OT Hydrogen economy, not?

[Don Klipstein]

About 6.2% in the last 20 years according to this article:
http://www.financialpost.com/story.html?id=569586

OK, to the extent this is allowed to cause biomass to increase we have a
negative feedback mechanism.
Some of this was not due to increased CO2 but due to increase in
sufficiently warm land area. Some of this is also from breeding of
faster-growing plants, irrigation and other developments for agriculture.

Hey, that outpaces CO2 ppm increases, doesn't it?

Latest 20 year period in the Mauna Loa data is 1984 to 2004. CO2
increase was 9.6% for that stretch.

- Don Klipstein ([email protected])

 

[RW Salnick]

Kris Krieger brought forth on stone tablets:

@c58g2000hsc.googlegroups.com:




I found that info here, FWIW:

http://www.houstontx.gov/abouthouston/houstonfacts.html
"The Houston CMSA covers 8,778 square miles, an area slightly smaller than
Massachusetts but larger than New Jersey."

BTW, not related, but, why do your posts (and maybe others as well) end up
with "�" added here and there in the message...? (Just wondering.)

problem must be on your end...

 

[Jonathan Kirwan]

<snip>
They are included in the section 7.4.1 Land Surface Parameterisation
around page 422 in my copy of WG I. One unknown for the future is the
proportion of C4 vs C3 plants that will be grown in a warming climate.
This is relevant because C4 plants are more efficient due to their
slightly more sophisticated structure and chemistry. eg

http://science.jrank.org/pages/5192/Photosynthesis-Photorespiration.html

For an quick intro.

Thanks. I was also going to add some peer-reviewed papers, too. But
the criticism was disingenuous and you've pointed out enough for it.

Jon

 

[Jonathan Kirwan]

Hey, isn't switchgrass a C4 plant? Not that I expect farming it to
cause much of a biomass increase, but they do say it's a good source of
ethanol.

Converting croplands used for food to producing ethanol or biodiesel
is going to be a serious problem for many people in the world. The
richer food-exporting nations may be able to afford the conversion, by
simply exporting less. Kind of a Marie Antoinette "let them eat cake"
kind of thing, but not quite. But survival is a complex of various
tradeoffs and food production is an important part of it. Converting
land used for food to land used for fuel is something we need to
carefully consider. There are 6.78 billion and growing towards 9.5,
within my lifetime, to worry about.

I've heard from a source (farmer) I'd consider merely 'suggestive for
consideration' that switchgrass competes for much of the same kind of
land as does corn. I don't know and haven't read anything well
informed on the subject, but without knowing more I'd want to find out
more about the thought before pressing for switchgrass (or corn.)

And even then, assuming it doesn't compete but instead can be grown on
otherwise non-food-productive lands, any civilization scale conversion
will remove a biodiversity that probably exists on lands currently not
used for food production. Which has it's own problems, especially
when considered on the scale of making a dent in fossil fuel
consumption. I haven't tried the calculations involved with the
research needed to find out what methods exist now or soon regarding
conversion to ethanol, but my gut tells me that no amount of land will
be able to achieve anywhere near replacement levels of fossil fuels.
Some 85-90% of our energy comes from fossil fuel and the very
population explosion the Earth has seen is in part due to both the
technology and the available energy that fossil fuels have afforded us
this last century. I imagine the numbers aren't going to work out in
our favor, but I'd need to study to know.

I do wonder about algae for fuel. Mostly because I think I've heard
they can be fairly efficient and perhaps because I'm even more
ignorant about the impacts production based on them might have (my
ignorance allows me far more room to wonder.)

Jon

 

[James Arthur]

They are included in the section 7.4.1 Land Surface Parameterisation
around page 422 in my copy of WG I.

WG I ? I'm not familiar with that notation.

My source was the list of models used by the IPCC, here:
http://www-pcmdi.llnl.gov/ipcc/model_documentation/ipcc_model_documentation.php

These include NCAR, NOAA, Hadley, NASA Goddard, Max Planck,
and a bunch more.

Is yours perhaps one of these?

AIUI, these are the models the IPCC's 4th Assessment Report
relies on.

http://www-pcmdi.llnl.gov/ipcc/about_ipcc.php

"In response to a proposed activity of the World Climate Research
Programme's (WCRP's) Working Group on Coupled Modelling (WGCM), PCMDI
volunteered to collect model output contributed by leading modeling
centers around the world." [...]

"In part, the WGCM organized this [collection of models] to enable those
outside the major modeling centers to perform research of relevance to
climate scientists preparing the Fourth Asssessment Report (AR4) of the
Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC)."

None of the models I checked had dynamic vegetation.

One unknown for the future is the
proportion of C4 vs C3 plants that will be grown in a warming climate.
This is relevant because C4 plants are more efficient due to their
slightly more sophisticated structure and chemistry. eg

http://science.jrank.org/pages/5192/Photosynthesis-Photorespiration.html

For an quick intro.

An interesting article that makes John Larkin's point: that plants were
designed for higher CO2 levels.

Regards,
Martin Brown

Cheers,
James Arthur
~~~~~~~~~~~~

[1] Typical example (I checked ~5, 6, or 7 models. All had the
same answers re: vegetation & ice-sheets, so I quit):

http://www-pcmdi.llnl.gov/ipcc/model_documentation/GFDL-cm2.htm
Model Information of Potential Use to the IPCC Lead Authors and the AR4

-----------
"II. Besides atmosphere, ocean, sea ice, and prescription of
land/vegetated surface, what can be included (interactively) and was it
active in the model version that produced output stored in the PCMDI
database?

A. atmospheric chemistry?

Not yet

B. interactive biogeochemistry?

Not yet

C. what aerosols and are indirect effects modeled?

No indirect yet

Aerosols – Organic and black carbon, dust (constant in historical/future
runs), sulphate, and sea salt.

D. dynamic vegetation?

Not yet

E. ice-sheets?

No."
-----------

 

[James Arthur]

Hey, isn't switchgrass a C4 plant? Not that I expect farming it to
cause much of a biomass increase, but they do say it's a good source of
ethanol.

- Don Klipstein ([email protected])

It's an absolutely dreadful source of ethanol according to a
reference Martin dug up:

http://petroleum.berkeley.edu/papers/Biofuels/NRRethanol.2005.pdf

The problem with all of those ethanol processes is,
whatever the feedstock or fermentation process, the
result is ~10% ethanol, with the rest being water.

Three distillations are needed to separate out fuel-grade
ethanol. Distillation is energy-intensive, and drives
the energy balance seriously negative. -50% for switchgrass.
(see pg. 70)

I don't see any way around that, for ethanol in general.

OTOH used directly, without wasteful conversion to ethanol,
switchgrass yields greatly more energy than needed to
raise it.(ibid) Pelletized, it's a useful heating fuel.

Cheers,
James Arthur

 

[James Arthur]

Thanks. I was also going to add some peer-reviewed papers, too. But
the criticism was disingenuous and you've pointed out enough for it.

Jon

I said the major models I'd reviewed don't model dynamic vegetation.

Since you've called me a liar, please find excerpts below from
the descriptions furnished by the agencies themselves.

Neither the NCAR, NOAA, Max Planck, NASA/Goddard, nor Hadley models
model changes in vegetation or ice sheets. As I said.

Those are the only five I checked today--maybe you can find a
better one.

All the models I've examined include an explicit CO2 sensitivity
constant, specifying temp. rise for a given CO2 increase. Which
is to say, the models do not model or predict temp. rise, they
take this assumption as a given, then project the amount of warming
based on the rise in CO2 they've programmed.

Those are just a few of their simplifications and assumptions.

There are others, such as clouds. Maybe you'd like to scare up
some peer-reviewed data on the performance of their cloud models
as compared to actual observations?

Cheers,
James Arthur


====================
CCSM3 (National Center for Atmospheric Research)
http://www-pcmdi.llnl.gov/ipcc/model_documentation/CCSM3.htm
====================
II. Besides atmosphere, ocean, sea ice, and prescription of
land/vegetated surface, what can be included (interactively) and was
it active in the model version that produced output stored in the
PCMDI database?

A. atmospheric chemistry?

Qualified yes: two processes are active:
(1. Modification to GHG concentrations by chemical processes; and
(2. Conversion of SO2 and DMS to sulfate aerosols (the sulfur cycle).

B. interactive biogeochemistry?

No

C. what aerosols and are indirect effects modeled?

No indirect forcing effects are included.

The semi-direct effect (reduction in cloud amount by aerosol heating) is
included.

Aerosol species included:
(1. Sulfates
(2. Black and organic carbon
(3. Sea salt
(4. Soil dust
(5. Stratospheric volcanic aerosols


D. dynamic vegetation?

No

E. ice-sheets?

No (glaciers are specified, but there are no dynamic ice sheets)


====================
GFDL-cm2 (Geophysical Fluid Dynamics Laboratory NOAA)
http://www-pcmdi.llnl.gov/ipcc/model_documentation/GFDL-cm2.htm
====================

II. Besides atmosphere, ocean, sea ice, and prescription of
land/vegetated surface, what can be included (interactively) and was it
active in the model version that produced output stored in the PCMDI
database?

A. atmospheric chemistry? Not yet
B. interactive biogeochemistry? Not yet
C. what aerosols and are indirect effects modeled? No indirect yet

Aerosols – Organic and black carbon, dust (constant in historical/future
runs), sulphate, and sea salt.

D. dynamic vegetation? Not yet
E. ice-sheets? No


====================
ECHAM5/MPI-OM (Max Planck Institute for Meteorology)
http://www-pcmdi.llnl.gov/ipcc/model_documentation/ECHAM5_MPI-OM.htm
====================

II. Besides atmosphere, ocean, sea ice, and prescription of
land/vegetated surface, what can be included (interactively) and was it
active in the model version that produced output stored in the PCMDI
database?

1. atmospheric chemistry? Yes (not active)
2. interactive biogeochemistry? Yes (not active)
3. what aerosols and are indirect effects modeled? In the IPCC runs
done so far, sulfate aerosol is prescribed (direct and first indirect
effect). An experiment with interactive aerosols is in progress (A1B)
including the first and second indirect effects as well as the
semi-direct effect.
4. dynamic vegetation? No
5. ice-sheets? No


====================
GISS-AOM (NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies (NASA/GISS))
http://www-pcmdi.llnl.gov/ipcc/model_documentation/GISS-AOM.htm
====================

II. What can be included (interactively) and was it active in the model
version that produced output stored in the PCMDI database?

A. Atmospheric chemistry: no

B. Interactive biogeochemistry: no

C. Aerosols: Boucher's monthly-decade sulfate burden (mg/m^2)

(downloaded from PCMDI web site) was converted to an

optical depth by global coefficient [.030 (m^2/mg)]

and treated as tropospheric sulfate aerosols with

particular vertical distribution;

indirect effects were not separately modeled

D. Dynamic vegetation: no

E. Ice sheets: nothing other than that covered under IV. D. 9.

====================
UKMO-HadCM3 (Hadley Centre for Climate Prediction and Research)
http://www-pcmdi.llnl.gov/ipcc/model_documentation/HadCM3.htm
====================

II. Besides atmosphere, ocean, sea ice, and prescription of
land/vegetated surface, what can be included (interactively) and was it
active in the model version that produced output stored in the PCMDI
database?

1. atmospheric chemistry? YES. Sulphate aerosols produced by
oxidation of SO2. Oxidants concentrations provided by running offline
the STOCHEM model [OH, H2O2 and HO2]).
2. interactive biogeochemistry? NO
3. what aerosols and are indirect effects modeled? Three modes of
sulfates aerosols (Aitken, accumulation and dissolved in cloud droplets)
with explicit parameterizations of transfers between the different
modes. SO2 and DMS are injected at appropriate levels. The direct
radiative effect from scattering and absorption is taken into account.
The indirect effect was implemented by prescribing cloud changes
calculated by offline models (see Johns et al., 2003, Appendix A for
more details)
4. dynamic vegetation? NO
5. ice-sheets? NO

 

[bw]

All the CO2 in a square foot of atmosphere (clear up to heaven) weighs
very roughly 4 grams. So if we were to increase the earth's biomass by
4 grams per sq foot, on average, we'd use up all the CO2 in the
atmosphere.

What's the weight of a tree, in grams per square foot?

John

You missed a decimal somewhere.
Atmosphere (minus water) weighs 10,300,000 grams per square meter
So 1 ATM x .00038 = 3900 grams CO2

Trees are mostly cellulose.
First year biology shows photosynthesis of cellulose is about 90 percent CO2
and 7 percent water. The rest is minerals, mostly nitrate, phosphate, etc.

Some years ago there was an entire issue of Scientific American dedicated to
Earth's Atmosphere. One of the stories showed that todays composition is
entirely (except Argon) from biological feedback.

 

[Tim Williams]

You missed a decimal somewhere.
Atmosphere (minus water) weighs 10,300,000 grams per square meter
So 1 ATM x .00038 = 3900 grams CO2

You missed a decimal somewhere.

1 atm ~= 1 bar ~= 10^5 Pa = 100 000 kg/m^2 = 100 000 000 g/m^2

So unless I'm missing something, it's actually 38 kg/m^2 in the atmosphere
(which is not only the weight but simply the partial pressure of that gas).

Pulling figures out of Google's ass, forest is ballpark 10-70 t/acre, or
2.2-15 kg/m^2, most of which is carbohydrates. So by pressure, there's a
good bit more CO2 than forest over the Earth.

http://www.earth-policy.org/Indicators/Forest/2006.htm says we have 3,952
megahectares of forest (and falling slowly), which is about 7.7% of the
Earth's area.

So to reduce CO2 to preindustrial levels, we'd have to triple the amount of
forests. Even covering the continential United States (982 megahectares)
would hardly make a dent, which seems kind of suspicious to me as rainforest
destruction in South America and Africa is blamed for at least a little CO2
I think.

Assuming these orders of magnitude are correct, it looks like evil nasty
coal and oil are best left where they were. Once you let them out, they're
not particularly easy to put back down there!

Tim

 

[James Arthur]

You missed a decimal somewhere.

1 atm ~= 1 bar ~= 10^5 Pa = 100 000 kg/m^2 = 100 000 000 g/m^2

So unless I'm missing something, it's actually 38 kg/m^2 in the atmosphere
(which is not only the weight but simply the partial pressure of that gas).

Pulling figures out of Google's ass, forest is ballpark 10-70 t/acre, or
2.2-15 kg/m^2, most of which is carbohydrates. So by pressure, there's a
good bit more CO2 than forest over the Earth.

http://www.earth-policy.org/Indicators/Forest/2006.htm says we have 3,952
megahectares of forest (and falling slowly), which is about 7.7% of the
Earth's area.

So to reduce CO2 to preindustrial levels, we'd have to triple the amount of
forests. Even covering the continential United States (982 megahectares)
would hardly make a dent, which seems kind of suspicious to me as rainforest
destruction in South America and Africa is blamed for at least a little CO2
I think.

Assuming these orders of magnitude are correct, it looks like evil nasty
coal and oil are best left where they were. Once you let them out, they're
not particularly easy to put back down there!

Tim

I've not checked your numbers, but don't forget marine creatures.
Cyanobacteria--/prochlorococcus/ is a major one--are responsible
for perhaps half of all photosynthesis on Earth.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prochlorococcus

Plus there are all those shelled critters that use calcium carbonate
for their houses, then die leaving all that precious CO2 on the
ocean floor.

Cheers,
James Arthur

 

[Don Klipstein]

Interesting; not quite 1:1, but the plants and the plant breeders need
a little time to tweak the genetics to match the changing environment.

Smart agribusiness will short-cut the time lag: breed plants in
greenhouses optimized for, say, 450 PPM, and be ready to cash in.

More power to those who do so!!!

- Don Klipstein ([email protected])

 

[Don Klipstein]

Converting croplands used for food to producing ethanol or biodiesel
is going to be a serious problem for many people in the world.

The advantage of switchgrass is its ease of growing where food crops are
marginally farmable or unfarmable.

The richer food-exporting nations may be able to afford the conversion,
by simply exporting less. Kind of a Marie Antoinette "let them eat cake"
kind of thing, but not quite. But survival is a complex of various
tradeoffs and food production is an important part of it. Converting
land used for food to land used for fuel is something we need to
carefully consider.

Switchgrass grows well over quite an area unsuitable for growing food
crops.

There are 6.78 billion and growing towards 9.5, within my lifetime, to
worry about.

I've heard from a source (farmer) I'd consider merely 'suggestive for
consideration' that switchgrass competes for much of the same kind of
land as does corn. I don't know and haven't read anything well
informed on the subject, but without knowing more I'd want to find out
more about the thought before pressing for switchgrass (or corn.)

I have heard very differently, as in switchgrass relies a lot less on
irrigation and rainfall than corn does.

And even then, assuming it doesn't compete but instead can be grown on
otherwise non-food-productive lands,

Actually true for switchgrass.

any civilization scale conversion will remove a biodiversity that
probably exists on lands currently not used for food production. Which
has it's own problems, especially when considered on the scale of making
a dent in fossil fuel consumption.

I don't see much biodiversity reduction from farming switchgrass where
it grows naturally.

I haven't tried the calculations involved with the
research needed to find out what methods exist now or soon regarding
conversion to ethanol, but my gut tells me that no amount of land will
be able to achieve anywhere near replacement levels of fossil fuels.
Some 85-90% of our energy comes from fossil fuel and the very
population explosion the Earth has seen is in part due to both the
technology and the available energy that fossil fuels have afforded us
this last century. I imagine the numbers aren't going to work out in
our favor, but I'd need to study to know.

However, I do see switchgrass ethanol being a significant part of making
the ends meet during the times when we have to work from everything that
is or can become workable.

I do wonder about algae for fuel. Mostly because I think I've heard
they can be fairly efficient and perhaps because I'm even more
ignorant about the impacts production based on them might have (my
ignorance allows me far more room to wonder.)

I think that ultimately motor fuels will come from "Frankenyeasts" and
"Frankenalgae" and the like (possibly bacteria) engineered to produce
motor fuel and the like from water, CO2 and daylight/sunlight.
Not that I think that over the next 40 years will most people have a car
that does 0-60 MPH (0-96 KPH) in under 7 seconds or accomplish from a
standing start a 1/4 mile (402.34 meters) in less than 12 seconds.

- Don Klipstein ([email protected])

 

[James Arthur]

More power to those who do so!!!

Let's not forget that population increase is exponential, not
linear with time.

Something is gobbling up a big chunk of the CO2 we've been
liberating, and even without considering evolution it's
likely to accelerate.

We started at something like 80% CO2, then plants 'made'
the atmosphere, burying a bunch of carbon in the process.
They're important.

Cheers,
James Arthur

 

[bw]

You missed a decimal somewhere.

1 atm ~= 1 bar ~= 10^5 Pa = 100 000 kg/m^2 = 100 000 000 g/m^2

Wrong
Pascal is a Newton per square meter. 9.8 Newtons per kg.

101325 Newtons per square meter divided by 9.8 = 10339 kg = 10339000 grams

So unless I'm missing something, it's actually 38 kg/m^2 in the atmosphere
(which is not only the weight but simply the partial pressure of that
gas).

Pulling figures out of Google's ass, forest is ballpark 10-70 t/acre, or
2.2-15 kg/m^2, most of which is carbohydrates. So by pressure, there's a
good bit more CO2 than forest over the Earth.

Thats just the tress in a temperate forest. Tropical rainforest biomass is
much higher than 15 kg per square meter.

http://www.earth-policy.org/Indicators/Forest/2006.htm says we have 3,952
megahectares of forest (and falling slowly), which is about 7.7% of the
Earth's area.

So to reduce CO2 to preindustrial levels, we'd have to triple the amount
of forests. Even covering the continential United States (982
megahectares) would hardly make a dent, which seems kind of suspicious to
me as rainforest destruction in South America and Africa is blamed for at
least a little CO2 I think.

Assuming these orders of magnitude are correct, it looks like evil nasty
coal and oil are best left where they were. Once you let them out,
they're not particularly easy to put back down there!

Earth biological feedback controls atmospheric composition. Plant biomass
exceeds animal biomass by 10:1, and Photosynthesis supports all biomass,
except deep ocean thermal bacteria.
Grass C4 pathways evolved due to CO2 starvation, generally the earth is CO2
starved from that point of view.
There is absolutely no reason to reduce CO2 to pre-industrial levels, it
would just cause a new ice age.

 

[Don Klipstein]

All the CO2 in a square foot of atmosphere (clear up to heaven) weighs
very roughly 4 grams.

General earth surface atmospheric pressure is close enough to 1 bar, or
100,000 pascals, or 100,000 newtons per square meter.
1 "bar" (100K pascals) translates to 29.53 inches of mercury or close
enough to 14.5 PSI.

100,000 newtons per square meter divided by 9.81 m/sec^2 (value for G)
means 10,194 kg per square meter, or 947.05 kg per square foot.

The 2004 year-end annual value for CO2 ppmv at the Mauna Loa observatory
was 377.38.
947.05 kg per square foot times .00037738 is about 357.4 as opposed
to 4 grams of CO2 in Earth's atmosphere per square foot of Earth surface.

Everyone is invited to tell me where I went wrong if I did so.

<SNIP from here stuff relevant to 4 grams per square foot being what is
true>

- Don Klipstein ([email protected])

 

[James Arthur]

That obviously won't do. The thing that eliminates poverty and brings
down birth rates is education, especially education of girls. That's
where the windfall carbon taxes should go.

Sorry, I meant "plant populations" in this case to suggest
we haven't seen the full effect yet. Any stimulus to plant
growth will take time to show up, and then snowball [sic]
over time, per the laws of population growth.

IOW the 6.2% increase in plant growth rate of the last ~20
years might not be the last word.

Cheers,
James Arthur

 

[Eeyore]

James Arthur

That obviously won't do. The thing that eliminates poverty and brings
down birth rates is education, especially education of girls. That's
where the windfall carbon taxes should go.

Highest rate of population growth in the UK ? Muslims ! Sad but true. See above.
Girls in fear of arranged marriages (I met one personally with those concerns).
Grrrrrr.

Graham

 

[Rich Grise]

BTW, not related, but, why do your posts (and maybe others as well) end up
with "�" added here and there in the message...? (Just wondering.)

That's how your newsreader renders that particular unicode. I get little
boxes.

Cheers!
Rich

 

[Rich Grise]

I don't know why people like slang, but they do. "Bonk" is a common word
in the endurance athletes dictionary.

"Bonk" is the sound you get when you whack someone on the head with a
frying pan. ;-)

Cheers!
Rich

 

[Rich Grise]

My apologies for the delayed response further above. It made me smile
though. I hear somewhere that some western car had to be renamed for the
Chinese market because it meant 'dog poo' or something similar. Oh the
joys of language

There is no longer an "Osco Drug" because "osco" is Mexicanese for "vomit."

And who can forget the Chevy Nova? "¿No va?" ;-)

Cheers!
Rich