to go down as the hottest year on record in San Antonio

It was another record-setting year, as 2024 edges out 2023 as the hottest on record.

www.ksat.com

 

[cytg111]

With globalization on the reverse its hard seeing global cooperation on climate. Unless someone basically invents a co2 suction device and can dictate the levels... its all gonna go to shit.

 

[[DHT]Osiris]

There was a show on Discovery a few years ago that has already looked for riches under the retreating ice in Greenland. There was a place where rubies were just lying all over the surface. Grift sniffer Trump apparently knows.

I love how there's an inference that anyone will give a shit about rubies at that point.

The fuck are you going to do with them? Stuff a bunch in a sock and brain your neighbor?

 

[hal2kilo]

I love how there's an inference that anyone will give a shit about rubies at that point.

The fuck are you going to do with them? Stuff a bunch in a sock and brain your neighbor?

It's like you can't eat gold.

 

[cytg111]

Think the planet needs to redirect all science and research expenditures towards stem and mechanisms for sucking greenhouse gasses out of the atmosphere.

 

[[DHT]Osiris]

Think the planet needs to redirect all science and research expenditures towards stem and mechanisms for sucking greenhouse gasses out of the atmosphere.

We have them. Grow switchgrass, dip it in tar sands by the pallet load, stuff it in the bottom of a coal mine. Repeat a couple trillion times.

 

[cytg111]

We have them. Grow switchgrass, dip it in tar sands by the pallet load, stuff it in the bottom of a coal mine. Repeat a couple trillion times.

Damn. The more you know....

 

[[DHT]Osiris]

Damn. The more you know....

View attachment 114165

View attachment 114166

It also grows phenomenally fast. It's not quite as good as seaweed for converting atmospheric (well, hydrospheric i guess) co2 into physical form but it's really good. Grow it, till it, compress it into bricks and bake the moisture out, seal it, bury it. Do about 1.5T tons of it and we'll be looking a lot better.

 

[cytg111]

It also grows phenomenally fast. It's not quite as good as seaweed for converting atmospheric (well, hydrospheric i guess) co2 into physical form but it's really good. Grow it, till it, compress it into bricks and bake the moisture out, seal it, bury it. Do about 1.5T tons of it and we'll be looking a lot better.

Is this thing already in motion? The economics, the land etc? Seems like it's something that should already be rolling...

edit: ran into this while diving... 1M ton per facility is not nothing either.

Carbon capture draws millions in lobbying, billions in federal subsidies - OpenSecrets News

Companies, investors and public policy groups are lobbying the U.S. government to invest in direct air capture.

www.opensecrets.org

 

[[DHT]Osiris]

Is this thing already in motion? The economics, the land etc? Seems like it's something that should already be rolling...

edit: ran into this while diving... 1M ton per facility is not nothing either.

Carbon capture draws millions in lobbying, billions in federal subsidies - OpenSecrets News

Companies, investors and public policy groups are lobbying the U.S. government to invest in direct air capture.

www.opensecrets.org

Not as far as I know. It's an extraordinary amount of work. We're not big on doing extraordinary amounts of work. We'd rather suffer the consequences.